Ugh, Talk About Mama Drama

I had an anxiety attack yesterday afternoon. It came out of nowhere and suffocated me. I was making bead necklaces with my kids and I was hating every second of it. The knots wouldn't tie right. The beads kept rolling off the table, falling to the floor so Liz would get down off of my lap and try to eat them. Erin didn't want Meghan to use certain letters, even though we all know she can only spell "Meghan" one way. And Erin had scammed me into believing that she was sick again yesterday so I had let her stay home. This came on the heels of four days of Erin being home and acting like an absolute animal. I just wanted her back in school, but her throat was bright red and I swear I saw raised things back there. I can't send her to school with her possibly having strep! After a trip to the pediatrician (again!) revealed that she did not have strep, she was bouncing up and down in one place as if an invisible pogo stick had been rammed up her backside. She was a maniac. I was done. I had had it. And I wanted to be anywhere but here.

And I started to freak. I started sweating and feeling shaky and my heart was racing and I could not think of one thing or one place in the whole world that could get me to snap out of it. It was awful. I took a deep breath, got a glass of water and walked away from the beads. It began to slow, as did my heart. It went away. And I hope it never happens again. For those few seconds, although nothing terrible happened, I had no control over anything. I was being sucked away or being drowned. It wasn't my life. I was like a comet hurling through space and I had no idea where I would land. The only thing I was aware of was wanting to make sure that when I landed, it wasn't on one of my kids.

I didn't land on them. I landed on Instant Messenger. I reached out to Jaclyn, even though I knew she was "away" and told her what happened. And then I went back to my life.

So why the hell, after all this time, all these years of feeling a bit better mentally than I was in the days of old, did this happen?

I guess it's because I've been having a pretty rough couple of days. Not happy. Dissatisfied. No exercise. No time alone. Every single second, someone is yelling, screaming, crying and demanding something from me...whether it's food, drink, hugs, refereeing, kisses, sympathy, or other countless, nameless things...it's always, always something. And they've been sick, or playing sick, and not sleeping, which means I'm not sleeping, and we all know how well I cope when I'm sleep deprived, which I always am. And Pete, whether it's just for now or forever, is working all day and into the night. A longer work day for him obviously means a longer one for me, too. And I am wondering when we'll know for sure if my brother is one of the Marines from Camp Lejeune who will go to Afghanistan. It happens to be a stressful time right now...and my coping skills are in the toilet. It's like I'm having a giant-mommy-sized-internal-monologue temper tantrum and I just want everything to be different than it is at this very moment. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

I left last night after dinner to do a Tastefully Simple party and gave myself some time to think about all of this stuff. Because, frankly, I was on my nerves. Thank God I did...because that little bit of introspection (and telling myself to knock off the bullshit) led me to a crossroads. One where I could choose the path of resistance and self-pity (one that, if chosen, would require me to have more panic attacks and temper tantrums and would continue to make me want to sell my kids), or the other path that would lead me to dig deeper, step it up and realize that this is a point in our lives where we must BOTH work harder for our family and I must cope better with the stress that life brings on a daily basis. Despite my lack of a paycheck, I just have to work those extra hours to hold us together and maintain peace and order within the confines of this home. And I really think the kids are revolting against me lately because I haven't been stepping it up. They see it. I haven't. Maybe I've wanted to resist adjusting to this new way of life...where he is working his face off, and not here, and consequently belonging to someone and something else besides me. Maybe I want things to be the way they used to be. But they're not. We are here, he has a different job with so much more responsibility and many more pressures. He needs me bitching because I didn't get to go to the gym and the kids won't play nice? Please!

So obviously I am choosing the path where I stop being a bitch and the internal whining switch gets shut down. If I won't tolerate whining from my kids, why should the same behavior be acceptable from me? It isn't. To place such high standards of behavior on them without imposing the same expectations on myself is ludicrous. And unjust. And maybe that's what all this acting out has been about...maybe they're trying to tell me that I need to set the example for them to follow. If I don't want them acting out, maybe I should stop leading them in that direction.

So panic attacks are banished. And feeling sorry for myself is done. I've got the world by the ass. And I've wasted the past few days, days I will never get back. I've squandered precious moments with them, and been so much more concerned with the way things aren't that I haven't been able to see just how good they are.

And really...they are.