Holy Carp, It's August!

OK, first things first!  WHO MISSED ME????

I kid.  Sort of. 

We've been fairly busy this summer with life in general, and some things have changed while others have not.  I'm still not exercising consistently, but we have gotten Runner Girl doing some running almost every week at least.  The Rock has lost about 60 pounds in the last few months and is looking dang good.  He's feeling better too, which is important.  Bitty is walking and running all over the place, and Little Mister?  He potty trained in late May/early June, is night dry, and did soccer camp last week and had a blast.  We've had a few birthdays, too, meaning I now have a 12 year old, 3 year old, and 1 year old.  The Rock and Small Fry's birthdays are later in the fall.

My depression is better under control with my herbs.  The husband has drugs for his.  And he and I are both starting college in the coming weeks.  I had intended to go last fall, but the postpartum depression was killing me (almost literally), so I put it off.  I managed to find an online university that is fully accredited, comparable in cost to our local university (which is where the husband will be going), and will be starting there so I can still be the at-home parent while I earn my degree.  But this has all made me nervous that our world is going to fall apart again.

Last week, I went to a midweek thing at church where they were teaching couponing and home organization.  I missed the couponing part (but that's OK) because I had to leave early, but I did hear the part about home organization and cleaning.  See, my depression has this vicious cycle.  I feel unorganized and messy, and I get lazy and beat myself up, and I eat.  So I get fatter, less organized, messier, meaner to myself, and I eat.  And it just keeps going. 

The sister who shared her struggle with keeping her home in order had some great advice.  It wasn't exactly new, but the way she presented it spoke to me, and I've made a lot of headway in the house.  I've tried other systems and they overwhelm me.  But her advice was simple:  Decide what needs to be done on a regular basis, decide who is going to do it, and decide to keep doing it and keep going. 

That's it.  No timers.  No real schedules.  Nothing has to get done at a certain time every day.  She also said that, aside from a small daily list, only give yourself one or two things to do every day so that you will keep going.  So I made a chart with days and chores and names of who does what and what needs to be done daily, but it's not complicated at all.  And my depression?  Better.  The house?  Better.  Eating?  Better.  The husband?  Better!

This afternoon, I noticed that our thermostat had quit working.  Now, ordinarily, I would have been a bit embarrassed to tell the landlord because I would be entirely too embarrassed about the state of our house.  No matter how much I felt like I was cleaning, the house was still a wreck, and his sweet wife keeps their house pretty immaculate.  Granted, ours wasn't perfect and I have piles of stuff still in the dining room to put away and some things on the counter, but we'd gotten a lot of it caught up in the last week. So when I noticed the thermostat had no readout and I was pretty warm, I went up to tell him what was up, and on the inside, I wasn't panicked at all.  I didn't run back into my place to shove things in bedrooms or scour the kitchen.  The floor was mopped last night so the tile was clean (though I haven't gotten to the grout yet), fingerprints and smudges had been washed off the fridge and pantry doors last night, we've caught up on laundry, and Kiddo had cleaned up and vacuumed the hallway this morning. We'd just had an early dinner so there were some dishes around though not many.  The living room wasn't even bad because I'd folded and put away laundry and Kiddo had cleaned up the toys and trash.  So he came down and fixed the A/C and installed a bannister in the front stairs and I wasn't completely mortified!!

This gives me hope!  HOPE!  That I can keep the house better.  That I can put a stop to the vicious cycle of self sabotage.  That I can get rid of this weight and break the bad habits I've had for years and create new, good habits.  Because really?  I miss me.  And I want ME back.