Maybe I Can® with Debbie Weiss

Ep. 135: When's The Last Time You Felt Like You?

• Debbie Weiss • Episode 135

Share episode

Send us a text

In this episode, I open up about something deeply personal: what it felt like to completely lose myself while caring for everyone else. I share the moment I realized I had become disconnected from my joy, my identity, and even my laugh. Maybe you’ve felt it too, that quiet sense of going through the motions, showing up for everyone but yourself.

Through reflection, honesty, and a few hard-earned insights, I walk through the different ways disconnection can show up in our lives, and how awareness is the first quiet step back to ourselves. If you've been feeling flat, unseen, or unsure of who you are outside of your roles, this episode is for you.

Let this be your gentle reminder: You’re not lost. You’re just waiting for you to pay attention.

NEW! The Sprinkle Effect Book!
https://www.debbierweiss.com/thesprinkleeffect


***NEW FREE WORKBOOK**

Kickstart Your New Life with One Critical Step: A Practical Guide for Women Ready to Redefine Their Paths and Embrace New Beginnings.

DOWNLOAD HERE TODAY: https://www.debbierweiss.com/kickstart


MAYBE I CAN BEGIN TO CHANGE MY LIFE

This transformative six-module journey of self-discovery and empowerment includes a printable worksheet and offers lifetime access to all materials. Designed for those facing major life crossroads or simply seeking greater fulfillment, this course is your path to a more purposeful life.

LEARN MORE HERE: https://www.debbierweiss.com/beginchange


Work with Debbie! See all the ways you can work with Debbie to help you live the life you know you're meant for: https://www.debbierweiss.com/workwithdebbie


On Second Thought... Maybe I Can Book on Amazon: https://bit.ly/maybeIcanbook


Morning Sprinkles of Goodness: Download your copy of this free guide to help you kickstart your day. Grab it here: https://www.debbierw...

Speaker 1:

Hi and welcome back to the Maybe I Can podcast. I'm your host, debbie Weiss, and it is nice to see you hear you even though I can't, but I know you're there listening and I know you love me talking back to me out loud. So, if you are, please always feel free to DM me on Instagram at debbierweiss, or send me an email at debbie at debbie r weisscom. So I've got to tell you I have been doing a lot of really deep soul searching recently, and that's because I'm taking a course, a business related course having to do with my speaking career, and it's asking me to reflect on a lot of things that maybe I really haven't before, and so I've been doing some soul searching and really trying to figure out who was I. I know who I am now, but who was I?

Speaker 1:

And in the past I've always described myself as a widow, a caregiver for over 40 years to my father for 30 years, and then my oldest son, who had learning disabilities and mental illness, and then my husband became a widow. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah all the things In my books I talk about other challenges that I've experienced throughout my life, as so many of us have, and so I'm thinking you know what I, when it comes down to it, I have always been a people pleaser, and I didn't really understand that who I was or I want to say, I don't want to use the word was, I would say, a recovering I-N-G. Not recovered people pleaser, because it is a work in progress. And so then I started tapping into the fact that I felt unworthy for a variety of reasons throughout the majority of my life, and that's something that I've been working on for the last decade and really really making great strides. But what it comes down to is that pivotal moment in my life, which I've talked about and I'll mention again in a little while when I turned 50, who I was before 50, and who I am now. And for those who don't know me, depending upon when you're listening, in a couple months I'll be 62. So I've been at this for over a decade.

Speaker 1:

So let's talk about one word disconnection. Because what I realized is it doesn't matter if you are or were a family caregiver, like I have been for the majority of my life, or you, you know, maybe you weren't a caregiver in the sense that you had a sick relative. As a mom, you're a caregiver. As a woman, you're usually a caregiver, whether it is to your kids, your nieces, your nephews, your parents, your team members, your co-workers, whoever it is.

Speaker 1:

I think prior to 50 was disconnected. I was completely disconnected from myself. And let me just ask you me just ask you, or let me describe for you who I was. I was doing all the things right, all the things for everyone. My kids were younger than I, was scheduling for them and my older son had therapy and their activities and their play dates, which you know were a priority for me, especially with my older son wanting to make sure he was having interactions with his peers and caring for my dad and, later on, for my husband.

Speaker 1:

And then I have to go to work and worry about everything that comes along with work, right, my team, my customers, money, just showing up every second of every day for everyone else, and from the outside it looked like I was superwoman. People would say I don't know how you do it. Oh my gosh, you're so amazing. Maybe that's what I was looking for, because I didn't feel worthy, you know, and maybe I needed that validation, or at least I thought I needed external validation. Now I know that that's not the case, but while all this was going on, inside you feel numb, disconnected and maybe even invisible, because I remember feeling like when are any of these people that I worry about 24-7 ever going to turn around to me and say, deb, how are you, what do you need? And I used to get frustrated because it never happened. In the end, I was living and feeling this way for so long I really don't even know when it started. Now, if this strikes a chord in you, just so you know you're not alone.

Speaker 1:

There are different types of disconnection and I've got a short list that I'll share with you, and I have to say that in my case, at that time I was disconnected from all of it, and sometimes it doesn't start out that way. Maybe you just disconnect from one area of your life and then it slowly seeps into every area. All right. So the first is disconnection from yourself. You forgot who you are outside of all these roles and responsibilities Mom, caregiver, volunteer, boss, co-worker, whatever it is. You forgot what lights you up. You can't remember the last time you felt like you Going through the motions, right, every day. You're going through the motions, you're doing it, you're getting the things done, you're checking them off the list, but you really don't feel present in your own life. You don't even know who you are.

Speaker 1:

It could be, specifically, that you know you were a caregiver and after you're no longer caregiving you have lost that identity. Or, after a grieving period, I can say, as a widow, I'm not a wife anymore, I'm not a spouse, and that's weird. That's weird after 30 years. Right, that was a big part of my identity. Who the heck am I now? Or maybe it's some other phase of your life where you're transitioning. Maybe you're all of a sudden an empty nester, or you're going into retirement and maybe you were defined by your career and that is gone. And now who are you? And that is gone. And now who are you? You no longer know what you want or you enjoy, or you don't even know what you even believe. You just feel numb and flat. You don't hear any of your own thoughts or voice or intuition, nothing. You're just. You're there, but you're not there. I think that's in my mind how I think of it.

Speaker 1:

Another type of disconnection is being disconnected from a partner or you know, in a relationship, whoever, whoever that is, it's functional but not fulfilling. Maybe you've stopped talking, or maybe you talk all the time but you're never felt, heard. And I have to say that for probably the last decade of my marriage I think that this would describe it, I think that this would describe it. You know that connection. For a variety of reasons, my husband had a lot of both physical and mental illness and that really did change our relationship. It changed the roles in our relationship and I did grow resentful because I felt like he wasn't supporting me. And I think he was resentful because he felt that I was always annoyed and not really understanding how he was feeling, both physically and mentally. And what happens? We were disconnected. Yeah, we talked right. I said did you go to that doctor's appointment? Or, you know, did someone take care of the dog? Or all those things? You're sharing space almost like you're talking to a roommate. You've lost that emotional and possibly physical intimacy. You feel unseen, unappreciated or misunderstood.

Speaker 1:

Disconnection from work or whatever your purpose is. So I'm not saying that you're not working. You're going to work, you're checking the boxes, but you feel empty. Doing it, you used to care, something used to excite you, and that's not the case anymore. You're just coasty or feel exhausted every day that you show up for work and especially not looking forward to Mondays. You're burnt out. Your job no longer has meaning, you're bored with it. Maybe it no longer aligns with what your values are, and why do you stay out of habit or fear? And maybe you know. You just feel like I'll just ride this out, I'll coast out through retirement. But you know what I can say, that reinventing myself and finding my purpose. I still have my career, but for me, finding this is talking to you, writing my books, giving speeches. That's my new purpose. But it has also helped to reignite a passion for my day job as well. So you never know what will do the trick.

Speaker 1:

And the last type of disconnection is just feeling completely disconnected from life. Life is happening around you, not with you. It feels like you're watching from the sidelines instead of actually living it. You've lost your sense of joy, spontaneity. You're just basically living for the next obligation or task that you have to do and you no longer really feel excited about anything. The thing is, is that so often disconnection? It's not screaming, I'm disconnected, it kind of whispers and you don't even know. It just slowly creeps into your life. It spreads quietly. But here's the good news. So does reconnection, which we're not going to talk about today, but we'll get to that in the coming weeks. Literally one small shift can begin to light things up. So I don't want you to feel like this is a problem. There's something wrong with me no way.

Speaker 1:

I think so many of us are dealing with this and really aren't aware. I think it happens. There's no shame in it. It is so common. It happens after we've spent years of kind of like over-functioning, caregiving, pleasing, looking to please people or just surviving your needs, your wants, your feelings. They have been pushed down for so long that they no longer show up. I know I can speak for myself in that, especially when I was in a very deep season of caregiving, my dad was, you know, the last few years of his life required more attention, which was at the same time that Sam, my oldest, also really needed more attention. Where he was in life, I guess kind of pre-puberty and hormones Everything was shifting at the same time that my husband began to feel overwhelmed and at the same time when before I mentioned pleasing and that I'm a recovering people pleaser in this season of my life.

Speaker 1:

If someone asked me oh, can you be the treasurer of the PTA, oh, can you be the treasurer of, you know, our sports organization or whatever it was? Can you be homeroom mom? I never said no because I didn't want to let anyone down, but the last thing I needed at that time in my life was to say yes to any other obligation, and when that happened, I felt like, if I take time for myself, that's selfish. That's selfish to put myself first, ahead of all my family's needs, my work needs, everybody else's needs. Who does that? That is so selfish.

Speaker 1:

That was my thinking, which I was completely, completely wrong, because what I've learned since then if you don't do that, then you eventually burst. You literally burst into flames. Whether that's an emotional outburst, whether that is like falling apart, having a breakdown, whatever that is, you cannot, nobody can, sustain this for an extended period of time. And so you know that analogy with the airplane put your oxygen mask on first so you can take care and help your child put their oxygen mask on. It's the same type of theory, but I think so many of us don't really understand that. We think if we say no because we can't take on any more responsibility, it's not good for us, that's selfish, because they really need me. That's what I was thinking. Oh, they can't find anybody else to do selfish, because they really need me. That's what I was thinking. Oh, they can't find anybody else to do this. They really need me and I don't want to let them down. But in the end I wasn't doing a good job for them. I was certainly not helping myself and I really wasn't helping my family members. I was spreading myself to.

Speaker 1:

I did not realize just how disconnected I was until I turned 50. And my friends insisted that we go away for a weekend to Bermuda to celebrate. And I remember like thinking oh my gosh, that idea sounds amazing and so I would love to do, but I can't. How can I leave for the weekend, gary, my husband? He'll flip out. He'll be so overwhelmed with the schedule that I'm going to leave him, who has to be where and what he needs to do and what happens if something happens. And what about the kids? Actually, my dad had passed away about a year or so prior, so he was no longer somebody that I had to be concerned about. But luckily I have amazing friends who convinced me that it was possible, and on that trip I realized for the first time that was my first burst of awareness that I had lost myself. I was completely disconnected.

Speaker 1:

The feelings that I felt in that moment or in that weekend when I was there the laughter, the reconnecting with my closest friends, reconnecting with myself Because one night at dinner after a laugh fest, something in me thought and I asked them did I used to be known for my laugh? I kind of have, like when I really laugh I have a very loud cackle and you know, if I was anywhere, people knew I was there because of my laugh and I was known for it. But I had honestly forgotten that. I had to ask them because I thought this sounds familiar but I'm really not sure and I'm telling you like that was my identity and I had completely forgotten. And I realized I had forgotten that because I hadn't laughed like that in decades, I had lost my laughs and I had lost myself.

Speaker 1:

And, wow, that realization really hit home that weekend, along with some other conversations that we had about our hopes and dreams, and I thought my hopes and dreams, I have no idea. I have a lot of hopes and dreams for my kids, but me, how can I hope or dream? I don't have time for that and this is my life. What am I going to do about it? And I didn't know the answer, and if you've listened to me, I think you might know what happened since then. But over the next few weeks we'll talk about this a little more.

Speaker 1:

This idea of awareness is powerful because you can't fix or change something if you don't know about it, and so I'm hoping that listening today has jarred something in you. And if it has, please don't feel badly about it. Don't feel any shame. And I felt shame. Oh my goodness. I can't believe how I let people down or I allowed this to happen. Just so many things. But that's not the case. I'm telling you. There's more, and it doesn't need to be at the expense of your loved one. That's what I was worried about, but again, I was wrong. So I want you to reflect. Where in your life do you feel like maybe things have gone quiet? You've lost that connection, and when was the last time you felt like you? I'm happy to say that I feel like me most days now, and that switch has changed my entire life. My life now looks nothing like it did prior to the age of 50. And that all started with that awareness. You don't have to fix anything today. You don't have to figure it out, you just have to notice. That is so. I want to close by reminding you that this didn't happen overnight, and reconnection won't either. But the moment you notice, you have already started the process of reconnecting to yourself.

Speaker 1:

Now I don't know how you feel about affirmations, and when I first heard the term, quite frankly, I thought it was a bunch of nonsense, didn't really understand. But how do you use them? They're just phrases that either you repeat out loud, you repeat in your head, remind yourself, maybe when you feel guilty, whisper it in the mirror, maybe when you're putting your makeup on. I write it down sometimes, keep it in front of me during the day and read it, either out loud or in my mind. So how about you use the affirmation this week?

Speaker 1:

How about you use the affirmation this week? I deserve to take up space in my own life, and if that doesn't work for you which is fine I don't know if that one would honestly work for me. You can change it. I matter in my own story. I'm worthy of being seen, even by myself. That's powerful. Forget it. That could go into a whole other episode. So I am going to stop right there. I just want to remind you, you are not lost. You're just waiting for you to start paying attention to yourself, and that begins today. See you next week and don't forget, keep on sprinkling.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Debbie Weiss

Host