Time, Energy, Balance- ?
I have been feeling inadequate lately. Part of this stems from two months of sitting around doing next to nothing, and part of this is just me feeling, well, kinda normal.And I am normally inadequate.
I can’t figure out why we just can’t run at the same pace other people do. I feel like I’m not accomplishing much, and I look at people who are up early, like I am, who go all day, like I do, and then who fill up every evening with meetings and classes and plays and activities- which I DO NOT DO BECAUSE I CAN’T TAKE IT, and then I feel not good enough.
Also, I have set some pretty broad no drama, no muss, no fuss rules in my life and household because I can only take so much emotionally. This is healthy self preservation. I just refuse to deal with certain types of people and events that I know are going to do nothing but take away from my energy. Some things I have to do. Right now, I have to have a screaming three year old in my life- I do not have to have high-maintenance, high-drama relationships with people who have a high potential for combustion- so I don’t. I’m fine with crazy friends who takes as much as they give. It’s the users I just don’t bother with.
Basically, I know how much energy I have to function with. I know it isn’t much, and so I try to use it only on the have tos and the want tos, and not the feel-obligated-to-put-up-with-this-crap-stuff.
Even so, I feel like a slacker.
I told Chris that we need to start doing things on the weekends. Don’t get me wrong, we do stuff. Sunday is always church, and the house usually gets a little cleaner on Saturday- but we don’t plan a whole lot of fun stuff. Very few family field trips. We’re boring.
Then this past week came along. We managed to have an evening activity that kept us out until after nine pm wed-sat, and then a piano recital after church today. I’m pooped. I don’t know if I can keep up and retain my mental health. Granted, every week isn’t like that. We usually don’t have more than two nights that get busy, and I protect that like crazy. My kids aren’t involved in oodles of activities because I will lose my mind if every day has an event. Am I a bad mother or a smart mother? Some days I’m not sure.
So I must know- I am a huge wuss because I literally want to just shut down every evening, or is that pretty normal and the handful of overachievers I hang out with are just blessed with a greater capacity to do stuff than I am?
Oh my goodness, Leah, you pretty much nailed how I feel a lot of the time, especially when you said, “- I do not have to have high-maintenance, high-drama relationships with people who have a high potential for combustion- so I don’t. I’m fine with crazy friends who takes as much as they give. It’s the users I just don’t bother with.” There is a family member that fits this and every time I have to deal with her I want to scream and it really frustrates me that I don’t deal with it better. I just don’t have the energy or the desire to deal with the drama and manipulation anymore but don’t know what to do- it’s so hard when it’s part of my husband’s family who lives in the same town and we keep getting thrown together in family things. Tonight she tried to be friendly to me and I don’t buy it. We’ve been through too much over many, many years and I am having a hard time with the whole “Stop it” thing. Just know that SO many of us can relate to what you are going through, Leah. You are definitely not alone in your feelings of inadequacy…I think we all go through that and some days are harder than others. There is always more to do than time to get it done in, we have to choose what is most important to us and learn to be okay with not doing it all. And, those who are a drain on me just can’t have a place right now- my energy has to be elsewhere. I hope that you have a good rest and can have a fresh start tomorrow.
i am SO with you on the not too busy part of life. i can’t handle it either. i have friends who simply run and run and run all the live long day and night, and thus, so do their kids. i don’t like having to be somewhere every day. i have friends who think i am probably a bit boring, but i’m cool with that. and i do not have my kids in a lot of extra activities. we are homebodies and i’m sooooo cool with that
you should be too 
oh and, my body can’t handle it anyway.
when i have a super busy few days then it pretty much shuts down and then i just end up losing a day or two in resting recovery. being diseased will do that to a person
I commend you for not overloading your kids with activities. It leaves them plenty of unstructured free play, which so many kids don’t get and it’s so important for the development of creativity. As they get older your nights maybe be a little fuller, depending on the kids interests, but you have set the tone, that live isn’t going to be crazy nuts all the time. Me on the other hand…I’m hyper-kinetic and feel completely inadequate if I’m not always busy, I feel like there is always something that I need to be getting done.
When my two boys were younger, we limited their activities because I did not want them, and therefore me, to be overscheduled. I saw too many people who had their children in three or four different things at the same time. Our neighbour’s son actually had four different things one Saturday, in addition to a birthday party in the middle! When we signed up for swimming lessons, they both had to be at the same time (give or take 15 minutes) so that we only made one trip to the pool. Same with their skating lessons when they were older. The only time they had two different activities in one week was at the end of the Scouting year when the swimming lessons overlapped with Scouting for a couple of weeks.
Now, it is a different story. They are older and they have chosen different paths. One is a competitive figure skater who skates 6 times a week on four different days but he is a serious athlete and he chose this for himself (silly me for wanting him to learn to skate so that he could go and skate on the Canal with his friends!). The other son still does Scouts and plays guitar. Once they are old enough to really want to pursue those things, it is harder to say no (I think that all of their activities now are valuable for them). At 12 and 14, our life has become busier but I am so grateful for having had the time when they were younger when we weren’t racing around to different things and when we had free time in the evenings. We still do make the most of the free evenings that we do have and, every so often, we have a pyjama day where we don’t get dressed and we all hang around the house just relaxing.
On the days when I do have something in the evening (something of my own, not the children’s), I do feel more tired. I do really look forward to the easy, non-scheduled evenings at home. Enjoy them! Don’t worry about what others are doing, only worry about doing the best for your family and for yourself. You have happy children, you are doing a lot of something right with them!
I so agree. If Im not constantly doing something I feel horrible guilt, like the whole world is going to come crashing down because I spent an hour on pinterest instead of cleaning my kitchen cabinets and scrubbing the bathroom floor like everyone else seems to be doing all the time… I constantly feel like an inadequate house-keeper, a mediocre student, an inattentive mate, an unavailable daughter and a crappy friend. Thank goodness we dont have kids yet, I can only assume this will all get a jillion times worse.
Sorry I dont have much advice to give you, but know that you are not alone, sometimes we just need a nap and theres nothing that will suffice except to stop moving and sleep for an hour. And besides, kids need to be able to occupy themselves sometimes, rather than have activities scheduled for them constantly, and the same goes for adults.
I don’t think you are the only woman in this world to feel inadequate, Leah. I see us compete in having “perfect lives”, but what is the perfect life?
I have stoppet comparing myself to others. I see people run like chickens without heads, accomplishing a lot more than I do, and I have wondered: how do they do it? How do they have the energy? And I came to a conclusion: they sacrifice something on the road. It’s too bad they don’t have to sit down to listen (I mean real LISTEN) to their kids, spouses and friends, and that meeting for a cup of coffee has to be sceduled weeks in advance. And their kids are just like that: high shoulders at the age of ten, really stressed out as soon as they have nothing planned for the evening.
Who do I want to impress? Who cares (but me) if the kid’s closets are filled to the brim with clothes they have grown out of? Who will admire my lovely decorated house ore perfect garden as nobody have time to come and see it anyway? And do I need the admiration to feel good and valued? When I die, will they remember me for my perfect garden or for beeing a friend who had time?
And how do we value others? By the number of cakes they bake and how little sleep they can say they function on? By how many numbers of meetings in the school board or church they go to, or by what they really make happen?
We say NO to filling up the every day with pre schedules activities for both kids and adults. I want to have room for Life to happen, without spending hours on resceduling. Call me boring, but I want my health and sanity to last long enough to enjoy my retirement days.
I say smart mother. But that’s likely because I’m about the same.
Having a sometimes-playdate on Tuesday mornings and Wednesday evening swim lessons and Thursday morning homeschool co-op is almost too much for me (although granted, I am having to get all four kids dressed and ready and out the door for all that), and sometimes church on Sunday. I have no idea how friends manage to run their household, get all the kids off to school, and have activities/sports every night and games on weekends. There’s no way I could do all that, no way.
You’re a smart mom! and I say this from a complete outsider’s point of view. I have no children but teach and so I have a bit of insight and I also read an article this weekend on just this topic> It is NOT healthy fro children to have every hour of every day planned! There must be time for just “being children”, just being at home with no particular plan for the day. Children with no “down time” can become very stressed by constantly being on the go!
Just keep doing what you’re doing! As long as it’s your best and what you consider to be in the best interest of your children- nothing else matters!
Remember slow and steady wins the race. It’s better to be slowly moving forward than running like a mad woman for a few miles and collapsing on the side of the road. Don’t use anyone else as your life gauge. No one is perfect-they are just better at hiding their inadequacies!