Ok, before I get to today’s email I have to share a piece of feedback, maybe the greatest compliment of my life, I received last week from a client, friend, podcast listener, email reader Nora (Hi Nora!!!) after listening to episode 85 with Jill Kargman (12 time NYTimes bestselling author and Bravolebrity). Nora said…
“It was like listening to future you, Alissa.”
🤯☠️
If you haven’t already listened, you can listen here. And if you already did and haven’t left a review, you can do that here!
I started teaching Pilates at Equinox in 2006 with clients at 5:30am. I may not have always been a morning person, but after years of this kind of schedule I became one. Then in about 2016 I made a rule that I don’t wake up in the hour of 5 anymore. It’s a hard boundary to hold in the service industry, as a people pleaser, and working for yourself. But I did it! No more waking up in the hour of 5.
Waking up in the hour of 6 or 7 I’m fine with. Once I’m vertical I’m good to go. Get some coffee in the tank and we are ready, set, spaghetti.
It’s the hour of 5 that’s the issue…Because waking up that early hurts me. It really hurts my feelings.
So it’s not a big surprise I’m having some feelings about Everett’s early morning wakings that now happen in the hour of 5. I created a boundary that I don’t wake up in the hour of 5 and here were f*cking are. The newborn doesn’t even wake up in the hour of 5!!! It’s the 3.5 year old who wants to watch tv and go through the entire inventory of our pantry to see what he can eat.
And it’s nearly impossible to hold a boundary with someone who doesn’t care about my boundaries. Not because Everett doesn't love me, he does! Because he literally can’t consider it because of being a healthy 3.5 year old.
So this has been going on and eating away at my patience (and Jeremy’s too) and got the best of me one morning last week. The baby slept great, woke up at 2:30am to eat so I knew I was set until about 6:30am. Hallelujah.
But then there was thunder.
Everett is terrified of thunder so there he was. In our bed. Promising to go back to sleep (bullshit) and then asking to watch a show quietly on Jeremy’s phone (bullshit) and poking me in the face (also bullshit).
He started kicking and hitting and I reminded him that we don’t tolerate that behavior in our room and he can choose different behavior or he has to leave.
His response? Punching Jeremy.
Note that this is all going down in the hour of 5!!!
I wasn’t happy. I am proud of myself that I didn’t yell. I simply picked E up, gave him a kiss, told him I loved him, put him down in the hallway, and closed our bedroom door.
Then the baby woke up.
IN THE HOUR OF 5!
You can’t make this up! I don’t even have to tell you how NOT my best self I was.
My milk supply hasn’t regulated yet so as I fed the baby I was waterboarding him, he unlatched, milk literally sprayed everywhere soaking everything I was wearing and he was wearing, then he spit up so I’m covered in milk and milk-barf and Everett is whining that he wants to take the foam tiles of the baby’s play mat downstairs…
IN THE HOUR OF 5!
It went on from there. It wasn’t the easiest morning, but if I’m being honest (which I always am) it really wasn’t the hardest either. Still, it got me. Even after I dropped E off at school, came home, fed the baby again (armed with accessories to handle the excess letdown and waterboarding), and slept while the baby slept…I felt off.
I have really been prioritizing my mental health during this postpartum experience since I struggled so much after E. The best medicine for me (outside of when I need actual medicine) is movement.
And I’ve made a commitment to moving my body every day (Pilates For My Privates, other pilates, yoga, dance cardio, doing for a walk, foam rolling, barre classes with Simi Botic, etc). Not because I’m bouncing anywhere or getting anything back. But because this is how I take care of my mental and emotional health. This is a boundary I’ve created for myself and I can f*cking hold. Because it doesn’t have to happen in the hour of 5.
So even though I was still tired and wanted to nap more. And even though I was in a crummy mood and would have preferred to whine about it or read ACOTAR (iykyk), I made time to move.
I’m taking an online class with one of my fave teachers Meirav Cohen and as I was clearing some space on the aforementioned foam tiles now back in the baby’s room that Everett was eventually allowed to bring downstairs because it wasn’t my hill to die on, I couldn’t find my theraband.
I lost my mind. I blamed Everett. I blamed the cleaning people who came and so expertly cleaned our house this week and are so nice. I almost tried to blame Jeremy but even I knew I was pushing it.
I was forced to wake up in the hour 5, in a house of whining, being puked on, covered in milk, and now I can’t even find my theraband?!?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!? Everything IS TERRIBLE!
And then I found the theraband under a foam tile (so sort of Everett’s fault) and started my class.
And immediately felt better. The class was a gentle exploration of the movement of your upper back which felt like heaven on my newborn ravaged body. It also helped me let go of the added tension of a morning of rage. As I stretched and moved and breathed and came back to myself the feeling that my time, body, and life belong to everyone else but me melted away…
Movement does that. It changes things. It moves things around; body parts, energy, feelings. I don’t want to sound too woo, but our bodies and our feelings are connected. If you want to hear more of my thoughts on this, what I’ve seen happen in clients’ bodies and my own, this week’s podcast episode 86 It’s Time To Sculpt Your Feelings talks about leveraging what we know about building physical strength and how it connects to and applies to our emotional fitness.
I’m not here to tell you what to do, but maybe consider going for a walk while you listen to the episode – You’re welcome in advance ;)
As always, I’ve got your back. I’ve got your front. And I’ve got your undercarriage.
Xo, Alissa