I don’t think I can do this again

16 January 2026

Hi Karyn. You won’t remember me but we had a brief exchange on LinkedIn this time last year and you gave me some great advice. I didn’t ignore it exactly but I didn’t follow it very well either 🙁 And here I am back again in exactly the same place.

I have just over two more weeks of holiday before the kids go back to school and I go back to work. My oldest is headed to high school and there is so much to get organised and I just can’t. I know I should be making this preparation time all about excitement for her, it’s a really big deal. She deserves better than a mother who keeps putting off shopping for her text books. I feel so useless. I really don’t think I can do this again, the job, the school run, the stress about what I’ve forgotten, the fights about homework… and that’s just the job at home!

I guess your advice will be just the same and I just have to knuckle down and get on with it. I don’t really understand why I’m so resistant because god knows I’m not managing the way I’m going. Perhaps instead of your kind advice you could just give me a good hard kick up the backside? Thank you for any time and suggestions you might have for me.

TM

My Dear TM

I’m so very sorry. This is really tough. You’re far from alone. I know a lot of executive mums who are feeling exactly this way right now.

First things first, cut yourself some slack, please. You think you’re the first woman who’s received great advice to care for herself and still found everybody else’s needs stick rigidly to the top of her list? I don’t think that’s just about self-sacrifice, for what it’s worth. I think it’s about fear of what will happen if we admit, especially to ourselves, just how finely balanced we are on that precipice. Far easier to tell ourselves to buck up and carry on.

And the last thing you’ll get from me is a kick for that. If you were with me you’d get the mother of all hugs — and that would be good for us both. Instead I’ll repeat a little of the advice I shared with you before. And if you’re open to it, I’d strongly encourage you to book a call with me so we can do a quick burnout assessment. I use a simple but very effective burnout barometer that gives us a clear picture in about 20 minutes and from there we can talk sensibly about what needs to change.

In the meantime, I do have some ideas. A warning: you won’t love all of them, and that’s why it can be easier to decide not to follow them. But you know already the cost of forcing yourself forward. These won’t fix everything on their own but they will most certainly help. And they don’t have to be forever — just long enough to help you stabilise and rebuild some energy.

Before we go further I feel compelled to say this: I don’t think you’ve actually had a holiday.

If your eldest child is just heading into high school, your kids are of an age that still needs parenting — which means you’ve likely swapped being an executive at work for being an executive at home. Time manager. Logistics coordinator. Petty cash officer. Chauffeur. Caterer. Emotional regulator. Fight referee.

That’s not a holiday. That’s unpaid labour in a different setting.

And I’ll bet you’ve had no real break from decision-making either. Who planned the holiday activities? Made sure everyone was where they needed to be? Remembered hats, sunscreen, towels, water bottles? Who’s been making all the invisible lists, including the list of who was feeling out of sorts yesterday and who might need cajoling tomorrow?

If I were betting, I’d say most of that landed on you.

When your executive function is depleted — not just your energy, but your capacity to decide, prioritise and hold complexity — it directly affects your mood and your thinking. Things feel heavier. Bleaker. More overwhelming. Simply recognising this can soften the self-blame. The should-haves and could-haves aren’t helping you right now.

Neither’s the exhaustion.

What will help is getting clearer — and much, MUCH more ruthless — about where your energy is going, and who else can help carry the load for a while.

Here’s where I’d start.

Make yourself a cuppa. Then do a full brain dump. Everything you feel responsible for right now — from the so-small-yet-you-must-not-forget (“she needs a new stapler”) to the enormous (exuding calm, confidence and excitement at the prospect of this huge transition for her and for you) — as well as everything you’re worried you’ll need to deal with when you return to work. Don’t edit. Just get it out of your head and onto paper.

Then — and this matters — write at the very top of the list:

“Go to bed early every night for the next month with a proper, replenishing sleep routine.”

I’m almost certain sleep hasn’t been treated as non-negotiable for some time. It needs to be. If you genuinely don’t know how to rebuild a restorative sleep routine, that’s something we can work through together.

Now have a stretch. Make another cuppa.

Next, go through the list and label each item:

A — Absolutely must be done today
B — Be nice if it got done today but nobody’s going to die if it doesn’t
C — Could happen later… or not at all

Once you’ve done that, I want you to take another pass at it, with the delicious letter ‘D’ for Delegate. Particularly for the As and Bs. For example: you might feel responsible for groceries, and they need to be done soonish if the family’s not going to starve, but YOU don’t need to walk the aisles unless that’s genuinely restorative for you. Online ordering. Delivery. Click-and-collect. Fewer decisions, less drain. (And do YOU really need to be responsible for groceries?! Every week? Can you make a master list and hand over the controls to somebody else now and then?)

Then onto the Cs. Cross them out with enthusiasm. Just cross them out. If something might come back to bite you later, set a diary note to reconsider it in 12 weeks.

Finally, check that sleep is still at the top of your list — and make a plan to start tonight.

None of this will magically “fix” how you’re feeling. Exhaustion takes a little time to recover. But it will begin to restore your calm, your clarity, your executive function, your sense of agency, and — with regular sleep — your energy.

Today is an absolutely awesome day to start.

Much love,
Karyn x