I Need To Do Less and That is Hard (For Me)

You know that whole "make time for rest or you'll be forced to rest" thing people say? Welp, last week I found out what happens when you really put that to the test.

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Last week I had my first real anxiety attack. Maybe just stating that is enough, but let me paint the picture: it started Wednesday afternoon and I thought it was a stomach bug. Something I ate? My digestive system being weird after starting a calorie deficit following a six-week break?

But it kept getting worse. By Thursday morning, I woke up feeling like I was being chased by a bear—for no logical reason I could identify. It felt like someone was punching me in the stomach while I was being watched, chased, in some kind of danger. Except I was in my pajamas, in my home where I feel safe. It was jarring to say the least.

The more freaked out I became, the more I tried to find a "reason why," the worse it festered. The anxiety came in waves that day—I'd feel better, then worse again. My natural hypochondriac tendencies kicked in and I even convinced myself I might have botulism from eating my neighbor's honey.

When I woke up Friday morning feeling no better, I packed up my 3-year-old and 1-year-old and took myself to my doctor's walk-in clinic after school drop-off. After I told her my whole life story (including the potential honey botulism theory), she explained very kindly and thoughtfully that what I was experiencing was considered “completely normal” for someone under acute stress from grief.

I couldn't help but blurt out: "So it's totally normal that I feel completely and totally not normal?"

I rarely experience anxiety. I'm more prone to depression—I never did homework in middle or high school and never felt anxious about it. You know those recurring nightmares people have about showing up for a test they didn’t study for? It’s never happened to me. I showed up to almost every test I’ve ever took without studying and never flinched lol.

So hearing my doctor say that all things considered—the dog dying, my 3-year-old starting school and screaming at every drop-off, back-to-school chaos—it was normal to feel not normal, that helped soothe some of my racing thoughts.

My therapist echoed this the same week. I'd been telling her how shocked I was by how overwhelming the grief felt—all consuming. Then I'd had four okayish days where I felt like I was managing my normal routine when my body absolutely freaked out.

"Grief is already too much," she told me. "You're doing too much."

The Uncomfortable Truth About My "Normal"

In our session, she had me list everything I do in a day and week. From there, we needed to eliminate about 75% of what I was doing and focus on one singular priority for the next two weeks.

Friends, I haven't prioritized one singular thing for two entire weeks... maybe ever?

Here’s a little peek into my “too much”. We can start right here with this newsletter which up until Tyson’s health declined I was writing and publishing two posts per week for months. I also workout 5-6 times per week and am nearly down 50 pounds since January 1st.

Losing that amount of weight takes a ton of preparing and planning and scheduling. I have just started training for a half marathon I am running in November. And then just like the rest of us, I have a house to clean, laundry to do and cook three from scratch meals three times a day for me and three tiny humans. I have no outside help. No cleaning service. No family nearby. I’m home full time with a 15 month old who climbs furniture now and I can’t take my eyes off him lol. And then on top of all of it I’m grieving the loss of my best buddy of 11 years.

I suppose I thought keeping up with my “normal” life things would help me through the grief, and I realize what I'm about to say probably stems from unresolved trauma (lol?), but honestly I feel like I'm at my best when juggling multiple things. (If you're into Human Design, I'm a Manifesting Generator—we need to flit between different things to thrive.) So slowing down feels a bit like a death sentence for my soul.

Since Tyson died, I’ve been wrestling more with the loss of my career than usual. That dog saw me through so much of my career dreams and career lows. It feels like a part of that version of me went with him. I’m having such melancholy nostalgia for the version of me who quit her dream job because she couldn’t take the toxic culture anymore, to the me who started and grew her own business from nothing and kept evolving so she could work and stay home with her kids. To the version of me now who has lost her career identity and her dog.

Everything is really feeling like too much. But in my truest version of myself, I really do love pushing myself to the limits and accomplishing things.

But it also can't be worse than waking up feeling like I'm being chased by a bear and hit by a truck simultaneously.

My therapist helped me build a tangible, tactical plan: quit the calorie deficit for now, don't add anything new to my routine, pull back workouts from 5-6 times a week to 3-4. These concrete changes are easier for my brain to accept. The mindset shift of being okay with doing less? That's going to be the hardest part.

I may have unexpectedly blurted out during this conversation, after seeing everything I do laid out on paper: