2021

Today I wasn’t a good mom. Or a good wife. Or a good daughter. Or a good human to be around.

This last week in particular, as the Christmas decorations are down, Bridgerton fully binged, and winter settled firmly in, has the yucky, lingering Ground Hog day vibes from last March feeling insurmountable.

The mental fatigue of being a woman and a mom is always exhausting, but right now it feels unbearable.

They’re spending way too much time on devices.

We haven’t gone and done anything cool in the winter break.

School starts tomorrow back in person and I hope we did all the work correctly last week.

I’m so tired.

Everyone online is doing more.

I’m not a good mom.

I’m not living up to my potential.

I’m too old to be feeling this way.

I am four years away from my oldest heading to college and I’m still browsing program catalogues trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up.

Omg my oldest is four years away from college.

I haven’t saved enough.

I need to workout.

I need to not care.

I should care more.

This pandemic is a war of attrition.

It’s not just threatening to weaken our strength, it’s straight up stealing it some days.

Today was the day I felt all the weight of the last ten months crash down around me.

Putting being a mom and a wife and a friend aside, I struggled in the shadow of apathy as a human being right now, let alone the extra expectations I have put on myself.

And that’s enough!

I’m saying this for whoever else needs this right now.

Stop it.

This isn’t going to last forever. This is a today feeling and to quote Glennon Doyle “we can do hard things”.

I needed to repeat my 2021 word many times before it sunk in. (I like words or a phrase in lieu of resolutions. Now is the time to confess my 2020 phrase was “just us” and holy hell did we have more than enough of just us.. )

Appreciate.

Appreciate what you’ve gone through to remember what you can get through.

Appreciate your feelings even if they’re a little poopy pants grumpy grumperson right now.

It won’t last.

But you will.

Yes, tomorrow is another day. But sometimes instead of wishing today away, we need to sink in and really feel all the ugly. Because there’s something to appreciate even in the ugly moments when you’ve given yourself a time out in your bed, pajamas still on way past morning, and a mug that tells the world where your head’s at.

Like discovering Yellowstone in all its western-soapy glory.

Tomorrow won’t feel like today. But it’s ok to feel today too.