Mar 30, 2015

Tired and Grateful





My days go like this:

Wake up feeling like something large has run over me, perhaps a rhinocerous

Read Scriptures, Write in Journal, get dressed and hug, diaper, clothe and perhaps bathe protesting, independent children who only want to run free and wild

Do school for an hour or so, in spite of tantrums over how much math and how much reading and whether lowercase letters are necessary

Send the kids outside and do laundry/tidy/give kids snack/kiss cuts/tell toddler not to whack his baby brother with sticks

Try to control the chaos of small children/go outside with the kids/sit exhaustedly in a chair in the shade and let the dog lick me

Make lunch & insist that bananas and carrots are important food

Put the babies down for nap/send the older kids outside with a reminder not to hit one another with sticks/dig up the yard with shovels/play with power tools

Write

Do YW calling

Market/submit

Try to fall asleep if possible for perhaps 15 minutes

As they come in the door, lecture adolescent daughters who forgot to brush hair/wear jeans without holes/wear shirts without stains/wear coats when it's snowing

Help school kids with homework/pick up or drop off from Piano lessons or soccer or playdates

Make dinner, which must be made so people can eat

Eat dinner, which must be eaten in spite of the fact that it's hard to like something I've actually made (why is that??)

Do chores/send kids to play practice/try not to snap or yell too much

Play games with the kids after chores/go to mutual

Collapse into bed and want to do nothing but lay there with Jeff and watch Poirot or Star Trek.


I feel like, lately, I've been losing my ground on sleep. We've had sick kids, I've had a stressful month. I'm struggling to be able to go to sleep, to be able to stay asleep, to be able to sleep in if I've not been able to go to sleep or stay asleep.

Honestly, I'm pretty exhausted.

Jeff and I are trying to move on to the next phase of getting the greenhouse ready. What's stalling us right now is we don't know how to do interiors... to put siding on interior windows/windowframes/beams/etc, how to make it look good. So we're waiting for a consult, right now. We could do the outside but we need to buy all the siding in one shot, so we get a good enough deal on it. We've set aside a bit of our tax return (usually all put toward paying off the house) for this purpose. But we have not had time, yet, since January, to actually have someone come in and look, or to decide on what kind of siding we want.

I guess I should feel grateful I'm dealing with these sorts of stresses, and not the sorts of stresses some mothers in rural Africa, for instance, are dealing with right now. I'm struggling because I don't have energy to make dinner... there are mothers out there who are struggling because they don't have food to make dinner. I'm stressed sending my kids off to play practice, there are mothers out there whose children are forcibly taken from them and made to go to war. I'm struggling to teach my adolescent daughters how to care for themselves physically and emotionally... there are mothers out there who are preparing their young thirteen year old daughters for marriage and the exhausting, heartbreaking life they've had to endure themselves. I'm struggling because i'm not getting enough sleep. There are mothers out there who are staying awake all night taking care of children dying of malaria, of aids, of starvation.

Sorry. I know that's a bit morbid. It's how I think though. I guess I'm just a bit morbid. I'm grateful that I have all my kids here, safe, and that I can keep them safe.

I'm tired and grateful.