Asking for Help

ALLISON SHEFF

Allison Sheff is a freelance writer, director and host of the podcast, Anxiety and the Artist. She is a firm believer of living her life in spandex, and is easily distracted by dogs. She can be found online at allisonsheff.com or on Instagram @anxietyandtheartist

I’m an only child, and my parents raised me to be incredibly self-reliant from a very young age. As a kid, my parents would have me walk the bill up to the counter and pay at a restaurant by the time I was five. At seven, I was doing my own laundry. There is a contentious story of my mother enlisting me to cook dinner for the family once a week when I was eleven. She claims I burnt the meal on purpose to avoid having this responsibility; I claim I was eleven and didn’t know how to cook.

I’m grateful that I was raised to be strong and independent. It taught me to walk fearlessly into situations where many of my peers balked. It gave me the confidence to move across the country when I was eighteen and pursue a career in New York City. It provided me with the chutzpah to stand up for myself. However, my strong belief in self-reliance has also made it impossible for me to ask for help. I become like an obstinate child who proudly declares that they can do it “All by self!!” and often find myself overwhelmed.

Life has a way of putting us in situations where we are forced to learn and grapple with our weaknesses. This was true for me during my recent pregnancy and birth of our daughter. Having spent twenty years working on and off in childcare, I thought I was prepared, and I thought I knew everything I needed to know. Ha!

While I had spent a significant amount of time with children and even worked as a postpartum doula for a period in my life, pregnancy baffled me and was quite scary. Your body changes with zero permission from you; it just kinda takes over. COVID restrictions prevented my husband from being present with me at early OB visits, and this caused a lot of anxiety. I kept telling myself that I was a strong and independent woman, and I’ve got this. And as I found myself struggling to get out of my car with my ever growing belly I reminded myself that, “I can do hard things!” One afternoon, while trying to reach for some pots and pans in a lower cupboard, I realized it was quite painful. I couldn’t do it. I needed help. I reluctantly called for my husband and asked for help.

Soon after, I found myself in physical therapy for pregnancy induced sciatica. Upon expressing my frustrations and anxiety over my recent experiences, my physical therapist, who had recently given birth to her third child, responded by saying, “If there are any questions I can answer for you, as a mother and as a physical therapist, please don’t hesitate to ask. I won’t offer advice unless you ask for it.” She took away any shame I might have in asking questions, and she also created a safe space where I could openly talk about my concerns and not have to worry about being bombarded with advice. I went to her with every question I had about my changing body and all those questions you don’t realize you have until you’re about to become a mom.

Shortly after I started physical therapy, my husband and I decided to invest in a birth doula. We were frustrated by the lack of information we were receiving from our OB, and our doula helped fill in the gaps and provided us with resources. I was embarrassed to ask for help, given my background in childcare and as a postpartum doula. She gracefully helped remove any shame I had in feeling like I should know everything, and reminded me to ask questions of my medical team and speak up for myself. Along with some of the most kind and supportive nurses I have ever had the pleasure of being under the care of, our doula helped give me a voice and made me unafraid to speak up for myself during my labor and delivery.

Covid forced us to relocate to an area where we have no local support. After having an unplanned c-section and spending five days in the hospital, I knew we were going to need help. We weren’t financially in a place where we could hire someone, and I reluctantly reached out to my friend Mary. This was, perhaps, the hardest ask for me. My labor had caught us by surprise, and we had no food in our fridge. Do you know how humbling it is to ask someone to buy you groceries? Mary traveled a great distance and not only filled our fridge and cupboards, but then stayed with us for those first twenty-four hours home and cared for us and our baby. She surprised us with some fabulous meals and stayed up all night with our newborn so we could get some much needed sleep. At one point, my husband and I were attempting to get our daughter to breastfeed and weren’t having much luck. Mary came up the stairs to the sounds of a screaming infant, a frantic husband, and me with both my breasts hanging out. She paused in the doorway, unsure if we wanted her, at which point I looked up and in desperation just said, “Help.” She swung into action, calmed both baby and husband, and guided us through getting my daughter to latch. She went above and beyond with so much joy that it made me realize that maybe asking for her help was as much a gift for her as it was for us.

These women helped me realize that while being self-reliant is a wonderful trait, there is no shame in asking for help. According to Organizational Psychologist Adam Grant, helping others makes people feel capable and useful, and in seeking help, we solidify and express our trust in those we seek help from. I realized that there is strength in asking for help, and that interdependence, community, and trust is the true mark of self-reliance.