little feet, big sky

I’ve been reading a book called Buddhism for Mothers. It’s like a cup of tea for my soul lately and is inspiring me to write the following…

I an tired. I would normally hate to admit this, but I’m trying to be compassionate with myself. The idea is that I would never treat anyone else as badly as I treat myself.

So, I am tired. My back aches, my knees hurt and I am mentally and emotionally drained. I feel guilty admitting this, as I’m sitting next to the recovering spouse, slumped sleeping in a chair because it’s too painful for him to move to the bed two feet away and there’s still ten minutes to go until his next dose of pain meds. Guilty, because I am a guilt-monger. Guilt is the whip that drives me onwards to some imagined perfection every day.

But where was I? Oh, right, I’m tired. I’ve barely caught a few hours of sleep since Thursday, and have been juggling baby, house and sick spouse since then. Maybe tired is an understatement, but I’m running on that extra adrenaline that comes with the fear of letting just one ball drop.

Oh, that’s what I was thinking. I was sitting here by the spouse, tearing up a little, and was wondering why I wanted to cry so badly. It’s just an appendectomy, right? Kids get them all the time. It was part exhaustion, I’m sure. But mostly, it was this overwhelming frustration at having to choose between the spouse and Spice. Three hours here. Four hours there. Both need me right now and I spend time with each guilty that I’m not spending time with the other. How messed up is that.

Of course, the logical side of me says that I can’t be two places at once, so there’s no point in crying over it. And the aiming-for-compassion part of me tries to pipe up that I really am trying to do the best I can, that I’ve done so much the past few days, and I just need to get a few hours of sleep. And that’s nothing to feel guilty about.