“You seem a bit grumpy”, says my hubs. “YOU seem a bit grumpy!!!” says the midlife monster. (Um, that would be me.) Most of my life, I have dealt with anxiety and depression. But when I passed 50, it definitely became a bigger issue. Between menopause, life changes, and health issues that often appear in midlife, “the blues” is no joke. Different from depression in that it usually passes (at some point!), it can show up at the most inconvenient times. And it can show up in a lot of different ways, like, oh, I don’t know, “grumpy”? (Or Sleepy, or Bashful, even Dopey… maybe not Sneezy or Happy, but you get the point.) 

I have a saying I like to use, “feel your feelings, but just don’t stay there.” Now, don’t get me wrong, if you are dealing with clinical depression, a few quick tips alone are not going to change everything. Make sure you are getting professional help. But for those days when you just want to hide away and not let anyone find you, I have some ideas to help you out of a blue day. Put them in your toolbox and bring them out when you need a lift or a smile when they both seem hard to find.

 

 

Dance It Out Girl!

For those of you who just rolled your eyes and said, “She’s got to be kidding,”? Nope, I’m not kidding. It doesn’t matter if you “can’t” dance. Whatever that means! Ever since I was a girl, if I turn on some dance music and “dance it out”, my mood is immediately lifted. And no, I never felt confident in my dance moves. Still don’t, but the difference is, now I don’t care. If I want to dance, I do. That’s one of the gifts of midlife. You learn that everyone feels a bit insecure and they are more worried about what they look like than what you do. All that being said, I probably only really let go with my moves when I am alone. So, I get the reluctance. But…

Dance can even improve memory and focus. And, there is science behind this. According to Harvard Medical School, “A 2003 study in the New England Journal of Medicine by researchers at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine discovered that dance can decidedly improve brain health.” In fact, dance is such a powerful tool, it is being studied for use in treating Parkinson’s. 

 

 

So no, you don’t have to don a mini skirt from the ’90s and head for the nearest club. Pull out your phone, cue up your fav dance tunes, and dance it out right in your living room. Need more privacy? Lock yourself in the bathroom if you have to. Just get your groove on! My favorite, no-fail dance tune to nix a blue mood?

Dancing Queen- Abba. Does it every time!

So funny story, one time when moving, I literally had to pack up a whole condo, clean, and vacate in one day. I had people coming by to pick up free things we didn’t want to move. I had an hour-long drive after the packing. I was exhausted. I mean super pooped. Like, “forget it, I’m leaving everything, and he can sue me”, tired. Tears. But I am my Mother’s daughter, which means pushing through and getting it done. So, I turned on Dancing Queen. And I dance packed. And then I played it again. And again. But it got me through the packing, the tears stopped, and for a little while there, I felt a little bit invincible.

So ask Alexa, “Play Dancing Queen by Abba”, find it on Apple Music, Amazon Music, or Spotify, or check it out on YouTube, complete with the original music video! Or check out my playlist post, Empowering Songs for Women Over 50.

 

The Blues are No Match for Funny Cats

So the internet can be a pain in the royal ***. But it also offers us so many tools and opportunities we couldn’t have dreamed of just a generation ago! One of them is instant access to a good laugh. “Laughter is the best medicine” was coined in the early 20th century, but the idea behind it is thousands of years old. For a reason. Laughter raises the feel-good chemicals in the brain. This includes endorphins, which are natural painkillers. But it also includes serotonin, dopamine, and oxytocin. These chemicals together are what help to make you feel happy.

 

 

So I know, now you are saying, “yeah, but I don’t want to spend an hour looking for some funny videos. Remember, Kathy, I feel blue?” No problem, I did it for you.

Go to The Pet Collective on YouTube.

Click ‘videos’.

Start laughing. 

You’re welcome. 🤣 ♥️

 

Nature IS Nurture

So Nature is kind of my church, so it makes sense that it works for me in bringing my mood around. After a good walk out in the woods or near the water, I just feel more peaceful, which leads me to feel more hopeful, which leads to… well, a better mood! The blues can be tough… it can appear out of nowhere. But it can also disappear just as quickly. So if you are thinking, “sure, Kathy, nature works for you. But I live in the city”, or “I’ve never been an outdoor person”, or “if you could see the snow outside my window, you wouldn’t be saying that!” Touche, but there are ways to immerse yourself in nature without ever leaving home.

 

 

• Tend your houseplants. Take them to the kitchen counter, trim off the dead leaves, give them a good soak in the sink, and wash the dust off their leaves with a soft rag. Why does this help? Nurturing any living thing has the ability to make us feel less like, “the world sucks”, and more, “look at the beautiful world we have around us”. We are naturally wired to care for the things we love. And when you do, it sends our brain the message that your care matters.
• Find a nearby park, trail, or even a quiet schoolyard on a weekend to walk around, feel the grass under your feet, look at the sky, sit under a tree… 
• Here is another fun thing about the internet. You can bring the beauty of nature from all over the world right into your own home. Put on your earbuds and listen to nature from one of these free apps. You can load them up on your phone and listen anywhere when you need a little nature. The ones on my phone?

1. Naturespace– Hi-res 3-D sound that is incredible.
2. Portal– Portal brings you spatial audio, so it works best with headphones or earpods. It really is an immersive experience. My fav? The Redwoods!
3. Calm– The only meditation app I use, but they also have nature soundscapes!

• Fill the birdfeeder. I can’t tell you how often I forget to fill it, and then wonder why I don’t see birds. Don’t have one? Get one. It’s so grounding. The next thing on my Christmas list is a Birdfy feeder. Their feeders have cameras, and you load an app on your phone, and it sends you an alert when a bird visits, so you can watch from your phone! It even tells you what kind of bird it was! My daughter has one and sends me screenshots all the time. So even if you are cuddled up in bed with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s, you can watch the birds!

 

Be Someone Else’s Blue Day Lifeboat

If you have the blues, chances are really good you aren’t the only one. One of my favorite books is The Book of Joy by Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama. Two very different gentlemen with very different views, but so much they agree on. And one of those things is, “The best way to dissolve our own suffering, our own sadness, is by turning our gaze outward—to reach out to another being in kindness or compassion.”

There is someone you know who also feels blue. Reach out. Drop off some muffins. Organize a lunch. Plan a weekend getaway. Text one of those funny videos you’ve been watching! Get out of your own head by getting into someone else’s. It’s so easy to get hung up thinking about our problems. What we don’t have. What we should have done. What we wish we could change. But shifting your thoughts to someone else can help break that cycle. And let’s face it, it feels good to do something for someone else. And sometimes that’s all we need to break out of the blues.

 

 

Cry, Cry, Cry

Yep. Just let it out, girls. I don’t care if you have to get in your car and drive to an empty parking lot, find a place where you can just cry it out. We have tears for a reason. To release. In fact, crying releases endorphins and oxytocin, those feel-good brain chemicals. Ironically, just in the same way that laughing does. And for those of us women who have in the past felt like crying was a weakness (my hand is up), stop that. Crying is one of your strengths. It shows you feel. You care. You are human. Long gone are the days when we women had to deny how we felt for fear of being seen as “hysterical” or “delicate” or “too sensitive”. The hell with that. Cry. It. Out.

 

 

Bonus Blue Day Butt Kicker

Netflix and mint chip. 

Don’t forget my mantra when it comes to the blues ladies. “Feel your feelings, but just don’t stay there.” The first step in that equation is to feel your feelings. That means it’s ok to binge-watch Downton or Bridgerton for a whole day while you eat nothing but mint-chip and brownies in your pj’s. Showers are overrated anyway. 😉

 

 

Just remember, the next day you need to pull out this list and get on with taking control of your mental health. Don’t spend too much time with the blues. You want to avoid getting stuck there if you can. And if you do happen to get stuck in the blues, and it’s been a couple of weeks, and you still can’t find your way out? Please don’t hesitate to get help… Today, there are so many ways you can get counseling. There are online counseling options where you can meet with a therapist via video, you can visit your doctor to talk about possible medications, or you can join support groups online. Please don’t suffer! You don’t deserve it, and women of our age have earned the right to happiness; you owe it to yourself to do everything you can to find it. Some resources I’ve used?

BetterHelp

TalkSpace

Anxiety and Depression Association of America Support Groups

 

It’s a Wrap on Your Blues

These, ladies, these are the tools I use when I have a blue day… When I wake up with that feeling of heaviness that just sticks with you, and you can’t seem to shake.  They work, but the best time to plan to use them is when you’re not feeling blue. We all know how it is when we’re feeling down; it’s kind of hard to motivate ourselves. So plan now to pick one of these tools to use the next time you’re having a day when you want to throw your laptop through the window (or maybe that’s just me!) or you want to hide away and forget the world. I’ve created a Feel It Then Fix It Checklist that you can either download onto your phone so you always have it, or print it out and tuck it into your dresser drawer or tape it to your bathroom mirror, whatever works for you! I truly hope all my Middle Girls have as few blue days as the universe sees fit to send you. Hugs to you all!

Please check out a couple of my posts that I think you might like!

Confidence, Self-Respect, and Self-Esteem for Midlife Women

25 Best Confident Woman Quotes

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