quiet

I know I've been quiet around here the last week or so (10 days w/out blogging! oh my!!), but believe me- the inside of my head has been anything but quiet.

Time for a brain dump.
Want a peek at the noise I've had going on?.....

Which house should we buy?
Should we stretch our budget and get closer to what we want or stay cheap(er) and just make do?
How badly do I want the community feeling that comes with a neighborhood pool?
How badly do I want the community feeling with a friendly neighborhood and lots of kids around to hopefully help us plug in and get to know people in a place where we know no one?
How badly do we need a guest bedroom?
What do we give up?
Which house fits us best?
This one?
That one?
What about the one with....?
How could we rearrange a house to work for us?
How much money would we have to put in it?
What do we do about our house here?
Should we lower the price again?
Should we put in the new floors we wanted to do instead of lowering the price?
How much money are we going to lose on this house?
Should we change realtors?
(we are most definitely not happy with ours, but is it worth it this late into the game??)
In the meantime, do we move down with Ryan or stay with our friends?
Should we rent? Where we want to eventually be? Where is that??
Will we have a place to live by the time school starts (in 4 weeks!!)?
Do I just start Savannah in school up here?
Do we just skip the start of school and wait until we're moved in?
Do I start her in school somewhere or "homeschool" until who knows when?
Does Sawyer have any chance of finding an empty space in a preschool classroom at the last minute?
Should we take advantage of the preschool system at the public schools?
Should I go ahead and buy clothes (specific dress code in Nashville Public schools) for the school year?
What am I not doing enough of to get our house sold?
Is it not nice enough? Clean enough?
Do I not have enough faith?
Am I not praying enough?
Am I not trusting enough?
Did we make the wrong decision?
Should we stay put and live apart for another school year?
Should Ryan look for another job here? Another job anywhere that can offer full relocation?
Should I get a job?
Family is trying to plan trips to visit... do they come here or there? Where will we be?
Will we still have this house? A new one?
Will we ever get a vacation?
When are we ever going to get to do foster care or get going on an adoption?
Does it bother the kids living inbetween and waiting and in limbo like this as much as it does me?
Why do I feel like crying all the time?
Why have I gained so much weight?
Why can't I do something about it if I feel so crappy about myself?
Why can't stress make me lose a ton of weight like it did when I was 24? Why does stress at 34 do the opposite??
Which house should we buy?
This one?
This one?
The one with...?
The one where we like _____ but don't like ______ and _______?
More house and more yard but an hour commute for Ryan??
Have we still not found "the one" or do we just settle on one that we've seen and not loved?
Why hasn't our house sold by now?
Why does every realtor that comes thru our house love it and compliment us on how nice it is and how well it shows and they're sure it'll sell in no time, but yet not one family has been interested enough to make an offer?
How on earth will this all fall into place in time?
What do we do when it doesn't?
Do we get a new realtor?
Do we just buy a new house anyway?
What is best for the kids?
What is really best for us?

Okay, I'll give you all a break now. But I'd like to point out, I don't get one.
This is just a taste of what's rolling around in my head non-stop, all the time. How do I turn it off??
And that's just the big stuff, the heavy stuff, not the stuff about regular life; keeping the house clean, what's for dinner, what gift do we buy for this birthday party, are my kids watching too much tv while I house hunt online, how on earth do I catch up on organizing pictures on my computer from the last year?!
Regular life goes on and I feel like I'm not doing it very well because I'm so caught up in the stress of this situation.

Not that I'm not trying.
Last weekend we had friends in town to staying with us for a long weekend while they were here for a wedding and I had a pretty great time with my great friend amidst the ups and the downs and the craziness of their weekend plans and having five kids in the house all weekend (and three house showings in the midst of it all!). We even squeezed in a quick last minute family photo shoot with a fabulous blogger friend, also from out of town, on Saturday that was so fun despite being hot and sweaty!! Then last Sunday as we said goodbye to our guests, we hurried to pack ourselves up, have the house ready for not only being gone for a week, but another house showing, and get over to celebrate Caleb's first birthday at a pool party on our way out of town to Nashville. The kids and I spent the week down in Nashville with Ryan and spent a good lot of time with Mr. Cohort and his wife and kids down there (all getting settled nicely in their beautiful new house)(what? no I'm not jealous or bitter at all...) and then we also hit up the Robertsons on our way home for some visit time where the kids played fabulously together and we got some snuggle time with their new baby girl. We got home to STL late Friday, spent the next day just relaxing and hanging out, napping, watching movies and of course some pool time. It was a good day.


Then Sunday, yesterday, suddenly, it all came to a head and I for some reason out of the blue hit a breaking point.
I spent literally the whole day "leaking" as Sawyer calls it. aka, crying.
All. Day.
It was not a good day.
I've never felt so tired, weary and exhausted before in my life.
Not a busy exhausted, as we actually had an pretty laid back and enjoyable week. (well, yes, physically exhausted too... I can't sleep, my brain won't turn off. Even with sleep aids, I'm not sleeping well at all, ever. And my hair is falling out, handfulls, every time I wash it or brush it or run my hands thru it. Ugh.)
But mostly, or combinedly (is that a word??) I'm just emotionally, spiritually and mentaly completely wiped out.

Decisions have to be made, something has to happen... but I don't have the answers.
And I'm realizing I don't have the energy for it anymore. Not having answers or an end in sight is so darkly overwhelming at this point.
I feel like I've done pretty well for the past six months and now it's all catching up to me really fast.

So I'm a little stressed.

I wanted to go back to Nashville with Ryan again... I miss him and I like hanging out with him and I don't want to have to spend all week keeping the house clean after the kids "just in case" and I don't want to parent by myself and I worry about him driving so far alone and I don't want to have to hang out with anyone else and pretend to be good company.
But I stayed because the kids want to spend time with their friends and our stupid frogs should probably be fed and as long as we're still paying for this thorn in my side house (and the pool!) we should probably use it.
But I feel like literally hiding out in my house this week, not even wanting to go to the pool or have lunch dates or even let the kids play outside because I don't want to talk to anyone. I don't want to fake being upbeat and optimistic and okay with everything. I'm tired of talking about all of this stuff, but in actuality it's the only thing on my mind.

Honestly, I'm nothing but frustrated and lost and scared, and it's kind of hard to be friendly and social like that.

And so I've been quiet.