A Life With Tea: Remembering to Fill Your Cup

(image description): A selfie of Stevie (author) and her 2 year old niece each holding a cup of tea, sitting on a couch smiling at the camera.

Hi, my name’s Stevie and I’m a hypocrite.

I’m an empath. I’m a sister, a daughter, a partner, a friend. I’m a mother.

I’ve worked as a carer for most of my adult life, and taken pride in being the one whom loved ones (and sometimes strangers) come to for comfort and advice. And now in my work as the CEO and Village Voice at RippleAbility, I am responsible for countless other carers. Their children, their burdens, their worries, and supporting their ever-changing emotional needs. Every day I find myself reminding others how amazing they are doing and rebuilding their capacity to give more. Reminding them to feel pride in themselves for how much they already do, and to take time for themselves.

To fill their cup.

And when I’m with other mums and carers, I talk a lot about filling cups. I even talk about filling my own. I know how important it is to care first for yourself, so you can care for others. And, for most of my life, I’ve been great at doing just that. Living in the slow lane, making all the time in the world to balance out work and play, refilling my cup. But if I’m honest, in this past chapter of my life I haven’t filled my cup at all. I don’t even have a cup, I gave all mine away. I donated it and everything in it to those who needed it more. How’s the irony of that?

I am cup-less…

9ish months in, 9ish months out. Postpartum. Oooft.

Coming off the back of pregnancy is so weird. You have just spent nearly an entire year focusing solely on yourself. Wholeheartedly nourishing yourself, being gentle on and loving yourself, being in awe of yourself, treating yourself to what feels good and taking the time to enjoy all the “last one without a baby”’s. You give yourself the grace to be unapologetically selfish because you’re growing life. You’re creating. You’re at full capacity of awesomeness! You and everyone around you gives you the care and rest you so rightfully deserve. You get the chance to drink a boiling hot cup of tea.

That to me is the epitome of “me time;” when I have a full cup of steaming tea warming my belly.

Then bubby is born and you’re swept up in the heart-bursting love and pride that is motherhood. And there’s someone else now who needs your tea. From the moment that baby enters your life, you share your tea with them. Every moment of every day you pour a little more from your cup into theirs. And you’re overjoyed to do so, because what in the world is more special than watching your baby thriving and content sitting in the warm juices of all your love.

(image description): Bubba, breastfeeding next to a cup of tea.

This feeling is not unique to mothers, but fathers too, grandmothers, grandfathers, and carers with no relation who get so deeply involved and entwined.

And in the beautiful chaos that is raising young, you slowly forget to top yourself up. And the more you give, to that little baby, and all the others in your life that still need you, you begin to poke more holes in your cup, and let the care spill from yours like a sieve. Little bits of “you” drip away slowly, almost unknowingly. Though all the while a growing feeling sits in the back of your throat, like thirst, telling you you want something more, but what?

It’s Tea.

All over the world, people are loving a bit of tea. Whether it be a herbal brew, a queen's traditional (may she rest in peace), an ancient herbal ceremony, a medicinal tonic, a tea leaf reading, a sweet iced nectar, or just a good old bit of spilled gossip or a crass teabag joke. Tea has such an important role in society, but an even more important role in my life.

(image description): a cup of tea (left) and a bowl of granola (right). The cup reads: “a good mum has great days, bad days, overwhelming days, perfect days, boring days, super mum days, just being a mum days and a whole lot of love days”.

Growing up, my mum always told me, there’s nothing that can’t be fixed over a warm cup of tea and a good night's sleep. And I always used to laugh it off with a quip about her having a caffeine addiction. But as I got older, I realised the meaning behind her words. She was referring to ‘me time’, and rest.

Me time looks different to everyone, but the main thing to highlight in the phrase is time. Time has a sneaky way of disappearing, dehydrating in the heat of the sun before it’s all dried up, and burnt out. And I for one am crispy. Charcoal in fact.

To me, me time is about reclaiming that time. Being able to slow down, be present, enjoy a hot cup of tea. No matter what’s going on in life or how wildly busy I get, I always feel better when I take a little bit of time alone to relish a slow, hot cuppa. And in doing so, I fill my cup. Bit by bit.

So ask yourself, what do I do that gives me that warm tingle back? How do you take TIME back for yourself? It can be hard, especially when you’ve been living in the fast lane for a prolonged amount of time. But it’s there if you are patient. Waiting right behind what might feel like boredom and the initial anxiety of blissful rest.

The truth is, caring is Hard. And some days I am pouring from an empty cup and wondering how I can possibly keep on giving, and I hope that you read this and are thinking the same way, and that you are reminded to do something to fill yours.

Whatever that looks like.

Because every day that I give to myself is a day I can give more to others, especially the most special others I care for. And giving love to those I love, fills my cup with an unimaginable kind of warmth.

And if you’re reading this, thinking “What a load of BS, I’m a coffee drinker”…as my good friend Kermit the frog says “That’s none of my business”

*sips tea*