The visual I want to give you today is flexing your “uncertainty muscle.” Imagine your pre-baby life for a moment: you wake up to an alarm that you set, maybe hit snooze once our twice, shower, dress in something that expresses your personality or your desired professional persona, sip steaming hot coffee, have the mental space to plan out your day and most of the time, it goes (somewhat) according to plan. Post-baby, you’re lucky if you get a shower and one thing on your list accomplished.
Living with so much uncertainty, not even knowing if you will be able to attend to any of your own needs today, is extremely difficult for us as humans, let alone women in one of the most vulnerable seasons of life—recovering from the effects of pregnancy and birth on our bodies, sleep-deprived like we’re being tortured in a POW camp, breastfeeding (which is a whole bundle of challenges in and of itself), attempting to scale the Everest-sized learning curve of conflicting parenting information on the internet and from unwanted advice, and most likely stressing about finances and our marriages.
While we have very little we can actually DO about all these stressors, we can, little by little, like an underdeveloped muscle that we are working on at the gym, start to flex our “uncertainty muscle” and watch it grow with practice and post-workout pain. We don’t have to like it, but we can learn to accept some of the uncertainty and cope with it, using some of the tools below. As we slowly realize that uncertainty is universal to all mothers in this season of life, we are reminded we are not alone. Like childbirth, other mothers have survived this helpless baby phase, and we will too. So what do we do to keep our sanity?
Just to throw some levity (and more uncertainty) into your day…
First, a fun question for you: “As a parent, you have a conundrum. You are always tired, hungry, and dirty. You can only solve two of these issues, max. What do you do?”
Sample answers: eat a sandwich in the shower; eat a scoop of peanut butter and fall asleep dirty; shower and nap nut digest your own stomach lining. Now post yours in the comments…Go!
Six coping tools for dealing with postpartum depression and anxiety, or the stress of just plain old uncertainty:
1. Laughter: Laugh with your partner about the silly faces your baby makes, at funny videos online, with other mothers at the ads for baby items where everything looks white and pristine (sans spit up). We know that laughter is our best medicine, but it can feel like such an effort sometimes, like dragging a boulder up hill because guess what, everything is a huge effort in life right now and your reserves are depleted and you’re not sure you’ll ever sleep again, let alone sleep in, so things don’t seem so funny right now. But we know from science that laughter releases feel good neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine and helps to reduce the amount of cortisol, the stress hormone in your system. If you need a little inspiration, laugh (in a non-bitter way, ) at Buzzfeed or HuffPost articles about the challenges you never thought you’d face as parents. There is humor in the mess and the mystery of motherhood.
2. Progressive muscle relaxation: Did any of you hear the phrase growing up, “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all?” Well, sometimes when you have nothing good to think, there’s no need to think anything at all. Ground yourself in your physicality, in your body. We are more than our thoughts; we are body, soul, and psyche. If you feel like you can’t turn off the negative or anxious thoughts in your head, or if it’s more subtle than that and you just can’t shake those down, blah, moving in slow motion feelings, try this exercise called progressive muscle relaxation. It’s like a guided meditation you can do for yourself, in which you simply tell each of your body parts to clench and let go, and you physically do it. The beauty of it is you can do it sitting down or standing up, whether you’re changing a diaper, washing bottles, driving, showering, or laying in bed. Starting at your feet, say either in your mind or out loud, “Feet, tense up and release. Calves, tense up and release. Thighs, tense up and release. Hips, tense up and release. Stomach, tense up and release. Chest, tense up and release. Hands, tense up and release. Arms, tense up and release. Shoulders, tense up and release. Neck, tense up and release. Jaw, tense up and release. Head, tense up and release. Eyes, close and open up.” And while you’re at it, your OB would appreciate it if you would throw in a few Kegel exercises. 😉
3. Get your feelings OUT: Journal for 5 minutes. Belt a sad song that makes you feel like the songwriter gets your pain. Scream gutturally. Run or dance to your favorite feel good song. Punch a pillow. Cry on the couch for 10 minutes and then get up and wash your face. Make a list of all the things that are not right right now. Just get them out so they stop rolling around like marbles in your head.
4. The Fours Breathing Exercise: when you feel your heart and mind racing, focus on your breath. Count to four as your breathe in, hold for four, breathe out for four, and hold the emptiness for four. Repeat, repeat, repeat. This is what military snipers and emergency medical personnel trying to keep a trauma victim alive are trained to do. This is not too simple to be effective. This is for badasses. And you as a parent, doing a thousand things a day that no one notices, are actually keeping another human being alive. You are a badass. So breathe…in for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four. (Practice it now.)
5. Reframe Worry as Evolutionarily Adaptive: Intrusive thoughts of harm coming to your baby are not pleasant, but they are very, very common to parents. Think about it, we as parents care for the most helpless, least developed mammals on the planet, and so it makes sense that a switch would be flipped in our brains to turn on those annoying and sometimes horrifying thoughts to warn us to avoid sharp objects, take a wide birth around corners and edges, watch your step on slippery surfaces, dodge the snarling dog in case it lunges at you and your baby. So reframe those intrusive, worrisome thoughts as evolutionarily adaptive and look for it to be so. Think of it like a good thing gone overboard, and tell someone who will understand in order to take away the power the thought is holding over you. Shame causes us to be secretive sometimes. I will say it again: these thoughts are not pleasant, but they are common to parents. Brush away the worry that you are going crazy like an annoying fly buzzing about your head. Thoughts come and go. Only when we focus our attention on them do we give them an unnecessary amount of power. Then, stop ruminating. Tell your brain, “I got the memo, I will avoid the sharp corner. No need to remind me again.” Print out STOP sign on your fridge if you need a visual reminder. Or put a coin in your pocket to remind yourself that sometimes our weaknesses are the flip side of the coin of our strengths.
6. Find your mantra: Mine ways, “I’m doing the best that I can.” I’m a fan of, “I will be kind and gentle with myself today,” too. In the moments when I wanted to scream but I was literally looking at my baby—an example would be when I couldn’t soothe her for the longest time and I felt so inept, so helpless and frustrated, and I. just. Wanted. It. To. Stop.—I would say “I’m doing the best I can.” Part prayer, part plea, oh, how I wanted her to hear that and understand me. Of course she couldn’t yet, she was only four months old, but it helped me center myself so I (more importantly) did not scare her and could keep my attachment bond with her healthy. Besides, on a deeper level, how will I teach her to have grace for herself someday when she feels like she is failing if I don’t start with myself in the here and now? Try saying it aloud to yourself, “I’m doing the best that I can.”
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My Stop, Breathe & Think Meditation for today: Change. Will you join me? #sbt