I’m sitting in the dark of a movie theater next to my husband, watching Avatar: The Way of Water. On screen, Neteyam is dying. This is the moment I should be crying, and on any other night I would be.

Instead, I’m thinking about the radio script I still haven’t delivered. Then about the book I’m waiting to get back from the designer. Then about the meeting we have to schedule to start work on the next issue of the magazine.

My husband glances over. He often does at moments like this — half teasing, half moved himself — to check whether I’m crying. He knows it embarrasses me a little to get caught. This time, he finds my eyes dry, which is not what he expected. “Are you okay?” he whispers.

His question pulls me out of my head. I’ve missed the scene completely.

That was an ordinary evening not so many years ago. Back then, I was juggling several projects at once, jumping from one to the next all day long. I was, and still am, a freelancer, so in theory I had plenty of freedom to organize my time. Yet I’d turned that freedom into a long list of things to do and goals to reach.

I had a particular income in mind, and it mattered to me. I wanted the security money can provide and the peace of mind that goes with it. Underneath that, I was also trying to live up to an expectation nobody had actually placed on me.

The number never seemed quite high enough. I always found a reason to raise it, and my expectations of myself rose with it. If I earned more, I thought, I’d feel a little more secure. And if I met that standard, perhaps I’d finally feel I was doing things right.

Stopping was never simple. Even when I tried to rest, I found it hard to switch off. Sometimes I felt guilty; at other times, I felt physically restless, as though I couldn’t sit still even when I needed to.

It took me a while to recognize how little kindness I was showing myself.

The Habit of Trying to Do It All

I know many women are familiar with the urgency of keeping up at work while also paying attention to family, the home, and other people’s needs. In midlife, many of these responsibilities can come together, while time for ourselves keeps getting pushed aside.

Some of that burden has to do with what we’ve learned about our place in other people’s lives. For generations, women have been expected to take care of others and handle much of what keeps everyday life running, even when that work is barely seen or acknowledged.

Over time, those responsibilities can feel so much like our own that it becomes difficult to ask whether everything we’re carrying is really ours to carry. And even when nobody explicitly asks us to do it all, we end up putting that pressure on ourselves.

This way of living can start to seem so normal that we barely question it. We mentally review what’s left to do, feel we must anticipate everything, and put rest and self-care off until we’re finished. Sometimes we even feel guilty for spending time on something we enjoy, despite having needed the break for days.

But are we ever really finished? There’s always something else to do.

That’s where guilt and the feeling that we’re responsible for everything can creep in: the belief that rest is a privilege we must earn and that, if something remains unresolved, we’ve failed. Recognizing this has helped me look more honestly at the pressure I put on myself and ask where it came from.

When I Started Feeling Unwell

For me, anxiety and some physical symptoms became part of the price I paid. They frightened me enough to make me stop and ask myself what I was doing to myself, my time, and my health.

I can’t say for certain what caused it, and I don’t think there was a single cause. Looking back, though, I believe all that agitation played a part in the symptoms that appeared later. I’d spent a long time taking on too many things at once, worrying about a financial goal that kept moving and trying to meet expectations that felt very heavy. The restlessness even started to follow me into the time I set aside to “rest.”

Wanting financial stability is understandable. Money can bring peace of mind, and there are times when working less isn’t an easy option. But I needed to recognize how much I was sacrificing in that pursuit and ask whether keeping up the same pace would bring me closer to the life I wanted.

I began to slow down and spend more time meditating, exercising, relaxing, and being with friends. Little by little, I gave my well-being more attention, even when I hadn’t finished everything on my list. I had to accept that caring for myself needed more space in my life, even if that time didn’t bring in money or allow me to cross another task off the list.

I didn’t stop demanding so much of myself overnight. It was a gradual learning process, and there are still times when I have to return to what it taught me.

What I Wish I’d Known Earlier

I’m glad to have reached this stage of my life with some awareness of my limits. That doesn’t mean I always respect them: I still catch myself expecting too much, wanting to move faster or feeling that I should be doing more.

When that happens, I try to ask myself whether the demand is necessary or whether I’m falling back into a habit I know all too well.

Does everything have to be done now?

Is it really up to me?

What would happen if I left something until tomorrow?

Those questions help me pause and look at things more calmly.

I wish someone had told me ten or fifteen years ago that I didn’t have to keep running harder and faster to get where I wanted to go. That it was worth taking time to find some peace and clarify my thoughts before setting off after the next goal.

These days, I try to work more thoughtfully and worry less about the outcome. I also try to remember that my life is made of more than what I produce, and that the hours when nothing gets crossed off the list deserve a place alongside my projects and responsibilities.

If I’m honest, I don’t know if I would have understood all this just because someone told me. Some lessons we need to live through ourselves, stumbles and all, before we can understand them and change something.

I hope this understanding reaches you sooner than it reached me. And on the days when stopping still feels hard, perhaps you can remember that learning to treat yourself more kindly takes time too.

Zaylen Claveria is an editor and content creator who is learning to add years without growing old. She is the founder of MenoPawse, a project celebrating the bond between women in peri- and menopause and their pets as a source of joy and renewal. Find MenoPawse on Pinterest and grab her free guide, 5 Practical Keys to Enhance Your Wellbeing During Menopause.

Resting Made Me Feel Like I Wasn’t Doing Enough was originally published in Middle-Pause on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Two muskrats in love ruined my childhood

Back in April 2026, I wrote an article about “the worst song of the 20th century and how it changed my life.”

Now it’s time to move on to the second worst.

If you were not alive in the 1970s, you may not believe that this song exists.

Let me assure you (and warn you): It does.

The title is “Muskrat Love.”

That is not a misprint.

It’s not about oenophiles pining for the grape varietal muscat. It is not about Revolutionary War enthusiasts with a penchant for muskets. It is about — I kid you not — muskrats. Yes, the rodents.

“Muskrat Love” tells the bizarre story of two muskrats named Susie and Sam. And honestly, to call it a story is a misnomer. There is no story, really. They just like each other. Oh, and they dance a little (they whirl, they twirl, they tango; they jitterbug, shimmy, and “jing a jango”). In the end, Sam (spoiler alert!) asks Susie to marry him. After she says yes, according to the lyrics, “anything goes.”

ANYTHING?? Well, that is troubling. Does Susie know what she’s getting into? Have they been together long enough for her to understand all of Sam’s proclivities, sexual and otherwise? Then again, who am I to judge? Susie could be the wild card in the relationship. For all I know, she could’ve been into some weird stuff.

In the song, after the proposal is accepted, Susie and Sam then tickle, rub, wriggle and giggle. And that’s about it.

Even at 11 years old, I found this to be an unsatisfying — and mystifying — tale, one that has haunted me ever since. So, former journalism major that I am, I dug deeper.

Three seconds of research revealed that “Muskrat Love” was written by Willis Alan Ramsey — a grown man! — who released it on his sole album in 1972, where it thankfully sank into oblivion.

Then, in 1973, in a crazy and terrible twist of fate, the song was recorded by the band America (who all met in England, by the way). The muskrats fared better with America’s ethereal harmonies and bigger name, reaching number 67 on the Billboard 100.

And if the story ended there, “Muskrat Love” might have remained totally unknown to me — and to much of the world. But no, the 1970s power duo, Captain and Tennille, had to record it in 1976.

This is when things get bonkers.

People loved it.

How could humans have listened to this on the radio and been happy about it? How could they have gone to a store to buy it on cassette or vinyl (which we unpretentiously called “records” then)? Were we that strapped for entertainment? The Captain and Tennille were popular, sure, with at least two chart-topping singles already. But why did this patently awful song hit number four on the top 100 and become the thirtieth biggest hit of that year?

I have a theory. Though music videos were not prominent in 1976, the ol’ Captain and his lovely wife had a secret weapon in their arsenal. No, it wasn’t a musket. It was their own television show, airing in 1976 and 1977.

The 1970s was a time of, let’s say…unexpected people having shows. There were big names like Sonny and Cher, medium names like Tony Orlando and Dawn, and head-scratchers, like Pink Lady and Jeff, which consisted of an American comedian and two Japanese singers who knew no English. That show must have been the brainchild of executives lunching on a big pile of cocaine washed down with a few quaaludes but for legal reasons, I can neither confirm nor deny this happened.

The reason “Muskrat Love” impacted me so greatly — to the point that I still have nightmares today — is that a video for it appeared on the Captain and Tennille’s show. Unfortunately it is available online, so I had to revisit it numerous times to write this piece. (The things I do for you, dear readers!)

With her dazzling smile, heavenly voice, and mushroom hairdo, Tennille (first name Toni — I’ve always loved her for that) sells the song hard. She’s so delightful, she almost makes you forget that “evening” and “pleasing” don’t rhyme — like, at all.

And when two human beings (miniaturized through the magic of television) in muskrat costumes descend from the heavens and land either side of Tennille’s head, she keeps on smiling. Toni was a pro.

The muskrats then appear on the Captain’s hat, where they rub butts and do a bit of a waltz before jumping down and landing on his piano. At this point, you have to imagine the Captain (whose name was Daryl Dragon — for real) was questioning some of the choices he’d made in his life.

On the piano, the muskrats do a poorly choreographed number, which includes cartwheels but no jitterbug (which seems like a real misfire, as it’s mentioned in the song). Then they bow to the front and side several times before leaping to their…deaths?

One can only hope.

Toni Gallagher is the proud author of two middle grade novels published by Random House and a not-as-proud longtime producer of reality TV. She is currently working on a one-woman show titled “Dear John Stamos: Tales of Heart, Hope, and Hollywood Name Dropping.”

https://medium.com/@tonigallagherink

The Second-Worst Song of the 20th Century and How It Still Gives Me Nightmares was originally published in Middle-Pause on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.