While parts of our country are being asked to stay at home, a physical distance has been created between us and those we love. We have found ourselves in newly created bubbles of separation.

Grandparents separated from their adult children and grandchildren. Friends no longer visit our homes. The venues we once took for granted – coffee shops, restaurants, movie theatres, gyms and entertainment venues closed for the foreseeable future. Our usual group exercise and activities stalled. Children now see the adults around them wearing masks. I wonder what they are making of this altered world. A world where the latest word on a four year old’s lips is ‘lock down’. Even as adults we are finding it difficult to process the changes that have occurred.

For many of us, we have come to accept that this is our present way of life, yet the future remains uncertain. As humans, we were built for connection. Our current times are definitely testing our natural state of being. We are grieving the physical touch, hugs and energy of communal gathering.

We are hardwired to connect with others, its what gives purpose and meaning to our lives, and without it there is suffering’    

Brene Brown

Yet our desire for connection with others is being heightened.

• We are looking for alternate ways to remain connected with others. The platforms and technologies that have been developed over the last few decades have become our savior in ‘staying in touch’. We can not only connect with our immediate community but also connect with friends and family around the world. Sharing both everyday moments and life milestones together.
• We are being motivated to do what is possible to end this isolation and see our loved ones again. There is nothing like the absence or unavailability of something to build our desire. The term ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’ seems appropriate for the yearning we feel. We remain sustained by the possibilities of a time in the future to celebrate life together. This will not be taken for granted when it finally happens.
• We are learning new strategies to navigate our days. Finding reasons to get up in the morning in a narrowed life existence. Establishing daily routines to strengthen our well being and mentally find balance and calm. It may mean creating boundaries around how much information we allow in from the outside world and stopping to just observe the simple things – the sights, sounds and textures of the world around us. It is increasingly important to maintain meaning and stay connected in our everyday lives.

In many ways, although we have reduced our physical presence with others in life, we can stay connected. Like invisible silver threads that join us, we remain in each other’s thoughts, memories and awareness. We all look forward to a time when we can spend more time physically together. Until then its important to use the ways available to us now to stay in touch.

Mother’s Day 2021 is drawing near. The emails and promotional pamphlets have been circulating. Retail promotions and venues are once again gearing up for another marketing opportunity. Yet this time is an uncomfortable one for a large proportion of women.

For me, like countless others, Mother’s Day has become a time of reflection and at times sadness and regret for what could have been. My mother received her heavenly wings forty years ago. She was fifty-two years old; I was twenty-two and my younger sister only seventeen.

At the time she received a late diagnosis of bowel cancer. A disease that was not really understood at the time. Many of her symptoms were put down to menopause and were not thoroughly investigated until it was too late to act. My sister and I are among the millions of Australian women who have suffered motherloss and also among the unenviable subset of 1.2 million women who have lost their mums before the age of 44.

‘There are 3.7 Million women in Australia who have lost their mum. That’s millions who have lost the deep connection shared only between a mother and daughter.’

Motherless Daughters Australia.

There are so many occasions in my life where her absence was felt. The day I was married, the pregnancies and births of my two children and seeing my children grow into adults and begin to raise their own families. Even the opportunity to seek her opinion or cry on her shoulder when things got tough was denied. Oh for five minutes again with her on the earthly side.

It is difficult for motherless daughters to share the pain and grief they feel with others. Particularly when all around them they see mothers and their daughters enjoying life experiences together. Thankfully, a wonderful organisation, Motherless Daughters Australia, has provided a platform for support and awareness. Their website and public Facebook page provide valuable assistance when it is needed. Events are organised and general awareness promoted.

This week, May 2 – 8, is Motherloss Awareness Week. A time to let the community know it can be a difficult one for motherless daughters. Yet the loss of our mothers continues to be felt throughout the year. Motherless Daughters are being encouraged to Draw Her Wings in a variety of creative ways and post them to their social media platforms. The week begins with several Pre-Mother’s Day High Tea events in several of our capital cities. A time when women can come together to remember their mothers and share their stories. I will be attending the Canberra event.

For me, it will signal a time to begin rituals that will honour the brief time together that my mum and I had in this life. I will be bringing flowers and spending time at her grave and that of my nanna. There will also be time for me to celebrate my own role as a mother and grandmother with my adult children and grandchildren. That is incredibly special. It’s also a symbolic connecting of my matriarchal line.

From a time of sorrow can come a time of deep reflection and gratitude. I feel blessed to have come across the Motherless Daughters Australia organisation. Daily we can share our struggles and remembrance within a private Facebook group. We have opportunities to connect with one another online and in person. Each of us have been invited to take on the role of a motherless daughter’s ambassador creating a meaningful outlet and purpose from our lived experience.

Within our communities are countless women who will hold up the memory of their heavenly mothers this Mother’s Day. If that is you, go ahead, Draw Her Wings, and fondly recall your relationship together.

One of the most challenging skills to learn is that of empathy. It’s our ability to share and understand what other people are going through. In order to do that – we need to be able to listen and observe, understand, and connect with others.

Learning empathy toward others –

When I was teaching young children much of the conversations around their misfired interactions centred on asking them ‘how do you think the other person feels? I would get them to look at facial features, emotional cues and how the other person had reacted when they were emotionally or physically hurt. In doing this I was hopefully planting seeds of empathy and their ability to understand that our actions do affect others. To help them to figuratively take a walk in another person’s shoes.

As children grow into adults we hope this learning continues but from research we find that we collectively show less empathy than we used to. According to psychologist, Jamil Zaki, our collective empathy has been eroding over time. The average person has less empathy than three quarters of people 30 years before. (Kohrath et al. 2011).  That’s pretty disheartening.

Yet we also know that empathy is a learnt skill that we can practice and improve. If we are able to turn toward rather than turn away from an uncomfortable situation it is then possible to build our empathy into a habit and characteristic of who we are. It takes the ability for us to slow down and pay attention to how other people feel. To let them and their life stories into our awareness. It also requires us to use our intuition and mind together.

‘The highest form of knowledge is empathy, for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another’s world’

Plato

Today’s world is fragmented. We watch politicians and those in authority miss the mark on understanding the needs of their people. A lack of concern and respect for the wellbeing of the elderly and for women’s issues is being increasingly highlighted. Racial issues continue to not be addressed. We turn our backs on the housing crisis and homelessness. Poverty is real for an increasingly large sector of the population who can no longer access employment and provide the basic essentials of life for themselves and their families. There are so many areas to build our empathy muscle.

Sometimes it feels easier to turn a blind eye to injustice. To feel entitled to maintain the status quo if we are lucky to have advantage in one form or another. The current ‘White, male and entitled’ call out is systemic of a lack of empathy and perspective taking by a particular sector of the population. Yet as a learnt skill increased empathy is possible, with a caveat, as particularly for males it requires an incentive.

We need to find that incentive to create a more harmonious and caring world. Perhaps it starts when children are young. Exposing them to a diverse range of people and fostering their interaction with them. As children grow into teenagers and young adults the empathy training – respecting and understanding difference and deliberate exposure to a wide range of life experience can continue.

So, what is the incentive: –

1. To deepen and create more balanced, respectful relationships. By building connection with a diverse range of people and their perspectives you become a better leader, parent and romantic partner.

2. Find purpose and ability to make a difference in our world. Supporting and advocating for those less fortunate. Sharing skills and knowledge. Lessening personal loneliness, isolation, and anxiety.

3. Improve the wellbeing of others and in turn improve our own. Compassion and connection are key.

As you go about your day, notice your own ability to tune into others. Do you avoid or turn away from uncomfortable encounters or do you take time to lean in and stay uncomfortable for a while to another person’s distress. The more you are able to practice empathy the more it will be a habitual part of your life and an asset to those around you.

A group of women gravitated to the painting. Mesmerized by the facial expression of the woman in the kitchen. Perhaps we have been this woman. Caught on a roller coaster of busyness. With a long list of things to do. Unable to sit and just be by ourselves for any length of time.

We all smile at each other with knowing looks and one woman responds with ‘Too much work and not enough pay’. We all giggle in recognition. Perhaps it is not monetary gain we seek from our doing. Just a word of appreciation or recognition for our efforts or an offer of a helping hand is all we need. Just once, we would like to share the load or to take a rest from our endless activity.

When we overdo the busyness of life, trying to be everything to everybody, it is easy to feel resentful and overwhelmed. We often don’t realize we are in a vicious cycle until we see the signs of physical and emotional burnout from our efforts to constantly give. Somehow we feel a moral obligation to be fulfill this feminine cultural norm. As women we have learnt to stay pretty, happy, quiet, calm, and generous with our time.  As a result, we are more likely to suffer from what has been coined Human Giver Syndrome – the desire to constantly tend to the needs of others to the detriment of meeting our own. We feel inadequate or punish ourselves with the ‘I’m not good enough’ label if we take a moment to rest.

As a result we may feel a slight annoyance at our inability to advocate for our own needs. With the continual demands on our time and additional external stressors that crop up in life our emotions can strengthen to feelings of frustration, anger, or rage (attack responses) or worry, anxiety and fear (avoidance responses). Alternatively we can just come to an emotional grinding holt (the freeze response).

Identifying Burnout

Emily and Amelia Nagoski in their book Burnout, The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle have identified three components of burnout.

1. Emotional exhaustion: – Our bodies are constantly processing our emotions. When we are often in stress mode it seems easier to push these feelings down into the inner reaches of our bodies – our blood vessels, digestive, and endocrine systems.  Left unprocessed, these emotional responses can lead to physical symptoms such as higher blood pressure from adrenaline pumping for longer than required and gut symptoms from unresolved issues. Our bodies are left lacking energy and feeling dull.

2. A decreased sense of accomplishment: – Although we may have been in a constant state of action we can get the sense that ‘I can’t make a difference’. Particularly when the outside world is full of stressors that seem outside our control e.g. natural disasters, the Covid 19 pandemic.

3. Depersonalization: – We can feel a real sense of brain fog detached from our bodily responses. Our ability to show empathy and compassion becomes depleted. This can lead to us experiencing compassion fatigue.

Ways to process your emotions effectively and avoid burnout

• Doing physical activity that you love. Walking, going for a run, dancing in the living room, even a few minutes stretching your limbs than flopping to relax calms the nervous system.
• Remembering to breathe. Deep, slow breathes both in and out right down to the abdomen. Focusing on the breath rather than the thoughts running around in our brain.
• Lovely, positive interactions with others.
• A good, natural bout of laughter. Unforced, real and belly giggling.
• A long hug in a safe context. Hold your own centre of gravity with another and stay in the hug until you both feel yourselves relax.
• A good, old fashion cry. Contrary to our beliefs, once we start we usually can stop after a few minutes. Crying is a physical expression of our stress and its release. Focus on the physical sensations rather than the mental reason for the tears.
• Get creative. Take the inner emotions outside the body to paint, write, dance, or use your imagination.

‘Take your broken heart and make it into art’

Carrie Fisher

It is important, particularly for women, to be able to voice our own needs, ask for help or advocate for much-needed time out. In doing so, we honour ourselves. Creating the opportunity to process our emotions allows for the possibility for us to recharge and energize. Focusing on our own wellness, both physical and emotional, helps us create a balanced life view – good for us and good for those we care for.