After the tumult of the fall semester, most students return to school with the lofty goal of getting enough sleep maybe at least once in their lives.
But after reading one sponsored Buzzfeed article about the best bath bombs Lush has to offer, sophomore Livia Morris has taken her New Year’s resolutions to the next level.
“My theme for this semester is radical, uncompromising, unflinching self-care. And I’m taking down anyone who tries to stand in my way,” Morris told the Misc.
Morris’ attempts at self-care started mainstream enough as she purchased face masks, nice soaps and fuzzy socks. But Morris’ roommate, sophomore Sarah Ike, immediately noticed an issue with Morris’ new habits.
“I can’t open the door to our room anymore. She has so many beauty products in there, and even if I could, I wouldn’t want to go in. You can smell the lotions and bubble baths and soaps from down the hallway. It’s unliveable. We haven’t even been back for a week, and there’s so many cosmetics that I can’t walk into the room. You can’t even be in the building without smelling the smell. I’ve been sleeping in that big corner booth in the Deece near Your Kitchen,” said Ike.
Ike tried to address the problem with Morris before she was pushed from their dorm room for good.
“Livia said she couldn’t talk about it because it stressed her out to talk about it, and feeling stress is against the philosophy of self-care,” reported Ike.
Ike couldn’t see how this version of self-care was truly helpful. Ike added, “I’m all for healthy boundaries and understanding when you’re too emotionally heightened to engage productively in conversation, but she’s just wrong. Having difficult yet productive conversations counts as self-care. It’s just more long-term self-care. You have to stomach the moment in order to not let your problems fester. Also why did she buy so much bubble bath? There aren’t any baths on campus, and if there were, who’s gonna use them?”
Morris’ new unilateral commitment to taking exceptionally frothy showers has had even more direct impacts than forcing her roommate to live in the dining hall.
“Well, my boyfriend did try to break up with me,” Morris told the Misc. While her new personal pedicurist did her feet during her sociology lecture she added, “but I wouldn’t hear that kind of negativity because I’m not letting anything get in the way of caring for ME.”
Despite an official breakup, her ex-boyfriend shared his perspective: “I mean, I actually get manicures every so often, but I don’t expect it to fix all my problems the way Livia does.”
Her former partner continued, “I guess things started going south when she started covering herself in clay face masks for every second of the day—like honestly covering, head to toe, in probably an inch of fragrant clay goop. I’m not attracted to goop, but I’m not a shallow guy. I figured she’s going through something, and I can try to support her.”
He sighed, “But I just had to break things off when my dog died, and she told me she wouldn’t listen to me talk about it because that made her really sad and feeling sad is not good self-care. Feelings are so important to feel and express. Pain is part of life. I just can’t be with someone who doesn’t listen.”