What a wonderful, helpful, thoughtful completely non-MAHA take on what actual rest would look like. You'd think since entering unemployment (former, fired Fed), I'd be able to step off the treadmill for a bit and do some of this, but it's like I'm hyper-addicted to what the next anvil will be. Thanks for giving me some things I can put into effect (going outside, ending social media after 9PM (stretch goal), working on my focus by leaving my phone and computer in another room, making a friend date).
Reading about your detox was such a lovely way to start my week. Thanks so much for sharing what this looked like for you. You have inspired me to try to figure out a similar one for my own sanity.
I'll preface by saying, I can't quite make my words sound right. I just want to recognize that you take on *so much responsibility* for your readers by way of staying informed, having your finger constantly on the pulse point. I know that this just feeds the screen addiction (?), making all of those negative implications so much worse. Thank you for doing that for us. Thank you for also showing us your humanity. YOU DESERVE SO MUCH MORE REST. Thank you for taking on all that you do for us, and (!) let a stranger on the internet also tell you that this responsibility doesn't need to be 24/7/365. :)
Oh my, YES, THIS 👆!! So much gratitude that we get to have you in our (online, not IRL but still very present) lives, Emily! And beyond thanks for sharing so much - your impact is immeasurable.
Firmly agree with Kelly's thoughts here. I know you give a lot of yourself, Emily, in helping the rest of us navigate what is important in the current political atmosphere. Incredibly grateful for this work that you're doing. Hoping you are able to find the balance you need <3
I coordinated a few nights out at the theater and by theater I mean high school musicals. They have been an inexpensive delight! Spending time with a friend and loving the energy and enthusiasm of the kids is so inspiring! Highly recommend it!
I love this post and I hope you are able to do more of this intentional resting and detoxing and more writing about it. Yes this is a wellness trend that MAHA writes about. But so what. It's also what I considered critical healthcare for women especially as we approach menopause. When I was 42 I literally burned myself out. After a lifetime of growing up and a dysfunctional family, losing a 17 year relationship and my mother in a 6-month period, and struggling through a toxic work relationship at a high stress job, my nervous system just said enough. I ended up leaving that job and taking time off for a couple years. I still to this day joke that single-tasking was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I also learned that I was an HSP. Going slow, spending a lot of time in nature, ensuring I got good sleep, and learning to say NO were critical for my mental health. They still are. I do not check my work emails when I am not in my work hours. It's well known that women take on way more work than men do so it's no wonder we burn out by our 40s. Now in 2025 when America is burning I've added one more coping mechanism to my toolkit and that's to add Joy wherever I can in whatever manner I can.
I LOVED this article and LOVE hearing that it's helping you to feel better! I hope several of these become permanent additions to your life. For me, getting my ferritin addressed post kids has been a gamechanger! It started to crash again last summer and it was impacting my body enough that I could see it in my fitbit. My resting heart rate started to creep ever upward and my heartrate variability was very, very poor. Always tired, always irritated. Still a ways to go but lots of progress being made.
I will also say post election, I trimmed my political content quite a bit. I shifted to hyperlocal. I can't do much about the fElon getting into SSA. But I can (and did!) recruit great candidates to run for school board and then run their campaigns! This feeds both local action + social/in-person contact. Crossing our fingers this goes well tomorrow but it's been such a balm. See some terrible national news? Go help candidates edit answers for an endorsement application.
And lastly - nature. I am expanding my garden this year and I've leaned hard into winter sowing. Again - bad national news? I can go start some jugs of cosmos or tomatoes. Build my little future. Take my kids for a walk. Get to know the neighbor kids. Community, nature, care (largely for myself!!), and finding joy. It's a great recipe.
Hey! So I took an iron supplement (forget the brand) for over a yr and it did very little. I tweaked things (with a provider) and changed to Thorne Ferrasorb every OTHER day, about 1-2 hours before food in the morning. I went up 10points in 2 months which was great for me. I've been as low as 11 (provider wants me over 70) and last I knew I was at 36. Actually getting tested again later today so I could tell you how 4 months of Ferrasorb has done. It's been very gentle on my stomach, no issues. You can also eat more eggs, cook in a cast iron pan - ferritin improves very slowly. I was actually referred for infusions but was too busy this past month and now I'll see if it's moving enough without needing to do additional treatment.
Hi Emily! This is such a great update. I have a book recommendation for you. “Uncommon Waters: Women Write About Fly Fishing”. Edited by Holly Myers. It’s a great anthology that I enjoy revisiting at times. I think you’d enjoy it, too.
I had the luxury of an 8 week vacation+sabbatical. I hadn’t had that much time off since before starting medical school in 2006. I set an aggressive away message and did not check work email for the entire time. It took 16 days before I woke up feeling rested - which meant not anxious that I missed the pager going off, or that there was some other work related disaster that needed my attention. I was able to sleep with Do Not Disturb on every night and then I kept it on during most of the day as well. The luxury of refusing to be needed was very healing for me. I returned to work exceptionally calm. I was able to be responsive rather than reactive on a deeper level than before. Everyone around me could sense that I was settled and would not be hopping directly in the anxiety train despite many efforts to pull me on. I’ve manufactured a life of responding to emergencies and struggling with people through their deepest, ethical problems. I love my work, and I also do it too much. It is not healthy. I have a hard time shutting off. I’ve been back from my time off for over a month and I can feel the overwork tendencies taking over. I haven’t figured out how to be somewhere in the middle - something sustainable.
Inspired by you, I logged out of instagram two weeks ago. I told myself that I just needed to log out for a week, but I have now been logged out for two weeks and I may not go back. I’m happy to have this Substack to keep me up to date on politics but the news is already bad enough, so spiraling about the news every time I went on social media was doing a number on my mental health.
Last year, I stopped sleeping with my phone in my bedroom and it’s been great. One of the biggest advantages is that I don’t look at a screen the moment I wake up.
One of the things I love most about my job is that you literally can’t take a work phone out of the country. My husband and I went to Spain two years ago and it was so amazing to just not even think about work or what I was missing.
Been waiting for this update <3 So happy you got some well deserved rest. This is such a great reminder that we have so much more control over our own mental headspaces than we think. I'm 100% going to strike up a conversation with a stranger at the dog park this afternoon.
Also, downloading Opal as we speak - 2025 is the year I return to a 2010's dependance on social media (aka no dependance at all)!
Thank you for this post. One daily ritual I have taken to is a short, leisurely walk each morning before I do anything else. I get outside and just take in nature around me. It seems to ground my day. Right now it is great to see Spring arriving and the new colors each day.
My morning coffee is worth the antacid I have to take daily, lol. I know I could give it up if I had to, but I do not want to! I love everything about coffee.
I started reading physical copies of books again. It's so good for me! I will still read eBooks. But it's nice to mix in physical books as well. I splurged and bought myself a reading light. I told myself eBooks were easier because I can read them whenever. Well my book light means the same thing.
Exactly this! Reading physical books is super important, especially to counterbalance our shortening attention spans. READER COME HOME by Maryanne Wolf explains the neuroscience behind what's happening by reading screens all the time. Highly recommend that book AND reading physical books.
I loved reading about your experience and the reminder that community can be had simply by putting ourselves in proximity of others and engaging with them, strangers or not. I am such a homebody and my mobility issues makes going new places feel stressful, but I want to keep that in mind and try to go somewhere other than my home once a week now.
Since you mentioned Opal, I pouted because it wasn't available on Android, went down a rabbit hole of what *was* available, and then simply discovered some of the built-in digital wellbeing controls that I'd never explored before. I don't think they're as robust, but I have started with putting a daily limit on IG of 90 minutes (something I hit three times in a row, but that was more a function of a weekend, I hope). I also have had a habit in my to-do app where I have to put my phone down by 10 PM 3 times per week to keep my streak, a thing I have been doing for awhile. I still would find myself scrolling egregiously late some of the other nights, but I'm hoping continuing to figure out which apps are tripping points for me and adding limits to those will curb that impulse as well.
Thank you for all that you do! I am so happy for your discoveries and wish you the most luck in weaving them into your life and achieving better balance.
Thank you, Brooke! I initially stopped hunting for alternatives when I realized I was just using it as a way to scroll (rabbit holes of random-thing-research are one of my biggest time-wasters), which was defeating the purpose, lol. But today I should have been working and instead watched a few hours of Youtube TV and something like Freedom might be the ticket for some of my impulse issues during the workday!
I have Android & have found ScreenZen to be exactly what I need - you can selectively allow use of some apps and not others, as well as limited time for each use (not explaining this well at all). Next up: Going to a "third place". It's a process.
This was a joy to read. Two slightly different experiences I want to share:
1) I was a major perfectionist and procrastinator in school and in my early career, and quitting social media (and maybe age) helped me to cure that to *even better* than how I was before. I'm a "start the midnight deadline assignment at 6pm" person now too. Or maybe even 6am when my brain works best.
2) Switching from coffee to chai made a big improvement in my health, specifically my mood and the quality of my sleep. I think the amount of caffeine in coffee just doesn't suit some people. (PSA for anyone reading, I grew up drinking chai and it does not have to be a huge recipe -- I just boil water with a black tea bag, one clove, one green cardamom pod and then add milk and sugar and boil several times. You don't need 20 different spices or a special mix if you don't want them and I find it just as quick and pleasurable as coffee)
I'm decided to stop social media for Lent. The first week I couldn't focus on anything. The second, I planned dates with my husband and went bird watching and did artwork, it was amazing. My focus is back! I also learned about the book "The Chaos Machine" from Tess Whitehirst's blog (she's a wellness witchy writer I like, but a good one, not a MAHA one). I am reading the book and it is chilling, I am learning how social media was absolutely designed with ill intent (before, I had assumed it was neutral.) I was also very distressed to see how Instagram hurt not just me but my favorite creators (like you). I use a combo of Freedom and Minimalist Phone to block it.
I am also doing the Galveston Diet which cuts sugar, and I'm a total sugar addict, but I hardly miss it at all. Quitting that was easier than social media for me. Scary.
Love your insights Emily! Just got back from a beach vacation with my family where I mostly unplugged myself. I didn’t realize how much time I was spending doom scrolled and just how much my entire mood and outlook was affected. Commenting to spending less time on social media. And also committing to taking a rest week at least once every 6 months, if not more often.
The timing of this is on point, and I’m going to genuinely reflect on how I can apply some of the same base principles.
I recently learned, thanks to completely unrelated “just to clear you” testing, that I had a heart attack at some point in the last 3 years, and have been dealing with the effects of heart failure since. (Related: women’s health really isn’t ever taken seriously, is it?) Your post is a good reminder that some improvement, with changes like yours, are always better than no improvement.
What a wonderful, helpful, thoughtful completely non-MAHA take on what actual rest would look like. You'd think since entering unemployment (former, fired Fed), I'd be able to step off the treadmill for a bit and do some of this, but it's like I'm hyper-addicted to what the next anvil will be. Thanks for giving me some things I can put into effect (going outside, ending social media after 9PM (stretch goal), working on my focus by leaving my phone and computer in another room, making a friend date).
Reading about your detox was such a lovely way to start my week. Thanks so much for sharing what this looked like for you. You have inspired me to try to figure out a similar one for my own sanity.
I'll preface by saying, I can't quite make my words sound right. I just want to recognize that you take on *so much responsibility* for your readers by way of staying informed, having your finger constantly on the pulse point. I know that this just feeds the screen addiction (?), making all of those negative implications so much worse. Thank you for doing that for us. Thank you for also showing us your humanity. YOU DESERVE SO MUCH MORE REST. Thank you for taking on all that you do for us, and (!) let a stranger on the internet also tell you that this responsibility doesn't need to be 24/7/365. :)
Oh my, YES, THIS 👆!! So much gratitude that we get to have you in our (online, not IRL but still very present) lives, Emily! And beyond thanks for sharing so much - your impact is immeasurable.
Firmly agree with Kelly's thoughts here. I know you give a lot of yourself, Emily, in helping the rest of us navigate what is important in the current political atmosphere. Incredibly grateful for this work that you're doing. Hoping you are able to find the balance you need <3
I coordinated a few nights out at the theater and by theater I mean high school musicals. They have been an inexpensive delight! Spending time with a friend and loving the energy and enthusiasm of the kids is so inspiring! Highly recommend it!
This sounds so fun and adorable!
I love this post and I hope you are able to do more of this intentional resting and detoxing and more writing about it. Yes this is a wellness trend that MAHA writes about. But so what. It's also what I considered critical healthcare for women especially as we approach menopause. When I was 42 I literally burned myself out. After a lifetime of growing up and a dysfunctional family, losing a 17 year relationship and my mother in a 6-month period, and struggling through a toxic work relationship at a high stress job, my nervous system just said enough. I ended up leaving that job and taking time off for a couple years. I still to this day joke that single-tasking was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I also learned that I was an HSP. Going slow, spending a lot of time in nature, ensuring I got good sleep, and learning to say NO were critical for my mental health. They still are. I do not check my work emails when I am not in my work hours. It's well known that women take on way more work than men do so it's no wonder we burn out by our 40s. Now in 2025 when America is burning I've added one more coping mechanism to my toolkit and that's to add Joy wherever I can in whatever manner I can.
I LOVED this article and LOVE hearing that it's helping you to feel better! I hope several of these become permanent additions to your life. For me, getting my ferritin addressed post kids has been a gamechanger! It started to crash again last summer and it was impacting my body enough that I could see it in my fitbit. My resting heart rate started to creep ever upward and my heartrate variability was very, very poor. Always tired, always irritated. Still a ways to go but lots of progress being made.
I will also say post election, I trimmed my political content quite a bit. I shifted to hyperlocal. I can't do much about the fElon getting into SSA. But I can (and did!) recruit great candidates to run for school board and then run their campaigns! This feeds both local action + social/in-person contact. Crossing our fingers this goes well tomorrow but it's been such a balm. See some terrible national news? Go help candidates edit answers for an endorsement application.
And lastly - nature. I am expanding my garden this year and I've leaned hard into winter sowing. Again - bad national news? I can go start some jugs of cosmos or tomatoes. Build my little future. Take my kids for a walk. Get to know the neighbor kids. Community, nature, care (largely for myself!!), and finding joy. It's a great recipe.
What did you take to improve you ferritin?
Hey! So I took an iron supplement (forget the brand) for over a yr and it did very little. I tweaked things (with a provider) and changed to Thorne Ferrasorb every OTHER day, about 1-2 hours before food in the morning. I went up 10points in 2 months which was great for me. I've been as low as 11 (provider wants me over 70) and last I knew I was at 36. Actually getting tested again later today so I could tell you how 4 months of Ferrasorb has done. It's been very gentle on my stomach, no issues. You can also eat more eggs, cook in a cast iron pan - ferritin improves very slowly. I was actually referred for infusions but was too busy this past month and now I'll see if it's moving enough without needing to do additional treatment.
Did it go up?
Oh I forgot! Yes it did! Up to 45 so I'm moving about a point a week based in being 26ish in Nov.
Hi Emily! This is such a great update. I have a book recommendation for you. “Uncommon Waters: Women Write About Fly Fishing”. Edited by Holly Myers. It’s a great anthology that I enjoy revisiting at times. I think you’d enjoy it, too.
I had the luxury of an 8 week vacation+sabbatical. I hadn’t had that much time off since before starting medical school in 2006. I set an aggressive away message and did not check work email for the entire time. It took 16 days before I woke up feeling rested - which meant not anxious that I missed the pager going off, or that there was some other work related disaster that needed my attention. I was able to sleep with Do Not Disturb on every night and then I kept it on during most of the day as well. The luxury of refusing to be needed was very healing for me. I returned to work exceptionally calm. I was able to be responsive rather than reactive on a deeper level than before. Everyone around me could sense that I was settled and would not be hopping directly in the anxiety train despite many efforts to pull me on. I’ve manufactured a life of responding to emergencies and struggling with people through their deepest, ethical problems. I love my work, and I also do it too much. It is not healthy. I have a hard time shutting off. I’ve been back from my time off for over a month and I can feel the overwork tendencies taking over. I haven’t figured out how to be somewhere in the middle - something sustainable.
Glad you were able to get some rest and reset!
Inspired by you, I logged out of instagram two weeks ago. I told myself that I just needed to log out for a week, but I have now been logged out for two weeks and I may not go back. I’m happy to have this Substack to keep me up to date on politics but the news is already bad enough, so spiraling about the news every time I went on social media was doing a number on my mental health.
Last year, I stopped sleeping with my phone in my bedroom and it’s been great. One of the biggest advantages is that I don’t look at a screen the moment I wake up.
One of the things I love most about my job is that you literally can’t take a work phone out of the country. My husband and I went to Spain two years ago and it was so amazing to just not even think about work or what I was missing.
Been waiting for this update <3 So happy you got some well deserved rest. This is such a great reminder that we have so much more control over our own mental headspaces than we think. I'm 100% going to strike up a conversation with a stranger at the dog park this afternoon.
Also, downloading Opal as we speak - 2025 is the year I return to a 2010's dependance on social media (aka no dependance at all)!
Thank you for this post. One daily ritual I have taken to is a short, leisurely walk each morning before I do anything else. I get outside and just take in nature around me. It seems to ground my day. Right now it is great to see Spring arriving and the new colors each day.
My morning coffee is worth the antacid I have to take daily, lol. I know I could give it up if I had to, but I do not want to! I love everything about coffee.
I started reading physical copies of books again. It's so good for me! I will still read eBooks. But it's nice to mix in physical books as well. I splurged and bought myself a reading light. I told myself eBooks were easier because I can read them whenever. Well my book light means the same thing.
Exactly this! Reading physical books is super important, especially to counterbalance our shortening attention spans. READER COME HOME by Maryanne Wolf explains the neuroscience behind what's happening by reading screens all the time. Highly recommend that book AND reading physical books.
I loved reading about your experience and the reminder that community can be had simply by putting ourselves in proximity of others and engaging with them, strangers or not. I am such a homebody and my mobility issues makes going new places feel stressful, but I want to keep that in mind and try to go somewhere other than my home once a week now.
Since you mentioned Opal, I pouted because it wasn't available on Android, went down a rabbit hole of what *was* available, and then simply discovered some of the built-in digital wellbeing controls that I'd never explored before. I don't think they're as robust, but I have started with putting a daily limit on IG of 90 minutes (something I hit three times in a row, but that was more a function of a weekend, I hope). I also have had a habit in my to-do app where I have to put my phone down by 10 PM 3 times per week to keep my streak, a thing I have been doing for awhile. I still would find myself scrolling egregiously late some of the other nights, but I'm hoping continuing to figure out which apps are tripping points for me and adding limits to those will curb that impulse as well.
Thank you for all that you do! I am so happy for your discoveries and wish you the most luck in weaving them into your life and achieving better balance.
I have Android and the Freedom app and Minimalist.Phone work for me :)
Thank you, Brooke! I initially stopped hunting for alternatives when I realized I was just using it as a way to scroll (rabbit holes of random-thing-research are one of my biggest time-wasters), which was defeating the purpose, lol. But today I should have been working and instead watched a few hours of Youtube TV and something like Freedom might be the ticket for some of my impulse issues during the workday!
That was me!
Minimalist.Phone is good too, it makes your screen black and text only ...I.E. boring
I have Android & have found ScreenZen to be exactly what I need - you can selectively allow use of some apps and not others, as well as limited time for each use (not explaining this well at all). Next up: Going to a "third place". It's a process.
This was a joy to read. Two slightly different experiences I want to share:
1) I was a major perfectionist and procrastinator in school and in my early career, and quitting social media (and maybe age) helped me to cure that to *even better* than how I was before. I'm a "start the midnight deadline assignment at 6pm" person now too. Or maybe even 6am when my brain works best.
2) Switching from coffee to chai made a big improvement in my health, specifically my mood and the quality of my sleep. I think the amount of caffeine in coffee just doesn't suit some people. (PSA for anyone reading, I grew up drinking chai and it does not have to be a huge recipe -- I just boil water with a black tea bag, one clove, one green cardamom pod and then add milk and sugar and boil several times. You don't need 20 different spices or a special mix if you don't want them and I find it just as quick and pleasurable as coffee)
I'm so glad you rested!
I'm decided to stop social media for Lent. The first week I couldn't focus on anything. The second, I planned dates with my husband and went bird watching and did artwork, it was amazing. My focus is back! I also learned about the book "The Chaos Machine" from Tess Whitehirst's blog (she's a wellness witchy writer I like, but a good one, not a MAHA one). I am reading the book and it is chilling, I am learning how social media was absolutely designed with ill intent (before, I had assumed it was neutral.) I was also very distressed to see how Instagram hurt not just me but my favorite creators (like you). I use a combo of Freedom and Minimalist Phone to block it.
I am also doing the Galveston Diet which cuts sugar, and I'm a total sugar addict, but I hardly miss it at all. Quitting that was easier than social media for me. Scary.
Love your insights Emily! Just got back from a beach vacation with my family where I mostly unplugged myself. I didn’t realize how much time I was spending doom scrolled and just how much my entire mood and outlook was affected. Commenting to spending less time on social media. And also committing to taking a rest week at least once every 6 months, if not more often.
The timing of this is on point, and I’m going to genuinely reflect on how I can apply some of the same base principles.
I recently learned, thanks to completely unrelated “just to clear you” testing, that I had a heart attack at some point in the last 3 years, and have been dealing with the effects of heart failure since. (Related: women’s health really isn’t ever taken seriously, is it?) Your post is a good reminder that some improvement, with changes like yours, are always better than no improvement.
Omg!! Take care of yourself 💕