Karen’s Struggle to Push Through
I’d like to tell you a story of an expat named Karen…
Meet Karen. She started her life overseas when she was 24. Having spent 13 years as an expat she felt comfortable with frequent transitions and cross-cultural life. Sure, it was tiring sometimes, but Karen described herself as a “high-capacity person” and she loved the adventure of experiencing new cultures. She had good friends and a great husband (who she was lucky enough to find while living overseas…Score!) and a job that she loved. Life was good.
As time went on, Karen and her husband had a baby...then 21 months later they had another baby...and while she cut back on her “work” hours, she still felt constantly drained and tired. Of course she wasn’t exhausted EVERY day…sometimes she felt ok. But she had young kids after all...this was just part of life. It wouldn’t last forever.
So Karen tried to embrace this season of life (often begrudgingly) and kept going...taking breaks from time to time, but never fully able to shake the tiredness. It seemed she was in good company....everywhere she went people were always “tired”.
If she admitted it, deep down, being tired made Karen feel like she was truly accomplishing something in life. In a weird way, when she wasn’t tired, she doubted she was doing enough. And she felt bad complaining because so many things were going really well. So she just kept going.
Over the next year her family had a few health issues that were stressful, and they moved to a new apartment, but Karen thought that for the most part everything was still “ok”...except for the fact that she was feeling pretty exhausted and more impatient with her kids and her husband than ever before. She rarely slept through the night...whether it was potty training, teething, or a toddler’s sock that came off...there was always a reason for someone to wake up in the middle of the night. So her motto played over and over in her head: “Just keep going...it’s just a season...it won’t always be this way...one day everything will get easier”.
At this point I should probably come clean. This actually isn’t the story of “Karen” but the story of “Erin”...me. And this is my confession that I’m recovering from an endurance lifestyle that has been slowly depleting me for many years. That story was a picture of my life right up to March 2020, right before the world fell into the hands of COVID-19, and Jordan, our current home, went into total lockdown for 6 weeks. No driving. No childcare. Working from home. And I began to crumble from the inside out. Keeping with my patterns, I denied it. But everyday I woke up with the same thought “I don’t think I can do this much longer”.
Thank you to those of you who admitted freely that you too have felt the same stress….
During the past several years, several ideas consistently spiraled through my mind, clouding my thinking, and keeping me from seeing the situation clearly:
“It’s just a season...you’ll just have to push through”
“There’s not enough time in the day to do what you want.
“Just suck it up and keep going”
“I have to take care of everyone else before I take care of myself”
“If I slow down, I’ll let people down”
And this one’s hard to admit, but…”If I ask for help, I’ll seem like a failure”
Sound familiar?
What about you? Do you reach into your reserves to find them empty? Are you afraid to reach out for help because it might make you seem weak?
You’re not alone. There’s a good chance culture taught you to revere a lifestyle that works you to the point of depletion. Staying up all night to finish a big project is a badge of honor. Burning the candle at both ends makes you tough. The more you produce, the more you’re worth. Fighting against these deep seated messages might not be easy, but it could be the gateway to a fuller, richer life. And you don’t have to wait until the “next season” to start to feel more rejuvenated.
Now let me ask a question that could set your life on a new trajectory:
What would it look like to live with a mindset of resiliency instead of endurance?
Stay tuned for part 2 to start refilling your reserves.
