Exhaustion Be Gone!

So, I've been trying to find the time to really focus on this blog. Then I realized that that is exactly the problem. I can not function or focus on anything with my current level of sleep. This really is the contributing factor to a great deal of my frustration lately....lately being the last seven years. Seriously. Ever since the birth of my beautiful oldest child, and the subsequent births of his two younger brothers, I have not really had a good night's sleep. I am either up with a small child or trying to stay up during that quiet time when the whole house is sleeping and I can get a little bit of my to-do list accomplished. Even though I stay up late to try to get more done, I find myself constantly running against time and life to catch up...on everything!

Not getting enough sleep makes it very hard for me to think clearly, to remain rational in conversations, and to regulate my emotions. Lately, I've found myself in a constant state of "woe is me." In the midst of rehashing every negative thing that has happened or been said to me, or even that I have said or done, I will tell myself to just go to sleep. So, I'm realizing that I am very much aware of what the problem is.

This has got to change. So, I'm thinking I'm going to challenge myself to go to bed by nine o'clock every night for the rest of the month of January. My eight month old still wakes up all hours of the night, hence the really early bedtime. I'm hoping going to bed early will help compensate for the times I have to wake up with him.

Here is what I hope to gain with the early bedtime:
1. Sanity
2. Feeling refreshed when I wake up in the morning.
3. Clarity of mind so that I can handle the constant multi-tasking that occurs when you home school, take care of two little ones under 30 months, help your bi-vocational pastor husband start a church, and just try to find time to call your dear mom at least once a week.
4. More time to actually be constructive and productive and get back to feeling more like myself.

Well, it's late tonight. I will go to bed now and start this thing tomorrow. I'll post soon about my progress.

Life Happens and then I Returned

It's been a while since I started this blog. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, I also started another one, Raising Mancubs, slightly before this one. Of course, this led to writer's paralysis as I tried to think of how to organize my various musings between the two. Even though I haven't worked out all of the details, I've decided to come back and put something on this page!

So, here I am. Life happens and then you return. Hope to see you again soon.

And here I am....

Sometimes in life you look up and you realize that life has been moving at the speed of light. In that moment, you realize that you are not at all where you thought you would be. This can be good. Yet, this is can also be not so good.

And there I am. If you look closely, you can see me, the young thirty something wife, with the good-looking professional husband, the three children, dog, mortgage and a car note. Throw in a few extra pounds and you might just catch a glimpse of the subtle expression of utter desperation as I struggle to keep the plates spinning and the world turning for myself and my family. I am in that space between good...and not so good.

It's time to go back. Somewhere in the shuffle of life, parts of this woman was left behind. Some things needed to be discarded; this is true. However, sometimes, in those moments of frantically looking for the keys that I have lost for the umpteenth time or that missing sock, I realize that I am really looking for the left behind fragments of a young confident girl who got shoved aside by a young woman struggling to attain an elusive something.

In this blog, I hope to record my thoughts, opinions, struggles, and life changing efforts. She may be left behind, but not for long.