From Frozen to Forward
I am having one of those mornings when I feel overwhelmed for seemingly no reason... which leaves me feeling frozen. So frozen that doing my job or basic tasks feels impossible. So I decided to write in order to get some momentum going.
I may be newly diagnosed as autistic, but the overwhelm is anything but new. Now I just have more of a "why" behind it. I've had this way of making my special interests my job. I feel a bit torn and pulled in two directions. One part of me hates doing meaningless work that leaves me feeling empty and like I am not adding anything to the world, and the other part of me gets insanely anxious and overwhelmed when I am doing work that is really important to me. I can't decide which one makes me most miserable.
For the past 8 years and 7 months, I have been working as an online coach. At first, it was a breath of fresh air and what I felt like was an autistic dream. I could work from home, control my environment and not feel like I was being monitored by a manager surrounding my social interactions and customer service. Not only was I excited to help people, but I was also excited to feel like I had actual autonomy.
The first few years were hard but good. I had the energy and the drive to keep pushing forward even when funds were low. I was hardly making anything in my previous kitchen job, so I didn't have much to lose anyway. I was only making about $1200/month working in a kitchen, so as soon as I started matching that income, I quit the kitchen job and started online coaching full-time.
I felt both relief and anxiety after quitting the kitchen job. On one hand, the kitchen job was the only job I had been able to stay in for four years because it had just enough structure and predictability that I didn't get so overwhelmed that I freaked out and just stopped showing up. (I had done this with a few jobs prior to this.) But on the other hand, it became increasingly unpredictable with the change in management, and I grew more and more tired, feeling like I was doing meaningless work. Sure, I got to cook, but there was no room for creativity since I was just making large pots of soup and hot bar items for hippies with the munchies. (I worked at a natural foods co-op.)
So when I finally had the opportunity to quit and work for myself, I took it, and I dove in full force.
Fast forward to 2020. COVID hit, and suddenly people were being laid off while we were on lockdown. When gyms first started closing, I was in pure panic. What was this about to mean for my business? If people didn't have jobs, how on earth were they going to pay for my services? Little did I know that 2020 would be my best business year yet.
Although people were stuck at home, most moved to remote work, or they were able to collect unemployment and focus even more on their fitness with a lot more time on their hands. On top of this, most coaches began moving their businesses online, which helped normalize online coaching.
Before 2020, when people asked what I did for work, and I told them I did fitness and nutrition coaching, they asked where I coached. When I told them I did online coaching, they looked at me, confused, or asked me, "How does that work?" After 2020, I no longer had to explain it, and now online coaching is probably the norm more than in-person coaching.
Although I was pushing myself to extremes trying to keep up with social media and a client list of nearly 90 clients, I was financially stable for the first time in my whole fucking life. I always had this life goal of being able to go to the grocery store and just grab what I needed off the shelves without worrying about prices. You know you are living the life when you can afford both toilet paper and paper towels at the same time. Paper towels are a luxury, let me tell you.
Fast forward to 2026 and the online coaching industry is saturated AF. Everyone and their mom is an online coach now and trying to break through all the noise of coaches marketing their services on the internet is exhausting. Back before instagram became TikTok, social media was still draining, but at least people were still to be educated on topics. My posts still reached my audience, and new client applications still came in at a steady flow...but when instagram started prioritizing reels, I tried so hard to fight it but my content was reaching no one. The new client applications slowly dwindled until I had no choice but to start to participate in short form video content for instagram.
I posted a reel nearly every day trying to keep my audience engaged and keep potential clients coming in, but then the algorithm shifted again, and I never recovered. I still kept posting regardless, but after a couple of years of my reach getting lower and lower, potential client inquiries dwindling down to nearly nothing, and being in a very taxing IOP program for anxiety, I gave myself permission to stop and take a break.
That was about 3 months ago now and I haven't been able to get myself back into a groove of posting regularly again. I just can't seem to get myself to do it. I feel frozen and overwhelmed. Trying to hustle every weekend to plan out the week's content...busting my ass to try to stay relevant ate away at me until there was absolutely nothing left.
So then, I decided to pivot and go back to food. I started a granola business and although that was grounding at first, I am finding myself feeling torn between two passions and I have never been good at doing two things at once. I have this need to be absolutely ALL in when I am doing something. I don't have hobbies, or etc. I just put my whole ass identity and life into what I am doing for work, and now I am spiraling out, torn between two passions, leaving me feeling overwhelmed and frozen vs. hyperfocused. I don't know how to function if I am not hyper-focused on what I am doing. Being anything less than obsessed feels... just wrong to me.
I don't really have a point to this post besides just getting things out of my brain. I think ultimately I just wish I could quit coaching completely due to extreme burnout with it and just focus on granola, but granola doesn't pay the bills yet. I wish my brain didn't work like this, and I wish I was more flexible...but currently I just feel like I am sinking.