Yesterday, I stumbled upon the blog books that I printed several years ago, full of all the posts from when the boys were young.  I love that I wrote, and I am thankful I printed them.  So many of the things I read I had already forgotten.  I thought, "I should start again."

So here I am.  Today was a struggle.  I have no cute pictures to share of my babies; they are big now.  But my thoughts and feelings are all a mess, so I want to use this to try and straighten them out.

This past school year was hard for me.  I realize, in the grand scheme, the bulk of it was minor.  At M's bday party two weeks ago, a lady said, "I had a hard year." I shared, "Me too!" And then she proceeded to tell me that her sister was tragically killed, her husband lost his job, and they have had to move in with parents.....my stuff is not that big. Mine is mostly just a crap ton of small stuff. 

But it was hard.  I felt like I was drowning, simply overwhelmed with things needing my attention, and I was constantly in motion.  It was my first year teaching preschool, and it was hard.  We lost our kitchen for 3 months.  It was hard.  The main water line to the house broke. It was hard.  And I tried to take good care of myself during that time by eating, exercising, sleeping well--but it just felt so damn overwhelming at times. (FYI blog--a lot of the polish has fallen away from our fearless heroine.  The Biscuit cusses now.)

I realize that I was not operating in a vacuum.  It was hard for Handsome too.  And he had the added stress of having a wife telling him, "I am having a hard time. I can't do this. I need help." 

What got me thinking again about all of this is that, this week, for the first time in ages, I am not under the gun.  My life had become a series of just constantly putting out fires....not right now.  And it honestly through me for a loop.  Yesterday, I kept thinking, "What am I supposed to be doing? What is most urgent?" Only to realize....there wasn't really anything urgent I needed to be doing.  Last summer, I did some nanny work when I was in town, leaving Handsome and the kids at home. This summer has started with me not working, and, though I have volunteered to do fill in a few days, there is the real chance they will not call me.

The bright side is all this crap has created an environment where I have to proactively work to take care of myself and introspectively look at my thoughts and feelings.  I end up trying to wade through my thoughts/feelings, Trying to ascertain, "Are they legit?" or "Am I just at the end of my rope and need to sleep it off?" I have realized that my anxiety has had a little flare (no wonder really the way things kept happening).  And a couple triggers for that are: 1- feeling alone 2- feeling unsupported.  So, I am going to ponder on that and hopefully dissect one of them tomorrow. Because it is just me on this little blog right now.