When Rest is History

 Why Putting Yourself First Feels So deeply uncomfortable

If you’re reading this, the idea of putting you first and foremost, priority, top of the pile (yes even above your kids..!) likely feels VERY uncomfortable.

Most of the women I work with come to me completely overwhelmed, exhausted, running on very little sleep and a lot of coffee, and the idea of resting - or taking a break to recharge - is completely unpalatable. 

The resistance to rest bingo phrases I hear on the regs are:

🎯 ‘ I just feel selfish putting myself first’

🎯 ‘ I can’t relax and stop! There’s so much to do’

🎯 ‘ Everyone else needs me more than my own need to rest’

And guess what? Until very recent times, this was also VERY much me. 

Let me paint you a picture of Helly BC (before children): a tale of rest, restlessness and well, all the rest. 

Before I had kids, my relationship with rest was basically… nonexistent. I’d always been an over-achiever - not necessarily top of the class academically, but definitely an A* for effort, for pleasing, for doing a good job and winning people over. I loved the praise, the sense of being seen as capable, reliable, the one who could be trusted to deliver. That carried straight into my early working years. I was the one who made the tea, who offered to take the notes, who said yes to the extra project, took on the tricky client, jumped at the new opportunity - because I wanted to be the positive, peppy, competent person who could always pull things off - and with flair at that. 

Years in client services honed my presentee surface skills of calm, cheerfulness, competency and absolute ‘leave that to me’ vibes - but underneath I was giving furious paddling swan: late nights, early starts, working hard, playing even harder, keep on pushing and doing more and never really stopping.

But in my 20s, I LOVED this state of being -  I really did! I wanted to do all the things in work, life and more, all of the time. Burning the candle at both ends and all through the middle was my vibe and really the only way I knew. To me, it was synonymous with being a ‘yes’ person - for grabbing life by its cheeks and shouting ‘LET’S DO THIS!’ and my oh my I have had some adventures along the way.

And so for a while it worked. It was fun, exciting, varied, full of twists and turns, exhausting, but sparkly, never dull, gave good stories and was so worth it.

This was until my early 30s when I became a Mum - and the weight of responsibility, breast feeding on demand, having a small human rely on me and the sheer torture of sleep deprivation made me feel like the rug had been whipped out from underneath. Although I was still spinning from this, I was still mostly in a heady daze of new motherhood, in love with this tiny human we had made, bringing her along for a full calendar of jollies with friends, weddings, hen-dos, parties, pub days and all the rest. I just sort of transferred my carpe diem attitude to all things mum AND all things well, everything else. Tired, sure. But what’s a bit more tired when you got a newborn? Let’s keep going!

And then after 11 months I planned to return to work. But my flexible working request - although informally agreed during mat leave with my CEO - was rejected, and I was categorically told my role - essential to the organisation - could definitely not be done in four days. It confused me. It made me doubt all the conversations I’d had agreeing to these terms. Had I imagined this? Was the baby brain taking over? It knocked the wind right out of my sails thinking ‘it must be me - I’m not good enough for the job.’ I never returned, not being able to justify the cost of five days London childcare on a charity salary - but more importantly wanting my Fridays for days with my firecracker of a toddler more than I wanted a full time job. I never returned, and they never recruited for that role.  Suggesting it was perhaps not as crucial as they said.

This was a big blow to my momentum. I felt my ‘ go getting’ had been hit by a huge road block, knocking me off course and leaving me lost, confused, not quite sure where to turn, what to do or even who I was anymore. I channelled this unknown feeling into ‘it’s just new territory!’ positivity, throwing myself into freelance life to be flexible around the growing family, adapting to working and mumming from home a lot, life suddenly shrinking quite a bit and finding myself less and less enthusiastic to throw myself into the fun, adventures and opportunities of yore. 

But it was only around 6 months into having two under three,  where the endless pursuit of more, the keeping going, the grinning and bearing it and the running on empty just kind of ran out. No big dramatic change or a major crisis - just a slow realisation that my energy, my pep, my steam, my get up and go… had petered out. Ppphhhhut.

This was the start of several years of digging deep into the whole idea of rest. What it was and wasn’t in my life, why I was so confronted by it, what it should look like and what it could mean to me. I worked through PND, a rollercoaster diagnosis of chronic migraine, a pandemic, a big relocation with two small humans. I spent lots of time feeling unwell or isolated or like my body was working against me. It was boring, debilitating and very much not on brand for me as a dynamic doer, not a sofa sloth. I felt idle. Rest felt idle. 

During this time I discovered many uncomfortable truths and self reflections, I rid myself of much self sabotage, I reluctantly admitted to the habits that weren’t helping, I tentatively started to put boundaries in place, I reluctantly learnt the power of saying ‘no’ more than yes. I tried new habits and strategies that supported rather than sapped me, my own way to recharge and nourish that worked with rather than against my body and mind. I discovered coaching. (I couldn’t have done any of this without various coaches in fact!) I retrained. I felt well enough again, and had my third baby. 

I learned how to rest - in my own, unique way - and more importantly I truly understood the value of it. 

I know now that rest is essential. For absolutely every single Mum - not just the ones with ‘the time to do it’. But I also know it takes work and digging deep to find how rest works for you (and spoiler alert it will look NOTHING like the next person). And you need support with that work.

My discomfort with rest came from years of being the capable, responsible, go getting one - which 12 years ago, if I’d heard you describe me as, I would have beamed with pride about.   Now I’m viewing that side of me as just that - a part of me, now blended with others that include the slower, better paced, good enough, middle of the road version of me too.

Nowadays rest looks like lots of things to me - less of the traditional naps and pamper days (I’m just not wired that way..), and more of the cutting corners when parenting, sitting down with my kids to slob out rather than running rings around them, spending good times with my GOAT friends, seeking out quiet and space and fresh air more than busy-ness and a full calendar, creative rest in the form of writing, coaching, collaborating with other female founders and playing Disney on the piano as often as I can. Oh and give me some sunshine, a pool and a podcast and I can rest like you’ve never rested before. 

I’m still a work in progress in body and mind, I'm still learning to say no more than yes but in small, quiet ways I’m putting the years of overextension finally to rest.