You Do Not Have To Be Good

Life lately: burnout, unmet needs, and radical self-compassion

This week has been filled with a very unfun stomach bug.

My youngest got it first last week. Three mornings of vomiting first thing in the bed, yet somehow she mostly bounced back between episodes, as toddlers mysteriously do. The timing was especially unfortunate because it was also my middle daughter’s fourth birthday.

She was feeling so poorly the day before her birthday that I genuinely wasn’t sure whether we’d be able to celebrate at all. But on the day itself she rallied, and we managed to have a sweet little tea party with cake and a small celebration at home.

Then the rest of us got it, one by one, in age order. Four nights in a row I was up with a different child, until eventually it was my turn.

Five nights of almost no sleep later, I was shattered.

It has taken me the rest of the week to recover. My go-to physical symptom, no matter what ‘bug’ I seem to ‘catch’, is always vertigo. I start feeling like I’m living on a boat. At one point I caught myself asking the kids, “Is the room spinning, or is it just me?”

All of this got me thinking about burnout in motherhood. Especially solo motherhood while also trying to build a business and home educate your children… and, and, and.

Just me?

I still catch myself believing that if I were doing motherhood “well,” it wouldn’t feel this hard.

I still catch myself believing that if I were doing motherhood “well,” it wouldn’t feel this hard.

From Mary Oliver’s poem Wild Geese:

You do not have to be good.

If you’re anything like me, your internal script in hard seasons can be quite brutal.

I should be coping better.

I should be more patient.

I should need less rest.

I should be grateful.

I shouldn’t find this so hard.

Should. Should. Should.

I am increasingly convinced that “should” is one of the most violent words we direct at ourselves.

My sister and I were talking about burnout, overwhelm, and capacity in voice notes recently. She was reflecting on how increasing our capacity is sometimes about creating more space, both physical and energetic. More sunlight. More time outside. More grounding. Better nourishment. Supporting our bodies with minerals and the basics we so easily neglect. The idea being that if we can increase nervous system capacity, perhaps things that currently feel impossibly hard become a little easier.

I agree with all of that.

But I think there is something even more fundamental.

Radical self-compassion.

Fundamentally, I think burnout is simply what happens when needs go unmet for too long.

Need for rest.

Need for support.

Need for safety.

Need to be held instead of always doing the holding.

I think so many mothers are trying to carry impossible loads while believing they should somehow do it all gracefully, patiently, and without complaint.

No wonder we’re tired.

Something I’ve been learning through Aware Parenting, Nonviolent Communication, and Marion Rose’s work is that so much of our suffering comes not just from unmet needs, but from the brutal things we tell ourselves about those unmet needs.

Guilt. Shame. Self-judgment. The endless inner coercion of I should.

Everything we do is meeting a need in some way, anyway. Even the things we judge. Scrolling social media for an hour might be meeting a need for escape or decompression. Binge-watching a series may be meeting a need for rest or comfort.

So instead of asking, What is wrong with me? I am trying to ask a different question.

What need is going unmet right now?

Sometimes the most loving thing is also the most unglamorous.

Lie down.

Actually lie down.

One of the most helpful things I read this week was a simple list of things to do when your capacity is low. Cancel something. Delegate something. Lie on the floor.

Not once you’ve “earned” it by finishing everything. As medicine.

I hope you have a restful weekend ahead.

With love,