In Episode 22 of the Healing Her IBS podcast, I spoke about the specific practice of using cod liver oil and heat to manage some of my bad bloating and stomach pain
I mentioned having a conversation with my husband about needing to do this practice and asking for his support so that I could get away by myself for twenty or thirty minutes to just breathe and have this hot blanket on my tummy when I was in pain.
I realized as I was describing this practice and it’s high efficacy for my healing that part of the battle of dealing with your IBS is asking for the help that you really need from the people in your life that are there to support you.
In today’s episode we’ll find out how essential it is that you learn how to communicate your needs to your loved ones and why it can be so challenging.
Find the full transcript for this episode and other resources at healingheribs.com/24.
Resistance to Asking for Help with Your IBS
I have realized over the years, as I have gotten older, as I have spent years upon years in therapy learning more about myself and trying to figure out what it is that I want and need in this life, that I have had a huge resistance to asking others for help.
It’s a combination of the culture in which I was raised and probably my personality, that I have felt this pressure to be able to do things on my own, to figure things out and I just haven’t liked asking for help from others.
The thing about IBS though for me (and maybe for you too?) is that it forced me to realize that I couldn’t do it on my own. On the one hand, I had no idea how to help myself heal. On the other hand, I would often really need help when I was experiencing my worst symptoms.
When I would come home from my very stressful job in the evenings, that is when my second job would start which I know if you are a mother you can relate to. I had to get my child home, make sure he was okay and had what he needed. I would have to start thinking about dinner, getting us dinner and then cleaning up from dinner. The whole bedtime routine would start after that.
Those evenings would often feel like a rush to get everything done, have the whole house clean and us clean and in bed by a decent hour so we could get up and do it again.
Of course, these were also the times when I would get super bloated, having really bad stomach pain that would often knock me out of commission for hours. At first, I would just push through it. I felt I didn’t have the time to stop and rest and what was the point anyway? Everything that needed to get done would just be waiting for me later in the evening if I didn’t get it done in time.
How do you respond when your IBS symptoms come on? Do you stop and rest and care for yourself or do you just push right through?
Why We Need Help in Healing IBS
Over time, this practice of mine of pushing through just wasn’t working anymore. I would get in worse and worse pain and on those evenings, I would often become so overwhelmed physically and emotionally that I would just collapse crying and feeling horrible and sorry for myself. I would have a complete meltdown.
When I stared going to acupuncture and the acupuncturist taught me the remedy of using cod liver oil over my belly together with a heated blanket, I suddenly felt like I had something to do that could help me heal.
Luckily and unluckily for me, I’ve always been a rule follower. So when a health professional told me something that I should and could be doing to help heal my IBS, I took it very seriously.
And thank God I did, because that simple practice evolved into a lot more for me than just the heated blanket on my belly.
I learned how to stop and care for myself in the times when I most needed it. And I learned how to communicate those needs to my husband and other loved ones that could help.
Looking back, I’m not sure which part of that remedy was truly the key that helped to start unlock my healing. My gut says it wasn’t one thing that was the trick. Knowing now the complexities of IBS, I know that taking the time to lay down and meditate and to send love to my inflamed and bloated belly made a huge difference in that stress response to my IBS.
Feeling supported by my husband to drop everything in the height of our toddler evening chaos so that I could just lay down for half an hour also had a profound effect on my well-being.
How to Get Help When You Need It
The first step to getting the help that you need with your IBS, is admitting to yourself that you do need help and identifying what you need the most help with when you have a clear head. Don’t try to figure this out in the height of stress. Find a time when you are calm and can thinking more clearly about what would be most helpful for you.
This is such an individual issue but start looking at your life and when you need more support.
This could be asking for support at home with things that need to get done so that you can devote more time to caring for yourself through meditation practices or other relaxing activities that feed your need for rest and pleasure.
You might need support from a coworker to take something over for you when you are managing an IBS episode.
You may need to allocate some resources or get financial help so that you can hire professionals to help you start healing from your IBS.
Ask yourself today where is somewhere that you can start getting more help?
Come up with a plan that doesn’t feel overwhelming for you, take one tiny step towards asking for help today. Part of getting better from IBS is admitting we don’t’ have it all under control, and we need others to partner with us empathetically.
Part of healing IBS is releasing into the knowledge that we are not alone and that we need support to thrive.
I hope you enjoyed today’s episode.
