Today was such a fun day. We started off with a concert at the high school – Dot performed with the jazz band and had her first solo and did AWESOME!!! – and then we headed out to Metamora (a cute little Christmas town in Indiana). Even though there were the usual little reminders and stresses over “look with your eyes, not with your hands” everyone got along and we played games at the park and climbed trees. It was just a wonderful day… which brings me to the main point of this (rather long?) post: While today was a wonderful day without a lot of trouble or drama it was not a normal day.
In fact, it was quite out of the ordinary. I tend to focus on happy positive things – mainly because I think life is better when we accentuate the positive and focus on all the amazing blessings we have. But that can tend to make it appear like we have it together all the time. Someone once told me that we must have so much fun as a family at home and that they could see how much we loved each other. I remember thinking about that morning where there had been multiple arguments and fights. The day before where I had completely lost it with my kids and how up to that one very precise happy moment it kind of felt like a war zone in our home.
So, here is the thing – life is hard. It has its good moments, it’s bad moments, it’s gorgeous moments and it’s phantom-of-the-opera-ugly-scary-face moments. Raising a child with severe ADHD is not easy, pretty or even fun, nor is raising a teenager, pre-teen, grade-school aged, preschool aged, toddler aged, or infant aged child – even when they are as amazing as ours (because despite their and our many faults, they are amazing). At any point you could probably stand outside our house and hear yells and screams – not the happy kind – coming from within our walls – and, I’m rather embarrassed to say – sometimes it’s me. Sometimes I catch myself stuck in pitty mode saying if only… if only Lizy were still here everything would be better – which is hogwash because we would still have the same problems, the same issues, the same horrible, rotten, very bad no good days. And sometimes those days turn into weeks and longer. Oh sure, there are good spots, but sometimes the good spots can be overwhelmed by the bad ones and I have to work really hard to find them.
Sometimes life feels so hard I can hardly breathe and I just want to be done. Sometimes it feels hard and I feel “I can do this!” Sometimes it’s scary and I’m terrified. Sometimes I’m brave. Sometimes it’s stressful and overwhelming. Sometimes I feel like “I’ve got this”. Sometimes I feel lost and utterly alone. Sometimes I feel purposeful. Sometimes I feel like a total failure. Sometimes I feel like a million bucks. I love my children and often feel they are the most amazing people on the planet and sometimes they are terrors and I hide from them because I’m tired of dealing.
This post isn’t meant to be a feel sorry for me post, or wow she’s awesome post… This post is to say we are normal everyday people with ups and downs. Our friends are normal everyday people with ups and downs and even the seemingly perfect and amazing spiritual giants that we strive to emulate are normal everyday people with ups and downs. Sometimes it’s easy to look at someone and say “wow, they are so strong, incredible, inspirational” – what have you, and it’s easy to compare your weak moments with someone’s shining moments. But when it all comes down to it, we’re all mucking our way along in the trenches of everyday life and dealing with challenges in one unglamorous way or another while trying to keep our faces to the light. And because of that, days like today, the rare gem in the pig-sty of life are greatly cherished. And at the end of the day, week, month, year – if you’re really taking tally, the good actually does out-weight the bad.
Fun and Flawed 