Paradox of Self-Care
We moms embrace “busy-ness” as a badge of honor, shuttling our children to sporting events and birthday parties. Our lives are literally full, but when we lie down at night, our bodies ache and our souls feel depleted. Naturally, mothers don’t feel like they have time for some blogger buzzword like “self-care.” Hence the paradox. Yet self-care is worth the effort.
Honor thy body
Bodies need food, exercise, sleep. Yet while mothers prioritize their children’s nutrition, they subsist on leftovers washed down with caffeine. We need to alter our mindset on food as fuel vs. food as reward. Food journaling, and recording my triggers—sugar can send me into a spiral of poor eating—has helped me be more mindful about my choices.
Nobody wants to think about exercise when they’re exhausted, but cardio and weight-bearing exercise helps with diabetes, heart disease, and osteoporosis. Carving out time for cardio will provide you with that energy boost you need—and for many, a mental health boost too.
My mom friends often skip sleep to score coveted “me time,” but lack of sleep results in moodiness, poor food choices, and increased caffeine to compensate for fatigue. Women need seven to nine hours of sleep per night.[1] Prioritizing sleep helps me complete my daily tasks efficiently, so I have more time left at the end of the day.
Gratitude & Internal Connection
Gratitude can lower blood pressure, strengthen your immune system, and improve sleep. I keep a blessings journal; jotting down simple things to be grateful for really does help you feel more compassionate and empathetic, more forgiving, and less lonely. Another part of my process is meditation. Whether you choose a traditional guided approach (trust me, there IS an app for that) or just go hiking on a crisp fall afternoon, meditation can help with stress, anxiety, and sleep.[2]
Setting Boundaries
“No.” Just two letters, but difficult to say! Yet “no” can be a powerful shield. Creating boundaries tells others, “I love you, BUT you need to respect my time.”
Nothing made that clearer to me than the COVID shutdown. When things started “opening up” again, I missed family time, reading, board games, yoga. Suddenly my activities, events, and projects were taking time away from the people I wanted to be around and the things I genuinely WANTED to do. Instead of going back to the way things were, I learned to say “no” to pursuits that depleted me, and “yes” to things that energized me, like pursuing my education, homeschooling my younger two children, and working on my podcast.[3] I love helping others, but to do that, I need to help myself—which sometimes means uttering that difficult two-letter word.
Nurture Your Partnership
I take my four children to practices, tutoring, and training—all while running a business and OH wait a minute, dealing with the added stress of a pandemic! I am like millions of other mothers carrying more than their share.
With my poor husband consistently at the bottom of my never-ending to-do list, tension and stress started erupting at every misplaced sigh or abrupt ending to a conversation. Parental responsibility, physical exhaustion, and emotional depletion became excuses for lack of intimacy as we crashed into bed each night, backs turned and love tanks empty. And with us struggling, the kids started feeling untethered and anxious too.
It took a heated argument and some therapy, but now accountability, consistent check-ins, and one-on-one time without the kids have helped rekindle intimacy. After all, before we were parents, we were partners.
Work-Life Balance
Sorry, there’s no such thing! Telling mothers they can “have it all” just sets them up to fail—but accepting our limitations can help us integrate the various components of our lives so that we feel emotionally balanced.
In my life, that means compartmentalizing, scheduling short blocks of time to focus on one task—and accepting that periodically, all of that goes out the window to accommodate life’s surprises. It helps to schedule around your productive periods when you are naturally more alert. (For me, that’s before 5:00 pm.) Embrace multitasking. Listen to audiobooks while you fold laundry, chat with your mom as you do dishes.
The self-care paradox will always be there. As mothers, it’s our nature to feel guilt when we prioritize our own needs. But remember what flight attendants always say before takeoff: “Please put your own oxygen mask on before helping others.”
It’s true. If you can’t breathe, you can’t help anyone else.
[1] Of course there are exceptions to this. Some people need less and some people need more. https://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/sleep-requirements
[2] https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/12-benefits-of-meditation#TOC_TITLE_HDR_10