Fun Times...

I appear to be in the grasp of some sort of anxiety at the moment. Which is why I am writing, hoping that this can be some sort of therapy. When I wake up in the morning I feel so overwhelmed I want to go back to bed, and I have this heavy icky feeling deep in my stomach.

I don't know totally why I am feeling like this, I am on university holidays after all. The kids go to school and I have the whole day to myself - so yay - my house should be spotless and I should be totes relaxed....or something. 

 I know I am nervous about going back to school - the holidays are so long and I forget how to study. This is on top of already feeling like I can barely handle my children now - (and other grown up concerns,...), how am I supposed to do it while I am back school with a full time study load?? When I think of the kids/my life I think of a tornado out of control and I am just fighting to survive.

Yes my home is clean and reasonably tidy, I make my bed everyday, I work out regularly, I get my kids to school on time, I make lunches, I bake muffins, I make dinner most nights....but the problem is, afterwards I am left feeling exhausted and I have starting drinking (1 or 2 drinks takes the edge off) almost every night to deal with the stress. Which of course is a terrible thing because that is not what good Mormon mums do...right? Cue more stress and more guilt!...

I spoke to my Naturopath mother (so ridiculously grateful for this smart woman!) and she informs me that I am self medicating with alcohol, something about my neurotransmitters, and how stress affects important brain processes. So my supplements have been adjusted so I am giving my body what is really needs instead of subbing in alcohol.

BUT - still, if this is my stress now, what about when school goes back in a week? How do I manage it????

So its almost 7am - and I didn't go back to bed. I have fiddled around with the printer because it hasn't been working lately and I REALLY wanted to print this rad FREE To Do List from Art By Jaz Higgins, a local Brisbane artist. Check out her gorgeous work here.

The first thing on my TO DO list today is : Get a new colour cartridge for my printer!!

A Life of Adventure....?

Do you ever wish you could vicariously live someone else's life?......

I guess that is a little bit of a stupid question - because of course! The evidence is firmly in our cultural obsession with movies, books, TV shows etc....

You see, I was having this thought lying in bed at approx 8.30am - because I didn't really feel like getting up and getting on with my day....it is a public holiday for us - The Show Holiday - although I haven't really seen much advertisement for it this year....and we are not going. But, public holidays are good, because we are all at home, without the usual Saturday or Sunday commitments...

Anyway, so I was lying it bed being a bum and quite enjoying it after a couple of 3am study sessions this week...and thinking about how it would be nice to trade my life for some adventure....However, the point is that it is now 3 hours later and I have put on and hung out washing, swept the floor, cleaned the kitchen, cleaned the toilets, made my bed, chatted to the neighbour, dusted the living area, denied Amelie's request to cook in my clean kitchen, then reneged and let her cook as long as she didn't need supervision (a chocolate cake is in the oven - I can smell it now!), and had a shower and made myself presentable....oh yeah and bought tickets to Soulfest and called hubby a few times and tentatively tried to organised an early father's day celebration for tomorrow....

I don't have time to live a life of adventure!! I still have a long list of things to do  - the usual 'taking care of my family' business, including a couple of hours of law reading and an online quiz to do by midnight....so by the time I finish everything I will be totally shagged and all I will want to do is vicariously get involved in someone else's emotionally tumultuous, adventure of a life via TV or the book sitting next to my bed. 

Hmmm....

I currently wish I had more eps of this...."Outlander"

Exposed.....

As it turns out, I haven't blogged properly for over a year....What stopped me was feeling like I had to edit myself for the few people that actually read it, and know me socially. I felt like some of them  (definitely) wouldn't be able to identify with things that I was/am dealing with and would judge me as a being weird, self absorbed or shallow.

So I just closed myself off.

It wasn't just blogging either...over the past six months I have done it with church as well. I don't think it was about someone, but they were probably the catalyst - another woman disapproved of something that I was sharing with members of my local congregation and deemed it inappropriate.....I did not agree and I know others didn't either. But the fact that I was sharing myself and my talents, and because it had taken effort to expose that part of myself - it really burnt.

I guess it is a not so unfamiliar feeling to others - but I hate being disapproved of, my self esteem cannot handle it. So I usually just avoid situations or exposing things about myself that can warrant disapproval....

I have to admit, it is quite exhausting - for starters people disapprove of the darndest things, and there is another part of myself that just wants to be open and carefree 'this is who I am!!!' - consequently, I feel regularly torn and angry with myself.

Argh!!!

All of these emotions are still very real to me - I still feel intensely insecure and not good enough/don't fit in for church, dancing, friends, my family (parents, brothers, step-children), my children, university - I get anxious/depressed over ridiculous things and I drink at every social opportunity (although social drinking opportunities are infrequent) because I am getting more and more socially awkward and I just want to be around people and feel relaxed and not care what others think of me!


*Sigh*.....I would love to be free to be more unashamedly real.....

Long Time No See....

Hello Blog, it's the day after, the day after Christmas, and I have been thinking about  you.....I think it's time we saw each other a little more....

Its been almost a year since I have written anything - I put too much pressure on myself to Gratitude daily and I couldn't keep up, so I quit. Standard procedure.

Over the last month I have been blog writing in my head - I miss it.

No pressure this time.

365 Days of Gratitude: Days 68 - 78

So I have dropped the ball a little....Last, last weekend was a bit eventful. I was released from my calling as a Primary Teacher, well that actually happened this Sunday because of last Sunday.

The last few weeks of Sunday teaching for me had been getting harder and harder. I was completely bogged down by feelings of obligation in almost every area of my life. I would be preparing my lesson on Sunday morning and thinking "I don't want to be doing this...", "how I can I testify and teach about this principle if I am just not feeling it?" Church for me is different from other aspects of my life, the rest just grind on no matter how I am feeling, but my religious experience is so completely dependant on my spiritual health. This means that in order for me to fully serve my Primary class and I need to be nourished. And yes, I know we are all up and down sometimes with our commitment and attention to spiritual things but I didn't feel like I was getting any better. I started not wanting to go to church at all.

This all came to a head on that Sunday. I had 12 children to teach because one of the other teachers wasn't there. It happens, teaching is a voluntary role. Which was fine, really, because it was my old class so I knew them well. The problem started when I realised that I had prepared the wrong lesson, because I have been away for 2 weeks (one for a dancing commitment and the other, because I just couldn't drag myself there) and I misjudged where we were up to. The children had already had the lesson that I was about to teach. So instead of rehashing it I decided to have a quiz.

I am not a person that functions well thinking on my feet, so it was a little messy from the beginning. What made it worse was that two brothers that I normally have my individual classes who are fine by themselves, together were a nightmare! They were hiding under chairs and and being totally distracting. We are not a school, not qualified teachers so we do not discipline - if we encounter bad behaviour (this was a first time for me) we are required to take the child to their parents. Problem is these two boys would not listen, the wouldn't come out of class at all. Eventually the Primary President came in took control - and I was happy to give it, but them I was barely holding it together.

After class I was a wreck. I sat it the toilet, crying and praying. I couldn't do it any more.

I didn't want to ask for a release, because that just isn't done, well it is, but I guess it shouldn't be. At least that it how I felt. You accept you calling to serve until it is over. The flip side was that if I couldn't stop teaching I was going to stop going to church. I was hiding from all of the Primary ladies but one found me and took me to the mother's room and I cried again as I shared with her how I was feeling. Like a complete failure, that's what! She told me that it was far better for me to stop teaching than to stop going to church over it. She also expressed her gratitude to me for being such a reliable teacher over the past year - and told me not to feel like a failure. (Trying to!) It was important for me to take care of myself  first.

So I walked out of church that Sunday relieved and completely grateful.

Then I took a break. Blogging had started to feel like an obligation too. Instead stopping however I have decided to modify - I think I need reduce my posts to every second day, or every week. I will see how it goes.

These past 11 days I have been grateful for....

My blow up that Sunday. For without it being so difficult nothing would have come of it and I would still be trying to grind on, feeling worse every week. I am grateful for the opportunity to get back to me and to focus on my spiritual experience every Sunday.

Surviving another week of school. It always feels like that, I just manage to get my homework or my readings done the morning - or half hour - before my classes. I wish I could get on top of it more, although it feels like this is just the nature of full time study with a family. I acknowledge there is space for me to try harder though, so I am not so frazzled all the time. Working on it!

My thrifty husband. I love that he is so responsible and cautious with our financial circumstances. Sometimes his thrift is quite hilarious though.....I like to buy the children dressing gowns or winter PJs for Easter and this year mum bought them PJs and I was buying the dressing gowns. I was talking about it with Michael and of course he said we can't afford it, which was followed by the response 'I will make them myself'. It is the usual response and has been quite a running joke with me, because often it is in response to things he most definitely cannot make!....like when I wanted to buy a wall clock! (Recently instead of getting a new power cord for the laptop, he spent a whole weekend messing around with his power tester, soldering, cutting wires...etc - but by the end of it the cord works brilliantly and you wouldn't even know that he cut an inch if it. He saved some money and was very pleased with himself.)

So dressing gowns. He is most definitely making them. Instead of buying material he has purchased coral fleece blankets from KMart which are far cheaper - queen size for $19. The challenge has grown to making some for his grandchildren as well....7 in total. Currently his 4 down with 3 to go and getting better and better with each one.

Love my super talented husband!

365 Days Of Gratitude: Day 67

Yesterday I was thankful for....

Early morning study time, and the chance to sleep when I am tired. Jack wet the bed, it happens twice a week lately, he is still in training but getting a lot better. Unfortunately afterwards I couldn't get back to sleep - this was at 2am. It was not very useful laying in bed so I got up and did a couple of hours of study. I don't know why I am so productive at that time of morning, I hate that I am, but it works.

The flip side to a super productive morning is that I was exhausted by 11am. Very thankful that all the kids are at school and I get to catch up when I don't get enough sleep. I remember those days too well when they were little and I was constantly exhausted and sleep deprived.....it was awful.

Family time and Psych Pizza Night. Woot!!

365 Days Of Gratitude: Day 66

Yesterday I was thankful for.....

Time with friends. More specifically my best friend, the only person I have even been able to swap shoes with (size 10 too!), my bridesmaid....who helped make my wedding one of the best days of my life....Evette.

I have known Evette for almost 5 years, I cannot believe it has been that long! Our sons were both in Prep together. I had just left my first husband and I was a mess. Withdrawn, ridiculously insecure, anxiety girl. She noticed that my son was wearing a "Huonville Primary School" school jumper and started a conversation with me. She had grown up in Huonville. Of course she was from Tassie, she was the funkiest mum there.

We became instant friends, with the help of our boys being best mates. She watched me heal, listened to me wax long about myself, my future, the men that I dabbled with, drank with me, shared her wisdom, her insecurities, laughed with me....and confirmed my feelings that Michael was most definitely a keeper.

I don't get to see her much. I moved further away and we are both so busy with work/uni/family etc that it is hard to catch up. But when we do, it is awesome and I cherish it, and wish those times were far more frequent.

Yesterday we went op shopping....one shop, piles of clothes - over three hours of girlie awesomeness. We talked and tried on clothes, swapping them above the change room stalls. It was so fun...we must do it again...soon.

We lunched and talked more. I wish we didn't have to pick up the kids, because we probably could have talked all day. Sometimes I wonder if we had unlimited time, how long could we actually talk for? hmmm.....