Suck it up Buttercup (or I'll Punch You in the Face)

This last week has been pretty rough. Today was just one of those days. It was a day that I seriously just wanted to throw in the towel. Here’s a quick recap:

• Patton came home sick from school Monday
•  Dave left on DET Tuesday 
• I found mold in my kitchen
•  Today, I contracted Patton’s illness
•   McKinley was having severe stomach pains at work and insisted I bring him medicine

But when I think about how awful my day was, I think about how awful this week has been for the friends and family of Lt. Nathan Poloski. Lt. Poloski lost his life tragically when he and another pilot collided mid air last week in the western Pacific.

Sometimes a little perspective is all I need.

I can’t help but think of his parents, knowing they will never again hear his laughter on the other end of the phone or feel the warmth of his embrace when he comes home for the holidays. My day wasn’t that bad. In comparison, it really didn’t even suck.

So this week, I’ll be trying to put everything into perspective and maybe be a little less dramatic with my ‘hardships’.  Life is good and I’m blessed to serve an amazing God.

A Little Bit of Heartbreak

Mornings have become my new least favorite part of the day. Specifically from 5:55-6:35. This is the time of day I spend arguing with Patton (my almost 15 year old) about why he has to go to school. I explain how there is a difference between not feeling well and being sick. I tell him how I understand that he may not feel well, but he really has to go to school. I try to help him understand how difficult it is to catch up once you get behind in high school.

This morning took the cake. After I woke him up, I sent in reinforcements to make sure he was up. This is when the “I don’t feel wells” began. Dad told him to get up, get in the shower and then see how he felt. Ten minutes later, I went up and found him in bed. Lights out, covers up, IN BED.  I am pretty sure he was faking laryngitis and he even started crying. I try not to yell at the kids: today I failed. And in the middle of it, I got a “Oh my gosh, SHUT UP” from McKinley’s room.

In the end I got him up, drove him down to the bus (which he first refused), and sent him to school.

I’m praying he isn’t really sick, but maybe feeling a bit like I am.

Homesick. Missing my friends in Oakleaf. Longing for social interaction that doesn’t somehow revolve around my husbands job. And by the way: moving sucks.

Being unhappy is exhausting, but what is more exhausting is pretending to be just fine. Why do I pretend? A number of reasons: firstly, I don’t want my husband to feel bad. As a career Naval Officer, he doesn’t really get too much of a say about where we go. He has struggles of his own in his new job and I don’t want to make things any more difficult on him than they need to be.

Secondly, I need to be strong for my kiddos. On Sunday, Patton asked when he could visit Jax. That’s right, my 14 year old thinks he is entitled to fly back to Florida to visit his friends. Well, that’s not going to happen. Number one, we don’t have the money and number two we feel visiting Florida and remembering how happy he was there will start the adjusting process all over again.

And the main reason is that I try really, really hard to do the whole "fake it til you make it" thing. I seem do be doing a pretty good job of faking it because until this moment, you probably thought I was doing great here in Virginia Beach. 

So, this morning, after Patton left for school, I sat and cried. My heart is breaking for him and his struggles at his new school. My heart breaks for me, trying to find my place here. I’m upset for Dave because at some level, he has to feel responsible for both mine and Patton’s heartache. McKinley  seems to have settled in quite well here. That pretty much makes me hate him. Thinking about charging him rent as some sort of happiness punishment. 

The truth of the matter is that I get it. I get that he doesn’t want to go to school. He doesn’t have any friends. I read an article once that said friends were the most important aspect of school for being well balanced. I would even venture to say that having friends is an important part of life in general. I went to an event with him last week for drama and even most of the moms weren’t interested in talking to the new girl on the block. I actually had to excuse myself to the car because I felt myself tearing up. Many thanks to the one mom, Barbara, who welcomed Dave and I (but to be honest, she seemed like a bit of an outcast from the rest of the group—she was probably excited that she could have a friend now).

I have spent the last couple hours crying for my baby’s broken heart (and maybe a little for my own). After I post this, the crying is going to have to stop. It’s time to put on my big girl panties, accept the hand I’ve been dealt and play it the best I can.

Love You

I sent some thoughtful words & prayers to a friend this morning before she went into surgery (not to worry, she’s fine. She’s just vain). We went back and forth for a while and I closed with ‘Love you’ and thought, wow that seems impersonal. So, I deleted it and added the word ‘I’ to my closing and it seemed so much more personal to tell her that I loved her.

It got me thinking about the word ‘love’, the term “I love…” and how overused and abused it has become. I then thought of something my Dad wrote a few years ago. (Nick, my Dad, not to be confused with Daddy or New Dad) So I guess today we have a guest blogger of sorts. Words of wisdom from my Dad, Nicholas Mitchell.

Love You Too

How many times have we heard those words?

They are usually a response to you telling someone

“I love you”.

Did that person ever call you first and say “I love you”?

It saddens me that love can be such a one-way street and that

so may people take it for granted but are not willing to

commit themselves to an honest friendship.

“love you too” is a way of avoiding the truth in a relationship.

We throw away words so easily because we don’t want to face

the truth of our feelings and just say what we want the

recipient to hear. What he or she wants to hear.

“I love you too”. What a lie.

My life has been filled with so many “love you too’s”

God never says I love you too.

He says I love you!

We all need to practice this principle in our lives.

We have to follow His example and tell our friends

And neighbors “I love you”

Maybe they will start believing this and stop responding with

“I love you too”

and start saying “I love you”! Before you do!

The first time I said those three little words to my husband, his response was less than what I had hoped for. If I remember correctly, he took a deep breath and said “thank you”. That’s right, people, he THANKED me for my love. At the time, I was so heartbroken, but I get it now. Nobody wants an obligatory “I love you too” response. It would probably feel similar to getting the forced “I’m sorry” from the bully on the playground. Saying “I love you too” is definitely not always the right thing to do.

I feel like in today’s society, the word love is just thrown around so carelessly that it is sometimes reduced to “Oh my gosh, I LOVE those chicken nuggets!” And then we tell our kids “Love you!” on the way out the door. I’m totally guilty of it—as a matter of fact, I just cooked some Cracklin’ Chicken from Nom Nom Paleo and we all LOVED it!

So for today, I’m going to make my loves count and try to say it first!

Funny side note: when I messaged Dad to ask him for this writing, he closed his response with “love you”.

Tamin' my Complainin'

I have been working extremely hard on tamin’ my complainin’. Looking past the negativity around you really does help you see the joy in front of you. My #21DaysofnoComplaining has been a great experience. I can literally feel the positive energy swarming around me. Until yesterday.

Soooo, here’s what happened: Tuesday evening, we were sitting around the table after dinner…sweating. So, I went to turn the AC down and saw this:

I sent the hubster out to do all the manly things with the AC and he found nothing wrong, so I sent an email out to the PM. She promised to get someone out the next day.

I woke up at 4:45am sweating. A friend offered to let me come over and bask in the coolness of her house once everyone left for school, but I just didn’t. Wanna know what I did instead? I moved the couch so it was under the fan and rotated bags of frozen vegetables under my knees, tops of my feet, and back of my neck (I guess I should throw those away now). I also took a couple extremely cold showers.  I don’t really know why I didn’t accept her offer. Lord knows I would have just showed up at Nina’s house and imposed myself in whatever plans she had for the day—I digress, that’s another issue entirely.

At some point during the day, I went to Wal-Mart and got a text from my best friend that said “Good Morning, Beautiful!” to which I replied, “There’s nothing good about a morning spent at 83 degrees. Inside.” Way to snap on someone for being nice, Tonyia. But that’s kinda what best friends are for right?

WRONG! We shouldn’t use the ones we love the most as a punching bag. Especially when they are trying to lift us up. I just went through my text messages from yesterday and they were all me moaning and complaining.  Until the magical hour when the AC was repaired. At that point, I was all smiles, happiness and rainbow unicorns. This is exactly the person I don’t want to be. I don’t want to be the kind of person who is happy only when things go in my favor. I often tell people who are going through a hard time that we wouldn’t realize when things were good if they weren’t sometimes bad. Yesterday I failed at being who I want to be.

So today, I recommit to my #21DaysofnoComplaining. Who wants to play with me?

Winds of Change

Today, my youngest son began high school.  Last week, my oldest began college.  I feel like there's not much use for me as a stay at home mom at this point, but I absolutely love being here for those rare moments when they open up to me, we share a snack or a laugh.  Time is slipping away and before I know it, my babies will be headed out the door to start families of their own.

I stopped myself today right before I told them to take their nonsense upstairs.  They just successfully completed what I would classify as the 'Loudest High Five on Earth' (by the way, don't EVER high five either of my kids…they will break your arm, or at least leave your hand stinging for a good 30 minutes).  So there they were: laughing and joking.  They were being brothers and my first instinct was to chase them away.  Why on Earth would I do that?  Why would I miss the opportunity to share in their laughter and hijinks?  Because I love the quiet.

I'm making an effort to enjoy the laughter, the noise and the craziness.  I want to embrace the fact that dinner is a few minutes late or the laundry's not being folded.  I want to relish every moment I can with these two so that in twenty years, I know we had good times together.  I want to make sure the financial sacrifice of me spending another year out of the classroom was worth it. 

That being said, Dave was forty minutes late getting in from work today so dinner wasn't late and the clothes were folded--the first load anyway. 

So here is my challenge to you: take the time. Take the time to be present with your babies.  Put away the phone.  Turn off the TV.  Let dinner sit half cooked for a while.  All of those things will be there when you get to them.  That precious moment with your family might not be.