Episode 422: How to Feel Less Overwhelmed

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No need to whine and whiney palooza. Have some wine and join us on the Winey Palooza Podcast with Rebecca Greene.

Welcome to the Winey Palooza Podcast. I'm your host, Rebecca Greene. I'm a wife, mother of 3, and licensed clinical social worker. I also have 3 fur babies at home too. My passion has always been to help children and their families. I always dreamed of being a wife and a mother. Parents are always learning through their struggles, failures, and successes and joys. I am no stranger to this wild ride of parenting, and I know behind every great parent lies a team of supportive friends and family. I want to be part of your support system. I want you to know that you are not alone. We are in this parenting world together. Join me every week for insightful discussions with experts on parenting and marriage, as well as other parents who have found the secret to successes in parenthood. You'll learn tips and tricks to make life with your family better than ever. I hope you will follow along with me while we dive into what it takes to achieve a happy family.

Hello everyone, happy Whiny Palooza Wednesday.

Happy Whiny Palooza Wednesday.

How is everybody doing?

How was your day? How was your week?

Tell us, are your children off of school this week? It's not a consistent break for everybody, but our kids are off of school this week.

Yes.

And we are home in the cold and the snow. And on the way home from the mall today, Lily thought it would be smart to tell me that everybody's in Florida right now.

Oh, that's such— designed to make you feel so much better.

Made me so happy to hear that. So if you are in Florida or Arizona or somewhere warm, I'm so happy for you and I wish I was with you. And we are still in cold, snowy Buffalo and I am waiting patiently for spring.

Yes, I don't know how patient.

You don't need to share it.

I'm sharing it, baby.

Okay, I guess he's sharing it. So, okay, so today was an interesting morning which led to this topic. The topic is how to feel less overwhelmed. Are you feeling overwhelmed?

Yes. Oh, it wasn't a direct question.

My honey is feeling overwhelmed.

Okay, so when I wrote this, I was thinking about moms. However, We're gonna help Seth today.

Yay!

So even though this is my therapy session, so even let's just, yeah, let's just do a live therapy session. I feel like I've been doing a lot of husband therapy lately. So it's so funny, there was one day where I feel like I did therapy with Max Ella and Seth.

Yep, that is correct.

And I was so drained, and I was like, oh my God, I just did—

I was saying you used to see patients, clients all day, and I'm like, I just did 3 sessions.

Yes, but when it's your family, yes, very different. It is 150% different because I'm so emotionally invested. Yes. So therapy with your family is definitely more draining. So let's help Seth feel less overwhelmed. Let's help me and let's help all of you. This came from this morning. I did not write a blog this week. I am with my children this week.

It is pure chaos.

I totally forget that when they go to school, like, it's— they have something to do. There's structure, there's routine.

There's a limited amount of food that goes with that.

Oh my God, the amount of food. Are your kids like eating everything this week?

Week.

So they're home and they're eating and they have all have different plans. And this morning I was like, okay, Lily's going to the mall with her friends from a sleepover. Ella is bringing a friend to the mall that I'm gonna pick up. And Max wants to go to the mall with us but is at the gym. Hi Randy, how are you? So I was like, spinning, and I'm not gonna bore Seth with the details because he just heard the details.

I can—

for me, yes, I heard them already.

I'm not gonna bore you again by repeating them.

I was fascinated the first time.

So I said to Seth in the kitchen as we were discussing my day, I said, I have nothing on you.

Like, he's telling me about like big huge work things, like trying to get his client like a ton of money today for a house like, that is so much more stressful than what I was doing.

But at the time, I didn't know that, you know.

It like puts it in perspective.

What you— what your stuff is very important. Well, so I mean, less—

I was overwhelmed trying to please 3 children. Pleasing myself in the process is even harder. That's a whole nother conversation. But I was frustrated with my attempt to please 3 kids today, which you can't do, by the way. Don't do that.

And not at the same time.

And I get to the mall and I look at my friend who has 8 children, and I was like, oh my God, I found 3 very overwhelming this morning, and you have 8.

I've got nothing. And I need to stop saying that. Yes, because all of our issues are significant. We are significant. Our issues are significant. So let's do it. I am going to start with what I think is the most important And Seth tried to do this tonight unsuccessfully. Um, drawing boundaries for ourselves helps us feel less overwhelmed. Okay, did I want to wait for Max to go to the mall? Yes. Was I meeting people? Was I on a time frame? I have to say no. Max, I'm sorry, you're working out. I can't wait for you to finish and shower. I'm meeting people, right?

You had a time—

I had to say no. I wanted to just wait around for him so he could come. And Seth tried to draw a boundary and not bring his laptop.

I did not bring a computer home today. I was very proud of myself until I got a call right when I got home going, "Can you jump on a Zoom right now?" Which I did from my phone and then got a, "Can you send us paperwork right now?" And I said, "Nope, you're gonna have to wait till tomorrow morning.

I'm not running back to work to go get my computer." When Seth left the house at 8 o'clock, which is late for him, went to work, and I got home at 6 o'clock thinking, oh, he's home. He was upstairs working. And not only was he upstairs working, but I want you to know he had another work call tonight.

That was at 8.

As I was waiting, I was not planning— I was trying to use the blender, people.

I was trying to use the blender, and I was like, when is he gonna get off the phone so I can blend?

I would have gone upstairs. I did not know— realize you were waiting for me to blend.

I apologize.

So he tried to unsuccessfully set some boundaries.

So I'm gonna tell you that if you wanna feel less overwhelmed, we have to learn to say no and we have to not do things that we don't wanna do. I wanted to take the girls to the mall today. That's fine. I pushed my work stuff aside. They're more important to me. We can't always do that. Sometimes we have to work, right? I want to devote time to my kids this week, so I have purposely not scheduled a lot for myself this week. Boundaries, people. Let me know, can you say no? Can you set boundaries? Because that's a whole nother topic that we can do. Okay, so I get in this place of, oh my God, I got to do this and this and this is this, and I spin and I spiral. Instead of slow myself down, I said to Ella in the car, "I need to reset." Like, I was really grumpy because the morning was chaos, and I was like, okay, I know that I feel completely frazzled right now, and I'm taking it out on Ella. Ella did nothing wrong. I'm going to take a deep breath. I'm going to apologize to Ella, and I said to Ella, "I'm gonna reset." I can't get over how much Seth looks like Simon Helberg from The Big Bang Theory.

I don't watch The Big Bang Theory.

Seth is gonna look it up for us.

We don't know who that is, we don't watch it. So Randy, we're inspecting that. Okay, so slowing myself down, slowing my breathing down, resetting, prioritizing. What do I need to do first? What do I need to do first? Do you do this? Do you prioritize a list?

When I— yeah, I attempt. Yes. So I have to get myself into a state where I can slow down enough to say, what do I need to do in what order? I am normally good about that. When I am overwhelmed, I need to work on being able to do that and saying, hey, stop the spiral. Yes, let's just knock things out one at a time.

So I, I think that this is perfect for you because I'm in the car and I know that I'm frazzled and, and I know that I'm breathing heavy and I know that I'm snapping and I know that it's time for a breath and a reset.

Awesome.

And it took me a couple times to say, "No, I need to reset." I had to do that a couple times. And the main thing was Ella didn't do anything wrong, and I didn't want to be cranky to Ella.

That was very nice. Good awareness and very nice of you.

So thank you. So I reset.

It's very conscious of you.

And I have to think, what do I need to do first? Don't think about the 10 things going on that day. What is first? Right now I need to go to the bank and get Ella money because I have no cash and Ella can't find her cash.

So I need to get money for the mall.

I needed to just prioritize what's first, what's second, and I felt less overwhelmed.

Awesome. Okay, step one.

Step one. Well, step one is boundaries.

It's always boundaries.

We talked about prioritizing. Okay, breaking things up, and I want to tell you a perfect example that I thought of when I was thinking of these. I want to clean out our basement, okay? I am not thinking about the whole basement. If I go down and look at all the crates in the basement, I will have some anxiety. No joke. If I say, you are going to break this up, you are going to go down and get one crate today. Then I don't get that whole anxiety.

Like, you gotta chunk it.

I gotta, I gotta break it up, and I have to ask for help. So Seth has gotten better. Seth and I have had so many conversations about this. Seth is such a wonderful, hard-working man who, you know, I'm, I'm not going to say he's the sole provider Because I know you do pretty darn good. I do, I do. You make like 3 times what I make, probably more than that. Thank you for that. So you are an excellent provider, whatever you want to— we want to call you. However, Seth takes things on himself and he carries the burden because he is the head of work and he's the head of home, so he has me. So I've had to reframe this for him because he thinks he needs to do so much and take on so much himself.

Yes.

So we have had to have many conversations of use your support.

Yes, 100%.

It is hard for the head of a company because what I was taught when I was a supervisor is the higher up you go, the more lonely it is.

Yeah.

Okay, so I felt the loneliness when I moved up and I wasn't with the other therapists.

Yes, you were not rank and file anymore.

Yeah, so I felt the loneliness and I talked to Seth about it and he really related because he feels the same way.

Yes.

And I was like, I understand that you need to be strong for your team, but your team is full of really smart women. Like, I can't believe how smart the women are that he works with. And I'm like, talk to them because they can give you— like, not in a— he can still be a strong leader.

Yes.

And ask their advice, input. This is the situation. And then he can come home and he can talk to me and he can tell me what's going on so that he's not holding it all in.

Right.

And you also have your, um, business group EO.

Yes.

And you have other people at work that you talk to.

Yes.

But I just try to encourage Seth to use his supports because men in particular— watch out for this with your husbands and your sons— men tend to internalize more and take things on themselves. And I think women are much better at using their supports and talking to people.

Yes, 100%.

So what my friend sent me, this really awesome is it a meme? Is that what it's called? I don't know, whatever, a graphic from the Instagram, and it was all about how writing and reading are good for coping. Okay, I'm just gonna sum it up. Yeah, and I wrote her back and I said, those are my two greatest coping skills, is writing and reading. However, the third thing is talking, and I talk a lot to a lot of people. So I have to get him to talk more.

Yes, for sure.

And we have to watch out and make sure that our sons are learning to talk. I think Max is good at coming to us. Yes, right. So we're teaching him. Okay, ladies, we are not so great at taking time for ourselves, and I'm going to give you a couple examples. I had plans with friends two nights in a row. This week.

I'm proud of you.

And I felt really bad and guilty about it.

I was happy for you to go out.

I am happy to go out once in a while, but to have two back-to-back nights out with friends made me feel kind of bad as a mom and wife because I didn't see Seth for a couple days. But, um, I had been with the kids. It's different when the kids are off. I had been with the kids so much, and I don't want to make them feel bad, but it was so nice to just—

yes, get out, get away.

I needed it. I needed to regroup. So we have to do those things for ourselves. And I find that when I prioritize the treadmill, and now I'm adding in our sauna from the basement, and when I do those things for myself, my tolerance and my feelings of overwhelm are so much less. Like, I just took out So much frustration on the treadmill. Awesome, right? And are you finding that when you're going to Krav that you're taking your feelings out? Like, are you using it to your advantage?

Yes.

Like, sometimes you'll say, I just need to go punch something.

Yes, absolutely.

So Krav Maga—

days I need to fight people.

Yes, Krav Maga is an excellent coping strategy.

And there are times I have had my sparring partners go Dude, you, you seem like— they've commented like, are you stressed or something? Because you're way more intense than normal.

Oh no. Oh honey. So as I was researching feelings of overwhelm, I could, I could vouch for this advice.

One of the things was to limit your screen time, and I'm going to talk about Seth with this, and I'm going to talk about me, and it's very different. Seth needs to limit his time, let's say, on his computer, and he needs to like get away from screens to like give his eyes and his body a break. Like, I bet you sometimes your eyes are like, oh my God, I can't look at another screen.

Yes, well, that's probably because I'm on in front of a computer 8, 10 plus hours a day.

That can't be good for your eyes.

What do you want me to do?

I don't have an abacus like What is an abacus?

I was just being funny. What they used before calculators and computers to do math.

Oh, that's not gonna help you.

No.

Okay, so for Seth, it's different. Like, Seth, Seth needs to give his body a break from screens.

For women, Seth is gonna get mad when I say this. Oh, see, I want to cry.

I saw someone in warm weather on Facebook, like, right before this, and I literally wanted to cry.

And it's—

I'm so happy for them.

It wasn't like, oh, that bitch is in Florida. It was, oh God, I miss the warm weather.

So, and this has what to do with screen time we were getting at.

So for women, she wasn't on the beach with her phone. For women, social media leads to comparisons, which leads to feeling of overwhelm, which leads to anxiety and depression and feeling bad about yourself.

Right, you felt bad. Got it. Because you were looking on social media and saw—

so I was comparing myself that I'm in this—

because you're not in Florida.

And then I was— and then I— and then it got worse, everybody. And then I saw someone doing something like a cool mall with their kids, and I was like, man, 'You really did not do anything for your kids this break.' I wanted—

that is so not true. Okay, you don't have to go anywhere for it to count, and we did just go somewhere in December that was awesome and a good trip and not cheap.

Uh, women are too hard on themselves.

Case in point.

I have to go somewhere. I did some excellent self-talk. It was kind of It was a path of, they're at a really cool mall, I feel really bad about myself because I've done pretty much nothing for my kids this break. And then it was, it's okay, you are a good mom, you don't have to take them somewhere cool to be a good mom.

Awesome.

So it was good self-talk.

I'm just—

the progression.

So yeah, women. Okay, so I have talked about this many times with Seth that we can't be overwhelmed or stressed or anxious or depressed or any of the things when we start thinking about all the things that we're thankful for. And I did this thing on the way to the mall and I was like, health, health is the word that comes to me all the time. And I have even said this to Max. Max, our health and safety is what's most important. All of this other stuff is not as important. Like, it helps me to put things in perspective, and it helps me to feel so grateful and thankful and blessed. So every time I start to go to a negative place of I'm overwhelmed, I don't feel good enough, whatever it is, I'm like, we have health and safety, and that's all that matters.

Yep.

Well, and we kind of need the roof over our heads.

That's a food on the table.

Food on the table. The, the stuff that's provided is also needed.

Yes.

But the health and the safety make me feel just so grateful and puts everything into perspective.

Awesome.

Okay.

Okay, so this applies to me. I don't know if this applies to Seth, so we're gonna ask him. So I'm feeling overwhelmed, I'm feeling in a tizzy. If I look around and my space is tidy and clean and neat, I can feel centered, versus if it's a mess, then I feel even more overwhelmed. Did I explain that well?

You explained— I understand what you're saying.

So the question is I think a tidy space, I think organizing and cleaning and, and making yourself feel at home helps you to feel less overwhelmed. How do you— does that apply to you?

Not to the extent that it does for you. I mean, yes, if it's a mess, I mean, I don't think, oh my God, now it's a mess, I won't, I won't be able to find something or whatever and get more anxious. But it being Not being messy certainly helps, but it isn't like, oh, I can calm down this overwhelm because my desk is organized. My desk— what's on my desk has nothing to do with why I'm feeling overwhelmed in that moment. Okay, if that made sense.

Okay, so our minds work differently. I think so, because when I was at an office, I needed my desk to be neat.

That sounds like you.

And I needed my office the whole thing.

Oh, I'm sure it was very— yes, I remember on your purple couch and your office is very well organized.

Oh my God, does that feel like that was 18 years ago?

For the record. Wow. Yeah, I know, feels like yesterday.

It does.

Okay, so last but not least, okay, there's no perfection. We're gonna embrace the messy, we're gonna embrace the chaos. Life is messy, life is not perfect. So if I I actually said this to myself this morning. If I expect everything to go in a certain order, in a certain orderly fashion, with 3 kids and a husband and their friends and everyone else who is involved, I'm setting myself up to be really overwhelmed and disappointed.

I need to work on that.

Okay, so we talk about this All the time. This totally applies to you.

Yes, it does.

Well, thank you for saying that because I just realized we talk about this all the time.

Right, you think it's— you tell me it's unrealistic that you think hundreds of clients and staff members and everybody, your expectation that they'll all be happy most of the time is unrealistic.

Well, he'll come home with an issue and he acts surprised. I don't think I act surprised at all when you come home with something to talk about. I, I, and I just said this, um, on my group, on my Wine and Blues and Mom group. So parenting is full of challenges. I don't expect my 3 kids— I don't expect to send my 3 kids out into the world, okay? So right now they're going to school. I don't expect to send the 3 of them to school all day and have them all come home happy. I don't expect them to have had a flawless day, right? I know that they're going to want to talk about something. If Lily is in a bad mood and she's cranky and she's taking it out on me, I know that at some point that night it's going to come out what happened at school. So like, I have just learned that it's not perfection every day. And you know, as successful as they are in school, I know that they have bumps. Max came home the other day and he was like Oh my God, that test. I, I have— I don't know that I've ever heard him say that. That's kind of scary.

I don't know that I've ever heard the girls say that.

So I don't know if he's ever said the test was hard. Well, so that he may not have told us.

So then I'm going to teach you something else. Are you ready for this?

I'm ready.

And I used to talk to parents about this. We get things figured out. There's a bump and we figure it out and we're like, okay, we're great parents, we figured out the bump, and then they come up with something new.

Yeah, and it's always something new.

And they're— okay, so he has all these clients, all his children. So like he gets a challenge and his team addresses the challenge and is like, okay, we learned from this, we grew from this, we're not going to let this happen again.

And then something different happens.

Yeah, so it's the same with my kids. I have 3 different, very, very different kids So it's messy in different ways. So like Lily's complaining about one thing and Ella's coming home complaining about something totally different. So their experiences are different.

Yes.

And you could have the same process for your clients and they're experiencing it different.

We have very different— yes, yes, one of the current issues, normal— we have a person who is not experiencing the normal wonderfulness of our process.

Well, and the other thing that I thought of today because someone, someone was like, like, that didn't happen, or whatever. Okay, I know that it happened. I was there and I have proof, and I don't need proof. It's my perspective. Their perspective is very different. So we're at the same dinner and we have two very different perspectives. So it's amazing the, the stuff that we learn every day, and we are going to figure out how to be less overwhelmed, and then a different situation will overwhelm us, and we're like, okay, how are we going to apply all of this stuff to feeling less overwhelmed in this situation?

And you just got to keep sharpening this on, working on your skill set, right?

Yes, yes. So, um, I did see a couple of things I wanted to tell you guys. If your kids are on break and you need things to do, I did want to tell you a couple of cool things that I saw people doing. I did see people skiing.

Okay, which we could do.

Is that me or is that somebody else? That's what I—

no one else. I— oh, there's your giant thumbs up.

Okay, I just don't know if that's me or the person.

So, oh my gosh.

So I did see someone on vacation skiing, and it's the first vacation that I was like, no thanks.

I don't want any cold weather vacations. I don't want to go to Alaska.

I'll go to Alaska if you want to see Alaska. I don't want to go— I don't— we know that the sign is backwards, by the way. We will work on this after the show. We did not work on this.

The camera is backwards. The sign is on right.

The sign looks backwards and we have to figure out how to fix it.

To flip it is not showing up.

I wonder why.

Shows up on my phone.

I will play with your phone when we're done.

Okay, so anyways, you could take your—

I don't want to do this, but I see people sledding and skiing, so I say embrace the cold.

I don't want to.

I'm not—

so you're not practicing?

I am not taking my own advice. I don't want to go sledding, and I don't want to go skiing, and I don't want to go ice skating.

My daughter wants to go skiing. I'm sure they would love to go ice skating. I am sure I will do something outside with them.

I don't want to, but I will be a good mom and go do it.

I love that my friend is having a musical marathon with her daughter this week. Every day they're watching a new musical. It's a good week to watch movies and get cozy under a blanket. It's a good parenting modeling tool to get them to sit on the couch with a book with you and get them to put the device down and read with you. I think we're good at modeling that.

We do read a lot.

Seth and I would like to read on the couch with a blanket. That sounds good.

Yes, sounds great.

I'll do that in a minute.

I also want to tell you that my amazing friend took, um, Lily and some friends to a hotel to go swimming and sleep over, and that is an awesome winter.

And yeah, they weren't outside, honey.

Um, I also love seeing people doing puzzles and Legos with their kids. Like, they're so—

want to do a puzzle? We could do a puzzle.

I love doing puzzles.

I did not know this. We never do puzzles. Let's do some puzzles.

I was— during COVID I did a bunch of puzzles, right?

You haven't done one since then, so I thought that was the COVID thing.

Had me stuck at home all the time. Now I'm chasing our children.

Got it.

Driving our children is a better way to put it. So, um, you have any other— oh, I know what I wanted to tell them. I have not been successful yet this week, but I'm not going to give up. Get your kids to cook and bake. They could cook you dinner. Take a night off and give them the task of cooking dinner.

I think it's a great idea.

I think it's a great idea.

So there is stuff to do Even if you're here, enjoy it, embrace it, go outside, stay inside under a blanket, whatever makes you happy. But I hope that we helped you to feel less overwhelmed.

And that was really good. I will use some of that at work.

I'm so glad. Anything in particular stand out, or did you forget it all already?

Um, prioritizing will help, using supports will help.

I think those are my two biggest takeaways.

I think that before we leave, I just need to say repetition, repetition, repetition. I have told Seth to use his supports many, many, many times, but it doesn't sink in. Well, it does, but I think it's better every time. I think that you do— I think you forget, and I think that we just have to remember that whether it's our husband our kids or our friend, people need to hear things more than once to learn them.

Yes, including myself, right?

I'm including myself. So I do want to tell them that this Friday on the podcast is the fabulous Jamie Grupp. Jamie is going to teach us about fueling our kids with healthy nutrition, and we had such a good conversation. You're gonna love her, and I know Jamie personally and am honored that I got her on the podcast. So you're gonna love that episode. And come find me on Facebook, everybody. I have the Whiny Pooza Mom group. It is a supportive community for, for moms, if I could talk, but you don't have to be a mom to join. I have aunts and dads and grandmas and A husband in the group. My husband's in the group. I don't know if you pay attention to the group. Sometimes he's very busy. He's not on Facebook a lot, right?

And go to whiningpalooza.com, find Rebecca Greene's Linktree with all of her amazing free resources. Make sure you sign up for her 3 times a week email newsletter. And as always with all of her content, please help her spread her magic to as many parents as possible by liking, rating, reviewing, sharing, and subscribing.

I don't think people know that when they hit like and they comment and they share things—

share it, give her some hearts, give her some thumbs up, all that good stuff helps the algorithm know that her content is awesome and more people will get to see it and benefit from it. And that will be all thanks to you wonderful people, especially the podcast.

Yes, right?

Yes, rate, review.

Yes, please. And share it with people, like share this with someone who you think is feeling overwhelmed. Right?

Isn't that everybody at some point? Unfortunately, you are not alone.

Nobody's alone. We all get feelings of overwhelmed. Today was one of those days.

I understand.

Yeah. Okay, well, have a wonderful night and stay warm, and we will see you next week.

Happy Winey Palooza Wednesday.

Thank you for tuning in to the Winey Palooza podcast. If you like what you heard, please be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. While you are there, leave a review.

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Thank you so much for listening.

Until next time.

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