When Overwhelm Is The Air You Breathe

Feeling like being a caregiver parent is a constant onslaught of tasks, emotions, and responsibilities? You’re not failing — you’re overwhelmed. My memories of Sunday evenings are a reminder for all parents caring for children with additional needs that they’re not alone, not broken, and not expected to do it all.

There was a time in my life when overwhelm wasn’t just an occasional visitor – it was the air I breathed.

I remember regularly staying up well after 11 o’clock on a Sunday evening because it felt like the only peace I had before the onslaught of Monday.

I would watch anything from RuPaul’s Drag Race to a prison documentary to part seven of a series I’d never seen before and would never see again. In fact, I’d watch whatever was on live TV — it required no decisions, no care, no attention, and frankly, no real interest.

It wasn’t really about the TV at all. It wasn’t a break or a reward. It was simply about holding my life in a moment of avoidance and reality at the same time.

On a Sunday evening, my (now ex) husband would have returned to his work 100 miles away. My children would be in bed — though I knew one was probably still awake because her sleep was so bad (she’s ADHD). One I’d have to check in on and decide whether she’d be able to manage school in the morning based on the pain I could see in her face. And a toddler would come into my room at any point from now until dawn.

The next morning would come too soon and I would put the brave face on. Phone calls. Appointments. Medication schedules. School liaison. The mental load of tracking three different children's needs while trying to remember which prescription was running low and who needed to be where by when. Research into topics of potential interest or help. Running the house and home. Check ins with any child who was home (up to 50% of the time). And then somehow, somewhere in there, my actual paid self employed work too.

With full awareness of the weeks and months of this complicated and challenging journey behind me, I was already drowning in dread about what the next few hours, the next day, or the next week might bring.

My Sunday evening of staring blankly at the TV screen was the only way I knew how to cope in that moment. Living in uncertainty, managing multiple children with multiple needs, and still trying to appear “normal” in work, friendships, and everyday life was overwhelming.

Why am I telling you this? I’m not sharing this for sympathy, but because I know what it feels like to live in that constant state of survival. And because I want you to know — you’re not the only one living there.

It’s to remind you that you’re not alone.

It’s to remind you that you are doing an impossible job.

It’s to remind you that no matter what you’re doing, you’re doing your best.

It’s to remind you that we all need a “staring at the TV moment.”

And it’s an important reminder that you don’t have to do this alone. I felt that I did, but I look back and realise that if I’d had a community like the one we’re building in Mamas In This Together, I would not have felt so isolated, hopeless, or helpless.

So if you’re feeling alone – you’re not. Reach out.  There are millions of us out there doing what you’re doing right now.

If you feel like you’re doing an impossible job – you are. We are not designed to bring up children on our own, healthy or otherwise. The reason there’s an expression “it takes a village to raise a child” is because it’s true — none more so than for a child with additional needs of any kind.

If you feel like you’re not doing enough, or not doing well enough – it’s not true. We can all do more, we can all do better. But we can also only do what we can in the moment. And for today, that might just have to be enough.

If you feel the need to have my equivalent of watching TV on a Sunday evening without really watching it – take it. Switching off, in whatever way, is a vital part of rest, recovery, and rejuvenation.

None of us were meant to do this alone. Overwhelm doesn’t mean you’re weak — it means you’re human. So take the moment you need, and then reach out. Let this community hold you the way you’ve been holding everyone else. It’s a place where you don't have to explain, justify, or perform. You can find us at mamasinthistogether.com, on Facebook or join us in the comments below.

We can make the impossible just a little more possible.