Anxiety with a side of

Fries, Carrie B, Papa Roach, Fun Chill Mom. Stomach Bug for dessert!

Friday. Friday. Friday.

I wrote a few different jumbled sentences to intro this post but none of them were doin it for me. The beginnings couldn’t find the ends. And the middles were out to lunch. Or maybe my brain is out to lunch. I’ll take a large Anxiety with a side of…I don’t even know what. SEE! I can’t even come up with that. No endings. No nothin. Maybe it actually should just be Anxiety with a side of Fries. Fries don’t need to be subbed out to fit a metaphor. Fries are fries. Don’t mess with the fries.

Brain? Come back.

I can get pretty anxious on Fridays or actually Thursday evening which is where I am currently as I type to you all. The Ghost of Anxieties Past.

Recently something about a no-plans staying put weekend approaching more often than not gets my nervous system short-freakin-circuiting. I wish I could be sitting here typing away all “I couldn’t help but wonder” but actually Papa Roach is screaming SUFFOCATION, NO BREATHING in my head like a white noise machine lulling me straight to Crazytown. And I’m the Mayor. Carrie and Papa Roach in the same sentence. Who woulda thought.

Maybe it’s that my work is no longer a straight and narrow Monday through Friday 9-5 with a start and finish. I don’t quite have that built up -see ya later-we made it-I deserve it-sigh of collective relief that Corporate America so enthusiastically exhales on Friday afternoon. The perfectionist who thrives off of accomplishment and praise is out of orbit by being my own boss and lacking a clear linear task list. And with 3 boys under 4 who wake up ready to ROAR, weekends are not necessarily the 72 hour free for all of deciding to do all the things or do none of the things at my own will. And even on my most well adjusted days, that Friday school pick up time tick tick ticks away in my head not unlike a time bomb. Maybe it’s work or motherhood or my period or that weird thing I said at a party 5 years ago. Maybe it’s that these days, every inch of me and every inch of my day is being gobbled up in the heavy quick sand of she’s not here. I no longer have her. And it’s really really freaking hard to be a mom, without your mom. It’s really freaking hard to do anything without your mom. To see anything but quick sand filling in.

But even on a more normal, light on the quick sand Friday, rather than it being and feeling the start to the fun, I often can’t help but frame it as the end of the opportunities, the end of childcare, the end to more than an hour to myself, the end of having more windows to sit in my grief or ADD or finally gaining momentum on that project or clean out or feeling GOOD. And I fully recognize my privilege. The luxury of a flexible work schedule and, even more so, the blessings of three healthy, relatively seamless to conceive babies sleeping safely in their warm beds. Full stop. I also know Weekend Warrior is a term that takes a whole new meaning for everyone and anyone with children. My soap box is or can be or is warranted to be a crowded one by many a parent hustling between games and birthday parties and the 3pm tantrum. Times a million for those doing it alone. Some of you might want to slip slide me off this soap box before I get another word in to make room for someone more worthy.

However my soap box isn’t really about the meat and potatoes of my weekend meal- about the substance. It’s about how I’m surveying the menu. I wish I more frequently viewed our lazy and lovely weekends at home or even the crazy but FUN booked and busy busy as just that- lazy and lovely, crazy but fun. With a full stop. I wish I viewed it as a chance to hang with the adorable delicious offspring I know one day might be too busy or too jaded to want to be attached to my hip. As a time to regulate and reset and really enjoy making that banana bread. To hang with friends or just each other. To experience and revel in the ~bEaUtIfUl cHaOs~. To nod enthusiastically to the Instagram videos of children giggling down slides with heartfelt music telling you the days are long but the years are short YOU UNGRATEFUL CHECKED OUT MOFOS.

I want to view weekends and family life in general like this because we do do all those things. And as I type this I know in my heart that I do feel genuine joy and appreciation. I love my kids with every cell in my being. Full stop. I smile and sigh and roll my sleeves up at curveballs. I take couch naps next to a realllly really cute kid who sucks his thumb and likes to fall asleep with his hand on mine. I tickle feet and come up with games and do funny voices. I chat with friends and make time for me. I laugh at the craziness while sipping a cocktail and side stepping spilled milk. I can be Mother Theresa meets Reba bless her soul McEntire navigating the lose-lose mine field that is an underdeveloped frontal lobe on a sugar high and a he-stole-my-toy low. I say to my husband “How lucky are we???” with not an ounce of sarcasm or irony.

And yet there’s still such a large part of me that is just holding my breath and wanting to fast forward to Sunday night. To sprint through it all. Dreading it all. Fight or flighting it all.

I want to be the fun roll with it Mom. And I am that Mom! That Woman! But I also am so so not that Mom sometimes. Often at the same time as being Fun Chill Mom. Fun Chill Woman. In a blink of an eye I’m light as a freakin fancy-free feather and I’m also all short-fuse explosions and sinking to the bottom wearing a weighted vest of GMTFO. I know this is the both/and. But sometimes I’m so weighed down by that double existence that I don’t feel like carrying a banner for it. I don’t want to march. I just want to wave the white flag.

The comments and notes and emails I received from you all last week were overwhelming in the best most beautiful way. They filled me and grounded me and I am working to get back to each of you to thank you- and at the very least acknowledge that you can build the plane while it’s flying but it sure helps the momentum if the passengers are enjoying their flight, missing windows and all. It’s a bumpy ride but I’m grateful for every inch of support and “keep flying” that you are all giving me.

That said, re-reading my post and re-reading your kind words had me wanting to clarify or rather elaborate on my thoughts. See, for every “We Can Do Hard Things” and definitely every “Faucet on Full Blast” phrase I type dripping in resilient positivity, I hope it’s clear that there’s a side of me that is sometimes dripping- no, drowning- in an anxious angry negative can’t do it don’t wanna do it NOT! gonna! do! it! ball of blah. And I guess I just wanted to make sure you all know that I know that sometimes you can’t swim against the current, or fill that cup all the way up or be all “I Am Woman Here Me Roar”. And while I think I said that to an extent, The Ghost of Anxieties Past just wants to drive home the acknowledgement that sometimes you just need to make your way through that extra large double Anxiety with a large Fry. Even though there’s a nutrient-dense Positivity Power Bowl waiting for you in the fridge. Sometimes you’re gonna need to lie horizontal while Papa Roach screams at you.

This June will be 4 years since my mom was diagnosed with the rare and bitch of a disease, Amyloidosis, paired with a prognosis of only a few months to live. In attempts to help guide me through the whiplash of trying to remain hopeful while also being weighed down with the terrifying possibilities looming (and being a new mom to a 3 month old in a pandemic), my therapist (obsessed with her) shared a now favorite, seemingly simple yet so impactful, sentiment:

“Two feet on the ground.”

I wanted to fit this in last week but the idea is that whether you’re hopping on one foot full of persistent positivity or leaning on the other filled with loom and doom, you are going to get knocked over either way. While there’s no denying the power of positive thought, if you refuse to see and understand and prepare for what grave possibilities lie ahead, you’ll fall even harder if they come. And if you allow yourself to be swallowed whole by outcomes yet to even happen, crawling out of your hardship will be all the more impossible. Two feet- the positives and the negatives- firmly on the ground.

Not to say there’s a bit more spring on one side than the other, but I find that you can truly keep swimming, even against the current, when you are filled with faith yet grounded by awareness. And again, I think I said this last week. But I also think there was some propaganda for the happy hopping side of things.

Often loved ones (and certainly strangers) can try to tell you all the reasons you’d benefit from hopping on one foot of positivity and happy happy joy joy. But the slightest light as air nudge can still topple you over. Especially after they leave you there hip hop hopping alone with nothing for balance.

I’ve shared this Two Feet mantra with friends going through their own hard times or just a shit day. And it comes particularly relevant during the conversations we know all too well. You can share with someone how hard the weekend or day or hour was or even just that it was up and down but the down was really freakin down. You share and open up only to have them respond and only acknowledging the up. You get nothing but “But that’s so nice you got away!!” "How lucky are you to have x, y, z!!!”. “But it’s so worth it!!!” “How blessed are you to have had her in your life???!!!!” Not unlike a parent rushing to a fallen toddler shouting YOU’RE OKAY YOU’RE OKAY YOU’RE FINE, I understand the motive behind not making mountains out of mole hills but um, sometimes I fall off the monkey bars and I’m not effing fine? And didn’t you just see what I see or am I going crazy? Didn’t I just lose my mom and yea totally- FULLY aware of how lucky am but um, she’s not effing here.

Like, yes. Totally. For sure look at the positives. But can I just get a “That’s really hard.” Full stop. Even if it’s something everyone has dealt with or is dealing with. Even if everyone else deals with it more gracefully or quietly or for longer.

If you understand and believe someone to be a well-adjusted, aware, compassionate individual, can we also operate with the disclaimer that we know they are grateful, we know their blessings are counted. I’m not gonna set the world on fire if you acknowledge my down just as, if not sometimes more, than my up. I’m not wanting to wallow away. I just want the room to wallow for a hot sec. Or a long one.

Now I know a good chunk of these people are well-meaning single leg happy hoppers doing it somewhat successfully and just trying to help you do it too. I know some have truly tried and tested it all and know this is the only way for them to survive. Some are from the buckle up buttercup generation raised by an even harder nosed generation. Some just don’t know what to say. And another chunk comes from the fact that people are not comfortable with the uncomfortable. They’re gonna extinguish that anxious angry fire in fear of getting burned. Or in fear of me/you getting burned. But sometimes you made it through or know you will make it through. But you just want someone to acknowledge that you were freakin walking through fire. Or fell off the monkey bars. Or had a day trying to keep three kids alive while you’re POSITIVE they’re trying to kill themselves and are out to get you. Or you lost your person.

But what I’m really getting at is that we also do it to ourselves. We can barely let ourselves try a bite of the anxiety sandwich without snatching it away. We probably would’ve thrown it up or thrown it out anyway in our own way (much like how that toddler often brushes themselves off or at least does so the next time when you actually just recognized the fall). But so often, or at least for me, we shove the positive, the be grateful, the we’re fine everything’s fine down our own throats. Talk about suffocation, no breathing.

Why do we need to follow up a negative or fully skip over one and go straight to the bLeSsInGs? Whether talking to yourself or a friend. Why can’t you just say to your girlfriend, I really don’t want to hang with my kids right now without a BUT I LOVE THEM HOW LUCKY ARE WEEEEEE.

I’ve scrolled and saved enough internet memes and solidarity video vents to know I’m not alone in these feelings. I’m not the only one serving herself an Anxiety sandwich or a Resentful sandwich or a Can I Get a Body Double Sandwich. This isn’t a “It's Okay to Not Be Okay” Sermon because we know that and theres enough of them (and they’re needed!). And I know we all do or can have the safe spaces in our mind and in our friend groups to share the uncomfortable with nothing but a full stop after. But I think it needs to happen more? I sure as heck need to stop spiraling and be more comfortable with my uncomfortable. I sure as heck have shoved sunshine down someone’s throat when they probably just needed a “Ugh. I saw that. I feel that. That must have hurt. That must be hurting.” (Parenthood is realizing spiral defusing language works just as good on a 34 year old as a 4 year old).

Two feet on the ground. The both/and, yes for sure. But don’t get caught up in needing to be the spokesperson poster child for both/and. The “This is hard.” humming but the “WE CAN DO HARD THINGS!!!!!” hammering away over top of it. Sometimes it can just be “this is hard.” It can be not wanting something to start. Or not wanting something to end. It can just be. You can just be. Full stop.

Yes, let that faucet run on full blast while you can. But also don’t drown yourself. If you’re a little less roar and a little more squeak at times. To not want to roar. To not be able to. Or you’re sure as hell roaring away but not quite in the way Allison Reddy had in mind, and a little more in a I’LL TURN THIS DAMN BUS AROUND way.

So looks like I found some beginnings and the middle made its way over and here’s an ending. I’m feeling a little less anxious. I’m gonna get some work done. Laundry put away. Maybe we’ll do ice cream before dinner tonight?! Fun Mom. Chill Mom. Fun Chill Woman here me roar.

But suddenly it’s now Friday late morning afternoon, I have too few hours of sleep and I just received a note saying one twin just threw up and needs to be picked up immediately and the other isn’t lookin so hot either.

I can’t help but wonder, what the eff is so good about a Friday??? Full Stop.

BUT I LOVE MY KIDS!!!!!!!!!!

xo

Amanda

PS. If you’re like yo I just came here for some dresses….Stick with me!

PPS. If you missed it, the first little Vintage Haul dropped on Wednesday for paid subscribers. Plenty more to come. And if you’re in NYC this weekend, two of the best and brightest Vintage shows are happening: Manhattan Vintage Show is today May 31st through June 2nd in Chelsea and A Current Affair is happening in Brooklyn Saturday and Sunday June 1st and 2nd. Worth it worth it worth it. My happy places. Other than a twin stomach bug. Blessed!!!!!