I am joined at home these last two days by a child with a fever. It’s gone over 103, and yet she is perky and cheerful, in large part because she feels fine but isn’t allowed at school, so is forced to watch TV, play video games, and loaf around. “I wonder what I’ll do after they leave on the bus?,” she says, aiming her chin at her younger brothers. “Maybe take a bath, maybe read, maybe play outside.” “We still have four more hours until they come back home!,” she says happily, awhile later. It’s kind of fun having these Girls’ Days with her, but I’m not getting much done. She’s so…chatty.
Even if she weren’t home, I wouldn’t be very productive: I have been bad lately at Getting Stuff Done. I put things on a To Do list, and instead of doing them and crossing them off, I DON’T do them. There they sit. Sometimes I don’t even look at the To Do list.
In the morning and before bed I have that unpleasant cyclical feeling. Here I am, washing my face yet again, putting more clothes into the laundry, putting on my pajamas again, getting into the bed again. There’s the alarm and I’m showering yet again, drying off again, getting the tangles out of my hair again, making the bed again, washing my face again, clothes back into the laundry, back into bed, ACK.
It would probably make me feel better to get some of the things on the list done. The problem is, I hate everything on the list. It’s like having a terrible job where I hate all my tasks, and it’s not paid either, and also no one is making me do it, but also I can’t quit. Should I call about having the house painted, or should I say “Screw it, who cares, it’ll just need painting again anyway” and read a book? Tough call, tough call.
I may be reading a book at work instead of actually working. I’m in the mode of hating everything and eating junk food. Which yes, I realize that will probably make me feel worse instead of better but bah! I tried to take a walk instead and it is too damn windy out. (It IS actually super windy and I have heard it blew a post in our yard right over. Like sheared it right off.)
YES. I keep trying to be productive. Pomodoro method? Sure, I can make a to-do list, pick a thing, set a timer, then go read a book or do ______ (some good but way less urgent task). Waaait, that didn’t work.
I am off of work today due to two sickies in my house, who are really fine, just glued to screens all day. Normally I have a thousand things that I want to get done on the rare day that I am home, but instead I just feel malaise. So I am in my bed being malaisey.
I’m in this awful cycle in which one task has many related tasks or else it develops into many other tasks. So, then I either avoid the initial task or I’m swallowed up by the demands of the additional tasks and feel like I never actually finish anything. It is driving me crazy and makes me lazy. (For example, we’re giving our old mattress to our daughter so we got a new mattress and then: had to rearrange the bedroom; had to find spots for other furniture; needed a longer cable cord for the TV; had to find an alternative bed for the dog; now am washing loads of bedding for the old and the new bed…..ARGH!)
If you’re feeling bleah about the list, do just one thing on it. Just one. Then reward yourself with chocolate.
Next Tuesday is my 3 year old’s last day of preschool, which means just three more days for her after today, so today I did exactly nothing but sat on the couch and stared straight ahead.
I was looking forward to this yesterday and then remembered I had to take her sister to the dentist at 11.
I’m avoiding this task on my To-Do list so hard, I started cleaning my room instead. (I realize this is a fairly typical avoidance mechanism, but for me it’s UNHEARD OF.) I just got called out on it though, as Irma a work thing, and now I have no choice. Am dreading it.
THIS. So THIS. I’m home today because I had an appointment this morning and decided to not bother dealing with a half-day commute to work (have unused personal days anyway, so may as well do the whole day).
I *want* to be able to say I took the rest of my day to do much needed things around the house… but ugggh. CHORES. So chore-y and boring. I was not very motivated. I did a few very small tasks, and then felt pride in those VERY SMALL tasks… so then gave up on anything else. I even BLOGGED about my small tasks, just to make myself feel like I accomplished something. HA!
Glad to see I am not alone in my malaise and not-wanting-to-do-chores. It is a grey and gloomy day today, I think if it was sunny and nice I’d have felt more motivated to get off my couch.
It was sunny here. I was still not motivated. I don’t think it’s the weather. Maybe some weird malaise transmitted through internet blogs? Because I couldn’t get anything done today either.
I’m in a similar funk. I put Shower and Keep the Kids Alive on my to do list, though, so I at least have one or 2 things to cross off.
Sometimes I put things on my list that I already did just so I can cross them off.
I found my son a sunhat. I think that counts for today.
I seem to have just stopped folding the laundry. I mean, there it sits, the piles getting higher and higher and yet I don’t seem to be able to force myself to fold it. I’m not sure why this is happening and hope I will break out of the this laundry funk soonish, but man, I am just not feeling it. At all.
I understand this. Totally. Think about it – you’ve been doing THE SAME JOB for years and years and years. If a guy were feeling this way about his job, people would be advising him to change jobs. But we can’t do that, not really. And people just look at us and think, “Haven’t you figured out how to keep up with the laundry and clean the house after all these years?” Sure, I have, but I am SICK of it.
Your job won’t go away, but you need to throw something new into the mix to make yourself feel better. Maybe start thinking about what you want to do once the kids are all over 10, say, and research whether that means you need to take some college courses or whatever. Says the woman who is not following her own advice…
I wish I could click a star or a like button under this comment about ten times. YES. AMEN. NAILED IT. PERFECT.
this is one of the great blogs on which I enjoy the comments as much as the original post. :)
This! This! This!
In fact, I’m mired in this same inability to get stuff done and reading this post and the comments is making me feel so much better. I might even get some stuff done now.
What I love about your blog is how normal it makes me feel. Lately I have had “that cyclical feeling” in spades but was wallowing in how it is clearly the symptom of some sort of Major Life Crisis. And now I come here and you casually refer to it as something we all have, sometimes, something common and passing, and that is just so warm and reassuring. I am off to have my fourth cup of tea today (again, some more) and put the kids to bed (again, some more) and it will be much lovelier to think of all the other moms in the cycle.
omg this. THIS THIS THIS THIS.
“I hate all my tasks, and it’s not paid either, and also no one is making me do it, but also I can’t quit. ” YES. This. Though to be fair, I don’t hate ALL my tasks. Only a lot of them. *sigh* I should be washing dishes and/or folding laundry right now, but I don’t want to and no one is making me, so…
I think it’s also infuriating when there are all of these little,endless tasks that crowd out your thoughts and then you look over at your husband and he’s doing ONE THING.* It’s usually for work so it falls under the huge umbrella of “Daddy’s Concentrating” so all of your stuff, the stuff that keeps EVERYONE going, is relegated to not as important. I’m sorry to be writing in Second Person but I feel like it applies. None of these tasks are particularly fun, they eat up a lot of time and if you look over at your husband and he’s assuming the position of Rodin’s Thinker , all bets are off.
*my book club is reading “”Overwhelmed: Work, Love and Play When No One Has the Time” by Brigid Schulte . This is basically a summation of one of the many situations she addresses and she really hits the nail on the head!
Ooh, the “unpleasant cyclical feeling.” I hate that one. Haven’t had it in a while, but yeah. That’s why I LOVE days where I have something different on my schedule. Even mildly unpleasant things, like today’s thing, which was a meeting with a swimming pool membership director, to see if we want to join it. Uck, I was nervous, dumb as that is. It went fine, but the better thing was that it was a different day, not same old, same old. I think of it as “field trip” mentality.
My laundry hamper has been sitting in my living room for 4 days. I already did all the laundry in it, but there are 3 items that i hung on it it to dry and then tossed back into the hamper once dry to keep them away from cats. All I need to do is retrieve those 3 items and put them away so that I can put my hamper back and start putting dirty clothes in it again (instead of the pile on the closet floor where my hamper usually is, which is where the dirty clothes are currently accumulating).
And yet.
I have one toddler running around. Clearly, I’m not an expert. I thought once she turned ten, I could apply for some reasonable amount of mental health days. A day when I post a “I’m SICK” sign on the door. If it needs further instructions, I could add, “You are now a big girl. You know where the peanut butter is located. If you are hungry, make yourself a sandwich. If you need clean clothes, do some laundry. You know where that is. If you are bored, go outside. If you are tired, take a nap. Don’t ask for Mommy, I’m not answering to that name today. I’ll be in my room with some movies and a tub of ice cream. If you want to join me, please be quiet and bring your own spoon. PS – I really couldn’t care less if your shoes/coats are put up because I’m not leaving my room. Remember – If you are not bleeding or on fire, I don’t need to know about it.”
Is this really not an option? :)
I get this way too. I really think it has to do with the end of the school year. 3 more weeks of drudgery and very set schedules. During summer everything kind of relaxes, and by the third day of summer vacation, I’m going to WANT to shut myself in my bedroom and fold laundry. Ha!
I’m guessing that the best reward would be smiles on your kids’ faces. Can you take some kids to the park? Go out on a special lunch date with Elizabeth? Ask Rob to drive you to the grocery store while Paul watches the younger kids?
I’m so there too. I haven’t mopped a floor in… a long while. Every day I think I’ll get to, every day I don’t. Not for lack of time, but because I will stare at it and think, “I’m going to mop this today… and then tomorrow it’ll be dirty again. So who cares? Why shouldn’t I ignore it until it really is too bad to ignore?”
Reading always seems like a better choice. Especially now it’s nice out- I’m like, “Well, I could clean, but look at this LOVELY DAY. It would be CRIMINAL to waste it indoors!” So I sit in the sun and read.