love and fury

There's this thing that happened when I had another kid... my life turned into an insane zoo of diapers and potty training. Then there was the moving and traveling. Blogging wasn't important.

Over a year later and I'm like... maybe it is, because it was an outlet for me to say things. I sit here all day with two boys who are adorable but not great conversationalists. Then Jake comes home and we're both too exhausted to talk about much. My blog was a place for me to put down my thoughts and the moments that matter. Then I look back and it and am reminded why I love this crazy life I signed up for. SOOO here we go....

A lot has happened in the last year.

We learned we were leaving California to teach pilot training in Del Rio, Texas. Just a few miles from the Mexican border. I was in denial for quite some time. Now we're here, living in a house we bought and I'm like wow, this is real. Miles is one now, he runs around with his adorable curls and pot belly. He still hasn't grown teeth, he's still very much my baby. Graham is three and in preschool three times a week. The kid has soo much personality. Quite the handful. My days are a frizzy mess, trying to keep us busy, keep the house clean, etc etc. I've been battling the blues, desperately wishing I was closer to home and family.

I recently listened to Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle Melton. She describes my current situation perfectly. She says, "We get ourselves a mortgage and a minivan. We find a church. Who could ask for more? Life at home with three kids is rich, bursting at the seams with love, but I am stunned by the amount of work that caring for my children requires. Their needs are relentless. From dawn to dusk and then through the night I am reacting, responding, juggling, dripping with children. I am running a never-ending relay race, and since I am the only runner, I keep passing the baton back and forth to myself. My exhaustion is total. It is the best of times and the worst of times. I am both lonely and never alone. I am simultaneously bored out of my skull and completely overwhelmed. I am saturated with touch---desperate to get the baby off of me and the second I put him down I yearned to smell his sweet skin again. These days require more than I am physically and emotionally capable of, while requiring nothing from my brain. I had thoughts today, idea, real things to say, and no one to hear them.
    I feel manic all day, alternating between love and fury. At least once an hour I looked at their faces and thought I might not survive the tenderness of my love for them. The next moment I am furious. I feel like a dormant volcano, stead on the outside but ready to explode and spew hot lava at any moment. And then I notice he doesn't fit into his onesie anymore and I start to panic at the reminder that this will be over soon, that it's fleeting-- that this hardest time of my life is supposed to be the best time of my life. That this brutal time is also the most beautiful time. Am I enjoying it enough? Am I missing the best time of my life? Am I too tired to be properly in love? That fear and shame felt like adding a heavy, itchy blanket on top of all the hard.
    But I am not complaining, so please don't try to fix it. I wouldn't have my day or my life any other way. I'm just saying---it's a hell of a hard thing to explain---an entire day with lots of babies. It's far too much and not even close to enough."

When I listened to that. I thought, FINALLY! Someone gets it. Someone could describe so accurately how I feel during this crazy phase of my life.

So here's to the moms. Especially those far from home and family whose husbands work twelve hour days. Keep doing what your doing and know you're not alone.