Brain Fertilizer

I feel like I started waking up yesterday...

What do I mean?
Well, last summer I was stressed out around home, which stressed me out at work, which stressed me out at home and in general. You remember.
Even after the worst time, and after I talked to Capt N about it, I was still always on the edge of stressed-out, because I was trying to do more and more and not really catching up. I was just getting caught up on everything at home when we moved buildings.
I knew that I was exhausted from the move, 13 days straight with all the responsibilities I had at home left me absolutely spent.
I had a hard time recovering...Looking back, I think it’s because we went right into the holiday season when no one was here, so we were actually quite busy every day. I still am not sure why our business never slowed down at all. (I was disappointed we didn’t get more “holiday” manning, but shoot! We were too busy to get any more!)
Then right after the new year I had a few briefs to do and was trying to get caught up on out-processing at the same time. Feeling behind on everything tired me out.
At the same time, I was trying to potty-train my daughter with no help. That’s harder than it sounds.
Soon after, we actually sign the paperwork for divorce. I take leave to go on vacation, but with driving so far only to get the 3rd degree from her relatives, well, I didn’t get much rest. Especially since even though there were so many adults in the house, *I* was the one mainly dealing with the kids and resolving disputes, playing with them, etc., to include my very rambunctious AD/HD neice (I don’t get it...I just don’t get how so much non-parenting can go unnoticed by anyone but me).
Last weekend I drove down to Portland and back. It was a nice time, but no ‘down’ time.
Through all this, I rarely get more than 5.5 hours of sleep each night during the week, and my “catching up” nights are never more than 8. At least two nights a week I feel I am forced to choose between being physically exhausted or emotionally unrefreshed.

Going through this last weekend I was finally able to get some rest. And I’m finally getting recovered. I think I can do a better job of staying on task and helping people out now. On that scale of likelihood of a major stress-related illness, I think my rating for the last year is probably something above 500. Thank goodness I’ve been pretty healthy.

Did I sound too whiny? She was pretty much up to speed on all the issues, so if I seem too vague in spots, it's because I'm eliding over ground already covered.