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

in

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?

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Microaggressions: What Are They and Why Should You Care?

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I am currently exploring the idea of microaggressions. Did you know that there are various ways in which we can display microaggressions? There are microinsults, microassaults, and microinvalidations. I always thought that because I did not engage in microassaults (conscious and direct attacks and overtly aggressive or prejudiced actions) that I was not perpetrating these microaggressions.

The more I dive into this, the more I see I have been guilty…

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Get off the hamster wheel and live a life you choose rather than pursue.

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It is so easy to get swept up in the current of urgency — we need to do it all now or risk being behind. Whether that is in our personal lives — “settle down”, pick a career, have kids, be debt-free, move out, etc — or in our professional lives — make 'X' amount of money, get promoted, launch a new business or, more generally, be "successful" — we are consumed by it.

We expect so many things to happen immediately or on some arbitrary timeline imposed by the world around us. I think of it as the conveyor belt perpetuated by the cult of the average. To be clear, I am not commenting on anyone’s value when I say average. I am commenting on the drive to conform — to find safety and solitude in the collective plan and goal. To fit in at all costs and pursue a dream bestowed upon rather than cultivated by us.

These ideals have been fed to us since we were young — before we really knew we could ask “why” before hopping aboard. But the reality is that all that awaits us at the end of the conveyor belt is loneliness, resentment and what I call, “predictable sh*ttyness” — a life of stagnancy and “fine”. We do not like our lives but we are comfortable in the predictability and at least feel like we know what to do and what to expect so we stay, trapped and unhappy.

What keeps us stuck in this cycle?

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You Have A Right To Your Grief

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How many of you have uttered the words, “It’s fine” when deep down there was no part of you that actually felt that way? Whether coping with a loss, dealing with the pain of recent wrongdoing, feeling burdened, isolated and hopeless, we have all done this.

We have hidden our pain, belittled our experience, and taken on the responsibility of maximizing harmony and minimizing distress in the world around us.

Why?

Because, as a society, we are incredibly grief averse.

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Emotions are like onions.

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Emotions are complex.

Understanding our emotions and the language we use to describe them is an incredibly powerful tool. For many of us, we have “go to” emotions or descriptors. We may be “anxious” all of the time or “stressed” out and “overwhelmed”. However, sometimes, these catch-all terms are not exactly accurate and leave us with a misconception of our emotions and the complexities of our experiences. Why is this important?

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