Ch-ch-changes

I’m makin’ them and they are so good! I’m feeling really positive and excited about the future for the first time in a really long time. I’m focusing on simplifying, cutting out the excess (excess everything – food, stuff, commitments…). Until I really started evaluating how I spend my time, I didn’t fully realize how much of my life is one big avoidance tactic. I mean, we all need coping mechanisms, right?  The key is to find healthy coping mechanisms that don’t take over your life and to use them when it is both convenient and necessary rather than relying on them to function at all. So that’s what I’m working on. It’s actually a pretty slow, painful process. While my vices aren’t addictive in the chemical sense, I love them all the same and it is HARD to give them up. But, one at a time, they are going to be eliminated.

Starting with (most of) the kittens. Tomorrow every sick kitten (which right now is almost all of them) is going back to the shelter. I am not going to feel guilty about it. And I’m not going to accept bullying. I know it sounds dumb but it is probably the first hardest step I’ve taken to re-prioritize my life. I really felt so stuck with those kittens and could not see an end in sight. The animal shelter does not make it easier. They are hard-core salesmen who use guilt and scare-tactics freely and easily and offer help and real opportunities to get them adopted rarely. I’ve fostered with many rescues in my life and never experienced anything like this.

Guess what else I’ve done? I have successfully kept a to-do list for over a week. All my life I’ve been an AMAZING list-keeper but a total failure at ever (even a *single* day) using the list I make! I don’t know what changed but I am rocking the to-do list. I fill it out every night before bed and every day I cross off most of it. And we aren’t talking a handful of items either. Every day’s list has at least a dozen things, typically more. I’m so proud of myself!

One vice I’ve picked up recently that I’m not so inclined to drop is crocheting. I have been a knitter for 13 years but didn’t learn to crochet until 18 months ago and after I learned, I pretty quickly dropped it. I haven’t really touched a needle (knit or crochet) in over a year. Life was just too crazy to find time to do something like that. That should have been my first clue that things needed to change! For me, crochet is like prayer beads. It is meditative and I can lose myself in the repetitive rhythm. I can crochet during a birth (often there are long spans of time, usually during transition, when a Mom needs to be in the dark so I’m unable to take pictures) and it is the FIRST thing I’ve found that I can do during a birth that helps me focus and be better at my job. I have tried lots of other things and I’m just too excited and anxious and distracted to focus. I have crocheted myself from anger to acceptance and into personal accountability through a few major issues lately. It is good therapy. It is a good vice.

Another good vice that has been neglected in favor of some less healthier distractions is this blog. I started this blog as a journal for Addison and it has expanded to be a sort of journal of the last several years of my life. I love the history it contains – the good, bad and ugly. While I don’t really need to spend great time delving into my problems on the blog, I really do want to keep up with it like I used to. I want to post more pictures of my kids, more videos, more commentary about life with all these crazy kids. So I’m recommitting myself to doing that.  And I’m excited about it!

So…I’ll see you soon! Sooner than once a week. Because I’m taking time for the good, the important and the necessary.