14: Power of Pause: How to Reclaim Your Life After a Difficult Time

Raise your hand if you can look back in time, and wonder how in the world you survived that difficult week, month, or year. It felt so difficult in the moment, it's a wonder you didn't fall apart!

Believe it or not, there's a lot to be learned from getting through difficult seasons in your life. If you take time to pause, and follow the framework I share in this week's episode, you'll be better prepared the next time challenge strikes!

Listen to this week's episode of The Family Fork where I share a personal account of the major challenges I faced last month. I'll tell you what I learned, how I took an honest look at myself, and how it helped me plan for a better month ahead.

When your life feels like its swimming in chaos, and you're hanging by a thread, it's unlikely you're doing what you need to take the best care of yourself. This episode will help you unlock a refreshed mindset for feeling more calm, collected, and in control...regardless of what's happening around you.

To learn more about reclaiming your life with an easy-to-follow framework, check out The Method: the only weight loss and mindset program designed for moms in perimenopause.

Ashley Malik is a women's health and wellness coach, helping busy moms lose weight in perimenopause. You can learn more, and discover how to work with Ashley, by clicking here!

*** Ready to lose 15 lbs in 10 weeks? The Method gives you all the tools to make it happen! We start April 2nd. To learn more about The Method, click here!

Transcript

I had something entirely different planned for today's episode, but after the month that I just had, I knew I needed to share it with you. Now, coming up in the next couple of episodes, we're going to talk all about goal planning, both the strategy and the mindset needed to hit your health and wellness goals, especially in perimenopause. So you're definitely going to want to tune in for those. But today,

we're going to talk about the month that almost made me quit everything, like quit my health journey, quit my business, quit parenting. Well, no, that's not really possible. But you know what I mean. Have you ever had one of those weeks or months where it just feels like chaos is coming at you from every angle, like everything is going wrong and you can't get things to slow down or quote,

get normal, and life threatens to derail every single thing that you're trying to do. Yep, that was the last month for me, and I know that you have had months like this too.

I want to give you some context as to why last month was so difficult for me. But more importantly, I want to talk about why stressful periods of life like this threaten to derail everything that we have going on in our lives. And we're going to talk about what you do about it so that you can give yourself grace in that stress and then move beyond it.

And I promise, it's a lot more than a few entries in your gratitude journal or faking it till you make it. Because honestly, that kind of stuff just doesn't usually work.

You might be wondering what all of this has to do with family and food, which is what the family fork focuses on, right? Think about it. When things are stressful in your life, are you actually prioritizing healthy nutrition? Are you moving your body or scheduling time to work out? Or are you just holding on for dear life until things kind of return to normal?

whatever that is.

As moms, we all know that we carry this huge invisible load. Things like meal planning, school projects, after school activities, when to schedule doctor and dentist appointments, and what gift to bring to a friend's party.

We call it an invisible load because honestly, it's the 10 trillion things that float around in our head each day that we just remember or that we automatically take care of. We don't really write any of this stuff down. It's just invisible. And yet we get it all done. And half the time, our family isn't even aware of all of this stuff that we manage.

So imagine your usual daily invisible load, a full work schedule, plus some other challenging things thrown in for fun. Yes, I'm rolling my eyes. And you can imagine how it's enough to make any strong woman just throw up her hands and quit. For me last month, here's what the chaos looked like.

I was solo parenting for the majority of the month with a puppy and an almost six year old at home.

We had four and a half snow days, which meant no school. And Suraya was also sick for three more days, which meant three more days out of school. I had my own three day head cold that came with a relentless headache. I had two scary episodes in the middle of the night that actually felt like heart attacks. And one of them even required a trip to the urgent care.

Everything's fine, but apparently my thyroid medicine was suddenly too much for me in perimenopause. So of course that's just one more thing for me to start figuring out.

I helped my parents with a house painting and roofing project. And with my dad's Alzheimer's, this really required a ton of effort and patience. I missed a few self-imposed benchmarks in my business. And to be honest, that felt really frustrating. We had three days of the family being completely wiped out by norovirus, which meant we didn't put up our Christmas tree or bake cookies.

and we had to sell our tickets to the Nutcracker Ballet. And then this morning, I woke up with two really strange bumps between my calf and my shin. I have no idea if they are blood clots or something else, but really they just piled on top of an already challenging month.

Now, to be clear, I am not sharing any of this to complain, but I want to help you see that as moms, our lives are full, like super full. So when things start to go wrong, it can feel like it's all too much. And really, it is just no wonder why we want to literally throw up our hands and just quit.

Now, anyone could look back at this month that I had and say, wow, that was a lot. Good thing it's over. Or some people have actually said to me, well, at least you have x, y, and z going for you. Look, I appreciate gratitudes and all, but with as overwhelmed and frustrated as I've been feeling, trying to look at the bright side just hasn't really been working. Instead, my brain

has been going back to this story that it often plays over and over and over again. This story sounds like this. Nothing ever works out for me no matter how hard I try. Do you have a story that plays on repeat? Maybe yours sounds like that, or maybe you hear yourself saying, you know, my life would be better if I could just learn to be consistent and stick with things.

or, my god, what's wrong with me? I know exactly what I'm supposed to do, but I never do it. Really, I want you to spend some time thinking about this. What is a story that your brain tells you all the time, regardless of the situation? Why is it important to uncover the story that plays on repeat? Because it is actually this story that changes your actions,

It changes your thoughts and it ultimately changes your outcome. So when I hear the story of nothing ever works out for me, my brain sends me straight into protection mode. I stop trying new things because honestly, my brain is just trying to conserve energy at that point. I don't take chances because my brain doesn't want to risk failure.

I mean, when you look at the past month that I had, you can imagine that I'm already feeling like a little bit of a failure. I stick with things that are predictable because that also feels more comfortable. You see, it's our brain's job to keep us safe, to conserve energy, avoid pain, and seek pleasure. That's all that our brain wants to do.

So when we have a month like this, it is truly just human nature to pull inward, to stop trying, and to just wait it out. Can you relate to that? That feeling of just, I'm just waiting until it all passes. But the reality is that we need to really dig into our story that's playing on repeat and figure out what it's making us do.

and what it's stopping us from doing.

The next time your story starts playing loudly, I want you to stop and take some notes. First of all, notice what is the story stopping you from doing? If your story is, my God, what is wrong with me? Do you think that you're going to be bold and try something new, like a new recipe or a new workout? No, you're not going to take any risks. It's stopping you from taking risks.

Or if your story is, my life would be so much better if I could just be consistent, you're probably not adding something new to your daily calendar because really, one more thing added would just be another opportunity for you to be inconsistent, which it's going to make you feel like a failure. So the second thing you should do when you hear your story playing so loudly and consistently is what are

you actually doing.

So for me last month, I was overwhelmed AF. But I was sitting in that overwhelm and I wasn't asking for help. I was definitely pushing things off in the hopes that I get to them eventually. seriously, if you just looked at my laundry room right now, you will know what I mean. And if I am really honest with myself, I was doing what's called buffering.

I was kind of trying to self soothe with things like watching Netflix. I'm currently watching Suits and I love it. Internet surfing and going to bed super, super early, like seven o'clock at night.

When you can get super, super honest with yourself and write down what you're doing and what you're not doing when that story starts playing on repeat, you will see how that story is actually giving you the outcome that you have.

You see, it wasn't the events of last month that almost broke me. It felt like it, but really it's how I thought about them that truly gave me my outcome. Because remember, I woke up most days saying to myself, my God, nothing ever works out for me, no matter how hard I try. That led me to pulling inward, buffering with Netflix and sleeping, and essentially just freezing.

in the hopes that things would blow over soon enough. But ultimately, this kind of feeling and those actions really just left me feeling out of control of my life, my schedule, my house, my routine. I didn't feel like I had control over anything. So by getting clear and honest about what I did and didn't do last month from a thought and mindset perspective,

It's actually helped me to plan differently for a new month. I have already planned for areas where I will ask for help. That's huge for me. I removed some of the things for my business calendar so that I can anticipate setbacks and delays and so I could feel more on top of everything else.

I set some doctor's appointments to tackle these really strange and sudden health issues, and I have already tasked my family with helping out more to get the decorating and baking underway. These are much more constructive uses of my energy than constantly believing that nothing ever works out for me, no matter how hard I try. Hopefully, you can see that this is why that idea of

Fake it till you make it or just write down your gratitudes. It never really gets you out of freeze mode when you are in the thick of chaos. You have to make yourself more aware of the one or two stories that you hear constantly. And then you have to get really, really honest with what you end up doing and not doing as that story plays on repeat.

Because once you can do this and figure this out, you can help your nervous system feel safer and more at ease. And when you feel more at ease, it is easier to handle the inevitable ups and downs that are simply a part of life.

If nothing else, I want you to know that I see you today. I see how much you're juggling that invisible load that you're holding, the hopes and dreams that you're wishing for, and the frustration you feel when it seems like everything is crashing down around you. I really see you because I feel that same way, probably more than I care to admit.

But doing this work to uncover the stories that our brain gives us is ultimately what helps us move forward to create the life that we really want.

This is the deep thought work that we do in the method, which is my program for moms and perimenopause. We really learn how to uncover those stories, those stories you hear constantly every day. And then we make a plan for getting out of freeze mode when the chaos settles in. Looking at your life in this unique way truly changes everything.

If you want to learn more about the method and how it's ready to help you, you can check out the link in the show notes.

Last month was challenging beyond belief, and maybe you were in the thick of it with me. But while you know that you're strong and resilient, sometimes you need a little bit more. When you start hearing that story that your brain plays on repeat, I want you to ask yourself, what am I doing and what am I not doing? Then,

It's up to you to use that information to create a plan to help your life feel more safe and more calm. Life, it's funny, it's never going to go as planned and there will always be curve balls around the corner. But if we can manage our brain and the stories it gives us, we have a much better chance of feeling safe, calm, and in control of our lives.

And I know that you'll agree with me, that feels like a much better way to approach each and every day.