Post Christmas Blues

I'm feeling a little lost.

Hubby is worried about new house and the feasibility of it - bad internet, no mains gas or sewerage....

I think I am suffering from post christmas blues (as opposed to the pre-christmas stress that I also suffered from - as I do every year).

I just feel like the house is such a tip. I feel like I need to completely reorganise myself. I need a new start, a new me. I need to get fit, detox, eat healthily, teach the kids to tidy up after myself.

I've been looking on some organising blogs that I used to follow when I was doing my own organising blogs and I love some of the ideas that I see but I feel like I just lack the motivation to do anything with them. I feel so sluggish and slow. Its so depressing and frustrating because I really am at that point where if my life gets anymore stressful, messy or chaotic I may just explode.

The other day, can't remember which day it was, Ben took both kids out and I decided that instead of sitting on the sofa watching TV enjoying the time to myself, I would whizz round, making the most of the lack of distracting small children, and tidy up the sitting room - the main area of concern in my house. When hubby came back, shortly followed by a friend of ours, they both mentioned how great it looked. Sadly about an hour later the kids had undone most of my hard work. They couldn't exactly unsweep and unmop it (so at least it stayed clean-ish) - although I reckon they'd probably give it a go, but they certainly got everything out again and threw all their toys everywhere. I just wanted to sink my head into my hands and cry. I yearn to live a tidy organised existance but I'm just not the type of person who is able/willing to spend every single minute of every single day picking up, wiping, mopping, tidying..... I lose the will to live. Secretly, I want someone to do it all while I'm sleeping, but as that's unlikely to happen..... Not sure what to do.

Feeling on edge

I'm feeling a little on edge.

Its 4.40pm and I am leaving at 5pm and I can't be bothered to start anything new. I had a chat with my mum earlier and it turns out my sister is going to be on her own this Christmas so I have invited her over to ours if she wants (she is going to check if hubby is working all day or just the morning). Anyway, at the end of the phonecall I asked her how my dad was doing (my dad is an alcoholic and has been drinking again recently - I did know this as I could tell he had been drinking the last time I saw him - you get to know the signs even if they do not appear drunk to a stranger). She told me that he's been drinking for 5 days now. So now I'm left with an unsettled feeling. I am used to finding out that he's been drinking as its been on and off for years. He has a streak of a few months where he's sober and goes to meetings and then falls off the wagon for a few days. I worry more about my mum and how she is feeling. I feel terrible for having a row with her via text on Saturday night as I realise now that she must have been feeling very lonely and hurt and was probably having a horrible time with my dad. So glad I rang her first thing Sunday to make up. I also worry about my dad's health. It can't go on indefinitely. Doing that to your body.

The other thing I'm on edge about is hearing whether we have an offer on our house or not. We had people come for a second viewing on Friday and they did seem VERY interested. They were there for over an hour and asking all sorts of questions. Really seemed like we might be in luck. But have heard nothing all day. If it was us, we'd make an offer right there and then. On the doorstep basically. But guess not everyone is like us! Mores the pity!!!

No title as I'm being harrassed to come down so hubby can do brewing

I LOVE how my new blog looks. I might just give up writing posts in favour of staring at the pretty pink and black format all day!!!

Its Saturday morning and I've been up with the kids since about 8. They woke up earlier but we've managed to get them in the habit of chilling in their room for a while in the morning at the weekends. Plus its nice for all of us to not have to rush out anywhere so nice to make the most of it.

Hubby is taking them out this morning. Have given him a list of things to buy/do. I might have a bath when he's gone. Or watch TV or write in my blog (although technically that's what I'm doing now). As well as writing this, or rather in between writing it - and listening to crying kids downstairs (getting them ready to go out is not going so well for hubby it seems) I'm organising my Twitter lists. I have recently added a load of new people (mostly ppl I have been #FF'd with or people who have followed me - only polite to follow them back) but I am kind of anal and I don't like to not have them in a category. So I am using Twitlistmanager to find all my UNcategorized twitterers and adding them to a New Followers (actually it should probably be new followees) list so that once that's done I can go through that list (you can't see uncategorized list on Twitter) and add them to the relevant list.


Great. Have just found out from hubby that he thinks daughter is too poorly and tired to go out with him. Great. Just great. Not that I mind chill time with my girlie but was actually quite looking to a bit of child-free time.

Got him to change a big pooey nappy she's just done to make up for him not taking her out too. So nurr!!!

Right, am back. Put girl child to bed with milk (with anti-biotics mixed in - she STILL won't take that stuff off me although our lovely childminder number 2 - who I have to say I absolutely adore and will be so sad when she has her baby - only kidding. I can't wait to see her little baby but I love her having Lala - I always know she's so well looked after and entertained and happy - er... what was I saying? Oh yes, childminder gets her to take her yucky yellow medicine no problem! Just not sure what I'm doing wrong).

Back to sorting out my Twitter Lists. These are the ones I've set up:

•  Uncategorized (was called New Followers but as per my comments above, that didn't really make sense)
• Favourite People (I previously called this Top Bloggers but changed that as some of them may not actually be bloggers. This is where I will put people I have made a connection with)
• People I'm following (this was called Bloggers - as most of the people I'm following are mummy-type bloggers)
• Friends - for people I actually know personally
• Celebs (obvious really)
• Blokes (just added this one - for those bloke bloggers or tweeters for when I fancy reading something not by a woman)
• Organisation (for shops, organisations and people who do nothing but tweet about stuff they're selling - am keeping them as a) I may be interested when I need something b) its only polite to follow back Twitterers that are following me but I don't need this in my main newsfeed tbh)
• Uninteresting - now, don't get me wrong. I love all you lovely people but while I don't want to be rude and unfollow you, some people only seem to tweet about offers or competitions or clubbing or stuff like that which I'm not really interested in - sorry :( )
• Oh and another new one I've created - Working Mums. I might create another one called Mummy Bloggers and put all my mummy bloggers in there. Obviously (do you love how I like to state the obvious)

Hubby went out. Lala went to sleep and I ran a bath and lay in the steaming hot water reading @manicmum4 's blog. I had been trying not to race through the entries quickly as I knew that any entry would be the first one after her husband had to go into hospital. You know when you are reading a book and someone has given away the plot and you kind of want to race to find out what happens. I know that sounds horribly callous and I don't mean it that way but her blog has been for me like reading a book - only I know she's a real person so in a way it has so much more meaning. The funny bits really do have me chuckling my head off. There was a bit where she said her little girl had put a penny in her front bottom - I was reading this at bedtime while in bed next to my husband and he thought I had gone mad, I had such a sudden laughing fit. I have so thoroughly enjoyed reading them. I have to say I have completely neglected any other blogs I have subscribed to. I'm such an OCD mad person - have to do things in order and when I'm hooked on one thing I hate flicking between other things - for instance, I've never understood how people can read 2 or 3 books at once. Anyway, I digress. I was in the bath reading her blog. I got to the first entry where she explains what happened to her husband and what she has been going through in the first few days after his health issue - hard to know what to call it. Not an accident. I have had to force myself to put my phone down and stop reading as hubby and Joshua are back and I needed to write this down. I have been so moved by her story. I lay in the bath reading, with tears rolling down my face. Feeling a little ashamed of my own selfishness that I want hubby to take the kids out so I can have some me time, send my daughter to bed so I can have a bath.... but then we all have our little daily dramas. The important thing I suppose is to occassionally step back, take the time to appreciate what we are lucky enough to have. I have my little things that bug me. Things about my hubby and things he does. I worry too much about the little things - my weight and how I use food to comfort myself rather too much, the house and how (even though I'm too bloody lazy to do it) I still have too high standards and wish it could all be perfect all the time (and it can't so I just won't bother at all, cos really, whats the point?). But I know deep down the truth. I have a wonderful husband. My family (although not always understanding me, or me them) are very lovely and caring. My kids are beautiful and precious. I am so amazingly lucky to have had good fortune, decent jobs etc to enable us to love in a pretty amazing house - and to be considering moving to an even MORE amazing house (fingers crossed - but if it doesn't happen we are still incredibly lucky). And I couldn't forget to mention my wonderful friends. Especially the ones that tell me that I've neglected them and I need to buck up my ideas and be there for them a little better.

Manicmum4: thank you for sharing your journey with me (not just me obviously - with the world). I'm not done yet. I still have 140 posts to read until I'm up to the present day and (darn you) you keep writing more!!! haha. Just kidding.  Honestly, I feel humbled.

Must go as hubby wants to do his brewing stuff.

Feeling guilty

I feel a bit guilty.

Have been reading Manic Mum's blog and absolutely loving it. But to me it is an enjoyable read. A distraction. She is a really funny writer. I know that I have yet to get to the very sad event in her life and I suppose for me it hasn't really happened. I commented earlier that she should try to get it published and asked her some questions about her earlier life. I now feel bad that I'm treating her as if she is a story with no feelings and just there for my entertainment.

Is that silly? Maybe I worry too much.

Daydreaming

You know how you often get a musical or very very silly episode in many American TV shows (usually in about series 7 - thinking of Buffy, House, Angel, that kind of thing).  Well, I'm yet again not amazingly busy and daydreaming about this house that we may or may not buy (depends on if we can sell our house in time). But because dreams are no fun unless you can change around or even completely rewrite the other realities of your life, I've actually imagined a whole different life. I will try to describe it here:

We've moved and are now living in this gorgeous house which we are hoping to buy. Its very rough around the edges cosmetically but the layout is amazing. It has three levels. On the ground floor it has a hallway, kitchen & breakfast room, living room, dining room, family room, playroom, toilet, utility room, study & 3rd bedroom with ensuite (like a granny flat). On the 2nd floor it has the main bedroom with ensuite, what would be the kids bathroom, two bedrooms (for the kids) or one for them, and a spare. Then it has a 3rd level. Like a loft conversion but it does also have a loft (storage space). the third level has two bedrooms (or really just rooms). Our plan would be to eventually turn that into a master bedroom with ensuite and walk in wardrobe. It also has a front garden which is quite big and a smaller but very nice back garden. Basically, one garden for grownups and kids (or maybe just grownups) and the front garden (which has fences and gate) for the dogs, chickens and vegetables. And maybe the kids and all their kids toys. Although I might be happier having them play in the back garden (watched too many TV shows where kids were snatched while playing in front garden).

So, in my dream world, I'm not working full time. I'm certainly not commuting every bloody day for at least an hour each way. I think I'm either allowed to work from home all the time. And I have a nice office all of my own where I can focus to my hearts content. Or I'm running my own business doing something creative or enjoyable. Maybe I have the kids around more than I would if I were working full time. but somehow money is so much of an issue (probably cos I'm hugely successful in whatever it is I'm doing). The house is lived in but still tidy and organised. Maybe we have a cleaner (but one that doesn't put things in the wrong places and clean things you don't want cleaned or not clean things you do want cleaned - and one that comes when I'm out as I always find it very embarrassing having to be in when someone is cleaning my house for me).

I have lots of energy in this dreamworld. When the kids are home we bake cakes and do fun creative stuff. And they run around playing hide and seek and playing hopscotch together in the garden. And my son will teach his little sister games he learns in school (he's in school by now - must have skipped forward a year or two). The house will still be mid decoration but we are loving doing it up - I can see us in overalls with music on enjoying painting together (I HATE painting!!!). Its Christmas and all the decos will be up by end of November and we'll go choose a tree together instead of lazily getting the plastic one out of the loft (in fact we ARE going to do that this year as I spoke to the hubby and said I'd like to start it as a tradition).

Anyway, what was the point of this little dream. I don't know. I guess it was that in it I didn't have shoulder and neck ache from being stuck in traffic for 2 hours in the morning. I didn't have to race across town to drop my kids off and watch my son say bye bye and my daughter run off with the childminder with not even a backward glance at me (you can't win, can you - if they cry you feel awful, if they run off without looking back you feel like you are no longer important to them). I guess my dream world is a slightly slower pace. A bit like the Good life, but with iPhones and iPads and iMacs (hopefully one day a MacBook too - yes I am a little Apple mad). I guess its a little unrealistic too as I seem to end up getting stressed, tired and depressed occassionally no matter where or how often I'm working (or even IF I'm working), where I'm living (although having lived in the same place for probably 8 or 9 years a change must be as good as a rest) and whether or not I have kids.... Maybe one day I'll learn to cope.

Working guilt

I tell you what else I was thinking about.....

I was wondering, while lying in bed neglecting my kids (ie letting my husband look after them - not saying that he would say I was neglecting them but that's how your brain works sometimes as a mum - guilt-centric), will my kids grow up and not feel that I did enough with them.

Obviously I do play with them and I love spending time with them (sometimes - sorry, I have to be honest), but I'm working full time which means we get up at 6am - when one of them, usually the 4 year old boy, comes and wakes us up. We get him to go back to his room with either an iPad or iPhone so we can have another half hour. At 6.30-6.45am, my husband goes and makes them breakfast and they eat it in their room usually, unless they follow him downstairs. Sometimes he brings me a cup of tea too. He's nice like that. Then I drag myself out of bed and get in the shower and get ready. My husband wrestles the children into clothes and then gets teeth brushed and shoes on etc while I'm getting dressed and putting makeup on. Sometimes I'll drive them to their various places (nursery 1 or 2 / childminder 1 or 2) or sometimes my husband does it and then I can leave the house and go straight to work (I have to drive about 50 minutes to get to work - and if I have to drop either of the kids at the place that is the other side of town it will take me an hour as I'll need an extra 10 minutes to get through town traffic. Either way, the time I spend with them in the morning is 10 minutes while they jump up and down on the bed while hubby makes breakfast and the 10-15 minutes that I'm driving them wherever they are going unless hubby is doing it in which case I don't even spend that time with them.

In the evenings, I usually pick them up (at 6pm) as hubby doesn't finish work until 6pm (he does work from home so this is quite convenient) and then once home I chill out with them until bedtime when hubby usually puts them to bed. I'll help if they are being particularly difficult.

Weekends I usually have a lie in on Saturday morning until 10am.

Today my son was driving me crazy. I guess cos I haven't been feeling 100% well and he seemed to be extra loud and full of energy it just got to me but as soon as I lay down for a (much needed) nap, the cogs started turning and I started to feel incredibly guilty.

The thing is I'm actually really happy. I don't like the commute and the job is not busy enough for me right now but its the run up to Christmas and I am getting my name around trying to be helpful so people will come to me for help. But generally, at work, I'm happiest I've been in ages. I did have a short stint as stay at home mum when I was on gardening leave before my redundancy leave started and the grandparents wanted to have a break from childminding our kids (fair enough really - I feel like that too sometimes and their MY kids) as I was at home. So I was at home with them all day apart from a couple of mornings and one full day (Friday - my day of bliss) where I got on with housework and TV! But I was home with them more than usual. And they drove me up the wall. I wasn't nearly as organised as I wanted to be. I wanted to be one of these perfect mothers who arranged playdates and did things with her kids and got the crafty stuff out. But I just couldn't do it. I'm not that person. Maybe its the perfectionist in me coming out again. At least when I'm at work, I can truly focus on what I'm doing without distraction. It also has other benefits like being able to drink tea and coffee and eat your lunch without being climbed on.

Am I a bad mother because I don't want to spend every day with my children? 

On a low

I was thinking about this while I was lying in bed too tired to move.

Everything has to be perfect or I just won't bother. And nothing will ever be perfect so why even start anything.

The thing is when I'm good I'm really good. I can be so productive and busy and organised that you won't even see me moving. I had a bit of one of these periods a couple of weeks ago. I was not busy at work and that didn't stop me from being super-productive. I created spreadsheets, tweeked spreadsheets, organised lunches, planned things, sorted out calendars, re-organised my Evernote account. OK, this was all done on a computer at work (as I had not very much work to do) but if I'd been at home I'd probably have been productive around the house.

And then my period hit me (sorry any boys or squeemish people reading this) and within a day or two of that starting, I got a mild tummy bug - Thursday night/Friday. And today (Saturday) I'm still feeling exhausted but I feel like I should be doing so many things.

We have put an offer in on a new house but our own house isn't even on the market yet so we have to get the house decluttered and tidy so they can come and do photos and I'm not even sure how we are meant to start. Its such a mess. The thought of getting it all done just makes me want to cry. I sometimes think that if we could only have the kids not around for a weekend we could get it done (not much good really as it would have to be this weekend of which there is only sunday night left now) but even so I know really that I use the kids as an excuse for my inaction. I am simply in a low-energy period, where I feel like I cannot achieve anything and can't even be bothered to try.

Well, I'm off now to go do a little bit of tidying up in the bedroom as hubby is cooking dinner and may well kill me if I haven't achieved anything by the time he has it ready.

Why I think I could be manic-depressive

OK. Take recently. I started new job. BEen pretty manic since I started. Not really had a choice. However, even after the busy-ness started to die off (is generally a quiet period) I kept myself busy organising my personal files, organising my evernote system (complete re-organisation from scratch - of about 20,000 notes including notebooks and tags), completely reorganised my childcare spreadsheet and did quite a lot of work on my finances spreadsheet. Organised a xmas lunch with friends. Yes, have a spreadsheet to go with that too. I’ve just kept myself incredibly busy. 

 

Last night it kind of all came to a head with the person out in Turkey who manages our holiday home (yes, I know lucky us to have a holiday home) quitting on us due to a big cock up concerning getting money out to her in time (completely our - well, my husbands, fault) and culminated with me saying that I would now deal with all the issues related to that (if she would not quit) as my husband clearly didn’t have the time. I mentioned that I really needed a laptop as work one is horrible and heavy & then I pretty much went online and ordered it. On finance. Sneakily in the kitchen while hubby was watching TV. 

Now I’ve been found out and have cancelled the order I feel like all my energy is gone (not just because I’m sad cos I’m now not getting a new toy - its more than that). I have very little work to do but I now have no inclination to either find anything to do, or to do personal things. I can’t even be bothered to walk to the cafeteria to get a coffee. I’m only making the energy to write this because I feel like I need feedback and answers. 

Maybe its a bit of a jump to think that I could be “manic-depressive” or Bi-Polar, but there are varying levels and I do seem to go through these stages. Or maybe I’m just a hyperchondriac that should get a grip!

New mums - overprotective or rightfully cautious

I was in my local supermarket’s starbucks on Sunday afternoon waiting to meet a friend for coffee.
There was a large gaggles of new parents (both men and women) who all had very new babies with them. I’m guessing they were all the members of an ante-natal group or something…. They had taken up most (but not all) of the comfy chairs but I managed to move some around so that I could get a little corner with two comfy chairs for me and my best friend (and her 18 month old).

So I sat in my little corner reading my book. I decided to wait a while for my friend as I didn’t want to have to get through two coffees (money being a tiny bit tight at the moment) before my friend had even arrived. So I sat there, on my own, with no coffee just reading my book. One of the little babies was in its pushchair asleep opposite me. Arms up above its cute little head. Now I am quite a maternal person and I can’t really help myself - when I see a tiny baby I come over all clucky!

Maybe it was because of the way I was dressed (big hoody jumper and tracky bottoms - these mums were a little better turned out), and the fact that I hadn’t brushed my hair - just pulled it back in a ponytail and the fact that, as I later found out when I eventually came across a mirror, that I had panda eyes from Friday’s mascara (how on earth does Mascara managed to continue marking the bit of skin under your eyes even after two days - yes, I know I should probably just get busy with some make-up remover but I’m more a fan of taking the leftover makeup off before I reapply the next lot and as I only wear makeup to go to work at the moment, there is a gap of 2 days when I forget that I have old make-up rubbing its way down my face). Anyway, suffice to say I looked a bit of a mess and sitting there on my own eyeing up their babies, its not surprising I got some funny looks.

My friend seemed to be taking a good while to arrive (can’t blame her as I know what its like trying to get yourself and a toddler ready and I was quite enjoying my book) and so after a while I thought I’d better let these ladies know that I wasn’t there to steal their babies and when one of them came back from the loo or somewhere I engaged her in conversation. I asked if all their babies were the same age, how old that was and explained that they were making me clucky, and that I felt a bit sad that I’d never experience that stage again (explained mine were 2 and 4 and that we’d just been at kiddy rugby in the sports centre). This woman seemed very friendly and nice. Then I went back to reading my book.

Then after waiting for a bit longer for my friend I decided to get a coffee, so I asked one of the mums if she could watch my bag for a few minutes while I went to the counter. She gave me a funny look but said yes. So I put my bag a little closer to her (not on my seat sadly…). I noticed when I had got my coffee that another woman had taken my seat and the woman who I’d asked to watch my bag either hadn’t noticed or hadn’t cared that I’d lost my seat. So I went back to get my bag, giving the intruder a good glare in the process, and hovered nearby. There were other tables and chairs but I had gone to reasonable effort to get a comfy one. Anyway, some of the mums had gone and there were a few unused chairs around them so I asked if they were going soon and they said they were in a bit. So then I asked if I could move some of the chairs around so me and my (invisible) friend could sit. They said yes, so I moved the chairs around so me and my friend could have a nice little comfy chat. Friend had arrived just as I was grumpily huffing about loss of first comfy chairs and was queuing while I tried to figure out what to do so was quite glad when she eventually turned up and we sat down so that protective mother (of twins) didn’t think I was a complete stalker person who was going to run off with her babies!

I suppose the point of this post is a few things:

1. I never had an ante-natal group - well, we did go to one when I was pregnant with No1 (boy) but there were about 50 people in the class all squashed into one little room so it wasn’t really conducive to friendly chit chat - and even if it had been a smaller group the sessions were from 8-9pm and for me as a pregnant lady that was a struggle to be sat in hard plastic chairs basically listening to a midwife lecture you, so I probably wouldn’t have been that into meeting up afterwards. I actually set up my own local group of Mums to Be (which later became Mums & Mums to Be) on Facebook so I did get some of this socialisation but I was slightly envious of all of them knowing each other. My group was fairly spread out. Some would converse only on FB and never meet, others would meet up regularly. Often if I arranged a meeting it would never be the same person each week.

2. Mums (new mums particularly perhaps) can be very closed and suspicious. I don’t think I was ever like that. I loved showing my baby off. I never thought that someone was going to steal him/her just because they showed an interest. Obviously if someone had been particularly suspicious I would have been careful though (maybe I just didn’t realise how suspicious I looked!).

3. Maybe this particular mum was just very tired - she did have twins afterall - and didn’t have the energy to be nice to some stranger getting love eyes for her babies….. maybe I should just mind my own bloody business.

Just thought I would document this experience as it really did make me feel quite uncomfortable (because I realised that these women were suspicious of me - if I’d had my own kids with me it probably would have been different) and it made me think.