I've got so much to be thankful for. I could list it all but I'm sure it would be a boring thing and too long of a list to read. I have the list in my heart, and that's good enough.
I also have much to regret and be embarrassed about. I've made so many mistakes this year, it's crushing me and my family under a mountain of worry and all of these "running away" feelings are just my coping mechanisms taking over and it's not good.
When the people around me lose hope, I usually fight back with tons of optimism and fixits galore, but I'm getting very tired and not really finding those reserves that I need to help prop everyone up. I HATE. I have a lot of anger and hate in my heart for the things around me that seem to be pulling me down into that sin of hopelessness and useless regret.
Debbiedowner is back again, full force. As much as I love the season of fall, it always happens this time of year. I think I kind of know why. It's because it's the time of year that I feel most accountable to "the Man". School starts, activities for the kids rev up, we have to be certain places at certain times, winter is coming and so are the bills that come with colder weather, the holidays, and school books, kids are not used to the "buckling down" and get more anxious and their fighting starts to make me feel like a failure. I can't keep up.
I really can't keep up. I've been fooling myself for 2 years that things FOR SURE have to get better and that the economy will turn around soon and that there will be more work for Butch and I can make "extra" by doing something at home...it's all a total farce. Work is NOT coming for Butch and, in reality, his income will have been cut nearly in half by the end of the year (with the bits and pieces taken off in such a slow, menacing way, it was hard to see at the time:lay offs, injury, half days here and there, etc.). The sick irony of it is that his job was always "recession proof" in the past. Every time he'd come home and say "Things are going to slow down! They hinted at it in the office!", I'd just laugh and say "Yeah, right!" because it never did...BEFORE. Now that it's a reality, it has me stumped. How do we move forward when we can't even pay for the here and now? How do people live like this?
We've always been stretched, and suffered hard times early in our lives together...but this is just...so bad. We have each other and we have a great family, but everyone in it is suffering similar worries. What happens when we can no longer lean on each other for support, for fear of pushing the other person over the edge?
It's going to be a tough rest of the year. We are going to have to make some hefty decisions and I really don't know what to do. I hate being a slave to debt and insecurity.
There are a lot of "I"s in this stressed out rant. Depression is a very selfish thing.
Hopehopehopehopehopehopehopehopehopehopehopehope has to be the mantra/prayer. I just can't find it right now.
