Feeling burnt out as a stay at home mum? Learn simple self-care habits, why a calm home is important and how hobbies will help you feel like you again.
Last year was a really tough year.
We spent most of the year in surgery recovery, Anest grew out of her off-road wheelchair and it felt a little bit like life just got put on hold.
I ended the year feeling just a *little bit* burnt out.
And honestly? That’s not how I had hoped to be going into the new year.
But that is okay, because I think sometimes you have to hit a point where you feel like you can’t keep feeling the way that you and it’s time to do something about it.
To start feeling more like you again.
To get your spark back.
Whatever you want to call it, if that’s how you are feeling too, then I am right here with you.
It is time.
We burnout for so many different reasons.
Life is stressful, it’s busy and there are seasons where it can feel like taking care of our own needs is impossible.
But it’s important that we do, because not taking care of us is the reason we burn out.
Here is the thing though, if life is busy and we burnout and then make an effort to feel better, but don’t do anything to change our lives/stress levels – we are going to just burn out again.
Feeling like us again involves making changes in all areas of our life and not just deciding that losing weight will fix all our problems – which tends to be something a lot of us do!
We also need to make smaller, more sustainable changes because nobody wants to feel better just to for a few months and then have to restart the cycle again.
Even if you don’t feel like you are burning out but you still feel like you want to feel more like you again for whatever reason – this post is for you too.
How to feel like you again
Your vision
A year from now, what would you like your life to be like?
Instead of thinking about what you want your life to look like, I think that the best way to answer this question is to think about what you want your life to FEEL like.
Remember when you are creating a visualisation that you do it in the present tense – like you have already achieved those things (e.g. I am)
Instead of ‘My house to be clean and decluttered’ think about what that would feel like – ‘My home to feel calm and cosy, like I am on top of everything – it’s a place I can relax in’.
‘I want £1000 in an emergency fund and £ X saved’ becomes ‘I feel in control around money, our bank account looks healthy and I feel calm knowing we have money if an emergency happens’.
It might not seem like much of a change, but when you are writing it out what you will notice is that it will feel less like a todo list, and more of something that gets you feeling excited.
You are allowing your brain to think and feel about what you want life to look like – and that’s powerful.
Try it and let me know if you feel the difference.
Create some goals to help you get there.
I recommend working backwards for this. Start with your goal then work backwards to where you are now to work out what steps you need to take to get there.
Just a note here – don’t overwhelm yourself. The goal here is to feel better and not to get out of feeling a little bit burnt out to go straight back into it so just choose a couple of goals to focus on at a time.
Sleep
We know sleep is important.
For a lot of us, if we have young children or we are carers, a full night sleep isn’t the norm.
I think I can count on one hand how many I have had in the last 13 years.
So if you can’t do much about how much sleep you get – then you need to focus on the quality.
Start by going to bed a bit earlier. Even 5 minutes earlier will add up.
Sleep is really important in helping us manage stress and to help us cope better with life.
We all know what it feels like to have a night where you hardly sleep, everything feels so much harder the next day and we have less patience, coping and tolerance because of it.
Not getting enough sleep makes everything just feel overwhelming and it can really affect our mental health.
So if you are feeling not quite like you lately then getting more sleep is definitely one to focus on.
If you do have a bad night sleep it’s important to try and rest if you can too.
Move your body
One of the fastest ways to feel like us again, is to move our body.
Not only does moving your body move the stress through your body, so you are going to instantly feel much better anyway.
It also boosts those feel-good hormones and gives you a confidence boost.
All these things combined just help us to feel much more like ourselves and to have a bit more clarity on where it is that we want to be or do with our lives.
That doesn’t mean that you should start doing high intensity HIIT classes or sign up to some sort of boot camp – it means moving in a way that you enjoy moving and that makes you feel good afterwards.
If you are feeling a bit burnt out or tired all the time or like your stress levels are too high then the best place to start is with a lower intensity workout.
Such as walking, pilates or yoga or maybe swimming.
There are a lot of different low intensity workouts that you can try – just give it a google to see what you can find.
Exercise raises our cortisol levels – which is a good thing – but when our cortisol levels are already too high because we are under way too much stress, we are going to just feel worse.
That is why low intensity workouts are recommended because they don’t raise them as high, and actually help to bring those stress levels down.
We need to spend less time in our heads and more time in our bodies and movement helps us to do that.
Just remember that walking counts.
You don’t have to overhaul your life to fit in some exercise routine that is only going to last a couple of weeks.
Start slowly.
If you don’t move at all now, bring in one workout a week then add a second one the week after.
Make it simple and fit it into your life in a way that works for you and your life.
How eating well will help you feel like you
One of the ways we tend to trip ourselves up when it comes to feeling more like ourselves again is we instantly think that the best route is to start eating really strictly and healthily.
We declare that we are going on a ‘health kick’ and that we aren’t going to eat takeaway or chocolate or *insert favourite snack* here.
It lasts a couple of weeks, and while we may feel good initially – it’s not very joyful constantly fighting cravings.
So as with everything…I suggest starting small.
Start with the foundations – making sure you are eating three meals a day, eating a balanced plate and listening to your body (eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are full).
It’s a lot easier to feel like you when you are not absolutely starving.
Eating a balanced diet helps us to feel like we can cope better because our energy levels are a bit more balanced.
This isn’t to say you can’t have a chocolate when you fancy one but be mindful about it – I have at least one of my favourite snacks everyday.
Life is too short.
The best way of eating well without making it a restrictive diet is to add in.
Instead of trying to cut out loads of different foods or food groups, try adding in more whole foods instead.
The more whole foods that you are adding in to your day, the less room there is going to be for those less nutritious foods.
There is still room for them, but just a little less room.
Making little changes like this stops us falling into a binge/restrict mindset – where we are really strict about what we can and can’t eat and then next thing we have eaten an entire packet of custard creams.
I may be talking from experience.
So make it easier for yourself, start by making a point of eating three meals a day and trying to make them balanced (carbs, protein, fat, fibre, fun) and then make a point of trying to eat as many whole foods in your day as you can.
It doesn’t have to be complicated, and being healthier shouldn’t take over your life.
Make it easy.
Do things for you
As mums we spend a lot of time thinking about things we can do with the kids.
But we need to be doing things that we enjoy too.
If we aren’t mindful about it, we can get to the end of the day and other than the usual motherhood tasks, and cooking and cleaning and laundry, we haven’t really done anything for us.
And it is going to be very difficult to feel like us, if we are not doing any of the things that make us feel like us.
Start making a point of setting aside 10-15 minutes every day to read your book, or work on your craft, take a long bath or go for a solo walk, or do a workout.
Whatever it is that you enjoy doing, make a point of adding it in everyday.
Arrange to meet up with a friend for a coffee, block off an afternoon while the kids are in school to go and have a look around your favourite shops or bookshops.
Have a monthly solo date.
Make time to get together with friends or join a community of like-minded people.
Book yourself in for a haircut or a manicure or whatever it is that helps you to feel like you.
Try something new – sign up for a class, or a workshop or a course.
Doing things for us not only helps us to feel like us, it’s really good for our mental health.
It helps us:
- Reduce stress and anxiety
- Brings us joy
- Practice mindfulness
- Gives us more confidence & Self-esteem
- Helps keep our brains healthy
- Gives us a better life balance
- Helps us socially
The list could go on.
If you are not sure what it is that you do enjoy doing anymore, do a bit of a brainstorm about what it is that you used to enjoy as a kid and then see how you can bring those things back into your life.
How a calm home will help you feel like you
Maybe on your list of things that will help you feel like you your house didn’t come in to it – but it’s an important piece of the puzzle.
Managing our stress levels is a huge part of stopping us burning out, and our home is one of the places that we are a little bit more in control of managing those stress levels.
We also need somewhere that we can go to when life is busy and we can feel safe and calm – your home should be that sanctuary.
Less stress and Less stuff means that there is more time to focus on doing things for us instead.
Less stuff = more life
Visual clutter causes us a lot of stress, much more than we realise, so decluttering is a good place to start.
Having less stuff, not only gives you less visual clutter, it also makes life a lot easier.
It means less stuff to clean, less things to tidy up, less things to rummage through when things get lost and it means that your home feels a bit calmer and less stressful too.
Which means that you will also feel a bit calmer and less stressed.
Rhythms & routines
Routines may not sound like the most fun of things, but they are a life-saver when it comes to keeping on top of your home.
Our brains are full of all the things that we need to do and remember – when did we last clean the oven? We need to remember to do a grocery order! Etc.
So having a routine helps us to free up some of that mental space, because instead of trying to hold all of that information – we have a plan for it.
We don’t need to stress about when we are going to clean this or that because we know that that gets done on a Tuesday.
The thing that puts people off with routines is that life can be a bit unpredictable, especially if you are a parent carer but a routine is meant to be there as a loose guideline that supports you.
If nothing is on the Tuesday you can get what you need to get done, but if something crops up and you can’t do anything on the Tuesday – there is always going to be a Tuesday the next week.
So instead of spiralling about things, we can relax a bit knowing that it will get done.
As tempting as it may be to ignore this step, doing things to reduce your stress levels is very important.
Some other routines that will help you to feel calmer and more in control of things are routines to help you keep on top of laundry, meal planning, workout or when you are doing any physio or therapies etc.
Make it small
It’s tempting, when you want to feel more like you or to overcome burnout to just go all in.
To try and make changes in all areas so that you feel more like you faster.
If might work initially, but you will very quickly burnout and we back in square one again, so make slow, gentle changes.
Focus on one thing a week.
On week one focus on your sleep.
Then the next week or longer than that if that’s what you need, add in movement.
And keep going like that until one day in a couple of months you completely changed everything and you didn’t even have to overhaul your life for it.
Doing it slower means that it’s more likely to last.
And what we really don’t want it to feel like we feel more like us, and that we are less burnt out but a couple of weeks later we are burning out again so slow and steady really is the answer here.
I hope this helps, if you need any more help let me know!
Beth x
