This Season of Motherhood

Older kids, a quieter calendar, and somehow my brain that still hasn't gotten the memo...

This one's for the moms who have dreamt about a free afternoon and then felt lost when it finally happened. You're not alone...I'm figuring it out too.

In this episode I'm talking about the guilt, the tendency to default to hustle mode, and why slowing down physically and slowing down mentally are two completely different things. 

PS - if you're following along here in real time - thank you AND I had a family emergency and had to pivot my podcast schedule this past week but 3 days late is better than not at all. *pats self on the back 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to Open Book with Ash. I am Ashley Moller, your host. And today I'm actually coming to you from sunny Florida in my parents' backyard. Had a little bit of a plot twist in my plans, and I'm down here helping out for a couple of days. And I wanted to keep my promise to myself and keep my promise to you guys and stay on schedule. So I found myself with a little bit of free time and I'm sitting out here by the pool, sputting my ass off in my swimsuit, but wrapped up in a towel. So if you see this one video, it might look like I don't have a top on. I absolutely 100% do have a swimsuit on under this towel. But, anyways, I just, like I said, I wanted to stay on track. So I'm recording this for you guys while I am here. Um, on today's episode, I kind of just want to talk about the season of motherhood that I'm in because it feels so bizarre to me. Um, I have more of a free calendar, if you will, especially during the summer. My clients tend to go to like once a month calls. So we cut back a little bit. And so when I find myself with extra time on my calendar, and my kids are older, right? They're 18 and 12. My daughter is a dancer, so she's got some dance practice throughout the summer. My son plays baseball, but that's mostly on the weekends, right? Um, so I found myself with like more free time on my calendar. And I decided to go to the pool solo. Um, my daughter sometimes wants to go with me. More often than not, it's when she can bring a friend, right? So I get to the pool, and I guess you could say, like, my brain just started giving me shit. It's like, you don't deserve to be here. Like, you have to earn this time for you to go to the pool by yourself by yourself, especially without the kids. And it's like all of a sudden, I realized this season of life where I have more time to just be me kind of snuck up on me. And apparently I'm a little less equipped to handle it than I thought I would be. So yeah, I like, I thought I learned to take time for myself in my 30s when I was like, I am gonna wake up in the morning. I'm gonna be like the morning person. I'm gonna get up at, you know, five, 5:30, do my workout, read some personal development books, you know. That was my downtime. That was my me time. But when you look back on it, I was always moving, producing, doing something, right? It was never just quiet downtime or downtime just for me for fun. So I'm learning that this is a different kind of me time, and I'm not so great at just letting myself be. And I'm still figuring out how to navigate this. And that's just what I want to talk about today. Um, so if you have older kids who don't need you the same way anymore, and you're just kind of like, what? Or if maybe you're sending one off to college, like me, um, or maybe you're even in the thick of it with little kids right now, and you can't even imagine like free time. What's free time? Then stick around because you're eventually gonna be in this spot. I promise you, it will happen. And you might be like me, finding yourself wondering, how in the fuck do I navigate life with all of this extra time? Now, take that with a grain of salt, right? I say all of this extra time, but it's just more time than I'm used to having for myself. The first thing we're gonna talk about is the guilt, right? Like maybe when your kids were little, or maybe now if you have little kids, you dreamt or dream about a free afternoon, right? Or an evening where no one's having a 5 p.m. meltdown. I don't know if it's anybody else's kids, but that's when shit hit the fan for us. But like now it's here, the time is here, and there's no one that you have to read bedtime stories to or tuck in. There's still nightly hugs, though. So don't worry about that. Instead of breathing a sigh of relief that the moment is here, that we have some extra time, we're actually feeling guilt that we're not doing things with them or for them, even if they're off on their own and they're not asking you for anything, or they're with a friend, or they're just doing their own thing. So that guilt is kind of just tied to motherhood being so much of our identity, right? And so when they don't need us anymore, it feels weird and we question it and we realize one, it's just kind of something that happens when you've spent so many years being everything for someone, right? So for me, and maybe your brain does this too, but like when you're not needed the same way anymore, and you get a quiet moment, your brain spirals and it kind of goes into those moments of, oh my gosh, they don't need me as much now. Did I did I hug them enough when they did? Did I read to them enough? Did I miss something while I was trying to balance motherhood, you know, motherhood with other kids or work and kids? And it's exhausting as fuck. Okay, it's exhausting. So back to the whole point of why this came to me. I was at the pool at home, not here. This is this is a different situation. I was at the pool and I'm laying there, and my brain's like, shouldn't you be doing some sort of like mom thing? Right, like giving back to myself isn't a motherly thing to do. And it was like, shouldn't you be with your kids? Shouldn't you be doing something for your kids, with your kids? And I'm like trying to remind my brain, hey, my daughter is with a friend, or my daughter, I don't know if it was the day she was actually with a friend, or if she just said, no, thanks, I don't want to go to the pool. And my son is doing 18-year-old things, right? They didn't even need anything for me, you guys. Like they weren't asking for a thing from me, but my brain, on the other hand, was like, oh no, you should be doing something for them. So, in a sense, it's like this freedom almost feels rude because it's giving my brain space to reflect. And if if your brain's not used to that quiet, it might freak out a little bit. So I'm learning to reflect in a way that it doesn't lead to the negative spiral, but instead kind of finds the good stuff, right? Like the things I did do right as a mom, the ways that I was around enough, the ways that it's naturally, it's a natural progression of life for this to happen. It's completely normal. And it actually is kind of a good thing that they're like off doing their own things and don't need me all the time. So the other thing is for me, and I don't know if you guys can relate to this or not, but like if no one needs me and the guilt feels really loud for me, my brain goes straight to productivity next. It's like, okay, go do something. And it's not like I don't have things to do, right? I have my business, I have this podcast that I started. Erin and I have some goals we're working towards in life. So there are things that I know that I want, things that I'm working on, but I don't need to be working on all those things all the time. But it's crazy because in those free moments, my brain immediately goes to like hustle, work harder, go do something. And for I feel like in my case, it's a byproduct of being in an MLM at one point in my life that kind of um instills that on you. Some of us are just the type of people who were always go, go, go growing up. Maybe you were in sports and all the school activities. And so you just continuously were spending all of your time on the go and now having free time feels weird too, right? The version of me when I was an MLM, I never gave myself downtime, right? I was like, oh, I've got my business. I'm gonna do things for my business. The version of me now wants to find ways to use my downtime that actually are rest, right? That actually help me be more creative. My brain doesn't always have to be turned on. So while my physical calendar opened up a little bit, I have decided to try some new things with that, right? Like I am going to Pilates, I'm getting out of the house, I'm meeting new people, I am um reading just for fun. I used to only read for personal growth. And now that I'm reading for fun, it's like I have a book in my hand, I can't pick up my phone, I can't doom scroll. I bought these fun little color by dot things on Amazon that I'm really enjoying doing. You can pick the colors you want, but it creates an image. It's literally called color by dot. Look it up in this podcast, right? This is another thing. Like these are ways that I am choosing to spend my time that just allow me to be me, that give me the space and freedom to just be and exist. Um, and the podcast is serving like a couple different purposes, right? Um, one of the things that I told you guys is I was kind of getting sick of social media. So I'm using this as a way to creatively express myself without having to show up on social media as much. So it actually is also making me feel more connected to you guys. I know that may sound really weird, but it's just like a different kind of connection without so much pressure. And that's actually really good for me. But the other thing that I think is really important to talk about is yes, physically, like your calendar may open up and you may have more time as your kids get older. But physically slowing down and mentally slowing down are two completely different things. So my calendar may be less busy, but my brain is still like go, go, go, go, right. And that's where I think some of that like hustle culture mentality comes in. So I'll sit like, even though I am reading, right? I'm taking the time to read. Sometimes I'll sit down to read and my brain will immediately be like, you should be doing something. And I kind of have to remind it, no, like this is this is what I'm doing right now. Um, we talk about rest, like it's some just easy decision you can make. But when you're someone who has been going constantly for so many years, sometimes your your brain doesn't get the memo, like, hey, we can chill, like it's fine, calm down. Um, I really wanted to share that with you guys and just kind of be like, this is where I'm at right now. And if anybody else is in this season of life, I see you, I get it, it's weird. Don't get me wrong, having a kid going off to college does take up a a little bit of brain space for me, right? So um part of me is like, if we don't find something for you to do now, like if you don't, if you don't work on this whole like hobby thing and quieting your brain now, you're gonna spend a whole lot of time when your kids at college worrying about someone who's five hours away. And that is not that is a hundred percent not how I want to spend my life, nor would he want me to. So I think working on some of these things and finding ways I can allow myself real rest and also new ways to get out and and fill those spaces. So there's a balance, right? There's a balance between actually letting myself rest and and quieting my brain, and then also getting out and meeting people, doing new things, finding hobbies, etc. Um, finding that balance. And so that's where I'm at right now. Um and I just, I just have to remind myself and you like our kids needing us less is not, it's not a failure. It's literally like the goal, right? It means, hey, like these kids are good, like they're out doing the things they want to be doing, and that's fabulous for them and for us. And this is just an identity shift, and nothing has gone wrong. And we can miss how motherhood was and learn to embrace this season of life. Both can be true. Like we don't have to choose, right? I don't have to ignore the moments that feel different, but what I know to be true is a brain left to its own devices will always do what it knows best. So mine will go down the rabbit hole of mom guilt and convincing me that I need to be doing more, but I can bring it back. Like nothing has gone wrong. This is just a new chapter in my story. And I want to enter it with curiosity, not dread, right? But I mean, when I think about my future self, she wants me to enjoy this time, she wants me to relax and to use this time to rediscover pieces of myself that I've set aside for a while and I'm choosing to see it that way. So the question to redirect when your brain says, you should be doing something right now. Whenever you're just like, hey, I'm gonna sit. And your brain's like, uh-uh, you should be doing something right now. Ask yourself, what is actually important to me in this season of life? Do I really need to be doing something for someone right now? Or is it just habit? Is it just what I'm used to? And what do I want to do right now instead? If no one genuinely needs me, what do I want to do right now instead? And that question looks different whether you're in the thick of motherhood or on the other side of it, but it's always worth asking no matter where you're at, so that you don't completely lose sight of who you are and what you value. And like I said, I do not have it all figured out, and I'm definitely gonna keep sharing as I go. Um, thanks for tuning in this week. Thanks for letting me ramble and get off track a little bit as I am not in my normal space at home, but I still wanted to come to you guys anyways. And as always, take what feels good, leave the rest, and I will talk to you next time.