Nothing to See Here…

I haven’t been around.  I’ve been so busy at work, and so busy at home.  My husband was out of town for 5 days and has been either sick or gone since he’s come back.  I just took Halloween decorations down today.  I have to leave Monday two hours before the buttcrack of dawn for New York, which forces me to have laundry caught up this weekend so the kids have clean outfits while I’m gone and I have something to pack Sunday night before I collapse for my four or five hours of sleep. 

I need to get my stupid dumb fake nails filled and I need to get an eyebrow wax but who knows if I’ll get those done.  I’d much rather have bitten down nails and bushy eyebrows and NO trip to New York but hey, you can’t always get what you want.   also need to grocery shop and pack and I really have a lot of work to get ready for my meetings next week, but I suppose I’ll stay up and do that Monday night after the team dinner out.

Session four at the counselor’s office was the other night.  We worked on conflict resolution.  If only… if only it could be so easy to resolve our conflicts in a 55 minute hour with “I think…”, “I feel…” and “I need…” statements.  If only.

The truth is that life is hard.  It’s hard for everyone.  It’s hard for a whole myriad of reasons, emotional, physical, medical, psychological.  It’s hard for me and who the hell am I to suppose my hardships are even significant in this world?  They are not.  They are ordinary to the nth degree.  They are so ordinary, they would surely put an insomniac to sleep.

What is weighing on my mind currently is the weight.  I’m tired of being fat and I’m tired of being tired and I’m tired of fighting this battle.  The little voice in the back of my head feels like I will just fight this battle all my live-long life and die, probably younger than I should, as a fat person.  Everything I tell myself seems to be so laden down with excuses.  The infrastructure of our lives is filled with processed food.  Our over-burdened schedules force us to eat for convenience. It’s all because of genetics, PCOS, apnea, whatever.  Excuses, excuses, excuses.  Just frickin’ DO IT and quit blah blah blahing about why you can’t.

It’s hard.  Compromise is hard, marriage is hard, marriage is compromise.  My husband was out of town for five days and I got to make all the decisions and there was easiness in that.  But I’m not naive enough to think that the life of single motherhood is at all easy.  I was there before and back then, I wanted nothing more than to have someone to share the decisions with.

I’ve been thinking about weight loss surgery.  It’s not the first time I’ve thought about it… sometimes, when I’m tired of treading water, getting nowhere, I look across and see this weight-loss-surgery life preserver out there in the distance.  I don’t think it’s an easy out.  I don’t think it would fix everything.  But I think it would give me something to hold onto and at the same time drag me forward.

I probably won’t do it.  I’ll probably just keep on with my struggle hoping that one of these times I overcome.  Hoping that at 70, I won’t regret all those years of struggling and think “If I would have had the lap-band surgery, my last 30 years might have been very different.”

I still haven’t been contacted for the sleep study.  Today, I was driving with five kids in the car and they were all chattering and laughing in the back of my van and the rhythm of the road was so mesmerizing, I caught myself thinking “It would be so nice just to close my eyes right now.”  Then I wondered what Freud would think of that.  I’m not narcoleptic at all and I’ve never ever fallen asleep at the wheel or work or anywhere else.  But I do often think “I just want to lie down and rest for a few minutes.” at the oddest times.

I leave for New York on Monday for 3 solid days of team meetings with people who don’t want to be in these 3 days of team meetings.  “Doesn’t she know how busy we are?” is the sentiment that has made it back to my ears (just a warning out there to people - it seems almost everything makes it back to my ears… watch what you say to coworkers because it all could be getting back to your boss).

My house is mostly clean.  My laundry is mostly caught up.  My kids have been bathed and have had an active, fun day.  I should feel more at peace than I do.  I’ve been on the edge of tears for weeks.  Is it the weight, the struggle?  Is it the marriage counseling?  Maybe I do have pent up anger over it all.  Over my job, my weight, my marriage, my life. 

But the rational part of me screams out “Stop your whining, Cindy Brady!” because I have a great job and a great marriage and a great life.  I’m so fortunate in so many ways.  Why can’t I just be happy with it all?  I have a great boss and a great group of peers and I work for a great company.  My husband is so very loving and sensitive and attentive.  My house is warm and dry and I don’t have any issue making the monthly payments.  My kids are beautiful and healthy and smart. 

STOP YOUR WHINING, CINDY BRADY.  I just need to put on my big girl panties and deal with it (as says the very cute magnet on my refrigerator).

What I’ll do is what I’ve done before… I’ll keep plugging along trying to turn around this crappy attitude and when I get into a better frame of mind, I’ll let the stuff that is currently eating away at me just simply wash over me.  The compromising and the job dissatisfaction and the never-ending laundry.  The eating for convenience and the insufficient exercise and the fatigue.  I’ll just smile and accept it and move forward because that’s what life is.  It’s just about getting through the hard stuff and taking joy in the good stuff - the bits where we laugh or hug or remember how lucky we really are in the grand scheme of things.

ps:  I know I get a lot of St. Louis traffic on this blog - looking for a person I could hire as a coach on weight-loss, nutrition, fitness.  Where could I find such a person??