Moms often find themselves at the center of family life, constantly giving and rarely taking time for themselves. This video explores the critical need for self-care among moms, emphasizing how small, daily practices can significantly enhance their overall well-being. By incorporating activities such as exercise, reading, and relaxation, moms can recharge and maintain their health, ensuring they continue to be the strong foundation their families rely on.

The video delves into the long-term benefits of self-care routines, particularly for those who often put others first. Highlighting the importance of taking moments for themselves, it provides practical advice on integrating self-care into busy schedules. This approach not only supports personal health but also improves family dynamics, as a well-cared-for mom is better equipped to nurture and support her loved ones.

Highlights of the Podcast

00:04 – Introduction and Self-Care Philosophy

00:29 – Attributes of Mothers

01:00 – The Importance of Self-Care for Mothers

01:24 – Examples of Self-Care Activities

02:12 – Constructive Self-Care Practices

02:45 – Personal Self-Care Routine

03:33 – Variety in Self-Care Activities

04:07 – Massage and Self-Care Misconceptions

04:51 – The Ax Sharpening Analogy

06:24 – Routine and Habit Formation

09:16 – The Changing Support System

10:16 – Personal Anecdote on Self-Care

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:04] I have something to say. How I feel about self-care. The patient asked me, what it what I thought of that. I’ve talked about this a lot. I will give you the mom lecture again. This is the talk I give to moms when they are about to have children. Women are generally better than men to begin with. They’re more caring and loving and kind and compassionate.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:26] And all those things.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:29] Then they have children, and all of those attributes are greatly exacerbated. So what ends up happening is that.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:37] You know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:38] They’ll take care of their kids, their kids friends. Their friends kids. Stray animals, stray people. I think that, you know, whoever’s in need doesn’t care about. And at the end of the day, if there’s any time left, they might consider taking care of themselves, which is fantastic. Make some great servants. Great, you know, great people.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:55] You.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:55] Super important have around. But the problem is, is that the moms specifically.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:00] Are.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:01] The linchpin of the family. So what ends up happening is that everybody comes to mom for all the issues. So if mom goes down, everybody falls apart. There’s things that each person is supposed to be able to do, but mom is kind of the one who, like, ties it all together.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:16] So when mom goes down, everybody goes out.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:19] Which is why it’s super important for mom to do stuff for mom.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:24] Self-care.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:26] So do the things you’re got to do. You know, if you like to read books, stay in some time every day reading a book. If you’re a bubble bath person, take a bath. The best thing to do is go to the gym. And the reason I say the best thing to go to the gym is the gym, is because neurologically, what we see is a inhibits all the stress issues. So getting out exercising is fantastic. Certainly weight bearing exercise, but it doesn’t have to be that. It’s one of those things where we’ve got to find the thing.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:53] That.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:53] You do to recharge and kind of unplug and spend time.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:56] With you and.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:57] Let you do your stuff. I prefer.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:01] That.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:02] We do something wildly constructive.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:04] I’m a big.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:04] Fan of things like Gratitudes, where we spend time focusing on the things that bring us joy, the things that, you know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:12] Bring.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:12] Us contentment and happiness and peace. Because as we start to do that, we start to recognize the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:17] Things that.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:19] Perhaps we should lean into harder and perhaps the things that we should kind of.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:24] Abandon.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:25] Because as we start kind of figuring out this thing.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:28] That I thought brought me joy.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:30] Doesn’t it? You know, it’s temporary. It’s like a dopamine hit, like, oh, I was nice, but, and so if we can start reducing this thing that doesn’t actually.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:38] Bring.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:39] You proper long term satisfaction, it makes a lot easier to then focus on the things that do bring.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:45] Long.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:45] Term satisfaction. So as far as as far as doing things for yourself, very, very important that you take care of you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:54] Nobody knows your needs better than you do.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:02:58] No one knows your shoulder hurts like you do. No one knows that you’re tired like you do. So figuring out where those things are and how you address those things is very, very important. One of the things that I do is I go to the gym.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:11] So every day, I will end up in my gym by myself.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:16] Working out.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:17] And it is.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:18] Spectacular. It’s my favorite thing to do.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:20] All the way around because I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:22] Get to be by myself, work on myself, think, you know, spending time with God sometime.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:27] You know, in my.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:27] Head trying to figure out what’s going on while I’m working out. It’s a fantastic mix for me.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:33] It might not be the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:34] Thing for you if you’re, if you’re a book person, if you need to escape into, you know, that sort of thing to kind of clear your issues and kind of go somewhere else for a little bit.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:43] Read your book.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:45] You know, if you just need to relax and take a second away from the family and.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:49] You know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:50] Take a bath or whatever, great. A lot of times I talk to new moms.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:53] And.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:54] The the taking the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:55] Bath has.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:57] Nothing to do with needing to get clean or liking hot water. It’s I need time to be away from you people so I can kind of just let myself calm down.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:07] I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:08] I can’t imagine. How most women do the mom thing like they have to be. It has to.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:14] Be inbred inside them.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:17] Genetically.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:19] Because.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:21] As far as you know, I can’t speak for all guys, but it’s real hard to deal with that level of insanity.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:27] All day long. So you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:29] Guys need to make sure that you find a way to separate yourself.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:32] Out.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:33] And do something for you. Massages are also fantastic. The problem we get into with massage is that people think that it’s a frou frou thing that we do for luxury. It’s not. It’s extremely beneficial from a health standpoint. So just because you like it, just because you feel better afterwards doesn’t mean that it’s a luxury that you can excel.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:51] And get rid of. So go get a massage. Like take a nap, rest. Read a book, you know, do.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:04:58] Whatever it is. Paint like, do whatever it is you do. Like, you know, if you spend 30 40 minutes doing something for you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:04] To help.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:05] Recharge your batteries and how kind of de-stress and take the problems off of you that you have all.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:10] Day, every day. You’re all going to that.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:13] All that’s going to do is help you be the better person as we go forward. There’s a there’s an old analogy business coaches use a lot. It’s about chopping down trees. And so you got two guys, they’re both eager, they’re both ready to go, and they both start going out. And I think you’re actually sort of cutting down trees.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:34] Every once in a while.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:35] One of them stops and just seems to rest.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:39] The other one.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:39] Just thinks.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:40] Oh.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:41] That’s he’s wasting time. Like, I’m going to cut down a lot more trees. And he is. And so he just keeps hacking away at the trees. He’s hacking away the trees.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:49] And the guy who rests.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:50] Ends up cutting down more trees at the end of the day is like, I don’t understand.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:55] You took.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:55] All this time to rest and be lazy and just do nothing and you know, and yet you cut down more trees, and.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:00] I did.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:01] And the point of this whole story is that the guy who took the breaks because, like, I wasn’t breaking, I was sharpening my ax. I was becoming more efficient at the thing I was doing. So a lot of times that’s what it is. You get to take chances, take a step away, clear your head, come back to the same crap, the same incessant nonsense that it is dealing with children.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:24] You, you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:25] You’re able to look at it with fresh eyes and make better decisions. And so there’s a lot of life that’s in that. You know, if you’re working really, really hard, you’re, you know, you’re building something or your work is crazy and it’s just that constant monotonous, like hit in the face.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:41] Find a way.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:42] To do something every.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:43] Day.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:44] Or you step away and you kind of let your brain go do something else. Find something throughout the week, on the weekends. Now, something that you do this just for you, where you get to go and be a little bit selfish for 34 or 5 minutes and just be like, I’m going to do things for me, because I know that if I do the right amount of things for me.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:02] I will become.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:02] A better person for everybody.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:04] Around us.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:06] That’s it. It sounds super simple.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:10] When you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:10] Explain like that, and it is pretty simple. The problem is that we don’t do it.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:15] And a lot.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:15] Of times when you start trying to do it, you feel guilty for taking time for you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:20] When.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:21] You could be doing that time and other people. And that’s 100% the fact you could be spending that time on other people.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:26] But again.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:27] Sharpen your ax. Take the time to go. Be by yourself.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:31] Relax. Calm down.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:33] Defrag. Get the stuff out of your head. Stop worrying about it for a minute. Let your brain kind of calm down and you’ll come back with better thoughts and better ideas later. There’s a whole lot of us.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:44] You know, we I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:44] Know people who work themselves to the point where they don’t sleep enough because there was cleaning to do. There was things preparing to do for tomorrow.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:52] I got all.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:53] The kids needed this, and the kids knew that. And so I only got five hours of sleep.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:58] No.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:07:59] You’ve got to make sure that you get your sleep. You got to make sure that you get the stuff that you need to function for your body. And this goes for you. If you don’t have kids like the easy people to point out our moms because they work incessantly.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:12] Hard on everybody around them.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:14] And it’s really obvious when I talk about this, no one goes, that’s not true. Mom doesn’t work that hard thing.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:20] I’m me and me.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:21] I’m I’m super easy. Like, no one ever says that because it’s absurd.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:25] So it’s easier.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:26] To pick on those guys because it’s like, well, if you’ve filled your day.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:29] With other.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:29] People’s needs, it’s obvious that you’ve done it. No one’s arguing that fact. So take some time for you. It’s easy to do that. But people who don’t have kids.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:38] You know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:39] Who are working.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:40] On, you know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:41] Helping, you know, create a business.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:43] Being, being at.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:44] Work, doing things like that.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:45] You know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:46] Those are also the type of people that you need to take a step back and do something. And here’s the most important part.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:52] Your body.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:52] Runs.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:53] Really, really well on routine.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:55] And so if you are a, say, 23, 25, 27 year.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:59] Old woman and you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:02] You start making time to do little things throughout the day.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:06] You.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:07] Know, they don’t be expensive. They don’t have to do anything like that. Little time start the day where you take a second to do self care. If you get in the habit of doing that.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:15] When you.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:15] Have the children.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:16] You’ll already be in.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:17] The habit of doing it, and so it’ll be something that’s easy to transition into. It’ll be something you’ve already made the decision on psychologically that this isn’t this self-care is important, and then it’s not detracting from everybody else. It’s actually enhancing what you can do for everybody else. And so once you’ve already come through that type of thought process, all of a sudden a kid comes along, you’re going to deal with the kid. It takes some time for you to go back to the kid. One of the things that we see that makes parenting nowadays so much more difficult is that we don’t have a team.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:49] It used to be that, you know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:51] 56 years ago.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:52] You had the women in.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:53] The neighborhood, you had family, you have friends, you had everything.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:56] Else. And it.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:57] Was like, hey, I had a.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:58] Kid. I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:09:59] Need to be.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:00] Helped make.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:00] Casseroles or food.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:02] Or whatever, or.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:03] Hey, I’m exhausted. Can someone else take a kid for, you know, a couple hours or a day while I kind of rest and regenerate? And that was the way it happened? Yeah. If you look back at a lot of other cultures, a lot of other cultures have smoked us on this one.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:16] You know, mom, grandma, you know, live in the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:19] House with.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:20] You.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:20] So when you have kids, you can be like, here, you take the kid, I’m going to go to the store and just veg out. And that’s, by the way.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:27] One of the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:28] Things that I learned early.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:29] That.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:29] If you’re if you’re a.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:30] Young dad.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:32] And you’re trying, you think, you know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:33] What, I’m going to I’m going to.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:35] Take some stuff off my.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:36] Wife’s plate.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:37] I know she was supposed to go to the grocery store today. I’ll go. I’ll get all that stuff so she doesn’t have to. That’s a mistake. The reason that’s a mistake is because she’s been trapped in the house.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:46] All day long doing mom.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:48] Stuff, which she does. She enjoys. She’s fantastic at it, and no one does it better than her.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:53] However.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:54] It’d be nice to go to the house every once in a while. And so if all you got to do is run to the store to grab.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:59] Bread or eggs or whatever.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:02] That’s 20 or 30 minutes that you get to get away from the house, do something productive for other people so you don’t feel.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:08] Bad about it. However, you’re.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:10] Away from the situation that’s constantly poking.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:12] You in the eye.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:13] So it’s a great way to do some self-care is actually just to go to the store, get the groceries, and come home. I learned this is a bad idea because when I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:23] Was with my.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:24] Wife and we just had our first kid, there was a list of stuff on a, grocery list, and instead of coming straight home, I was like, I’ll just stop the store. So I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:32] Did that. I got.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:33] Her, and she goes, I was waiting on you to.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:35] Come home all day.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:36] So I could go to the store and just be out of the.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:38] House. I was like, oh.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:40] Okay. Which is funny because I go.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:42] I go. Well, I.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:44] I get back to the time I was still drinking beer and I was like, I didn’t get any beer now, so, you know, I could always use, you know, a six pack. And she was gone before I finished those things.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:53] So again.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:55] Those are some of the things even even going to the store for a couple minutes is.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:58] A new mom. Phenomenal thing to do.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:02] Getting help is also phenomenal.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:04] I know a lot of women.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:05] That we talked to, and they.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:06] Won’t.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:07] Get nannies because they feel like the nannies raising your kids. They’re not the person who cooks the food and cleans the stuff up. Isn’t the one raising your kids? The one raising your kids is the one who sits down with them and says, here’s what’s important to the family. Here’s our core values. Here’s what’s right, here’s what’s wrong, and here’s how we judge right from wrong. Those are the ones who are raising your kids. So if you’re not doing that. You might want to start thinking about, you know, instilling those values, what values you have as a family. Right. Start instilling those values. The person who feeds your kid isn’t the one who is raising them. So the first thing is, feeding your kid is helping you by taking.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:44] That that role, that that time.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:47] Out of your schedule so you can dedicate that time to something.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:50] Else. Planning.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:52] Planning vacations for your kids. Planning activities for your kids. Planning activities for the family.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:57] Right?

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:12:57] Doing the things that create quality, not quantity. Time.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:01] So there’s a.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:02] Lot of stuff that’s.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:03] In self.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:04] Care. And we I work with this for people every single day because it’s one of the most important things you can do because it goes back to mental function, mental strength, mental ability. Because if you’re if you’re chaos of being ahead all the time and you never get a chance to steam.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:19] Out your.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:20] It just doesn’t work very.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:21] Well.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:21] So finding time for mental health, finding time for self-care is critical.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:26] Now again, you’re going to feel like.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:28] You’re being selfish and you’re wasting time that can be used on other.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:31] People.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:32] But that’s what you need to work for. So work through it with somebody. Get a therapist, whatever. But that’s a big one. So self-care is really important.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:41] It’s not being.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:41] Lazy. It’s not being silly. Now, having said that, if you don’t have a job, you don’t have any other responsibilities.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:46] And all you do all day.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:48] Long is play video.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:48] Games and nap.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:51] Yeah, you don’t need more self-care. You got you got that whatever you need to care for others. But the vast majority of people in this, in this world.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:13:58] That we live in, are going 90.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:14:01] Miles an hour and they can’t slow down, stop. And they need to for their health and the health of those around them. So if you’re not practicing any self-care, evaluate that and try to figure out how you can add some of that in, because that’s what’s going to help you help other people the most. All right. Thanks for your time.

As always if you have any questions, please send them to [email protected]

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Disclaimer: This content is for informational purposes only. Before taking any action based on this information you should first consult with your physician or health care provider. This information is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health providers with any questions regarding a medical condition, your health, or wellness.