Being Stuck Feels Like I'm Waiting?
I overthink and self-analyze constantly and my latest realization for why I feel stuck is that I’m waiting. I’m 41F, husband and I both have good jobs (whether we like them is another issue), two great kids, 11 and 13. From the outside, everything looks fine and nothing is particularly wrong. But I’ve been somewhere between unhappy and miserable for years.
As a good midwestern millennial, I did all the steps. I did well in school, picked a practical major, got a good job, got married, had kids. None of it felt forced or for my parents’ approval or anything - it’s just what you did. My husband is also 40; we’ve always seen eye to eye on what life looked like and what the next steps were without a long discussion. And when the young adult steps ran out, we flowed along with life – raising kids, going to work, living through a hurricane and the pandemic - while waiting for the next step.
Over the past several years but especially since COVID, I’ve been trying to “fix” whatever this feeling is. Health stuff (minor things but there’s nothing clearly “wrong” with me), diet plans to lose baby+COVID weight, supplements, yoga, minimalism, productivity systems, therapy-adjacent things. I keep thinking there’s a root cause or a switch I can flip. But nothing sticks, mostly because I don’t stick with anything.
So I’m waiting. Waiting to feel motivated. Waiting to become the kind of person who just does the things I know would probably help - like walking, cooking better food, making plans, leaving the house on the weekends, finding a hobby, reading books. But I don’t want to do those things or don’t have the energy. And I'm not sure they’ll make me happy anyway. I followed all the “right” steps before and that didn’t do it. General "wherever you go, there you are" defeatism.
So I go to work, take care of my kids, and then sit on the couch and eat ice cream because it feels like I’ve earned it. And because, what’s the point of doing more? I’m not waiting for magic, exactly. I just feel like I’m in this “waiting place” (like Dr. Suess) and like something is supposed to click and hasn’t. Has anyone else felt like this? Did anything actually change it, or is this just what life feels like?