Minnie Mouse, Ducks, Podcasts, and a Whole Lot of Restraint

There’s a version of me that most people experience, the steady, capable, direct one. The one who can walk into a situation, figure out what actually matters, and start moving things forward without a lot of noise.

She’s real.

But she’s not the whole picture.

The past few weeks have carried a kind of weight that’s hard to name unless you’ve felt it yourself. A close friend passed away, and even writing that feels too simple for what it actually is. It doesn’t capture the disorientation, or the strange way life keeps moving while something meaningful has very clearly stopped.

Somewhere in the middle of that, I wrote. Not for an audience or to make a statement, but because I needed somewhere to put it, something outside of my own head.

Not long after, I got a message from her mom telling me to take it down. Not asking. Telling. And it was based on something I knew wasn’t true.

So I did what I always do. I slowed it down, went back through old texts, replayed conversations, checked myself before reacting, and made sure I was standing on something solid before I responded.

I was.

I could have pushed back. I could have laid it all out clearly and defended every word. But I didn’t. I chose restraint, not because I agreed, and not because it didn’t bother me, but because I understood the emotional place it was coming from, even if I didn’t agree with the premise.

That doesn’t mean it sat well.

It didn’t.

I had to bite my tongue more than once, and if I’m being honest, that moment is a big part of why I’ve been quiet lately. Not because I don’t have anything to say, but because I know exactly what would come out if I didn’t filter it, and I’m not interested in rage writing, even when it would be justified.

What I am noticing is how consistent that instinct is across everything else.

Work hasn’t slowed down. If anything, it’s been the opposite, late nights stretching into early mornings, a few full all-nighters just to keep things moving, days that blur together because there isn’t really a clean stopping point.

I can operate like that. I’m good at locking in, pushing through, and getting things across the finish line.

But what that kind of pace doesn’t leave is space. Space to sit in something, to feel it without immediately translating it into the next action that needs to be taken.

And lately, I’ve been trying, intentionally, to carve out a small pocket of that space anyway.

A few nights a week now, after dinner, we go to Lake Morton.

It’s nothing complicated. We bring food for the ducks, walk around, let Haisley run ahead of us, stopping every few steps to throw handfuls and watch what happens next.

It’s simple. Predictable. Quiet in a way the rest of life hasn’t been.

But the part that matters most is that it’s protected.

Between 6 and 8 pm, everything else gets pushed aside. Work can wait. Messages can wait. Whatever felt urgent earlier in the day suddenly… isn’t.

And tonight, Haisley insisted on wearing her full Minnie Mouse costume to go feed the ducks.

Every part of me, the efficient part, the practical part, almost said no. It didn’t make sense. It wasn’t necessary. It was a whole production for something simple.

But I didn’t.

Because watching her, completely unbothered, fully confident in exactly who she wanted to be in that moment, I realized that’s something I never want to interrupt or shape too early.

That level of certainty in just being yourself.

So we went to the lake with Minnie Mouse, and nothing about it needed to make sense beyond that.

That instinct, to step in, to optimize, to make things more efficient or more reasonable, is still there.

It just doesn’t always need to win.

Which is part of why the podcast felt different, too.

I was a guest on the Rarely Normal podcast recently, talking about mental health, my OCD, ADHD, how I got diagnosed, and how it actually shows up in my life, including at work, where a lot of those tendencies double as a strength.

And I realized going into it how much I rely on having time to process before I speak.

Writing gives me that space. I can sit with a thought, shape it, make sure it lands the way I intend.

Speaking off the cuff doesn’t.

That lack of control made me anxious at first, because there’s no second pass, no refining, no cleanup, just whatever comes out in the moment.

But once we got into it, I actually really enjoyed it. There was something honest about not over-processing, about letting the thought exist as it is instead of perfecting it first.

It’s not how I usually operate.

But maybe that’s the point.

If that resonates, give it a listen. I’m really proud of the conversation.

Stepping back, the pattern is hard to ignore.

I don’t stop; I integrate. Something hard happens, I process it just enough to keep moving, show up where I need to show up, handle what needs to be handled, and carry the rest quietly.

Even emotionally, it plays out the same way. When something doesn’t sit right, I don’t always say it in the moment. I run it through a filter, Is this fair? Am I seeing this clearly? Do I need more information?, and by the time it comes out, it’s measured and structured, easy to understand and hard to argue with.

What doesn’t always make it out is the original feeling, the part that was immediate and unfiltered.

And lately, I’m starting to see the cost of that.

Not in big, dramatic ways, but in the small ones.

In the moments I smooth over instead of staying in.
In the things I choose not to say because they’re not fully formed yet.
In how quickly I move to resolution instead of letting something just exist.

That version of me, the one who handles it, fixes it, makes it make sense, isn’t going anywhere.

But she doesn’t get to run everything anymore.

Because if I’m not careful, she doesn’t just keep things moving, she edits things down before they ever have the chance to be real.

And that’s not something I’m willing to keep trading away.