What is Grace?

And where the fuck do I get some?

I have struggled with unrealistic expectations my whole life. It has negatively affected many of my friendships and romantic relationships. But the person I have probably been the most unrealistic with is myself.

Very side note: I was convinced I had used the wrong form of affect vs. effect (honestly, let’s just move forward with one of them at this point) and I looked it up and I had actually used the right one. Huge win!

Now don’t get me wrong, I am by no means a perfectionist. At least I don’t think so. My house is not Pinterest worthy, I lose things constantly (has anyone seen my license or my David Yurman ring?) and I say wildly inappropriate things in almost every social situation. But even that assessment of myself is coming with a dash of judgment.

So here I am in this moment in life and I have been presented with a really tough set of circumstances. I am battling my regular dependable everyday depression, throw in a lil extra Postpartum depression (“Bam!” -Emeril Lagasse) AND grief from the recent loss of my father. Don’t worry, we were very close.

And if I find myself being vulnerable with people when they ask “how are you”, I am given so much love and support and a constant reminder to give myself grace.

“Give yourself grace” on repeat x1000. And it is good advice. And I am sure I have given it to people in the past. But what the fuck does it mean?

Unfortunately, I don’t know Grace. I guess we never met. She must have been in a different sorority. So can I earn grace? Could I buy some grace? Can an Etsy witch whip me up some?

Despite all the horrors happening in the world and my own tough personal battles, I have found the time to ramp up my anxieties and criticisms of myself. Multi-tasking!

I am feeling hyper-critical of my mothering, career, body, how I am in my marriage. How I interact with my family members who are also grieving. I am even critical of how I am grieving. And of course I realize there is no right way to grieve. I know all of that and yet, here we are.

So I asked my Instagram Close Friends circle (a very VIP group where I mostly post about being high) for some advice on how to locate this said “Grace.” And I got a wide array of feedback. Probably the best advice was simply: Mushrooms. That I can do! But another friend, who is very smart and successful and I never imagined would also struggle with this, said she gives herself a time limit on wallowing. She’ll allow herself a day, an hour, whatever it is and then it is time to move on.

And I think I can at least try that.

And another friend suggested doing something active that could allow my mind to turn towards something positive. She suggested swimming. So I joined a gym and went swimming! I knocked over my giant water and it sent me into a tailspin that resulted in me sitting in a bathing suit in a gym locker room crying but then I swam.

And guess what? It did help! Mostly because I was away from my dumb ass phone. Which believe it or not, is not helping my anxieties.

Then, I woke up today in another anxiety spiral. I didn’t have the opportunity to swim. I couldn’t do mushrooms because I had to take care of my two children. Bullshit tbh! And I didn’t set a timer. I just gave myself no grace and had anxiety on and off and then cried.

So I guess I am still searching for this elusive Grace who probably has really cool bangs. If you see her let her know I need to meet her!