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Just Get Off Your Ass and Do It

06 Friday Oct 2017

Posted by in All Posts, Seeking Health Now, Seeking Life Now

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I’ve been in a rut. Life has changed time and again over the past 5 months and I think I am just starting to feel the effects of it now.

As of April: I left my job of almost 7 years, we packed-up our house and moved from the city to the country (moving-in with my parents), I stayed home and took care of my son for 4 months, my husband got a job with hours that have drastically altered our family dynamic, my son started school, I can’t get a Doctor (despite calling the clinic almost every week to see if anyone is taking new patients), I got a casual job at the local school board and I have also started school as a full-time University Student (working on my BA in English through Queens Distance).

I tend to be the type of person who just ‘puts my nose to the ground’ and gets-on with things, without dwelling much on the enormity of things, because I fear that if I let myself think about it, I will drown.

The problem?

I take it out on my health. Instead of allowing myself to think about it, feel the emotions and work-through it all, I eat. I eat them away.

The truth is, I’m exhausted. I’m exhausted and tired and I feel overwhelmed.

Take a look in my rubbish bin next to my desk and you’ll find it overflowing with cans of Diet Pepsi, Cheezies and Aero wrappers. Granted, they are the mini Halloween-sized ones, but when you’re eating 5 of them at a time, I think that excuse loses its strength.

People often comment on how they think I am brave, or strong, but the reality is – I’m a wimp.

I hide my fear in food.

I’ve been trying to get myself ‘back on track’ for months now. I was doing so well with things until around my Birthday, followed by my Mom’s, when I let myself fall off the rails.

This is the longest stretch of time in almost 2 years that I have been lost in this place where I feel out of control and at a loss to bring myself back into focus.

This has troubled me, and I’ve been embarrassed to write about it because, on paper, it would seem that my life is pretty good. I should have things together.

My husband has a solid job.

My son is in school.

We have settled-into our new living arrangement (for the most part).

I have a casual job.

I’m finally working-towards my lifelong dream of obtaining a University Degree. Not just obtaining the degree, but being a full-time university student.

This should be my time of life. I should be excelling and ‘walking on clouds’.

So, why do I feel like I’ve been dragging myself through a mud run?

Guilt plays a part in it. I feel a sense of guilt for not being at a full-time job. I feel like I’m never, fully, doing my share. I’m not the sole-caregiver of my child, I’m not busy cleaning the house/yard and taking care of my folks all day long, I’m not out at a job earning a pay cheque all day.

I’m working on something that feels selfish.

I know there are plenty of arguments as to why this is not selfish. But, I’ve never really been good at putting myself first.

I want to write. I want to be a writer.

And, as you can tell by this post, I need the help.

My thought process is all-over the place. I jump from one topic to another with very little transition. I have a lot to say, but can never seem to get it down, or out quickly or clearly enough.

I saw a piece on a news channel recently talking about the current top books, or something. I didn’t really hear what the piece was about because I saw the image on the screen, a stack of recently published books, and heard a freight train in my head as tears filled my eyes.

I wanted my name, my book, to be on that screen.

Filling up from the bottom of my toes and spilling-out the top of my head was this overwhelming desire to create something, in print, that would speak to people. Something that would be read and loved and carried all dog-eared in book-bags everywhere.

I have always written. I have over 30 notebooks and journals.

I have a lot I want to say.

I also want to feel better – physically.

So, as I sat here tonight (trying to focus on my homework), one thought just kept running-through my mind – “JUST GET OFF YOUR ASS AND DO IT.”

So, here I am.

Again.

I  Could Get Used to This

09 Tuesday May 2017

Posted by in All Posts, Seeking Life Now

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It’s not “home” as I once knew it.

It’s not where I grew up, where I spent years of learning, maturing, laughing, crying, working and resting.

It is not where I rolled on the ground with the dogs, flung hay around for the cows’ lunch, learned to drive, or spent endless hours in my bedroom dreaming and pining for the kind of romantic adventures I had read about. It’s not where I fought with my brother, or where we spent hours recording ourselves on cassette tapes as we played Mario Bros. or watched Degrassi. 

My brother thought the tapes would be worth money one day. 

It is not where I used to sing opera at the top of my lungs in the hay loft, or dance around the calf stalls singing “16 Going on 17” when I was supposed to be cleaning.

No, it is not the home I grew-up in; still, it is home.

It is where my parents live and now, so do we.

Myself, my husband and our 3 year old son. Five of us under one roof. I am glad that we have our own space upstairs and will be much more glad when our things arrive and we have our space filled with our things. We have always been 3. The trinity. A perfect triangle. The 3 Amigos. 

There has been an adjustment period as we have expanded our triangle into a pentagon. The 5 Amigos. Or, as my son likes to point-out, the perfect finger family.

I get impatient with adjustment periods. I want to be settled NOW. I am hard on myself when I feel like I should be doing better, I should be feeling better, I should be more settled, I should have everything set-up and all the details under control. I have to keep reminding myself that it’s only been 1 week. Well, 1 week and 3 days. 

Although it has been, in actuality, a short period of time, it has felt as though we have been suspended in this unusual state for many months. I have gone in and out and around various stages of mourning. In the past few days I have cried over the loss of what had been routine family times, back when it was just the 3 of us. 

I have missed coming-downstairs on Sunday morning, after my husband let me sleep-in, to find my boys, sweetly, playing together. I would turn-on classical 96.3 FM and sit at the table with my toast, eggs and tea and just soak-in the sweetness of our trinity.

These moments are gone. They have become memories that feel terribly distant and teasingly close all at the same time. 

But, new moments and new memories are already beginning to establish themselves like the first green buds that poke out of the ground after a forest fire. New life full of new stories and sweet memories are already springing-up. My husband and I have shared many of these while watching our son with his grandparents; when he goes to help Nana feed the birds or bursts out laughing and says “You’re funny, Grampa!” in response to almost anything Grampa says.

And this evening I had a moment of pure perfection while bathing my son. I sat on the little, white stool that he uses to climb up onto the toilet or stands on at the sink to brush his teeth and watched him playing in the tub. As I watched him, the sweet smell of lavender baby wash circled around me and the song “Don’t Grow Up So Fast” by Train played quietly behind me, I realized that life couldn’t get any better than that moment.

Perfection. 100% pure perfection.

I wanted to seize on it, to tie it down, to capture it forever. 

In an attempt to trap the moment as long as I possibly could, I hit repeat on my phone. I sat there soaking in the sweetness, trying desperately to ensure that it was securely planted deep within my mind, somewhere it would never be lost. 

I did this another 4 times.

And I thought the thought that I have had many times since arriving here:

I could get used to this.