I’m Stressed, You’re Stressed- And How We can Help Each Other

“Yeah, you’re stressed and now you’re stressing me out and everyone else!”

Said my 8 year old boy.

When did my 2nd grader become a conniving wee therapist who could deftly wield a shovel to simultaneously unearth my mood and bury my parental authority alive?

Of course I was stressed.

• My insulin pump site wasn’t working right and my numbers were elevated. 
• Just a day before I was convinced my swollen appendage was a sign of an unfortunately named malady called “sausage finger.”  
• My husband was out for the evening (which he totally deserves, but stress doesn’t have time to give out merit awards.)
• My hysterical daughter was convinced for 10 horrifying minutes that her indigestion was a stomach bug and began bemoaning all the things that the imaginary virus had the potential to steal from her. (Thankfully she’s fine.) 
• My 4 year old pooped in his pants.

• Even the Netflix Christmas movie I watched with my daughter caused my blood pressure to rise.  “Good God, can the poor girl just have the wedding dress SHE wants!!??  Does a royal wedding have to rob her of her SOUL!!!??” 

• Oh…and are you still listening to me?  Because NO ONE under 4 ft in this house seems to be.

So yeah.  I was stressed.

Every once in awhile you just can’t see past that moment right in front of you.  These are the moments you’re lying next to your kid to get them to sleep, hoping they don’t roll over and see your hot mess tears.

The moments you pray that maybe just one person will text you to say they’re thinking of you or praying because anxiety has gripped your mind and you hope someone else has the key.

The moment your son unravels you a little completely by calling you out on your stress cycle.  

We seem to be the gatekeepers of the stress, don’t we?  We try to stop the cycle for everyone else by intervening: we send kids to timeout for rude behavior, we require them to apologize and make things right, we tell them to accept the fact that their brother WILL make faces as long as he has a face, and we tell them to take their valid anger to their room because THIS (we wave our hands in an unnecessarily emphatic gesture) is a place of peace.

But sometimes in all the monitoring of the stress of others, we can’t hold in our own stress and it bleeds out, perpetuating the cycle.  We lose our cool and answer harshly.  We react to things out of our control by trying to control more things out of our control: namely, our kids and spouse or generally anyone in our path.

Then the stress cycle becomes a shame cycle and we drag ourselves into bed assuming we’re not fit for this motherhood or fatherhood thing, this ministry or career thing, anymore because we couldn’t follow our own stress code. We furtively glance out the window shades in case the neighbors have picked up on the suspicious levels of chaos in our home.  Maybe we should turn ourselves in.

The funny thing is I recently had a conversation with a friend who thought of me as having my life all together.  Bwaha!  Thank God we were talking on the phone or she would have seen my “I’m-about-to-choke-on-my-own-saliva” face.  ME?! Put together?  But you’ve seen me cry on the way out of your house while I dragged an enraged child to the van where he proceeded to lock the door on me.  (Nothing screams “put together” like a sobbing mother who can’t control her kid.)

We can’t always control our stress.  Sure we can exacerbate anxiety through poor choices, but it’s not as though we sit there coaxing stress to our doorstep with a trail of chocolates.   “Here stress…ts ts ts…come on…over here…that’s right…what a good boy…”

Sometimes it comes and we just can’t help it.  Whiny kids, unexpected medical issues, an irritable spouse, overdue bills, broken toilets, and bloggers who remind us of all the stressors we were trying to forget about!

And yes, we can learn to handle it better, especially with our kids.  It’s not fair to take it out on them.

But there’s a moment where we have to admit that we truly are human, and we’re going to have moments where our only instinct is sheer survival.  And for each of us that breaking point is a little different.

I read a book called Overwhelmed that compares the amount of activities and stressors we can juggle to plate sizes: some of us can handle a platter full of things, and others might just be able to balance a saucer’s worth.  It helped me to stop comparing myself to every person around me who seems to be juggling twenty things well while I keep dropping one or more of my four remaining balls.

Still… some days it is all I can do to FIND my saucer let alone put anything on it.

Be gentle to yourself when you find yourself hyperventilating in the bathroom because you’re not sure you can parent today.  Be gracious to the you that has to curl up on a couch and ignore the dishes or the text messages.  Don’t hate that person for being human.

We shouldn’t lie to ourselves about how we’re feeling.  Pretending we are fine when we’re not will only make the feelings worse.

BUT we also shouldn’t allow our feelings to lie to us about who we are.  As my life coach is sharing with me, I don’t have to listen to the lies that I’m always going to be too overwhelmed to do anything meaningful ever again.  I don’t have to project this stressed moment into the future to determine whether my kids will run away from home and join a circus that seems less chaotic than home.  This moment doesn’t mean I’ve failed God’s test and am no longer allowed to serve Him.

So what’s my point here? Someone out there is feeling their stress point today and thinking they are all alone.  They think everyone else is pretty put together and they just need to know they’re not alone.  They just need someone to reach out and love them- give them grace- remind them that God doesn’t miss a moment or a detail. 

Yesterday that was me.  Maybe today it’s you.  If you are in a good place, think of someone you can reach out and encourage today.  And if you’re struggling- I may not be with you right now…I might not even know who you are…but please do not give up.  You aren’t alone and you aren’t crazy.  And if you need to talk- I’m here.  Seriously- leave a message or email me at carrye.burr@gmail.com.  I will check my mail and reach out as soon as I can!

We are in this together.