Sometimes it’s okay to ask for help

Sometimes it's okay to ask for help

I didn’t actually realise how much of a ‘perfectionist of life’ I was until my body forced me to slow down the pace. I’ve always been a super busy person and that’s just the way I am. I find it really hard to say no to things, ask for help from others, or to just sit down and do nothing, it feels so alien to me. Although just recently, I’ve realised sometimes my body just needs to rest.

So, What keeps me so busy?

There is my full time job, then of course my blog which I run as both a hobby and a business now. That comes hand-in-hand with the torrents of blog content and social media posts that I need to keep on top of, not to mention my overflowing email inbox too. I always try to make time to see my friends in between work and my blog and lastly, as if I didn’t do enough…. I’m a bit of a clean freak when it comes to my home and I find it hard to relax if things aren’t the way I like them at home. PHEW, that is a lot.

Basically, I just never sit still. Every moment in my day is taken up, right up until the last minute when I fall into bed exhausted, ready to wake up the next day and do it all again.

I’ve found as over the years, living this kind of ‘full on’ lifestyle has lead to a few burn outs along the way, but me being me, I can’t just switch off and think ‘Screw it, I’m just going to watch Netflix‘, usually it takes me to leave the country and get totally away from my surroundings to unwind and leave my fast paced life behind.

Sometimes it's okay to ask for help
The classic ‘Sausage Legs’ holiday snap, but being on the beach is great thinking time 🙂

Learning to change

This was all until this year when we began the IVF process I suddenly realised that IVF/Pregnancy doesn’t go hand-in -hand with life in the fast lane – something is going to have to give. As we investigated the IVF process I realised I was going to need to rest and look after my body and with this V began to worry about me burning out, so we talked about what areas of my life I could slow down.

Obviously my blog is my pride and joy, so that had to stay – it makes me happy and is my creative outlet. I couldn’t give up my full time job (I wish! 😉 ) so the area I had to sacrifice first was looking after my home. I’m not sure why, but this realisation of letting go of responsibility of something was quite hard for me, maybe I’m just super house-proud, or a bit of a control freak, but it felt weird to hand over the reigns to someone else and stop doing the tasks I have done for my whole adult life.

My initial thoughts were ‘what if they do everything differently to me?’ or ‘What if they move all my things into different places‘, it sort of felt like it wouldn’t be my home anymore. I also felt strange having someone else run around after me and clean up my mess and I felt guilty by not doing it myself.

Trust

Ultimately, I had to listen to my body and put my trust in someone else, sometimes thats the hardest thing to do. Luckily, V knew a lovely lady called Cath. She chatted to her about coming over to help us with some of the bits around the house and since then she’s been coming over weekly to help us. It’s removed so much pressure of keeping on top of household bits and she is brilliant – I don’t know why I had doubts about asking for help from someone else. I can’t thank her enough.

So, I guess where I’m going with this is that sometimes you just can’t manage everything, and it really doesn’t mean you are failing at life, it just means that your priorities are different at the moment. Maybe your house is a mess, but your blog photography rules. Or you are growing a human but fell asleep in a meeting. These things happen, trust me – I’ve learned if you spread yourself too thinly, then something has to give.

To Summarise….

  • It’s TOTALLY ok to ask other people for support if you need to, you haven’t failed in life – just because one area is slipping, it is probably because one area is growing.
  • Don’t feel embarrassed to reach out to people,  usually we’ve all been there at some point and good friends/family will understand where you are coming from.
  • Ask someone you trust to help you – I’m so glad we found Cath as I trust her in our home and she does a fab job, so I feel totally comfortable handing things over to her. Trust is a really important thing when you are feeling vulnerable, so speak to someone you can trust, and if it’s cleaning help you need, try this.
  • Don’t try and spread yourself to thinly – focus on the one/few things you can do, and do it really well. Forget about the rest.
  • Fall back on the blogging community – I know each of our blogs are our little babies, but we are all in the same boat and feeling the pressure. Usually bloggers are more than happy to help each other out, you just have to ask.

Basically:

Sometimes it's okay to ask for help

Post written in collaboration with Hassle.com, however all words, opinions and control freak tendencies are my own

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  • I’m a control freak in that I always want to do things myself and my way. I have a hard time letting go and letting someone take something on for me, so I can really relate to you on this. It’s definitely a learning process to let go a little bit at a time until you’ve handed something off while not letting your anxiety over that thing rise in response.

  • This is so resonating with me – also a life in the fast lane type, and I struggle to relinquish control too. But recently I realised that in trying to launch my freelance business, get married, blog, and renovate my house all at the same time, I was not staying on top of things on my own. The one thing I could let someone else take on was keeping the house a bit less of a soul-destroying filth hole (as with renovations, even maximising my cleaning time, dust was still reigning), so I got a cleaner fortnightly, and the difference it has made is huge. A weight off my mind, and the house is looking much better, which in turn is keeping me calm. Sometimes help is hard to ask for, but so worth it. xx

  • This was such a good read Lyndsay! I fully well know that I take on far too much at a time and I’ve been trying not since being pregnant! I’m glad you’ve got Cath to help around the house! It’s always lovely when you have someone, like you say, who you can trust to help you out when you need it 🙂
    Hope you and bump are keeping well my lovely x