I'm not sure what first tipped me off that I am slowly losing it...it might be that I've been more :w lately with everyone I meet, or the particular that I have reserved specifically for dh over the past month or so. I haven't really felt depressed...just angry about a lot of things. I have tried to get it together by working tirelessly to get the house cleaned up and by dressing up every day. I really haven't felt unhappy or like I'm losing it on most days. I'm just crabby.

Yesterday, everything caught up with me. I think this was really precipitated by the article that came out about our family. Though I know many people felt *moved* by it, I felt very agitated. I am still very upset about the photo that they chose for the cover and the fact that there were several inaccuracies, ommissions and too much melodrama. I thought it was going to be an article about survival, hope and strength and would provide a lot of information about resources for families, etc. Instead, it revealed too much personal information about me and my family and a picture of me at my most vulnerable was displayed.

Really...I'm just beside myself about this. I can't get past it. Though I'm very open here in the blogs and in the privacy of this website, I'm not as open in real life until I know someone quite well. I feel very exposed. (That, of course, I can't blame on the reporter. I had no way of knowing that I would feel this way.) It has brought all of my feelings to a boiling over point.

Suddenly, every criticism of me feels monumental...and there have been plenty of criticisms lately from too many places! I don't feel understood by my husband, who has essentially told me "i'm crazy" for feeling the way that I do about the article and to let it go. A lot of people in my life also just seem to be dragging me down. My mom calls daily (sometimes 2 or 3 times a day) to complain to me about the same things that she has been for years: She hates her job (but has 1000 excuses why she' can't look for another), She doesn't make enough money (but takes a lot of time off and then when the doc she works for actually has work for her to do that will be extra money she turns it down), She doesn't have any money but then goes on $300 shopping sprees for clothing because she doesn't 'like' her frumpy clothes, she can't get the tiles fixed on her completely crumbled master bathroom shower (where she has covered the walls with plastic bags in order to shower) because she doesn't 'want' a pre-fabbed plastic shower installed by a handyman...she wants all of the walls and tilework replaced....It is totally exhausting.

We actually got caller ID this week because I have got to be able to not answer the phone anymore when my CN or my mom call and I'm not in the place to be able to hear it. I want to be able to decline the *invitation* of a ringing phone without missing an important call.

I'm overwhelmed right now in the "kid" department too. Andrew has so much homework and is so disorganized that he's just drowning...I would love to help him, but since I'm the bastion of disorganization myself...well, I'm not very useful as a role model.

The social issues with Amanda are huge because of our neighbor. Her daughter continues to be mean and nasty to Amanda. When Amanda responds in any way, my crazy neighbor calls me and accuses Amanda of being mean and won't hear any explanation.

I'm also frustrated with other moms. I'm tired of getting those "do you know what your child did" phone calls. This week, I got an angry call from a mom because her daughter left her spelling work at our house when she and Amanda were supposed to be working on the assignment. The little girl called the house in the morning to ask Amanda to bring it to school. Amanda looked everywhere but couldn't find it. So the mom called me to say that she was convinced that Amanda didn't bring the assignment just to get her daughter into trouble. I felt like screaming "are you f***ing kidding me?" but I just sighed and said "I'll talk to her". This is the same mom whose daughter on that night insisted on sneaking out of our house and going into our crazy neighbor's house while my daughter stood outside on their lawn saying "please...we aren't supposed to be here", begging her friend to go back to our house. I of course punished Amanda for leaving the house and not coming to me in the first place, but the mom insisted that this was all Amanda's fault even when her daughter admitted that she had left because she wanted to paint her nails with the mean little daughter.

Seriously....this is just ridiculous! Do these people have nothing better to worry about or think about in their lives?

Yesterday, I just felt terribly depressed and I couldn't shake it. I was near tears all day. We went for a family walk and dh started in again about how I let crazy neighbor's son into our house to play. I tried to explain to him that I don't know what to do to keep the peace...that if I turn the child away at the door CN gets all weird and freaky and that it has more serious repurcussions for the kids too....and he treated me with such disdain that I lost it in the middle of a public road. I started screaming and yelling at him in front of the kids and just couldn't stop. We went home and got the kids to bed and then I went to bed...I'm exhausted. Dh came in and we started watching a little more of season 2 of desperate housewives (man, who knew that Bri really has issues ). Thomas discovered that Andrew was laying in bed trying to finish homework and he just went nuts yelling at him and criticizing him and I flipped out.

I'll spare everyone the gory details where I completely lost my marbles in front of my entire family and had a total meltdown.


I got out of bed and despite all of my work trying to keep things clean, my failure to clean yesterday, coupled with the fact that I let things go yesterday evening after kids were messing things up blew up in my face. At 7.20am when I was trying to get Andrew to school (and was still in jammies with no bra on) our builder came to my door to go downstairs and look at a floor that needs to be repaired.

For those of you who don't believe me when I complain about the mess, here is what he walked into:

Family room:


My work Station for sewing and scrapping (any questions about where Andrew's disorganization comes from)



Today is a new day and I'll just pick up the pieces and move on. The sun is shining and the Fall colors are absolutely spectacular. This really is one of my favorite times of the year and I think I'm going to take Aidan and Zoe our for a long walk to just enjoy it.

Speaking of walks, here are a couple of pics from our family walk this weekend at a local nature preserve: