Why Do They Put Up With Me?

I just realized that the posts I have been sending by email haven't been posting. Grrrr. I will post them one day this weekend.


Yesterday was my wedding anniversary and I remembered! Ok this may not seem like a bid deal but it really is. Since my first wedding anniversary it has been an issue. I thought it was the 28th instead of the 29th. My husband teased me so much about being a day early that I've made a special effort to remember.

That special effort lead me to be even more confused. It became a mental debate for me. Is it the 29th and I thought it was the 28th or is it the 30th and I thought it was the 29th.

This year I remembered correctly though and I was so proud! I got home and greeted everyone and beamed as I presented my husband with the card that I had loving purchased the day before.

And he forgot!!! My hubby who never failed to remember before, who got me a card and flowers for our day we met anniversary this year, who teased me so much he gave me a complex forgot! It was fabulous!!

It is a going joke at work that at 5:30 every night my hubby will call and ask when I am coming home. When I answer the phone he doesn't greet me or ask me about my day. Instead it is 'When are you going to be home?' He has picked up the kiddies from Daycare and then starts the countdown until when I will be home. This has been going on for months.

I finally got so aggravated with his habit of not greeting me after he did it 4 times one night in an hour and half. I mentioned it that night when I finally got home and it has been hit or miss since.

Tonight when he called he was super sweet. Asking me how month end was going and how I was feeling. Maybe he was feeling guilty about forgetting our anniversary, but it was so nice.

He then nicely asks me when I think I might be leaving. I told him it would be a while since I was in the middle of something. He tells me, 'Well I thought I would take the kids to McDonald's tonight since they were really good today. I just wanted to let you know that we weren't going to be home right away.'

My first thought was, No. You can't. You don't take them to playland, I do. I'm the fun parent. I am such a horrible wife and mother.

I should also throw in a disclaimer that this was probably the only way they were going to have dinner tonight since I haven't gone grocery shopping in about three weeks. My cupboards are bare. I think there is a package of hot dogs and a frozen pizza in the freezer, one lonely box of Mac and cheese in the pantry, and condiments and drinks in the fridge.

Since the kids and hubby are fed and there is nothing at home worth eating, I am stopping at our favorite hot dog place to get a gyros.

I haven't had a gyros in about a year, and hubby loves them so it is perfect. I get my craving taken care of, and get to remind hubby why I am the fun parent in one fell swoop.

Again, I am a horrible wife and mommy. No wonder he forgot our anniversary!

PMDD

I have pmdd and it sucks!

I was diagnosed about 10 years ago. It is horrible. Between this and my endometriosis I have horrible periods. My mood swings and cramps take pms to a whole new level. I miss work a couple of times a year because I just can't make myself to go in.

Saturday we went to my husband’s extended family Christmas party. We see these people once a year so my husband spends his time talking to his cousins and aunts and uncles he hasn't seen since the last party. It is never a lot of fun for those of us who married into the family, but this year was worse then normal. I was pmsy.

The party started fine and ended with me crying in the bathroom. It is sad when you are in a hall of almost a hundred people and feel alone. But this is what happens when my pmdd rears its ugly head.

I have only met most of these people six times, so we don't have a whole lot to talk about. I spent most of my time correcting talking to my kids. There are about 35 kids from age 1 to 19 so they can cause a lot of havoc. They also tend to run wild because their parents are too busy catching up with each other to pay attention to what their kids are doing.

I am sure I upset a few people in hubby’s immediate family. I was antisocial and pissed off at hubby. I spent half of the party typing an angry post. The rest of the party I was either crying in the bathroom or sulking not wanting to talk to anybody.

Hubby knows about the condition, but hasn't had to deal with one of my really bad times before now. My symptoms have been under control for the last several years. It seems to manifest itself more when I am tired and stressed.

Obviously I have been working too much, not eating so well as noted my attempt at buff-tober, and because I am never home, the kids want to sleep with me so I haven't been sleep well.

That Saturday I didn't sleep well, I hadn't eaten all day and we spent the afternoon running. All that created the perfect storm for my pmdd to manifest. Knowing why doesn't make it better, or any easier to deal with though.

The worst part of all this? I know I am being irrational. I just can't stop it. It is pms on steroids. One minute I am my normal happy self, the next I am throwing things, or crying hysterically. I am locked in my own head with all of these horrible feelings that I can't share. I don't want to share. And frankly I am scared to tell anyone.

I am scared that if I let someone see what is inside of me when I get like this they will know what true crazy looks like. Because in those moments I feel truly crazy. I am not in control.

I don't get violent, except throwing clothes or something soft occasionally, but I do yell. And that scares me. I know that emotional abuse is even more painful then physical abuse. It leaves no marks but causes deeper scars. So when I get like that I just shut down. I would rather internalize, instead of doing that to my hubby and kids.

But that causes a different problem. My kids don't understand why their mommy who always wants to snuggle and play is suddenly distant. That it varies from minute to minute a couple days a month but not the others.

Looking back at other posts and drafts of posts that never made it, I can see that my pmdd is getting worse. That means that the call to my doctor I have been putting off is now a top priority instead of somewhere on my to do list.

It helps to have some place to start though. Knowing that I can tell my doctor that my pmdd is getting out of control again instead of just saying I have been feeling irrational lately and don't know why makes it easier to make the call. It took an episode like I had on Saturday for me to start thinking about my pmdd. It has been under control for so long. that I don't think about it. Is this the only thing going on causing me to feel this way? I don't know. But it is a place to start.

Entranced

It just occurred to me that I haven't posted in over a week. I have been working on a couple of posts, but neither of them is finished yet.

The idea finally smacked me up side the head came to me that if I write my posts in email I don't have to worry about them going into Draft folder purgatory. And did you know that they made it so you can post from an email!? All these new fangled things, I swear. Yes, I are smart. S-M-R-T.

Anyway, my family is in town so I have been spending all my time with them since we are rarely in the same state anymore. My mom got to town a few days before the new arrival, and will be here until the New Year, but miracles do happen and my brother, his wife, and son were also in town!

I am not a big fan of my sister-in-law. The most recent reason because they almost didn't come into town. She wasn't going to take time off work, but wouldn't let my brother make the six hour drive alone with his son. My brother may not win a father of the year award, but he loves his son more then anything. And since he is a stay at home dad, I think he is capable of making the drive without her. In the end, they did come into town and that is what really matters. My kids got to spend time with their cousin, and I got to see my brother.

I tried to make sure I was giving my nephew the attention he deserved since I only get to see him once or twice a year, but it was hard. Fighting for my attention was this sweet little bit of nothin.

Brandon At One Week Old

I just want to nibble on his little hands.

Tell me you could resist!

He is the last baby of my family, so leaving that aside, and that he is my sister's child, and that I stood by her hospital bed for over three hours in three inch heels trying to bring him into the world, he is just sweetest bit of nothing I have seen since my children were born.

His mommy finally took him away from me since I wasn’t going to give him up. So I traded one sleepy boy for another. My Buckaroo fell asleep almost immediately following him climbing into my lap.

Sleeping Buckaroo

Looking at that picture, I can’t help but see glimpses of the boy and man he will become. Prior to being around my nephews, Buckaroo seemed little. Not little in the sense of height, because he is only and inch shorter then my daughter who is two years older, but little in the sense of young. Seeing him with his cousins, I was just struck by how much bigger he is both physically and emotionally.

I am a little sad to let go of the illusion of him being my baby/big boy and having to start seeing him as just a big boy. I don’t want another baby, or to keep him from growing up, it is just hard letting go of that time in our lives. I know I still have years before he will stop climbing in my lap to snuggle, years before I won’t be his comfort on the same level that his blanky is. And even after those years, I believe he will still run to greet me when I arrive home, and give me impromptu kisses and tell me he loves me; but he is grown up. He is turning into a big boy/little man.

I guess I didn’t pay as close attention to the loss of those years with my daughter because Buckaroo was born and suddenly my attention was split between the two. I had a more gradual realization with Angel Cakes. Watching her grow into herself and the person she will become has been easier because she always seemed older then her age. This is the Sassy Pants who at two told me that we needed to fix the lock on the cabinet because it was ‘dangerous’; it had ’chemicals’ in it. She said these words so effortlessly. When I look back at the pictures from when I brought Buckaroo home from the hospital, I can see what a baby she still was, but she just seemed so much older, more mature then her years.

I spent the time enjoying her and learning how to be a mom in each new phase of her life. With my son, I am more experienced and know that this is the end of those years. As much as I look forward to seeing the amazing children they will become when they enter school and later how they handle the challenges of every day life as an adult, I can’t help mourning for the passing of the baby years.