Ever feel anxious and don’t know why? You know that ants in the pants kind of feeling – only the adult version. You might even start running through your to do list or checking off tasks in your head. It is time to get serious about mom’s self care!
That feeling is a sign of overwhelm and burnout
. Don’t ignore it. Start making time 
for yourself a must do on your to do list. Even just 10 minutes a day can start having a big impact.
Don’t know how to get started? Here are two easy ways to find 10 minutes:
- Look through your to do list and get ruthless about it. Find 10 minutes by taking off the things that don’t matter to you.
- Put yourself at the top of the list. Schedule in time for yourself like you would for taking your kids to class or practice. It is time that can’t be negotiated away.
Be Ruthless for Mom’s Self Care
That kinda sounds badass and it is. I want you to take a long list at your to do list. Circle anything that has been on your list for more than 5 days.
Ask yourself 3 simple questions about these tasks:
- Is this something you need to do?
- Do you want to do it ?
- Is this something you think you should do?
Odds are it is either 1 or 3. Why do I think that? Because even though it has been on your list for multiple days you haven’t gotten it done.
Get real. If it something you think you should do and you haven’t done it in 5 days, you need to act like everyone’s favorite ice queen and let it go. It is hanging over your head and you neither want to do it nor do you need to get it done. It is just taking up mental space that you don’t need to waste.
Now we have our first things off the list.
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What is the next step for mom’s self care?
Since this is about self care you might think I’m gonna tell you to focus on the things you want to do next – I’m not. The thing is that as adults we ALL have a list of things to do that absolutely need to get done – let’s call these things responsibilities.
This means these are things that we need to do to provide for our basic needs. You may not want to take the dog to the vet, but he needs to go.
Schedule time for your need to do items (it is important that you don’t sneak those shoulds back on the list). Your child needs an education, but they don’t NEED you to participate in the bake sale. They need clothes, but they don’t need you to put away all of their laundry for them. See what I mean?
Check out a description of needs if you aren’t sure. This might help you start realizing your responsibility to meet your own needs.
When to do the need to do list.
Some of us have a natural ebb and flow to our week where doing errands and tasks like scheduling appointments is easier. Block some time out in your schedule for those things.
If you don’t have a low time in the week, choose a time when you have an energy dip to knock a few of these things out each day. Then reward yourself with ten minutes of quiet time. This is called habit stacking and is a genius way to get annoying responsibilities done.
Create a rhythm that matches your energy.
I encourage you to not use your most productive time to do things like make appointments or run to the grocery store (stop going grocery shopping). These are things that can be done once your mental game is a little off and you are in the downhill slide energy wise. The exception to this is if you are taking young kids some place – always be sensitive to their energy levels or everyone will pay the price.
If you have so many need to do items that there is NO TIME LEFT. You are doing something wrong. My guess, as a serial overachiever and recovering burnt out mom, is that you are doing TOO MUCH. We have a tendency to not see our shoulds and wants clearly.
Are you being realistic about what you have time to do?
Moms always seem to use the words “I need to do” or “I have to do” when talking about their lives. If you fall into this trap, you are not alone and let me give you a hand out.
If you still have a list that is too long we gotta ask some more questions…
- Look for the result. What will happen if I don’t do this?
- What am I making it mean about me if I don’t get this done?
- Try to be your own best friend. What would I tell my best friend about this task on her list?
- What prevents me from getting this done?
If you answer those honestly, you’ll be able to figure out what is really going on.
Mom’s Self Care – FINALLY
Finally we are ready to add some wants.
Pick two things that you want to do for yourself and schedule them into your day. I find most moms find it easiest to schedule at the beginning of their day, around lunch, and/or the end of the day.
Some ideas might be a ten minute walk, reading a book, taking a long hot shower and listening to a podcast or music, watching a television show or part of a movie you love, yoga, journaling, and I could go on.
The key here is that it has to be 2 activities that you can get done daily that you WANT to do because you love doing them. I want you to pick two because you might find one time works better than another. After a week, you may see you want to stick with one. Just try doing SOMETHING for yourself.
Creating non-negotiable time for you.
Scheduled time becomes non-negotiable. This mommy time can’t be touched under any normal circumstances.
If you’re someone that talks themselves out of self care. You might find yourself saying, “this can be put off till tomorrow,” or, “this really isn’t that important to me” this might feel a little tricky. This will feel really awkward at first. That means that you are making a change.
Moms who have put taking care of themselves off for a long time and haven’t prioritized their own needs can struggle with it because everything else feels urgent. Keep in mind -when everything is urgent, nothing is. That includes mom’s self care.
Go back to asking some of these questions to help you reprioritize your tasks.
The mom who says, “I can’t take anything off the list”.
The other thing you can do is simply add yourself to your to-do list. If you are the kind of person that always has a list that isn’t getting done, stop using your list as a reason you can’t take of yourself. The list excuses your from taking action. It prevents you from making necessary change.
If everything’s not going to get done anyway, stop using that as an excuse. You can take care of yourself. You just have to decide you matter.
If you have five things you want to do to take care of yourself then pick on. Put it at the top of the list as a non-negotiable for today. I will say that if you start prioritizing taking care of yourself and refilling your cup, that all the other pieces tend to fall into place better.
The case for Mom’s Self Care
I’m not going to say that you’re suddenly going to have a perfect house, that’s always clean, the kids always love every meal that is prepared, and all of the schedules align perfectly where you have dinner at the table every night. This is not what I’m saying.
When crap hits the fan you can handle it.
There will be the energy to take a pause and look at whatever chaos is going on with a little bit more perspective and be a little kinder to yourself. It’s really easy to not be kind to yourself.
Rest provides Energy – that we all need.
Our brains often will go to negative first and we’ll start this inner self talk – “Well, this is just one more example of why I’m not a good mom, why I’m not a good wife, why I’m not a good friend, why I shouldn’t have even started this.” Stopping that requires having something left in the tank when the pieces get hard to juggle.
You want to make sure that you’ve got bandwidth for those days and one of the ways you do that is by constantly refilling your tank. This is done in small ways throughout the day and the week.
I mentioned this low level anxiety twice now. Have you ever tried to relax in the afternoon and got a cup of coffee or a cup of tea or a soda or whatever, and just sat down but could not relax. You might try a favorite activity but you just could not let yourself get into it. and you were like, “I’m just going to like read a book for 10 minutes,” but you couldn’t relax into it?
You have to decide.
That’s a sign that taking a few minutes for yourself on the daily is going to help you immensely. It’s going to kind of decrease that ants in the pants anxiety feeling. It’s going to reduce that so that you can deal with more of the ebb and flow of life.
Stop telling yourself you don’t have time to take care of yourself, and either reprioritize the list of things you have to do and create time that way, or just simply add taking care of yourself to the list.
Moms, that’s really my biggest suggestion to you, start making self care non-negotiable. You can’t keep putting it off until the kids are out of the house. It can even start with just morning coffee alone for 10 minutes.
The key to preventing burnout is you. You will need to remind yourself that everything isn’t equally important or urgent.
It can be really hard for some of us to tell our kids no or tell our spouse that he will have to wait, but the trade off is it will mean you’ll be less frazzled and short tempered once you start taking care of yourself. Most families get on board quickly – because MOMS SET THE TONE. It will make the entire house feel less frazzled.
Want to STOP BURNOUT NOW?
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