Day 7: 1 week down, many more to go.

   It's amazing what a person can learn about themselves in 7 days. I've always considered myself to be a pretty good person, not great, or productive, or anything special, but I do okay for my little space in the universe. I have a wonderful husband, he loves me more than I could have ever imagined, and I feel the same way. I have 3 beautiful, amazing kids, they drive me batty, but they are good kids, and I couldn't ask for better! Wyatt's stuggling in school, and not because he isn't smart, he's incredible, he's creative, and he is so much like me it's scary. I felt like I didn't need to do the work, I was so much smarter than the teachers, I was there to be everyone's friend and I couldn't possibly be bothered with school work when I was working so hard trying to impress my classmates. Of course both of these backfired, I was never popular, and I got horrible grades! It wasn't until I was in high school that I realized that when I did the work I did really well, and when I didn't try so hard, people liked me. I'm currently trying to make Wyatt see that, but how in the world am I supposed to change him when it took so long to change myself???
   Fast forward to the present day, and I have to look at myself to see why it is that he thinks being lazy is okay. Me: up until the last 7 days I have worked incredibly hard to accomplish as much as possible without working on anything, hence accomplishing nothing... Wyatt: Same as me in younger form. Hmmmm do you think, maybe a little, maybe just a touch, I have shown him that a person can live day to day by being lazy? I wish that he could feel the stress that I feel. I know I need to do more, I know I should be using my waking hours being productive, and I have let this depression rule my activities, and the kids activities. If I had my way I would let everyone around me do everything and I would be happy to watch. It's messed up, because when I do the work I'm great, I'm really good at everything I've ever tried in life, and I have really lost sight of that.  I think that the last few days have been tough for Wyatt, because my change in routine has upset his routine. He is not very happy with me, because I am now talking to his teacher once a week, and I have taken away everything fun. Something occured to me this morning though, I could be making the problem worse. When I take all of these things away, he gets to just hang around the house and sit and do nothing. What if I try making him feel good about doing good work and improving, instead of spending so much time focusing on the bad stuff.  In my struggle, I am focusing on the possitive outcomes down the road, not the stress and pain and blah blah blah, so if I make him miserable, how in the world am I helping him. He's been through a lot in the last couple years, and everyone in my little Billings circle seems to forget that. They all focus on how much his older brother has been through, and Wyatt gets left behind, all the time. I'm expected to coddle and nurture one, while being the strict parent with the other.... It's a double standard and I won't do it anymore.  I'm the one who is here with these kids, they are terrific kids, and I really want them to have the best childhood possible. It's one more thing that I really want to fix, starting now!!!
   Knowing all of this leads me back to the last 7 days.  I went back a couple steps yesterday, I didn't do much of anything, I let myself fall into the old habit of not doing much, and it was very easy. So, of course, I had a lot of trouble falling asleep again, I was mad at myself, and worried that I had completely shot progress down. So when the alarm went off, I stayed in bed for just an extra minute, and I made myself a promise that I would not do that again today. I didn't, I have already done twice the physical activity as I did yesterday, and I'm not going to focus on how I didn't do anything, instead I will focus on making today worth it, and make up for some of what I didn't do! I can do it, I know it, and I can make today the best day all week so far!!!
   Oh, and here is a fun fact about Billings, they don't believe that the small side streets need to be plowed until lawsuits over damages to cars are looming. So they plowed our 1 block long street while I was in the shower, and my house is the only one on the whole block without a driveway... guess who's car is the plowed in one? Luckily John's is 4 Wheel dr. and that's what I'm driving anyway.  My next door neighbors are very elderly, and their driveway is snowed in, so for part of my activity today I'm going to go remove that snow for them! Ugh I hate cold, but they are very sweet people, and I can brave it for 30 minutes or so.
   Hello week 2!