On exhaustion, pressure, comparison and remembering to write for myself...
A lot of words about various thoughts that have visited me recently...
Hello dearest one,
How is your tender heart feeling today?
Let me begin by saying my writing this week has consisted of four ‘started posts’ that are now sitting in my drafts. I seem to have so many things to write about, and yet each time I begin a piece something doesn’t quite feel right, so I abandon it and start again. This final piece began under a different title, with an entirely different intention, and has of course spun into something totally unexpected.
On exhaustion…
On Monday I felt so wiped out that I had to ask my husband to come home from work early to pick up my eldest (5) from school. I could barely move from the sofa, the fatigue was so intense, and it was the worst I have felt in a long time.
Instead of playgroup with my youngest (almost 2) as we normally do to start my week, I snuggled under a blanket with her and watched whatever children’s TV I could keep her attention with.
When she napped at lunch I lay down and listened back to back to two long and delicious meditations. The simple act of lying down under my heavy faux fur blanket, and letting my body sink into a feeling of being held, revived me.
In the afternoon, after a little energetic recharge, I took a solo walk in the sunshine, along paths I can’t get a buggy along, and slowly soaked up the last of the day’s glimmering light and contrasting shadows.
I also deleted the Instagram and Facebook app off my phone (which I have let seep into my daily life more than I care to admit again recently) and I instantly felt something in my system settle, and a piece of me come back alive.
After voice noting with a friend I allowed myself to start to truly see, and integrate the vastness of this year so far. Only by being forced into stillness and slowness, could I allow my body to catch up a little, and then I could truly see just how much I have been holding.
On pressure and comparison…
As I walked I cried tears of exasperation with the words ‘I can’t withstand this amount of pressure’ ringing through my ears. Closely followed by ‘why do I find this so hard?’…
The decisions to be made — not just for myself but on behalf of two tiny humans — taking care of my own mental wellbeing and physical health (hashimotos and, I suspect, some peri-menopausal symptoms adding to the mix to make things extra spicy), navigating illness and making sure everyone is fed well (me included), thinking ahead to Christmas, and beyond that when my youngest starts pre-school, holding the extreme emotions (and let’s be honest… whingeing!) that come with a 5 year old and 2 year old.
And then there is the school admin which is a whole new layer… this week we have school photos, requests from the PTA to donate gifts for the Christmas fair and remembering odd socks day… along with trying to send her in to school with the right kit on the right day for Forest School and PE… and probably something else that I can’t quite remember right now.
While I do everything I can to be present and live in the ‘now’ there is an element of that not really being a realistic expectation in Motherhood because somebody has to do these things and being organised is the only way to make it less stressful!
I have a very supportive husband who is an amazing father, but the reality is that his work schedule means that the majority of the daily care-taking in the week is on my shoulders, and as someone who needs a lot of space and time to feel grounded and resourced, I can’t help but feel overwhelmed by the monumental task that taking care of us all is.
When I feel this piling up on me, I return to a pretty unhelpful inner questioning of why I seem to find this so hard when other Mothers don’t appear to?
Although I have no formal diagnosis I am fairly sure I am neurodivergent. I have walked with anxiety for decades and I can’t seem to tolerate the sensory overload of Motherhood very well. When I am not resourced enough (i.e haven’t had time and space to be creative, walk in nature and tend to my mind, body and soul) my skin crawls at the gentlest touch from one of my daughters, which in turn spins me into guilt and grief mixed together.
And, while I know it is not helpful, I cannot shake the narrative that other Mothers seem to be able to hold way more than I can without this sensation of crumbling and without having a full body meltdown. Other Mothers don’t seem to need to ask for as much help, or to desire as much space.
The storyline that plays out is that I am a burden because I am not ‘like other Mothers’. But of course, this is exactly that — a story — and the awareness of that means I get to dis-entangle from it.
I KNOW not to compare myself, and in many areas of life I don’t, but it can feel so isolating believing that I am the only one finding things this hard.
It’s the remembering of things, and because of the fear of forgetting something, or making a mistake, the obsessive hyper-organisation that consumes my thoughts.
It’s the times that sometimes I have to force myself out of bed in the morning and force my body into the shower because I am still not getting anywhere near enough sleep.
It’s the sinking sensation that I often feel on a Sunday night now knowing that I am ‘on duty’ for the week ahead on my own for much of the time, and even on the two and a half days I have childcare I still have to navigate the mornings and evenings alone to do school runs and drop offs.
It’s the monotony of the thousands of little things that need to be done each day, and it’s the invisibility of those things. A food order… a form… a request… a medical duty… a meal… washing… an attentive smile… reading… the list never ends.
At times I am overcome with the sadness that so much of my time spent with them is an endurance test, while others get to fully enjoy just being with them. In their presence, noticing their laughter and their curiosities, soaking up every ounce of their magic and goodness.
Is this simply a Mother’s role?
And yet… when I am with my girls, really with them without any distractions, I feel so much joy in them. I truly do. They are pure love and expression, pure emotion and creativity. I want to have the capacity to devour each moment, no matter what chaos it brings.
On refusing to give up writing
As my feet pressed down on the earth and leaves scattered in front of my boots during my walk on Monday, I thought, what pressures can I remove from myself to bring more ease to my life? The ‘easy option’ was… this Substack space. ‘Maybe I should pause my paid subscriptions here for a few months, take a break from writing and not feel the need to tend to this space…’ and for a moment there was a sense of relief. But then I was struck by such a whoosh of sadness. Why should I, at a time when I desperately need to do MORE things for myself, not less, remove one of the things that offers me the most medicine?
Held. has always been a virtual space to encapsulate all the things that spark something in my soul. It is an outlet, a connection thread, a creative portal.
So no… I won’t give this up, even if it does push me to my edges sometimes to show up and write.
If you have been here for a while you will be familiar with the term ‘heart work’ that I used to describe my work in this world. My transmission here on earth at this time is very much centred around expressions of the heart, and contrary to the popular belief that following our passion and purpose is ‘easy’… the reality is that it often comes with a level of discomfort.
There is such tenderness, depth and vulnerability when we show up to our heART. We cannot know how it will be received, we won’t know if it will be seen or understood or accepted until we share, so every single piece of expression we put out into the world, be it one word or a whole body of artwork… comes with a level of risk. That takes courage, and a soothed and settled nervous system. (just one of the reasons that nervous system support makes up the foundation of everything I do!)
Honesty here on Substack growth and devotion
I have been in a bit of a ‘funk’ with my writing recently, in fact I would say I have been in a bit of a ‘freeze’ state with it. When I began this Substack around 18 months ago I had zero expectations and just wrote what was present for me in that moment.
At that time, I was in the absolute thick of navigating early postpartum with my second daughter and my writing was a healing balm to help me integrate the entire experience. Writing about the intensity of Mothering in every sense of the world, and being witnessed by a community of others, saved me over and over again.
As time went on and my own life evolved, my creative life wasn’t squeezed quite so tightly into the edges of nap times and while rocking a baby in the sling. Simultaneously my audience grew and I started to feel the pressure to write about certain topics, or have a theme, or have some sense of cohesion — which to me, as a Manifesting Generator in Human Design — is a sure way to pour a bucket of water over the fire of my creativity.
I thought by re-branding at the start of this year I was allowing myself the freedom to write about anything I wanted, but I can now see that while the outer edges of my space here changed, I didn’t fully let myself be the boundary-less writer that I truly am.
After writing every single Wednesday for months in the first year here I gave myself ‘permission’ to loosen the grip on a schedule, which for a while felt freeing BUT what I can actually see is that it allowed me to sneakily stop showing up for my writing, which in turn led to feeling less clear and more frozen as to ‘what to write’. For me, the longer I go without putting pen to paper (fingers to keyboard) the harder it is to show up to it.
While writing weekly did stretch me in some ways, it also held me accountable to the practice of writing.
The practice is IN writing through the murkiness to reach clarity. Writing through the imperfection. Writing through the often sticky starting places and sticking with it for long enough to turn mess into magic. Writing through the experience to actually process an experience.
If I sit and wait for a clear and ‘perfect’ outline and picture, then I will never write a word again!
Devoting myself to writing weekly gave me an anchor, and a discipline that was genuinely ‘good’ for me.
I am not talking about pushing through fallow periods, or forcing myself to do something from a totally depleted state, I know (and I preach) about the importance of pauses, of space and of void seasons for our creative process, but I also know that for me, I have allowed myself to slightly hide behind this ‘safety net’ over the past 6 months. I am calling myself out on this now!
So I am slightly nervously, but also excitedly, reclaiming my weekly (Wednesday ish) writing schedule. Alongside that I am also removing the rigid boundaries of having to write a certain style of piece because it is what is expected of me by subscribers. My writing to you here will likely look vastly different from one week to the next.
One week you may receive a poem, the next could be a podcast episode, then you might get a meditation, or a full essay on creativity, business, motherhood, womanhood, mental health or something totally different! It may be three lines, it may be so many words I get the dreaded warning ‘near email length limit’ pop up.
It was never about the numbers for me here, but as I come towards the end of this year and there are nearly 1000 of you in this space, I can’t help but feel totally in awe of what an incredible platform Substack is. I never could have dreamed I would get to ‘sit in Circle’ with so many of you when I wrote my first post back in March 2023.
I am forever grateful for you witnessing me, and forever grateful for your presence here.
On real life…
November feels like an integration month, the last little lull of calm before December begins, but I can feel this month slipping through my fingers like quicksand and I desperately want to savour it.
Parts of me are desperate to sink in to stillness and the other parts are frantically trying to get organised so that I can actually slow down and enjoy the magic of the festive season.
What emotions are you holding within you right now? What do you feel you need most in this moment?
And, just to put another dose of messy truth and honesty in here… I just had to stop writing for a moment because while I was absorbed in pouring out this piece and letting my girls play around me while I wrote, I was rudely brought back to reality by hearing the words from my eldest’s mouth… ‘Oh V you are putting poo on the bed’…. horrified I turned around and YES… sure enough my littlest had done a poo in her nappy, taken her nappy off and trailed her cute little faeces-stained bottom across my white bed sheets. MY white bed sheets… not hers!
So there we have it. I like to keep it real. The magic with the mayhem!
Thank you for journeying with me.
Until next time
With love
Lauren
xxx
Things I am enjoying this week…
â‹™ This incredible conversation between
, , and on womanhood, peri-menopause, motherhood and more at the point of mid-life. As a 41 year old woman I really appreciate the truth and honesty of these women and am looking forward to the follow up!⋙ Making this gluten free, dairy free carrot cake banana bread (minus the yoghurt) for afternoon snacks (and swapping out the white chocolate for pecan nuts and raisins because I can’t ever fully follow a recipe!)
â‹™ Soaking in the incredible poetry by Emory Hall in her new version of Made of Rivers. Having this book by my bed is pure beauty.
â‹™ This post by Lisa Oliviera on our practices being our rehearsal for life. I feel very much that the years before I became a Mother when I DID have time to meditate, and walk for hours on my own, and do a long yoga practice, infused some kind of memory in my cells which means I can access an essence of these practices during the intense times of life, even when I only have 10 seconds of space and am nowhere near my yoga mat.
Hello to anyone who is new here… I am Lauren. A Mother of two daughters, Writer, Women’s Circle Facilitator, Sacred Business Mentor & Guide, Soul Branding & Website Creator and multi-dimensional human being. I walk with, and hold space for, others who are treading the tender path of their heart and soul work. You can find out more about this space and what to expect here. Please do subscribe to join the journey, and if you enjoy this, and you do have the means, I would be so grateful if you chose to support my creations for £5 a month…
If you enjoyed this piece and wish to explore my other spaces please use the links below to explore…
Motherhood Essays
Self-Tending Practices
The Unravelling Podcast
Sacred Living
Work With Me
As always, Lauren, thank you for your honesty and being authentically yourself. I so relate to that feeling of overwhelm, that critical voice and often have times where I wonder whether I'm neurodivergent too ... But I feel very conflicted about that label. I know, however, that many find it comforting, validating and liberating.
I wish I could write more but I am very, very tired today! Thank you again for your words xxx
Very heartfelt read. I sense a sort of perfectionism running through at times. For parenting, delegating more to all in the household or externally might lift the burden more (maybe it’s an AI hoover you can get). It sounds like it’s all on your shoulders. The mental and physical load of it. Asking for help can be hard but oh so worth it.
Writing is clearly your way to escape and analyse what’s happening inside so it shouldn’t be the thing to compromise on.
PS: There’s a lot 5 year olds can be responsible for. My daughter has learnt to sort out her own breakfast and snacks. Even your 2 year old can load and unload washing machine, etc. in fact toddlers love doing chores and gain amazing life skills.