Seeing Burnout with New Glasses

“Shouting ‘self-care’ at people who actually need community care is how we fail them.”
Nakita Valerio

Some days I still wake up and ask myself, how did I get here?

It’s been over 6 months since I left my full time job and yet if I close my eyes I can still feel that gripping sense of isolation, fear and exhaustion that I was living in for too long. It was a feeling of being stuck inside a toaster machine, being burnt on both sides and yet not sure if anyone could see me. There was a smell of burnt toast in the air but it was one that we were all breathing in and so it just felt normal.

Most days I told myself the answer was to actually work harder. I preferred to spend a few extra minutes responding to emails and to stay another hour in the office after everyone left to soak up the quiet, uninterrupted time. I reveled in the moment that I could pop online late at night or on a weekend and “get ahead” of the next day/week without the sinking feeling that “to dos” were simultaneously compounding in my inbox.

And believe it or not, this worked for a while. My excessive drive to perform was fueled by the immediate satisfaction I received when a colleague would respond late at night to thank me for my hard work or when I was able to climb the proverbial ladder of adding the word “Assistant,” “Associate,” and then…drum roll…. “Director” to my title. Perhaps I was on track to something great. But inside I felt completely beholden to a cycle that wasn’t actually getting me anywhere. I was on a track headed towards burnout and was unable to see clearly what was falling apart around me.

Six months later and I am still that same person inside. As I’ve written about in previous posts, I still hear on a daily basis that same inner voice lamenting that I’m not doing enough, not accomplishing enough and not worthy of praise or validation. I have, however, noticed a few stark differences in my mindset day to day.

One is that I’m less attached to labels than I once was. I remember going to a conference in between jobs about 10 years ago and feeling mortified that I had no larger company affiliation on my name tag. I think I had written “Higher Education Professional” under my name but not having a specific university or organization to back me up left me feeling extremely self-conscious. It felt wildly taboo and in many ways confusing to not have my identity tied to a job, profession or employer. I felt exposed and almost desperate to land a position so I could cling to an identifier.

Fast-forward 10+ years and now we finally have language for those individuals who are intentionally choosing to step back from their careers. LinkedIn’s new “career break” feature may be almost revolutionary to the average person who in earlier years was riddled with shame and guilt for stepping back from the rat race, whatever the reason may have been.

In an effort, however, to take baby steps back into the world of work, I recently began a new part time job in retail. I wanted to do something radically different from the office managerial positions I’ve held for the past 20 years, while also caring for my young daughter. It’s been an interesting life experiment and after fumbling through a spotty onboarding, I can say with confidence that I’m happy to be there. Happy to be in an environment that necessitates being almost 100% in the moment. Happy to interact with customers and help brighten up a moment in their day and then to leave most of my stress at the door at the end of the day. It’s a darn shame that folks in retail are grossly underpaid as they are working just as hard, if not harder than anyone I’ve seen in previous roles. And they are carrying a huge weight on their shoulders that for some starts at 4:00 in the morning with shipment processing and ends at 9 at night with store closing procedures.

One other thing I’ve noticed as I peer out from under my slightly tinted rose colored glasses is that the managers in retail are just as harried and stressed (if not more) than I was a few short months ago in the non-profit world. They are combatting upwards pressure, benchmarks, sales demands, conversion rates and toxic bureaucracy. They are tired, overworked, underpaid and understaffed, just like the rest of us.

Initially my reflections while writing this post led me to think that the challenge in finding the “right” job landed squarely with the individual employee’s mindset. What narratives and stories are we telling ourselves that frame our experience on the job? What is reasonable to expect of ourselves and how can we temper our inner critic?

This may all be true, however, in doing some further reading and reflecting (including with my sister, whose current role focuses on workplace culture and mental health) I’ve shifted my thinking a bit. Perhaps the mitigation of burnout and promotion of employee well-being may have more to do with an organization’s commitment to “community care” than individual responsibility. In other words, what are the company’s culture and workplace conditions and how do they manifest themselves in ways that support the well-being of all their employees, both on and off the clock? How are colleagues and managers alike looking out for one another and promoting values such as empathy, boundaries and rest?

This is clearly a very nuanced question and perhaps the topic of an entirely separate blog post. But as we hear a push in this country towards focusing more dollars and time on mental health, I think we need to look at organizational structures as a whole (schools, businesses, religious institutions, etc.) and ask how we are building those organizations so that everyone feels seen and cared for as individuals within a broader community.

How Do We Protect Our Relationships?

“One of the greatest gifts we can give to the people that we love is to free them from our expectations of them.”
Meditation Teacher

I sometimes wonder how our relationships survive the act of parenting. By relationships here, I mean the relationship between a child’s parents or caregivers. Perhaps, the answer is that many of them don’t.

We don’t talk often enough about the “crushing responsibilities” that come with being a parent and how they can take a toll on the space and energy required to maintain the health of our romantic partnerships. This is not to presuppose that all co-parenting relationships look the same or have the same trajectory or expectations. With this post, I am speaking for myself and my journey which inherently look different than others. That said, I thought it might be helpful to share some of the personal challenges and vulnerabilities that have come with parenting and trying to maintain a strong foundation at home with a partner.

My wife and I met about 8 years ago through a mutual friend when I was living in New Haven, CT. She was living in a small rural town in CT and it often felt like our get togethers entailed exploring completely different cultures and terrains within the same state. Still new to New England, I was insistent on taking countless day trips to explore quaint towns, villages, cities, beaches, breweries and everything in between. It was light and fun when I stayed out of my head and just enjoyed the adventure of building a relationship with someone new.

This is not to say that building our relationship was simple or easy. We had our fair share of ups and downs. Coming out as queer was a long, arduous process that in many ways started when I was a young teenager. Having felt a bit stunted emotionally, I wasn’t comfortable or ready to start dating seriously until my late 20’s. By the time I met the woman who would become my wife I was 32, a very young 32 and still had a lot of maturing to do. I was no where near ready to settle down and had numerous hurdles to mount in order to feel ready to take that leap of faith.

Fast forward 8 years and our daughter has just passed the 20-month mark. She is a fireball, always in constant motion, exploring all the nooks and crannies of her big, wide world. It’s been an honor to be on this journey with her. At the same time, as the relationship with my daughter blossoms, I’m managing all the anxieties and stresses that come with motherhood. At times, this can become so overwhelming that I am able to see nothing else and am unable to focus on the role I play in my marriage.

In the days, weeks and months since our daughter was born — as we’ve muddled through ongoing sleep issues, a global pandemic, career changes and parenting anxieties — I am realizing that I’ve boxed myself and my wife into the role of logistics coordinators. Who is going to pick her up from daycare? Who is getting her up in the morning, doing bath time, giving meds, cleaning bottles, cooking dinner, driving her to the pediatrician’s office…the list feels endless. Resentment can so easily build up and our communication at times can look like a bidding war on who is doing more to manage our countless responsibilities. What starts as a conversation about the dishes or taking out the trash somehow devolves into an existential discussion about wanting to be seen and acknowledged for all “that we are doing.”

The truth is, everything we are “doing” can’t be assessed according to a rubric. No one is getting a grade. But we dig our heels in nonetheless and are ready to go to the ring to fight for our title as “hardest working parent, most deserving of a break.” The other day I found myself immaturely fishing for a “thank you” as if we were playing a game when I simply cleared the table after dinner.

Perhaps this is a form of #adulting that we are all immersed in, whether we have children or not. I do remember when we brought our now 5-year-old Portie (Portuguese Water Dog) home, we fell into a similar dynamic. I was more concerned with whether our dog got his paws dirty in the house, then if my partner had a good day at work. Had he been walked, fed, who was going to take him to the vet, etc.? Everything became a negotiation of sorts and communication between my wife and I centered almost exclusively around tying up loose ends at home.

I know that a lot of couples go through periods of this throughout the extent of their relationships, and some of it is to be expected.

But is there anything we can do to curb it before we start to feel more like business partners than life partners?

A couple of ideas that come to mind based on what I’ve noticed when I do manage to go against my “have to get things done” mindset…

To begin, when possible, I’m now trying to make a point to share space with our daughter, even if it feels like not a “good use” of our time. When possible, we will both give her a bath or pick her up from daycare or pile into the car for an adventure together. It may not make sense from a logistics standpoint, but it gives us a chance to breathe together as a family and create joint memories. Just this past weekend we decided to make an adventure out of a run to Target. What could have been a rushed errand to take something off our plate, was instead a full blown sensory and learning experience.

Interestingly, as a queer couple we are less subjected to traditional gender norms and heteronormative ideas around the roles we play inside and outside the home and who is doing “more” for the family. Instead of a power play, I am trying to look to our relationship as a team sport where we are both on the same team. If she is doing well, we are both doing well. And vice versa. If we are doing well as a unit, then our daughter is more likely to thrive. Admittedly, this is much easier said than done. There are so many pressures on each of us individually and it can become all too easy to slip into a contest of who is more deserving of the so-called parenting/logistics award. Perhaps it is a cry for control during a period in our lives where this kind of mastery feels more fraught than ever.

Additionally, I’ve realized how important it is to cultivate excitement around joint ventures and activities outside the parenting role. What is it that we can plan together, even if it seems lightyears away? (I already started daydreaming about a hypothetical winter 2023 getaway). I want to hold more tightly to those small moments of connection. Can we stay up past our bedtime to watch an extra episode of bad TV or meet up for a secret rendezvous at Chipotle for lunch? Perhaps these moments are not as sexy as our honeymoon period adventures, but they are just as meaningful.

As always, I am very much in the thick of this unchartered territory and open to the experience and wisdom of others. Above all I want to make more of an effort to give myself and my partner grace when one of us is stressed or overwhelmed. After all, what drew us to each other all those years ago at an ordinary bar in New Haven was our zest for life and adventure. Business and parenting logistics have their role, but perhaps letting go of some of these expectations and embracing “messy” will take us further in the end.

“Momsomnia”

“If we are to wake up out of our patterning, a key element of that is to be able to pause, recognize and open to a larger space than the cocoon that our mind is creating in thought.”
Tara Brach

It’s somewhere between the hours of 1 and 3am. I can feel it in my bones. I’m purposely not looking at my phone to see the time as this messes with my head when I try to fall back asleep. I’m at the door to my bedroom, leaning my right ear against the wall to see if I can detect a sound coming from my daughter’s bedroom. We share a wall so it’s not too hard to tell when she’s up and when she is sleeping. Lately I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night, thinking I’ve heard a sound (a shrill cry, a yell, a strange outburst, etc.). However, when I give it a few moments the sound tends to dissipate, which is likely a sign that either I was hearing what’s called a “phantom cry” or that she is self-soothing and “rocking” herself back to sleep.

I knew that sleep deprivation would be an issue in the immediate postpartum weeks and months, but I never stopped to consider how one’s relationship with sleep would be forever changed once having a child.

I’ve never been a great sleeper. Since as far back as I can remember, I have fallen asleep with the aid of white noise. I remember replacing my beloved white noise machine with a cheap clip-on fan my freshman year in college as I was embarrassed to bring what I used to call a “snore machine” into my dorm room. I attached it to my metal lofted bunk bed and would turn it on high every night to try and drown out the eclectic mix of sounds in the hallway. When traveling before the advent of smart phones, I would get creative and try different tactics to help myself fall asleep. For a semester in college while studying abroad I listened to Enya every night on my Walkman CD player until I nodded off. I remember my obnoxious foam headphones were not comfortable to sleep in but they were preferable to having no noise at all.

Now all these years later, and with multiple sources of white noise at my disposal (air purifier, white noise machine, and cell phone apps all playing simultaneously), I find myself in a new conundrum. My sleep is not my own anymore.

Since having my daughter I have become keenly aware that my sleep is all relative to her needs. In her first days, we would be lucky to get a couple hours of sleep in a row before being woken up. Once she would settle after an early morning feeding, I would try and give myself permission to drift back to sleep. But it was hard to do this with regularity as every night could end up looking a little different. Eventually my wife and I realized we didn’t need to be up at the same time and so we started taking different shifts, sleeping in our guest room when we weren’t “on.” We would switch places somewhere around 3/4am in time for the other one to “sleep in” past our daughter’s pending 5/6am feeding. On good days, she would go back to sleep after that feeding and we could either get ourselves up and showered, changed, etc. to get ready for work or we could crash and sleep all the way to 8/9am when she next woke up (a blissful treat when it happened).

Back then, the hours sort of melded together most days and we just hoped and waited for it to get better. As it turns out, we were one of the lucky ones. Our random assortment of sleep training techniques actually worked. Our daughter was sleeping 7/8 hour chunks by 3 months. And it’s only gotten progressively better.

Somehow though, as my daughter’s sleep has improved over the last 18 months, mine has gotten progressively worse.

So what’s going on here? Perhaps some of it is natural age-related changes to my body (I did just turn 40 after all). If I’m being honest with myself though, I think much of my sleep disruption is cognitive and presents itself in the form of mind games and self-manipulation. Just knowing that I could be woken up by a shrill cry or wail at any moment is enough to keep me in a sleep deprived trance most nights.

How is stress playing a role in exacerbating this dynamic? According to Nikki Trojanowski of mic.com, children’s crying can increase the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) arousal. This can mean instantly being awake and simultaneously feeling our hearts pounding, our palms or bodies sweating and our minds on high alert. Trojanowski explains, “One of the classic findings in stress research — initially done by endocrinologist Hans Selye — is that prolonged SNS arousal… wears the body down, essentially, but also puts a person in a permanent state of vigilance, which is wearying.”

As I’ve also been exploring in therapy, the narrative I tell myself about sleep (and if I’m being honest, about much of life) may be having the most profound impact on my sleep and well-being than any other factor.

I have a tendency to get stuck in a negative feedback loop and then lose a grip on what’s real and what isn’t. For example, my daughter wakes up one night due to teething or some other myriad of issues and I’m convinced I’m never going to sleep again. This negative, pessimistic voice then catapults me into a heightened, anxious space which then reinforces the negative thought. Pretty soon I’m on high maternal alert and ready to wake up the whole house. It’s a form of catastrophic thinking according to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) therapy and is one of many different automatic thought patterns that can send someone down a rabbit hole.

Another helpful concept which I’ve been aware of for years is the idea of the “second arrow.” Taken from Buddhism, the “first arrow” is the unpleasant experience we have that is not in our control, in this case, being woken up by a real or phantom cry. The second arrow is the more dangerous one though. As renowned psychologist and meditation teacher, Tara Brach describes, the second arrow is the judgement and self-blame that we shoot ourselves with as a result of the first arrow. (For example, “there must be something wrong with me if I keep waking up to phantom cries and can no longer catch a good night’s sleep.”) As Brach encourages, if we can show ourselves grace and compassion during these uncomfortable and unexpected moments, we will come to realize the second arrow is completely avoidable and in our power to control.

Building on Tara Brach’s teachings, I can’t help but think about how to extinguish the proverbial second arrow by following in my daughter’s footsteps.

As noted earlier, when she wakes up repeatedly throughout the night (which I’ve come to learn is completely natural), she does not ruminate or cast blame on herself. She calls out if she really needs something. Otherwise, she breathes through it. Her self-soothing techniques of the moment include laying on her belly, sucking her thumb, and giving her (stuffed) “doggy” an extra squeeze. And then eventually she falls back asleep.

The middle of the night is not the time to go through all the “what-ifs” in my mind. Instead, when I wake up and feel pangs of anxiety, or wonder if I’ve heard something, I will try sitting up, acclimating myself to my surroundings, perhaps drink some water, and take some deep breaths. I will commiserate with the other phantoms of the night who are surely out there and if all else fails, start brainstorming about my next blog post. Sleep tight, everyone.

Into the New Year with Questions Unanswered

“What if you finally saw that the sunflowers, turning toward the sun all day and every day — who knows how, but they do it— were more precious, more meaningful than gold?”
Mary Oliver

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger on Pexels.com

As I lay on the chiropractor’s table earlier this week for a routine appointment, I reveled in the fact that no one could reach me in that moment. My phone was on but in silent mode (which is typical for me in recent years). I took a deep breath into my sky blue surgical mask and let out a sigh of relief.

Sometimes I feel like crying when I realize I’ve given myself permission to be still. It would be a cathartic cry if I let it out. As though I have finally allowed myself the time and space to exhale and stop whatever I was doing. Sometimes it’s my mind that’s moving a mile a minute, sometimes it’s my body and sometimes it’s both. I’m holding my breath for no reason so much of the time and the tension in my body is palpable.

As we all round the corner into 2022, it’s typical to turn into reflection mode. Have we accomplished everything we intended to in the past year? Have we lay a good foundation for the year to come? Have we reached that professional or personal benchmark we set for ourselves a year ago? If you had told me a year ago that I would have quit my job at the end of 2021 I would have laughed. That’s simply not an option.

This is just life…feeling overextended and grasping for air at every corner.

This is the life of a working parent and we have no choice but to muddle our way through the best we can.

Now my body tenses up in defensiveness in response to questions about my future. At least once a week someone asks me, “what are your plans for next year?” or “how are you enjoying your free time?” “How’s the time off?” It’s funny because a year ago I would have probably asked a peer in my shoes the same questions. From the outside, perhaps this does look like “time off” or “free time.” But from my vantage point today, this IS my plan. This IS my work. This IS my future.

My wife and I made a calibrated decision to shift the division of labor and our budget so that I could be home full time with our daughter and we could catch our breath as a family. My plans for the first time in as long as I can remember do not involve networking or applying for jobs or updating my LinkedIn profile. I’m home. I’m taking my daughter to the park at 3pm on a Tuesday or meeting a friend for a toddler playdate at KidCity (a local children’s museum) on a Friday morning.

I’m using small moments to engage with her in her surroundings and to walk two steps backwards into the fall leaves instead of two steps forward.

Allowing oneself to simply “be” in the world and lean back from the rush and pull of “doing” is uncomfortable and scary. Yet, it’s also the most natural feeling in the world.

I realize it is a privilege to be able to lean into life this way. It does come with sacrifice but it is not in the realm of reality for most parents and caregivers, particularly those from marginalized communities and those who are parenting solo. Why is that? Why are most moms expected to return to work in a matter of months (and sometimes weeks) after giving birth?

“The U.S. is one of just seven countries around the world that doesn’t guarantee any paid maternity leave, leaving the vast majority of workers with nothing at all.” In a recent interview on NPR’s FRESH AIR with Terry Gross, Claire Suddath, discusses her recent article for Bloomberg Businessweek entitled, “How Child Care Became The Most Broken Business In America.” In it she examines why childcare costs are prohibitive for most families and attempts to provide federal funding for care continue to fail in Congress. As a result, families are caught in a Catch-22 and ultimately face burnout. This puts a strain on relationships and forces families into a near impossible dynamic of constant negotiation and sacrifice just to make ends meet.

What we are doing in my family as we move into 2022 is unconventional and perhaps unsustainable. But it is a “Hail Mary” at reclaiming the sanity that we lost in the past two years. I am willing to step away from my “9-5” for as long as it takes to get that sense of balance back. There is another formula out there – which I will find in 2022 – that allows for each parent to take time for themselves and to contribute to the family unit in tangible and intangible ways.

I don’t have all the answers and know this is a leap of faith, but hope and trust that it will be worth it. And that I will find a few more creative ways to exhale beyond just my chiropractor’s table.

Wishing a happy new year to my friends and fellow readers. May this year bring peace to all of us with questions that remain unanswered.

~~~~

A poem by Mary Oliver
HOW WOULD YOU LIVE THEN?
What if a hundred rose-breasted grosbeaks
flew in circles around your head? What if
the mockingbird came into the house with you and
became your advisor? What if
the bees filled your walls with honey and all
you needed to do was ask them and they would fill
the bowl? What if the brook slid downhill just
past your bedroom window so you could listen
to its slow prayers as you feel asleep? What if
the stars began to shout their names, or to run
this way and that way above the clouds? What if
you painted a picture of a tree, and the leaves
began to rustle, and a bird cheerfully sang
from its painted branches? What if you suddenly saw
that the silver of water was brighter than the silver
of money? What if you finally saw
that the sunflowers, turning toward the sun all day
and every day —who knows how, but they do it—were
more precious, more meaningful than gold?
Mary Oliver ‘Blue Iris: Poems and Essays’ Penguin Random House, 2006

Relationship to My Body

“You are imperfect, permanently and inevitably flawed. And you are beautiful.”
Amy Bloom

I took my first in-person yoga class today in over two years. The last time I attended a yoga class that wasn’t virtual was probably November or December 2019. It wasn’t a fancy class. I saw it advertised through my local gym and figured I’d give it a try. I saw it as an opportunity to decompress and move my tired joints, even if it was under bright overhead lighting and with blaring workout music in the background. In the end, this class exceeded my expectations and provided elements of surprise and reflection on so many levels.

For under 55 minutes, my phone tucked away in my jacket pocket in the back of the room, I was able to arrive in the moment and just feel my body move. In the midst of my contorted, stiff, inflexible stretches, my mind floated to just how much I had taken my body for granted prior to having a child. I haven’t written much about this topic to date so bare with me.

My relationship to my body over the last 2+ years has taken on so many new layers. When I learned I was pregnant, I remember having an irrational fear that I was going to “lose” my body. It was a fear of something taking over (like a parasite) and being at the whim of new forces that were outside my control. That, in addition to terrible nausea and morning sickness. Admittedly, the irrational fears did prove somewhat true. I was taken over by forces outside my control and my body did take on a life of its own. I ultimately came to a place of acceptance though and even awe in what the body was capable of. (I could write an entire blog piece on the body and the pregnancy journey.)

What I wasn’t prepared for though were the postpartum physical and hormonal changes that would continue to play out for months (and maybe years) beyond giving birth. Even as I approach 18 months postpartum, my balance is off. I am clumsier and a little clunkier in my movements. I wasn’t flexible prior but now my back can get thrown off by just crouching to put the baby in her car seat. My neck feels stiff just about every morning and I am not a stranger to muscle spasms at random points throughout the day.

I still love the same forms of exercise. For me it’s swimming and a slow walk/run ratio I picked up years back when training for a half marathon (which feels like a lifetime ago). And maybe it’s my middle age creeping up on me, but my body just isn’t the same. It’s subtle, but I’m keenly aware of how my clothes fit differently now. A little less give, a little less stretch. My body didn’t simply bounce back. It bounced into a whole new space.

I guess what I’m talking about is that both my relationship to my body and my body itself have changed in recent years. My rare moments to exercise are no longer with an end goal of a certain figure so much as just the freedom to move…The liberation I feel when I can find a moment in the early AM to do a “cat/cow pose” or “puppy pose” before the baby stirs. My joints are stiff and most days I just long to move. I now wear sneakers almost all the time, even when I’m putzing around the house, giving my daughter a bath, or going to the grocery store. It gives me the most subtle sense of satisfaction that I’m exercising. That I’m moving, even if it’s from one room to another.

As I sit here typing away, my upper back is talking to me. It’s telling me to sit up straighter and to stand up and move around. It’s achy when I sit too long now or when I stand too long. Maybe I need to listen more and respond “thank you” every once in a while. Thank you for making yourself more aware to me in recent years. Thank you for helping me to see that I am intrinsically tied to you and you to me. That we are here together to explore the world and accept the ebbs and flows. And perhaps to slow down enough to catch an extra breath or two even when life tells us to keep going.

As I hunched over in child’s pose this morning and stayed put 5 or 6 breaths longer than instructed, I realized that perhaps I need to fully accept this new reality–This body in all it’s floppiness and less than shapely beauty. Maybe part of its purpose is not to achieve some unattainable shape or figure projected on us from external pressures, but instead to simply stretch and rest and carry us through life’s ups and downs. And maybe it’s not just my body, but my entire being that never simply “bounced back” after having a child. I have yet to get to know a new and evolving version of myself that has bounced into an entirely new way of being.