The Weight You Didn’t Know You Were Carrying

Aug 19

7 min read

How to recognize the hidden 'backpack' of stress and start putting it down.

The Morning Struggle

It's 6 am and I’m already tired. I'm the mum of two children, 4 and 2. They are running around, not wanting to get dressed. Everything I say - the answer is NO, I don’t want to.

The day is a struggle and I haven't even made breakfast yet. I feel like I would love to just go back to bed. I’m tired of chasing my kids in the apartment.

And when I think about my to-do list for my work- all the emails I haven’t answered, the social media posts that I should do, the invoices I should make, it gets even worse. I get a weird belly feeling. Because I want to be a respectful parent who is trying to provide a nice experience for my children - definitely better than what my parents did- I am remaining calm, but inside I feel heavy, the weight of this situation is heavy.

I notice that I clench my jaw, I notice that my head starts to hurt. Yet I pushed through, You have to - I think. So I do.

That physical tension—the clenched jaw, the tight chest—isn't just a temporary reaction. It’s the weight of a 20kg backpack you’ve stopped noticing you’re wearing.

Why 'Trying Harder' Isn’t the Answer

If you are a mum of young children and you also work, I’m sure you do experience days like this. Days that feel like surviving, like a war battle with time and tasks rather than living. I know you know you should plan and organise better, you know you went to bed too late.

Or that Eckhart Tolle’s words are whispering into your ears - ‘’live now my darling’’ not in the past, not in the future. Life is happening now. You also know that you need to do something for yourself. That you should do sport, because it improves your energy and cortisol levels right? Or maybe a spa weekend would make things better.

On top, maybe you read the book about parenting - where they inspire you to be playful and more creative with your children - so instead of giving commands, you should initiate play just to get the teeth of the kids brushed. Just writing all of this makes me super tired.

How are you? Reading this? What is happening in your body? Now? I guess your life is not a big drama on the outside. It’s just a normal day of a working mum with kids right? But what is really happening inside of you? And what does your body say about all of this thinking? Analysing? Does it show you physical sensations, or is it just numb?

Why Your Body Braces

Your body actually is not just a vehicle that carries your brain from task to task or from meeting to meeting - it’s constantly holding physical tension. Imagine carrying that backpack, about 20 kg heavy. First you will feel the weight.

But with time, as you wear it every day, your body will adjust- your shoulders might not hurt anymore, your jaw might be clenched without even noticing, your body learns to brace against it. And after some time you even forget that you have this load on your shoulders, you just start living with it as if it were yours and you wonder from time to time - why does your neck hurt? Why do you feel so exhausted? So we do have a little problem here and the problem is not your time management issue or not enough time for relaxing.

The backpack will sit with you also while you enjoy your sauna ceremony. Believe me. It’s about gently setting the backpack down.

We are all very lucky that our body wants us to be alive. This is why putting the backpack down is so hard. Our brains are essentially wired with an alarm system that can't tell the difference between a saber-toothed tiger and a 'TAXES' notification.

Crying kids, unfinished tasks, stressful situations at work, relationship issues, marriage crises, all of these are stressful events that taught our bodies to build habits to survive them. What a great defense mechanism!

Why am I sharing this with you?

My Journey to Embodiment

I don't just talk about this because I'm a Dance Movement Therapist in supervision. I talk about this because I lived it. And it still comes to me.

Dance Movement Therapy goes beyond just working with the nervous system; it uses movement as a non-verbal language to explore emotions, build creative resilience, and reconnect with the parts of ourselves that words alone cannot reach.

When my daughter Emilia was born, we faced four terrifying months of medical uncertainty and endless tests. My mind spiraled into a relentless "head drama"—a loop of overthinking, guilt, and stress that completely pulled me out of my body.

I was seeing a psychiatrist, taking anxiety medication, talking in support groups, and analyzing my situation from every possible angle. My mind could narrate the 'why' of my stress perfectly, but understanding the 'why' could not fix the 'how.'

You cannot talk your way out of a physiological nervous system response. I was trying to solve a somatic problem with purely psychological tools—and that is exactly where words and analysis hit a wall. I knew what was happening intellectually, but talking and thinking couldn't shift the tightness in my chest. I was intellectually processing my situation, but my body wasn't getting better. The weight was still there.

It wasn't until I literally got down on the floor—moving from the vertical plane of high-alert thinking to the horizontal plane of yielding to gravity—that my mind finally quieted. I had to stop just teaching somatic theory and actually embody it.

Returning to my body didn't change our difficult reality, but it gave me the internal stillness to stop surviving in my head and finally be present as a grounded, connected mother. I share this because I know firsthand that when talking and analyzing hit a wall, your body is waiting with its own wisdom.

I found my way back to myself by hitting the floor. But you don't need a therapy session to start finding your own way down. You can do it right here, right now, with these simple steps.

A Quick Way to Find Relief

So, what can you actually do right now, in this exact moment, while you are reading these words?

You don't need a two-hour morning routine, a quiet room, or a spa weekend. Let’s do a quick micro-check-in together.

Wherever you are, whether you're holding your phone, sitting at your desk, or hiding in the bathroom for 2 minutes of peace:

Unclench your jaw. Let your teeth part slightly and allow your tongue to drop away from the roof of your mouth.
Drop your shoulders 5 centimeters. Notice how high up toward your ears they were holding themselves. Let gravity take them.
Soften your gaze. Instead of staring sharply at your screen, dilate your vision. Notice the periphery of the room around you.
Feel your feet. Press your big toes into the floor. Feel the solid ground underneath you, fully supporting your weight.

Take one slow exhale. Notice that? That tiny shift?

Pro-tip for emergency moments: If the internal tension feels truly overwhelming and you have the space, try laying fully down on the floor—even with your kids running around you. Moving to the horizontal plane helps signal an immediate release to your nervous system and can be a powerful way to ground yourself when the "high-alert" feeling is at its strongest.

The Science of Safety

Clinically, this threat-detection process is called neuroception. Your nervous system simply doesn't distinguish between a saber-toothed tiger, a late-night tax email, or a screaming toddler. It just senses danger and activates your sympathetic nervous system. It floods your body with stress hormones and signals your muscles to physically brace for impact.

And when this stress becomes your daily normal, your body loses its vagal brake—its natural, neurobiological ability to down-shift back into a state of rest and safety. You stay locked on high alert. Your shoulders remain up by your ears, your jaw stays clenched, and your breath stays shallow—even when you’re finally sitting on the couch or lying in bed.

This is why logic, books, and "trying harder" hit a wall.

Nervous system regulation is not about forcing yourself to "relax on command" or adding another 10-step routine to your morning. It’s a bottom-up clinical practice. Instead of using your hyper-analytical mind to analyze why you feel overwhelmed , regulation communicates directly with your body through sensory and somatic tools, like breath pacing, foot-heavy grounding, and micro-movements.

It sends a direct message to your brainstem: You are safe now. You can take the handbrake off. You can finally lay the backpack down.

Join the Regulation Lab

If this resonates with where you are right now, I invite you to join me in an unhurried, grounded space. Starting September 16th, I am hosting the Regulation Lab in 1070—a structured container where we move beyond analyzing our stress and practice the simple, daily somatic hygiene tools that allow our bodies to truly rest and come home to themselves.

You can read more about the upcoming sessions and save your spot here. You don't need any dance experience, and you don't need to perform. You need only be willing to arrive as you are.

My little wish for you, having read this far, is this: please remember that your body is not a machine to be managed, it is a home to be returned to. And please know, you don’t have to navigate this path alone. Give yourself permission to arrive, to rest, and to finally set the weight down.