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Episode: Decision Fatigue

Author: Michelle Chestovich MD
Duration: 00:12:50

Episode Shownotes

Physician coach Michelle Chestovich MD explains why many of us have a hard time making decisions and how this wastes so much precious time and energy AND offer a simple solution to overcome this.

Want more time? Start making strong decisions!Want to learn more about coaching with Michelle? Click here to set up a free consultation: https://mamadocscheduling.as.me/

Full Transcript

00:00:00 Speaker_00
You are listening to Episode 168 of the Remind Yourself Podcast. Welcome to the Remind Yourself Podcast, the podcast for physician moms just like you who want to ditch mom guilt, stop yelling, and start enjoying their lives today.

00:00:22 Speaker_00
I'm your host, Rachelle Chestevich, certified life coach, family physician, and mom of four. If you want to overcome overwhelm for once and for all, this is the place for you. Hello, Mama Docs, and welcome back.

00:00:39 Speaker_00
I hope you've had a most wonderful May and are excited to jump into summer. If your May is anything like mine, and I know it is, if you're a physician and a mom, it is chock full of all kinds of activities.

00:00:53 Speaker_00
We've had tons of track meets and graduations and my mama heart is so full and it's also exhausting. So take care of you mamas and make sure that you're getting adequate sleep and taking care of yourself during these fun-filled months of summer.

00:01:09 Speaker_00
Today I want to talk about something that I hear about quite often. Many women come to me saying that they're absolutely exhausted and overwhelmed. And there are many things that contribute.

00:01:20 Speaker_00
Something that I hear time and again is that women come home from work and they say, I just don't have any energy. I want to lay on the couch. I can't even make one more decision.

00:01:32 Speaker_00
So today I'm going to talk to you about why we get decision fatigue and what we can do about it. It is absolutely exhausting to have to come up with, for example, what we're having for dinner or where we're going to go at the end of a busy day.

00:01:48 Speaker_00
And the reason is this. Number one, we make thousands of decisions per day. Not only in our work as physicians, but also just little things like, what am I going to wear today? What am I going to have for breakfast? What am I going to pack for lunch?

00:02:04 Speaker_00
What are we going to have for dinner? We make thousands of decisions per day. And when we leave them and push them off to the end,

00:02:11 Speaker_00
your brain is exhausted and your primitive brain is saying, hey, let's seek some pleasure, let's avoid pain, and let's just, you know, be efficient and do the same thing over and over again.

00:02:20 Speaker_00
So if every day at the end of the day, you're like, I just can't make one more decision, that's just your brain being efficient and having that same pattern of thought, right? So what can we do about it? We'll get to that in a little bit.

00:02:31 Speaker_00
But I just love to always start with why do we have such decision fatigue? It's because you are making thousands of decisions per day. Do I stop for gas before or after work?

00:02:43 Speaker_00
Do I run over my lunch to pick up those items that my family needs, or do I save it for later? So many little things, along with big things, right? What's the correct antibiotic? What medication dose do I start this patient on?

00:02:56 Speaker_00
We make so many decisions per day that by the end of the day, in particular, your brain is kind of throwing up its hand saying, enough is enough.

00:03:03 Speaker_00
The second reason that we have decision fatigue is that we spend a lot of time trying to find the right answer. Now this makes sense.

00:03:11 Speaker_00
We've trained our brains since being little girls to have the right answer so we could do well in school, so that we could get external validation and accolades from others.

00:03:20 Speaker_00
And of course, in medical training, we're taught that we have to find like the right answer and the right plan, right, for our patients. And yes, it's important to take excellent care of our patients.

00:03:31 Speaker_00
But in life, there's not always a black or white right answer. But we make decisions, often like there is an exact right answer, like which which place to go for the weekend is going to be

00:03:44 Speaker_00
amazing for my family, and which one's going to be awful, right? Which dinner is going to be the best, right? So we spend a lot of extra time trying to find the right answer. And it spins us out into indecision. And that in and of itself is exhausting.

00:03:59 Speaker_00
And I'm going to talk about how to overcome that in just a moment. But the third thing that I often see that creates decision fatigue for physician women is really the people-pleasing that underlies a lot of the things that we do.

00:04:12 Speaker_00
We want to also not only have the right answer, but what's going to make other people happy? We don't often even consider, like, what do I want, but what's going to make everybody else happy?

00:04:22 Speaker_00
Which again, is fine as a human to consider other people's, you know, opinions about things. But when we're doing that time and again, it's exhausting because it's easier to just sometimes go inward and say like, what is it that I want? Right?

00:04:37 Speaker_00
So that will be a part of the solutions. But these are the three big things that I see that create a lot of decision fatigue. Number one, we're making tons of decisions per day. Number two, we're trying to get it right.

00:04:47 Speaker_00
And number three, we're trying to make everybody happy. So what do we do about this? What is a simple solution? You know me, I try to keep it very simple. This is what I suggest. Number one, try to make decisions ahead of time. What does that mean?

00:05:03 Speaker_00
So for example, dinner is something that I hear comes up often, the quote unquote witching hour and needing to decide what to feed your family or yourself at the end of the day.

00:05:12 Speaker_00
What if you could take a little bit of time, for example on a Sunday, 30 minutes and just make a rough draft plan for the week for meals? It makes it so much easier to know these are the five dinners that we're going to be having this week.

00:05:25 Speaker_00
So much easier than coming home, opening up the cupboards, opening up the fridge when everybody's yipping at you, everybody's tired and exhausted trying to figure out what to have for dinner.

00:05:33 Speaker_00
An example for clinic would be deciding ahead of time what you do with patient messages. You can have a standard approach to certain issues and it makes it so much easier.

00:05:45 Speaker_00
So when you're looking through your messages, you know what to do and you don't need to waffle in indecision. It's also a really great idea to have a plan in place when you look at messages, when you deal with labs and refills.

00:05:59 Speaker_00
Jumping around and taking the whack-a-mole approach also creates indecision. What should I deal with first? I've got a couple of minutes. Ladies, stop it. Make some decisions ahead of time and then evaluate how it's working for you. And on a similar note,

00:06:16 Speaker_00
constraining and keeping this simple is the second very important step. What things can you decide ahead of time and how can you make it super simple? Even things like I wear these couple of outfits to work or I wear scrubs every day.

00:06:32 Speaker_00
That was one silver lining of the pandemic is that I wore scrubs and a Patagonia fleece every day to work. It was amazing. It made my mornings so much simpler. So look at your life. Where are you spending time and energy trying to decide?

00:06:46 Speaker_00
Is it what am I going to wear today? Is it around food? Folks, we eat usually at least three times a day and if you have family members, that's a lot of people to consider.

00:06:56 Speaker_00
If we can just make that simpler and decide ahead of time when our brain is rested and we haven't already made thousands of decisions that day, it's so much easier.

00:07:06 Speaker_00
And this is where I love to ask my clients, like, what comes up for you when I say that? Some people are like, well, I don't have time to do that. Or I don't want to get locked in, right, to a certain meal. No, this is a simple outline.

00:07:18 Speaker_00
You're the adult in the life, you can always change your plans. You can always, what I say, call an audible and say, hey, tonight we're ordering pizza. No problem whatsoever.

00:07:27 Speaker_00
But the more that you can decide ahead of time, it makes your life so much easier. Even something like family vacations.

00:07:35 Speaker_00
What if you and your partner get together and decide, hey, we're going to take a couple of vacations per year and we're going to do a couple weekend camping trips. What if you just kind of knew that that was sort of your plan for the year?

00:07:47 Speaker_00
It makes it so much easier. Years ago before I did this work, I would often feel really restless and uncomfortable on the weekends because I kept thinking like we should be doing something.

00:07:56 Speaker_00
And there's just family life that goes on and you don't always have to be going away camping for the weekend, for instance.

00:08:03 Speaker_00
And yet when we didn't decide ahead of time, when I didn't decide ahead of time, it just kept coming up in my mind as kind of a reminder. My brain loved to remind me like, hey, you said you wanted to go camping this summer and we haven't done it yet.

00:08:15 Speaker_00
So every weekend I'd feel this like weird urgency and franticness to like get it on the calendar. So why don't you just do some general planning? Again, look at your family life, look at your career, figure out what is it that you want to do.

00:08:29 Speaker_00
Take some time to plan. It doesn't need to be a lot of time. But what if you took 30 minutes to an hour to say, hey, I'm going to just look at the calendar for the year and say, when might we want to do vacations?

00:08:41 Speaker_00
When might I want to go to a conference? Perhaps when do I want to get away? And just like pencil it in. Then the decision is done, and you can fill in the details later. And again, it might not be vacations at night.

00:08:53 Speaker_00
It might not be meals that are what's affecting you. But where in your life are you struggling with decisions and feeling like there's too much going on? And apply this. Decide ahead of time. Keep it simple and constrain, right?

00:09:09 Speaker_00
We high achievers want to do all the things. Your kids, you know, you think they should be in all the activities. Got to decide which ones. What if you just constrain and say, hey, we're going to do one or two activities per quarter?

00:09:22 Speaker_00
Whatever, again, works for you and your family. And thirdly, part of the solution is to realize when you've slipped into indecision, what happens when we are having a difficult time deciding? We start to ruminate.

00:09:35 Speaker_00
Indecision is an indulgent emotion and we spin in circles. We try to weigh the options. We try to figure out externally what is the right answer. And if you notice this happening, just put your hand on your heart and have a little self-compassion.

00:09:50 Speaker_00
Wow, I'm feeling really indecisive here. This is normal, part of being human. What do I need right now? And sometimes it's helpful to just like write down what you're thinking. Sometimes it's helpful for me to do a pro and con list.

00:10:03 Speaker_00
But again, I know we're trying to find a perfect solution. But just to recognize sometimes to get it out on paper, what are you thinking can be helpful and realize now I need to take the next step.

00:10:15 Speaker_00
The best way to get out of indecision and rumination is to make a decision. There isn't a right answer. Just choose one and move forward and have your own back.

00:10:27 Speaker_00
A lot of times women have a hard time making decisions because we do one thing and then we beat ourselves up and we berate ourselves, right? We're very critical or judgmental.

00:10:37 Speaker_00
We make the best decision based on what we know, and we move forward and have our own back. And then if we need to choose something different down the road, no problem. We don't need to make a big deal. We waste so much time, so much brain energy,

00:10:52 Speaker_00
in indecision. This is probably one of the top five things that people say that they have difficulty with is making decisions. And if that's you, listen again to this episode, write down what I'm telling you and give it a try.

00:11:05 Speaker_00
This is going to save you so much time. I used to spin and waffle about things as simple as like, where's my family going to stay as we're road tripping across, you know, the country for just like an overnight.

00:11:18 Speaker_00
I would spend so much time and energy like this hotel, that hotel, what does this cost? Like so much energy. Now I get it. We need to do some basic reconnaissance, right? Like how many beds are there? What is like the basic cost?

00:11:31 Speaker_00
But I kept spinning and spending so much time and then I would make a decision. I'd go back and look again. Ladies, we need to stop this. We need to make a decision and move forward. There's no such thing as failure. It's a learning.

00:11:46 Speaker_00
If it's not, quote unquote, the right decision down the road, great. Try something else. We don't need to make a big deal about it. So that is what I have for you today. I want you to have more time in your life.

00:11:55 Speaker_00
And part of it is learning to make decisions strongly. And that is done by making decisions ahead of time, keeping it simple and constraining, and number three, getting out of indecision by making decisions firmly and having your own back.

00:12:11 Speaker_00
This works, my friends. I'm excited for you to put it into place in your life so you get back time and you can do so many wonderful things. All right, my friends, that's what I have for you this week. And until next week, peace and love to all of you.

00:12:27 Speaker_00
Are you ready to take control of your life and put these tools into action? I'm here to help. I offer free consultations for physician moms to see if my one-on-one coaching package is right for you.

00:12:39 Speaker_00
You can sign up for a free consult at www.MamaDocLifeCoach.com.