Returning... and burn out

Burnout is what happens when we ignore the soul whispering against an unhealthy job or relationship.

Dr Dina Glouberman

I cannot believe it's been two whole years since I typed a single word on this blog. 

Time has literally flown by, and I have no idea how we got to here! 

Although it's easy to lose two years when you do the following:

• Buy a house
• Rip out the kitchen (on the 3rd day after moving in)
• Spend three months prepping the kitchen (aka bomb shelter) for the new units;
• Interview for and get a brand new job
• Settle Miss S and Mister L into nursery
• Go back to work and juggle the logistics of working and children
• Gain two stone
• Get pregnant
• Gain five more stones
• Settle Miss S into her school
• Give birth to Little S
• Have a slow recovery from said birth. 

Hmmmm... I get the feeling Gary and I don't exactly take things easy. 

I say this given we are about to embark on the second phase of doing up our house which entails do the bathroom, fixing our leaking roof (which is a much bigger issue than we initially thought!), re-do the garden, redecorate and carpet the hall, stairs and landing (which is huge in a four storey house). 

Looking at that list above makes me dizzy, and I'm the one who lived it. 

There's one thing I think is definitely missing from that list above. Self care.

In the whirlwind of everything that has happened over the last couple of years, both Gary and I have had little to no time for self care... and it shows. 

I think we are both pretty close to burn out... if not already there. Gary masks it better than I do, I'm the grumpy, negative one who stresses about everything, even things that aren't relevant (which holidays we'll take in three years, for example). 

I am exhausted. 

Recovering from a third pregnancy has been slower and more frustrating than ever. My hormones have still not settled down six months after giving birth, and I am seriously struggling to shift the baby weight. 

We've just returned from a short holiday, and that holiday made me realise that things had to change. That I could not continue on the path I was on, because it was causing misery for everyone, especially the kids. 

The only person who can bring in the necessary changes is me. 

I need to treat self care as another essential component of my life. On a parr with food shopping and getting the kids to school and nursery. 

We are finally beginning to feel settled, it really has taken the full two years. We now have friends, a support network, access to the right exercise/gym for each of us. Life finally has a rhythm and enough space for us to work in that self care. 

It's funny, I was feeling so stressed out and so burnt out and close to exhaustion that I wondered whether I had hit post-natal depression.... until I read back through this blog. 

My posts after we had repatriated... well quite frankly they scared the hell out of me. I have no memory of things being SO BAD. I cannot remember that feeling, I can't touch it. 

Reading those blog posts made me feel incredibly sad for the little me who was sitting in stressful misery two years ago. It also made me realise that while things have been a little tough lately, I'm definitely not in as bad a place mentally as I was then. 

Reading those posts made me want to write again. Not for an audience, not as a profession, but for me. So that I remember everything, both the highs and the lows. I want to be able to feel how I felt, when I read back through these pages. To chart our life as a family, and my progress and development. 

I want to be a better me, but I can already see that 2017 me is in a much better place than the 2015 me. I've already been through tougher times and that makes me excited about the possibilities going forward. 

So I'm back, hopefully writing something worth you reading!