Decoupling money from self-care – feeling I am ‘trapped’ into overworking in order to be able to afford take care of myself

Hello, the money theme has been well timed for me as I’m currently trying to work through some inner conflicts around it, and return to a place of sufficiency and safety.

I have been lucky enough to have grown up in family where money was not an issue and for most of my life, it has not been a question that I have enough, and will be able to earn enough, to live comfortably and make the choices I want to make. But, also have quite a strongly ‘anti-materialistic’ belief set, and I want to value generosity, as well as making choices that value other things – e.g. fulfillment, nourishment, space, health, community – above money.

This has been challenged lately as I am trying to conceive via IVF on my own. I’ve been able to afford 3 cycles so far, but I am going to struggle to afford more than one more on my own. To add to that, a couple of weeks ago my workplace told me they discovered they made a mistake 15 months ago with my payroll, which means I now have a lower salary than I thought, and also owe my workplace $13,000 AUD, which is basically two IVF cycles after rebates.

Overall, this has really challenged my sense of empowerment to follow my heart and make the choices that I want to make. Simultaneously, it is making me feel ‘trapped’ by my need for money, in a work context (I am a full time academic) that I feel is actively damaging – I have to work very hard to maintain the boundaries I need around my energy, and I actively want to either change professions, or drop my fraction, but I feel my need to earn money is trapping me in a context that is not supporting me to live an life that is aligned with my body, values and heart.

And – that work context (plus IVF) is also ‘creating’ expenses for me, in terms of paying for yoga courses, massage, acupuncture, supplements to support my fertility. In essence, I feel like I need to earn all of this money to take care of myself, to honour my body and continue healing my relationship to my body – but at the same time, I know that my work context is creating a ‘life I need to escape from’ in all of these ways.

I can see that the thought patterns around being stuck/trapped are not helpful, and that there is power in being really clear about the choices I am making and why, and perhaps being honest as to where there are conflicts and tradeoffs.

But, I’m still struggling not to feel disempowered, and also to separate from unhelpful thought cycles around conflicts between ‘I am being irresponsible with money spending all of this on myself’ vs ‘I need to do these things to be ok and to give myself the best chance to have a child’.

Any thoughts or approaches to help me get unstuck would be incredible. Thank you!

 

 

Answer:

Work around money reveals so much for each of us. What I would offer to you is to work on staying present. You still have all the same options available to you. A lot of pain and the trapped feelings are coming from worrying about the future. If you stay present, you wouldn’t be in such a hurry to get away from these feelings, you’d just allow for them. You can see your brain freaking out a little and just have compassion for yourself.

Try adding “for now” to whatever you are thinking.

I choose to stay in academics for now.

I have enough money for IVF for now.

I choose to continue my self care for now.

See how that loosens up everything? You can trust yourself again to make empowered choices FOR NOW. We talk a lot about seasons in TFC. You can keep all your values and recognize that this is a season where you may make choices that prioritize different things, but it’s not forever. An exercise that might really help you is to write a letter to you at 80 years old thanking her for the choices she made that created your life.