Anxious

I'm pretty much a basket case lately.    

I have not really ever been good with changes.  I have always been good at being anxious.  As a kid I was a little ball of anxiety.  As an adult, I manage it better.  Lately though, I haven't been managing it as well as I'd like.  

My dreams are crazy tales of tiny, itty-bitty turtles climbing under my skin and having to sing a solo without any recollection of the words for a big concert.  Frantic searching for the song ensues until I wake myself up and reassure myself that it was a dream.  A stupid, anxiety-inducing dream.  That is it.  You know it's bad when your dreams start throwing you into fits of anxiety.  

My stomach has been churning and my mind has been clogged.  It all makes me irritable and unable to focus on what is really important.  

I'm not a total mess, though I'm not sure my managing techniques are really that awesome.  Last night in frustration I sought out the ice cream.  I scooped myself a generous scoop and then heard a little voice in my head say, "That will make you unhappy if you eat it."  I replied to the voice in my head, "I don't care."  Except I did and so I put the ice cream back.  (I have been working hard at listening to that voice in my head and trying to find other ways to soothe myself) 

This introduction may give you cause to think things in my life are pretty horrible.  They are not.  They are good.  The kids are good.  Mike is good.  Tennessee is good.  

I'm just stressed.  

I have a new calling (second counselor in the RS).  I have never been a counselor in the RS so it's a new experience for me.  I am over compassionate service and the activities.  Also, we have a new business.  Our business is called Lilac Harvest which has nothing to do with harvesting Lilacs.  We are making wooden silhouettes, mostly of people, but we also decided to make temples and are considering other things as well like gift tags, ornaments, holiday decorations, etc.  I made some silhouettes of my family with my scroll saw.  We had a bunch of people encourage us to sell them but it took me quite awhile to make one and I just couldn't see myself spending that much time to make them to sell.  When some friends from our ward who own a few businesses encouraged us to make some, Mike started thinking about it seriously.  We decided to give it a try and bought a machine that would allow us to make them much quicker.  Then we had some other friends express interest in joining with us and helping with the business side of things so Mike and I could focus on the production side and suddenly we had a real business.  It seems pretty bizarre to me when I think about it.  What really seems crazy to me is that to make this work I have to learn a few programs and learn how to run this huge machine.  I am not a technological person so it's been frustrating to me on a number of occasions.  I am slowing learning them.  

The other thing weighing on my mind is the homeschooling decision, which really isn't as set in stone as my last post led you to believe.  I go back and forth every day, multiple times a day.  There is just so much I like about the public school system and so much I dislike.  Also, I feel like there is so much to me that I would have to sacrifice if I home school and I'm not sure I am selfless enough to give those things up.  When I look into the future and think of what I want for my kids there are many ways that I see homeschooling being the solution to helping us achieve those things.  But then there are other goals I have for them that the public school system provides much better than I feel I can (at least not without a lot of effort on my part).  Anyway, taking my kids out in the middle of a school year worries me.  There are a lot of reasons I look forward to homeschooling and a lot I dread.  Mike keeps saying I just have to decide what I want more and that is the problem--I am having a hard time deciding that.  

Adding to our stress is basketball season.  The boys wanted to play this year.  They have never played.  We never even owned a basketball until recently.  They are on different teams with practices on different days, at different schools, at different times. Try-outs were hard for me to watch.  Isaac did fine but he is in a younger age group and naturally athletic.  He wasn't the best, he wasn't the worst.  He didn't really stand out to me either way.  Will's try-outs were bad though.  There were about 60 kids and Will was easily the worst of the kids.  He cried, I cried.  He said, "I knew I was bad but I didn't know I was that bad" and "I knew I was doing bad but when the coach came and patted me on the back and said 'good job' I knew everyone else knew I was doing bad."  On the drive home he said, "Mom, I am committed to getting better.  I am going to practice an hour every day."  So far, he's been pretty good at doing that too.  The other day it was 27 degrees outside and we were outside in coats, hats, and gloves, dribbling the ball, practicing lay-ups and rebounding.  He has made drastic improvements already and I am really proud of his hard work.  His coach is not friendly but he is not unkind and he said while Will is a few years behind, he has potential and he is proud of Will's hard work so far.  

Anyway, all of this is happening while Mike is finishing up the semester.  He leaves after we get the kids to school and comes home after 7 every night but Friday.  Piper tags along with me in the day and then I shuttle kids to scouts and basketball after school, all my kids in tow.  We do Family Home Evening and dinner without Mike but he gets home usually when we are reading scriptures and kids are brushing their teeth for bed.  It's not the worst schedule but it's not an easy one either.  

Mainly, I just wonder how I am going to manage all of it.  My calling is a busy calling.  This business is requiring a lot of my time and homeschooling is a huge lifestyle change for our family.  It's all a lot of change for me in a matter of a few months (not including living in a completely new state and new home).  So, it's a lot for me.  I'm thankful we are all healthy and I'm so blessed with a wonderfully supportive husband who encourages me and when he is home, he is fully invested in the happenings in our home.  He helps me research homeschooling curricula, teaches us all piano on Sundays, goes directly from school to Will's basketball practices so I don't have to stay with all the kids, he helps empty the dishwasher and puts Piper to bed half of the time.  Mostly, he just tells me that I can do all these things and that I can do them well.  I'm grateful for that.  

I think this is just an important time for me of stretching and growing.  I am not a patient person.  I don't handle stress well.  I shy away from hard things.  I don't usually feel the need to excel in something--I'm fine just being mediocre.  Maybe this is my chance to really learn how to manage stressful things better.  Maybe I will look back on this time and say, "Whoa, I did all of that" and maybe, hopefully, I will see myself being somewhat successful at some of it.