I had therapy this week. Like… actual therapy. The talking-about-my-feelings-while-feeling-mildly-exposed kind. Except there was no couch. Just me, at home, on Zoom. Because the universe knows better than to ask a woman coming off seven consecutive plot twists to commute and emotionally unpack on the same day. Apparently this is what happens when your nervous system hits capacity.

This is still a relatively new chapter for me, considering I survived nearly forty years on sheer adrenaline, intuition, and caffeine-fueled stubbornness. (Frankly, even Bravo would’ve said, “This storyline is doing too much.”)

Anyway. At one point, my therapist hit me with an analogy that stopped me mid-spiral.

“Your nervous system is a jar.”

A jar. Like the kind my Grandma Bertha kept spare buttons in? Or jam? Or, apparently, my sanity. She explained that for years — years — I’ve been stuffing things into this jar like an emotional hoarder.

A medical crisis here. A business fire there. Five kids needing five different things at once. The dog eating something he absolutely should not have, leading to an emergency dental surgery. You know. Normal life stuff. But the kind that requires a helmet.

And because I’m “high-functioning” — which is basically therapist-speak for “you’ve been coping poorly but impressively” — I never noticed the jar was full.

Until two weeks ago. When something microscopic (my youngest having a tummy bug) sent me into a full-blown worry spiral that felt… excessive. Even for me. In real time, though, my nervous system was fully convinced we were moments away from catastrophe. And my therapist, very calmly like she was explaining gravity to a toddler, said:

“It’s not the tummy bug. It’s the jar.”

Absolutely infuriating. And completely correct. Because it’s never the small thing we’re crying about, is it? It’s the seventeen thousand things underneath it. The ones we minimized, rationalized, and shoved down with a tight smile and a “no big deal.” I’m really good at that one.

Somewhere between her explaining this and me ugly-crying into my sleeve, she said a sentence I think I’ll be carrying with me into the next year:

“It’s okay to not be okay. It just means your nervous system is at capacity and needs relief.”

Oddly enough, that felt comforting. Like a permission slip I didn’t realize I’d been waiting for.

Because somewhere along the way, we forget that no one is built to hold everything indefinitely. Not even the most capable. Not even the most intentional. Not even the women who look like they’ve got it all handled.

Even a well-designed life needs room for release.

So if your jar feels full… or overflowing… or shattered on the kitchen floor because someone bumped it while looking for snacks… same, friend. Truly.

And if you feel like it, leave a comment and tell me about it. We can unpack the nuance of simultaneously becoming and falling apart together. (We’ll file it under “personal development,” obviously.)

I went back and forth on whether this was too personal to share. And maybe it is. But in a world increasingly curated by algorithms and AI, I think it matters more than ever that we recognize the humans. The ones doing human things. Like unraveling on a random Thursday afternoon.

ChatGPT could never.

So here’s to slowing down long enough to notice when our nervous system is asking for relief.

And to remembering that needing rest, support, or space doesn’t mean you’re broken. It just means you’ve been carrying a lot.