Category Archives: Personal

Sep 02 15 comments
Blog, Character Flaws, Personal

I Think I Need a Life Coach (or a Drill Sergeant)

drill_sergeant

It’s that time again…that time of the month (I call it DMS for During Menstrual Syndrome) when I get an all-consuming desire to organize my entire life, experience massive amounts of guilt over my parenting and become thoroughly convinced that nobody loves me or cares about me—all while feeling more tired than I ever thought humanly possible and being busier than anyone who doesn’t work outside the home should ever be.

One would think that I’d be used to this cycle of suck by now, that I’d see it coming and somehow be able to ward it off but no…that never happens. Instead I act like a crazy pregnant woman and start “nesting” which really just means I start cleaning things and develop an overwhelming desire to turn my house upside down, shake it out and start fresh with NOTHING because I CAN. NOT. STAND. THE . CLUTTER. Now mind you, this is the same clutter I live with the rest of the month with apparently no issues whatsoever, which probably contributes to the problem.

Right now I’m fighting the physical clutter, as well as the digital and mental. I long to become a well-oiled machine of organized precision—our household operations will be streamlined, my thousands of photos will be sorted through with all the bad shots discarded and all the keepers organized in such a way that I can actually do something with them—although I have no idea WHAT that would be. And I will be so organized that I can make time for the most important thing of all…spending better quality time with my kids.

It’s that last one that really eats at me every month. I read other people’s blogs (and Family Fun magazine because I’m a masochist, apparently) and see all the great things they’re doing with their kids and families (this can range from craft projects to family outings to little things that create special memories) and I feel like a total loser.

Honestly, if I can get some work done in the morning, get a load of laundry washed and have dinner ready early, I feel like I’ve moved mountains—which is to say, I don’t exactly challenge myself and yet, squeezing in the planning and execution of special things to do with my kids always gets backburnered. Before I know it, the weekend has come and gone and the weekly grind starts all over again—school, work, errands, housework, dinner, cheer practice and/or Girl Scouts, bedtime—lather, rinse, repeat.

I just don’t know how to make any of this happen and yet it’s all I can think about during my period. Well, that and trying to find extra moments to sleep because I’m JUST. SO. TIRED.

Because it’s all part of the wacky nesting thing, I feel compelled to make a list—I don’t hold out much hope of actually doing most of this stuff but maybe seeing it in writing will make me feel more organized and uh…WHATEVER—I just want to make a freakin’ list!

Things I Want/Need to Do and That Will Hopefully, Somehow, Make These 5-6 Days Per Month More Tolerable—in No Particular Order:

Organize the thousands of photos that currently live on my external hard drive.

Plan a weekly dinner calendar. Grocery shop while kids are at school.

Clean out desk and old school papers, calendars, notices etc from last year.

Clean out overstuffed file cabinet so I can file more stuff that I will probably never look at again.

Finish up washing all the bedding from when we tried to go a week without Pull-Ups (See Also: Thank God for waterproof allergy covers for mattresses).

Plan 1 or 2 cool things to do with the kids every week (i.e. go to the duck pond, go to Busch Gardens in the evening, plant the seeds I got from the Greenworks luncheon I attended at BlogHer 09. (2009, people! This alone speaks volumes) Note: Grocery shopping does NOT qualify as ‘something cool’ and bribing kids with bakery cookies so they won’t complain? Not the best parenting technique.

Clean out all the junk from daughter’s room (this alone would take half a day).

Organize all son’s toys so he can actually PLAY in his room.

Plan a fall family camping trip. Think about a vacation for next summer since we didn’t do a damn thing this summer and I spent most of my time shuttling kids around between points A, B and C and dying of near heat stroke.

Start planning Christmas now because when December comes, I will, without a doubt, feel like skipping Christmas altogether.

Implement a work schedule I can stick to so I don’t spend so much time working when the kids are home.

Be more social (i.e. stop ignoring Facebook messages from friends, call people back in a timely manner, make real plans so I can’t claim I’m too busy when loosely organized plans come up.

Stop effing around so much on the internet. Reading news, reading junk on Twitter and bookmarking random crap that I won’t ever go back to is enriching my life HOW? See also: Spend more time writing.

Catch up on Editorial Calendar for The Green Mom Review so I’m not scrambling at 11pm to figure out what we’re posting the next day.

If I do read blogs, which I actually DO, make sure to comment because I don’t want to be one of  those people who swear they read blogs but never comments.

Watch the few shows I enjoy early in the evening so that when bedtime comes, I actually get some sleep instead of watching said shows. See also: GO TO BED EARLIER, DUMMY.

Look into swim lessons for my son, who totally got screwed out of them this summer (and it was really the only thing he wanted to do).

Make dinner earlier on cheer practice nights so we can still eat together.

Play with my son more when his sister is at practice instead of using this time to catch up on laundry while he watches TV and rots his brain.

Volunteer more at school (See also: get more sleep and use time more wisely so I will actually step up and volunteer instead of putting it off because “I’m too busy” —because I wouldn’t BE too busy if I was less tired and used my time more wisely.

Now I need a nap. I can do some of this stuff later, right?

OMG…see how I did that?  SEE? *head meets desk*

Jul 28 20 comments
Blog, Personal

Dear Universe, You Totally Win

Are you SURE about that?

So…my son didn’t get into the same school my daughter goes to. When we got her in there four years ago, the rule was that if one sibling was admitted, younger siblings would be admitted, too. Unfortunately, that rule has changed (due to class size amendments) so now I have two kids at two different schools.

My son will never have the experience of going to school with his sister. I know it’s silly but this upsets me—I was always envious of the kids that had brothers and/or sisters in the same school and I was excited that mine would be together for two years. My hopes and dreams? DASHED.

I try not to dwell on the negative aspects of life too much but recently, I feel like the universe and I are at odds; like I’m running into roadblocks at every turn—nothing is going the way I want it to and everything is a challenge, as evidenced by my crying big, fat, stupid tears of frustration yesterday at my son’s school while trying to get him registered.

Note to nice school office personnel: I swear I’m not unstable or crazy. Ahem. I’m just incredibly frustrated with our health insurance, our kids’ new pediatricians, the health department’s infinite loop phone system and my new eyeglasses, which make my eyes ache constantly thanks to a heaping helping of astigmatism correction. And that’s the super short list...

Generally speaking, I believe that going with the flow of life is the thing to do; that you should carefully pick the things you want to fight against and accept the rest because there just isn’t enough energy in the world to take on every damn thing.

But lately, I have a lot of things I can’t just throw to the wind, they need to be dealt with and they really need to go a certain way. It’s been exhausting and challenging, to say the least. I don’t know how people live like this all the time.

I’m trying really hard to change my attitude, to get back to where I was, but being positive actually takes a certain amount of purposeful thinking and action and I just don’t have it in me right now. Maybe going to Blogher next week will help with that…a change of scenery, a change of pace and for all intents and purposes, a vacation in my favorite city. Crossing my fingers. And toes.

Jul 13 10 comments
Blog, Character Flaws

Social Networking Shame

facebook_iconSocial networking… Every day is like a mini class reunion—so much fun and yet so much potential for shame.

Yeah, it recently occurred to me that when I meet up with old friends on Facebook I’m kind of embarrassed about never having left the town in which I went to college.

I might as well just put “Hi! I just stayed here f*cking marinating in this place while the rest of you went uh…wherever it is that you went and led what appear to be vastly more interesting lives. So how have you been?” in my bio and be done with it.

I didn’t join the freaking Peace Corp. I didn’t go backpacking across Thailand. I didn’t get my PhD or even my masters. I didn’t intern in Washington. I didn’t set up a charity to help build a school for deaf Albanian orphans. I didn’t travel the world as a photojournalist for a major media outlet.

I got a degree. Didn’t work in my field. Got married. Had a couple jobs that inspired homicidal fantasies on a frighteningly regular basis. Got pregnant. Quit working. Did a preschool co-op for a while. Founded a Moms Club chapter (that alone is reason for shame), had another baby, started blogging…and the rest is, as they say, history.

*gently smacks you*

Wake up!!! I know my life is boring and all but you don’t need to rub it in by snoring in the middle of my shamefest!

Jun 28 20 comments
Blog, Character Flaws, LOL

Please to be Interventioning Me

First off, let me say that I’m not a fan of McDonald’s. Other than the Southwestern salad, I find their food largely unappetizing. Now, that doesn’t mean I won’t eat a fry or two because okay…their fries are pretty tasty. But the burgers are weird and have little hard things in them and the nuggets, despite claims to be all breast meat, have the occasional weird rubbery thing in them AND, I read somewhere (and this  MAY be an urban legend) that, were you to put one in a sealed glass container, their burgers look exactly the same a year later, as in NOT DECOMPOSING.

So yeah..ungoodness all around—and we haven’t even discussed the Happy Meals for little kids promoting PG-13 movies thing or the obesity thing or the not-humanely-raised eggs issue.

Okay, so now I’ve painted a pretty accurate picture of how I feel about the golden arches. Not exactly “lovin’ it”.

But then they went and did something totally diabolical.

MORE diabolical, I mean.

They introduced the Frappé.

It comes in mocha and caramel.

And I hate myself for saying this but THEY. ARE. GOOD.

And cheap.

And easy to get.

Not unlike a visit to your conveniently located neighborhood crack house.

I don’t know how many calories are in them and I don’t want to know. I just want my fricken daily Frappé.

It’s cold, creamy coffee goodness soothing the helltastic summer heat…

It’s caffeine, however meager, coursing through my veins and perking up my wilting, heat-stricken spirits…

Like any good junkie, I have a love/hate relationship with my dealer.

I hate them until I need a fix and then, despite all attempts at resistance, I find myself taking a different route so I can hit the drive thru.

And like any good junkie, I feel guilty and ashamed when it’s all gone and make promises to quit.

I NEED an intervention. PLEASE!

Right after I finish this giant mocha Frappé—you know—last hurrahs and such…

Jun 03 19 comments
Blog, Incessant Whining, Personal

Braindump

The feeling. It’s subtle but it’s there…quietly threatening.

The only way to describe it is to say that I’m starting to feel disconnected from everything around me…again. I hear you, I see you, I talk to you—but it’s like there’s glass between us; between me and the world. It’s like a…precursor to depression; not as bad as the real thing but not so great either.

It could just be hormonal mood swings that will be gone as quickly as they came.

I hope.

I’ve been weaning myself off Wellbutrin realllllly slowly and it’s working out okay. I just hate being beholden to medication. I know if you need it you should take it but there’s this nagging voice in the back of my head that always reminds me that this is my BRAIN we’re tinkering with and that being on any brain-tinkering drugs long term might be bad for you and really, who’s going to tell you that? The drug makers? Pffffftttt. RIGHT.

So anyway, what I think I really need right now is to TALK, with actual spoken words (as opposed to emails and IM’s) to someone who isn’t my husband or children. I’ve been isolating myself….burying myself in new projects and hiding from the world. That can’t be healthy *sigh*

/braindump

May 22 16 comments
Blog, Character Flaws, Personal

Life, the Universe and Everything

life_the_universe_everything2I recently removed myself from a situation that was making me really unhappy. Actually, it was making me more than unhappy. I was stressed all the time; I felt distrustful of the people I was involved with and constantly felt enveloped in negativity.

I had originally entered this situation at a friend’s request. It seemed like it would be fun and at first it was. But after a while, things changed and I realize now that I stayed in this situation out of a sense of loyalty and duty far longer than I should have, even though I was totally miserable.

I had begun thinking of getting out of this situation but wasn’t sure how to go about it. Then one day, the opportunity to peacefully but honestly speak my mind and make my exit presented itself. I took the opportunity and have never regretted it. In fact, I’m amazed at how much happier and more positive my life is since leaving.

I’m a firm believer, though I seem to have forgotten it for a while, that the universe knows exactly what you need and will show you the way when the time is right.

It took me a while to realize how unhappy I was and for the longest time, it never occurred to me that I. Could. Just. Leave. I was so busy trying to do my part, meet my responsibilities and deflect the negativity that I forgot that I had the power to change the situation by removing myself from it. Once the universe showed me the way out, I took it and did it with dignity, self-respect and a good amount of restraint.

I’m not going to lie and say that I wasn’t bitter about certain things. I was. But I’ve worked hard at taking the high road and taking my ego out of the equation and that has helped tremendously. Sometimes it’s difficult to resist the urge to say or do something nasty and petty. Sure, it would make me feel better in the moment but in the end, it’s totally ego-driven and ultimately, it would hurt me more than anyone else.

I’m a sympathetic person most of the time but I’m not an overly empathetic person. I really do have to work on it every single day but by putting myself in other people’s shoes, the hurtful, thoughtless and rude things they do bother me a lot less. That’s not to say I don’t feel annoyed or irritated or insulted at times. I do. Frequently. I’m human. But being able to look at something from THEIR perspective and cutting them some slack because maybe they’re having a bad day, or they chose the wrong words or simply didn’t think before they acted makes me a happier person. I have to work at it because really, it’s a lot easier to carry around resentment and hold on to it, as if that will somehow make the other person sorry or make them pay for what they did to me—but it doesn’t. It just makes me dwell on it more and attract more negative energy into my life.

To be clear, I’m not a model citizen by any means and I don’t fancy myself to be any more enlightened than anyone else but in my opinion, what they say about forgiveness is true. It’s a gift you give YOURSELF. It’s not letting the other person get away with something bad that they did to you. It’s giving yourself the gift of letting it go and moving on. No, it’s not always easy and yes, there are some people in my life I still haven’t forgiven or even attempted to make amends with, mainly because I’m just not ready. That’s something I will carry around with me until I make it right and it is a burden.

As I said, I forgot all these things for a while—I was just too caught up in my situation to see clearly—but I’m making the effort to re-acquaint myself with these beliefs because they work for me.  Trying to live and make choices and act without my ego calling the shots is really hard sometimes, but when I do it, I consistently see positive results.

One notable change is how people act towards me when I’m operating in such a manner—they are simply nicer, kinder and more helpful. It’s the weirdest thing but I swear it’s true. The only conclusion I can come to is that I am giving off a more positive energy and people, even total strangers, respond to it. Maybe I smile more. Maybe I have a happy vibe. I really don’t know. All I do know is that when I’m not weighed down by my ego, life is just better and easier and the universe seems to respond to my needs far more.

Example? The other day I was worrying about money. I know worry is a useless emotion but things have been really tight lately and I was feeling really strapped financially. I tried some positive affirmations about abundance and prosperity and thanked the universe for all our blessings, of which there are many. Two days later, a former client from over a year ago came to me and proposed a situation that would give me some needed financial relief. I was happy and grateful. But when the money came into my account, it was double what we had discussed. My client wanted to do expand his original request and had gone ahead and paid me for it, which I was not expecting. The universe was listening and brought me exactly what I needed and had asked for.

Please know, when I say universe, that’s my catch-all term for all things divine. It can be God or Goddess or the divine creator or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, if you wish. Names are irrelevant. It all comes from the same place.

And why am I prattling on about all this? Because I hope it can help someone else. And really, it’s never a bad thing to put more positivity into the world—it all comes back to you eventually :)

*I never actually read The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy OR Life, the Universe and Everything but the title of the latter is so befitting this post, I had to reference it. I’m a book poseur. *shameface*

May 07 18 comments
Blog, Character Flaws, Personal

Gawd Mom, That’s SO Dumb

When I was about eleven, a dog inadvertently came into my life. It was one of those things where a kid got a dog from God Knows Where and brought it home and their mom was all NO WAY! And then that kid had to find a home for the dog and asked another kid, who asked another kid (that would be me) who, in turn, begged her mom to keep the dog and quite possibly threw in some emotional blackmail to seal the deal.

And that? Is how I got the dog—a small, snaggle-toothed, white fluffball of unknown origins who was aptly named (wait for it)…Fluffy!

Fluffy was the only dog we ever had that liked me better than my mom but she was a wily, spunky little thing and one day when I let her out into the backyard, she squeezed her way through the small gap where fence meets gate and she was gone.

When I realized Fluffy had outsmarted our high tech security (read: chain link fencing) and breached the backyard, I was, of course, distraught. My friend and I combed our suburban neighborhood calling for her, “FLUFFEEEEEEEE! FLUFFEEEEEEEE!” but she was nowhere to be found.

I called my mom at work, something I did much too often, and reported to her, with great distress in my voice, that I couldn’t find the dog.

And she told me?  To call the police department and ask if anyone had reported finding a dog.

PFFFTTTTT!

I gasped! I sputtered!

I was all “Moooo-oooom, that’s SO dumb! Nobody calls the police to report finding a dog! GAWWWWWD!!!” Because when you’re eleven, you know EVERYTHING.

I’m not sure what I expected her to do from 25 minutes away, at her job, but I remember feeling irritated that my #1 problem solver’s only suggestion was calling the fuzz.

Annoyed, I got off the phone and after brewing on it, decided I would call the police department (probably just to prove that my mom clearly didn’t love me because if she did, she wouldn’t have given me stupidest, most unhelpful idea EVER and would have dropped whatever she was doing to come home and make everything okay).

Annnnnd, as luck would have it…

Someone DID file a police report about finding a small white dog the day before, about a half mile from my house.

I called the people and a nice lady told me they had found Fluffy soaking wet and shivering under a tree, in the rain, and took her home.

Long story short, I got my 20 yr old sister to drive me over there to pick up Fluffy, who had clearly been well-cared for by her kindly benefactor.

She yelped and cried with excitement when she saw me…and then very promptly peed and pooped on the woman’s kitchen floor.

I cleaned up the mess, thanked the lady profusely for taking care of Fluffy and we headed home.

Later, I told my mother, mumbling no doubt, that we’d found the dog after calling the police department. She must have bitten her tongue pretty hard to keep from saying “I told you so…”

I don’t think I ever apologized to my mom for insinuating that she was a total idiot and I’m also pretty sure I never thanked her for helping me find Fluffy.

I’m sorry, Mom. And thank you.