I’ve been thinking a lot about why we women go through crisis points. This applies to all women, regardless of social standing, wealth or the lack of it, super efficient women or winging-it women, working women or stay-at-home women…all categories of women. Comes a time in life when women question themselves, their place in the universe, their place in the home, their place as wife, sister, or any other familial position they hold….indeed, even their place within their own selves. Of course, society does put pressure, both seen and unseen on how women ‘should’ be, how women ‘ought’ to be, how women are ‘expected’ to be. A kind of taken for granted that women combine home with work, with social life, and with all the odds and ends of life that are left around. A subtle but definitive kind of expectation that it is the job of women to make sure that everything runs clockwork, no glitches anywhere, and still look perfect, and behave perfectly….be the gracious, loving, caring, tiptop wife/mother at the end of the day. No room for anger, or feelings of frustration, or gaaahhhhhh moments, with ‘I’m done’ moments not too far away. We may take coffee breaks with our friends, or by ourselves, indulge in retail therapy, or go to the beauty parlour…but how many of us are actually able to disconnect ourselves from the lists of chores that we instinctively make every morning? There isn’t any prioritising for women—everything is a priority because everything has to be done. What starts out as a loving and efficient homemaker ends up as a crabby homemaker with feelings of being taken for granted, and put upon, and feeling as if she is on a treadmill that doesn’t stop. She can have help come in, but it doesn’t ease the feelings of being the home drudge and workhorse. And if she is a working woman, all these feelings end up getting magnified.
How to have moments of total disconnect? How to have ‘me’ time…real ‘me’ time? How to take time off to reconnect with our core? How to just stop everything and curl up with a book and a glass of wine? How to do what I really want to do without explanations to anyone or most of all, without reasoning it through with myself?
We know we must not give the strings of our lives to anyone. We must not become slaves to work, housework, or work outside the home. We must be our own people. We must not conform to what is ‘expected’ of women. We must find time for ourselves…. And yet we get so caught up in the whirlwind of everyday life and chores around home and family that we not only put ourselves on the back burner, but we neglect ourselves so completely till one day there is an explosion….
We just have to learn to treat ourselves a little more kindly and lovingly, ensure we are healthy for our own sakes, and in the midst of the turmoil of life, we need to create and fiercely protect our inner haven…