If You Don't Take a Break
...your body will force you to.
Good morning, friends! Long time no see. Admittedly I have been fairly awful at maintaining a consistent writing practice since my daughter was born [nearly] nine months ago. I have had to really take a good hard look at how I spend my time, and prioritize how I use the time I don’t spend either at work or with my baby bestie. Usually, I nowadays end up spending whatever small pocket of free time I have to work on my other writing project (aka the book I’ve been writing and trying to finish for what now feels like forever), reading or doing glamorous things like folding laundry. I’ve taken to reserving my time in this space for when inspiration strikes rather than planning out content and sticking to a schedule here like I used to. Maybe one day I can get back to that, but right now, it’s just now feasible for me.
Anyways, here I am, in your inbox, with a particularly ominous essay title if I do say so myself. The last week and a half of my life has felt a bit like I was whisked off into the upside down. Out of seemingly nowhere, I had a health-related issue pop up — minor (in the sense that I am not dying or facing a lifelong diagnosis of great consequence) but serious and genuinely day-to-day altering. It was absolutely not something on my bingo card for 2025 (although honestly, what has happened this year that was on it for any of us?), and reminds of the old adage that the things you worry about are never the things that sweep you off your feet and take your breath away. They’re never the things you probably should be worried about. Couldn’t be truer right now for me. I don’t want to get into the details because my health anxiety is already raging from one (10) too many Reddit spirals and anecdotes from friends, but all that to say my regular life has been tossed into a garbage disposal and I don’t have a clear timeline on when I’ll be back to normal.
This came on the heels of a several weeks of me feeling generally burnt out, like the pace and schedule of my life was not sustainable. I knew working full-time while also raising a tiny human would be busy and hard, especially while my daughter’s very young and not in school yet, but I severely underestimated exactly how all-consuming it would be, especially if you don’t have help. [I have never been angrier about the lack of childcare resources in this country than now, but that’s a different post.] And now I’ve literally been thrown onto my a$s with this surprise health situation and reallocating all my free time (and work time) toward being at unexpected doctor’s appointments. My body has forced me to rethink the schedule I was on, the way I was letting myself run ragged.
If you don’t take a break, your body will make you take one.
My current situation completely feels like a punishment from the universe for not taking better care of myself when I had the chance to. For not deliberately slowing down on my own terms. It has really shoved me wayyyyy down into a dark place tbqh, but I’m trying to be more optimistic. I’m trying to be less angry, less sad, less frustrated about the cards I’ve been dealt, again. And, ultimately, hopeful and positive that my case won’t turn into the nightmare ones I read about on Reddit. (Someone please remove my access to the internet.) Maybe this can instead be a lesson, rather than just a consequence. A perspective shift even? Muscled, but still.
I found myself thanking my coworkers this week for giving me grace and flexibility, but really, shouldn’t I thank myself for that too? Shouldn’t I allow myself that grace and flexibility in the first place? We can’t all do everything all of the time, and I honestly wasn’t even trying to, but what I was doing was not something I could maintain. Now I have been *gifted* the space to consider that, and imagine a new way to shape my days, my weeks, my life that I can better sustain. (Can’t even exercise for the foreseeable future, so guess I have at least 45 minutes of spare time back in my days… 🙃)
I don’t like to rest, and I don’t like to admit I need a break. I also don’t like to ask for help. Toxic traits and all that. If you’re like that too, consider this a sign from the universe to take a beat and consider what you’ve been battling in your days. What schedule or routine have you been pushing even though it’s clearly (or maybe quietly) not serving you. What can you change that makes your daily schedule kinder, gentler? What can you let go of, and what do you need to gather more of and hold tightly to your chest?
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Have a great weekend, friends, and thanks for being here! While I’ve been down and out, I’ve been catching up on the most recent season of ‘Abbott Elementary.’ I highly recommend this show if you need a good, goofy laugh. (It’s literally laugh out loud funny — the best medicine.)
Thank you for reading,
Joelle