How to Manage Unexpected Stress for Moms
Episode #36: How to Manage Unexpected Stress for Moms
Stress and anxiety are the things that plague working moms. Often, they try to control the circumstances through various planning to get control of their lives and feel that sense of stability. In this episode of Empowering Working Moms Podcast Real Talk with Dr. Prianca Naik, she shares that it is futile to attempt to control circumstances because life is constantly throwing curveballs. The key is accepting that the universe continually likes to laugh at us and that our plans and control are ineffective. She shares some strategies that create a sense of calm and centeredness when things go awry. To learn more about Dr. Prianca’s systems, tune in and enjoy!
In this episode, you will learn:
Controlling the circumstances in an attempt to get control of our lives
Examples of situations during which things get thrown off
Practicing gratitude can help shift our mindsets to what is working
When these moments happen, remember, “this too shall pass.”
When we resist this suffering, we add extra layers of pain to ourselves
To end burnout and exhaustion and get your peace of mind back, check out her free masterclass on 4 steps to overcome burnout, get rid of overwhelm, and get your peace of mind back.
https://program.stresscleansemd.com/4-secrets-to-living-a-life-you-ll-love-podcast
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www.priancanaikmdcoaching.as.me to book a 30-minute consultation call
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[FULL TRANSCRIPTION BELOW]
Well, hello there. Thank you so much for tuning in. I took a little bit of a hiatus from this podcast and I am shuffling things around in my life, to create more time and space to bring these recordings to you. Because I love this podcast so much and I appreciate you so much for listening.
So before we dive in, I do want to let you know that enrollment is open for my new group coaching program for professional moms in male-dominated fields, who are mentally exhausted in survival mode, but they want to enjoy the life that they work so hard to build and I'm launching this in March.
If you want to hear more about this program, get started on truly loving your life again because you deserve to book a call, priancanaikmdcoaching.as.me. Link is in the show notes and apply to work with me. I would love to talk to you see what's going on with you and see if you're a good fit.
Today I want to talk about something that really affects all of us because stress and anxiety is something that Type A working moms are totally played with am I right? But the thing is, we often try to control the circumstances around us. We plan plan plan in an attempt to get control of our lives and feel that sense of stability. I'm going to tell you that really just does not work because life is constantly throwing us curveballs. The universe constantly likes to laugh at us and laugh at our plans. I'm going to dive into today creating peace and ease by using these strategies.
Remember that trying to control things around us and outside of us actually does the opposite of creating peace and stability. It's truly a waste of time because we really have no control over anything outside of ourselves. As we are currently in the winter here in North America illness is upon us, meaning that illness is upon our children as well, meaning sick kids are staying at home from school and....who is taking care of them? Can I get an Amen? It's the moms, right?
And then when we're working and our work gets thrown off. Because of these illnesses where we have to step in and take care of our children when we're supposed to be working and this is just par the course, right? This is just something that we know arises every single winter and though it might not be fair, working on acceptance of this and realizing it's going to happen can ease some of our suffering and stress about it. There's no use of freaking out about any of this. I'm going to give you some examples of situations during which things get thrown off.
Let's say you are working on having good sleep hygiene and you want to have a good night's sleep. You stop revenge staying up late. Now one of your kids decides that they've either wet the bed, they're up throwing up, whatever and they wake you up and they put a complete kibosh and wrench in your plan, right? So that's one, great example which happens pretty often to us mother's where our sleep gets thrown off.
When this happens, all you can do is try to get back to sleep using some mind-body techniques. I like to use really starting to relax my toes and working my way up the body. As I focus on my breath, sometimes I count my breath and often I will fall back asleep. Now, if that doesn't work, I will try my best to find time during the day, if I can get in a quick nap. If it's the weekend, maybe I can nap with my kids are napping and if your kids are too old to nap, I suggest having some rest time or quiet time in their rooms, even for a little bit. Just so you get a breather and a break for yourself during the day.
The next example, I'm going to give you a something that happened to me last week. So, I actually was all ready, I got dressed I put on makeup which isn't you know, that's not my usual modus operandi and I was all excited to go to Manhattan for a doctor's networking event by SoMe docs and I put my business cards in my purse ready to roll. I was actually meeting up with my old college roommate, Carolyn beforehand and was excited about that. I hadn't seen her since the summer and wanted to connect with her. Literally as I am at the train station and the train pulls up,nI look down at my phone and my babysitter has texted me that she's sick. vNow, this babysitter is reliable so I believe her and I take that second to not get on the train. I make a few phone calls. I send a few text messages to see if anyone else can cover her and care for my children while I go to this networking event and low and behold, there's no one available. So I end up going home. Meanwhile, I've already activated my ticket and paid for the ticket to go to Manhattan on my phone. And of course, I'm all dressed up now with nowhere to go.
Instead of being in a frenzy, instead of being completely frustrated, I had gratitude that my babysitter coincidentally texted me before I got on the train. It would have been much more of a headache to get off on the train stop cross the tracks to go to the other side, get another train going back, and get back on time to be home, when my children were dropped off. I was grateful for spending an evening with them and funnily enough, my older child was having some bowel issues. I'm sure you can relate if your kids are from 0 to 5 age range or maybe even older and it was actually good that I was home to help him with that. So that ended up working out to be honest and I just took the evening to relax and I realized that I was going to bed earlier than if I had gone to this event and come home probably later than, you know, when I was home. So, I just practice gratitude for all the goodness that came up and often when these kinds of things happen. I wonder if maybe the Universe saved me from a car accident or something bad happening. You just never know because you never know what would have happened, right?
Let's fast forward to the next day. Here's another incident where my day was thrown off course I the following day. I actually after this whole thing, my date my daughter's daycare called me that she had one episode of vomiting and they wanted me to pick her up and luckily, I was not seeing patients that day. I did have a podcast episode scheduled with a very special guest whom hopefully I will end up recording that with her and sending that out to you guys. But basically, I had to cancel that and pick up my daughter and instead of being frustrated with the fact that I had to reschedule the podcast recording with my special guest, I had gratitude for the fact that I wasn't on call seeing patients would have been a lot more hectic to shuffle around my day in a range for her pick up. But luckily, I was home and I could do it because what I'm doing when I'm working on my coaching business, I work from home, which is awesome, and it's much more flexible than being on call. In these instances I truly was not in a huff about either one of them and I just practiced gratitude which I think is such an awesome tool. I've talked about gratitude before but it's really useful in moments where you feel like your life is being shaken up or you're being inconvenienced. It's also really useful when you're having a bad day or something bad is happening to you. Gratitude can help shift our mindsets to what is working because so often our brains really, as a survival mechanism, were wired to look at the bad and that can really create an unhappy life experience for us. So, if we practice gratitude not only in these moments but also day-to-day, if you just say a few things that you're grateful for every single day, it can be so useful in just having a more peaceful experience every single day.
I actually just had one more example of this happen this morning. So literally, I'm recording this podcast in the morning and my older one was not feeling. Well, he was nauseous, he woke me up and I tried to get back to sleep and actually it was, it was an awkward time to go back to sleep because it was basically, I think 5:45 a.m. That's always kind of tough to come back from and I have a very important appointment tomorrow actually where I have to be a couple hours away from my home and I had arranged for some backup child care in case one of my kids get sick, but the person who is helping me has an appointment of her own and she's really not going to be back until noon. So, from the hours of 8:00 to noon. I need some backup and so, basically, my brain was working on those arrangements just in case my son ends up being sick, which we'll have to see how the day goes, but instead of panicking, instead of stressing, instead being anxious about it, I know that I will figure it out. Just like, I always have, just like, I always will, everything truly is figure outable. And if you can also remember that you're a problem solver, you're intelligent, you have the answers within you, you don't have to spin out and freak out about something adding an extra layer of suffering to it.
So right now, today, I'm going to take moment by moment. I have a plan, a back-up plan for the eight to noon and that's what I'm going to do and it's totally going to be okay and tomorrow is going to come and go and then I'm moving on with my life. So, remember, when these moments happen, also, this too shall pass. Not only is everything figure out-able but these moments are so finite, they're so short in the scheme of your lifetime. That there's no point in allowing them to steal your joy because they're going to happen again and again but they don't last forever, right? So, remember that. Keep these tools in your back pocket. The gratitude practice, which I suggest doing every day, but definitely during these moments, the idea that this too shall pass is going to come, it's going to go. There's no point in adding extra layers of stress, to yourself and that, everything is truly figure out-able-like Marie Forleo's book title says and really learning to live by that mantra. This mantra comes back to me regularly, keeping me centered and grounded and it really allows me to know I have my own back. This keeps me peaceful and calm. When previously I would have spun out with and made myself miserable, really and truly embracing the discomfort in the moment and allowing it to happen will cause less resistance and less suffering in the end. And remember that suffering is a universal human experience is part of our experience and when we resist this suffering and really play into it, we add extra layers of pain for ourselves.
So if you can see the benefits of the curveball, see how you have solutions, right? And if you don't believe me, think of past solutions during which you solve your issues or work them out, or if the worst did happen, how bad was it truly? And when you handle the situation like a boss, reflect on how well you did remember that part too because so easily we dismiss our own management of stuff. I mean we are going around like machines and it's amazing, right? The more we acknowledge what a great job we're doing the more we can improve our self-concept and appreciate ourselves and then the more we do not have to look outside of ourselves, we don't have to seek external approval and the more inner peace we will have.
So, try any and all of these methods. The next time the universe decides it wants to have a huge laugh at you, laughs its tail off at your expense by putting a wrench in your plans and you throwing a curveball at you. If you want to get started on having this kind of inner peace every day, make the most of your life, have a fulfilling life, get out of exhaustion and survival mode, book a call with me to join my group coaching program. I am launching it in March. www.priancanaikamdcoaching.as.me. Let's get started. Let's go. Thanks for tuning in and I will talk to you next week.