This Woman Explains Why We Shouldn’t Ever Feel Guilty About Taking Care Of Ourselves

People, especially women, are often taught it's best to put others before themselves. Jess, the woman behind the @plankingforpizza Instagram, struggled with this when she discovered a family member was an alcoholic. Since she was about to leave for college, she wasn't able to help her sister. She also felt guilty about not dealing with the situation in a more socially acceptable way. "Even my therapist at the time told me I was a bad person for being judgmental when really I needed help knowing how to process and feel the unexpected news I had just been told," she said. "So I went to college lost, lonely, and feeling unloveable." She's coming to understand, however, that spending time on her own and paying attention to her feelings wasn't wrong. "I've had years of therapy and never once have I spent time learning about self-care, but only how to better live with others' expectations and demands of me," she wrote. "So for 25 years, I loathed myself because I never learned the value and importance of both self-care and self-love. But the day after my 26th birthday, I walked into therapy again after a few years' break and said, 'This year I'm choosing me'!" Since then, she's ditched the fear that she's a bad person for prioritizing her own mental health. "This journey has been all about putting myself first. And it's not selfish, nor do I feel guilty. It's important. It's empowering," she said. "It has nothing to do with changing my body, but tapping into my fullest potential in the way that I want, not how others want it for me."