Thursday, December 4, 2014

In which I bitch and moan and verbalize a mid-life crisis.

Argh. I'm a bit disgruntled and annoyed. I think it's more hormonal than anything else, but I am finding myself perturbed at EVERYTHING. People on FB are annoying me with their racist bullshit. Actually, FB is just annoying me period.

The quarter started yesterday. I'm already annoyed and overwhelmed. My TR class are on the other side of campus. Not a big deal, but sorta. It's a giant PITA that I didn't want to have to deal with this quarter. Uh, I don't understand why there are the same amount of courses offered each quarter and suddenly there's no room in my building for me to teach in. Blerg. Whatevs.

Aside from hormones, I am also not dealing well at all with turning 39. I don't want to be 39. I don't want to be almost 40. I am totally having a midlife crisis. I feel as if I've accomplished nothing. I'm still struggling with trying to be healthy and fit and do all the work I need to do. I get up at the crack of dawn to work and it's still not enough. Magpie is getting so bi. I hate that I can't quit my job, spend time with her, do freelance stuff or something and support my family. My life feels cluttered and impossible right now.

I know, woe is me. I've been complaining for months now. I think it stresses me out having more than 2 adults in the house. When it's me and J, I'm fine. Me and my mom, I'm fine. Me and dad, I'm fine. Any other combination that equals three adults and one baby, and well, I'm just stressed. I actually sort of hate my schedule, but I cannot envision any other schedule for myself that would not involve the kid being in daycare from 7:30 am until 4 pm every day of the week. 8:30 until 4 is too much I think. I hate it.

My head hurts. My body hurts. I thought I'd get some stuff done over break, but surprise, the baby was sick and not in day care for the whole break. We did get tubes on Tuesday, so hopefully this will be a new start for her. I have so much to do.

Seriously, the last two months have been me dreading Saturday (my birthday) and like crying daily about it. And consuming chocolate. Like crazy. And that's not me. I am totally and utterly depressed. Lethargic. Blah. I know all of the things I need to do to better, but I cannot bring myself to do any of them. Even my Christmas spirit has been dampened, and I'm like Clark Griswold when it comes to freaking Christmas. I start celebrating Nov. 1. And now I'm just like "whatever."

Sigh.

I know. This is pathetic. Ugh. I'm sorry I'm such a downer! This blows. I need to figure out how to get to where I want to be so I don't have another breakdown next year when I turn 40! Egads.

I'm sorry for being a debbie downer.


6 comments:

  1. You are perfectly entitled to come here and be a Debbie Downer, or just a normal person trying to juggle everything and feeling like they can't do everything well enough. Much better to have a good rant here, maybe get some sympathy (virtual hugs! (((Maude))) ), than to take it out on people around you.

    Here's hoping things get better as the quarter winds to an end...

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  2. I just did this when I turned 39!!!!!! I also feel sucky and miserable and unaccomplished. Solidarity!

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  3. Maude, I am so sorry. Could this be one of those times when you feel bad bodily and then it's coming out as psychological (like my midwife said about low-level pain that the body can feel but we can't really feel exactly)? Because you have so totally accomplished a lot. You have a PhD. You got your dissertation done in totally trying circumstances. (Remember? Your advisor died.) You have a husband you love and a gorgeous baby girl who gets sick all the time. You have a job that you like (your second job -- so you know you're hireable!). That's a lot. Think of Bridget Jones! She'd be happy with any one of those things (though she'd obviously like the husband the best).

    But I'm sorry you're overwhelmed. And of course you're overwhelmed. I really didn't feel like I came up for air until Absurdist Child was 5 (a year ago), and even so I still feel torn between job and home (actually more than ever now that Partner and child are at home) to the point that I too wish I could freelance and spend more time at home. (Sometimes it helps for me to think of getting out of the academy in a ten-year plan, which also corresponds to when I can get my student loans cancelled after ten years of paying them dutifully and working at an educational institution -- this is a standard plan through Department of Ed that you may want to look into if you haven't already.) My answer to my overwhelm is checking out and watching movies late at night. (Really embarrassing ones, like Austenland. Ridiculous. Wonderful. Probably not your cup of tea, but I love it.)

    I think it's amazing that you can function with your parents around so much. I would totally freak out. (I used to fantasize about them helping much more than they do because of course my family sucks like that -- they've never come out to visit and never will because they think we should visit them only -- but hearing about your fam being around so much makes me realize that I'd probably go bonkers (of course, this depends on the family in question), but I wonder: maybe they should only be around so much if they are helping you, rather than stressing you out. You have enough stressors! If they're around so much, why aren't they helping with Magpie so she doesn't have to spend so much time in daycare?

    You may be turning 39 tomorrow, but I'm turning 42 in two weeks. (I found my forties freeing, actually, because I don't have to be cool or hip or anything, but I'm not so naturally cool as you.) It could always be worse.

    Now you understand why I haven't called you in so long! Total overwhelm. But I'm sending you my phone number so you feel like you could call me any time, even though I know you totally don't have any time to!

    I'm sending you the biggest hugs in the world!

    Hey, let's close our eyes and think about going to get drinkies at Fancy Pants. I'll meet you there in five, four, three. . .

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  4. Ooh, also, I think that my hormone fluctuations have gotten worse. When I have PMS, I seriously think that everything is terrible and everything sucks and it will never get any better and yuck. I seriously hate everything. Chocolate is necessary during these moments. It goes away after but I seriously think I'm spiraling into a serious black hole every time. Maybe this is happening to you too.

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  5. Life feeling cluttered and impossible is exactly how I feel right now. Thank you for giving me the words to explain it, thinking of you and hoping you feel better soon

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  6. Thank you everyone for the commiseration. My birthday was very low key and quite nice. I'm still just so blah though. I've been thinking about things that I can do to get me to where I want to be and how to get there. So I'm trying to be positive about things right now and how I can make 39 good so that I do view 40 as even worse. It seems like a lot of energy for such a trivial thing, but I'm so glad that it's not just me who feels this way. Thank all!

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