The Mental Load

If you have been reading my posts or checking in with me in person, you might have gathered that I have been on the struggle bus. I recently described it to some friends as feeling like Charlie Brown with a rain cloud following me wherever I go. I do not want to be in eternal rain cloud land but wherever I go, there it is. Thankfully this isn’t my first rain cloud rodeo and I know that rain clouds don’t last forever, I cannot control when the cloud comes or goes, and the cloud always shows up to teach me something.

This was not an average year for me. I started over at a new job. No matter how seasoned I feel in my profession, starting over at a new place is always stressful. It is work to learn a new building, new culture, new procedures, new curriculum, and navigate new relationships. I’m very glad I chose this new job, but there is no getting around the learning curve of the first year. It added a pile onto my already full mental load. My two youngest entered middle school and both did cross country, track and travel soccer. My oldest had her last year of college and graduated in May and just moved into a new apartment to start her internship. Did I mention that there was a deadly school shooting on my daughter’s college campus not far from where she lived? Our family’s emotional needs were HIGH this year.

In an article in Psychology Today, the Bronfenbrenner Center for Translational Reseach says that “In recent years, sociologists have attempted to study another aspect of women’s household workload: the mental work of keeping a family running. You can think of it as the brain power that goes into running a household such as remembering to stop for a gallon of milk on the way home, keeping track of the registration deadline for a kid’s activity, or supporting children’s emotional ups and downs.” (2021). We are learning that a majority of this work can fall to women in a married household. Well when you are the household because you are divorced, you get it all. The nature of my job is to be a caregiver of many children and their families, so the last part about supporting emotional ups and downs is multiplied many times over for me. I’d love to say that I check my job duties at the door but I do not, I cannot.

I have a few other special qualities that make the mental load of life feel like a Charlie Brown rain cloud at times. I am particularly sensitive to judgement, criticism, and negativity because of my trauma history. My brain is hard wired for protection and I have an uncanny ability to hear tone, remember words, and make connections between words and actions. If you comment on people’s larger bodies all the time in a negative way, I understand that you think less of me because my body is large. You don’t have to say it to me, I can feel it. If you have nothing nice to say around me, I will assume that you are unhappy with me and that I need to change something in our dynamic so that you will be more positive. My brain will always think it is my fault, my job and add it to my to do list: my mental load. I really have to be in a healthy space, be attuned to my body and very connected to myself to be able to interact in a healthy way with many people.

I am being tested soon to see if I have ADHD. This was not on my radar until this year when I started seeing a new therapist. She brought it up as a possibility and gave me a preliminary screener. I scored a 95% on the test and that mean I likely have a pretty good case of ADHD. This might mean that there is a medical reason for my inability to cope with my mental load at times. It is not a moral failure, it is a brain malfunction. I don’t know how to feel about this yet. I have so many feelings about it, but one of the biggest feelings is relief because on the top of my mental load to do list was always to figure out how to cope with my mental load. I was always failing. Turns out there may be good reason I fail and I might be able to cross that off my list soon.

Speaking of crossing things off the mental load list, I have been doing just that for the last few weeks. A talk with my therapist helped me understand that I can take steps to decrease my mental load just by looking around my home. Anything that I walk by and have to add it to my to do list can be adding to my mental load. I did not understand this at first so I made a list. I started in my closet. There were so many clothes hanging in there that required thought. Why did those jeans still have a tag on them? Oh right I was going to keep them in case I lost 10 lbs because then they might fit. That reminds me, I should lose 10 lbs. That reminds me I should get that treadmill set up in the basement so I can workout to try to fit in those jeans. That reminds me, you can’t just workout, you have to diet, do I have the right groceries to diet? You can see the mental load mountain building and that was just one pair of jeans.

The more I looked the more the mountain grew. I had craft projects I had been meaning to finish from 8 years ago. I had papers that hadn’t been filed or shredded in years. I had toys in the garage from when my children were little that they never played with anymore. When I thought about one single thing, say a craft project, it was a string that led to a deeper tangle every time. If I wanted to finish making a sign I had bought supplies for I had to get out the vinyl and the Cricut machine. I haven’t used the machine in a while and it needs a software update. Now they have changed how the program works and I have to relearn that. I don’t have enough of the vinyl color I wanted so I’ve got to run to the craft store. At the craft store I see they are having a yarn sale, that reminds me that I have that blanket to finish, what specific color of brown was that yarn? This looks close enough so I buy it, get it home and it is not the right color. Now I have two unfinished projects and yarn to take back, but who am I kidding, I won’t and I’ll just add it to the mountain of yarn I have that reminds me that I never have time to knit anymore.

Mountain of yarn

My mission for the last few weeks was to clear the things that take me down the rabbit hole of the mental load. I took papers to be shredded, I am renting a dumpster to throw away all the things that we do not need anymore. I am finishing jobs that can easily be finished and I am hiring people to do the ones that I do not have the skill or capacity to do myself. It has been so difficult but it feels so good. I feel the strings attached to all the things being cut as I throw out the root. Those jeans that took me down the rabbit hole are now at the resale shop waiting for a new owner. Why keep something that gives me two new jobs. If something doesn’t fit, I can get rid of it instead of giving myself the job of diet and exercise. I can choose to diet and exercise if I want to but I really don’t need another job right at the moment.

I’m cleaning up relationships also. I am taking time to untangle myself from other people. That means that I need to know if being around you feels good or if being around you adds to my mental load. If being around you makes me feel like I need to fix me, I need to figure out why. If being around you drains me or fills me, I need to figure out why. I’m cutting all those strings that lead me to mental load mountains and it is hard. It is lonely. It will be worth it. Sometimes it is as simple as just recognizing the mental load associated with that person. My children have an immense mental load and I gladly take it on (but do sometimes complain about it-hint: travel soccer) because they are my people. They bring joy and love along with their needs. My pets add to my load but they also bring me companionship and humor. I’ve heard that the secret to relationships is boundaries. Learning those is part of the mental load I am willing to take on because the end result will be peace.

The bottom line for me is that my cloud is shrinking. First I became aware of the cloud, then I talked about the cloud with people who could help me with it. Then I accepted the cloud, made friends with it almost. I had to sit in the rain and feel how it felt to be in it. Now I am learning what to do about the cloud and the rain. I’m changing what I can and that is all I can do. Someone just rang my doorbell and I answered it in my bathrobe at 2pm. It was a friend and her family just wanting to say hello. I’m sure I looked like I had been battling the rain cloud to them, because I had, but they were a little ray of sun that let me know that the clouds will clear, the sun will shine, and I can take control of my mental load so that it doesn’t control me.

Making Space For Sadness

Healing through feeling.

This is a picture of me. It is not my favorite picture but it is a picture of real life. I sent this picture to my friend Cathy last January asking if it was normal to be crying while waiting for your take out order at Noodles and Co. She of course told me that it was not normal but that she was sorry I was sad. She is a good friend. She lets me be sad. This sadness however. had gone on for far too long and I was crying at the most inappropriate times. I had been talking to my friends and family a lot about my symptoms and I decided to see a doctor for depression. The truth was that I couldn't stop crying. 

I was diagnosed with depression and put on a mood stabilizer. Whoo hoo no more sadness and inappropriate crying right? Well, sort of. I believe that unexpressed emotions can lead to a depression. The feelings don't go away, they just fester and build. In my case resulting in a lack of wanting to get out of pajamas, do anything I used to like doing, and crying all the time. Taking a pill to stabilize my mood is good for helping me to be able to get up and function daily, but it in no way takes away my feelings. 

My challenge this year was to learn to let feelings flow through me and to feel them without getting trapped in them. Seriously SO HARD! I was used to shutting down the feelings when they got intense because I was afraid that I wouldn't survive the pain. So short term gain, long term loss. I was building a 40 year volcano of sadness, upset, fear, loss that erupted without me being able to stop it or control it or handle it. 

With some help and guidance I am learning to let what I feel in the moment be. I am learning to make space for my feelings. Today it was sadness. Today it enveloped me like a cloud. Why? Many reasons but it doesn't matter. I don't have to know why for it to show up. It was here whether or not I could figure out why. So first I wanted to run and deny it. I thought about taking the kids somewhere fun for the day, but when I went to go offer it, I saw how content they all were just playing around the house and I let that idea go. It is not fair for me to force my family to outrun my emotions with me. 

So then I decided that I could get busy with some sort of work. I have been putting off sanding and painting my kitchen cabinets, perfect. I got out my sandpaper and started in to work. I actually did feel good about this work I got done today but it did not take the sadness away. I decided that I had to accept that the sadness was here to stay for today. I had to face it, accept it, make space to feel it, to be with it. This is not an easy thing to do when you are a mom. It is hard to get the space to cry without having your children worry about you. So I let myself be sad around my kids without crying. This just looked like me being quiet. Telling them I wasn't in the mood to do certain things or just saying I was feeling kind of down or sad but not sure why. 

I met up with some friends tonight and one of them shared about the sadness they were feeling around the holidays, missing a loved one who was no longer with them. That was all it took for my sadness flood gates to open. I cried for about an hour and a half. In the safety of trusted, loving friends. No one needed to know why I was feeling so sad and could not stop crying, for they were feeling the sadness too. There was no need to explain. Sometimes you just need to know you are not alone. So we all held space for our collective sadness. Each of us having different sources of sadness, but still accepting it all without judgement or competition. 

On my way home, I cried more and more. I could not stop. I'm crying as I write this now. Is there something wrong with me? I'll admit sometimes I wonder. Is this normal? I don't know. Do I enjoy sitting in sadness and crying, not even sure of the reasons for it? No. Nor do I like stuffing, pretending, and putting off the inevitable explosion of emotion that will come if I do. I used to think self-care was finding a quick way to cheer myself up. I no longer think that at all. Now I think that good self care is to love myself through the sadness. To not force myself to know all the reasons why. To be okay just letting it flow out of me, knowing that I am accepting reality, dealing with and feeling my feelings. 

Other people who do not practice the feeling of feelings, will not like this. You will make them uncomfortable. They will say things like "smile, things can't be that bad" , "hey let's go get a drink and cheer you up, let loose" or "look at all you have to be happy about, how can you be sad when you have all of this". Ignore that crap. It is just a way of getting you to stop a behavior that makes them uncomfortable. They are not your concern, you are. Feel whatever you need to feel and maybe wait until you are in the company of safe people, who can handle your emotions, do you let loose completely. Or in the company of yourself, who can let you cry or feel without being critical and making you think things like you are wrong or selfish or dramatic. 

This won't last forever. I won't die in my feelings. I just need to be sad today. I might need to be sad tomorrow. I don't know. I just know that denying it will just postpone and intensify it. It might turn into anger toward someone or something if I try to stuff it down, and I don't want that. So tonight, I'm letting it out here on the page. I'm letting it run down my cheeks. I'm going to let it wrap itself around me and make space for it to go to bed with me tonight. It will have it's time, it's space, it's acknowledgement and then it will move on when it is done with me. And I will be okay afterword. In fact I will be better than okay, I will be free of that emotion until the next one because I let it flow through me without trying to control it, stop it. or stuff it for later. And every time I can let this sadness flow through me, it heals me from all the years I didn't know how to do it. All the more reason to make the space and invite the sadness in. 

Be well.