Applause please.... and no

"I don’t know how she does it"….. I never saw the movie with the title, and more than likely never will, I am not a fan of chick flicks.  The title always bothered me.  How does she do what? So many women and men I know balance tons of things and no one ever praises them for getting sh*t done, but yet it gets done. Kids get to school, dinner gets made, and people go to work.  I had someone recently say to me “ Girl, you do so much and I don’t know how you get it all done. I hear you get up early to get the kids, workout, make dinner every night and are at work 4 12 hour night shifts a week.”  I said, “it’s not that much. I should be going back to school, and you do that full time, raise your family, and have a full time job.  That’s more work than I do! “ I think we all see busy “getting things done people” and wonder in amazement at how they get it all done and their lives are so seemingly perfect.  I can attest my days are far from perfect.  I pick apart everything I do on a daily basis.  I don’t want to workout most days, but I made it a priority about 6 years ago, and won’t go back.  It would make my life easier? Sure. It would make dinners better, sure. I could fill that time with school work to finish my Bachelor’s degree.  But how would I feel? I would feel like a failure, is how I would feel.  Since I started dedicating time and effort to working out, I have noticed a huge change in my life. My depression had lessened.  My energy had improved.  My self esteem increased, not that I don’t see areas for improvement, like my diet, but overall, I am more comfortable in lingerie.. Hahaha.  But someday I hope to fit in that class here and there AND continue my current routine, but I need to make sure it doesn’t cut into homework, working out, dinner time.  I don’t want anything to compromise what it is, we do have.  It isn’t much and like I said, far from perfect!!  But it works enough to keep us together and for the most part happy and cohesive.  My husband gets up easily an hour earlier than he needs to for work to get the boys up, every day.  He comes home from long stressful work days and works out while I’m making dinner, finishes in time for us to all eat together, and does the dishes.  Somewhere in there he also squeezes in lawn mowing, vacuuming, and cleaning bathrooms. Do I praise him enough for it? No I don’t, but I should.   Instead when I’m running around stressed I get annoyed he’s playing a game. Is that fair? Absolutely not, and I’m working on it…. I’m always working on it. I know I get on his nerves…. A TON.  I’m not always in the best moods when I’m stressing out or tired. I’m all too often battling some form of depression that he can’t wrap his head around. I have weird issues about hand holding and cuddling. So let’s fa

ce it, I’m the lucky one, I am so incredibly blessed to have someone in my life who puts up with my sh*t behavior and should definitely not add more to my plate, and to his frustrations.  So for now, I don’t have immediate plans to return to school. Maybe I’ll work on getting a certification at work.  Hahahahaha. It’s crazy that I feel like I need to do something more on my professional life.  Not only do I work my full time nursing gig, I sell makeup, candles/essential oils, and workout coaching.  I put probably so much effort into all of it, that I’m spread thin, but I’m definitely seeing what I can do with it and am quickly on my way to dropping my hours the next few months.  I know that will help emensely.  Do I want praise for all I do? Maybe...hahahahaha… but do I deserve it, no.  I do what I do because I enjoy it, and it makes me happy and my husband and kids seem to be ok for it.  My sons routinely make comments of healthy living since we started our health coaching and daily workouts.  My kids also see the value of what we do for our careers, and don’t get caught up on the fact that 4 nights a week I leave after dinner.  Our house is,for the most part, clean.. just leave my parent’s/guest room out of it…. my clothes enjoy their freedom on the bed and floor.  And really I like to make everyone happy, so I won’t take that away from them, at least until my parents visit.  But alas, we do it.   We get things done, and we don’t seek praise, we don’t ask for assistance, we do it.  And so do you. Be proud those days you get up and get out of bed, some days that’s a feat.  Be happy you cleared out the cardboard heap in the garage. Despite not getting the other 7 things you had in mind to do. Which may or may not have included cleaning out the spare room for the  past 3 months.  But I’m not a failure, even though looking in there on the reg, I do feel hopeless.  I need to work on that.  I need to applaud the little accomplishments more.  We all do.  Maybe that’s what I am getting from writing this.  I thought it was going to be about making priorities, and keeping them and life will be easier.  But maybe it’s also about letting little or big heaps of clothes that aren’t going to get put away, go.