I'm finding myself feeling overwhelmed. I'm sure it's a combination of lots of things--primarily lack of sleep and stress at work, but I find myself getting so tired and feeling all this weight pressing down on my shoulders. I'm sure we have all been there before; we have so many different roles every day, it's hard to juggle them all without dropping one every now and then. I guess the trick is not letting them all drop at the same time. I am trying to focus mainly on losing weight and transforming my life, but I still have all these other roles that I deal with daily--mom, employee, daughter, friend and more. It would be nice if we could all be on a TV show like the Biggest Loser where the only job you have is to get fit and lose weight. But that isn't the real world.
First and foremost I'm a mom and at times I find myself feeling guilty for spending so much time focusing on myself and putting some of my needs and wants ahead of Toby. I think that guilt is compounded because I am a single mom and it's pretty much always just been me and him. Since he was little, I have overcompensated for the fact that his father wasn't around and have tried to be both mother and father to him. Granted he's a teenager and doesn't need or want me around as much as he used to but I think sometimes he misses me always being home. I know he is really proud of me and is glad I have gotten healthier but sometimes he does complain about me not being as available as I used to be--usually the complaints come around dinner time when he's starving and I haven't fixed dinner yet because I was working out or when I didn't have the laundry done and he was looking for clothes. Speaking of laundry and dinner, I am definitely not juggling the household chores very well. When Tommy and I separated I pretty much didn't have the energy or desire to do anything. I didn't care if the bed was made or if I dusted each week. I let the mail pile up and lost any organization I once had. Now that I do have more energy and I'm tired of my house being a mess, I feel totally overwhelmed and have no clue where to even begin. By the time I get home in the evenings, fix dinner, do dishes and get things ready for the next day, it's about time for bed or I'm too drained to do anything else.
I have worked so hard these past several months to find myself again---no actually, to find myself for the first time. It has taken me almost 37 years to start feeling happy in my own skin. I have finally made myself & my well-being a priority. I spend a lot of time in the gym and I know that is time I could be getting other things done, but working out is an outlet for the stress and it's during that time that I've worked through a lot of my issues. I honestly believe the progress I have made by working out has had a greater impact on finding myself than the weight loss itself. Losing weight is an awesome bonus, but it is in the workouts and Kyle pushing me that I have found confidence and strength. I have this drive now that I have never felt before. My mind will still tell me I can't do it but that no longer stops me. I will try and keep trying until I conquer it (remember the box jump). For instance, this past week at our final boot camp, Kyle had 2 people doing assisted pull ups instead of the seated ones we had all been doing the past 6 weeks. I told him at my training session that night, I wanted to get to where I could do a real pull up. I love the fact that I am constantly wanting to improve and get a little further each time I workout. So cutting back on the time I'm spending at the gym and on this weight loss journey is not an option.
I think we as women and mothers expect ourselves to be Wonder-Woman or Supermom. Able to do it all (and perfectly at that) and won't settle or expect anything less of ourselves. It isn't working for me anymore. Expecting myself to do it all and have it all together all the time is putting way too much pressure on myself. I need to figure out a way to balance out all these roles or at least come up with a plan to keep me from feeling so overwhelmed. I'm a list person but tend to think I can accomplish a lot more in a day or weekend than I really can. Inevitably I end up beating myself up for not being able to do enough (imagine that--me beating myself up over something!) I'm working on breaking that cycle and be happy with whatever I do get accomplished instead of thinking of all those things that I did not, but I struggle with that. Sometimes I feel like a hamster trying to keep up with the wheel that occasionally throws you upside down on your ass.
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