Hopeless and Alone

The last few weeks have been a struggle for me.

Every day seems to be nothing but avoidance, excuses, and a whole lot of backsliding. It is SO frustrating, because I was doing so well for months, and I don't know what has changed in my life to cause the change in my mindset.

I really wanted this to be a positive and uplifting blog, full of inspiration and ideas and encouragement, but how can I make a blog like that when I'm constantly feeling like I'm just not good enough and I'm just not doing enough? When I'm constantly overwhelmed and always feel like its all just too much?

I know, I know. Baby steps, right? One day at a time, one thing at a time, just keep up, don't worry about getting ahead... but it feels like "just keeping up" doesn't show any actual progress.

Everything just stays the same.

It doesn't help that with a hubby on the night shift, two constantly sick kiddos, and an average outdoor temp of 30 degrees, I am basically confined to the house. So even though I tell myself every day to "just keep up" and not worry about anything else, I still SEE everything else.

Constantly.

Every single day.

And I see it all not getting done. I don't see it ever getting done.

Gradually, little by little, day by day, it wears on me. And I start to lose hope again. I get more and more frustrated, more and more overwhelmed, more and more lonely, more and more depressed. Because nothing is happening. My house is on hold, my days are on hold, my life is on hold. Always. Something needs to change, but I don't know what. I don't know how.

I feel lost. I feel helpless. I feel alone.

                                    

I don't WANT to

When I started this blog a few months ago, I fully intended to conquer this house and all of my messiness issues. To start at the beginning and work my way through. But I can't seem to get over that initial hump. 

The one where I know what I should do. I know how much the boring day-to-day stuff will help, I know that putting things off will only make it harder when I finally get around to it, I know that it's all about baby steps, but I still never do it. 

Logically, I know that the time when my son is in preschool for three hours and the baby is down for her nap would be an ideal time to get caught up. To do the non-negotiables that I was supposed to do last night (or last week). But when I finally do get those few hours of time without someone demanding my constant attention, all I want to do is nothing. 

I want to sit and watch a tv show, or read a book, or color (yes, I still love to color), or something equally easy on my brain. I don't want to clean!

It is baffling to me how people are able to get past this. M says that when he sees something that needs to be done, he just does it. Because it needs to be done. 

Except it doesn't. 

He sees a counter full of dishes and immediately commences to washing them, because they need to be done.

I see a counter full of dishes and walk right past them, because there is still one bowl left in the cabinet for my cereal. So obviously, those dishes don't need to be done right now.

Wait. 

Okay, I just noticed something. 

When I wrote what I would do, I specified that dishes don't need to be done right now. But I didn't do that when I wrote about what M would do. So maybe that is the difference? M thinks "well yes, they don't need to be done right now, but they DO need to be done eventually... might as well do them now before it gets any worse." Hmm... I will have to follow up with him to confirm.

Either way, that still brings me back to one of my main problems, and my biggest "excuse" when it comes to things like housework. I just don't want to do it.

So I don't. 

And I am starting to realize that is kind of important in this process. 

I do want it to be done, I do want it to be better, I do want to be less stressed and less distracted, I just don't actually want to spend the small amounts of free time I have actually doing it. I glance at a counter full of dishes, or a table full of clutter, or a pile of clean laundry and think "eh. Not interested." Then I promptly forget about it and move on to something that IS interesting.

How do I make myself want to do it? How do I see something that I don't want to do, that I know doesn't actually need to be done right now this second, and make myself do it anyway?