Breathing

I had intended to do a nice, light post but I feel it is a bit beyond me right now.

The reality is that I'm struggling.  I often do when we're in the final weeks of the school holidays and all the little, and not so little things build up.  I've become quite adept over the years at dealing with it all but I find that no matter what strategies I use and things I put in place to make it easier, it's still a struggle.

We had plenty of extra kids over during the day recently and even though it's fun at the time and I'm happy to help out other people when needed, it really takes its toll.

I've mentioned before that both my kids are on the Autism Spectrum and both of them have sensory issues in various degrees for different things but too much noise and stimulation can really add up.  It got to the stage where they both weren't coping well with one child very noisily freaking out and making it known to everyone and the other pretty well 'shutting down'.

So the last week has been dealing with two gorgeous and quirky kids.  My sister had Miss R for a night which was a wonderful blessing for us all.  It gave the kids a break from each other too and something different for my girl to focus on.

When we have moments like this I usually have trouble sleeping so when a good nights sleep is more important than ever, I find myself tossing and turning and good old insomnia kicks in. That means I'm tired, cranky and have a lot less patience so I'm not at my finest as a mother.  It's a reality that we all deal with and when I hear people talking about someone being the perfect mother I get twitchy.  I mean, didn't the 1950's housewives have a stash of cooking sherry somewhere!

The worst seems to be over for now and I'm finding that I need to plan the rest of the school holidays around what triggers there may be for the kids.  We'll get there, we always do.  We don't have a choice really except cope with it and deal with what's in front of us at the time.  One day at a time is how we're working on things right now, sometimes we work on getting through to lunch, then the afternoon, evening etc and break it down if needed.

A huge positive is the fact that hubby will be home around 3 am tomorrow and will be here for 5 days before he has to head back to work again.  Yay! Let's hope it's not too much of a mad house he lands in.

Thanks for listening my friends and remember to look for the little positives in your day.

xx Susan