Why do I feel the need to justify every morsel I put into my body?
Convincing myself I deserve each calorie as if I don’t run and climb and hike and lift.
Society and I glare hatefully at those extra 10–15 pounds each day as I fail to shake them.
As if they aren’t a side-effect of one of the most heartbreaking, stressful, painful periods of my life. As if I’m not grieving the recent death of a beloved pet. As if I’m not struggling to move despite chronic back pain; chronic emotional pain.
These cataclysmic life events would naturally happen in the middle of the holiday season, an incredibly triggering time for me as an abuse survivor.
Confusingly, it’s also a time that’s chock full of temporarily comforting, sugary desserts.
Thankfully, I have a distraction: all the gifts I feel obligated to spend my meager savings on to celebrate a religion I don’t practice. Not to mention the many holiday events I have to feign neurotypicality to get through.
Endless categories in which I have the opportunity to fail, to be too much, to not be enough.
Does our society not put enough pressure on us to keep up with the wellness trends year-round? The plant-owning and weight-watching and scratch-cooking and caffeine-reducing? Now I need to figure out where to store a hopeless tangle of string lights?
As if I’m not still trying to work full-time, go to school part-time, have a skincare routine, grieve the shit show that is our country’s political downfall, maintain my relationship, build a retirement fund, figure out how to help my dog be less anxious, and have a side hustle or two.
Always one small change I could stuff into my daily self-care. One thing I could be doing more or less of. One more task to keep track of, to learn a hack for, to monitor vital health data on.
Until it all ends up taking so much time and focus to organize that I fail to actually accomplish any of it.
When did we all decide we needed to be doing so much?
What if we agreed we were allowed to rest?
Now that’d be some holiday magic.
