My 10 easy secrets for building a better life

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Lindsay Nicholson13 April 2012

In the second part of our Quality of Life series, Lindsay Nicholson — who lost her husband and daughter to leukaemia then beat cancer herself — reveals what she has learned from adversity, while therapist Derek Draper combats the pressures of work...

Can you measure quality of life? I used to think so. I guess I thought of it as some sort of calculation based around the number of zeros on your salary plus the number of bathrooms in your home multiplied by the miles you travelled in business class and all divided by your dress size.

By anyone's calculation, I had a pretty high score as I came up to one of those Big Birthdays recently. Everyone kept asking me if I was going to have a party but, frankly, I saw nothing worth celebrating in getting old. So instead I practised avoidance and booked up a very expensive, very faraway holiday for my family that would put us on the other half of the globe on the dreaded day. And because this was to be a beach holiday and I would therefore be required to wear some sort of swimsuit, I started going to the gym, in earnest.

As a result, on the day my age flipped over into a new decade I was able to splash about in the Indian Ocean wearing an Agent Provocateur leopard-print bikini. And anyone standing on the beach watching would have thought I was at least, ooh!, five years younger than my actual age.

Fast forward six months, I had a plastic tube sticking out of my chest, half my right boob sliced off and was entirely bald from chemotherapy. I probably looked at least 20 years older than my chronological age. Not that I cared. Staying alive was far more of a priority.

This was not the first time that fate had dealt me a crushing blow. During the Nineties I was doubly bereaved when both my first husband, John Merritt, and my eldest child, Ellie, fell victim to a rare genetic form of leukaemia. I was widowed while pregnant with my younger daughter and coped alone as a single parent when Ellie fell sick and died as well. I had no choice but to carry on working throughout as a magazine editor and — frankly — work was my saviour.

Filling my mind with page proofs and photoshoots was easier than dwelling on my unbearable losses.
Time passed, I remarried; my surviving daughter Hope grew into a fabulous teenager. I even got promoted to oversee titles such as Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping and Harper's Bazaar.

And then I found the lump.

My form of breast cancer turned out to be not very advanced and not terribly aggressive. It was scary — but not nearly as scary as when John and Ellie had been ill. However, during my treatment I was forced to take eight months off work, which was the longest break I've had since, well, for ever. At first, all the thoughts and fears I had put off for a decade came flooding into my brain. There were days when life looked pretty bleak. But then, incredibly, I realised I was getting to know myself in a way that I had never had the opportunity to do before. Bizarre as it sounds, my illness was an opportunity.

I am fully recovered and back at work now but I try to hang on to much of what I learned in my eight months of solitude — the first rule of which is, of course, not to be afraid of having nothing to distract you — it's only by letting your brain freewheel that you can really move on. Here are 10 other things I discovered can give you a rich and fulfilling life:

1 Walking is the best exercise.

Frustrated at being unable to do any of what I might have termed proper exercise, I read somewhere that just walking for an hour a day reduces the chances of a recurrence of breast cancer. So even on the days when I was fresh out of hospital and my legs were all weak and wobbly, I would pull on my trainers and totter down the road to Hampstead Heath for a gentle loop through Kenwood and back past the Ladies' Pond.
Eventually, I knew when my strength was starting to return because my hour took me longer and further, across to Hampstead High Street or over to the Heath Extension. Apart from the exercise, I was able to watch the changing seasons. And I grew to value the mental space it gave me. Now I'm back at work, I walk my dogs at 7am instead of hitting the gym. It's heavenly and the 15lb that the steroid medication made me put on has all but disappeared.

2 Try to find a job you really like.

I love magazines — always have done since I was a little girl cutting out pictures in my bedroom. Even when I was too sick from the chemotherapy to be able to move off the sofa, all I wanted to do was read them. If I can teach my teenage daughter anything (big if), I would encourage her to find a job she loves so much that she would do it for nothing.

3 Keeping a diary is better and cheaper than therapy.

There is something magical that happens between the brain and the hand when you write down a problem. If it doesn't solve it, it does at least make it seem more manageable. Now, I keep a Moleskine hardback notebook with me at all times to jot down random thoughts and ideas.

4 Really, most people don't care what you look like.

Once you've walked into a restaurant with a head as bald as a billiard ball and no one spills their soup, you realise that everyone else is entirely wrapped up in their own little dramas and they couldn't care less what you hair looks like — or indeed whether you have any. My husband told me he found my bald head sexy – that was all that mattered to me.

5 If a party is fun only if you have a drink in your hand then it's not a good party.

I was too sick to drink for several months so when I finished treatment I took the opportunity to cut right back on alcohol — and was amazed to discover that what I thought had been enjoyable events were, in fact, just enjoyable drinks. Now, if I'm bored, I leave and get an early night. Life's too short to stay at boring parties.

6 Eating organic is pointless if you fill your face full of Botox.

I try to follow a healthy low-fat diet and choose organic wherever possible. But I don't freak out about it. Nor do I get Botox injections to iron out my wrinkles. There's no known connection between Botox and breast cancer but it still seems crazy to me to go out of your way to have toxins injected into you. So I have wrinkles? Why not? I'm 51 and this is what 51 looks like.

7 Being mortgage-free is my financial dream.

There's nothing like a health scare to make you take a long, hard look your finances and even before the credit crunch hit I realised that a huge mortgage is like having a headache that never goes away. We moved house to reduce our mortgage and now all my planning and saving goes towards truly owning the roof over our heads.

8 Try to think positive.

OK, I realise that sounds a bit odd coming from someone who has had my run of back luck. But I honestly believe the reason I have never gone under is that I am one of the most positive-minded people I know. I cannot help but assume things will turn out for the best. It may not stop you getting cancer (clearly!) but it works like a charm for finding parking spaces and hailing black cabs in the rain.

9 Acknowledge your spiritual side.

I was raised a Catholic although I always fought against its strictures. But the tragedies I have lived through have made me recognise that humans are spiritual as well as physical beings and, whether you buy into an organised religion or not, it helps to remember there is a bigger picture.

10 Always celebrate birthdays.

Each year of life is a gift and it's good to get together with friends and family to give thanks for it. Don't put it off, you really don't know what's around the corner.

My anti-urban stress guide

BY DEREK DRAPER

Thankfully, being a psychotherapist is a lot less stressful than my previous life as a New Labour spin doctor. I am back advising the party but determined to do so only part-time and in a much less intense way. Back then I had two mobile phones and a pager and turning any of them off for even a minute was treated by my then boss as being akin to mutiny. I am certain that never being able to "switch-off" contributed to my breakdown in the late Nineties.

I used to get to the office early and keep going all day — lunch was just "work while eating", as was dinner. My socialising was always linked to work and I hardly ever spent a night in. My flat was just somewhere I crashed to grab some sleep.
For a long time I coped with all that pressure – most of us do. In moderation pressure is a healthy part of life, it spurs us on to succeed. The problem comes when the pressure is too great, or too constant. That is when healthy pressure tips over into unhealthy stress.

And with long hours, hundreds of emails in our inboxes, growing financial worries, hours of exhausting commuting every week and relationships under strain as a result, is it any wonder that our levels of stress are going through the roof?
That needn't always end up with depression, as it did with me, but it usually brings a lot of misery and robs us of the chance to relax and really enjoy life.

A Samaritans survey of Londoners has found that four out of 10 of us feel work rules our lives and a third think employers don't take the problem of stress seriously. The same number, unsurprisingly, have dreamt of quitting for a life abroad.

Yet London's workers are the nation's best at soldiering on. They typically take four days a year off due to stress — half the national average. That, though, is a mixed blessing. Ploughing on can just build up the pressure until things become really unbearable.

That can be devastating for our mental — and physical — health. Studies show that chronic stress can really harm your wellbeing — increasing levels of depression and anxiety. These in turn can lead to physical ailments, such as indigestion, high blood pressure and heart problems, alcohol and drug abuse, and, at its most extreme, a shorter life.

So are we doomed to our increasingly stressed existences? Well, hopefully not. After my breakdown I remember feeling as if my engine had been removed. All that manic activity came to a halt and I had to work out what to do with myself. Yoga helped, as did reading books such as the classic Power of Now, so did attendance at my local church. But as my life got back on track and I wanted to be able to pick up speed without risking another crash, I found increasing my understanding of stress really helped.

Forewarned, as they say, is forearmed.

You can get my free helpsheet which explains all this from www.diy-therapy.com

In the meantime, there are four practical, proven steps you can take now that will help you feel less stressed:

Cut down on caffeine, smoking and alcohol: you will soon feel the difference.

Find a relaxation technique that works for you and use it every day.

Burn off your stress with regular exercise, even if it's just a brisk walk at lunchtime or walking to the next bus stop.

If you're really having trouble coping, talk to someone like your HR manager or your GP.

You can find out more by watching a short video on stress that my company made for the Samaritans at www.flowvideo.co.uk/stressvideo.

Remember, help is out there if you are feeling too stressed. It's unlikely many of us will be able to abandon our lives with all their pressures but we have to learn how to minimise and manage the attendant stress. The good news is that's possible. Now it's up to you.

Derek Draper is a psychotherapist with diy-therapy.com. The Samaritans are on 08457 90 90 90

Our city's life enhancers... from canine company to graveyards

KATHY LETTE
The London dinner party

What improves my quality of life in London is conquering the Great Indoors — your theatres and galleries and museums are the best in the world. But the indoor activity I enjoy the most in England is the London dinner party. It's the Wimbledon of wit. Banter is lobbed back and forth with grand-slam speed. Londoners are the Navratilovas of the back-handed compliment; the Nadals of the verbal volley. I often laugh so much I have to be hospitalised from hilarity. Shooting from the lip is a Londoner's greatest quality. Your humour is so black, a guest needs night-vision goggles.

ANNE MCELVOY
The view from Primrose Hill

Walk to the top of Primrose Hill and then look down on the city and identify the buildings. The Germans say, "You have to leave a city to look at it," and that's the exhilarating feeling the heights of NW1 give you: a sense of intimacy and knowledge of London and the thrill of living here.

BRIAN SEWELL
My dogs

The welcome of my dogs repairs yet another day damaged at its weary end by broken signals and missing drivers on the District line. Winck (short for Wincklemann) surges around my legs pressing hard against them, Lettie repeatedly throws herself at me as high as she can leap with not a thought of how and where she will eventually land (I occasionally sidestep), and Jack — fragile and transparent, a filigree of bones — hovers, waiting for the moment when, their exuberance faded, it is safe for her to wriggle among them and tell me that she too is glad to have me back.

LIZ HOGGARD
Graveyards

When I'm feeling blue I head straight for London's graveyards. Personal favourites include Brompton Cemetery and Golders Green and Camberwell cemeteries. Not only are they incredibly beautiful (and funny and moving) but psychologists say they increase our quality of life. Confronted by mortality, you leave feeling determined not to waste any more time.

YASMIN ALIBHAI-BROWN
Our global kitchen

There are some of the best Indian food shops in the world where I live in west London — across Southall and Alperton. I was in Vancouver last week and couldn't believe the comparatively minimal selection on offer there. I love cooking, so it's fantastic to be able to enjoy London's extraordinary range of foods. I remember moving to London in 1978 when you couldn't even buy a green chilli, but now there are dozens of amazing vegetables I can't even think of an English name for.

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