Today is my day off…
And I don’t feel good.
The ick that’s been building finally caught me. My head still hurts, day 419… which sounds dramatic until you realize I’m not exaggerating. At this point the headache feels like background noise. Like a steady hum I’ve just learned to live with. And I don’t even know how to explain it anymore.
But today everything feels louder.
My brain is going in a thousand different directions.
Work.
Money.
Reputation.
Bills.
Motherhood.
Hawaii.
I built something at work. I worked my ass off for it. Rockstar numbers. Leadership praise. The overachiever label.
And that sounds great… until you realize there’s no room to be human once you’re known for being exceptional.
Once you’re the 100 percent girl, 72 percent feels like a public failure.
There’s no middle lane in my brain. It’s all or nothing. Ahead or collapsing. Secure or screwed. Rockstar or replaceable.
Bills are mostly caught up. My phone isn’t getting shut off Wednesday. Things are tight, but they’re handled.
But my brain doesn’t say handled. It says fragile.
It says one tow truck, one bad week, one dip in performance and the whole thing tips over.
And then… Hawaii.
Twelve years with that man. Twelve years of big, sweeping ideas. Alaska. Montana. Sugarloaf. We even had jobs lined up one winter until housing fell through.
I know the pipe dreams. I’ve lived inside them.
Most years Hawaii was just something my daughter would repeat, starry-eyed. Something he told her. Something floating in the air.
But this year it was a text. From him. To me.
And Hawaii isn’t two hours away.
That’s what my nervous system latched onto.
Distance.
Finality.
What if this time it isn’t just talk?
And here’s where it gets complicated.
I cannot be the mother who takes an experience away from my daughter because I’m uncomfortable. A couple months somewhere beautiful could be incredible for her. I want her to see the world. I want her to have stories bigger than Maine in March.
But I will be damned if I’m stupid.
I will not rely on vibes. I will not do “we’ll see.” I will not wake up to “just one more week” turning into another… and another… and another.
So now my brain is trying to solve everything at once.
Be supportive, but protect yourself.
Be trusting, but get it in writing.
Be high-performing, but don’t burn out.
Be stable, but don’t be rigid.
Be strong, but don’t be the villain.
That’s a lot of pressure for one woman sitting on her couch with a headache and the flu creeping in.
Nothing has actually happened.
There’s no plane ticket booked.
There’s no court order filed.
There’s no tow truck outside.
There’s no performance review saying I’ve slipped.
There is just a brain wired for extremes trying to secure every possible future before it arrives.
This is what all-or-nothing thinking does. It doesn’t wait. It reacts. It catastrophizes. It says if you don’t control every variable, you’ll lose everything.
And I’m tired.
Not physically. I sit at a computer all day.
Emotionally tired. Decision tired. Hypervigilant tired.
Tired of sprinting.
Tired of scanning.
Tired of feeling like if I stop performing at max capacity the floor drops out.
Maybe the truth is nothing is collapsing. Maybe I’m just saturated.
Maybe today isn’t about solving Hawaii or proving I deserve my reputation or rehearsing worst case scenarios.
Maybe today is just about closing a few tabs.
Letting my nervous system land. Even fighter jets need to come in for refueling.
Admitting that I can want this experience for my daughter and still demand legal clarity.
Admitting that preparation isn’t paranoia.
Admitting that being exceptional doesn’t mean being superhuman.
Today isn’t a rockstar day…
It’s a breathe… regulate… don’t let your brain run the whole show day.
And maybe that’s the real growth for someone like me.
Not shutting off the intensity.
Just learning how to live inside it without letting it burn the house down.
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