5 signs your Nervous System is running your motherhood
Your to-do-list is growing larger. The clutter keeps piling higher. The hours in the day seem to be getting lower and lower. You feel it. It starts deep in the belly, rising and growing hotter by the second, it reaches your chest, then shoulders and when it gets to your throat you can barely hold it together. It then fills your entire head and you feel it expanding. You try to hold it in but you can’t contain building steam. You blow. The guilt loop is now in play.
Gosh, do I know that feeling and if you are reading this I am sure you have too. It’s why I’m passionate about Nervous System Regulation for moms. The thing I want you to know, and really read this slowly. This is not a character flaw or a parenting problem. It’s a Nervous System problem.
A dysregulated Nervous System keeps us on edge, always waiting and ready to react. We get dysregulated from living in a high paced society, from giving birth, from parenting, from trauma, from traffic, from childhood, from insert yours here. If you don’t have a practice in place to nurture your Nervous System it doesn’t have a chance to just be chill. It’s always trying to keep you safe and alive.
Here are 5 signs your nervous system is dysregulated
Sign #1 You go from zero to rage faster than you can think
One moment you feel relatively chill then the next moment you feel like the Heat Miser and you are about to blow, if you haven’t already. It becomes harder and harder to come back down before the burning rises to far up.
This isn’t because you are flawed it’s because you are living in Fight or Flight or both. Your Nervous System is registering a threat and wants to save you. It just doesn’t know that the threat is just another bookbag not put away.
I use that example because a bookbag laying on the floor certainly has had me in crash out mode when my Nervous System was dysregulated.
Sign #2 You are exhausted but can't fully switch off or rest
You are exhausted. You feel it to the core, deep in your bones so why in the world can’t you sleep.
Your Nervous System is in overdrive. It’s revved up to save you and it can’t do that if it’s sleeping. The longer you stay in this state the harder it is to get out of it.
You give give give when you have nothing left to give and that just keeps the loop going.
Sign #3 You are physically present but emotional and mentally checked out
You are at the dinner table eating with your family although your mind is anywhere but. You want so badly to be present and that causes so much guilt. You are checked out not because you are a bad mom but because you are in freeze mode. Another way for our Nervous System to protect us. We check out so we can’t go further into dysregulation.
Sign #4 Small things feel like big emergencies
A bookbag on the floor, garbage not taken out, a toy left out, send you into high alert. The person sitting next to you eating way to loudly is making you want to crawl out of your skin. Every little thing brings you to sign #1.
Chronic stress short circuits our inner threat alert system putting it on the highest alert at all times. As far as our stressed out Nervous System is concerned inconveniences are actual threats.
Sign # 5 The guilt and shame loop never stop
You may be wondering how this is a sign your Nervous System is ruling your Motherhood.
Being in the guilt and shame loop keep us dysregulated. When we are feeling guilt and shame our Nervous System can return to safety.
Our Nervous System can’t distinguish between actual threat and perceived threat. Replaying our crash out in our mind over and over again tells our Nervous System we are still in the midst of the threat.
So then the loop goes on and on and on and on.
This is not who you are-it's what needs healing.
I’m here to tell you and be the proof that the loop can stop. The Nervous System can be regulated even while living in a stressful environment. You CAN and WILL be able to show up exactly as you want to. A matter of fact, you already took the first step by reading this! Next I encourage you to take 5 minutes every morning before the house rises and just sit with yourself. No need to do anything fancy. Just practice being.
Come back and see how I can support you when you feel the time is right. I’ll be here.
You were never meant to white knuckle motherhood alone.
