I woke up at 4:30 this morning nauseated with the chills (no fever though). I've spent the last 2.5 hours trying to will myself to puke so I can feel better. So far it hasn't worked. I have a feeling today is going to be spent on the couch with the laptop.

I wonder if it is at all similar to what Philip felt like. Why does it seem like bloggers can contaminate each other over the internet?

What's worse than having an open blister on your finger?

Coughing the other day, I felt a slight "pop" feeling and then pain in my lower abdominal area. It's starting to feel better, but could I feel like more of a loser?

I am domestically challenged. When I was pregnant with Em and decided to be a stay-at-home mom, I had visions of clean gleaming surfaces and laundry baskets full of clean folded clothes. I might have even envisioned myself wearing an a-line dress, heels, and a string of pearls. Wow, was I high on crack!

I’m lucky to get in the shower before my husband comes home, what makes me think I can keep a clean house? I know it’s an issue of motivation and initiative. It’s so hard to throw myself into laundry and cleaning when it seems like such a Sisyphian task.

How often have I cleaned the main floor, went upstairs to clean or do laundry, and come down to what remains after an undetected toy bomb goes off.

Or put go upstairs and find a dresser emptied, clean clothes strewn around one of the girls’ rooms.

Some days, it’s almost enough to make me lose my mind. It’s so overwhelming sometimes, and of course the longer I go without doing anything, the worse it gets. Often, I don’t even know where to start. Actually, an alcoholic beverage might not be a bad place to start. I do get the kids involved (in the cleaning, not the drinking), but sometimes that seems more trouble than it’s worth.

I’m hoping to gain some inspiration and motivation from Philip. I know at the heart of it that it is not important where you start, just start. Unfortunately, I seem to follow that rule of physics that states “An object at rest tends to stay at rest”.

It’s not so much that I hate housework, I can actually get quite into it. It’s that I either can’t finish, or my work gets sabotaged in some way. Being the one that stays at home, I carry the responsibility for the appearance of the house, and it weighs heavily on me. In 6.5 years, I still haven’t found a way to balance everything. I would love to have a home where I can have unexpected guests, and I would love to make a home-cooked dinner every night.

Honestly, it’s not fulfilling for me to cook and clean, that’s why I’m going back to school. Hardly anyone notices, and I don’t get a paycheck. Worse still, my “project” is never complete, it’s always stuck in some stage of a never ending cycle of pick-up/clean. I could nag at the kids all day to not leave stuff around, and boy howdy, would that make me fun to be around. I actually used FlyLady in the past and managed to have an immaculate house for a whole month. I collapsed from exhaustion at the end of that month, but hey, the house was clean!

I don’t keep secret that I have a black cloud of depression always lurking and lingering, searching for a crack in my armor to seep into my psyche. You do not find me refreshed in the mornings, no matter what time I passed out the night before. The strength of will needed to perform simple tasks (like laundry) often seems so great that I avoid doing it altogether until an underwear crisis occurs. I hate living like this. I can’t think clearly and I’m embarrassed whenever someone drops by.

Sometimes my attitude scares me. I often wish the kids were easier to deal with, or they were more self-sufficient, then the guilt sets in. Wishing that means I’m not enjoying them right now, in the stage of life they are in. Real or imagined, there is a feeling of demands being placed on me that I can not fulfill. There is always noise, both outside and inside of myself. There’s my inner adult full of “You should” and my inner child screaming “I don’t wanna!”. There is chatter and protests from the kids. And there are sometimes even grumbles from the better half.

I used to be lighthearted and loved to play. Nowadays, I have to be pushed, prodded, and cajoled to spend time outside of the house, or with people other than my immediate family. The temptation to scream “Just leave me alone” is sometimes overpowering. And the guilt starts again. Why do I feel that it is selfish to pamper myself and give myself a break. Probably that Catholic upbringing, it’s all about sacrifice, obligation, and servitude. Yet I feel like I’m wasting the best years of my life living for others. Something is missing. Satisfaction, yes, but what is underneath that? If I discover that answer I may yet solve all my issues. The questions that I feel need to be answered is “What is my purpose?” and “Am I fulfilling that purpose?” “Am I headed down the right path?”. Mostly it comes down to validation.

So I broke down and took some Robitussin DM today. Coughing up my lungs daily was getting tiresome, as was the cleanup after I put them back where they belong. I had Em take this stuff when she was sick last week, and there is something I need to say to her:

I'm sorry.

I knew this stuff tasted bad, but my memory of it must have faded because I would have just as soon done a shot of Jager than the shot of 'tussin I took this morning. Em was sweet enough to get me an atomic fireball out of my stash so I could cloak the taste, but it still didn't work all that well. For a few seconds there, I thought it was going to come back up. I just have to say that it better work, because we would like to see "A Series of Unfortunate Events" today and I don't think the audience wants to hear some old lady hacking through the entire movie.

The thought of taking another dose in a few hours puts chills down my spine, but it's the only thing I've found that works well enough to quiet things down. Maybe I can figure out what to mix with it to make it taste better.

Maybe Jager?

You know, when I got this plague, I don't remember ordering lung oysters. Ugh!

Curse you internet. THat plague that's been....well....plaguing fellow bloggers seems to have found a perfect host in my body. The coughing, the aches, the headaches and the moaning, and whining are taking it's toll.

Simply put, I feel like poop.

I ignored it as long as I could, but it wouldn't go away. I'm gonna be pissed if this turns out to be the flu, seeing as this is the first time in quite a few years I couldn't score a flu shot. I see myself doing nothing more strenuous than surfing Blog Explosion and clicking every thirty seconds or so. If anyone dares join my pity party, you can IM me on Yahoo Messenger at amy_psychobabble, but you probably shouldn't stay long, I'm pretty sure I"m contagious.

Whew it feels good to post multiple times a day again. After last week which shall be forever known as, "The Week None of Us Got Any Sleep" or "Em Has Asthma Despite The Preventative Medication She Is On". Three days in a row the poor girl was up all night coughing, sometimes until bile and phlegm came up (sorry for the visual). We were giving her albuterol and Robitussin but it wasn't cutting it. Finally the synapses in my sleep starved brain started firing and I realized it wasn't going to get better and we'd better take her to the doctor. Doctor gave us nice prescriptions for Zithromax (since she had a fever) and Orapred.

Ack, the Orapred, again! For those of you familiar with it's side effects, forgive me for repeating. For those of you unfamiliar Orapred increases the appetite, causes jitters (I wanted to tell her to lay off the coffee until I realized she doesn't drink any), and irritability. The first two are manageable. The third?

Not so much.

I decided this time she was getting no leeway from me, despite the fact that the medication makes her stark raving mad. She's ask for something to eat, I'd give it to her, she'd take a bite, then announce she didn't want that, she wanted something else. Many tears were shed and many feet were stomped in frustration and anger. Em got in on the act a bit too. So now she finally finished the medication and her personality is returning. No longer do I feel that she is the spawn of the devil. She needs to be on the albuterol a little longer, which is fabulous since I ALWAYS have 10 extra minutes in themorning to have her sit with the nebulizer. Also, she gets to take another preventative at night. So we are now layering 2 medications in the hope that the evil bronchial inflamation and extra mucous doesn't break through the drug barrier (like this last time). You'd think that after 3 years we would have figured everything out, right? Apparently, this asthma is a sneaky little bastard, making itself known only when it's too late to deal with on our own.

I always feel like such a lousy mother when I don't realize that "cold + coughing = asthma" nine times out of ten.

And what is a gauntlet anyway? Are they talking about those glove thingies that are worn with suits of armor?

After having ice cream for breakfast this morning, the kind that inspired this post, I have to say I'm disgusted with myself. Not even a year ago I was working out daily and had the eating thing down, no issues. Now? I think I'm preparing to hibernate.

Just as a guideline, I got on the scale today and promptly launched into a freak-out. I weigh more than I have in about 2 years. Wow did I get lazy.

So I went to the grocery store and got a whole bunch of vegetables, lean meat, yogurt, cottage cheese, and only healthy stuff.

The sad thing is I know how to do this, it's in the doing that I get hung up. I think I have this conversation in my head that being in shape is "too hard"! Well, it's a lot harder being out of shape and not looking good in clothes, not to mention getting winded going up the stairs.

So I have one thing to say.....

Just noticed that my fingernails have vertical ridges on them. Wondering whether or not this indicates some underlying health issue I decided to do a google search. The consensus of all the sites I've visited is:

...vertical ridges usually represent a normal aging pattern, and some consider the presence of such ridges to be an indicator of those at risk for developing arthritis.

Is it just me or does this basically say, "Yeah, you're getting old".?