The First Chore is Getting Up

It's so hard for me to wake up in the morning. It's hard to sit up, get up, do anything, or think clearly for an hour.....or two.  Sometimes I get up before the kids, sometimes I don't. No matter how hard I try, the morning just won't get any easier.

And man, do I beat myself up for THAT.

My husband can pop out of bed and be ready to leave for work in less than 20 minutes.

I had this thought today that maybe I have a hard time getting up because I have to rebuild myself every day. My husband, on the other hand, is so confident in who he is, he is so strong and stable. His foundation is solid and his self is secure. He doesn't need to rebuild his house every morning, because, when he wakes up, it's already done. I kind of get the feeling he would say "duh. and?" to this statement.

When I wake up in the morning, I feel like a pile of rubble. Everything I had built the day before is wrecked. I am not stable, certain, or confident.

It's a reminder to me that I'm not as I should be. I'm not 100% "normal", if I can use that word. Again, I've been so hard on myself for not being able to wake up in the morning, but, really, I've been hard on myself for having depression, anxiety, and an eating disorder. I'm wondering why I'm not like everyone else, when I'm NOT like anyone else.

Each morning I have to rebuild my mental, emotional, and spiritual health, brick by brick, stone by stone, until I'm (hopefully) back to where I was yesterday.

I was thinking that all I had to do was get into the habit of waking up early, before the kids, and take some time to get ready for the day. When I used to work outside the home, I got up an hour or more before I had to leave. I really took my time preparing for the work day. It would be nice if I could do that now, I thought. I know not everyday will be perfect because kids are unpredictable, much to my dismay. I want to wake up before them, but I also do not want to get angry when they wake up early and "steal" my morning time away.

Back to the main thought...I think I wake up very slowly because I am still having to redo all the good work of recovery each and every day. It's kinda like that movie, 50 First Dates, when Adam Sandler has to redo all the work of his relationship with Drew Barrymore over and over each morning because of her short-term memory loss. That's how I wake up. I'm not screaming outwardly but I'm shaking on the inside.

There's a check list that I didn't realize I go through each morning. I'm playing back the "movie" of my recovery. I have to remind myself that I am beautiful, worthy, enough, happy, strong, capable, honest, trustworthy, a good friend, a good wife, a good mom, etc. I have to remind myself that I am not the sum of my feelings, but the sum of my actions. I have to remind myself of my mission and my purpose. I have to remind myself that I am a daughter of God and that He wants me to be in heaven with Him someday.

All that thinking takes time! No wonder I just need to do some hard-core staring out the window when I wake up.