December 10, 2012
This has been a rough morning. I had a pretty good weekend – Saturday I went shopping with my sister then went to the Christmas parade our town puts on every year. I was probably more excited about this parade than my kids were, and for that hour and a half, I was happy. Genuinely, excitedly, in-the-Christmas-spirit happy! Then I woke up Sunday and still felt okay, but as the day wore on and I realized how much needed to be done (laundry, grocery shopping, more Christmas shopping) I started to feel overwhelmed. And those old familiar thoughts of “man, a hot fudge sundae sounds good right about now” were floating around in my head, so on my way to the grocery store, I got one. I sat in my car and savored every moment. Did it help? Yep. It did, but only for a while. I got home, cooked dinner, did some more laundry, looked around my house and just sighed. I didn’t even have the energy to tell my kids to pick up their stuff – I just looked at the mess (it wasn’t a huge mess, just homework, shoes, books – typical living stuff) and then went into another room. I woke up this morning feeling down and I can’t even put a specific reason on it. I’m also coming down with a cold, so I know that isn’t helping. My husband asked why I was pissed off, I told him I wasn’t pissed off I just felt down today and I didn’t know why. He asked “well what’s wrong?” I said I didn’t know. He said “well what’s going on?” I said again I DON’T KNOW. I mean really, what part of I DON’T KNOW can he not understand? To make matters worse, we’re having this exchange as I’m walking out the front door to go to work. Not exactly a good time to have a deep discussion. I got in my car and as I drove down the driveway, I bawled my eyes out. I think I’m feeling overwhelmed and frustrated: there’s so much Christmas shopping to be done, so much house-stuff that needs to be done, so many kids’ activities to deal with – it’s all just too much for one person to add to a 40 hour work week.
Speaking of work, my job is a source of conflict all its own. I have a good job, I do. I don’t mind the work and I’m good at what I do. My salary is very good for what I do (anywhere else, this would be a $10 an hour job, but I get paid considerably more than that) and the benefits are great: very affordable health insurance for my whole family, paid holidays, no nights or weekends, 3 weeks of paid vacation (in 2 years, I’ll be eligible for 4 weeks of paid vacation), a couple of yearly bonuses; I work only 15 minutes away from home and from my kids’ school, and my boss is very good about letting me leave to do whatever I need to do (orthodontist appointments, basketball games, etc), so it’s hard to just get up and walk away from all that. It’s a gravy job.
The problem is the people I work with: I’m the only woman here, I work with 7 men – most of whom don’t have more than a high school diploma (only 2 of them have college degrees). I don’t want to sound elitist, but to put it bluntly I work with a bunch of uneducated rednecks. My boss is probably the redneck-iest of all of them (want proof? Read this.) with the least education – he’s a good guy, but he thinks he knows it all and has no idea how to manage people. And he’s super lazy. SUPER LAZY. It’s hard to work for someone you don’t respect, ya know? The 3 “top dogs” around here are the real problem – my boss, and the 2 men directly under him: they’re not very smart and they don’t get along – I watch them make mistake after mistake and all the while they think they are smarter than everyone else. It’s really frustrating. Most of the time, it’s just my boss and I in the office, everyone else works at a different location, so I’m only around the others for one hour at lunchtime. I get along fine with the other 4 guys, I just wish they were women! If you can’t tell, I love connecting with women, so to not have that connection is hard (which is probably why I rely on YOU ALL so much). In an economy where so many people are looking for work, I feel like I don’t have the right to complain. And like I said, there are a lot of good things about this job, very important things (my husband is self employed, so our health insurance comes from my job), but it’s not the day-to-day stuff that keeps me here.
I don’t mind working, in fact I think I do better when I have a job outside of the home. I was a SAHM for 6 years and in that time my self esteem was really low. There are no raises or pats on the back when you stay at home (at least there weren’t for me). So I do get a lot out of working, I just wish that I enjoyed my job more. And maybe it’s just a matter of having the right perspective? Maybe I need to change my attitude. I don’t know, but spending 40 hours a week with people you don’t really care for is hard.
I have to say, I do feel better now since I’ve written all this out. I think I just let things overwhelm me and I don’t know what to do with all of the emotions and they build up until I either snap at my family or have a good cry. Guess I need to start getting it out in writing before it gets to that point!
Today is going to be a busy day – my daughter has a basketball game at 4:30, then right after that we have to go from the school to the PAC for the band Christmas program (my son and my oldest daughter are performing). I have no idea when or where we are going to eat dinner – it’s going to be 9:00 before we get home most likely. I hate having things like this fall on a Monday, Mondays are hard enough without adding in 2 extra activities!! Ugh.
Well, I think I’m done whining for today. Thanks for sticking with me – I appreciate you all more than you know!
Posted by Jill in fitness Tags: Mental health, overwhelm, weight loss
