I will start by bragging and, as you read, you will see why I am entitled to this. I ran 4 miles and did Jillian's 30 Day Shred Level 3, all in under one hour today. Other than the half marathon, it may have been the most difficult work out of my life. I told my family I'm taking things up a notch this year and I really meant it. But here's why I started today.
If you saw me in the grocery store today, I apologize right now if I was rude to you, did not make eye contact with you, or even if I appeared to run off to a different aisle just as we spotted one another. It had nothing to do with you. I was in a BAD MOOD. I hate the grocery store and every ounce of time I spend there. I never know what to buy and am especially irritated when the store is out of the items that I actually know I need. What makes it worse is that when I leave the house I always ask, "Do you need anything?", "Anything special you want from the store?". The answer, always, is no. But, within 30 minutes of my return, people are complaining that there is nothing to eat.
In anticipation of this occurence, I started to feel grouchy while shopping. I started to get that sick feeling that mothers get sometimes. That mean, nasty voice that slowly starts to creep in but quickly becomes a scream inside my head. "THEY DON'T APPRECIATE YOU!!!!!!!!" What if I never shopped? Would they eat anything? Probably McDonalds. But what if I never balanced the checkbook and we had NO money? Does he even know what kind of bills we have? NO! When is the last time that kid actually picked up after himself? Does he even deserve Christmas gifts???? I do everything around here. No one even notices. And the worst. . . what would they do if I was gone?
Hold on, hold on. I'm not going anywhere. This just tends to overcome me once in a while and I suspect it happens to many of you too. If it doesn't, then you must fit into one of these three categories:
1. You are a man;
2. You have no kids; or
3. You are not married to a man.
If you are lucky enough to be one of the people listed in 1-3, may I please spend the holidays with you? For the rest of you women-who-have-kids-and-are-married-to-men, we need to pull ourselves together and deal with this issue before we leave our families to the wolves to starve and fend for themselves.
The first thing we need to do is realize that we are making this scenario so much worse by allowing this train of thoughts to get so derailed in our heads. Honestly, I don't think our husbands appreciate us as much as they should, but I have a feeling a lot of them are doing the best they can. They are not built like us, their brains are not the same as ours, and I believe that they do not have the capacity to think like we do. So why do we keep expecting them to? Once we come to terms with that, it is easier to stop expecting something that is never going to happen.
The next step has something to do with why I challenged myself to the second hardest workout of my life. I couldn't get my thoughts to stop. In fact, when I came home from the store, my son was six inches in front of the TV watching a Big Time Rush episode that he has seen at least 10 times, at top volume. My husband was in bed, asleep. Four letter words that start with F came out of my mouth louder than the TV as I dramatically carried in all the groceries by myself and let everyone know about it.
It was at that point that I realized I had (maybe) crossed a line myself. Before I could talk myself out of it, I put on my workout clothes and hit the home gym(AKA 10 year old treadmill). The workout was rewarding and I did it myself. I wasn't expecting anyone else to chip in, wasn't waiting to hear someone thank me for how hard I worked, and wasn't pissed off when I didn't get the help I thought I deserved.
Working moms, whether you work inside or outside your home or both, you NEED this for yourself. It is the only time when you will work your butt off and REALLY feel appreciated and all that appreciation will come from your own heart and your own voice. Let the laundry go for one hour. Honestly, no one appreciates that you are doing it for them anyway!
And in case you are wondering, the workout song that fuels this self-appreciation workout goes something like this:
"So raise your glass if you are wrong
in all the right ways
All my underdogs
We will never be never be
anything but loud
and nitty gritty dirty little freaks
So come on and come on and raise your glass"
Raise your glass, ladies, and cheer yourselves. No one is going to do it for you!
No comments:
Post a Comment