The Unattainable Goal of Balance

I've spent all my 7ish meager years as a parent trying to figure out how to balance what my kids want and need with what I want and need. I have finally come to the conclusion that THERE CAN BE NO BALANCE. I don't believe you writers out there who write about balance as if you have achieved it.
(If you really have, teach me how. Please! I'm begging!)

HOW can there be balance when the children are so many and their needs outweigh mine by a truckload? And? Don't even get me started on the house! If it was just the kids, I think I'd be OK, but there is always more laundry, always more dishes, pet care, cleaning, and always bills to pay and errands to run and it's someone's birthday and I forgot to get a present and worse - I will have to go to the frickin' frackin' post office to mail it because everyone lives so damn far away!

BALANCE.

It can't be done.

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 In addition, I think the transition to homeschooling is really starting to weigh on me. It's not the school work, but there is never any time for myself. My husband works too much, at least right now, and we are always busy. We are hardly home, so it's not like we don't get out, but I'm starting to feel really isolated. It's weird now, going to play dates when everyone else's kids are in school. I feel like people are starting to pull away, because I always have my kids with me and can't do a lot of things anymore. Plus, I *do* have to teach them and that takes a lot of time and energy to do it the way I want! (The feeling of isolation is completely irrational, by the way. In the last week I have had coffee with a friend, had friends over for a movie night, had a lovely friend bring me a dish, went on a playdate and lunch with another friend and spent a morning at the pumpkin patch surrounded by wonderful people. What is my problem, anyway?!)
I've joined a homeschool group but I'm NOT good at meeting new people. Huge new group of people + lots of new places = very uncomfortable situation for me!
I get very intimidated and it's hard for me to open up right away. I'm a slow bloomer at friendship.
I will keep at it, and hope that it gets easier. I have to find a couple people I click with, but so far I haven't.
Having the kids with me all the time has some great upsides too. They are learning so much, and we are having SO much fun! I'm closer to them than I was, and I think homeschooling was absolutely the right choice for them.  I didn't want to do it at first. At times, I'm as overwhelmed as I feared I would be. However, I rarely feel convicted, but I could practically hear the voice in my head screaming that this is what I was supposed to do. I couldn't ignore it anymore.
That's a whole different topic...
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Anyway,  back to balance. How do you find it when one side of the scale holds a truckload of bricks and the other side holds a cup, just begging to be filled? Is this one of those times when you just stop complaining, and put your head down and plow through it? I'm good at that; I've got experience there... just grit your teeth and keep going. But, I have to know that it's the only option. Is balance as unattainable as it feels?

ha. ha! Part II

Remember my last post, where I said I was sick while we were at the beach? Well, I finally sucked it up and decided to go to the doctor because I was wheezing with every breath and having a hard time getting a deep breath. It turns out I don't have a sinus infection; I have pneumonia! (which I also cannot spell!)
I don't get sick enough to go to the doctor very often, so I put it off a lot longer than I should because it involved D taking time off work, me calling (yuk) and driving across town and waiting and blah, blah, blah. I'm glad I did it, though, because if I'd waited too long I could have ended up in the hospital. I woke up this morning feeling worse than ever, but with 2 doses of antibiotics in me, I'm hoping I start to feel better soon!
I'm taking today to rest after I googled pneumonia last night. It scared me a little bit and I certainly don't want to get worse! I blame my high stress level before our vacation for a weakend immune system that allowed this to develop. I don't know if that idea holds any water, but it gives me a good reason to take it easy.
I even convinced D to work from home today and do all the running around I would have been doing. He'll probably have to work over the weekend, but hopefully I'll be feeling better by then.
September, despite being my birthday month, has had a lot of problems. If we hadn't been to the beach last week, it would be a big disappointment. Today's Fall temps have me in a pretty decent mood though, so here's hoping the rest of September looks up!

ha. ha!

Until last week, we hadn't been to the beach in over 2 years. We eat up a lot of D's vacation time (and our money) traveling to Missouri to visit my family or Texas to visit his/mine, so we don't get to go on beach vacations that much. (first world problems... I know. )
Anyway, I have been having a rough time with D working 12+ hour days for weeks on end, no weekends, homeschooling, no time to myself, etc, etc. To say I'd been looking forward to this vacation is HUGE understatement. So, of course I got sick before our vacation... of course I did.
And then, I got MORE sick while we ON vacation. I had this hacking, nasty, smoker-sounding cough and no voice for all of our days at the beach. Oh, and a giant headache. I took a lot of Ibuprofen and I have to admit that my visions of the beach included margaritas and NOT cherry flavored cough syrup. Gross.

Anyway, I still had fun! How can you not have fun when you're on the beach?! We went mini golfing, went to a mini carnival and D and d rode dune buggies. D and my dad (because my parents were awesome enough to come with us and increase the child:adult ratio!) went scuba diving, and we spent a lot of lovely time with our toes in the sand. D & I even managed to go on two little date nights to celebrate our 15 years together. (the 20th is the 15th anniversary of our first date) Despite my hacking sexiness, he still  wanted to take me out. ;) The trip was too short, as always. My parents have gone home now, D's back at work, our fall break is over and we started school back up today, so today is definitely a BIT of an adjustment day.

I spent $250 and then I cried.

A short story.
This morning the cats were fighting, after about a month of getting along again. I made an appointment at the vet and we went with 2 kids in tow and 2 in preschool. The vet took forever. I spent $250.
Pip is physically healthy except he needs to lose 2 pounds.
The options for the aggression were as follows:
Keep them separated
Control the environment (which both the vet and I agreed is not really possible in this house)
Spray which calms the cat - except he's aggressive when startled and that's it - so we're not sure this will work.

I left feeling like all my questions were answered but nothing was really done. It's a behavior issue and there's no telling what's going to set him off. About 30 minutes later I was crying because it finally hit me that the only option is to find a new home for one of them.
The End.

Does this cat look like a bully?

One Precious Hour

Today is my birthday! I've been 31 for about 3 and a half hours now. I really wanted to take the day off, but D is working overtime and there was a lot to do today and well, realistically, today is just another day.
So, I took the two younger kids to their first day of preschool, took the two bigger kids to pick out my birthday cupcakes, to the grocery store, then to the park and then off to their science class.

That's when it happened. I was alone.

I had ONE precious hour all to myself. I also had a large salted caramel latte and a box of cupcakes. Yes, I sat in the car (alone!) and ate my decadent chocolate cupcake (alone!) and drank my delicious coffee (alone!) with no one asking for anything, or talking, or fighting. It was quite lovely - albeit a little pathetic - that a quiet hour alone is the best I can hope for at the moment.

After my precious hour was over, we ate packed lunches and picked up the little kids from preschool and came home. I've gotten some lovely presents in the mail from some lovely people, and cards from the kids and D bought us a new mattress which is something I've wanted for a long time! It came yesterday and it's heavenly! All in all, it's been a pretty good birthday.

First day of school pictures: