About eight months before the pandemic, we moved to a veritable mountain paradise. Our cabin home was built quite literally into the side of the mountain. We drove past exactly five houses spread out on their own parcels of mountain land to get to ours—end of the road privacy that had pines and aspens and a few outlooks all around us.
I had orchestrated the *exact* outer circumstances to make my inner dialogue (and yet undiagnosed autistic, dissociative identity disordered needs) unavoidable. Moving there forced me to confront that there was nowhere I could escape being me, not even paradise. I had to acknowledge that this had been my ideal solution my whole life: to escape and split myself.
Of course when I tell people about our life in the mountains, and that we moved back to a suburb of Dallas last summer, the shock in their response is the same. (Why? Why would you give up that serenity? That peace?) And the short answer I give is that solitude isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially if you become a mother for the first time.
But I do feel nervous about letting them down with the truth that their ideal escape won’t help them like they hope it will. It might be a stepping stone to somewhere more honest. But it won’t be a gentle ride. I don’t suppose the road to belonging to yourself ever is.
I don’t know who first said, “wherever you go, there you are,” but I think it was laid out in stark relief for all during the pandemic. Not everyone had somewhere to go, so we had to just sit with ourselves and our stuff, physically and mentally. And we’ll be unpacking for a while still.
I agree. I agree so much that I wrote about it in a piece called “No place to go but in.” I think collectively we have a lot of unpacking work that our usual resources just aren’t equipped to support. What happened in the pandemic unfortunately does NOT stay in the pandemic. It ripples everywhere.
It’s weird for me to answer how I show up for myself “first” because one of the ways I show up for myself *IS* by surrounding myself with the right people and investing in my deep, intimate friendships. When I was single and dating, I needed these friends to love me and remind me what I was looking for when my vision got blurred by the hellscape of dating apps. When I had to leave behind a job I loved for a much less fulfilling role, I needed these friends to help me sketch out a life in my new position to see if it would be bearable or if I needed to pivot. Now I have an almost-1 -year-old and I need these friends to remind me who I am outside of this small yet all-consuming human. The keeping of the friends *IS* the self-care. I validate their emotions and they validate mine. I try to solve their problems and they try to solve mine. Caring for them *IS* caring for me.
A commenter on another blog I read just shared these wise words: “I’ve started talking to myself the way I talk to my beloved cat. ‘ It’s ok, baby girl’ I will tell her when she is upset about something.” This is a brilliant way to think of self-talk and self-care, I think!
My mother passed away about 8 weeks ago. I need more support from my friends right now, especially since I live quite far from family (across an ocean & half a continent).
So I posted on FB - in a private group I have just for my 60 closest friends in my city - to tell them what I need (walks, invites to spend the night) and don’t (alcohol, asking how I’m doing).
Creating a framework for my friends to help me made them feel more at ease with knowing how to reach out. And it let me simultaneously ask, but not continuously, for help. That one post has let me show up for myself, and allowed them to show up for me, in lovely ways.
i’m so very sorry for your loss, and what a brilliant thing you did to communicate exactly what you need. i think everyone has the desire to help but sometimes we are so afraid of doing the wrong thing that we do nothing. i will be borrowing this idea for the future.
This is brilliant. I've found in my own crises it's hard to navigate the support offered by others. It's almost always well-meaning, but what is helpful for some folks isn't helpful for all, so there's no one-size-fits-all advice. I know it's hard asking for support when you're going through it, but it strikes me that communicating the way you did might take less effort in the long run.
I'm so sorry for your loss and hope you continue to get the support you deserve and need.
Thanks so much - I’ve felt so supported by my community. Being vulnerable is something I try to practice and model, and it makes it easier when it’s someone else’s time to need a bit more/different for people.
The balance is hardest when things are starting to go wrong. My father was just diagnosed with cancer (it looks like it might be aggressive but we don’t know—more tests are needed). Time is slowing down. I’m feeling that pull of the terrible chaos weight of anticipatory grief. I know I NEED to show up for myself more than I have in other crises. To be fair to me I am showing up for myself much more now than I used to. But the pull of outside forces comes so much more strongly when things are starting to go wrong.
There really is no permanent place of rest in life, for some of us it’s little stopping points between crises. Hope you can grab some time for yourself soon; caregivers need all they can get.
I'm so sorry about your father and for what you are going through as his loved one. I've gone through my own cancer diagnosis, and can say that the way time moves through treatment isn't uniform. It may be that you only have the energy to show up for yourself in small ways during the initial onslaught of tests and decisions and grief -- a nice cup of coffee, a 15-minute walk, etc. -- but you might be able to push yourself to do more for yourself even just a few weeks from now, depending on your father's prognosis and treatment plan. A more aggressive cancer may make it tough, but if he's in for months of treatment then you might find that stuff starts feeling a little more routine and your mental energy might open up a bit more. That's also when you may need the self nurturing more. I wish you and your father comfort, healing and support.
Solitude being connected to not having anyone else in your brain? Wow, that hits hard.
I have recently been undergoing somatic therapy for a year and already I can see such amazing results from learning how to connect to my own physical body as a place of constant resourcing. I used to view being alone as a time to learn, recharge, and get better so I could go back to doing everything. Now I view it as a time to connect to my physical body, to listen to it, and to honor it. What a huge difference this has made to my mental health!
I actually put up a post about this today! The personal part is behind the paywall but I put up a few great introductory youtube videos by various somatic practitioners if you are interested! https://dlmayfield.substack.com/p/the-body-remembers
I absolutely loved this — and just sent it to my 19-year-old (because I know how much I struggled with this in a big way when I was 19!). And, of course, still do today, just in different ways. When I’ve met people in my life who have this gift, it’s like an otherworldly experience being around them — they give you that feeling, even just for a moment, that “all is right with the world.” This is such a great reminder, too, to appreciate ourselves in all our quirky little ways, in all our weirdnesses. Thank you for this 🙏
None of the possible answers come easily. I'm a long way and many years from your situation. I was in that spot as a divorced mother of two toddlers, first working for myself freelance so if I didn't hustle for and do the work I didn't have rent money, then working a job that required an hour's drive each way and long weird hours on days we had big events I had to be part of but at least I had health insurance and a steady paycheck.
I remember the pressure I placed on myself at times not only to do All The Things but to do them WELL. To do them PERFECTLY. To do them BETTER THAN THE OTHER PEOPLE also doing them.
And now I wonder why. No one would know what I meant to do, they would only see what I did do. Letting go of some of the self-imposed expectations and standards might help, if that's a trap you're in. Are you putting extra rocks in your own backpack? Whose standards are you applying? My stay-at-home mom's daily home-cooked meals with two veggies of different colors weren't always possible in my schedule. Boxed mac/cheese could actually be a whole meal, guilt-free if I stopped beating myself up, and my kids were thrilled with it. (Honestly, so was I--cheesy comfort food goodness. Add carrot sticks and I was 2/3 of the way to a "mom dinner".)
One more thought: I still remember a night I couldn't get to sleep thinking of all I had to do, all that hadn't gotten done that day. I remembered my mom saying that when she couldn't sleep she would get up and iron. There was always a stack of ironing (my dad's shirts and hankies, tablecloths if we had company), she could feel a sense of accomplishment, and she could stop at any time so it wasn't starting a thing she had to finish completely.
I don't buy things that need ironing so this wasn't available to me. What I did instead in my journal was to write everything I'd done that day. And I mean everything. From making lunches for my girls (by this time they were both in school) and putting a note in them to moving things along at work even if they weren't complete. Everything. Our to-do list culture places us in the trap of having to check the box only when things are done, not when we're still doing the doing, but the doing moves things forward. I gave myself credit for everything, and it was a long, long list. I had been amazing and I hadn't even realized it. You're probably amazing most days without realizing it.
Thank you so much for this. Especially the question: Am I putting extra rocks in my own backpack? Or put another way, am I still unconsciously carrying extra rocks my mom (and our broader culture) put there, the ones about being a "good" woman?
I dropped the hair and makeup rocks long ago. I keep the food rocks because food is really important to me and I truly love to cook. Ironically, cooking dinner, with all the kitchen sounds, means I can't really hear anyone else, and I get 30-45 minutes of relaxing solitude, rewarded by something tasty.
But there are more subtle rules I'm following, that I'm just starting to pay attention to, that are all about how to be a wife and mother, and that usually say "tend to others first."
I overheard a conversation on a chairlift yesterday that brought this home to me. A man and a woman, partners, I assumed, were discussing which ski run to do next. The woman said something about going to the back side for the nicer snow. The man jumped in with "there's not enough vertical, let's just do the front again," to which she immediately replied, "yeah for sure!"
First of all, I'm a better skier than both of them, and had already done both runs, and the woman was right - the backside was objectively higher quality skiing, and actually has more vertical. The man was full of s-t.
Regardless of who was right, however, the way she *immediately* gave up her opinion in favor of his made me shrink inside. It was so sad. In this case, it was easy to see because I'm such an experienced skier. His bs was obvious to me. But how often do I unconsciously defer to others? How often do I willingly accept rocks from other peoples' backpacks and put them in my own?
I'm going to start making lists of everything I do in a given day. Partly to pat myself on the back, and partly to see what I can let go. Thank you.
Thank you for that last bit, that we only “count” stuff when it’s “done” but some things are never done. (This is harder for me right now too because I have a job where there’s never a clear “done” point so it’s hard to tie all the work to any sense of accomplishment.) Going to try out this way of thinking and reckoning it.
I love this idea of journaling every single thing that you’ve done! I spent quite a while making a daily task list, and I was sure to put every little thing I did on it - whether it was on the list or not - putting things on just to cross off - just to show myself that even when I think I haven’t accomplished anything that day, there are actually MANY things I did that day! I still periodically do this, but have used up all the notebooks I found that were the perfect size and style LOL 😂
Seriously! Even with older kids - while there are less caretaking demands, there comes a different set of demands. Especially if you have a child with a different set of needs. My 16-year-old daughter has many challenges (some having to do with emotional regulation). My plans for spending a small amount of time doing necessary self care (shower), and time for myself to write on Friday were thwarted when something happened in my daughter’s first period class that set her off on a downward spiral that I spent all.day.long dealing with through emails and messages. On any given day, there is too much I *need* to do, and too much I want to do. Self care is often thrown to the wayside. At the end of the school day, after dealing with the initial issue and then two unrelated issues with my daughter through emails and messages, she messaged to ask what was for dinner. Dinner was another task on my list for the day that I didn’t have a chance to decide or go to the store to get.
Lolz (in gallows humor tone): "What's for dinner?" My 9-year-old's constant refrain: "Can we redecorate my room?" This, when she can barely keep the floor picked up enough to vacuum once a month.
For those worried about TS and TK, don’t. She’ll dump him and write an album about it. Like Carly in the 70s, Stevie in the 80s, Alanis in the 90s. I don’t know who in the oughts because I’m old. She’ll definitely show up for herself.
The pandemic really through things off for me in many ways. One of which is that I got into this dissociative place where I thought I was making time for myself, but really I was trying to escape from the chaos of the world.
Finally in a much better place and I’m excited to be doing more things for myself again. I’ve signed up for adult dance lessons. I just want to move and have fun! Experience joy
I have this weird switching between feeling absolutely at calm with myself for months, and then suddenly going off balance and being all miserable (and that's when I sometimes push others away as well). These days I generally wait for that 'phase' to get over, but I'm wondering if others also feel this way. Do you have strategies that have proved useful to counter this?
Hi George. It’s hard to say for sure what’s going on but I just wanted to say that I recognize myself in a lot of what you said. The switching off and on, for me, amounted to dissociation but not the common “dozing off on autopilot while driving a familiar road.” It is more an intelligent coping mechanism my brain creates when something is perceived as too threatening—it takes the high stressor inputs and “poofs” them away. That is, until that dissociated compartment can’t stay contained any longer and screams to the surface.
I used to go in a loop about every six months of feeling mediumly OK about myself (it was 18 months before everything would “crack open” in a job setting). It wasn’t until I began studying body-based psychotherapy (and receiving weekly treatment!) was I able to build some safety to hear and acknowledge these threats my brain felt compelled to hide away from my living memory. If you look up “somatic experiencing” or “bottom up therapy,” you should find some information about these sort of modalities. 🧡
I’m in the midst of writing a book on top of my day job and I’m more socially isolated than I want to be. It might also be a function of winter. But I don’t know how to find the time to initiate social time on top of digging in to find the stamina and creative juice to finish this book AND work a full-time day job, (vaguely) manage my house, and be present for my two kids who are still home (16 and 20), though they’re with their dad half the time.
For me temperamentally, there’s always a real push and pull between solitude deep enough to create and cultivating community.
I love my alone time & solitude. And in a busy season of life (busy/stressful job that I love but also takes up a lot of my time and energy, married w/ a toddler) in a new city (we moved from LA back to the east coast for a job offer I had, and to be closer to family) I’ve found it so hard to prioritize the types of activities that I know will help me make friends in this new city and help us find some sense of community. Outside of work, I prioritize time with family, my husband, & time for me to be alone by myself, but that doesn’t leave much time for friendship and socializing (which feels like a big gap in our lives right now).
I’ve been having a hard time with this balance lately. I’ve been dealing with ongoing medical “stuff” (POTS?long Covid? burnout? a fun cocktail of all those things? TBD) and I feel like I’ve had to really lean into taking care of myself and it’s been hard to show up literally and metaphorically for my friends and at work. I’ve been trying to give myself time and space to just be. I’ve been pacing my energy and taking each day at a time and I do think that’s helpful for me, but it feels like I’m dropping balls elsewhere. Some days it’s hard just to muster texting friends to keep in touch. Sometimes because I just don’t really want to get into what’s going on with me—it’s a little scary to not really have answers and not really know if I’ll improve. I’m also just…tired, and it doesn’t feel good to feign enthusiasm or interest when it’s not naturally occurring. I also don’t know when I’ll have a good day or a bad day—so making plans just feels futile right now. In my work in a caring profession where my job centers on showing up for other people, it’s hard to feel like I can only give what I got on any given day. I’ve had to take more time off more frequently than I’ve ever had to before and I’ve had to pull back on a leadership position I hold that feels impossible to pull back from without facing other consequences later. I live with my partner who has been wonderful throughout all of this and so I don’t necessarily feel lonely, but it is a weird feeling to have the balance in my life flipped so much where most of the focus is just on taking care of me and spending time with myself (which I don’t feel particularly good at—but I’m working on it). I’ve been getting into baking and that’s a task that’s helped me find some joy in this time when I can’t go out and do my normal solo activities like walking by myself. I’ve also started reading the Artists Way and find it interesting that solitude and spending intentional time alone is coming up here and also there—I love when the universe does that.
I’m so empathetic to your situation. You have a lot of unknowns going on and that’s got to be so challenging!! It’s hard to give yourself grace and space when you feel like you are dropping balls everywhere. I love to see that you have found something (baking) that is bringing you some joy. That’s so important!
Hi Taylor - I relate to so much of what you wrote, I’m just a few years ahead on the same path. It’s really hard to navigate all of the uncertainty, but it does get easier. If only because eventually you’ll get your life recalibrated to align with your new capabilities and if the health stuff goes on long enough, you get to stop talking about it as much (that’s been my experience, at least). Take good care of yourself and cancel plans as often as you need. Coincidentally, I’m just picking up The Artists Way too. I’ve always wanted to work through the whole program and am finally going to give it a go.
I love being alone. I’ve always needed time and space to myself since I was a small child. It is harder to come by now that I have a husband and three kids and live in a downtown neighborhood with people I know at every time. For one of the first times lately though, I’ve been grappling with loneliness. I live about 30-50 minutes from my family of origin and childhood friends which makes it hard to see them as much as I want. I feel like most of my older friendships could use a lot of TLC and I’ve struggled to make lasting friendships in current community mainly due to work and parenting demands and lifestyle choices I’ve made. I actually have been writing about it a lot on my blog (readership of life 1-2 people!) if anyone wants to understand more of my feelings and thoughts on this topic. And yes, I’m definitely in the Portal, and maybe even exiting the portal as I turn 45 later this year. www.charm-citizen.com.
About eight months before the pandemic, we moved to a veritable mountain paradise. Our cabin home was built quite literally into the side of the mountain. We drove past exactly five houses spread out on their own parcels of mountain land to get to ours—end of the road privacy that had pines and aspens and a few outlooks all around us.
I had orchestrated the *exact* outer circumstances to make my inner dialogue (and yet undiagnosed autistic, dissociative identity disordered needs) unavoidable. Moving there forced me to confront that there was nowhere I could escape being me, not even paradise. I had to acknowledge that this had been my ideal solution my whole life: to escape and split myself.
Of course when I tell people about our life in the mountains, and that we moved back to a suburb of Dallas last summer, the shock in their response is the same. (Why? Why would you give up that serenity? That peace?) And the short answer I give is that solitude isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially if you become a mother for the first time.
But I do feel nervous about letting them down with the truth that their ideal escape won’t help them like they hope it will. It might be a stepping stone to somewhere more honest. But it won’t be a gentle ride. I don’t suppose the road to belonging to yourself ever is.
I don’t know who first said, “wherever you go, there you are,” but I think it was laid out in stark relief for all during the pandemic. Not everyone had somewhere to go, so we had to just sit with ourselves and our stuff, physically and mentally. And we’ll be unpacking for a while still.
I agree. I agree so much that I wrote about it in a piece called “No place to go but in.” I think collectively we have a lot of unpacking work that our usual resources just aren’t equipped to support. What happened in the pandemic unfortunately does NOT stay in the pandemic. It ripples everywhere.
Also in case this is helpful, I’m sharing a link to my essay. 🧡 https://theeditingspectrum.substack.com/p/no-place-to-go-but-in
One thing I feel is a truth is similar.. wherever you go, you take yourself with you.
It’s weird for me to answer how I show up for myself “first” because one of the ways I show up for myself *IS* by surrounding myself with the right people and investing in my deep, intimate friendships. When I was single and dating, I needed these friends to love me and remind me what I was looking for when my vision got blurred by the hellscape of dating apps. When I had to leave behind a job I loved for a much less fulfilling role, I needed these friends to help me sketch out a life in my new position to see if it would be bearable or if I needed to pivot. Now I have an almost-1 -year-old and I need these friends to remind me who I am outside of this small yet all-consuming human. The keeping of the friends *IS* the self-care. I validate their emotions and they validate mine. I try to solve their problems and they try to solve mine. Caring for them *IS* caring for me.
A commenter on another blog I read just shared these wise words: “I’ve started talking to myself the way I talk to my beloved cat. ‘ It’s ok, baby girl’ I will tell her when she is upset about something.” This is a brilliant way to think of self-talk and self-care, I think!
I LOVE this so much!!
My mother passed away about 8 weeks ago. I need more support from my friends right now, especially since I live quite far from family (across an ocean & half a continent).
So I posted on FB - in a private group I have just for my 60 closest friends in my city - to tell them what I need (walks, invites to spend the night) and don’t (alcohol, asking how I’m doing).
Creating a framework for my friends to help me made them feel more at ease with knowing how to reach out. And it let me simultaneously ask, but not continuously, for help. That one post has let me show up for myself, and allowed them to show up for me, in lovely ways.
I’m sorry for your loss. I love the way you’ve opened the door to be loved by your community.
Thank you!
i’m so very sorry for your loss, and what a brilliant thing you did to communicate exactly what you need. i think everyone has the desire to help but sometimes we are so afraid of doing the wrong thing that we do nothing. i will be borrowing this idea for the future.
Ah, that makes me happy! There are many times we need help, and saying the ways that are best for us really allows people to feel at ease.
This is brilliant. I've found in my own crises it's hard to navigate the support offered by others. It's almost always well-meaning, but what is helpful for some folks isn't helpful for all, so there's no one-size-fits-all advice. I know it's hard asking for support when you're going through it, but it strikes me that communicating the way you did might take less effort in the long run.
I'm so sorry for your loss and hope you continue to get the support you deserve and need.
Thanks so much - I’ve felt so supported by my community. Being vulnerable is something I try to practice and model, and it makes it easier when it’s someone else’s time to need a bit more/different for people.
The balance is hardest when things are starting to go wrong. My father was just diagnosed with cancer (it looks like it might be aggressive but we don’t know—more tests are needed). Time is slowing down. I’m feeling that pull of the terrible chaos weight of anticipatory grief. I know I NEED to show up for myself more than I have in other crises. To be fair to me I am showing up for myself much more now than I used to. But the pull of outside forces comes so much more strongly when things are starting to go wrong.
I struggle with this too: sometimes it feels like I’m either in caregiver or patient mode, but life requires both simultaneously.
There really is no permanent place of rest in life, for some of us it’s little stopping points between crises. Hope you can grab some time for yourself soon; caregivers need all they can get.
I'm so sorry about your father and for what you are going through as his loved one. I've gone through my own cancer diagnosis, and can say that the way time moves through treatment isn't uniform. It may be that you only have the energy to show up for yourself in small ways during the initial onslaught of tests and decisions and grief -- a nice cup of coffee, a 15-minute walk, etc. -- but you might be able to push yourself to do more for yourself even just a few weeks from now, depending on your father's prognosis and treatment plan. A more aggressive cancer may make it tough, but if he's in for months of treatment then you might find that stuff starts feeling a little more routine and your mental energy might open up a bit more. That's also when you may need the self nurturing more. I wish you and your father comfort, healing and support.
So, so sorry this is happening for you, your father, other family members.
Solitude being connected to not having anyone else in your brain? Wow, that hits hard.
I have recently been undergoing somatic therapy for a year and already I can see such amazing results from learning how to connect to my own physical body as a place of constant resourcing. I used to view being alone as a time to learn, recharge, and get better so I could go back to doing everything. Now I view it as a time to connect to my physical body, to listen to it, and to honor it. What a huge difference this has made to my mental health!
If you’re open to sharing, I would love to learn more about the type of somatic work you did/what type of practitioner you worked with. Thank you.
I actually put up a post about this today! The personal part is behind the paywall but I put up a few great introductory youtube videos by various somatic practitioners if you are interested! https://dlmayfield.substack.com/p/the-body-remembers
Thank you. 🙏🏻
I absolutely loved this — and just sent it to my 19-year-old (because I know how much I struggled with this in a big way when I was 19!). And, of course, still do today, just in different ways. When I’ve met people in my life who have this gift, it’s like an otherworldly experience being around them — they give you that feeling, even just for a moment, that “all is right with the world.” This is such a great reminder, too, to appreciate ourselves in all our quirky little ways, in all our weirdnesses. Thank you for this 🙏
The "doing less" part: How?? Like AHP says, "MUST BE NICE, HAVING TIME TO HANG OUT WITH YOURSELF AND WITH OTHERS!"
If you have young kids and a job, just, how?
First, true sympathy and empathy to you.
None of the possible answers come easily. I'm a long way and many years from your situation. I was in that spot as a divorced mother of two toddlers, first working for myself freelance so if I didn't hustle for and do the work I didn't have rent money, then working a job that required an hour's drive each way and long weird hours on days we had big events I had to be part of but at least I had health insurance and a steady paycheck.
I remember the pressure I placed on myself at times not only to do All The Things but to do them WELL. To do them PERFECTLY. To do them BETTER THAN THE OTHER PEOPLE also doing them.
And now I wonder why. No one would know what I meant to do, they would only see what I did do. Letting go of some of the self-imposed expectations and standards might help, if that's a trap you're in. Are you putting extra rocks in your own backpack? Whose standards are you applying? My stay-at-home mom's daily home-cooked meals with two veggies of different colors weren't always possible in my schedule. Boxed mac/cheese could actually be a whole meal, guilt-free if I stopped beating myself up, and my kids were thrilled with it. (Honestly, so was I--cheesy comfort food goodness. Add carrot sticks and I was 2/3 of the way to a "mom dinner".)
If you're not already reading Virginia Sole-Smith's excellent Burnt Toast (found her via AHP) she has great advice and interviews about the expectations of parenting, especially around food but also other elements of diet culture like screen time (https://virginiasolesmith.substack.com/p/are-screens-the-new-sugar), outside time for your kids (https://virginiasolesmith.substack.com/p/inside-kids-1000-hours-outside), and making really simple things to eat (https://virginiasolesmith.substack.com/p/how-do-you-feed-yourself-when-life-is-busy).
One more thought: I still remember a night I couldn't get to sleep thinking of all I had to do, all that hadn't gotten done that day. I remembered my mom saying that when she couldn't sleep she would get up and iron. There was always a stack of ironing (my dad's shirts and hankies, tablecloths if we had company), she could feel a sense of accomplishment, and she could stop at any time so it wasn't starting a thing she had to finish completely.
I don't buy things that need ironing so this wasn't available to me. What I did instead in my journal was to write everything I'd done that day. And I mean everything. From making lunches for my girls (by this time they were both in school) and putting a note in them to moving things along at work even if they weren't complete. Everything. Our to-do list culture places us in the trap of having to check the box only when things are done, not when we're still doing the doing, but the doing moves things forward. I gave myself credit for everything, and it was a long, long list. I had been amazing and I hadn't even realized it. You're probably amazing most days without realizing it.
Thank you so much for this. Especially the question: Am I putting extra rocks in my own backpack? Or put another way, am I still unconsciously carrying extra rocks my mom (and our broader culture) put there, the ones about being a "good" woman?
I dropped the hair and makeup rocks long ago. I keep the food rocks because food is really important to me and I truly love to cook. Ironically, cooking dinner, with all the kitchen sounds, means I can't really hear anyone else, and I get 30-45 minutes of relaxing solitude, rewarded by something tasty.
But there are more subtle rules I'm following, that I'm just starting to pay attention to, that are all about how to be a wife and mother, and that usually say "tend to others first."
I overheard a conversation on a chairlift yesterday that brought this home to me. A man and a woman, partners, I assumed, were discussing which ski run to do next. The woman said something about going to the back side for the nicer snow. The man jumped in with "there's not enough vertical, let's just do the front again," to which she immediately replied, "yeah for sure!"
First of all, I'm a better skier than both of them, and had already done both runs, and the woman was right - the backside was objectively higher quality skiing, and actually has more vertical. The man was full of s-t.
Regardless of who was right, however, the way she *immediately* gave up her opinion in favor of his made me shrink inside. It was so sad. In this case, it was easy to see because I'm such an experienced skier. His bs was obvious to me. But how often do I unconsciously defer to others? How often do I willingly accept rocks from other peoples' backpacks and put them in my own?
I'm going to start making lists of everything I do in a given day. Partly to pat myself on the back, and partly to see what I can let go. Thank you.
Thank you for that last bit, that we only “count” stuff when it’s “done” but some things are never done. (This is harder for me right now too because I have a job where there’s never a clear “done” point so it’s hard to tie all the work to any sense of accomplishment.) Going to try out this way of thinking and reckoning it.
I love this idea of journaling every single thing that you’ve done! I spent quite a while making a daily task list, and I was sure to put every little thing I did on it - whether it was on the list or not - putting things on just to cross off - just to show myself that even when I think I haven’t accomplished anything that day, there are actually MANY things I did that day! I still periodically do this, but have used up all the notebooks I found that were the perfect size and style LOL 😂
Seriously! Even with older kids - while there are less caretaking demands, there comes a different set of demands. Especially if you have a child with a different set of needs. My 16-year-old daughter has many challenges (some having to do with emotional regulation). My plans for spending a small amount of time doing necessary self care (shower), and time for myself to write on Friday were thwarted when something happened in my daughter’s first period class that set her off on a downward spiral that I spent all.day.long dealing with through emails and messages. On any given day, there is too much I *need* to do, and too much I want to do. Self care is often thrown to the wayside. At the end of the school day, after dealing with the initial issue and then two unrelated issues with my daughter through emails and messages, she messaged to ask what was for dinner. Dinner was another task on my list for the day that I didn’t have a chance to decide or go to the store to get.
Lolz (in gallows humor tone): "What's for dinner?" My 9-year-old's constant refrain: "Can we redecorate my room?" This, when she can barely keep the floor picked up enough to vacuum once a month.
For those worried about TS and TK, don’t. She’ll dump him and write an album about it. Like Carly in the 70s, Stevie in the 80s, Alanis in the 90s. I don’t know who in the oughts because I’m old. She’ll definitely show up for herself.
Adele! I think she has 2 breakup albums.
I agree.. Not a chance is she staying with him after last weekend
The pandemic really through things off for me in many ways. One of which is that I got into this dissociative place where I thought I was making time for myself, but really I was trying to escape from the chaos of the world.
Finally in a much better place and I’m excited to be doing more things for myself again. I’ve signed up for adult dance lessons. I just want to move and have fun! Experience joy
I have this weird switching between feeling absolutely at calm with myself for months, and then suddenly going off balance and being all miserable (and that's when I sometimes push others away as well). These days I generally wait for that 'phase' to get over, but I'm wondering if others also feel this way. Do you have strategies that have proved useful to counter this?
Hi George. It’s hard to say for sure what’s going on but I just wanted to say that I recognize myself in a lot of what you said. The switching off and on, for me, amounted to dissociation but not the common “dozing off on autopilot while driving a familiar road.” It is more an intelligent coping mechanism my brain creates when something is perceived as too threatening—it takes the high stressor inputs and “poofs” them away. That is, until that dissociated compartment can’t stay contained any longer and screams to the surface.
I used to go in a loop about every six months of feeling mediumly OK about myself (it was 18 months before everything would “crack open” in a job setting). It wasn’t until I began studying body-based psychotherapy (and receiving weekly treatment!) was I able to build some safety to hear and acknowledge these threats my brain felt compelled to hide away from my living memory. If you look up “somatic experiencing” or “bottom up therapy,” you should find some information about these sort of modalities. 🧡
I’m in the midst of writing a book on top of my day job and I’m more socially isolated than I want to be. It might also be a function of winter. But I don’t know how to find the time to initiate social time on top of digging in to find the stamina and creative juice to finish this book AND work a full-time day job, (vaguely) manage my house, and be present for my two kids who are still home (16 and 20), though they’re with their dad half the time.
For me temperamentally, there’s always a real push and pull between solitude deep enough to create and cultivating community.
I feel this!
Yoooooooooo THAT HOUSE in the links. Incredible.
Are you talking about the Sunday links? I don't see them anywhere in the newsletter and I wonder what I've missed!!
The Sunday links don’t show up for me in the substack app, only in my email for whatever reason
It's soooo inconvenient! I still haven't seen them because of this reason lol
At the bottom!!
I love my alone time & solitude. And in a busy season of life (busy/stressful job that I love but also takes up a lot of my time and energy, married w/ a toddler) in a new city (we moved from LA back to the east coast for a job offer I had, and to be closer to family) I’ve found it so hard to prioritize the types of activities that I know will help me make friends in this new city and help us find some sense of community. Outside of work, I prioritize time with family, my husband, & time for me to be alone by myself, but that doesn’t leave much time for friendship and socializing (which feels like a big gap in our lives right now).
I’ve been having a hard time with this balance lately. I’ve been dealing with ongoing medical “stuff” (POTS?long Covid? burnout? a fun cocktail of all those things? TBD) and I feel like I’ve had to really lean into taking care of myself and it’s been hard to show up literally and metaphorically for my friends and at work. I’ve been trying to give myself time and space to just be. I’ve been pacing my energy and taking each day at a time and I do think that’s helpful for me, but it feels like I’m dropping balls elsewhere. Some days it’s hard just to muster texting friends to keep in touch. Sometimes because I just don’t really want to get into what’s going on with me—it’s a little scary to not really have answers and not really know if I’ll improve. I’m also just…tired, and it doesn’t feel good to feign enthusiasm or interest when it’s not naturally occurring. I also don’t know when I’ll have a good day or a bad day—so making plans just feels futile right now. In my work in a caring profession where my job centers on showing up for other people, it’s hard to feel like I can only give what I got on any given day. I’ve had to take more time off more frequently than I’ve ever had to before and I’ve had to pull back on a leadership position I hold that feels impossible to pull back from without facing other consequences later. I live with my partner who has been wonderful throughout all of this and so I don’t necessarily feel lonely, but it is a weird feeling to have the balance in my life flipped so much where most of the focus is just on taking care of me and spending time with myself (which I don’t feel particularly good at—but I’m working on it). I’ve been getting into baking and that’s a task that’s helped me find some joy in this time when I can’t go out and do my normal solo activities like walking by myself. I’ve also started reading the Artists Way and find it interesting that solitude and spending intentional time alone is coming up here and also there—I love when the universe does that.
I’m so empathetic to your situation. You have a lot of unknowns going on and that’s got to be so challenging!! It’s hard to give yourself grace and space when you feel like you are dropping balls everywhere. I love to see that you have found something (baking) that is bringing you some joy. That’s so important!
Hi Taylor - I relate to so much of what you wrote, I’m just a few years ahead on the same path. It’s really hard to navigate all of the uncertainty, but it does get easier. If only because eventually you’ll get your life recalibrated to align with your new capabilities and if the health stuff goes on long enough, you get to stop talking about it as much (that’s been my experience, at least). Take good care of yourself and cancel plans as often as you need. Coincidentally, I’m just picking up The Artists Way too. I’ve always wanted to work through the whole program and am finally going to give it a go.
I love being alone. I’ve always needed time and space to myself since I was a small child. It is harder to come by now that I have a husband and three kids and live in a downtown neighborhood with people I know at every time. For one of the first times lately though, I’ve been grappling with loneliness. I live about 30-50 minutes from my family of origin and childhood friends which makes it hard to see them as much as I want. I feel like most of my older friendships could use a lot of TLC and I’ve struggled to make lasting friendships in current community mainly due to work and parenting demands and lifestyle choices I’ve made. I actually have been writing about it a lot on my blog (readership of life 1-2 people!) if anyone wants to understand more of my feelings and thoughts on this topic. And yes, I’m definitely in the Portal, and maybe even exiting the portal as I turn 45 later this year. www.charm-citizen.com.