I’m learning you don’t have to do life in hard mode, even when things are hard.
After fourteen years of wrestling off and on with arm pain, I finally surrendered to the doctor’s recommendation: surgery on both arms. The first, on my dominant left arm, took place earlier this month. Next month, it’s ole righty’s turn.
In the past, when a stressor like these surgeries happened, my go-to move was to let it show as little as possible. To not ask for support unless it was “really bad.”
It’s not that I never asked for help. But I had a habit of waiting until the final straw had already sent the camel down for the count to even consider lightening my load.
Why was I so bent on showing everyone that I could handle it all? On some level, I believe I was worried about needing too much or being too much. If I let anyone see my neediness, the jig would be up. Everyone would know what I fear to be true: There’s something wrong with me, and I don’t really belong anywhere.
It doesn’t take a grad school education in counseling psychology, like mine, to spot this thought as dramatically unhelpful. Jumping to the worst possible outcome is called catastrophizing. Catastrophizing, like other cognitive distortions, is not a reliable guide for action. Still, an intellectual realization doesn’t always translate to changed behavior in the wild. I would need to act differently to teach myself that things could be different.
So, I decided to be deliberate: I would use this set of surgeries to practice a different approach. Maybe my arms wouldn’t be the only part of me to heal.
I had already started to see that hitting your absolute limit isn’t always the best way to meet a challenge. For example, while training for a big race series this fall after last year’s cancelation, I obeyed my training plan, which encouraged me to dial back the pace for long runs. Wouldn’t you know it? I ran farther than I had in a decade, but slowing down made those long runs feel breezy. Later, during the race weekend, I clocked my fastest finish time yet. The experience taught me, in a way I could feel deep in my bones and tendons, how powerful pulling back can be.
During an afternoon retreat last month, the insight crystalized: You can find ease even while doing what’s difficult. By dropping the performance of perfection and being truthful about where you’re really at, it’s possible to soften some of the edges of hard mode.
Here’s a non-exhaustive list of how I’m seeking ease in difficulty as I recover from surgery:
- I let my people in on what was going on. I texted friends to tell them in advance about the surgeries, even though I didn’t have any clear needs in mind. It felt awkward to make a personal announcement, but I realized it would be strange if any of them didn’t loop me in if the roles were reversed. And I learned that letting people in allows them to offer whatever support they can. I’ve benefitted from streaming recommendations, company, calls, and check-in texts.
- I’m saying yes to offers to help. I worry about asking for too much. So it took some courage to respond to my preschooler’s teacher’s offer to help by asking if my three-year-old could attend extra days for a little while. She said yes, and it’s a huge difference-maker not to be caring for him by myself right now. In the same vein, I took my parents up on their offer to extend a planned trip to help with the kids in the first days after surgery. Another out-of-my-comfort-zone-but-worth-it yes brought a cleverly adapted bra I could put on myself tailored by a sewing maven friend – and, more importantly, a deep feeling of being cared for.
- I’m asking for help for things that may seem small but add up to something big. For example, I asked a friend who was coming over if she could bring along her copy of our book club book for me to borrow. It’s a relief not to need to figure out how to get to the library across town that has it when I can’t drive, even though, yes, of course, I know how to take a bus or push a buy now button. Another neighbor friend drove my youngest to his nearby preschool one day, a 20-minute task that made my family’s morning.
- I’m letting go of expectations that don’t fit. I’m walking daily but letting the excursions be as slow and short as is comfortable instead of holding myself to fitness goals that don’t fit the moment. Likewise to sleep routines. They’re important, but sometimes you need to turn off the alarm. My husband and I also canceled a family fall break trip that would have happened a week post-op. I love traveling with my family, but I had to accept that making this trip happen would surely have sent us all spiraling.
- I paused instead of pushing through professionally. I gave my regular assigning editors notice that I’d be taking some time off, a grace I failed to give myself during a health crisis a couple of years ago.
- I’m seeking joy. At times in my life, I’ve felt like enjoyment and pleasure is an unnecessary bonus for unserious people. Now I know better. Appreciation, wonder, and delight fuel us for the rest of life. During my post-op walks, I unabashedly stop to admire the fall colors and soak up the sun in the clouds. I’m letting my kids crack me up. I’m sinking into shows and books.
The key for me is that none of these things are 100% necessary. There is an alternate timeline where I don’t tell anyone outside of my immediate family, push through with work, and don’t change my expectations for myself. Sure, I’d flame out with stress, but at least I wouldn’t have risked bothering anyone else until I absolutely had to.
It’s also noteworthy that none of the above tactics are particularly grand. They’re all comparable to things I’d do (or have done) for a friend or would advise a loved one to do.
Nor do any of them erase the pain of a major surgery. The difficulty is still there, it’s just alleviated a bit. This is an important point: Ease does not mean easy. I’m still physically uncomfortable, as expected. But assuaging difficulty in small ways has greatly impacted my well-being during this recovery period. I don’t feel overwhelmed. I feel supported. I’ve found small joys every day. I mean, I’m still me, which means I’ve got my normal bugaboos, including a restless “need to be productive” I have to swat down. But overall? I’m doing well, actually.
So, how did I reset myself from hard mode? I sure didn’t come up with a list of ease-full ideas all at once. But I did ask myself curious questions:
- What is my priority right now? How can I be flexible with everything else?
- What expectations could I adjust temporarily?
- What would being gentle with myself look like in this moment?
- How could I add ease right now?
- How could I lower the stakes?
- Could I ask for what I honestly want and trust others to say no if it’s too much?
- Could I say yes to this offer of support?
Bit by bit, the answers to these questions have led me to an unexpected place: I’m recovering from surgery, and I feel pretty good. Two things can be true.
It turns out that difficulty and ease can coexist, and life becomes lighter when you let them.
My Latest Writing & Editing
One of the coolest things about being a freelance writer is that you see how the sausage is made for some of the internet’s most trusted publications. It’s a thrilling prospect. Still, you’d think glimpsing the process that the public doesn’t could lead to some disheartening discoveries.
But the opposite happened when I started writing for Reviewed (part of the USA TODAY Network) [pdf].
As a freelance parenting writer for Reviewed, I learned first-hand about the quality and thoughtfulness that went into their product review process. Once I started working for them, any time I needed to make an important purchase myself, I made sure to read through what my colleagues there had written.
That’s why it feels like such a loss — not only for the publishing community but for the public — that Reviewed announced it will be shutting down next week, on November 1.
As I reflect on my time writing for Reviewed, I’m so grateful for the assignments I was trusted with and the great team I got to collaborate with — and I’m sending them good work mojo as they seek new professional opportunities.
At Reviewed, testing was always epic. For example, I took over 300k steps while pushing my youngest during stroller testing — which in retrospect was terrible for my arm situation, whoops!!
Check out my hard-won Reviewed articles out below (with links to Reviewed and to self-hosted pdfs since none of us know for sure what’ll happen to the articles once the site sunsets).
The Best Kids’ Winter Boots of 2023 [pdf]
The Best Breast Pumps of 2023: Babyation The Pump Update [pdf]
The Best Strollers of 2022 [pdf]
The Best Baby Spoons of 2022 [pdf]
The Best Nursing Bras of 2021 [pdf]
The Best Booster Seats for Dining of 2021 [pdf]
The Best Maternity Leggings of 2021 [pdf]
Book Recommendations
The Life Audit: A Step-By-Step Guide to Discovering Your Goals and Building the Life You Want, by Ximena Vengoechea
Written by a former user researcher, Life Audit is the sturdy, wide-toothed comb you can count on to painlessly untangle your thoughts so you can live a life better aligned with your values. In its pages, you’ll find an unusually well-conceived, welcoming roadmap for gaining clarity about what direction to head next, something most people I know wonder about to some degree at least once a year. I want to press a copy of this book into the hands of all my favorite people.
*Thank you to NetGalley for the advance review copy. See my disclosure statement for my policy on accepting books for review.
Psychology According to Shakespeare: What You Can Learn About Human Nature From Shakespeare’s Great Plays, by Philip G. Zimbardo, PhD, & Robert L. Johnson, PhD
Psychology According To Shakespeare is simultaneously a primer on Shakespeare’s creative corpus, psychological theory, and the historical context of each. I know a fair amount about psychology and some about Shakespeare, but I don’t think knowledge of either is a prerequisite for appreciating this book. Plus, pre-existing familiarity will only enhance your appreciation of the authors’ fascinating observations about Shakespeare as a prescient, intuitive psychologist.
This is nonfiction of the type I like best — a novel view into the stuff that’s all around us, done expertly. Not only are there 60 pages of endnotes (and a bibliography), but the authors really are luminaries in the field (Dr. Zimbardo is *that* Dr. Zimbardo of the Stanford Prison Experiment fame. Sadly, Dr. Zimbardo passed away earlier this month at age 91).
This book is intellectual, for sure. You’ll find it’s driven more by clever analysis than breezy storytelling. For me, that’s a recipe for a page-turner. But if that literary style is not your jam like it is mine, you might not enjoy this book as much as I did.
Recommended for fans of psychology, Shakespeare, theater, and history.
*Thank you to Rowman & Littlefield for the advance review copy. See my disclosure statement for my policy on accepting books for review.
Hate Follow: A Novel, by Erin Quinn-Kong
Hate Follow is as addicting as it can be to check up on that influencer you just can’t believe. This novel follows the story of an influencer mother and her daughter who can’t stand being content any more.
I read this during a summer weekend, and it was the perfect book for that scenario. Interesting, smart, and equally easy to read on the Kindle app and device so I barely had to put it down.
I liked that no one in the book is really awful. It’s easy to see the worst in momfluencers (for me at least), and while I never liked the one in this book, I appreciated that not every choice she made along the way was completely terrible, even if mostly made me cringe. The action feels driven by the characters but also by the contexts in which they find themselves, which makes for a more interesting exploration of the issues than a lone horrible person would.
All in all, a fun fiction book that I recommend to readers who like novels that intelligently explore a contemporary topic, like Such A Fun Age (Kiley Reid) or I Have Some Questions for You (Rebecca Makkai). Also seems like it would be excellent for book club discussions.
*Thank you to NetGalley for the advance review copy. See my disclosure statement for my policy on accepting books for review.
Browse more books on my Bookshop | Read more reviews on my Goodreads
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This is honestly great. I am so glad you thought about this conscientiously and as a person who is (I know you’re surprised) terrible at this it really is worth thinking through.
I am surprised! But I’m learning to be less shocked the more some of the smartest, most competent women I know open up about this kind of thing. It’s part of what inspired me to write about it — I’m clearly not the only one who has to unlearn the hard mode tendency. I’m hoping we can get energy from each other’s efforts to break these habits.