Hello Again World

My recent battle with burn-out and anxiety...

Hello reader. I apologise in advance, this is going to be a long post; I wouldn’t blame you if you switched off after this initial paragraph. But if you have decided to go on this journey with me, then thank you. So, let’s take a deep breath… and here we go: My most recent battle with burn-out and anxiety.

Photo by nikko macaspac on Unsplash

Everything was on fire

January 2024, the Year of Dreams, the year of creativity, inspiration and the pursuit of my true calling… ended up nearly bloody killing me.

It was a creative month. I found myself writing poems, joining multiple courses and writing groups, adding more to my novel. It felt incredible. But then, reality hit me like a truck.

January was also the start of a new term at school. My timetable had changed which meant I had taken on an extra class, and the lessons this class replaced resulted in me having to organise lessons for five extra people that I hadn’t had to do before. I had parents evenings, reports, marking, organising World Book Day, performance management reviews etc. This, on top of dealing with poor organisation of other people, nearly broke me.

I found myself not able to write, which frustrated the hell out of me. Then, when I did have a spare moment, I just couldn’t bring myself to create anything. The creative in me started to shrivel and enclose herself in a crumbling cocoon, shutting herself away from the real world. And no matter how hard I tried to rest and bring her forward, the creative refused to come out.

Emotionally, mentally, I was becoming depleted. And yet, for the world, I had to paint a smile on my face and continue.

Then sickness came… literally, like the plague. Okay, not an actual plague, but it dragged me down further into despair.

My 18 month old son suffered an awful cold. Although my rational brain told me he would be okay in a week, irrational brain took over. Why isn’t he eating? My baby is going to starve? Why is he screaming and crying at me all the time? I’ve tried playing with him but he doesn’t want to play. He wants to be picked up… no, now he wants to be put down. No, now he’s crying to be picked up again.

It was exhausting. Just existing became hard work.

It was as though everything was on fire. As soon as I put out one flame, another one started up somewhere else. I tried to be positive and sensible, navigating myself through the firestorm with solutions and mindfulness activities. I tried to do yoga, eat well, live in the moment and all the other bullsh*t you’re supposed to do when everything goes wrong.

But the flames closed in. I was engulfed. And I just let them have me.

Photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash

Phoenix

I really hate the cliched (how does one do the accent on a keyboard? I literally just spent 10 minutes trying to figure out and I’ve given up) metaphor of “and like a phoenix, she rose from the ashes”, but I literally did just that.

After the fire consumed me, and I had a minor meltdown, I felt clearer. Like the fire burned away all the stress, angst, frustration and despair I had pent up for over a month. And now, like water, I had clarity and a sensation of calm washed over me.

Today, I decided to do some tasks that I knew would make me feel better once completed, but I decided not to spend more than 10 minutes on each activity. And before noon’s sun had greeted me, I had managed to do the following:

• Two loads of laundry

• Made a bread (using a bread-maker!)

• Played with my son (I did this for longer than 10 minutes, but, for once, I didn’t feel like this was a chore because I had done some other tasks too).

• Wrote a poem (thanks Beth Kempton for the prompt).

• Wrote a tiny bit of a scene for my novel.

• Read a bit (Once Upon a River by Diane Setterfield - bloody brilliant book so far!)

• Sorted the bedding out

• Fed my friend’s cats

I’m not saying I’ll be able to do this every single day, but today I did. I also found time whilst my son napped, to stop and rest. I drank a hot cup of tea. I ate some biscuits. I watched Real Housewives of Orange County. I read some more.

And I genuinely felt zero guilt for resting.

Now it’s 2.30pm, my son has had his lunch and is playing, whilst I sit in my lovechair and watch him over the top of my laptop screen, writing this Substack essay to you.

I’m coming back

Why am I writing about this? You may wonder. This is not supposed to be one of those look, I got out of the darkness and you can too posts. But I did want to write something totally raw and real. Being a writer, a teacher, mummy, dog mum, home-owner, wife… these are wonderful accolades that I am very proud of, but they also come with a price, a toll, a stress. Sometimes on social media and even platforms like this one, we see a lot of people talking about the incredible things they are doing (which is genuinely lovely), but sometimes we need to see that sh*t happens to everyone, and it’s okay, and we can get ourselves out… and that it’s normal.

So, if this post resonated with you. Thank you for being here and reading this. And I sincerely hope you are able to find a way out of your darkness. You are seen, you are heard, you are here.