A Crisis of Confidence

I'm sure I'm not the only one who suffers from the occasional crisis of confidence? 

I have days when the gloom settles around me and I feel like I'm being a bad mother, a bad wife, a bad friend, and an all round useless person. It's usually when I've been working so hard on one thing or another that it's taken up all of my effort and energy, and then once I take a break, those fears and worries creep over me. 

It's also almost always when I've taken a risk. Done something new, or exposed my vulnerability. Honesty is definitely the best policy, but when you are honest about the things that are part of your make up, your fears, your beliefs, your hopes and dreams even, it leaves you open to be hurt. 

Especially when you open up a part of yourself to your family and friends, the people closest to you, that you love the most. And that's the most silly part of it all. The people that you love the most are usually the people that love you the most, and they love you, all of you. So learning more about you isn't going to make them love you less, and it might even make them love you more. 

Every time I push the "Publish" button on a post, my heart races. I have to swallow hard before I do it, and then tell myself not to be stupid. 

Writing has been the most incredible outlet for me. It has helped me find myself and to find peace with my decisions and my choices. It has helped me to see that being a Stay At Home Mum doesn't necessarily mean that I'm "just" a mum and nothing more. That I can do what is right for  our family and have a part that is just for me too. 

It has also been the scariest thing I have ever done. I'm not a journalist, I have never been taught to write for an audience (except GCSE English, and I don't think that counts 14 years on!). Everything you see written here, it's just my thoughts, spilled out onto the page. I try not to censor my writing, try not to edit so that it is what I think people want to read, but what I really think. Because that's the kind of writing I love reading, writing that is honest and simple and reveals a part of the writer. 

I don't know if I'm a good writer, I don't know if what I write is even interesting to other people. It's interesting to me, or I wouldn't write it, but that's no guarantee of it being worth reading. I definitely do not conform to proper sentence structure, I'm certain that starting sentences with "And" or "But" are definitely not correct, but I don't care. It's how I talk, and so it's how I write. 

I really hope I remember my basic English though, the difference between which and witch, effect and affect, there and their. If I don't, please please please correct me! 

I always tell myself to snap out of it, to just push away the gloomy days and move on to something sunnier, but I can't do that. One way or the other, I have to work through it. It doesn't usually take long, I usually get a hug and a kiss from my daughter, a smile from my son, a text from my husband or my mum, that makes me see how loved I am, and that starts to push the gloom away. And once I've gotten emails or messages from the friends that are like sisters to me, or even messages from my brothers and sister, the world seems a much sunnier place again. 

I almost think that these gloomy days are necessary, that you need to have fears and worries when you are vulnerable, it reminds you of the risks you are taking, and hopefully, that those risks are worth it in the end. Even if those risks aren't obvious to those around you. 

I also need to learn to talk about it. I know that if I told my friends or family how I'm feeling, that they would do everything possible to remind me how loved I am, but sometimes, admitting how you feel is much harder than actually feeling it. 

I'd like to go back to my old habits of eating an entire tub of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream and watching Disney movies, but I'm trying not to eat sugar and gluten, and Ben and Jerry's Cookie Dough or Chocolate Fudge Brownie has those in spades! So I'm trying the longer route of working through how I feel and trying to bring myself back into balance. 

How do you deal with the gloomy days? I'd love to hear some more coping strategies that I can add into my gloomy days.