Ramble Ramble

I have 3 websites launching this week (like, TOMORROW), and our big trade show next week, and I am FREAKING OUT because I have so much to do and so little time to do it, and I feel like one of those cartoons where the steam inside the character’s head keeps building and building and building until their head explodes, and dear GOD do I want this week to be over, and then, maybe then, I can relax and not feel like this giant ball of OMGOMGOMG!

So um, yeah, posting may be a little sparse until later this week when I might be able to, ya know, breathe or something.

P.S. Your comments on my last two posts have not gone unnoticed–when I have time to intelligently respond to them, I will, but for now, let me just say–You guys are the best, and I know that more every time you leave me such thoughtful comments!

These days, I’m really stressed. (as I may have mentioned). I’m over-worked, and over-tired, and over-stressed. And when I get over-stressed, I tend to become stupidly emotional. Sometimes my stress manifests in anger, sometimes in sadness, and sometimes, like now, in overwhelming guilt.

Yup, I get stressed and GUILT is the primary emotion I feel. I’m my own brand of crazy.

Some of the guilt makes sense.

• I feel guilty about working so much, and not spending enough time with the kid.
• I feel guilty when I’m at work and have to take breaks to pump, since it’s “wasted” work time.
• I feel guilty when I’m at work and itching for the clock to hit 5, so that I can at least go home and work near my kid.
• I feel guilty about not feeling like I’m giving any of the areas of my life enough of me. I feel like everything is getting short changed–you know, jack of all trades, master of none type stuff.

But those things all kind of make sense. Those are things that you could see any logical person thinking when things get stressful and there aren’t enough hours in the day. Let me share with you where my feelings of guilt are CAH-RAZY person talk, obviously brought on by emotional stress:

• I feel guilty for feeling guilty. I feel like I should know better, so it just exacerbates the problem.
• The kid has been spitting up a lot lately. It’s relatively new in the last couple of weeks (well, the volume. It’s not like he’s never spit up before). Rather than think, like a normal person, “oh the kid is drooling a TON, and has recently figured out how to nurse way faster but hasn’t figured out how to feel full as fast, and therefore, extra contents of stomach must find exit point”, my first thoughts are: “what did I eat today? Obviously I ate something that disagrees with him. Oh, God, what if he has reflux or an allergy and I’m missing it because I’m so busy, and crap I’m the worst mother in the world because my kid is miserable and it’s all because of me. I should just eliminate everything from my diet except crackers and water, just in case.” It should be noted that the kid? Is never bothered by spitting up. He’s not upset, or fussy, or mad (except when we stop playing to wipe his face, how DARE you stop the playing?). I on the other hand, have been turning into a mess about it.
• I threw N.C. a surprise party this weekend for his 30th birthday (which, by his telling actually was both a surprise and a lot of fun). But a bunch of people ended up not able to make the party, turning the surprise party into more of a surprise…gathering? get-together? So I spent the night feeling guilty that I didn’t throw him a good enough party, or that I should have invited more people, or that I should have known that people wouldn’t make it and so planned something different where it wouldn’t be so obvious that I failed completely at my (self-imposed) task of throwing him a party. Somehow I managed to feel guilty about OTHER people not showing up to a party.
• I found myself feeling guilty the other day that we’re doing ok financially. I know a lot of people, family included, who aren’t so lucky right now. And rather than just feel blessed that we’re in a good place right now, I feel guilty about our relative good fortune. Like I should be ashamed of our lot in life.
• On Friday, the girl who reports to me left work early because she got sick. Because of that, something (that is not on any deadline at all) didn’t happen. And when someone asked me about it today, in a totally non-confrontational way, I felt guilty and defensive that it hadn’t gotten done. Like I should have done it on Friday when my coordinator went home and so felt guilty that I hadn’t.

These are just a few examples of my crazy. I mean, the guilt extends into all areas of my life. Cat not getting enough attention: guilt. Car needs to have the alignment done: guilt. Give the baby to N.C. so I can go to the bathroom: guilt. Tracked water into the office during torrential rain: guilt. I mean, over the stupidest crap. And I recognize it’s stupid crap, and I recognize that it’s related to my stress level. But that doesn’t really help–even though I know I’m being crazy, I can’t seem to stop.

I know it will get better when the stress lets up. I know it will, so it’s just one more reason to hang on until then. It’s a little like a roller-coaster–I’m all white knuckled fear, gripping the bar for dear life, and just waiting, waiting, waiting, until the ride is over and I can breathe again.

As always, more lists can be found over at Anna’s at abdpbt!

Hey, have you guys heard of the stress diet? It’s a miracle weight loss program! I’ve lost 6 pounds in the last week on this amazing diet–without having to eat well or exercise. Granted, the side effects of the diet may include crying at the littlest thing, lashing out at your loved ones, stress headaches, body aches and general frustration and irritability. But hey, weight loss is weight loss, right?

Seriously, this stress is killing me.  My day right now is get up, check work email while feeding the baby, get ready, go to work, work work work, head home, eat dinner, play with baby for a few minutes, then work work work some more, lately until 11 or 12. I keep telling myself that if I can just make it through Feb. 1, when one of the websites and the ecommerce store that I’m working on launch, things will even out a little. I’ll be able to breathe.

I hate this kind of stress, particularly work related. I haven’t had this kind of pressure at work in a long time, and I know it’s compounded by the guilt I have when I’m working and feel like I should be with the baby (particularly at home). But regardless of the baby, I’m neck deep in projects and deadlines, just barely keeping my head above water. I need more hours in the day or a clone or, and this is a novel idea, a workload for one person rather than the workload of four people.  But since that’s not likely to happen anytime soon, I guess I’m stuck with bitching about it and then sucking it up and doing my job. At least I’m losing weight through it all…right?

Day three of my return to work, and I haven’t cried today–victory!

Ok, only sort of. Monday pretty much sucked. I cried getting ready, I cried pulling out of the drive way, I cried on the freeway, and then I spent the rest of the day trying not to cry every time someone asked me “how are you doing?” or “do you miss him already?” I’d get myself calmed, and focused on something else (like a new computer that needed to be set up, or 3 months of emails, or the urgent thing that needed to be reviewed right away), and then someone would ask how I was doing and I’d have to fight, HARD, not to break down.

Add in the drama of figuring out the hows, and whens, and whatnot of pumping (oh, let me tell you how much I already hate, hate, hate pumping. That’s another post for another day though), which then left me trying to focus on the kid to help things along, and it was an exhausting day. I was never so glad to get home to a screaming baby who needed me (at least for his dinner).

Tuesday didn’t start out much better…I was teary on the drive to work, and at a coworker’s birthday breakfast everyone kept asking the same questions (was it hard? did you miss him? don’t you wish you could be with him? Um, folks seriously, you’re not helping). I was worried it would be another day of emotional beat-down.

But then, something came up. A project that was supposed to be taken care of while I was out on leave didn’t get done and was stalled, and I basically had to come in and save the day. And it felt great.

It felt great to know that I’m still needed here.

It felt great to know that I’m still good at my job.

It felt great to have something to think about besides Jackson.

It felt great to use that part of my brain.

And while it didn’t stop sucking that I’m not able to be with the kid, I was able to give myself a break by doing my job.

Today is…ok. I can’t allow myself to keep thinking about what I’m going to miss with the kid–I’m going to kill myself slowly if I keep that up. I wallowed last week, I wallowed on Monday, but I can’t keep wallowing. There’s no other options for me–I have to work, I have to have the paycheck and the benefits, and I can’t do it at home, so this is what it is. I need to soak that lesson in and make it my own: this is what it is and there is nothing else I can do about it, so I need to figure out how to move forward.

Do I think I’m “over it”? Not a chance. It still hits me at moments, and I’m sure that will continue throughout Jackson’s little life. I’m going to miss things in his life and that’s going to suck. But since I don’t have any other options, I’m trying to find ways to move past the heartache and into a space where I’m ok with this. I’m doing what I have to do for our family, so I’ve got to suck it up and move forward.

And I get to come home to this:

And I’m thankful for that.

P.S. We’re flying today for the first time with the kid. Wish us luck (and non-sicky sick folks in the flying tin can to germ up my baby who can’t get flu shots)!

Um, did anyone else realize that it’s almost the end of June? Which for me means I’m officially about 2 months away from my due date? Which means I might officially start panicking?

I mean, I knew it was getting closer–you know what with the swollen feet, and the clothes not fitting, and the waddling (seriously, I waddle already. It’s sad). I just didn’t realize quite HOW close it was getting until I started working on a project for work that has a timeline, and I was able to see, in stark black and white, just how soon that date is approaching. It’s a project that I will start, but won’t be able to see through to completion. That was a big, giant wake-up call.

This big wake-up call may be why I suddenly feel the need to go ahead and DO a lot of the things on my to-do list. For the longest time, I felt like I could say “oh we have plenty of time.”  I don’t quite feel that way anymore–we have two months, yes, but knowing how we both procrastinate, I know those two months could easily slip by with little getting accomplished other than freak outs.

That’s not to say that we haven’t done anything. On the contrary, we’ve done a fair amount, including:

• scheduling childbirth classes
• starting registries
• researching a 529
• ordering the crib bedding (we’re having it made for a fraction of the cost of buying one)
• priming the nursery (it was brown before…bleh)
• saving for my maternity leave
• buying a crib & changing table, and moving our dresser into the nurser
• deciding on at least some cloth diapering

But we still have a lot left to do, like:

• choosing a pediatrician or family care doctor
• finishing up the registries (I feel like we’re missing a lot–any mommies want to check ours out and give me feedback?)
• painting the nursery
• picking a name
• researching and deciding on all the biggie issues: circumcision, vaccinations, daycare.
• finalizing all my maternity leave paperwork with HR
• putting together my maternity leave plan for work, including all the marketing plans for the three months I’ll be gone
• decorating the nursery
• actually buying all the baby stuff (we’re using the registries just as much for ourselves as for anyone else, if we’re honest)

There’s more little stuff, but those are the ones weighing on my mind. I know, in the end, we’ll get it all done–and if not, babies have been born into this world without every single thing being in place beforehand, so we’ll survive. And the kiddo will never know if everything’s not “perfect” before he arrives. It’s more for my peace of mind (obviously). It’s just that all of a sudden, it seems like it’s right around the corner, and I’m not ready yet.

But really, are you ever REALLY ready for the change that a new baby brings?