Hello, hello, hello my beautiful friends. I hope you’re all doing so well!

Welcome to another episode of the podcast. So today, we’re going to talk about overwhelm, everyone’s favorite, I’m sure, definitely relatable. In fact, I ask each of my clients, one of the questions that I ask is for them to list the top three emotions that they notice the most often, and overwhelm is one of the ones I see all the time. So I have a feeling you’re going to relate to what I talk about in this episode. 

So a couple of things we want to cover first- beginning with grief. I believe that grief is a natural biproduct of the infertility/ IVF journey. Many people might not contextualize it that way, but grief is an emotion that is the result of a thought you have about a loss. I know that took a couple of winding turns but the idea is that infertility and IVF, in many ways is the loss of the expected course of our family planning journey. Not many of us, I won’t say all bc that wouldn’t be correct, but many of us do not expect to be met with a dr telling us “the best chance you have for a baby is to do IVF.” Some of us might, right? If you have a known condition- male factor or female factor- that you kind of suspect or are even certain that IVF is path- and even then, ya know, I think there’s still a huge potential to experience that feeling of loss. 

This is of course true if you have experienced miscarriage, or failed cycles or failed transfers. 

So grief is a pretty integral part of this process. 

And the second thing we need to do is acknowledge what grief does to our brains- like physiologically. The physiological impacts of grief. when we have had a loss, our system is overwhelmed. Our capacity to process information can be diminished. It’s like our brain is constantly buffering, right? 

And I don’t mean that in the way that I’ve taught buffering in the past. What I mean is kind of like that buffering symbol that you get when your computer is running slowly, our brain is doing that too. I call it the spinning wheel of death. It’s like buffering, buffering, buffering, and it can’t process the same capacity of information that it could have been able to process before this experience or loss.  

So our brain can be overwhelmed. Our processing speed is diminished. Our ability to remember can be compromised, everything I talked about in the episode that I did on The IVF Fog. We might not be sleeping as well. We might be swimming in all of the hormones of stress- not to mention all of the other hormones you are likely putting into your body. This is just the reality of the physiological experience that most grievers have- outside of IVF, and certainly within that experience.  

So, we need to cut ourselves some slack. We need to show ourselves some compassion and some understanding, we need to show our brains and our bodies some grace. You know that is what I am all about. So there’s the physiological process of grieving, but what I am going to focus on is the emotional aspect of grief. So there’s the physiological aspects that we really can’t do a whole lot about. They’re already here. It is what it is. But then there are those moments where overwhelm is our predominant emotion and that’s what I want to talk about. 

This is the type of overwhelm that might surprise you. What we’re typically thinking causes the emotion of overwhelm is that the circumstances of our lives have changed. We are pursuing the possibility of future children via IVF. Notice I said the “possibility.” BC that’s what we’re talking about. There is no certainty. So that adds an element to the overwhelm. Then you tack on things that we might participate in like: family functions, pregnancy announcements, baby showers, gender reveals, other events where you might see pregnant people or babies, a ton of drs appts,, the fact that IVF is a logistically heavy process., if you’ve experienced a loss then your are likely to have some sort of remembrance for that date or what would have been your due date- things are coming and we’re expecting intense emotions. 

Maybe you’re juggling a big work project and your drs appts, or maybe well intentioned people are asking you questions about the process and maybe don’t have a whole lot of knowledge around the process and you find that you have to explain a lot of things and you find that to be difficult, whatever your specific situation might be what is important to remember is that we think that the circumstances is the reason that we feel overwhelmed. But this is a problematic, albeit completely understandable take if you are new to the type of thought work I do.

So why is this type of thinking problematic? That’s a great question, I’m so glad you asked. 

The only way for us to get out of overwhelm is to deal with all of those things, to change all of those things. Some of those things might be in our control, but the lion’s share of them aren’t. The lion’s share of those things are just the facts of life. 

And as long as we think that those things need to change, before we can not feel overwhelmed, we’re in a bit of a pickle. And this is why it’s important to teach you and what I want you to know, that our thoughts cause our feelings. Not the things around us. 

Now, I don’t teach you that so that you will blame yourself when you feel overwhelmed. That is not the point at all. If I teach you that your thoughts cause your feelings and now all of a sudden you’re thinking it’s your fault and you just need to think better thoughts and there’s something wrong 

with you, and now you’re blaming yourself or shaming yourself, we’re headed in the opposite direction of my intention. I tell all my clients, the first rule of thought work is that we do not use thought work against ourselves. 

The reason I want you to know that our thoughts cause our feelings is so that you can really start to see what your options are. You can start to see how powerful you are. You can start to see the path to reducing suffering in your life. And you don’t feel like you have to control the entire world or change all the things so that you can feel better, because that won’t serve you. 

So the real reason we’re feeling overwhelmed when things like that happen is because of the way that we’re interpreting those things, because of the story that we’re telling ourselves. The thoughts that we’re having about it. 

So when we’re thinking, “I can’t handle this, I’ll never get it all done. It’s too big. It’s too much. I don’t know what I’ll do if,” those interpretations of the things that are happening around us, some of which we can control but much of which we can’t, that stuff is just the math. 

A common example that I see is around pregnancy tests, like the pee on a stick variety. We can feel very overwhelmed around the time that we suspect we might be pregnant or around the time that we would have our beta blood test. There are some people who begin testing very early to watch line progression and there are some that do not test until the blood test or specifically when their clinics tell them to test- no right or wrong. 

But I think we can often feel overwhelmed is because of the constant barrage of thoughts- a lot of the what If’s that we ask ourselves- that do nothing more than keep us locking into the What if game. But many of us fixate on the pregnancy test because we are so hungry for some degree of certainty and control. Right so we’re thinking about the what ifs- asking ourselves all of the unhelpful questions, which creates a feeling of overwhelm, and one of the actions we take, based on that feeling, is to take a pregnancy test. And depending on timing of the test vs when your beta or other test would be- we can actually cause ourselves more harm, more pain, more overwhelm. 

But the pregnancy test has no power over us. None. It doesn’t get to decide FOR you how you need to think and feel about your life, this cycle, or anything else. It is literally a stick, a stick that you pee on, nonetheless, that tells you if there is any measurable amount of HCG in your urine. THAT is the math. The math is you either have a detectible level of HCG in your urine at that particular moment, or you don’t. 

The results of the pee test are just what they are- they do not cause emotions. Do you know how I know? Because for someone who does NOT want to be pregnant, seeing a negative result is a relief; because they have different thoughts about the result. So if there can be more than one belief around this thing (or any thing) then it’s not a universal truth that a negative test will result in despair. Then it’s not math. It’s thoughts and feelings. That’s just an example of how the human brain creates feelings with thoughts. It just is what it is. It’s our brain and it’s unintentional, but well-intended thinking that creates our emotional experience of anything. 

So I’m using the pee on a stick as the example, but I just want you to take a minute and think about where in your life, what’s an area that right now you experience overwhelm when you think about. Or maybe it’s an overwhelm that happened yesterday or the day before, or last week. What was that about? And can you separate the facts of that story from the story your brain is offering you? 

Now again, we do this from a place of compassion and love. Not shame, not blame. That’s just not helpful at all. Of course our brain is going to tell us a story that we can’t handle it, that it won’t or didn’t work, that it’s too much, that we don’t know what to do if we have a failed cycle, transfer, or a miscarriage. That we’re we’re out of our depth. That our brains are against us, that we will never have the family we see in our hearts. 

Of course our brain is going to offer us those thoughts. It’s not even important that our brain stops offering us those thoughts as much it is that we become aware of what our brain is offering us and we start to see it as thoughts. 

Because when we can see it as sentences in our mind, when we can see it as the story our brain is telling us and we can separate what exists objectively versus what we’re making it mean, then we can start to get our power back. Then we can start to go, oh, I see, okay. This first response test or result can’t overwhelm me. I don’t need this experience to be different to feel better. This experience has no power over me, but these sentences in my brain that I believe are the only thing that really needs to change. If I am willing to accept that pain will be part of this process. If I am willing to be compassionate and kind to myself throughout this process- that literally covers the two most challenging areas of this whole experience. 

You start to think, maybe I can handle this. Maybe I can allow feelings of sadness, or grief to exist, without also piling on a bunch of BS about who I am as a person. Maybe I do know how to take care of myself, if I don’t get the outcome I want.  Maybe I do know where to start, if this is my first round, or we’re just discussing IVF, trying to switch clinics, whatever the case may be. Because what happens with overwhelm is that it just results in no action on our part. 

When we feel overwhelmed as humans, we don’t really do much. We get stuck. We spin around and we second-guess ourselves and we procrastinate. We make plans and then we don’t follow through because when we go to do it, we’re feeling overwhelmed. And as humans, we just don’t take productive action when overwhelm is the emotion that’s fueling us, and it’s like a Catch 22. 

I’ve taught you about cognitive bias. So we think the thought, I can’t handle this, we feel overwhelmed, we don’t even start, or we start and we stop, and then our brain uses that as evidence that yeah, you’re right, you can’t handle it. See? There’s another thing you can’t handle. Oh, look over here. See all those other things you can’t handle? 

And now we’re really believing I can’t handle it. It’s too much, I’ll never get what I want. We have all this evidence for it and until we stop and we step back and we go, hmm, what is the math here? Versus the drama that my brain is creating, thank you very much, and then we make some conscious choices about how we want to think. 

And we choose our thoughts on purpose, knowing that our brain is going to offer us some doozies that really aren’t all that useful. And then we’re ready. I’m constantly on the lookout for when my brain says, “You don’t have enough time. There’s not enough time.” 

My brain wants to tell me that all the time. You’ll never get it all done. It’s too big, it’s too much. Em, you have bitten off more than you can chew. My brain loves telling me that. And I’m constantly having to redirect it, just like I would redirect a toddler. 

Like yeah, I know, I know you want to tell me that it’s too much and we’ve bitten off more than we can chew, but guess what? I don’t need to know EXACTLY how everything will play out. I just need to take the first step. I just need to be compassionate to myself. 

Okay, so let’s get into the practicality of it. So we’ve talked about overwhelm in the body and in the brain. We’re not going to argue with that. It’s just part of grief. We’ve talked about overwhelm as a feeling, which is caused by our thinking. That’s where we want to focus our time and energy. 

So here’s how we do that. In the moment, we notice what we’re feeling and we give it a name. This is overwhelm. We don’t resist it. We don’t try to push it away. We just name it. We claim it. We allow it. It’s not going to hurt us. It’s not a black hole that we’re going to get sucked into and never come out of. It’s just a feeling. We’ve had feelings that are much more intense than this one before, guaranteed. 

So feel the feeling. Name it. Open up to it. Witness it. This is what I’ve taught you in episode three. The now feeling process. If you notice you’ve got a really harsh inner critic here, we might want to get some coaching on that. We’ll talk more about that in the future, handling an inner critic. 

But notice it, name it, allow it. Remember, remind yourself, you’re not alone here. Overwhelm is not just you. There’s nothing wrong with you because you’re feeling overwhelmed. Overwhelmed is a human experience. I guarantee you, it’s an emotion that almost everybody listening to this podcast right now, especially widows, and I know a lot of people listen who aren’t widows, they’re very familiar with it. 

So remind yourself that you’re not alone. It’s not that no one understands or that other people are farther along than you are in their life or with their goals and you’re the only one that doesn’t have it together- the only one missing out on a family. No, that’s not true. Overwhelm is a shared experience between us all. Doubt is a shared experience for us all. 

So then, you want to get curious and ask yourself, what’s going on here? What am I thinking? What’s causing this overwhelm? Because my brain wants to tell me it’s the pregnancy test, or the medications, or the injections, or the things that people say to me . My brain wants to tell me it’s the process. My brain wants to tell me it’s literally anything that is outside of me. 

But that’s not it. If it’s my thoughts, what am I thinking? I’m thinking, I can’t handle this, this is too much. See if you can isolate it. Tell yourself the truth. You don’t have to do any of this stuff. You can walk away entirely from your life. Many people do. The truth is that’s not what you want. That’s why you keep waking up every day and showing up, even when you feel a hot mess. 

The truth is that you are choosing to act, to carry on, to deal with all the things that come with an IVF cycle, to figure out what to do with all that stuff in service to this goal, to navigate all of these emotions that you’re feeling, to figure out how to take care of yourself, to love yourself through this process- regardless of the outcome. 

There were (and continue to be) so many times that I have to refocus my intentionality towards myself. Sometimes it’s even as basic as, “I’m safe, This is temporary. I don’t have to like it; if it’s part of my goal, I will still move forward.” Like I use a variety of those things to help myself through tough times. 

Marie Forleo just came out with her book not too long ago, Everything is Figureoutable. 

Em, you’re going to get through this. It’s going to be okay. One foot in front of the other. Talk to yourself like you would talk to a good friend or someone you loved. Because the reality is that we’re all going to think thoughts that make us feel overwhelmed and we want to be prepared for that. 

Doesn’t mean we’ve done anything wrong when that happens. It’s just the way of our brain. Not a problem. We want to be ready for it. We want to have a strategy for it. When it shows up, what do we do? Who do we want 

to be? How do we want to talk to ourselves when we feel this overwhelmed feeling? How can we be our own cheerleader, our own ally, our own best advocate, our own champion when that happens? 

Many of us notice that our brain wants to bring out the shame and the blame and the judgment and the comparison and it’s okay that it does that. But we can make different choices. Just because our brain offers us junkie thoughts doesn’t mean we have to keep thinking them. We can decide what we want to think so that we’re supporting ourselves through all of this and providing some relief to ourselves. 

We have that ability. None of that external stuff has to change for us to be able to improve our emotional experience of it. So that’s what I want for you is less suffering. I want you to know how to support yourself when you’re feeling overwhelmed. I want to give yourself a break. 

Know that physiological changes might still be impacting you. That’s okay. We’re not going to argue with it, but we can control what thoughts we listen to in our brain and what thoughts we choose on purpose. And we can control our reaction to what it is that we feel so that we can create a different outcome for ourselves. 

Alright, that is what I have for you this week. Have an amazing week and I will talk to you soon!