Are you swimming or drowning?

(Do women even know they're in water?)

Apr 17, 2024

We all know the story by David Fisher Wallace of the two little fish swimming past the big fish who asks them how the water is. The little fish swim on a little, confused, before looking at each other and asking, “What water?”

Context is everything,

It’s everything.

If we don’t know the water we’re swimming in, we might not realise we’re drowning.

And women in midlife are often drowning - in overwhelm, in the expectations thrust upon us, in the sheer overload of roles and responsibilities and life events they are juggling.

I’m writing this from Belfast, having come up to support my 87 year old dad through his first day of radiotherapy treatment. For the next 4 weeks I’ll have to juggle his needs, my single parenting needs of three teenagers back in Dublin, my business, my clients, my pets and you know, me! This is normal midlife stuff.

I spoke recently at the National Menopause Summit and asked the audience to put up their hands if they’d ever experienced overwhelm, grief, loss, a broken heart, divorce, career struggles, or health issues and every hand was up. That’s not taking into account the general day to day management of perhaps kids, parent-care, work, home-care, peri/menopause, and what to make for the bloody dinner 15624932531857 nights in a row. All whilst looking Fabulous Daw’ling! as per Instagram, because you know we also have to age in an age of Anti-Ageing Propaganda.

Women are the busiest, and least supported, cohort of society.

There was a time when I just thought it was normal to feel totally torn apart by overwhelm. Literally pulled in every direction, so far scatted from my sense of self I often didn’t recognise the woman with her hair on fire in the mirror. I didn’t know I was in water.

I can very easily still be her (and am occasionally) if I don’t proactively invest in stopping the shit hitting the fan, or ducking when it does. It takes sheer stress-inducing nerve to not collapse sometimes from the weight of worry I’m not going to get it all done. And the only reason I do that is because I know now I’m in water not of my making, and how catastrophic my emotional well-being is hit when I let the overwhelm smother me. I’ve been there, and it takes far more energy to crawl back up off the floor than it does to stop from getting there.

Overwhelm and burnout are the epidemics of the 21st century, and it affects women intently at the most intense time of their lives.

Here’s why.

Fairer Fucks

We are the transition generations shifting from 2000 years of Patriarchy to some better form of equity - let’s call this future utopia Fairer Fucks for the craic. So much has been achieved since the greatest advancement of humankind in the last 100 years began with the education of the other half of the population, and there has never been such an exciting and advantageous time for women. But until we get to that Fairer Fucks time we have to understand the reality and context for most women today, especially those in the mayhem of midlife: some of that is good, and some of that is bad.

The good is we have unprecedented chances, choices and opportunities that no generations of women have had. All the constraints that kept women in one very clear role of breeder and carer of others are dissolving. Those are still powerful roles, but they no longer have to be the only roles that define us. Today, we don’t have to get married or have kids, we can get divorced and not be pariahs, we can have careers, study, travel, and explore life in our own right, not just in relation to who we are to others. We are redefining all aspects of life.

The bad impact is that we aren’t living in that equity yet, which means we are often experiencing those freedoms and opportunities while living and working within the old paradigm where women have to be all things to all people, and the world is designed for, and by, men.

At the National Menopause Summit last week it was highlight just how much the lack of basic research and support for something as fundamental as menopause which affects half the population has hurt women’s mental and physical health and it’s still staggering just how much women just weren’t considered or supported.

Now we are playing catch-up, but in the meantime we are running forward with open arms to a world that sees us a people, while being held back by outdated systems and societal narratives and conditioning that means we are often struggling to juggle the inordinate amount of roles and responsibilities we have, while countering the viscous social narrative that still tells women who and how they should be.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. It’s. A. Lot.

As I constantly remind myself and the women I coach:

When it feels hard, it’s usually because it is hard. Now, you have to ask yourself what do you need to support yourself though it.

Because of that patriarchal hangover, the conditioning is so deep rooted, it adds a noise around women that can drown out our own voice. I call it the Triad of Turmoil: People Pleasing, Perfectionism, Imposter syndrome, which can cause us such damage.

It’s all around us in the water we swim in, which means often we are not responsible for the first thought in our head. The first thought is the out-dated cultural narrative that tells you you’re too old, not good enough, or can’t prioritise yourself and must do everything for everyone until you can’t see out from under the overwhelm. I’ve had clients who think they have to spend the time their kids are in Playschool or school cleaning the house or making the dinner so that when the kids return they enter 1950’s Perfection, instead of using that time to work, workout or do whatever they need to do, and then make it a family affair to make the house presentable to live in.

You’re not often responsible for that first thought - the one that is dictated to you by the Triad of Turmoil……… but mattering more in your own midlife means understanding the water you are drowning in, and realising you can be responsible for the second thoughts. Where you get to say, “hang on a minute, I matter! This can’t and shouldn’t all be on me.”

Sanity v standards

Where you get to decide between your sanity and your definition of standards, not Facebook’s and TikTok’s. Where you get to decide what is enough, before the water you’re swimming in drowns you in a tsunami of overwhelm.

So much of my coaching is helping women find the context of their life - where do I need to pull back and get perspective, and where do I need to hone in and find the actual issue that is blanket smothering so much? Sometimes that means waking up to the water, and seeing some of standards you set aren’t set by you. Choose sanity instead.

In my free download My Midlife Marker to help women check in with where and who they are, I ask them to select the issue they most relate to: Are you overwhelmed, at a crossroads, have lost all sense of yourself, or at an exciting new stage?

The overwhelming (pun intended) response is overwhelm.

We have to recognise the water we’re in, and start asking, can I breath in it?

In response to this, I’m running a special work-(of the nice kind)-shop called Revive & Thrive to help you see the water you’re swimming in and give you practical and powerful tools to get a life-support, breathing space or a stronger stroke. (Paid subscribers get a 10% discount - just email me at alana@alanakirk.com)

It’s the water, not you. Remember, when it feels hard, it’s usually because it is hard…. Now ask yourself what do you need.

Overwhelm is a result of the context: it’s not fair on you. And until we are living in Fairer Fucks times, you need all the support you can get.

I’d love to know how you think about overwhelm, so please join me in the comments below (if you’re reading this in an email, please click on the link below to go through to the website to join the conversation.)

Are you swimming or drowning?

(Do women even know they're in water?)

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