134. What to Do When Survival Becomes Your New Normal

Some seasons of life are meant to be intense—but temporary. We tell ourselves, I can do this for a little while, and we push through on adrenaline, determination, and grit. But what happens when that season doesn’t end?

In this episode, I talk about what happens when a sprint quietly becomes a marathon—and why the strategies that helped you survive short-term stress can actually start working against you over time. We’re not talking about changing your circumstances. We’re talking about changing how you’re running your race so you don’t burn out, shut down, or lose yourself in the process.

If you’ve been feeling more irritable, exhausted, emotionally flat, foggy, or like sleep doesn’t quite fix things anymore, this conversation will help you understand why—and what to do instead. I’ll walk you through how to recognize marathon mode, why self-care becomes non-negotiable (not indulgent), and how to make small, sustainable shifts that protect your energy, your nervous system, and your joy.

This episode is for any mom who is carrying a long season with courage—and needs permission, wisdom, and compassion to run it differently.

If you'd like to get the show notes for this episode, head to:

 https://leighgermann.com

Transcript

What happens when the season you thought was temporary quietly becomes your new normal?
When your sprint is turned into a marathon and you're worn out in a way that makes you wonder how long you can keep this up.

Today we're not talking about changing your circumstances. We're here to change how you are running your race because there is a smarter, more sustainable way to carry what you're carrying. And today I'm going to show you how.

This is Leadership Parenting: what to do when survival becomes your new normal.

Did you know that resilience is the key to confidence and joy? As moms, it's what we want for our kids, but it's also what we need for ourselves. My name is Leigh Germann. I'm a therapist and I'm a mom. Join me as we explore the skills you need to know to be confident and joyful. Then get ready to teach these skills to your kids.

This is Leadership Parenting, where you learn how to lead your family by showing them the way.

Is there something in your life right now that started out as a temporary focus, like kind of an intense stretch? Something that maybe you said yes to, knowing it might be hard, but telling yourself it would be over soon. And have you noticed that you have something going on like that where it's not over soon? It's no longer just a temporary thing. It now has turned into your new normal.

Maybe it was a home remodel or waiting for a new home to be built, and you're living in a situation where it was supposed to take eight weeks and it's now taken eight months, and you're still living in the middle of someone else's home or a construction situation. Maybe it was a job change or a career pivot where the learning curve was supposed to flatten out and it just never did.

Or maybe it's having a new baby. That's a big one. And we keep waiting to get our life back. And then they go into toddlerhood and other kids' stages start to occur and we're still waiting to get back to normal.

Maybe it's starting a business, the grind that was supposed to be temporary, that just became your life now. Maybe supporting your child through a really hard season, a diagnosis, a difficult year socially, anxiety, learning differences. Maybe that one hard year quietly became two or three.

I have moms that have gone through separations and divorces or moves to a new city, or they're caring for parents, or they have a health diagnosis with themselves or with someone in their family that's rearranged all their focus in their life, or they've started a ministry or a nonprofit, or they're writing a book, something that's consuming so much more of their time than they anticipated.

Whatever your version of this might be, I hope today's episode will be enlightening for you. Because what I want to talk about today is what happens when a sprint becomes a marathon, when the short-term, intense stretch of life quietly shifts into something much longer, and why the strategies that get you through the sprint are now maybe something that's actually not working for you anymore.

Here's the thing about a sprint. If you've ever watched racers or you've run marathons or sprints yourself, in a sprint, you're agreeing to do things for a short time that you would never agree to do for a long time. And that works because of the limited duration of that race, right?

You can run on less sleep, you can eat on the fly, you can put your own needs on the back burner, you can say yes to what needs to be figured out because you know it's temporary. This is how runners run a very short duration race. They give it their all and they're not replenishing as they run.

And most of the time that works, right? The storm passes, a new normal forms, and we have a stress response that comes up and adapts for us. And we can actually go on very little sleep. We could go on little nutrition or movement or all of those things. Our body is so resilient and our mind is so resilient that we can handle short-term stressors.

But the way our system is set up is that that short-term hard press needs to have an end. It needs to have a break so that there can be restoration and recovery.

And what I want to talk about today is when our acute stress situation doesn't resolve. Instead, it kind of stretches out, right? The duration has changed to something more than what we realized we were signing up for. The intensity might even increase. And the hardest part, I think, is that we don't often notice when that shift is happening.

We just keep running, running, running faster and faster, or as fast as we can push our body to go. And what has ended up to be the case is that that hard push has now turned into a really longer race. And we wonder why are we falling apart? Why are we getting so tired? Why can't we keep running at this pace?

Do you know what the signs of that are? Less patience, stronger reactions to small things, that irritability, a kind of emotional exhaustion that sleep doesn't seem to fix. Health symptoms that show up, brain fog that we can't quite explain. Do any of these sound familiar to you?

Oh my goodness, I see these almost on a daily basis from women who come to me absolutely worn out and panicked and really fearful that this is who they are and that somehow it's a failure.

And what I want you to hear is this: those are not signs that something is wrong with you or that you're a failure, that you're a terrible runner in the race of life. These are signs that the very strategies that helped you survive the sprint are now working against you. And that means it's time for a new approach.

Because in a sprint, you can skip that sleep and avoid rest and neglect play for a short season. But in a marathon, you can't.

Our self-care is more than just feel-good activities. They're fueling activities, they're things that keep us on our feet. And not just that, they're things that keep us on our feet and feeling good.

So self-care in a marathon stops being optional. It starts being non-negotiable.

And I want to say that as lovingly, but as firmly as I possibly can, because I know that word self-care can feel like one more thing on a list, like indulgence that we don't have time for, like something other people can manage to do, but that we don't have space to do.

Let's start with the idea of sleep. Most people need a minimum of seven hours. And not because seven hours is some arbitrary number, but because sleep is when your brain processes memory and regulates your emotions and recovers from stress. And without it, your brain moves into that fight or flight mode, into survival mode.

And a brain in survival mode is not the brain you want running your life, your relationships, or your decisions, right?

And it takes about seven hours every night for your brain and your body to go through the sleep cycles to do all of that stuff your brain needs to do. So before you think of anything else, I want you to look at sleep.

This is why that's one of the primary components of our self-care pillar. And it's one that I even roll my eyes about too, right? Because it just feels like, ugh, do we have to keep talking about sleep? We really do. Because if we don't get it, everything gets wobbly. Without it, nothing else works.

I kind of wish I had a sleep gauge on my body, like I have a fuel gauge on my car for my gas tank. Because when I see that fuel gauge go way down, and I've talked about this before in past episodes, I've been stranded a couple of times, sometimes in stressful traffic situations where the car just stops because I didn't either see the gas gauge or I thought I could go farther than the gas gauge showed me that I could go and I didn't fill it up.

And I pay serious attention to whether my tank is full or not or has enough gas to keep going. I wish I had that for my body.

Although I'll tell you, I probably would be tempted to ignore it, like most of us do. But at least if I could see that, I would have that sense that that's the source of the signals that I'm getting.

So many times we think these are mental health problems and they show up in mental health ways, right? Like we start to feel a little blue, we start to feel depressed, we start to get really anxious, we start to have brain fog, we start to be impatient or irritable. We start to just feel like, I don't love my life anymore.

And when those things happen, what I want you first to do is look at: is there something situational going on that maybe has put you into this place where you're not getting what you need?

These are signals. These are lights on your dashboard. This is your fuel gauge blinking at you, screaming at you that you need a little something.

And it might look like getting more sleep. Not sexy, right? Not a romantic idea of self-care. Just that you need a little more sleep because you've been skipping it or demand has had it that you don't have enough to get everything done.

Or that you eat a real breakfast, even if that means it's a smoothie that you take with you in the car. It's a gentle walk in the morning before the noise of your day starts, because that noise of your day isn't going away. It's turned into the marathon noise, right?

Five minutes of quiet before you pick up your phone. A moment of prayer or mindfulness or just stillness. Something spiritually or emotionally nourishing that you can take in before all your demands begin.

These are the things we skip when we feel like we're in short-term stress that end up really eroding our wellness and our confidence when it turns into a long-term thing.

Now, I want to acknowledge something. If you're in a work environment that expects early, fast, intense productivity, this might create some friction for you because people might wonder why you're not immediately available. There might be pressure to dive in the moment that you wake up.

This is the world that we live in now with easy accessibility to us. Not only do we have text messages, but now we have platforms like Slack where they know if you're on, they know if you're paying attention. And so much of the time we have these things pinging for our attention, especially if you're in an environment where you're part of a team and this has become expected.

So I know this isn't an easy thing, but the tension is real. And I'm not going to pretend it's not. But I want you to hold on to this idea that front-loading your care is not a luxury. In marathon mode, it is a survival strategy.

It's how you're going to stay in the race and do whatever that thing is that you really care about, even if it's keep your job.

And I think there are ways, small ways, that we could do this that don't blow up your life, right? If your current situation naturally offered this rest to you, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. So the situation itself is not going to give you what you need.

So now, this is so important. You have to intentionally create what the situation cannot provide.

I have moms ask me this all the time. I have a newborn. When am I going to find some time for myself? I have little kids. There is no peace and quiet. I have parents that are aging and they need round-the-clock support. I get it.

We're not judging those situations. You are heroes. You are hard workers. You are the backbone of your family and your work settings.

But I want you to sit with a couple of questions. You don't have to answer them right now. I just want them to kind of settle in and have you ponder them.

Number one, what do you need to recover during your off times?
Number two, how can you create that even in small ways?
And number three, who can help you when you can't do it alone?

So many of us use every pocket of downtime to catch up. We finally get an hour to ourselves and we fill it with twelve things that have been piling up, and then we wonder why we never feel rested.

If you use every break to catch up, you're never going to recover. You're going to keep running until you feel completely empty.

So here's a practical thing I want to invite you to do. Look at what is on your plate right now and try to sort it into four categories: the bare minimum that truly must get done, what can wait, what can be delegated, and what can honestly just be dropped entirely.

And that last category is usually bigger than we think. We're often carrying things that we picked up out of habit or out of guilt or the person that we used to be before the marathon race started.

So let those questions just kind of roll around in your mind a little bit. The way you operated in a sprint is not how we want to live in a marathon. And one of the most loving things you can do for yourself and for the people depending on you is be very, very aware of that.

In short-term stress, we say yes easily. We overpromise. We commit our future selves to things our future selves don't have the capacity to do. Sometimes I'll say yes to things just to get it off my plate even, and I'll think, I'll fit it in, I'll do it later.

Because when I'm in that mentality, everything feels urgent and maybe even in that temporary bucket, and I think I'll just figure it out.

But when you recognize you're in marathon mode, I want you to then think about shifting. Instead of “I can have this done today for you,” maybe it's your boss or your spouse or even your kids, you then place that in the long list of to-do things you know you have to do because you've been running this marathon race for a while now.

You know what your day really looks like. You know what you can really accomplish. And you know what it's going to cost you if you work through that fifteen minutes you have in the middle of the day that is your recharge time.

If you say yes to that thing, you're not going to get your recharge time. And if you don't recognize you're in marathon mode, you might not even be aware of that decision that you're making.

People give us requests and sometimes with deadlines, and we agree to them because, well, many reasons. We're trying to be nice. We want to please. Maybe we really think we can get it done.

But what I'm asking you to do is think about it in terms of all of the things you're taking care of, including yourself. And can you set a more realistic expectation?

Could you say, “I can have this to you by Tuesday,” instead of, “I'll get it to you by end of day.” Instead of saying yes to everything that comes in, we're working honestly. We're setting expectations that reflect sustainability, not that quick survival mentality.

So what I want you to be thinking about is: what am I doing that I'm delaying my own self-care because I keep thinking I'm going to get it done?

And then if you notice that you got it done and you can go back to your routine, then this is great. You don't need the concepts that we're talking about. You really were in a sprint and then you moved back to your normal self-care as soon as it was over.

But what I'm talking about are those tricky times when we find ourselves trapped, kind of in that sprint mentality, and it's not lifting. And that's when we're going to see a lot of problems arise.

Sometimes I can notice just as I'm visiting with someone, this is the problem. This is all we need to do: start putting some care back in for you so that you're getting some things that rejuvenate you or refuel you or start to build up your reserves because you've been going on empty for a really long time.

And I think this is an internal shift, but also an external one. And it's okay to say out loud, “I'm in a hard season right now. I need to adjust my commitments.”

And sometimes you have to practice it quietly and creatively within systems that wouldn't understand that, right? You might not say that to your boss, but you can have that conversation with your family, with your husband, with your spouse.

The question at the center of it: what is actually reasonable for you at this time and season of your life?

And finally, I want to say this gently because I know it's a hard one. If your situation continues to demand sprint-level output while clearly being a marathon, a much bigger time commitment, and clearly not something you can keep doing at the pace you're doing it, bigger changes may eventually be required.

This might mean finding a different job. It might mean bringing in some more help at home, whether that's childcare or someone to help with household tasks. Asking for more support from your family. It might mean releasing responsibilities and expectations that you've been holding on to. It might mean having hard conversations that we've been putting off because we're not ready, because we feel like it means we're failing if we can't do all of these things.

And those decisions can be so hard because we care about so many things.

This is not failure. This is wisdom.

There's a difference between pushing through something temporarily hard and destroying yourself over something that has become more of a permanent activity. It's not sustainable.

And recognizing that difference and being brave enough to act on it is one of the most courageous things a person can do.

I'm reminded of something I think about often when I work with people in these kinds of seasons. Even in the most extreme, uncontrollable circumstances, people find small places of power, small ways to preserve their choice, their dignity, their identity, their inner strength.

And over time, these small spaces create freedom. They create a sense of autonomy and of choice. Resentment melts away. Empowerment replaces it.

And I think we do grieve some of the things that we have to let go.

When things got really, really challenging for me, managing a bunch of children's schedules and work and trying to take care of myself, then I started to have health challenges and I started to not love my life anymore.

So when I put myself back into the mix and I started to add small things to take care of myself, it meant that I had to take some other things off of my plate. And some of those things made me sad.

Like I wasn't able to volunteer in the kids' class because if I did that, I didn't get any time to take care of myself. There was a season where I didn't take clients at all.

And I was fortunate enough to be able to change things financially for a season where we lived on less. We spent less money in our budget because I needed to be able to take care of myself more as I took care of my children. And if I was working, I wasn't able to do that.

Now, we don't always have situations that allow that. But what I'm asking you to do is find small places of change that you can make where you can insert some decision-making. And if you need to, some grieving over things that you're letting go of, but empowerment over the things that you're choosing to rise to the top of your list.

And the best part of this, you guys, is that you're on that list.

Your wellness. Your care. Your support. You're getting fueled and nurtured. And this allows you to enjoy your life as you're taking care of others.

I want to close with a truth that I think is worth sitting with.

If you don't protect your body and your mind, your body will eventually demand that protection through illness or collapse or crisis. And we don't want to wait for that to happen.

This work, this awareness, this adjustment, this decision to take yourself seriously—it’s as important as anything else on your list or in your life. It's not more important than the people you love, not more important than your responsibilities, but equally important because you can't pour from an empty pitcher.

Have you heard that phrase before? I think you already know that intuitively.

So here's what I want to leave you with today.

Name your marathon. Say it out loud to yourself or write it down. This is not a sprint anymore. This is now a marathon, and I need to run it differently.

And then pick one thing. Just one from what we've talked about. Not all of them.

Whether it's protecting your sleep, front-loading one small act of care for you tomorrow morning, dropping one thing from your list that you don't need to carry, or maybe it's asking for help.

And as you do this, you'll start to notice what shifts. The biggest shift of all is the awareness and the compassion that comes when you realize this isn't me failing. This is me running a marathon at breakneck speed.

People don't finish races—real, actual races—when they don't pace themselves. This isn't a fault. This is something that sneaks up on us. And we can handle it. We can deal with this with wisdom and with grace.

So think about what the challenges are that need your extra attention, with you being added into the equation, and take some time.

Thank you for trusting me with your time today. I know I say that every week, but I mean it every single week. I don't take it lightly that we get a chance to spend time together.

I hope you feel my love for you, that what you're doing is so valuable in the world. Whether you're in active mothering or you're just showing up as the best version of yourself, we need you.

And I want you to see that so that you can get on your own side and really be your own champion.

Until then, I will continue being your champion because I believe in what you're doing and I send you my love.

Take good care of yourself, and I will talk to you next week.

You can always find me on Instagram at LeighGermann or on my website at leighgermann.com.

The Leadership Parenting Podcast is for general information purposes only. It is not therapy and should not take the place of meeting with a qualified mental health professional. The information on this podcast is not intended to diagnose or treat any condition, illness, or disease. It's also not intended to be legal, medical, or therapeutic advice. Please consult your doctor or mental health professional for your individual circumstances.

Thanks again, and take care.