Truth Time: I am Awful at Asking for Help, And How It Came Back to Bite Me

If you've been following the blog, you may have read some of my blog posts over the past few weeks talking about self-care and how important it is, especially as a parent (if you haven't read them and want to you can find them here: How to Find Me Time When You're a Mom and here: Chasing Super-Mom Status And Why I Need to Aim For Real Mom Status Instead). I think I'm pretty good about taking a few minutes here and there and doing those things like taking a long shower after the kids go to bed, or treating myself to something nice like a subscription box every now and then. But when push comes to shove and I'm in dire straights, I royally SUCK at asking for help.

This is something that I have been bad at my whole life. I feel like I had a good handle on it for a while, though. Then I became a mom and BAM! It's like I forgot how to ask for help. Many a fight last year between Dan and I resulted from me not vocalizing what I needed from him and expecting him to be able to read my mind and "just know" (I know you get me, right ladies?). Well, obviously that wasn't going to happen. Nothing against Dan at all - this is totally a ME thing. If I can't tell him what I need, how is he supposed to know? He does not have a crystal ball into my mind. Heck, I feel like 1/2 the time I don't even have a crystal ball into my mind. After a few arguments and many tears, I finally started getting better at asking for help, and we were in a groove.

Then Eloise was born. Maybe it was the hormonal adrenaline shift from just giving birth, maybe it was me trying to be Super Mom again, but I suddenly forgot how to ask for help. AGAIN. And I was struggling. I cried a lot after Eloise was born. Not from hormones (though I am sure that was part of it), not from Post Partum Depression (my crying spells didn't last more than a few weeks after Ellie was born), but more I think from sheer exhaustion. I had my routine of everything to do with Annie, I could totally and seamlessly handle adding the responsibilities of mothering a newborn to that mix without skipping a beat, right? Oh, was I wrong. So very, very wrong. So again, after maybe 2 months, Dan had to give me the "You need to start asking for help again" talk. And I really do think I've gotten better.

Just when you think you've gotten better at something, you get smacked in the face with being sick, and that's when you really find out where your weaknesses are. Last week, Dan was travelling for work, and Eloise and I both came down with a fever. Annie had had it the prior weekend, but when you're healthy as a parent, that's a heck of a lot easier to deal with. Turns out Dan also had it, and he was not even home. He had to spend a day of his work trip - the day he was supposed to be at a conference - in bed in a hotel. People who know and respect the limits of their bodies, well when they feel a mean bug coming on, they usually take better care of themselves and slow down to make sure they can fight if off before it gets worse. I am not one of those people, and that is how my not asking for help came back to bite me. Maybe it was the flu, but I think there is a possibility it could have been Strep Throat as well. I had a fever, sore throat, achy joints, chills - the whole shebang. It was rough. I cannot remember a time that I felt that sick in recent memory. When I started feeling crappy on Wednesday, I should have asked someone for help. I started feeling a bit better on Thursday and thought I had kicked it, but NOOOOOO, Friday it came back with a vengeance. Had I not tried to power through it, taking care of the girls alone while Dan was out of town and trying to convince myself that I was NOT sick, I may have avoided the worst of it. But no, unfortunately that's not my MO.

Dan came home Friday afternoon and we were supposed to go to a family Happy Hour, but we were in no condition to make it, and didn't want to get other sick, so we texted and cancelled. My mother-in-law, our angel of the day, said she'd would come and pick the girls up and take them to the get together so that Dan and I could rest. And let me tell you, that made Friday night SO much easier. We were able to simply rest, and didn't have to move. Which was great, because just moving hurt. And the girls had a heck of a lot more fun there than they would have had with us.

And that is when I realized this: I may have gotten better at asking for help on small things, but I REALLY need to get better at asking for help on the bigger things. I always feel like a burden when I ask someone to take my kids for a little bit. Unless they offer, then I don't feel so bad. But out of the blue asking, especially if it's so I can just lay down? I feel like I'm inconveniencing them so that I can "be lazy." Had Dan's mom not taken the girls, I know I wouldn't have asked, and I would have been even more miserable than I already was. And I probably wouldn't have been able to take that time and do a bit of a re-set to relax and unwind before the weekend. (Because you know, it's not like I can learn how to completely slow down and have a weekend where I don't have anything planned. That is next on the list of things I need to get better at, but asking for help probably should be first.)

Saturday morning rolled around and we still weren't feeling well, but definitely were getting a little bit better. Dan knows me, and knows that he had to explicitly tell me not to do anything more than I needed to do on Saturday. I'm so thankful he did, because at the first hint of feeling better, I always think that I need to make up for that lost time of laying on the couch and I try to get a bunch of stuff done. So Dan telling me that was crucial for surviving the weekend. I'll be honest, we didn't even put clothes on Annie that day. She was in her pajamas ALL day long. The only thing I did that day was take Eloise to the grocery store with me to get a few things for a baby shower that I threw for my cousin on Sunday. Other than that, this was our Saturday (our fun and different "activity" for the day was playing in the basement with Santa):

As a work outside the home home, I'm so grateful for weekends. I get 2 days to spend with my family. Sure, we don't do everything together as a family, but we have the chance to spend several hours together at the very least. Every Sunday I get a little bit sad, because these weekends are far too short, and before I know it, Monday rolls around and the landscape of our days go from the photos above to photos more like this:

Being sick on the weekend really puts a damper on it, because I feel like I don't get to truly enjoy that precious time with my family like I want to.

That being said, this past weekend has taught me 2 things:

1) I need to get over myself and ask for help more. And not just ask Dan for help. Ask our village for help. We know a lot of awesome people, so we need to rely on them not only for a quick visit to say hi, but also for the times when we need a break. Truly need a break.

2) I really, TRULY need to slow down and take better care of myself. I haven't quite figured out the best way to do that, but it might start with eating a bit better, and blogging a bit less (so 2-3 times a week as opposed to 4-5 times a week - don't worry I'm not going anywhere!).

I'd love to hear what other people do to take care of yourselves, or how you grew to be comfortable asking for help. A lot of times my blog is about giving MY advice or sharing MY experiences, but I'm no expert. I'd love to hear what advice YOU can give too! I'm constantly trying to find that balance, so if you are too, please share what you're doing. Maybe we can all learn a little from each other.

#parenting #SlowingDown