Dealing with Fatigue and Exhaustion

On our first year of official homeschooling with a homeschooling provider, that was in the year 2021, I felt so exhausted I thought I was going to give up homeschooling. My daughter was in her kindergarten year that time. I was feeling stressed and so she was feeling stressed. There was a lot of friction, I can feel my husband also feeling stressed out because of this. The only thing that kept us going during that time was the thought that we know that homeschooling is the best way to educate our child.

But there still is the matter of exhaustion. Everyday felt too draining not just for me, but for my daughter too. She even came to a point when she dreaded our schooldays. That was what made me rethink our choice of homeschooling provider. Changing our homeschooling provider was just one thing. I still have to deal with my exhaustion and burnt out. Because I was starting to become the grumpy momma and I was not liking it. Which is why this week's question from @ladiesofhive is such a wonderful topic to discuss.

We women are known for carrying out several activities at the same time. Somehow we always balance our schedules to accomplish them all, even though sometimes that brings us excessive fatigue. My question is: what do you do when you feel exhausted? How do you regulate your physical, mental and emotional state to be yourself again?

It took me a long time to regain my composure. During our kindergarten years, there were moments when I had to remove myself from our study table because I was starting to lose it. Teaching is such a highly demanding job and for a first timer who has very little training and experience, it is very intimidating. If I did not deal with my exhaustion and mental fatigue, I'm not sure if we will still be homeschooling to this day.

There are a few things that helped me get through that phase in my life. Up to this day, I still do it to make sure that my mental health is in check. Because I know in my heart of hearts that a happy momma is a happy homeschooling momma, and a happy homeschooling momma produces a happy homeschooled kid.

Quiet Time

This is probably the best thing that I have ever learned in my entire life. Quiet time is as simply stated, a time during the day that you set to just keep quiet. Althroughout the day, our brain performs a lot of functions whether we control it or not. Quiet time is when we consciously hit pause from all the thinking, and juggling, and planning, and worrying. Quiet time is a moment I set aside to give myself an hour or two of rest before I continue on with all the other things I need and want to do.

It helps give me clarity and peace. Mornings are spent mostly in cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, feeding the cats, watering the plants, and of course, teaching my kid. Those tasks, may sound simple but when you do it all together simultaneously, it demands a huge chunk of energy and brain power to complete. My quiet time is a moment for me to recharge in the middle of the day. I do it after having lunch where I just rest and let my stomach digest the food we had, then after, I'll either read a good book, paint, crochet, or even have siesta. After 2 hours of quiet time, my entire being is once again ready to take on all the other chores I need to finish before night falls.

Self Love/ Self Improvement

Women - mothers specifically - feel guilty when we choose ourself first over others. We were groomed and trained to take care of everyone in the family, in the community, in society. It is because of this guilt that we take ourselves for granted. We avoid the topic of self care and treat it like it is such a selfish thing to do. But self love is important. We can't pour from an empty cup. We can't give love and take care of others when we ourselves need loving and caring too. We shouldn't wait for other people to do that for us, we need to do it ourselves.

Every now and then, I take myself to coffee dates with a book, I learn a new hobby, enrich an old one, or simply have a hair cut or have my nails done. I recently learned and realized that I can learn to paint too. So now, I am giving myself time to learn how to paint. It gives me that happy feeling of accomplishment whenever I discover something new about myself.

The Art of Letting Go

This is the hardest thing to do. Letting go of things that weighs me down. Did you ever have those 3AM thoughts about the terrible things you did from eons ago and still haven't forgiven yourself? I have tons of those. I was angry at myself for things that I did and didn't do before. I was furious for the words that I should have said and for those that I shouldn't have. For the choices that I should have made, and for the wrong ones I did. When the one time I yelled at my kid because I was too tired and frustrated and took it out on her. When I forgot to keep the promise I made.

Those are things that weigh my heart down. One by one, I had to let go of those things and accept that those are all in the past. It was a slow and agonizing process. Sometimes I take one step forward and then two steps back. But the moment I am sure that I have let go of that heavy chain, my heart feels a lot lighter.

Letting go is not just about forgiveness. It is also accepting that there are things that I cannot do and are out of my control. I used to hold on to the fact that I am a housewife, and as such, I should be doing all the house chores while taking care of my husband and my daughter. Also when I let those 2 do the chores, I used to redo everything they did because I want things done a certain way. Now, I've let go and let loose. I let go of some of my tasks and gave it to my husband. I assigned some chores to my little girl too. It is so liberating to just accept the fact that these two are still learning and that I need to let go so that they can reach their full potential.

Healthy Living

I know there are a lot of other things I did just to make sure that my mental health is in good state. I did some yoga and exercising too. Sometimes sweating it out helps a lot. Zumba is a good way of releasing the stress. So is boxing and weight lifting. Depending on the level of stress I am feeling, I interchange all these physical activities.

Sleeping a full 8 hours is something that I am still working on right now but I noticed that whenever I am well rested at night, I tend to be so much chirpier than usual in the morning. Even without my morning coffee.

Here in our country, mental health isn't something that was talked about during my childhood. I never knew about it until I was in my adulting stage. I was taught that whenever we feel something terrible like exhaustion, burnout, stress, we should just fight through it. To weather the storm as they say. But mental fatigue isn't something that should be taken lightly. Whenever you feel tired, do not feel guilty to take the time to rest. When you feel like you're not at 100%, don't force yourself. Have some me time. You deserve it. Afterall, we women care a lot for the people we love. It is only fitting that we keep ourselves happy. Because it is true. Happy wife, happy life.