Why You Should Stop Trying to Get Out of Overwhelm as a Stay-at-Home Mom

Meal planning, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, laundry, one-on-one time with my daughters, time with my husband, keeping up with friends and family, exercising, getting to bed at a decent time, getting anywhere on time...I spent seven years trying to find a way to fit it all into my day and only ever ended up feeling utterly overwhelmed.

That feeling can be paralysing because, while we tell ourselves we’ll feel better once we get everything done, we also know that getting through our to-do list is actually an impossible goal. That list will, of course, always be growing, and spending time re-scanning it with no clue as to where to start only adds to the feeling of panic as we watch ourselves fall further and further behind.

Until you get to the point where you realize that the overwhelm has become an activity in itself - and one that doesn’t move you forward in any way at all! And the same goes for getting out of overwhelm too; I can’t tell you how many books I read or hours of research I did on this topic, but I do know that the time I dedicated to that research would have been better spent getting even just one small thing actually crossed off my list. 

Because you can read all the helpful tips you want on decluttering your home, establishing routines, meal planning strategies, or improving your time management skills, but nothing will actually change until you completely shift your mindset. 

So how do we create a life where we no longer see ourselves as stressed and stuck all the time, but instead start to feel light and free?

Stop focusing on the overwhelm

If you’re currently feeling overwhelmed, you may well be beating yourself up and wondering why - no matter what you do or how many tips and tricks you try - you just cannot seem to get control of your day.

The answer is actually very simple: You’ll never get out of the overwhelm when you’re believing yourself to be overwhelmed, focusing on the overwhelm, struggling against the overwhelm, and trying to clamber out of the overwhelm. In fact, you’ll subconsciously be doing whatever you can to increase that feeling of overwhelm because your brain will be looking for every shred of evidence it can find that you are, indeed, overwhelmed.

For the first seven years as a stay-at-home mom, I was incredibly self-critical. I would inwardly berate myself for doing the wrong thing, handling a situation badly, or being late (again). “I’m such a mess!” I’d say to my three daughters, often in a light-hearted way. But this became the label I assigned myself and, because I thought of myself in this way, I was constantly creating the evidence for it.

If you do this too, try asking yourself what emotion you’re feeling that makes you consistently go to overwhelm. Perhaps you become impatient when things take longer than you’d like, or you may be feeling frustrated that the same old issues pop up each and every day. You could also feel resentful that your partner gets to come and go as he pleases, and doesn’t help out as much as you think he should. 

Become aware of what you’re feeling and start to really take notice of the thoughts that are causing that feeling. It’s not at all useful to you to feel overwhelmed because it simply doesn’t get you anywhere. But it is useful to explore what it is you might be trying to avoid feeling by indulging in overwhelm. 

And let go of the thought that getting out of overwhelm would mean your life magically becomes all sunshine and roses - you will have to face your feelings and be ok with feeling those emotions in order to get to the point of not having to go into overwhelm in the first place.   

Just start with one thing

Taking action (right now) is absolutely the best place to start when you want to take back control of your life - simply pick one thing on your list that you think will make the biggest impact today and give yourself 30 minutes to get the task done. 

Be confident that you will get it done in that time and focus only on that one thing. While we may tell ourselves we can easily multi-task, we’re actually only switching constantly between tasks, which naturally wastes time as you’re forced to redirect your attention. 

Just by getting started, you get yourself out of feeling like a deer caught in headlights and into “doing” energy instead, and you’ll soon see that you begin to feel productive and intentional about your day. You may, however, find yourself itching to get out of the task and feel compelled to do other things (like check your phone) during the 30 minutes, but it’s important to stay focused on the task you set yourself until the timer goes off.

When you consistently do this over several days, you’ll start to see that you can rely on yourself to get done what you set out to do, and really start to build up that trust in yourself. I love this quote from Brooke Castillo from the Life Coach School, who said she’s found that “sustained self-regard is one of the best ways to be happy”.

I now find that if I slip into old habits of telling myself “all this is just not possible for one person,” I quickly catch myself because I’ve proven time and time again that it absolutely is possible for me to deal with any situation I find myself in. I no longer believe that just because I have three daughters, a husband who is a pilot, and family living on the other side of the world, overwhelm is inevitable and motherhood is hard - I now know that it can be anything I want it to be.

Ask yourself what you’re getting out of staying stuck

If you try allowing yourself 30 minutes to get tasks done and still feel just as overwhelmed as you ever did, try exploring whether there may be something you’re getting out of staying stuck there. What benefit does it bring to your life? I personally found that by choosing to remain in a state of constant overwhelm, I was actually choosing to stay safe in my life and hide. 

So ask yourself this: What would you do if you found a gentle rhythm as a stay-at-home mom, and felt balanced enough to start to prioritize yourself? Maybe you would find something you love so much; something you’re incredibly good at; something that is uniquely you - and would then feel a pull to share your gift to contribute to the world for the benefit of others. Perhaps that feels scary to you, so you’re more than willing to keep going as you are.

But you have to remember that staying in your comfort zone doesn’t benefit you - or anyone else! Parenting is an incredibly important job but it’s also temporary. Motherhood is not your identity, and yet so many of us lose our sense of self entirely to the servitude of life at home with little ones.

If you’re feeling that you want to find out more about who you really are and what you want from life, I believe the best way to give yourself the nudge you need to slow down enough to explore this is to purposefully plan out time to do something that truly lights you up. Give yourself permission to play for ten minutes every single day!

Because when you start to play, you’ll see that your true, authentic self quickly reemerges - you don’t care what you look like, or what anyone else thinks or needs - you’re simply lost in the moment and fully focused on doing something that you love! 

Giving myself permission to do this showed me just how capable I truly am. Because the very first time I played on purpose (I chose to dance on my own around the living room), the girls came out of their rooms to watch and showed me they were in awe at seeing me in my element. They wanted to join in and show off their dance moves too, and soon we were laughing so hard and having so much fun. I knew in that moment that this was exactly what I’d wanted all those years I spent reading books and researching on the internet - to get to a point where I felt I had the time and energy to be this mom. And here I was, doing something entirely impractical and entirely selfish, and getting exactly what I’d wanted for myself in an instant: Truly believing the thought that I was capable of being the mom I wanted to be.

And that left me wanting to explore what else is possible for me, which in turn led to becoming confident in my ability to run my home, improve my communication with my husband, have more playful and connected relationships with my daughters, and ultimately train to become a certified Life Coach (whilst planning an imminent move across the country!).

If you’d like help on seeing yourself as the amazingly capable person that you are, or are curious about all the possibilities that are available to you, I’m currently offering free life coaching sessions on anything you need help with this summer.