Quiet Confessions, Episode 2: Burnout, Bedtimes & Becoming Me Again

In this episode of Quiet Confessions, Chelsea reflects on a hopeful session with their new psychiatrist, the ongoing struggle with sleep, overstimulation from chaotic parenting mornings, and their evolving relationship with trauma and healing. 

They candidly share their challenges with burnout, their nervous system’s fragility, and the everyday chaos of parenting with PTSD.

This is a raw, unedited space—where Chelsea lets their guard down, explores messy emotions, and gives themself permission to exist without performance. 

You’re invited to sit beside them in this sacred space of honesty, exhaustion, and slow healing.

Topics Covered:

• Meeting a new psychiatrist and feeling seen.
  
  
• Parenting with a dysregulated nervous system.
  
  
• The impossibility of sleep after trauma.
  
  
• Magnesium baths & grounding rituals.
  
  
• Distress tolerance in trauma therapy.
  
  
• Real talk about routine, overstimulation, and bedtime battles.
  
  
• The importance of claiming space for yourself.

Mentioned:

• Morbid Podcast 
• Flewd Magnesium Bath Soaks (not sponsored)
• Odd Moms On Call (Chelsea's other podcast)

Transcript

Chelsea Myers (00:01)
Hey, it's Chelsea. Welcome to Quiet Confessions. These mini episodes are my space to slow down and share the real raw parts of my parenting journey, one moment at a time. Last I spoke to you, I was getting ready for a intake appointment with a new psychiatrist and I was a little nervous, but it went really well.

I am excited to work with the psychiatrist. I feel like I just jumped right into that without giving you space for hi, hello, hi. But I guess that's where I'm at today. And I have to use every little spare moment of alone time that I can get. So right to it. I met with the psychiatrist ⁓ and she is

very like energized, has much more energy than I have. But she seems really, really, really good at what she does. And she listened to most of my history, listened to all of the medication challenges I've had over the years, was very, very validating and really reassured me that my goals in terms of my

mental health and physical health and medication journey that we can meet those goals. And it will probably take a while, meaning like a couple of years, but that is actually what I wanted to hear. I don't want to do anything quick and hasty again, because that was done so often the first two years of my youngest's life. And now she's almost three.

She'll be three very soon. But yeah, this was the first time that I felt like hopeful. She kept reassuring me, because I would say things that doctors have been saying to, well.

Former doctors, they're still doctors, my former doctors, doctors that I don't see anymore, who were pretty cruel and just unkind in their treatment of me. But I went from being told like, yep, this is your life now. You just have to get used to it. And now I'm hearing more and more. And I heard from the new psychiatrist yesterday, like, no, this is not the rest of your life. You are going to heal and you are going to feel better and you're going to find yourself again.

And finding yourself again doesn't mean the person that you were before, because I'm never going to be that person again, but I will find me in this mess. And I can't say that I believe that every day, but today I believe that. And yesterday after speaking with her, I believed it. So that was pretty cool. So I wanted to share with you that update that I did meet with her and it went well and next steps.

feel good, which is awesome. Other than that, this morning, I don't know what was going on, but everyone, everyone was dysregulated. I don't sleep well, just as a rule. I used to be an expert sleeper. I loved to sleep. I loved to sleep in. My husband has always been amazing.

At his rule when we had kids was I would get to sleep in in the morning because I, I birthed a child and I, and I take care of the baby and the kid and the, all of those things. And I do the midnight feedings and all that stuff. And so his rule has always been that on weekends or days that he's home that I could sleep in. Well, ever since my birth trauma and everything tied to it, I can't sleep in anymore.

It's really hard for me to fall asleep and it's really hard for me to stay asleep and I'm usually up This morning. I was up at 430 and I made myself go back to sleep. It took a long time But again, I was up at 620 For the day most days it's like 530 or 6 even on weekends. I just can't sleep in I used to nap And it's really hard for me to nap now, too. So

That was something I talked about with the psychiatrist or who thinks that I may be perimenopausal, which I have felt for a while, but it's really hard to figure all that stuff out with me because of all of my complex medical crap. It's like, we keep saying it's like whack-a-mole. It could be this, it could be this, it could be this. But anyway, so yeah, the kids were just not happy campers this morning.

I was really not on my game. had no patience and I am a person who has pretty, pretty good patience. I'm, I'll say my patience isn't as strong as it used to be. I used to have some pretty epic patience. but these days my, my fuse is a little bit shorter just from burnout, but

I had none today and I was getting overstimulated. That may have carried over from last night. Do you guys have partners who like to rile your kids up at like the worst times? Cough cough bedtime. Really not subtle there. Our kids go to bed between seven and seven 30. And

Last night it was 6 45 and then it was seven and my gosh, the kids are screaming because daddy's a monster and daddy's chasing them and they're chasing each other and everybody is people are falling into things and crashing and then crying and then laughing and it's so loud. I had to put on noise canceling headphones and I tried to listen to a podcast. Shout out to morbid who I've been obsessed with for a while, but that's my jam right now.

Ash and Alaina you guys are getting me through some, ⁓ some wait times at the doctor's office and some rides on the lawnmower. And anytime I can get some time to myself, morbid is playing. But anyway, yeah, they were off the walls and I did at one point have to say like, it is time for bed. We need to be calming down. And like, I wasn't just saying that to my kids. I was saying that to my partner too. And of course.

That makes me the spoil sport. but we have, we have pretty good communication and a good understanding of each other's needs. So yes, he, he was like, you need to take care of you and I'll take care of this. And I was like, no, it's time to get ready for bed. whether you want to chalk that up to my OCD and my need for routine and schedules, or whether you want to chalk that up to just, you know, sticking to my kid's bedtime.

you can decide, but it wasn't an argument or anything. It's just, I went to bed dysregulated and I woke up pretty dysregulated and the kids were still very wound. But this morning I have a little bit of time to myself. My husband took the kids up to his parents' house and they're gonna, he's gonna help his parents get some work done and the kids are gonna play with their cousin.

And I get to record an episode of Odd Moms On Call, which if you haven't checked out, is another one of my podcasts that I am a panelist on. And it's amazing. You should check it out. It's so much fun. I have so much fun doing it. It's a bunch of moms from all over North America. trying to reach moms in other countries as well. We're getting there, but we're talking about current events and how they affect our families. So yeah, it's relevant.

It's on top, like on whatever current events are going on and it's personal. And we're all, we all come from completely different backgrounds. So we're all experiencing these things differently. So I'm really excited. I always get excited when I get to record Odd Moms, but this is quiet confessions, but I'm not so subtly telling you that you should probably check out Odd Moms on call. You'll get to see a different side of me there too.

But then you'll get to meet some incredible moms that I am really lucky to call friends. I call them my pocket friends. Someday maybe we can meet in person. yeah, chaotic kids on a Saturday morning. I feel like that's not necessarily, like that's not an unusual thing. I'm sure that many of you can relate to that. But coming.

from a position of having a very overwhelmed nervous system to begin with, and just not feeling good in general. It's not fun, you guys. It's not fun. And I am incredibly thankful for this little nugget of time that I get where the house is quiet. I can just hear the laundry tumbling in the dryer. I've got some incense burning because, you know.

I'm that kind of weird. That's not weird. I'm that kind of person. I like incense. like essential oils, I'm not in place of... I don't even know what I'm trying to say. So this is what you get when I say that these are not heavily edited or edited hardly at all. You get my brain ramblings.

I really like incense, I like aromatherapy, I like essential oils, I'm into all of that. love cranial sacral therapy and acupuncture, which I really want to get back into. But I also eat ice cream and I ⁓ don't know, I don't eat meat. I was gonna say I eat my kids' chicken nuggets. I used to.

but not anymore. I'm pescatarian. Anyway, I think that's called being a scrunchie mom, but I'm not sure. don't like labels. so whatever it is, that's what I am. you can fill in the blank again, but yeah. So having your own nervous system be just wild and then experiencing everyone around you in a heightened.

state of just being like off the walls is is really challenging for me. So that's like that's what I'm dealing with right now. I'm using this time to regulate, to get it out, to talk about it, and hopefully by the end I'll feel a little lighter. And I mean maybe you can relate to it too.

I have this massive imposter syndrome, like no one wants to hear this. No one wants to listen to you just ramble about your life. But at the end of the day, even if just one person is like, ⁓ I feel seen, that's fine. And even if nobody feels seen, that's fine too. I'm using this as a space for me. And I don't do that. There are not a lot of spaces that I reserve for myself.

And I made the conscious decision to start quiet confessions as a little sacred space for myself. So while I hope that it resonates with you or that you can sort of feel some sort of solidarity or see yourself and know that you're not alone. I mean, that's the goal, right? Just in life. I just, I want people to know that they're not alone and that...

You can sit with me and I'll sit with you and, and we can just kind of feel our feelings. But at the end of the day, I, I deserve some space for myself. So that's what this is. I don't, I don't have any huge revelations, other than, you know, I have therapy tomorrow, so I will definitely be processing this some more.

we're going to be working on more distress tolerance in therapy. If you go to therapy, there's so many different kinds and there's so many different methods. And I've tried a lot of them. CBT is the most common cognitive behavioral therapy and that's worked for me for a really long time. I got into dialectical behavioral therapy, DBT, after all of my experiences with

and being hospitalized. And I actually use those skills every single day. And maybe someday I'll dive into that a little more. EMDR has not and has never worked for me. I can't get past the distress portion. So me and my therapist are working on ways to sort of process the trauma

And she mentioned something and I cannot remember what it's called for the life of me, but I remember she described it as EMDR light. So we're going to attempt that. But I need to work on my distress tolerance, just in general. Like I have trauma to process and I can't process that trauma if I'm triggered every time it comes up. And then I'm triggered by so much.

because of my PTSD and sent into panic attacks and flashbacks. I need to be able to navigate those in a healthier way. cause I don't think they'll ever completely go away. And if they do, that would be amazing, but I need to be able to face them and ride them out in a way that is not so damaging, to my nervous system.

whatnot, because it's keeping me from like, will keep me from getting medical attention or it will keep me from like following up on things that I should definitely follow up on because I have so much fear associated. It's really a lot of medical stuff. And I get triggered from certain like going to certain hospitals or going to the doctor's office or seeing an ambulance or things like that. And those are

normal things that I need to be able to adjust to. So we're going to work on that. This, I don't know why I feel like I need to explain everything, but I do, so I'm going to. This is how my brain works. I fall down rabbit holes and I go in different directions and I have no idea how I get here. So I don't know how I got here from how we started.

But when I do my Quiet Connection episodes with my guests, it's always so seamless. I mean, yes, I trip up and those little bits of me, like, I will be completely honest with my guests saying, like, I completely lost my train. Like, my train jumped to the tracks. I have no idea where I am right now. Those get edited out most of the time. I'm trying to do it less. You'll notice that in some upcoming episodes. But here...

You're going to get them. You're going to hear me in real time. Have no idea what I was talking about or or what direction I'm trying to go in. yeah, that's just I'm just hopping on to get things out, to update you on the meeting with the psychiatrist, to let you know that, holy crap, it is really, really challenging to manage your own

emotions in your own like nervous system when everyone around you is in such a heightened state of of just like being and existent when the energy is so high and you are so burned out. ⁓ man. Wow. So thank you for taking that for me and listening as I sort of

verbally process this, I guess. But yeah, I'm looking forward to this afternoon to recording with my odd moms. I think I'm going to take a magnesium bath. If you guys haven't tried taking magnesium baths, you can make your own, which I do sometimes. But a brand, again, I don't have any brand deals or anything like that. So this isn't sponsored, but

Flewd ⁓ F-L-E-W-D, Flewd I think it's stress care, I'm not sure, but they make these magnesium bath soaks. And I was never a big believer in that sort of thing. I'm like, okay, well, it smells nice and it's a nice bath. But these make a huge difference in regulating my nervous system and like grounding me. And you should check them out. I'm not...

Again, not sponsored, but you should absolutely check them out. And they have some good deals on bundles and they have things for like insomnia. They have things for depression, anxiety, panic attacks, pain, like muscle pain and joint pain. And they really do make a huge difference. My husband uses the ones for pain management because he was...

I mean, he was in a catastrophic motorcycle accident almost four years ago now and shattered his spine and a million other things. He's a walking miracle. Again, you can check out past episodes to learn more about that. He shouldn't be alive. He shouldn't be walking, but he is and he's in pain. His spine is fused among other things. But these magnesium baths he has said too, he's like, wow, this makes a huge difference in

in the level of my pain. And for me, it makes a huge difference in helping me ground and I feel less anxious when I'm done. I feel, mean, baths do that too, but really it's beyond that. I've tried to wind down and bring us home like four times now and I get caught down rabbit holes again. So while this doesn't necessarily feel like that,

deep sigh moment. I'm going to let you guys go. I'm going to take that magnesium bath and prep for my recording with Odd Moms. And you know what? I do feel lighter. So thanks for being here for this second quiet confession. And until next time, be kind to yourself.

and I will try to do the same.