When there’s too much “stuff” going on around me, my executive function just shuts down and I do nothing. It happens mostly when I feel like I have no control over my time. One child wants to be woken so that we can have breakfast together. The other needs lunch to happen at a particular time, and then to be driven somewhere straight after. And then some more in the evening.

It’s not that it takes up a big part of the day. And it’s not at all that I don’t want to do these things. I am happy that they still prioritize mealtimes with me instead of being away with friends.

These fixed points spread out through the day chop it up and I feel like it all slips away from me. Then it feels like there’s no point even trying to take any control over the rest of it, and I just let time pass between those moments.

The mere knowledge that I could be interrupted at any time is almost as bad as actually being interrupted. When the day is over and everyone else has gone to bed and I know that nothing more will happen, that’s when I finally breathe out, look up, and feel like I could actually do something.

Charles Dickens reputedly felt similarly. “The mere consciousness of an engagement will sometimes worry a whole day,” he’s quoted to have written.

What can I do about this? Make a list. Commit in advance. Remove myself from the situation even for five minutes to get out of the tunnel and clear my head of this illusion.