THE HILARY HENINGER

It’s been a wild and crazy weekend!!

Like an octogenarian who needs strength for their compression stockings early the next morning – I have gone to bed at 9:00pm the last two nights. In reality the countdown has started closer to 7:30pm and the only reason I didn’t go to bed then was because I was on taxi duty for 1 out of 3 teenagers.

I am exhausted.

This is new for me. While it might be middle age (I object personally to this) – it is likely more to do with the energy suck that is ‘living my life at capacity’ for an extended period of time.

I come from a family that insists if your knees hurt while you run – you should probably run some more – I wonder why I’m like this? Hmm, no idea. Yah, me either.

But in all seriousness, I have spent a lot of my life taking on a lot at any given time. Having what I would consider a high level of capacity for life, stuff, things, moving parts….and rest was never really something I was good at, but mostly because a) I never felt like i needed it and b) it seemed lazy (Do not come for me people – Yes, I have a therapist and even if I didn’t I have read enough Holistic Psychologist posts to know better now).

It’s an insanely unhealthy approach to life and to say that ignoring your body or your mind when its screaming exhaustion is the antithesis of insanity.

In all fairness, since my divorce I have had to get really good at listening to my need for rest. To understand when I was headed to ‘meltdown town’ before I arrive (hint: the more hysterical laughing is present the closer I am to my edge). To recognize that there are literally a million micro moments of evidence before you reach your threshold if you pay attention. It’s still hard – old habits die hard.

Just two weeks ago, while juggling a full time job, side hustle, parenting three teenagers (2/3 full time), and planning a full house renovation, I considered signing up to train for a marathon and run it in three months….I can’t help it – my brain literally says ‘I could totally do that – how hard can it be?’….It’s the shadow side to my capacity for taking on so much and maybe a side order of trauma.

It’s hard. I also think it’s hard when you don’t have anyone to pass the baton too. There is no back up plan. Ironically you would think it would be more important for me to have awareness; you can’t always take on less when there is only one of you. But as I tell my children, we strive for practice not perfection and I am still working on the practice part.

So today, I did just that. I had lofty goals to load an entire order of Ikea cabinets into my car, finish setting up my new office and getting all the laundry done and put away. However, I did none of these. I listened to what my body was asking for and in full alignment gave it exactly that. I watched tv, had dinner with my daughter, face-timed with my girlfriends and wrote this post. Sometimes it’s hard to do nothing.

The truth is that sometimes nothing counts as something.