Earlier this year, I hired a professional organizer. I was overwhelmed by the chaos exploding from my eensy-weensy, teeny-tiny kitchen pantry; the clutter on my kitchen counters; and the hot mess of skin care, meds, and styling tools jamming up my bathroom cabinets, so I threw up my white flag and tossed some cash at the problem.
As I explained my dilemma to my organizer, near ready to light a match to my entire home—"there’s just not enough storage space, I hate this clutter, there’s nowhere for anything to go!” I protested—she nodded calmly and said, “This is very common. You have a 1970s house with a 2000’s amount of stuff.” It made so much sense. 1970s homes, and 1970s people, didn’t have the access and the options that we have today.
Much like that time, right now I’m overwhelmed. I don’t need to belabor my problems, we’re all busy, but I feel the need to explain that things have come to a head. It’s that time of year when everything is crazy—end-of-year work deadlines, holiday shopping, holiday travel, holiday chaos.
I’m juggling a larger workload than normal as I wrap up a couple of side projects in addition to my full-time job, and generally tie up loose ends before my maternity leave.
I’ve written an essay on prenatal depression that I’m eagerly pitching for publication before this baby arrives. (So far 1 rejection, 1 non-response, currently it’s out to one editor, with about four back-up pubs on deck should I get another “no, thanks.”)
My daughter’s birthday is early December, which means the requisite buying of both birthday and Christmas gifts; the sorting of the cake and the goodie bags and the party location and the decor, not to mention the school birthday presentation, replete with photos and captions (let the child get involved, too!) recommended by all Montessori schools for their at-school celebration (“but please—no sugary sweets, no nuts, and we’ve got one vegetarian in class”).
On top of that, we’re shuffling boxes and furniture around this 1970s-size house to make room for a newborn, while also completely redoing our daughter’s room, since all of her things will go to said newborn.
We’re prepping for holiday travel and managing our toddler’s big feelings about going to a new, larger classroom with a new routine and different teachers and expectations. She simultaneously moved up in swim lessons—no more parent in the pool!—and she’s generally grappling with growing into a “big girl.” (I’m not crying, you’re crying!)
The deadlines and to-dos are making me feel as though I’m drowning every minute of the day. Most days I forget I’m eight months pregnant. And the whole, growing-a-human-while-doing-all-the-other-things at 40, with a toddler to boot, isn’t exactly a walk in the park, physically or emotionally. I’ve always been a hustler, but this. This is where I start to lose the thread.
The weekend of my daughter’s birthday, my mom and mother-in-law came into town to celebrate. They were extremely helpful, both around the house and with my daughter, but I couldn’t help but feel like a Real Life Cathy Cartoon during each of our interactions.
My mother is extremely empathetic, and has never once made me feel as though I am being dramatic about my woes. (As I practically fling my person on the bed in distress.) She listens calmly and helps me devise a plan.
“I just need you to help me make sense of this room!” I said to her, exasperated, as I scanned the soon-to-be-nursery overflowing with boxes, bins, and bags containing hand-me-downs for the baby; outgrown clothes to donate and give away; not-yet-wrapped Christmas and birthday gifts; and soon-to-be-used bottles, breast pump parts, and burp cloths. But even as I complained to my task-tackling mother, I felt guilty. It’s not like she hasn’t raised two children; not like she doesn’t understand what it’s like to be busy. She’s still working in her 70s. Am I just a spoiled old millennial unable to see my first-world problems?
As I heard myself venting, I thought about my organizer, what it means to have limited space, and I realized: There’s not enough room…in my brain! I’m living in the body of a normal woman, faced with the expectations only a god, a phantom, a super hero, or a time czar could successfully achieve. We all are! And every day it makes us feel like we’re failing. Because we are. We’ve set the bar too high.
Our parent’s generation, unencumbered by the Internet, didn’t spend all day attached to a tiny computer that dinged them with 50 work emails, texts from friends and family across the globe, social media notifications begging them to look now! (And they certainly didn’t have a watch, a phone, and a computer doing it all at once.) No, they made phone calls when they had the time; they wrote letters at designated times of the day. Their news cycle was different. They didn’t pop online multiple times a day to watch a war unfold in real time; they watched the news at 7pm or 10pm and the images projected weren’t shot by the phone of a genocide survivor or onlooker escaping terrorist kidnappers. Back then, there was no such thing as gentle parenting; there was just “do your best.” Our parent’s didn’t do their holiday shopping at 900+ online retailers; they just went to went to a mall and knocked it all out in a day or two.
They didn’t have this many options and distractions, greedy hands pulling them in every direction, and I think they were better for it. They were certainly more focused. For everything technology has given us, which is paramount to our daily convenience and comfort, it has also taken so much from us. Namely, our peace, our focus, and our intention. So how do I actively participate in a 2000s world, but with the scope of a 1970s participant?
I can’t believe I’m about to make another Daniel Tiger reference, but here we are.
There is this Daniel Tiger song called, “Your Best is the Best for You,” and it’s one of the most obnoxious children’s tunes because it’s an ear worm in the way bad Christian music is. Catchy, upbeat, not good but still a familiar rock and roll, albeit soft-rock, considering what it is.
The song opens with a singer who sounds suspiciously like John Mayer (it’s definitely not, but there’s a whole conspiracy theory around it). It starts, “Do your best…your best is the best for youuuu.” And then Generic John Mayer continues to croon about all the ways Daniel and his friends didn’t try to overdo it, or someone helped them achieve something, which is their best.
Our daughter loves DT, and we often employ the messaging in his songs to persuade her to do any number of things. “Remember what Daniel Tiger says about [the potty/sharing/taking a deep breath?]” which is, unsurprisingly, more effective than one of us yelling, CAN YOU PLEASE [SIT ON THE TOILET/GIVE THAT BACK/CALM THE FUCK DOWN?]”
As often as we use these persuasion tactics on our daughter, I can’t help but see the irony in not taking the advice myself. I’d like to tell you that I’m doing my best, but by doing it all, am I really? Maybe my best is operating at half mast. Maybe my best is actually not burnout. I’ve spent so much of my life in hustle mode, subscribing to the belief that I could do it all, I would have it all—just watch me—that I’m constantly setting my expectations higher. And then I miss the mark or practically die trying. I don’t think it’s my best. I think it just makes me a pawn in the system, a willing participant of a culture that demands too much.
In a few weeks, I’ll return to the cocoon of new motherhood. It was easy to shut out the world with my first born, in the thick of quarantine. Social obligations didn’t exist. This time, there will be more to tend to, namely a toddler. The world has opened up again, and I already know there will be an urgency to “return to normal” quicker than necessary.
I’m trying to resist, to slow down and be present. Three years into parenthood, I’ve seen in real time how the clichés are true: The days are long but the years are short, etc. But I’m realizing that this is just what life is all about: Constant reconfiguration. Perpetual evolution. Finding our own unique speed in the marathon. Though the circumstances were different decades ago, the sentiment remains the same. It’s so tempting to try and keep up all the time. At least I find it to be. But we only get one shot at this, and I want it to be my best. Whatever that looks like for me.
Speaking of doing less… I’ll see you new year! I’m taking the next few weeks to be with family. I only have about a month left with my daughter as a family of three, so I’ll be leaning into that. I haven’t yet discerned what B L U R T will look like with a newborn and a toddler, so I hope you’ll bear with me while I figure that out. Thanks for a great year, and as always, thank you for reading. Your support means the world. xx
“Your best is the best for you” - simple but thought provoking! You are so good at making me see things in a different way. Enjoy your family. I love you!
“I’d like to tell you that I’m doing my best, but by doing it all, am I really? Maybe my best is operating at half mast. Maybe my best is actually not burnout. I’ve spent so much of my life in hustle mode, subscribing to the belief that I could do it all, I would have it all—just watch me—that I’m constantly setting my expectations higher.”
This statement resonates so much. Work has been intense since 2019; no slowing down because of the pandemic! Almost immediately after Thanksgiving 2022 (which coincided with a major software implementation for our client) my father had a debilitating stroke. For the past year, I’ve been staying with my mother every other week (or longer). I’ve continued to work a full-time + job. My father passed in August. I’m still traveling to stay with my mother (she’s never really lived alone in her 92 years). It’s hard. I told my bosses today that I wanted to cut back my hours after the first of the year. One was cool with it. The other tried to convince me to continue full-time and just take vacation hours one day a week and then take leave without pay after my vacation hours are depleted. Because full salary and benefits and all that. I’m skeptical and I’ll discuss with HR. But I’m tired and burned out and I need a respite.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I hope you find peace and joy over the holiday and before your baby is born.