Sleep

I have always been one that needs sleep.  If I do not get my 8 hours or more I really feel I struggle through my day.  And lets be real over here people, I struggle through my days a lot.  I intentionally go to bed early because I know my alarm is going to go off at 5, but I am still not getting enough sleep.

Have you ever tracked your sleep before?  I recently just began looking at my sleep patterns closer because I was thinking I was getting 8 hours of sleep, but still waking up tired.  I understood that your body went through different sleep stages in the evening, but I did not realize how often those stages cycled.  I have found that even though I go to bed early due to needing to get up early, I as still waking up quite a bit in the middle of the night.

Last night I went to bed at 830, and still came up short a half hour of getting my full 8 hours of sleep. This stuff fascinates me and frustrates me at the same time.  I researched that it is normal to see about 10-30 awake times each night, and most times you don't even remember being awake.  However last night I was awake for 73 minutes, and I don't remember any of it, accept once when I moved the cat off my leg but I rolled back over and fell back to sleep.

One sleep stage that I have noticed that is very equivalent to my awake time is my REM sleep.  REM sleep is to improve your memory and mood, and your dreams are the most vivid.  It has been a couple weeks since I remember my dreams.  This may be because I am not spending a lot of time in this stage either.  Could this lack of stage be the cause of my crappy attitude?

A majority of my sleep is in the light stage of sleep.  This is super important because it promotes mental and physical restoration, but this makes so much sense why I wake up so many times at night...I hear everything!!  Last night my light sleep made up 61% of my sleep.  I should feel mentally rested, however I secretly want a nap.

I have been looking back my past week of sleep and really have noticed that my deep sleep has only been on average about 10% of my sleep at night.  This is funny and sort of explains the lack of feeling refreshed.  Deep sleep helps with physical recover and aspects of memory and learning.  If you spend some solid time in this stage you are to feel refreshed, and I am noticing I never have a solid chunk of time in this stage.  I wonder what would help me get that?

Overall I am noticing that I need to try and get more sleep in my life, but I need to do this with balance.  I seriously should not be going to bed right after I put my kids to bed at 8, but it looks like I may need to start doing so, so I can get the rest I need to be a better person.  I have included a couple screenshots of my sleep from last night from my fit bit.  I am not exactly sure how accurate this is, but it does open my eyes a bit as to why I am so tired all the time.

Hopefully you are all sleeping better than I am over here.  Sleep is so important to our bodies and I really feel this part of rest gets neglected by more of us than anyone wants to admit.

Parenting a 100 year old

Parenting is not for the weak I tell you!

Yesterday was the hundreds day of school and I was so excited that the kindergartners would be dressing up like they were 100 years old.  Ayden was not nearly as impressed as I wanted him to be, but he did humor me when I practiced his make up and attempted to size his bow tie and suspenders for the day of.

So picture this, I have him in khaki pants and a button down white shirt.  He has on a black bow tie and suspenders.  I went ahead and painted his eyebrows grey with face paint, and gave him glasses to complete his outfit.  He liked it for the most part, all but the suspenders, but he was pretty cool with the idea.

Of course as a mom I have to take things to the next level and I found the baby powder and really thought that making his hair grey would just be fabulous.  I added the baby powder and it seriously completed his 100 year old look.  That is when the tears happened.  Like full blown sobbing and I didn't quite understand.  I got him under control, snapped a few pictures because you have to document everything cute your kid does, and started to talk with him.  First he just kept telling me the powder smelled.  Then he cried more telling me he just couldn't go to school looking like that.  Because it was literally five minutes before leaving I made him keep the powder in his hair, but what he did in the car just broke my heart.

As we were driving to school Ayden decided to really tell me what was wrong.  It wasn't the baby powder or the suspenders, it was what was going to happen at school.  His biggest fear through this fun activity was being made fun of.  And although many of his classmates would be dressed up as well, he was afraid that in the lunchroom or on the playground someone was going to laugh at him.  My heart literally broke and I simply told him that it was not okay if someone did that, but if they did it was probably because they felt poorly about them self if they poked fun at a kindergartner.  But seriously this was suppose to be a fun activity and the kid is only five and he is already worried about what others are going to think.

So I was that mom, watching my son get out of the car, not making eye contact with anyone, grabbing after his sisters hand so that he could be guided at the door not looking anyone in the eye. It was so evident he wanted to be invisible and not be noticed and get into his classroom.  And you can probably guess I had tears streaming down my face as I drove home because I forced my kid to do something I am not sure as an adult I would be brave enough to do.

Just another box to check

This school year I took on something that absolutely makes my heart happy.  I decided to lead one of the groups for the JAM (Jesus and Me) Club at our school.  What a great way to fill my cup and actually be with kiddos.  A win win situation in my book.  Since coming back from winter break I have been trying to be excited and passionate, but the weather seriously brought out some crazy in both the kiddos and myself.  So I do feel drained this month each Wednesday when I attempt to get the kids excited about scripture and messages.  However there is some good that comes from this tiredness.

See this month the kids are focusing on strengthening not only their bodies with New Year's resolutions, but strengthening their souls as well as connecting more to God.  Of course I am an open book to the kiddos and I told them that I was going to do two things this year:  work out daily and read my devotion in the morning.  It literally has taken me three weeks to do the latter.  I mean how hard is it to read a few pages in the morning.  I have the time mapped out.  I eat 1/2 hour before I work out, so there is not room for excuses, but I still drug my feet on this one.

It wasn't until recently that I finally said enough is enough and I grabbed that book and took it to the basement where I typically waste the half hour watching something irrelevant on Netflix.  I had the book downstairs so that I no longer had an excuse.  So last Wednesday I read my devotional and announcement this huge accomplishments to the kids.  They were not nearly as impressed with the accomplishment as I was, but hey I followed through.  I began actually sticking to the spiritual part of my resolution!

Thursday came along and I was all pumped because I once again read my devotional, but I am going to be honest with you I didn't like what it said, so I ran upstairs to grab my other one because I have two for the year of 2018.  I read that one and it was pretty much the same message and I was like huh maybe I should actually listen to it.  It is funny how one of the gals that helps in the JAM club actually texted me to check in to see if I actually followed through for Thursday in reading my devotional.  I boasted and informed her I did and that I was really excited that I am sticking to my morning decision so that it can set the tone of my day.  Funny thing is that I wasn't liking what I read, but hey I checked it off my to do list so winning in my book.

So as the day continues I took  look at those devotionals that sat down in the basement.  I mean I really took a look at those book and I realized I had been reading my 2017 devotionals.  Seriously people, it was as if I said I was doing my resolution, but in all reality I wasn't really doing the work or listening to the words on the pages, I was just checking off another thing to do on my to do list, and in doing so I didn't even pick the books with the right year!!  Bringing those books back upstairs to then see the books that were actually to be read for this year, made me a little ashamed that I just wanted to say I did accomplish a goal I had set for myself.

Now this was an easy fix, and yes on Friday I was reading the book and actually listening to what it said.  It actually had a great point and it did set the tone for how my day was going to go.  But what makes me wonder is how often do I go through life just checking off items on my to do list, and not truly embracing what is going on around me?  I think as I continue through this season of life that this is a sign that I need to stop just checking the boxes, and actually relish in the things that I am doing or at least start looking closer so I don't end up eating something expired.  :)

To Laugh or To Cry

I truly have no problem with laughing at myself, but some days I do question why things happen to me.  I mean I would be okay with a little less excitement some days.

Yesterday I decided after I finished volunteering I was going to be productive and wash my car.  I am a creature of habit, and even though I drove past a perfectly good car wash I kept driving because I am a creature of habit.  I wanted to wash my car where I felt comfortable.  Right there see I should have just taken the chance and went to the one closer to the house.  I mean obviously from my post yesterday, I am struggling with the unknown, and going to a new carwash would have been a great opportunity to try something out of my comfort zone.  But once again I ignored that sign from God.  Seriously...I need big signs like maybe a flashing billboard because you all know how well I listen to that inner voice that tells me to be brave.  And maybe I am just grasping at straws to think that the thought of changing lanes and trying a new car wash wasn't my own idea, but I am only rethinking how I listen to the good voices in my head.

Okay now on to the car wash.  My first sign should have been that the first bay I drove in did not take my credit card, but I thought to myself I'll just try another stall and just knock this out real quick.  Well I pulled into the next stall, slid my card through the machine and bingo I was off to a great start. I began rinsing off all the mud and salt from the week and switch quickly over to the soap feature to rinse off the last little bit of dirt.  I got all the way around the car and was just about ready to switch it over to the rinse feature again, and that is when things broke into absolute chaos.  See the hose sprung a leak and it was literally flailing all over.  It was like a scene from a cartoon, where the character chases after the out of control hose.  By the time I got a hold of the hose, I remembered to hit the off button cause that came a few seconds to late...thanks inner voice for that help, and then hung up the hose.  I walked to the driver side of my van, sopping wet and looking somewhat like a drowned rat, and realized that I should probably go to another stall and try and get the soap off the van.   I drove to the next stall and got out.  I went to swipe my card and yet another defeat...the machine was broken.  So that was two broken machines, and another stall with a broken hose, and a car that still had soap on it.  At this point I did admit defeat, got in the car and drove home.

See it doesn't seem to stop there because as I thought I would just throw the jeans into the dryer and blow dry my hair, I realized my jeans were too tight to take off wet.  Thank you very much food and wine I could not control over Thanksgiving and Christmas.  So there I was blow drying not only my hair before I had to get the kids from school, but my pants because lets face it that water was cold.

Now at this point I could only laugh because let me tell you, this story is so out there that I don't even know if I can make this stuff up.  So instead of crying and getting frustrated, I decided to today I would just laugh.  Because lets face it, I look a lot better laughing than crying.

It's been awhile.....

Wow...it has almost been over a year since I have decided to open up this account and start a post.  I am not quite sure why it has been close to a year, but it has.  I mean it could be a multitude of reasons, but the main reason is that I just have not made it a priority.  See I struggle every day to try and get all the things on my to do list so that I can start each day new with a new to do list.  I seriously hate seeing items carry from one day to the next.  I am not sure if it is an OCD thing or if it is a sign of failure in my mind because why couldn't I have gotten all the things done?  This is where my pressure on myself begins.

This year is my first year of not having kids during the day.  I went from being a teacher full time, to a full time teacher and mommy, to full time mommy, and now I am a full time mommy with no one at home.  I struggle with this because really what is my purpose?

I have always been one that needs to have a purpose, that way to measure that my day has not been wasted.  In my current situation I feel like a lot of my days are wasted.  Wasted on cleaning and prepping to then start it all over the next day.  It is like I am getting into a funk of unimportance.  Now I know that after writing that I am important and I do have a purpose, but it does not get those questionable voices out of my brain.

Those voices consume me most days.  I feel like I am drowning and there is no way to escape death.  I can't see past the few days ahead of me and it brings me further down to the bottom of the ocean, to only smother me with doubt and anxiety.  And the scary thing is that once I get to the bottom and the doubt sets in, so does the paranoia.  It gets so deafening that I begin to question the strongest of friendship I have and over analyze the texts or conversations, and I just am done.

As each new season of life that is brought upon my doorstep I try to embrace the new beginning, but this past change has truly sent me running in the other direction.  I have found that even before accepting this new season, I busied myself by taking on any responsibility to make me feel important or have a purpose rather.  I truly think I was afraid to have quiet and peace, and in that fear I busied myself and now here it is the end of January and I am burnt out.  I don't think I have ever felt so burnt out in my life.  I honestly think I had more energy when we were preparing for our last move here to Nebraska, completely the last week of my masters classes, finishing up report cards, and managing my two kiddos who were under three and one!  And as I reflect upon that burnt out and tiredness that I feel now, it scares me because honesty what is it that is that is causing it?

It is funny how I had my entire life mapped out at age 23, as I began my journey to Alaska to become that teacher I desired to become and now here I am a tired mom that herds her kids from point A to point B and trying to keep it together.  I don't regret one minute of where I am today or what I have done in the past, but I do wish I could get back to the surface to embrace this life I am suppose to live.  I wish that getting out of my own head and leaving those voices to be on mute was only as easy as typing those words.  I truly believe that it is a constant struggle and battle that I will endure until it is time for the next season to begin.  I feel uncomfortable and uncertain of this season I am in and I think that is what I struggle with the most.  It is uncomfortable.  I always have had that purpose or evaluation for me to allow myself to become better at what I was doing, but currently there is no evaluation or self check to see how I am doing.  I am simply living the season and hoping I am doing it right and attempting to not let those looking in judge me for the hot mess that I  am.

Now I want those reading to realize I am not writing this for pity.  I am writing this out so that I can reflect and see that maybe in a week or two I have gotten better.  I need to see progress.  I need to prove to myself that it will be okay and there is a continual purpose for me to be living in the season of life I am right now.  With all that being said, all I ask after you read this is that you just accept the crazy, hot mess I am and just be patient.  I won't be and probably can't be the person I was a year ago, but I am beginning to see that maybe the new person I am to become will be the best version yet.