Carrying the Weight of the World (While Packing Lunches)

 For the past couple of weeks, something felt off—despite everything in her life being “fine.”

In this episode of A Glass and a Giggle, Kassi opens up about the quiet overwhelm that comes with motherhood—the mental load, overstimulation, and emotional weight of the world that can leave moms feeling disconnected and drained.

She shares what those days really felt like, the moment she realized she wasn’t okay, and why she left town for a quick escape to Reno just to reset and give her mind a break.

This is an honest conversation about mom burnout, emotional overwhelm, and showing up for your kids even when life feels heavy.

If you’ve been feeling the same way, you’re not alone.

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About the Show

A real, raw, funny take on motherhood, chaos, healing, and remembering who you are under the mom-life mess.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Okay, hi. I'm not even gonna try to make this sound polished or upbeat because that's not where I am right now. And I think if I tried to force that, you would hear it immediately. You know, when someone is talking and you can just tell that they're performing? That's exactly how I felt every time I tried to sit down and record this week. I would open my laptop, stare at it, scroll my phone, come back, and just feel like I had nothing real to say unless I was willing to actually admit to how I've been feeling. And I kept fighting that. I kept thinking, no one wants to hear something heavy or just keep it light, just talk about mom life, just make it funny. Because that's easy, right? That's what people expect. But every time I tried to go in that direction, it felt fake. Like I physically could not say the words without feeling like I was lying. And I think that's when I realized that this feeling I've been sitting in for the last couple of weeks, this heaviness, this weird mental fog, this almost constant sense of being overwhelmed without a clear reason. That is the episode. Because if I'm feeling like this, there's no way I'm the only one. There's no way I'm the only mom going through the motions right now, doing everything I'm supposed to be doing while internally feeling like something is just off. And I don't mean in a dramatic everything is falling apart way. I mean it in this quiet, hard to explain way where nothing is technically, I guess, wrong, but everything feels heavier than it should. The thing about this feeling is that it didn't just hit me all at once. It wasn't one bad day or one moment where I thought, okay, something is really wrong. It built slowly, almost so slowly that I didn't notice it at first. It started with little shifts, being more irritable, feeling overstimulated faster, having less patience for things that normally wouldn't bother me. The kids would be talking at the same time, the TV would be on, the dogs would be barking. And instead of just handling it, I would feel this wave of this is too much just hit me out of nowhere. And I kept brushing it off, telling myself I was just tired or that this is normal. Because let's be honest, being a mom is overstimulating. It just is. But this just feels different. It wasn't just the chaos. It was just like my capacity to handle the chaos had shrunk. Everything felt louder, heavier, and more overwhelming than it should. So this isn't gonna be a polished episode. This isn't gonna be me being funny and being my normal happy go-lucky self. I'm gonna talk about exactly how I've been feeling the heaviness of it. Because God, the world's the world's fucking scary right now, right? Like all of those horrible news stories you see about kids right now and everything with that 65 million like men, like on that article or like that how-to video. The world's fucking scary. And how are we just supposed to sit back and go through the motions where we feel like what kind of world are we raising our kids in? There's this like mental fog too, which I think was the first thing that really made me stop and go, okay, what's happening? Because I would walk into a room and forget why I was there, but not in that funny, relatable mom brain way I talked about a few weeks ago. It felt deeper than that. It felt like I wasn't fully connected to what I was doing. Like I was there physically, doing the things, checking the boxes, but mentally, I was just floating somewhere else, almost like I was on autopilot. And that's a weird feeling when you're a mom, because there really isn't space for that. There isn't space to just disconnect and figure out what's going on internally with you because someone always needs something from you. So instead of stopping and addressing it, you just keep going, you keep showing up, doing the routines, handling everything while this feeling just sits there in the background, getting heavier and heavier. There was one morning that really stands out to me, and I know this sounds so small, but it felt like a breaking point in a way I didn't expect. It was early, too early. Both kids were already up, my son was immediately asking for something. My daughter was in that low-level wine phase, the dogs were moving around and barking, and I walked into the kitchen, still half asleep, not even fully aware of what I was doing yet. The kitchen wasn't even a disaster, but it was messy enough to be annoying. There were dishes in the sink, toys on the floor, something sticky on the counter that I didn't want to investigate. And I went to make coffee because that's always the first step in feeling human again. And I opened the fridge to grab creamer, and I was out. And I know how that sounds. It sounds ridiculous. It sounds like such a small, stupid thing to react to. But in that moment, it didn't feel small. It felt like the last straw in a stack of things that I hadn't even realized were piling up. And I just stood there holding my coffee cup, staring into the fridge, and I could feel that heavy pressure building in my chest. Behind me, both kids were talking at the same time, asking for things, needing things. Someone dropped something on the floor. And instead of reacting, instead of saying anything, instead of just feeling the overwhelming feeling that I need to, I just shut down completely. No emotion, no reaction, just this empty, disconnected feeling where physically I was there, but mentally I was gone. And that moment stuck with me because it wasn't a meltdown. It wasn't traumatic. It was quiet. And somehow that made it feel worse. I think what I've realized is that it's not just mom life. It's not just being tired or busy or overwhelmed. It's everything layered together. It's the mental load we carry every day, the schedules, the appointments, the constant planning, the remembering, the anticipating. And then you add the weight of the world on top of that, the news, the uncertainty, the things you see and hear, even when you're not actively looking for them. As a mom that hits differently. Because it's not just about how you feel about the world. It's about your kids. It's about what kind of world they're growing up in, what you're supposed to prepare them for, how you protect them from things you don't even fully understand yourself. And those thoughts just don't come and go. They stick and they sit in the back of your mind and they add weight to everything else you're already carrying. The nights have been the hardest for me because during the day, there's always something to do, something to focus on, something pulling your attention in a hundred different directions. But at night, when everything gets quiet, that's when it all comes to the surface. I've had nights where I've just sat on the couch in silence, not even turning on the TV or picking up my phone because I didn't have the energy to take anything else in. I swear one more negative piece of information could have made me crack. And instead of feeling peaceful, it felt loud in a different way. Like my thoughts were louder than any noise could put on. And I would start with something small, just noticing that I felt off. And then my brain would start trying to figure out why. And once it starts, it doesn't stop. It turns into this spiral of thoughts that build on top of one another, going from I feel off to why do I feel off? To what's wrong with me? What if this doesn't go away? Why am I starting to feel like this? And before I even realize it, I'm sitting there thinking about everything all at once. And that's what actually led me to fleeing the state last week. And I need to say this honestly, because this wasn't just some fun trip or something spontaneous. I needed to leave. Not forever, not dramatically, but I needed to get out of my environment for a minute because I felt like I was suffocating in it. Like everything around me felt heavy and I couldn't separate it from myself long enough to breathe. So I went with my husband Torino to watch him bowl. And if you've ever watched bowling, you know it's the definition of mindless. You sit there, you watch, you clap, you wait, and then you do it again. There's no emotional investment, no problem solving, no mental load. It just is what it is. And that's exactly what I needed. I remember sitting there watching him bowl and realizing that my brain had finally slowed down. Not completely, not perfectly, but enough that I could actually feel a difference. Enough that I could take a breath without feeling like something was sitting on my chest. And I had this moment where I thought, wow, I really did need this. Not in the casual way, but in the real, almost surprising way. Like I didn't really fully understand how bad it was until I felt a little bit better. But then you come back and everything is still here. The kids, the house, the routines, the responsibility, all of it. And you don't get to just ease back into it slowly. You just step right back in and keep going because that's what you do. And that's the part that I don't think people fully understand. There is no pause button. There's no moment where life gives you space to catch up emotionally. You just keep moving, even when you feel like you're dragging yourself through it. And then there's the guilt that comes with that because even though you're doing everything, even though you're showing up, you know you're not fully present. You know when your mind is somewhere else, you know when you're not enjoying your kids, you know when your patience is thinner, when you're responding instead of engaging. And I had this moment sitting on the floor playing with my son where he kept asking me to watch him and I was looking at him, but I wasn't really there. And that hit me in a way I wasn't expecting because that's not the mom I want to be. And at the same time, I knew in that moment that was all that I could give. I wish I could sit here and tell you I figured it out, that I found some way to fix it or snap out of this heaviness, but I didn't. I'm still in it. It's not as heavy as it was in its peak, but it's still there. And I think that's the biggest thing I've realized is that sometimes there isn't a quick fix for feelings. Sometimes life is just heavy. And instead of trying to force yourself out of it or pretend it's not there, maybe the only thing you can do is acknowledge it and give yourself a little bit of grace while you move through it. So if you're feeling like this right now, if things feel heavier than normal, if you're showing up every day but it feels harder than it should, if you've had those moments where you feel disconnected or overwhelmed or unsure why you feel the way you do, I want you to know that you're not alone in that. You are not failing. You are not doing anything wrong. You're just carrying a lot. And the fact that you're still showing up and still taking care of your kids, still being their safe place, even when you feel like this, that says more about you than anything else. So here's to the moms carrying the weight of the world while still packing lunches, still showing up, still doing everything they need to do, even when the world feels heavy. You're doing better than you think you are. And I'll talk to you next week.