It’s Still Good

Words cannot describe the disappointment, pain, and anger I feel.  I am so very hurt.  Everything in my mind tells me that it is done it is over and so therefore I need to be over it too.  I feel unjustified to be angry I feel like I have no right to be upset for I have a wonderful baby safe at home.  Why my mind and body cannot let go of the pain and move forward?  Going to the hospital the night before my baby was born my body was filled with so much anxiety that I cannot describe the feeling into words.  I was in such a state of emotional turmoil that I could not make a concise choice to safe my life.  I depended on those around me to help me make good choices.  It is never a good feeling to feel like your own mind does not function because your guts want to burst out of your stomach.  Labor progressed that night and as it did I felt so alone in my pain and anguish.  All I could do was make choices based on past experiences.  I did not make all the best choices but how could I, the clouds would not clear out of my brain and the pain would not ease.  Time was coming closer to having my baby girl born into this world as my body ached in pain I wanted nothing more then to have my baby in my arms safe and for the pain and anxiety to ease.  As she was approaching the earth the world around me spun as I was asked to do do an extraordinary feet.  “Get Her out NOW!” I remember them repeating to me....”Get Her out NOW!” “Get Her out Now!”  The calm exterior trying to mask the worry in their voice as her heart dropped.  I pushed with all I had and could not get her out.  What have I done.  I kept trying and on the third try I finally got her out.  Blue and limp she arrived with the cord wrapped around her neck four times.  She started to cry and breath and I was finally relieved to have her on me.  I felt her thick black curls stuck to head and tried to wrap her in my arms while an awkward annoying nurse tries to help me and then the nurse needed her and said I would have her right back.  Of course I wanted her to be okay so of course I let her.  She stole her and didn’t give her back as I lay there almost bleeding to death as puddles of blood rushed to the floor, and looking over at my baby yearning to hold her as some kind of bandaid to help ease the pain.  No one could help me  get my baby because they were trying to save me.  The baby lay there crying and the nurse doing her charts and having no clue what she was doing to my heart.  As I asked for my baby over and over.  My bleeding stopped and she was going to bring her to me.  She lay next to me slow close yet so far away there was nothing I could do there was nothing I could say, I could not change what was happening no matter what I wanted.  How could this nurse be so insensitive and have no clue what she was doing to my heart.  Why wouldn't they help me the way I wanted?  My baby almost given to me, almost there,  and then my body started to shake.  My body shook so uncontrollably that there was no way I could have held her in me arms safely.  “I want my baby!”  As everyone around did there best to help me, I shook and I shook and I shook.  For two hours my body was out of control and I had no where to turn I could do nothing to stop and to get my baby.  I wanted her so badly.  All I wanted this whole pregnancy was the moment I got to hold her in my arms and reach hold her close to my body.  She had been mine in me and no one else could take her and now there she was and I could do nothing to have her in my arms, NOTHING!  Get her, Husband, just go get her! No!  He wouldn’t leave my side.  Finally, as my body started to calm, they brought her to me and I just looked down at her and had a sense of relief as I put her to my body and I felt her close to my skin.  She started to nurse and I just nursed her as long as she wanted because I could not bear to let her go.  I still shook off and on but held on tight to my love.  I could not loose control again because I might not get her back when I asked I might not get what I wanted.  That nurse had no right to make that choice for me. She was my baby and she took it upon herself to make a choice that was not hers.  I honestly hate her.  She broke my heart and took away something that I can never get back.  I hate her!      The day went by pretty well and the other girls got to come to the hospital and meet her and I got to see my family together.  Then as everyone parted the headaches, dizziness and pain started.  I tried to sleep and feed my baby but I was not succeeding.  Finally, I gave in and let the nurse take her.  I slept and the baby slept and there was some relief.  But needless to say I had some separation anxiety.  I had to get a blood patch the next morning which my husband was supposed to make it for and was late as I cried through the scary procedure.  A kind nurse massaged some oils on me and aided with some relief, I felt somewhat better and thought I might be able to go home.  My husband was anxious to go.  I could barely get up and walk around and without even seeing me the doctor released me.  No iron tests and no care from her and I was released.  Again with anxiety rising up in my soul I was not able to make a good choice and let those around me help me make those choices.  All I could do was go off of past experience and in the past I would have been fine to go home.  While back at home I had major headaches, chest pain, hearing lose, numbness, tingling, and so dizzy I couldn’t walk.  I couldn’t go back to the hospital because then I would be away from my baby.  I couldn’t do it.  I would manage.  When one night a Panic Attack hit me so strongly the chest pains and shooting pain was so strong that I thought I would die there.  Trying to stay there.  I held my baby day and night not to let her go as much as I could.  What a joy but the full joy of having a newborn was gone because I was in so much pain and in such a cloudy fog in  my brain that I could not feel much of anything besides that.  I feel like my joy was stolen away and I wanted it back.  There were so many people who reached out to me and blessed me and my family I am so grateful for the love others had for us and the great blessings we received during this time.  It took me two months to recover and fear of stroke from tingling all down the left side of my body from head to toe.  I wished my husband would have helped me more...but how could he really understand what I was going through and what would have helped me most.  I now have a beautiful baby that is alive and healthy and I am alive to enjoy.  I cannot dwell no the pain because I want to enjoy the now.  I must feel it and let it be.  Every time I see a baby, every time I hear a birth story, every time I see her baby photos, the feelings swarm back into my heart hard to push away the pain.  So don’t push it away.

When the event is triggered by something happening today I can:

1.) Let the feelings in and let it be.  Do not push the feelings out or try and stop them or deny them and the feelings will do what they are meant to do.

2.) After I have felt through it I can think more logically and come up with the story that makes it better....Something I learned....Something I can help others with....Something that is real and true.

3.) Amongst all the pain there is good and I need to focus on the good and feel through the bad.  

4.) Forgive those who trespass you as I would want others to forgive me.  Forgive myself.  The Lord will make up what was lost.  

5.) Do not let the pain of the past shadow the good of today.  Take control of my feelings today and do not give power to those who did me wrong. 

6.) Do not let the bad ruin all the good too.  She is here!  My Miracle!

7.)  Think it through beginning to end seeing both the good and the bad all the way through.

8.) Most things are out of my control.  

9.) I did all that I could do at that time.

10.)  Do not "What if” or “Should Have” the story.  I can not change it! I can only come up with what it means to me today to move forward with JOY!

Emotional Responsibility

I am working on managing my Anxiety and Anger.  The story of my life.  I have a ton both of those things but I have made a lot of progress.  I have learned how to control myself and take responsibility for my own emotions. Am I always able to do it perfectly? No.  But seeing progress gives me hope to keep trying.

One thing that I did not see before in myself was the fact that I find myself responsible for others emotions.  This is a huge anger trigger.  Anger comes from either not making a choice or feeling like you can still do something to fix something.  I get a lot of anger from feeling like I can fix or change other peoples emotions.  It is not possible, so the anger grows, when I do not get rid of the responsibility, the anger continues.

We have a rule in our house that you can eat fruits are vegetables anytime you want.  If they end up ruining their dinner because they ate too many carrots then for goodness sakes, who cares!  So, one of my daughters asked me if they could eat some grapes.  My answer was, “You know the rule, but just remember that dinner is coming up.”  Well, she continued on making a big fuss about it and went on and on about how I would not let her eat any grapes and her sister was eating grapes and it was not fair that she could not eat any grapes and yadda yadda.  Anyway, instead of letting her decide that she did not want to eat any grapes and just let her own her own decision, I bit.  Oh man I was angry.  The realization is that I became emotionally responsible for her instead of empathizing with her.  I took the blame and responsibility even though it was not mine and therefore I became angry.  I have also realized that I do this in many other instances and I allow others to cause me guilt and I make choices based on feeling responsible for someone else somehow.  I have realized people who tend to do this to me.  I need to recognize this and remember where the responsibility lies and not allow them to make me feel this way.  I also try to lesson my time with them.

Lessons in Progress:

1.) I am not responsible for others emotions.

2.)  Show empathy and kindness but do not feel responsible.

3.)  It is freeing to be able to make choices that I need to make and not make choices based on the emotions of others.

4.)  I am a kind person with high morals and I would not make a choice to purposely hurt someone so there is no need to feel responsible when someones feelings get hurt.  I can apologize and admit where they may have thought that but I will know my heart and I can be okay with what I have done.

Babies snack time! No grapes for her!

Doubt to Confidence

It is a strange realization when you realize that the love that you have for yourself is conditional.  The love that I have for myself is conditioned upon what I am able to accomplish.  If I am able to get a lot done, finish all of my goals, accomplish what I set out to do and when my life is going well and I am living up to my expectations of myself I am confident and making good and decisive choices because I love myself.  When I am not doing the above things I am not confident and I have a hard time making choices and I second guess myself.  Those are the times when I do not love myself.  If I could continue to love myself despite mistakes and setbacks then I would be able to bounce back out of those setbacks much easier.  Rather then having to prove to myself that I am worthy to be loved I could just forgive myself and move on making confident choices again.

I am shamefully a yeller.  I am fully capable of being a sane and level headed mother but when I do not love myself and when I feel guilty and when I do not love myself I also feel like others should not love me either.  I tend to want to be a grouch and distance myself from others.  I was having the worst night and unfortunately for the plate involved because it ended up shattered.  I was just yelling about everything mostly about everything that I had asked the kids to do which they had not done.  Not that my rampage was not shameful enough and of course the guilt was building up I then had the sweetest children in the world, if I do say so myself, tell me, “We love you Mom.”  What sweet spirits full of unconditional love for me.  I am humbled and learning from their sweet example to me.  Despite my rampage and the broken plate they still loved me, could I do the same thing and love myself and others unconditionally just as my kids did for me and the Savior does for us.  Through this experience I can see a glimmer of light as to what the pure love of Christ is,  It is unconditional and perfect.

Lessons in Progress:

1.)  When you feel like you are not good enough, have not done enough, and are not confident in your choices...choose to love, yourself.

2.)  "We’re not sayin' you can change him,

‘Cause people don’t really change.
We’re only saying that love's a force
That's powerful and strange.
People make bad choices if they’re mad,
Or scared, or stressed.
Throw a little love their way.

Throw a little love their way.
And you’ll bring out their best...

...Father!
Sister!
Brother!
We need each other to raise

Us up and round us out." (Wilson, Frozen, 2013)

Love can change how we treat ourselves, others, and become vulnerable to others.

3.)  Getting hurt is just apart of life we are going to disappoint ourselves and those we love but love, forgiveness, and trust are what we are learning and unconditional love can help pull this off.

The Thing I Could Do Without

I have been torturing myself with worry my whole life.  Mostly worry about what others think about me.  I went through a long time where I lost myself and became someone I didn't like, because I worried about what others thought.  I have really been working hard on finding myself and happiness and I am finding it slowly but surely!  I have many wonderful friends and family and professionals :) that have been helping me. Loosing myself in service and love towards others makes a huge difference it is really amazing how we can find ourselves through service.

 I am a passionate, assertive, friendly, outgoing, sensitive, and goal oriented person.  Sometimes in my passion for the ideas that I have and the strong love that I have for my family I can be outspoken.  I wish that people would form their opinions about you based on what they know of you and not what they hear.  I have been spoken badly about and I had such a negative response from others who thought they knew me and tried to defend themselves.  I am not judging anyone I am not accusing anyone I just want to be able to walk in the school where my children are and feel welcome and not be judged and be able to have open and honest conversations. I want to collaborate and communicate on level ground.  The frustrating part for me is that I worked so hard to try and make the school more safe not only for my kids but for so many other kids that were struggling and the other families get to benefit and I get to take the heat and judgement.  I feel like why did I speak up for everyone else when I am the only one who gets judged for this and did not receive support.  Why did I do this for others I feel like my kids are actually jeopardized because of me speaking up.  So why help the student body when it hurts my kids.  The worst part is to be judged by someone you do not even know.  I want to just go explain myself and make people understand the pain I was going through and the frustration of trying to help everyone on my own.  I just want to be done with the parent committee at school if all it is gong to do is jeopardize my personal relationships and my kids relationships in order to help the student body.

To make matters worse my husband lost his job and the rumors people are spreading are just vicious!!! I am very angry at the people starting such rumors and spreading them.  You can tell that people who used to be friendly to you are no longer friendly.  Or when friends ignore you and be cold it is hard not to be angry about the rumors when the rumors change your life and how people treat you.

I just read a wonderful talk by President Hinckley and one of the stories he talked about was a Mayor who was falsely accused of stealing something.  He spent the rest if his life defending himself to others and even in his death bed he was exclaiming that he hadn't done it.  How sad to live your life defending your honor.  The talk is here.

Lessons in progress:

I may not be able to change what others say about me and I'm not going to be able to change how others treat me because of it.  But I don't have to change me to fit what they think and I don't have to try and convince them that I'm not who they think I am.  All I have to do "is nothing" but be myself.  And if I loose friends over this then I guess they aren't truly friends.  If people cannot change their opinion of me after seeing how kind and compassionate I am, then I cannot do anything more about it.

I can still be me and be passionate and say how I feel in a respectful way and the part that I can get rid of is.... The worry about what others think about me.   I'm not changing me again so I better just stop worrying about what others think.

Release control and do my part and that is all I can do.

Forgive and remove the anger.

Photograph by Tenika

Thanks to my husband, family, and friends and teachers who support me through these hard times!

To Dream or not to Dream

Sometimes life just doesn't turn out the way we dreamed it to be or the way that our heart was set out on and sometimes we just have to trust that The Lord had given us another path that may be a lot better then the path that we had pictured.

Life's Disappointments:

We are so excited to have another little baby come and join our wonderful family.  We have felt blessed ever since we found out about this new little one.  We knew that we were walking in the steps that our Heavenly Father had planned for us.  Everything was just falling into place for us.  When we decided to have another baby we also found our first home that fit our family and that we were able to afford...which was looking almost impossible prior to this.  Additional income for the family also presented itself and was a blessing.

     

So I'm guessing you're wondering where the disappointment came in.  Ever since I was a little girl I had pictured being a mom and I had imagined having boys grow up in my family.  Part of my personality is to include details.  In fact, I had the exact family and the exact home down to the decorations pictured out and how my yard would look...etc.etc.  My husband and I have three beautiful little girls and are having what is most likely our last baby.  The ultrasound day came and we found out the gender of our baby....another girl.  Neither my husband or I were surprised.  A rush of feelings swarm us both.  Of course we will love this little baby and we know that we have a loving Heavenly Father who gives us what we need and that he knows what is best for us and our family.  I tried to pretend that it didn't bother me at first knowing that I would love this baby as I love all my children and the thought of being disappointed about a wonderful life coming into the world broke my heart.  So I wanted to pretend I didn't care what gender of baby I had.  As I listened to my husband poor out his heart of father and son outings that he would not be invited to and football games that he would never see his son play in my heart felt for him.  I realized that my dream had also been broken, of course I cried though.  He was glad that I cried first so that he didn't have to. :)  I quit frankly was mad at Heavenly Father for doing this.  I know he has a good reason but what the reason is I do not understand at this point.  I have often found myself wondering, "Why do I dream?" "Why do I care about what I have and what I don't have?" "Why do I try or hope?"  I have a hard time letting go of these dreams that I pictured in my mind as a child.  And perhaps they were my escape from any pain that I felt, they were my happy future that I so longed for as a child.  I cling so desperately to these exact dreams that when they fail I feel as if I have failed and my happy future is somehow gone never to return.  What I'm learning is that dreams must change not stop.  I may never have a baby boy but that doesn't mean I have to stop dreaming.  I may never have my own personal swimming pool, and I may never have some of the dreams that I've dreamed.  Just because I haven't been given my version of happiness doesn't mean that I won't have another version of happiness.  When we cling to dreams that won't happen I think it makes a person angry.  I could be angry the rest of my life for not getting what I want and what I think I deserve or I could take what I am given and be grateful for it and embrace it and make a new dream.  Dreams give us hope, dreams help us grow.  I can't control everything.  All I can do is figure out why was I given a family like my family growing up and why was I given a second chance.  What is my special plan and mission and how can I continue to dream and to find my happy place now.  

I'm not going to lie I am going to be disappointed when I think about it for awhile.  It's best for me to be disappointed now and to deal with the emotion so that I will be ready and happy and excited when she comes.  There are a many great things in my life and there are a many great things to look forward to with a new baby coming whom I am going to love and who is going to be a wonderful addition to our family.  Each child is different in their own way.  I'm not going to have the child that I want them to be no matter what gender of child I get.  My job is to love them and nourish them and help them learn and grow and learn and develop who they are.  

Now I just have to find some new dreams.  Good bye old dreams and hello new dreams.  Can't wait to meet my new baby girl!

Lessons in Progress:

1.)  Prayers that feel unanswered are only answered in a way that we can't see now.

2.)  Dream big, try hard, fail hard, dream again, try again, fail again and keep going.

3.)  Don't hold on to pride, admit disappointment.  

4.) Don't let lost dreams create anger, let go and make new dreams.  (they may not be as bad as they seem :)

5.)  Give thanks for what I have been given!

Happy Thanksgiving All!!!

Photo By Tenika

Sick

So much for managing the Halloween Candy like I had hoped.  The girls took their bags and hid under their fort and ate goodness knows how much candy today.  I did find out how much late tonight when my four year old came in my room saying, "I'm sorry mom I didn't know I was going to throw up."  I had a nice and patient response and I was really trying hard to hold it together.  Until I went in the room smelled it and saw it.  I quickly got to work after the dread of the moment had passed.  I gathered sheets and cleaners and rags and took things to the washing machine to start the laundry all the way trying to hold in my frustration of the moment and not to mention the throwing up that my body so  wanted to do itself.  It wasn't until I remembered that I didn't have any laundry soap and that making it was on my list of to do's for tomorrow that I had a total meltdown.  I guess I should explain that not only was I up in the middle of the night cleaning up puck with no laundry soap I was also sick myself.  I've been sick with a cough and it will just not go away.  I had it for two weeks and then I was better and then it came back, argh!!  So it had taken me awhile to fall asleep in the first place and I haven't been sleeping very well for who knows how long since the coughing and when you are sleeping well and get woken up after not sleeping well you are already on edge.  The smell of the throw up was just unbearable and since I'm pregnant it seemed to be amplified by ten and I'm surprised I didn't loose it myself.  Anyway moving on...so I guess now after writing this I could see why I might have a meltdown after all this on top of being tired and sick myself.  I gave in and lay on the laundry room floor in tears and whaling like a baby.  I must have been loud because my husband woke up and came asking what he could do to help.  I however could not respond because well I was too busy whaling and moping and feeling sorry for myself to answer.  Anyway in the end I made some laundry soap and my hubby helped clean up the mess and the child and everyone else is sleeping happily in their clean beds while I lay here awake, hence the blogging at this hour.  The coughs once again are keeping me up.

I guess on the positive note I will be able to find a lesson somewhere in this experience.  Not really what I want but I'm learning that what I want isn't always what's best.  I feel frustrated that when I need something it is nearly impossible to get it.  And I'm finding myself asking, "Why is it if I need it and it will help me had Heavenly Father made it so I can't have it."  Like now I'm sick and I need rest to get better but it is nearly impossible to get it.  Why is it that I am told to be patient but I'm given hormones and sickness and no sleep all at once making it almost impossible to have it.  Well the reality is that I don't know why and I probably won't know why for sure until I die.  So what I do know though is that I'm not here to do this on my own.  Or at least that's the way it is intended.  Heavenly Father never said it would be easy he only said it would be worth it.  So keep looking up and keep looking ahead and keep going and making progress.  We have been given hope through the atonement of Jesus Christ and we have been given other people in our life.  Sometimes I really try hard to push them away because I don't want to admit that I'm to the point of a meltdown on the laundry room floor.  I'm glad that my hubby was around to help too.  I also have lot's of wonderful friends and family that offer support.  A blessing I've gotten is to reread a conference talk that I love that reminds me to "Look up.”

Lessons in progress:

1.) When you don't understand why just trust.  Trust that even though it's not what you want it's gotta be what The Lord wants.

2.)  Don't push people away, they are our angels on earth.

3.)  Recognize that it is hard and that I am going to mess up more times then I get it right and that there is hope in the Atonement.

4.)  When I can't sleep it’s okay there are things that need to be done anyway.  So don't stress it just makes it worse.

5.) It is the small things that we do everyday that make a big difference.  Like small coping skills like writing and breathing and meditating and healthy foods......

Accept Defeat

When things go wrong and there is nothing more that you can do to fix it then sometimes it is time to accept defeat and keep moving forward.

The Necklaces

My girls got necklaces this year for Easter. They had pendant fairies on them with tiny jars of fairy dust. I knew the girls would love them and they did. They put them on right away and took great care of them. The next day one of my daughters had her jar of glitter in her mouth and was kind of chewing on it. And it breaks and fairy dust, aka glitter, goes everywhere including all over her mouth. I would be upset and could tell that she was but she was hiding it from us very well. I took her upstairs to get away from everyone and to clean the glitter off of her tongue and make sure that she didn't get cut. I asked her if she was sad about her necklace and immediately the wall she had up fell and the tears began to fall. "I'm really sad mom." And even though it was just a thing and maybe doesn't mean much to me I felt for her. I felt bad knowing that she tried to have a strong face because she knew that she really shouldn't have had that necklace in her mouth. It was her fault. So she should pretend like it doesn't bother her? It was okay for her to be upset I understood how she felt and I held her and let her cry and let her be disappointed. I had a friend who told me they were having another baby really close to another baby they had and she said, "I know it was my choice but I still want to be able to have feelings and share feelings when things get hard, because I know they will."

Within minutes of the first incident my other daughter tripped and fell and saved herself from falling into the entertainment stand but as she did her new necklace flung forward and hit the entertainment stand and broke. She didn't notice until later when one if her sisters saw the glitter on the ground and told her. She was sad and felt bad that her new necklace was ruined.

Later that same day the daughter with the only left jar of fairy dust didn't want to give me her necklace because she was afraid I would break or loose it. She promised herself that she wouldn't let hers break, so she put it in her coat pocket when we got ready to go swimming. When I left the house and saw the coats sitting by the front door I thought I better bring them because even though they weren't needed now, on this early spring day, they would need them when it was dark and cold and they were wet leaving the pool. So I grabbed the coats. Later, when my daughter realized I brought the coats she looked for her necklace and couldn't find it she had thoughts of a lost and broken necklace and worried about it until we got home. Luckily, we found the necklace on the porch outside the front door but unluckily the necklace had been stepped on and her glass jar was broken and there was glitter all over the porch. She was devastated. She was sad that her new necklace was broken but more then that she was upset that she had broken her promise to herself. I gave her hugs and understood why she was so upset. I hated breaking promises to myself and others.

I was also upset with myself for giving them such a breakable gift. I thought that they were tough jars but I was mistaken. I also thought they would just love them. Well, they did love them enough that they were so upset that they were broken. I felt like I set them up to fail and that wasn't my intention at all. I could easily find other jars of fairy dust to give them to replace the broken jars but sometimes it is just best to accept my mistake and move on. There were some great lessons we learned from the jars of magic glitter we sprinkled about:

Lessons In Progress:

1.) Even though it may be your fault that something bad has happened it doesn't mean that you are not allowed to have feelings about it.

2.) When something you love gets ruined or broken or lost its okay to be upset about it.

3.) When your kids or others feel upset about something that you wouldn't be upset about. Find a situation in which you felt the same way they are feeling and your heart will melt!

4.) Because I wasn't angry with the kids I was able to help them and see their side.

5.) When you don't end up doing something that you said you would do, despite your best efforts, it doesn't mean that you are a bad person or that you are a failure. It doesn't mean that you should stop trying or that you aren't able to do something that you put your mind to, it doesn't mean that you don't have integrity. It means that sometimes things go the way we want or try but most of the time they don't. There is something better in-store for us and we must trust and accept that we don't always control everything and that things will work out for us.

6.) Trying to go back in time and fix things won't work. Accept that you make bad choices sometimes and just move on. You can't always get back what is lost.

7.) Its good that we don't have to worry about making up for what is lost because the savior makes up what we can't do. He knows those struggles we are going through and even when we mess up he is willing to put his arms around us and let us cry.

This too shall pass

Sometimes I get so engrossed in what is going on especially when it's pain and that most always turns into anxiety for me because I usually don't deal well with it so I try to push it away and then well... Let me put it this way...

Beach ball..
If you push a beach ball under the water and let go of it, it will bust up out of the water. Well the farther down you push the beach ball the bigger the burst is when you let go of it. Also it is inevitable that the ball will come up sooner or later. The less you push it down the more you can control it when you do let it out. So the beach ball could represent our feelings and not only that our reaction to the feelings. The more i push them in the more anxious I become when they are underneath. I am denying myself something that is mine and the anxiety and pain take over. I can manage it much better if I deal with the pain right away and except that I'm just an emotional person.

When I let the pain grow it seems more and more impossible to get rid of it and then add the anxiety on top of sadness/ anger making it feel hopeless. Every possible solution I can come up with to help isn't working and I'm just feeling terrible. And have tunnel vision.... So something's that have helped me when I can muster up the will when I feel so bad...

1) talk to someone... Someone else can help put your pain or problem into perspective and give you empathy or help...(I find myself avoiding this at all costs as to not bother someone, which is not good I need to change the way I think about this)

2) do something that directly relates to the issue.... Deal with it before moving onto chores or activities because what happens to me is that since the beach ball is still under the water and a simple thing goes wrong the eruption happens at that and not about the issue... Like if I'm playing candy land with my kids and they start arguing I won't be patient in dealing with it... If I do chores or watch tv I'm not thinking about my problem and I'm avoiding it and I can't fully enjoy what I'm doing. So deal first... i.e. - write about it - forgive someone - pray - cry - exercise (dance) - breath and think. Identify what happened (action), then what the thought was, and then What was the feeling associated with the thought because thought = feeling

3) think about the bigger picture...realize that whatever situation I am in does not last forever...there is opposition in all things there must be bad if there is good... an eternal perspective of heavenly fathers plan can give me hope and clarity

4) try thinking of someone else who might need help. helping someone else can get us to stop throwing ourselves a pitty party!

Don't Forget Me Time.

One thing I do feel like I do a good job at our house is keeping a routine and a schedule for me and the girls. It helps with discipline because the girls know what to expect when. It helps me do get all the things I need and all the things that the girls need. To get things done and to get some rest. It works well in our home and it also gives me the chance to be more flexible because I'm not so nervous to break the schedule because I know it's still there and it will come right back when I'm done doing something else. It also helps because my husband works shifts and he's home during the week alot or working on the weekends and this gives me some kind of stability and feeling like I have some control over my life and schedule even though his work schedule changes all the time. Our Schedule, it's made a few changes over time.

Two Minutes...

Part of our routine that is very important is what we call our two minutes. Everyone gets at least two minutes of individual undivided attenttion once a day. We do ours before naps/quiet time. My husband or I spend two minutes doing what our children want to do just spending time with them. Then we get our time. My friend calls it her Peace. I like that! I have to do something I like to do, rest, or watch TV. Yesterday it didn't happen I got the girls put down and then I had work to do so I did that instead of rest. And I was very angry and upset the rest of the day.

Lessons in Progress:

#1 It's important for me to spend time doing something that I enjoy each day. If I don't I can't take care of others properly. Also, I get angry. Also when my girls don't get their time they get angry too. A number one reason for anger is when we feel like we aren't getting what we need.

#2 Make a routine that works for you and stick with it. It is important for me to keep my sanity.

#3 Doing what I need to do can give me more confidence. (I love bright colors and those flowers from others who care and table cloth reflect that to me.)