Chapter 1: Emotional Literacy
This lesson identifies the three factors that push normal stress into true distress and gives you a clear warning sign—the moment you start feeling "broken" or "checked out."
When Stress Becomes Overload (The Performance Drain): You’re used to operating at 100%, but fatherhood drops you to 20% capacity overnight.
When does this exhaustion become a problem?
When the stress increases in three ways:
1. Severity (how bad the feelings are—feeling truly hopeless or numb)
2. Frequency (how often it occurs—is it every day, all day?)
3. Longlasting (the duration—does this heavy feeling stick around for weeks?).
The Warning Signs: You might notice you’re getting shorter with your partner, isolating yourself, or feeling 'crappy.' You might start using concerning language like, "I feel hopeless," or "A tiny little human can break me."
If you’re consistently feeling checked out, overwhelmed, or hopeless, that’s your signal to stop and pay attention.
