When Even Looking After Yourself Feels Like Too Much

Your Monday Morning Happiness Prompt 🧡

Last week we talked about what can happen when the body has been running on stress for too long.

And there’s one particularly frustrating part of that experience I think deserves its own conversation because sometimes, at precisely the moment we most need care, care itself starts to feel like too much.

We cancel the massage we desperately need.

We don’t book the hair appointment we’ve been meaning to make for three months.

The yoga class we normally enjoy suddenly feels like an impossible amount of effort.

We postpone the dentist.

Ignore the reminder about the eye test.

Leave the lovely face cream unopened in the bathroom cupboard.

Sometimes we even cancel the appointment specifically designed to help us feel better.

And afterwards?

We can be surprisingly unkind to ourselves about it.

“Why do I do this?”

“I know I’d feel better if I went.”

“I really need to start looking after myself.”

“I’m useless.”

But I wonder whether we’ve been misunderstanding what’s happening here.

Because when your capacity is already stretched, even receiving care can require energy.

And when everything already feels like a lot, care can accidentally find itself sitting on the same mental shelf as all the other things we have to do.

Self-care still contains the word ‘do’

We’ve turned self-care into something that sounds beautifully restorative.

And sometimes it is, but think about what a seemingly simple appointment can actually require.

First you have to remember to book it.

Find a date.

Make a decision.

Put it in the diary.

Remember it’s coming.

Work out how you’re getting there.

Finish whatever you’re doing beforehand.

Get changed.

Leave the house.

Drive.

Park.

Walk in.

Speak to someone.

Explain what you need.

Make choices.

Be touched.

Talk.

Then travel home again.

When you’re feeling well resourced, almost none of that registers as effort, you simply think “I’m getting my hair done on Thursday.”

But when your nervous system is already processing a huge amount, the same appointment can feel enormous.

Not because the appointment has changed.

Because your available capacity has.

Sometimes it’s the transition that feels impossible

I think this is one of the least talked-about parts of overwhelm.

Moving from one state into another requires energy.

You may be sitting at home in comfortable clothes, feeling tired but contained.

Then suddenly you have to become someone who is going somewhere.

Shoes.

Coat.

Keys.

Car.

People.

Conversation.

It sounds almost comically small when we write it down but when we’re already overloaded, transitions can feel disproportionately demanding.

It’s why you can spend an entire day looking forward to a bath, then reach bedtime and somehow not have the energy to run one.

Why getting out for a walk feels impossible, even though you know you’ll probably feel better afterwards.

Why you can desperately want your hair done and still stare at the booking page for twenty minutes without choosing an appointment.

Sometimes it’s not the thing itself we’re resisting - it’s everything required to get from here to there.

And care can make us soften

There’s another layer too.

Sometimes the things that care for us ask us to stop.

And stopping can feel surprisingly vulnerable.

When we’re busy, we can keep moving.

Keep thinking.

Keep organising.

Keep attending to the next thing.

But then someone says “lie down. I’ve got you” and suddenly there is nowhere else to go.

The noise quietens.

The body softens.

And sometimes, underneath all that doing, there are feelings waiting.

Tiredness we hadn’t fully acknowledged.

Sadness we’ve been keeping company with quietly.

Tension we’ve become so accustomed to that we didn’t realise how much we were holding.

A need to be looked after that we haven’t allowed ourselves to feel.

This doesn’t mean every cancelled massage is some deep psychological event.

Sometimes you simply can’t face leaving the house, and that’s allowed too.

But there can be something strangely intimate about receiving care.

For women who spend much of their lives being the capable one, the organiser, the helper, the person other people lean upon, being the one who receives can take a little getting used to.

Our nervous system doesn’t always choose what will help later

When we’re overwhelmed, we naturally become drawn towards whatever reduces demand now.

Not necessarily what might make us feel wonderful in two hours.

Home is known.

Pyjamas are known.

The sofa is known.

Cancelling removes an immediate demand and then comes relief - of course our brain notices that.

It isn’t carefully forecasting how restored we might feel after an appointment, it’s responding to what feels difficult right now and removing that difficulty can feel good.

This is one reason avoidance can become a pattern.

Not because we’re lazy.

Because avoidance can offer something powerful: immediate relief.

The difficulty is that immediate relief and genuine restoration aren’t always the same thing.

Sometimes staying home is exactly what we need.

Sometimes the thing we’ve cancelled was the very thing that might have helped us come back to ourselves.

Learning the difference takes curiosity rather than criticism.

Hormones can change the size of the world too

There are also times when our physical and emotional capacity genuinely changes.

Before a period.

During a painful flare.

Through perimenopause.

After several nights of broken sleep.

During times of prolonged stress.

Hormonal shifts can coincide with changes in energy, sleep, concentration, mood and how much stimulation feels manageable.

The world can simply feel bigger.

The supermarket is louder.

Traffic is more irritating.

Decisions feel harder.

Conversation requires more effort.

So an appointment that sounded completely manageable when you booked it can feel very different when the day arrives.

The woman who made the appointment wasn’t foolish to make it.

And the woman struggling with it today isn’t somehow less capable.

Today is simply different.

Perhaps this is why flexibility matters

I’ve thought about this a lot in my own work.

When someone tells me they can’t face their appointment, my instinct isn’t usually to wipe it from the diary and leave it there.

I always offer another date.

Not because I’m trying to persuade someone into something they don’t want but because sometimes what they’re saying isn’t “I don’t want this” It’s: “I can’t manage this today.”

Those are very different things.

One closes the door, the other simply says not now.

And I think we could offer ourselves that same generosity.

You don’t have to abandon the thing that supports you simply because today isn’t the day for it.

Move it.

Make it smaller.

Change the time.

Ask for help getting there.

Choose the easier option.

Let someone else make one of the decisions.

Care doesn’t stop being care because you’ve adapted it to fit your capacity.

Making care easier to receive

Perhaps, rather than telling ourselves we need to become ‘better at self-care’, we could remove some of the friction around it.

If making the appointment is the difficult bit, book the next one before you leave.

If evenings are when your energy disappears, stop booking things for evenings.

If driving somewhere creates half the resistance, choose somewhere closer.

If having to talk feels exhausting, choose treatments or practitioners where quiet is completely acceptable.

If a full exercise class feels enormous, walk for ten minutes instead.

If washing, drying and styling your hair feels impossible, perhaps today the achievement is simply getting the dry shampoo out and giving yourself a smile in the mirror.

We don’t have to choose between doing everything and doing nothing.

There is an enormous, compassionate landscape in between.

And sometimes go anyway

There will also be days when you’ve learned enough about yourself to recognise the pattern.

You know you don’t want to go.

You know cancelling would bring immediate relief.

And you also know yourself well enough to know that if you can just get yourself through the door then you’ll be glad you went.

On those days, make the journey tiny.

Don’t think about the whole appointment.

Put your shoes on.

That’s all.

Then find your keys.

Then get into the car.

One transition at a time.

We can overwhelm ourselves by mentally experiencing the entire event before we’ve even left the sofa.

You don’t need the energy for the whole thing yet.

You only need enough for the next small movement.

Be open with the person you’re meeting (I’ve had to do just that today!)

I was due to have a beautiful facial, but I’m struggling. I’ve had a difficult week, topped off by a difficult phone call, and my energy was already pretty depleted before today even began.

I just couldn’t get myself there.

So instead of forcing myself through it, or cancelling and losing the support altogether, I asked whether we could change the appointment from a facial to a distance Reiki healing. That way I can stay in the comfort of my own home, still in my slippers, surrounded by the things that help me feel calm, safe and nurtured, and still receive care - just in a different form.

Sometimes the meeting can become a video call. A PT session can become a gentle walk. Dinner out can become a takeaway on the sofa. The plan doesn’t always have to be abandoned; sometimes it just needs to be softened enough for the version of you who is actually here today.

A gentle question to ask yourself

The next time you find yourself wanting to cancel something that was supposed to care for you, try asking yourself what part of it feels too much.

The journey?

The conversation?

The decisions?

Being touched?

Leaving home?

The time it will take?

The transition?

Or perhaps even the possibility of finally stopping?

Then see if there’s a way that you can make that part easier.

Perhaps you can.

Perhaps you can’t.

Perhaps the kindest answer really is to cancel and curl up at home.

But at least the decision came from understanding yourself rather than criticising yourself.

Care is allowed to meet you where you are

I think we’ve made self-care far too aspirational.

Beautiful routines.

Perfect mornings.

Treatments.

Classes.

Practices.

Things we apparently ought to be doing because we’re women who value ourselves.

But real care isn’t always beautiful.

Sometimes it’s moving the appointment.

Sometimes it’s turning up with unwashed hair.

Sometimes it’s saying, “I don’t really feel like talking today.”

Sometimes it’s eating toast for dinner because cooking is beyond you.

Sometimes it’s asking somebody else to drive.

Sometimes it’s doing five minutes instead of fifty.

Sometimes it’s cancelling.

And sometimes it’s gently encouraging yourself out of the front door because you’ve learned that this particular kind of resistance usually disappears once you arrive.

There isn’t one correct answer - that’s the point.

Self-care isn’t proof of how much you value yourself.

It isn’t another standard against which to measure whether you’re doing life properly.

It’s a relationship.

And relationships need flexibility.

They need listening.

They need forgiveness.

They need room for change.

Perhaps that’s a softer way to care for ourselves.

Not perfectly.

Not consistently.

But faithfully.

Returning to ourselves when we can.

Again and again.

And perhaps, over time, discovering that being cared for doesn’t have to be another thing we need to be good at. It can simply be something we’re allowed to receive.

🧡

#HalcyonDay

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