Tired Mama

I am going to keep this brief because I am tired, I am not sure I even have a point. This may be one sleep-deprived, incoherent bit of rambling- but I'm going for it. Heck I am not even going to edit it.

Who know's maybe you're tired too and it will all make perfect sense?

Sleep loss comes with the territory of being a mother. From the early nights of wandering around in the dark trying to find your breast and insert it into a crying orifice or mixing up a bottle while changing up the you can't remember how many diaper of the night-- to the teething, developmental changes, fevers, time changes, afraid of the dark, won't sleep for no apparent reason other than it is a perfectly good Tuesday- Sleep is lost.

All the lost Z's can leave you feeling like your taking crazy pills, wondering whether or not you could get an IV of coffee installed in your body.

Meanwhile, while I feel like I have been hit with all the cars, my child shoots out of a cannon every morning like he is the spawn of the Energizer Bunny and Roadrunner- on crack.

This week was especially challenging in the sleep department, I'll spare you the details, but today was tough. I was 'lose my shit' kind of tired, a cocktail of physically and emotionally spent with a dash of desperately exhausted.

By the end of the day I was questioning my sanity but after a good solid cry and a sob fest with my husband. I had a plan moving forward on how to better communicate around my sleep and self-care needs, and headed out the door to two hours of Restorative Yoga bliss.

If you have no idea what that is- look it up- find a class- go!

Or if your local, join me here

Anyway, after class I made my way to the grocery store to acquire a non-home cooked, I am certainly not scratch cooking tonight, semi-health conscious kind of meal and I was taken back by an encounter with a baby faced 1st year bagger at checkout.

He said "Hello, how are you tonight?"

To which I replied " I am doing better" (not that he knew or needed to know my day felt like a mess.)

Then he said, with big blood shot sweet eyes "I'm okay, I am really tired."

This struck me, he was maybe 14 or 15 and when I really stopped and looked at him, I saw that he looked just as exhausted as I had been feeling, and had I not spent the last 2 hours calming myself down, finding the quiet and stillness for myself, I think I may not have felt so connected and compassionate towards him? but I don't know he was just so flippin' sweet so he probably still would have broke my heart.

I drove home and I thought "man everyones tired, not just us moms, kids are tired, America is tired." and right then I saw Christmas lights, big beautiful bright letters- L.O.V.E.

Love is what we need. When we are tired, scared, feeling low, stressed, frustrated, uncertain, overwhelmed- love is what we need.

Love and the time and space to slow down and care for ourselves.

So tonight I am going to bed with love on my mind- for myself, for my family, for that sweet tired bagger, for the other overtired mama's, for people I find difficult, for strangers- love for all beings.

And with that... may we all rest peacefully tonight.

Mamaste Well,

Rose