When I stress myself to death, when I DIE of a stress attack, keel over from a stress-induced aneurysm, here are the possible straws that broke the camel’s carotid artery:

• not being able to open a jar
• not being able to open the frozen doors of my vehicle
• banging my shoulder on a door frame
• banging my head on a car door whilst trying to buckle a child in their car seat
• folding up my very expensive supposed-to-be-easy-to-fold-up stroller
• when the tab rips off a brand new diaper
• biting my tongue (literally)
• grocery cart wheels not turning
• grocery carts in which the baby seat belt does not work
• a wrong order at the fast food drive thru
• people who don’t DRIVE when the light turns green
• people who DO drive when the light turns red
• parents who let 11-year-olds terrorize the mall play place
• My children asking “WHY?” to something I’ve told them to do
• when I can’t get something to work and then my husband makes it work with no trouble whatsoever even though I am glad he fixed it I hate it that EVERYTHING IS SO EASY FOR HIM!

Steam is coming from my ears just after writing that list!

While I go try to avoid a fatal meltdown, tell me – what makes your blood pressure skyrocket?

click for image credit

I’ve never been one to make New Year’s Resolutions. This is mostly because I have zero faith in my ability to keep them! So, I’m not making any this year either. But there are some things I want to, how shall I say, adjust for 2012.

You see, I didn’t enjoy 2011 all that much on the whole. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great, either. Just writing that makes me feel horrible ungrateful and sinful, because I have SO MUCH to be thankful for and so many blessings in my life. Seriously. My un-enjoyment of 2011 had nothing to do with what I didn’t have. It had to do with what I had on my plate, and with how I handled it.

Having a new baby (third child), and having a child who had turned up developmentally delayed was way too much for me. 2011 was pretty much all about workworkworkworkwork for me. Take care of the constant needs of an infant while working on and being hypervigilant about getting Sophie over her delays. Also I spent the first several month of Jonah’s life battling the postpartum injury to my left hand which slowed me down and left me in constant pain. Add to this financial stress that accompanied the therapies and evaluations for Sophie (co-pays are a b!tch when you have weekly appointments. Especially when you have more than one weekly appointment. And don’tgetmestarted on our insurance only covering 20 visits of therapy per year for a child who needs 50 visits per year…) and the fact that we spent our life savings on our van…by the time summer came around and I had all three kids underfoot all day, still running around to appointments all the time, I was living my life in a constant state of anxiety and panic.

And I was doing my best. I handled it. I don’t think, all that well. And yet. We made it through. Jonah is a thriving one-year-old, Sophie is about all caught up and is kicking butt in school, in therapy, and on all her testing, and Joshua is doing awesome in 2nd grade, and swimming lessons, and it seems so far has retained only *slight* emotional scarring from having an angry mommy all summer.

So 2011. You kicked my butt. I was not even close to being a worthy opponent for you. I am not sad to see you go!

2012:It’s nice to meet you. I am already looking forward to how much better I am going to handle you than I did your predecessor! Mostly because my known circumstances are just plain going to be easier this year, but hopefully because I’ve grown and learned some things in the past year as well. I am not dumb enough to assume you won’t throw me any curveballs, but I’m optimistic enough to think I can knock them out of the park this time.

Happy New Year everyone! What are your hopes for 2012?

And then, there’s my “off” times.  When I work as hard as I can during the 6- 8 hours or so a week that I have two kids at school and one kid napping so I can keep the house organized, and I can never get it all finished. ( Not that I can’t do housework when they’re all home, but…let’s just say when they are all home and awake I get adult ADD from the constant “MomMomMomMomMomMomMom” and the “waaaaaaaaaah” and my productivity plummets.)  These are the times when getting Sophie and Jonah ready and out the door for morning preK drop off either has me on the verge of tears or screaming by 8:30 a.m.  When I can’t do anything but the bare-bones, basic stuff my family needs to survive.  When I don’t even have two seconds to text, email, or call a friend in need.  Those times, I’ve got nuttin’.

There really seems to be no in-between. I can say, that always, I am doing my best. It’s just that sometimes my best is super-great and sometimes it totally sucks.  This week, and last week, too, I am totally sucking.  I kind of have a bad feeling that it is going to be this way through the fa-la-la-lidays.  As a matter of fact, I am already looking forward to the week after Christmas because Bobby has that week off  and the kids will of course be off school and Jonah’s 1st birthday and Christmas will be over and I think, oh, Bobby will be here, maybe I can breathe that week. Maybe I will get caught up on the housework.  Maybe I will even get an hour or two to myself.  Maybe I can flip the switch back to “on”.

Or maybe, the switch will be flipped before that.  I sure hope so.  At this point, I’m longing for a switch to mediocre.

{sidebar, was that not the LONGEST run-on sentence/paragraph EVAH? I know you loved it, Berry.}

Like last week’s attempt to make coffee that failed thrice, many things I do or don’t do, or can’t do, make me crraaazy.  Like two days later I banged my other knee on something else and got a matching bruise, but now I can’t even remember what that something else was, which also makes me craaaazy. I JUST.WANT.TO REMEMBER THINGS.  And also not bruise myself all the time.

For the past couple days, I haven’t been able to get this Pink song out of my head…

I’m a hazard to myself

Don’t let me get me

I’m my own worst enemy

It’s bad when you annoy yourself

So irritating

Don’t wanna be my friend no more

I wanna be somebody else

More often than not, I find myself in a state of annoyance…with myself.

Good times.  Anyone else?

And when I did see it, I screamed bloody murder and jumped back four feet, even though I was inside the house and it was out. Because THIS is my newest tenant:

(Sorry, due to the fact that it’s sitting on it’s web on clear glass, I cannot seem to get my camera to focus on it. And if I get too close, it moves and when it moves I WET MY PANTS IN FEAR BECAUSE OH EM GEE IT’S FRICKING HUGE AND TERRIFYING!)

It’s big fat body that you see there, is about the size of my thumb. Ugh. I just shivered in fear while I was typing that.

So what is this thing?  A heartless human-killer, or just the kind that kills other icky bugs that I should welcome to my window, or is it the kind you put a leash on and take for a walk around the block?

I wish it was the kind that LIVED SOMEWHERE ELSE.

Cause it is freaking this little wimpy girl OUT fer realz.  Who wants to come over and capture it for me??

But anyhoo, it was REALLY hot.  And my new van wasn’t shifting right.  It’s an automatic transmission, and it was having a lot of trouble shifting. This wasn’t too surprising, because it had been giving me a wee bit of trouble previously, but my hubby the mechanic did a transmission flush and ran some conditioner through it or some crap like that, and it had been a bit better. (Though not totally.)

We went to the pool, Murrin was a huge help, we went home, and then we took Murrin home.  She lives about 20 minutes away, and the van actually ran a bit better on the way to her house.

But on the way home? It hardly ran at all.  I barely made it.  I had to put my flashers on a couple times.  Every time I hit a stoplight, I was afraid it wouldn’t go again when the light turned green.  The last block to my house, the transmission was making both a really loud revving “I won’t shift” noise and a terrible high-pitched squeal. AND it smelled AWFUL.

Did I mention this was the FIRST DAY of summer break?  And I had been dying to get a van before summer break?  And was so excited that I got it 8 weeks before? Plenty of time!

Oh, the irony. (Makes me want to slit my wrists.)

Luckily, we still had my old car, so I was able to get the kids to meet my mother-in-law for dinner before Sophie’s gymnastics class.  Bobby met us also, and was going to drive his mom and the boys over to watch Sophie – she and I planned to leave a few minutes early while they finished up dinner.

So, Sophie and I headed out to get in my old car.  Which I had just driven there.

Which WOULD NOT EVEN TURN OVER when I put the key in.

Clearly, I am the problem.  I killed two cars in one day! One that we’d only had for 8 weeks and one that I’d happily driven for 8 years.

It’s a good thing I’m married to a mechanic!  Maybe not so good for him, though!

The problem with my old car was merely the battery, sadly my van needs a new transmission – which is on order.  I’ve been hauling the kids around in Bobby’s station wagon for our two weeks of summer, and I haven’t killed it yet!  We’ll see what I can accomplish before I get my van back next week.  Watch out, Camry Station Wagon!  I’m a KILLA!

I’m in the kitchen with two steaming pots on the stove, and Jonah is in his swing in the living room, snoozing peacefully, while the big kids are playing legos.

Until the big kids start screaming at each other over who can touch which legos when, and the baby wakes up and then also starts screaming, because REALLY, apparently that is the thing to do at this moment if you are the spawn of Jenny and Bobby Rapson.

So then I of course, scream at the big kids to JUST.BE.NICE!  All I’m asking you to do here is play, people. PLAY. Is that so bad???

Then I pick Jonah up and get him calmed down.

Finally, I return to my steaming pots and fortunately neither of them have boiled over or caught fire.  Yay!  And the dinner turned out pretty good I thought! (It was a recipe I am reviewing for ReadySetEat.  Cheesy Chili Mac – yum!)

I got dinner together and the kids and I ran it over to E’s.  Which is really no problem at all, as she lives really close.  *BUT* Sophie was heartbroken when told that we were only dropping dinner off and weren’t going in to play with Olivia, E’s daughter.  (Olivia, could you be less fun and charming, please?  Geez!  Your allure is really inconveniencing me here.)  As soon as I pulled away from their house, she yelled “Wait! Go back!  You have to go back!” and proceeded to SOB all the way home. Dra-MA!  I assured her we’d have Olivia over soon but since it wasn’t right-this-second, it was not good enough.  I dragged her into the house and mopped the tears and snot from her face.

Then I pleaded aloud for the Calgon people to come take me away and plunge me into a warm, idyllic bubble bath.

No one showed up.

But, no one showed up with a straitjacket, either.

So there’s that.

Sooo, I’m basically a very rotund lunatic at this point.

What is keeping me up tonight? Well, what GOT me up was the fact that my body will not be comfortable laying down after a few hours.  Sore hips this time.  And  then my brain started contributing to the chaos and now I’m just all worked up!  Which is probably not helping my blood pressure.  Which is part of the reason I’m worried.  It’s a vicious cycle!  Let me slow down here and attempt to make some sense.  I think this calls for a list!

So, with out further adieu, here is what one freaks out about at 3 a.m. when one is 9 months pregnant.  Especially during the fa la la la lalidays.

1) The aforementioned blood pressure.  It has been a little high.  I have a dr.’s appointment in the morning at 9:45 and I am fairly convinced now, at 3:04 a.m., that they are going to send me straight to the hospital to have the baby.

2) If #1 happens, who will pick up Sophie from preschool at noon??? What if I can’t get hold of anyone on my approved pick-up list?  OMG I am going to go put her teacher’s phone number in my phone RIGHT NOW.

3) I haven’t packed a THING for myself or baby for the hospital.

4) Emily got me a really nice pair of nursing PJ’s and I’ve been wearing them already, and they’re wonderful, but they need to be washed.  There are three pieces.  These three pieces are scattered somewhere between my bedroom and bathroom.  I cannot now tell you exactly where they all are.  IF #1 happens, how am I going to get my PJs clean and to the hospital?

5) I have to eat breakfast tomorrow.  Or I might pass out before I get to the dr.’s office.  But usually you aren’t supposed to eat or drink  like 8 hours before surgery so what if #1 happens and I eat, and then something totally gross or awful happens because I did?

6) What if I have to go straight to the hospital and Emily can’t get there?  Oh, the blogging opportunity that will be missed!

7) I need to go to the grocery.  Not enough food in the house for mommy to be away for a couple days.

8 ) My dining room table is a mess and the floor really needs to be swept.

9) The kids are totally not prepared for Bobby and I to be gone for a couple of days, yet.  They are both still in school this week.

10) Not having packed anything for the hospital may result in some very ugly photos being taken of me (hey I am still slightly vain at this point!)

11) Emily and I are supposed to host a Twitter party for our favorite Lands’ End on Wednesday and the world might end if she has to do it alone.

12) And most importantly, who will obsess over the timing and nature of my big kids’ bowel movements while I’m gone??  Nobody can do it like I can…just sayin’…

As you can see, I pretty much need to be institutionalized at the moment.  But I haven’t packed a THING for the looney bin either, so that could result in a whole other list of problems.

I guess I’ll let you know how it all turns out…it has to turn out better than I think it will at 3:21 a.m., right!?

However, there is one advantage to being up at this ungodly hour.  And that is that no one else in my house is up. (ZOMGOSH I just heard Sophie make noise as I wrote this.  She BETTER be talking in her sleep.) And since I’ve been off my feet for a few hours at this point, I can get last night’s domestic failures under control.  You know, clear the dinner dishes, run the dishwasher, look in Joshua’s school folder to make sure nothing urgent needs to be returned tomorrow.

So, I did that.

And then I clicked through a few blogs.  I have been completely out of touch and so busy the past couple of weeks.  The only blogs I have even kind of kept up with are Cortney’s and Uncle Paul’s and that’s really, honestly, just kind-of.  Not to mention my real-world friends, whom I have hardly seen or even had the energy to have a phone conversation with.  I feel like such a loser, that in this season of giving, I don’t have much to give anyone who doesn’t live in my house or in my belly.

The truth is, my kids are demanding.  Sophie would rather play with me than watch a tv show these days, which makes me really, really happy. And tired.  Because she would also rather not play by herself! If I put on Word World or the Cat in the Hat Knows A lot about That, her two favorites, I can usually get in 15 minutes of dishes or laundry or blogging before she comes looking for me with a book in her hand.  And that is good.  It is much easier when Joshua gets home from school and they will entertain each other for awhile.  But by that time, I’m pretty beat.

So, I guess I am preparing to hibernate for the winter!  With a newborn just before the New Year, I doubt I’ll be getting out much.

But hopefully I’ll feel good enough to do dishes at a decent hours.  And maybe talk on the phone once in awhile!

30 days.

In 30 days I will go from two kids to three. I will have an almost-7-year old, a 4-year-old, and a newborn.

I know it, but I can’t really comprehend it.  On the outside we’re ready; crib, diapers, clothes, car seat – all ready.

But on the inside?  I don’t know.  I’m fairly terrified.  I’m so excited to meet my baby, and so TIRED of being uncomfortably pregnant, but I’m scared.  There’s so much I don’t remember about having a baby.  I have two children who already need, need, NEED me.  How can there be anything left?  Who will meet their needs when I am constantly breastfeeding for the next zillion months?  Will they resent the baby?  Will they resent me for spending so much of my energy on him?  Will they understand that I love them as much as ever?

It wasn’t that hard for Joshua to accept Sophie into our family.  But for Sophie, I think it’s going to be much more difficult to accept Jonah.  She’s been the baby for four years.  And I’m still not convinced she “gets” it – I don’t think she will get it until we bring him home.

Transition scares the pants off me.

But, it’s coming.  Like a freight train with failed brakes!  Jonah has already made his way into our hearts and soon he will be in our HOME.

I just hope I live to blog about it!