I had something more fun I wanted to write about today. It was gonna be funny and insightful and, hopefully inspiring. It still will be, when I write it. But today, I need to be real about a different topic, and maybe it'll still be inspirational, but in a different way. Maybe it'll make you feel less alone. Maybe feeling less alone will give you a little oomph to keep going. Maybe if you keep going, you'll have an opportunity to encourage someone else, and pay it forward. Or maybe, for today, you'll just keep going-and that's plenty.

I am extremely overtired, physically. I have been for a week, and though I've taken intentional steps to try to refill the tank, I've also kept pushing steadily forward, because this rebuilding is like pushing a cart (or boulder) up a hill (or mountain), and if I stop, I will go backwards and maybe get run over. So, slowly, steadily, forward. I know the source of the depletion; it's my choice to push to get the house clean a week ago today instead of resting on my rest day, because I didn't want the mental and emotional burden of a messy home one day longer. It was the right choice, but it also had consequences, and I absolutely am ok with paying them, objectively, anyway. In reality, it sucks.

See, when I get tired, I get anxious. I'm
far more easily triggered, and it's more work to pull myself out of panic. But when I'm extremely, severely overtired, my anxiety is off the charts. The generalized anxiety is there (the elephant on my chest) the second I wake, looking for a mouse to jump in its path and stampede all over me. That's just at baseline, before I'm triggered-and I will be. This morning, I noticed a big red area with some broken skin at the center on Declan's back. My heart started racing. It's a mosquito bite, y'all, and he'd been scratching it a bunch. I knew it when I saw it, but the elephant went stampeding all over freaking out and even with using my tools it took me hours to calm down. I'm not even going to dignify the irrational fears by giving voice to them here. I kept telling myself true things like "you know he gets bit up, you know he scratches like crazy. You know he had sensitive skin that makes anything look worse than it is. You will see in no time that the red area will calm down just like every other time." And it did. But even now, I'm still feeling anxious thinking about it.

I am trying today, to be kind to myself and only ask of myself what is necessary. Feed myself, feed the kids, have devotional time, read with the kids. I'm not feeling up to monitoring outside play, so we played indoors this morning and laid low. I'm choosing to be ok with that for today. Scott can't work from home and let me nap, but he will make dinner so I can nap when he gets home tonight.

These days happen sometimes. Sometimes they are avoidable, sometimes they aren't. Sometimes they are the necessary price of a bigger blessing, like a clean house that I can manage, feel peace and joy in, and not feel shameful about from the second I wake up. Whatever the case, these days need not be a source of shame or defeat. They are what they are, I do what I can, and move forward.

And I hope, if you're having a day like this too, that you can do the same.