A Day of Reflections

So it's been a weekend. Friday night was not pretty for me emotionally. Last night my son decided to be a teenager and push my buttons. (Hard to believe, I know. haha) What he did wasn't such a bad thing, just another petty annoyance and it caught me at a bad time. So this morning we talked and we're setting ground rules that will give him a little more freedom. He has a lot of friends and he should be able to see them. He doesn't need to be cooped up in the house just because I suck at meeting new people and making new friends. :-) BUT there are also now consequences in place and in writing so it will be easier for the scatter-brained side of me to follow through.

This morning I'm looking at these things and reflecting on how I would have reacted a year ago. It would not have been pretty. We'll leave it at that. I think I'm really coming along in managing my stress levels and my reactions. I'm letting go of what I can't control and not fretting over things as much. When that "fret nag" starts to try to talk her way into my head again I speak over her, reminding myself of the positive things. "You've not heard from this friend, they don't want to talk to you." No....I've not heard from them because they have a life and it does not revolve around me. BUT they like me, they like fishing with me, they like talking to me, they think I'm their emotional rock when they need someone to talk to and so on. A year ago that fretful nag would have completely overwhelmed me and I would have fallen into a funk and just been miserable. Today I'm able to look back on things and go okay, this is what could have been handled a bit better, this is what you handled well. No negative self-talk.

On the health side of things, this is also adding up. I've had less headaches, less muscle aches. I'm not tracking what I eat like I probably should be but I am still being more conscious of what I eat. I'm paying more attention to what my body is telling me and so I'm not over eating either. A pair of my grubby jeans can now be taken off without having to unbutton/unzip them which was a pleasant surprise this morning. I'm waking up feeling rested, even though I have been waking up once or twice during the night for a couple nights. No reason and I usually fall back asleep right away. One night I didn't so I chatted with a friend online for an hour or so and then I went back to sleep. It's odd, but it doesn't seem to have a negative effect at the moment so we'll run with it and see what happens.

Outside the snow is melting so I will soon see what the yard here looks like. I can see part of my driveway which is a bonus. I was beginning to wonder if there actually WAS one or if I was just jumping the curb over the snow all the time! lol Tomorrow I will wear my rain boots for the first time. The sidewalks are mostly clear but there is sooo much snowmelt that there are spots that are under 2-3 inches of water. Makes for cold feet! I'm looking forward to fishing and hopefully I'll be doing a lot more camping this year. One of the frustrations I had in my marriage was not being able to do things. We enjoyed doing the same things but with his job and my job the scheduling to do them just never happened. If my son & I went on our own, we were made to feel as if we were deliberately leaving him out. He would complain about it for weeks. So we just never went. I understand that relationships are about compromise and give and take. And I tried to get him involved with us. But for him, work always came first (which is not necessarily a bad thing...work is definitely a priority) and he wouldn't ask for time off and never said a word (to my knowledge) about working every weekend and so I really felt trapped. The melting snow is, in a way, melting away those guilt-laden thoughts. I tried. And I do feel it was unfair of him to ask me to give up the things I love to do because he couldn't be bothered to even try to get time off or ask for rotating weekends or something.

This year is all about discovering me again and doing things that make me happy. If I am fortunate enough to get involved with someone again, I hope they will understand that I just can't put my life on hold but I am happy to live it with them. It may take some give and take and that's fine. But hopefully they understand that I will go do things and I will enjoy myself and I won't be made to feel bad about it. Roles reversed, I would be glad they're able to enjoy their time. We'll have our time together.