When Exhaustion Meets the Inner Critic
Toddler parenthood, juggling work and various projects, survival—they pile up. Some days feel like running on fumes, with no time to breathe. If you’re in the middle of this season, you know what I mean: the endless logistics, the cooking, the cleaning, the caring, the trying to carve out even ten quiet minutes for yourself. And if you’re like me—highly sensitive, introverted, wired to notice everything—then the load feels multiplied by at least a hundred.
It’s not just the tasks, but the whole inner weather system. We’re wired for long, uninterrupted blocks of time to do the meaningful work and yet, this season of life we find ourselves in is anything but uninterrupted!
When I’m over-exhausted, my mind doesn’t just say “this is hard.” It sharpens the whole picture into something unbearable. And then my inner critic swoops in: “You’re whining again. You’re not strong enough. Other people handle this better.” And in the short term, that judgment crushes me. It makes me more irritable with the people I love most — my partner, my child, even the dog — the very ones I want to treat with utmost kindness.
Later, after some days or weeks even, I often look back and think: “Well, at least the criticism helped; it forced me to face reality. It sure did clarify things.”
(Do you catch yourself doing the same thing?)
Maybe it wasn’t the judgment that helped clarify things, at all! Maybe it was simply the passage of time.
But here’s the trap: maybe it wasn’t the judgment that helped clarify things, at all! Maybe it was simply the passage of time. Maybe it was the natural capacity to reflect and integrate, working quietly in the background, that sorted things out. And if that’s true, then I’ve been giving credit to the whip when the real work was done by much gentler tools.
The difference seems to matter. Because if we believe the harsh voice is what brings clarity, we’ll keep turning back to it. We’ll keep letting it drive us deeper into exhaustion, when what we actually need is rest, noticing and patience.
A small experiment
Here’s something I’m trying lately: when I hear myself say “I’m whining again,” I pause and reframe it as: “This is me noticing the load.” I then wait. A week later, I check in: Did clarity still arrive? Did perspective still come?
So far, the answer has been yes. Which tells me the critic was never the teacher—it was just the loudest voice in the room.
For fellow parents, or anyone under pressure
If you’re wired like me, deeply sensitive, introverted, aware of every flicker in yourself and others, then you know how double-edged it can be. That depth gives you beauty: you notice the seasons changing, the Japanese “komorebi“— those light patterns that the sunlight creates through the trees, the way your child’s laugh fills a room, the rare moments of peace.
But turned against yourself, it becomes an unbearable weight.
The lesson I’m holding onto is simple, but not easy: exhaustion will pass, perspective will return, and I don’t need to tear myself apart to get there. Sometimes it’s enough to notice the load, and trust that time—plus a little kindness—will do the rest.
