You can do anything short term. But are you in it for the long haul?

“anyone can play the short game…But the long game requires significantly greater mental strength and capacity and a commitment to taking small, calculated steps in the direction you want to go while weathering the storm.”

Shortly after my c-section and the arrival of our beautiful daughter, Everly, I found myself in a place of extreme frustration. C-section recovery is not easy and unfortunately takes a long time and a lot of work to “get back to normal”. I was frustrated that I could not get out of bed without rolling to my side or that I couldn’t even carry the laundry downstairs. I felt helpless (and I am sure the sleep deprivation didn’t help).

Fast forward to months out from surgery and I was still finding myself “playing the long game”. I was cleared to work out but with a LOT of restrictions. I couldn’t go from laying to sitting to standing without having to brace something with my arm. I couldn’t lift anything heavier than my daughter which meant I was in a position of needing to ask for help a lot.

Combine that with Everly’s various developmental leaps, nights where she slept 20-30 minutes at a time and her teething (yep, she is getting a tooth 2 months in), I often found myself feeling a bit helpless.

In a place of self-pity — yes, I have those moments same as you and sometimes, they are entirely necessary and helpful — I started crying to Jordan and just talked about how this feels so silly that everything feels so hard. And his response really hit me (in a good way).

He told me that anyone can play the short game even if they are just flailing their way through it. Anyone can do the short sprints and work. But the long game requires significantly greater mental strength and capacity and a commitment to taking small, calculated steps in the direction you want to go while weathering the storm.

Unfortunately, that meant grieving I couldn’t work out the way I might like to and that I still had to roll to my side to get out of bed. It meant I had to accept that many nights are filled with sleeplessness and I had to rely more heavily on the support of ibuprofen than I might like as headaches seem to be inevitable without proper sleep.

AND, if I looked back at the first few months after my c-section, I had, in fact, made significant progress and continued to do hard things every day. These forward movements had been lost in my grief, self-judgment, shame and frustration. My life completely changed on February 26th, 2020 — yes, in may ways for the better but let’s be real, it is not all rainbows and unicorns being a new parent or recovering from major surgery.

Even now, over a year and a half in, and fatiguing on the realities of a pandemic life, there is a long way to go. My body will always be different and in some ways, is still recovering as scar tissue breaks up or nerve endings become sensitive again. As much as I would like to, I cannot rush the process of healing — in any account. In fact, the more I try to force or rush it, the longer it will take as this will only set me back further into my shame and spending time, money and energy on things that I have no control over or do not serve me.

Okay, so how does this relate to you?

I am betting many of you have already started to recognize some parallels. See, each and every one of us had a major blow to our realities March 2020…and honestly, again in the last couple of months. COVID hit us like a slap in the face — repeatedly — and took the rug right out from all of us. At first, some of us sprang up and chased after the rug and all that it represented, some laid on the floor grieving the loss of the rug and some started weaving a new rug with the materials in front of them.

No matter where you found yourself, you were hit by a major trauma and, for lack of a better term, a natural disaster. And don’t get me wrong, it sucked from the beginning — the short game was no picnic. Panic ensued, extreme hardships, financial and otherwise, arose and the security and certainty we all once felt, vanished.

Suddenly, we couldn’t see our friends, going to the grocery store ignited panic within us and shame seemed to dress up in sheep’s clothing and found new entry point r.e. the pressure to do it all and slay quarantine.

This was made worse when we had hope things were returning to normal earlier this year, only to slide back into those higher fear and anxiety states.

Unfortunately, the storm has and will continue to be a long one and the resources we have, both internal and external are often depleted faster than we can replenish them. This is the long game.

Even when we face a more certain “reopening”, this uncertainty will persist. And there will be so much that lies out of our control no matter what we do — i.e. any new variants, if people will show up for each other rather than themselves, how many booster shots we may require, how long it will be before it is safe to be without masks. This is our new normal.

How do we find the energy to keep going?

I know this sucks. You are exhausted. You want to just go to the store and not worry about whether or not you can get what you need. You don’t want to have to coordinate drive-by celebrations or to keep cancelling plans. You are done grieving. Especially after this summer. We thought we got our lives “back” and soon found out it was all too soon.

The best we can do is to keep showing up, exactly as we are and exactly where we are and keep asking ourselves what we need right now and what is the next right step in our lives.

I cannot recoup all I have lost. I cannot expect to return to what was. I have to embrace what is and to create a new path in this world. I joked that it was like being a character in Harry Potter and finally getting the whole magic thing down and then being picked up and out of the story only to be plopped right into a battle scene in Lord of the Rings. What worked for me in HP doesn’t work for me in LOTR. It can’t — it’s a different story. And in our case now, it’s one that hasn’t been written yet so we cannot rush to the end of it.

Each day we are writing the next sentence in the story that is and will be our lives. We can only go 1 sentence at a time. It sucks, sure. And there will still be a lot of anxiety, loss, and grief. We cannot rush through that part either. But it is important to look at every moment as an opportunity to connect to yourself and to again, answer the question of, “what is the next right step for me?” as, contrary to what Drake may have told you, you cannot go 0 to 100 real quick.

There came a day when my body felt “normal” again. Everly now sleeps 12 hours a night — straight.

There will come a day when we don’t always have to wonder behind which corner COVID is lurking or what new stressor will be introduced in our lives. Days will come where we can grieve, properly and hopefully find forgiveness for each other and the world. We will hug our loved ones without fear and let our kids play with others without worrying what germs they may pick up in the process.

That day has not yet arrived. And the only way we will be able to get to those points is by doing the work at the pace we can and to focus on the small, 1% changes both for our own lives and for the community as a whole.

I know you are tired. Keep pushing anyways.

I know the masks suck. Keep them on anyways.

I know you are worried and you just want this to be over. Do your part and be patient.

And even if it feels like things are “over” or that you just want to go back to normal…remember there is no such option. We will never be “back to normal” and there is beauty in this realm if we choose to see it. Our brains, while capable of amazing things, are simple in that what we focus on grows. If all we do is see the devastation, the negative, the fear, the feeling of being trapped, that sensation inside of us will grow.

So remember, the best thing you can do is to be exactly where you are and to radically accept that this is where it is and to walk through each moment, sentence by sentence, to create a life and story that evolves with you and the world you exist in now.