I Want My Mommy

Tell me other people get completely overwhelmed with adulthood. Some days I just don't want to do it anymore. And lately, there have been more of those days than not. I feel like I'm the kind of person that's fine as long as things keep moving. But, as soon as I have time to relax and to think, I start freaking out. I'm not doing enough. I'm not saving enough. I'm not eating well enough. I'm not socializing enough. I'm not working hard enough. I don't see my family enough. I don't call my mom enough. I don't clean my apartment enough. Sometimes, despite feeling like I never have time for myself, I feel like it's just never enough.

I had a minor meltdown last night. I'm blaming it mostly on the fact that Ben's been going through his nicotine withdrawal, and for the past month I've been focused on him. I've been walking on eggshells, because his fuse has been the shortest I've ever seen it. Some days, it doesn't take much to completely set him off. And I'm terrified of upsetting him to the point where he goes back to cigarettes for comfort. That's not in any way blaming him. It's just part of the process. I expected it to be difficult for both of us. I just didn't really expect it to be this difficult for me. I'm not what you'd call a patient person, so I ran out of sympathy and nice gestures pretty quickly. When the second week was harder than the first, I was completely thrown. And when he was still moody after a month, I just started retreating into myself. I didn't really know what I could say to him, how I could help him. I've just been waiting it out. And he's doing really well. But, still. There have been days when I've needed him, and he just couldn't be there for me, because he had his own stuff going on. Such is life.

In any case, last night was just my breaking point. No particular reason. Nothing earth-shattering happened, nothing terribly stressful. I just suddenly couldn't deal anymore. I woke up yesterday just feeling like I wanted to run away. I wanted to be alone. But, not in the sense that I wanted Ben to make himself scarce for the day. I just didn't want to be where I was. I ended up at a children's bookstore (naturally) after trying to get my niece and/or nephew, and a friend's kid to come with me. None of them were available. Probably for the best anyway. That completely defeated my whole "alone time" thing. Getting out of the house and doing something for myself made me feel better, even though I had anxiety about spending money, since my paycheck doesn't seem to be going as far these days (I haven't even thought about Christmas yet...don't ask me...I can't deal with it right now). The rest of the day basically just consisted of Ben and I hanging around the house doing some chores and watching a movie (Bambi...he'd never seen it...it's much more boring than I remember). But, that night, we were laying in bed, and I just told him that I've been feeling really anxious lately. He told me that he could tell I haven't been feeling like myself lately, and I confessed that I've been trying really, really hard not to take my anxieties out on him. It's been difficult. Almost every day this week, I've wanted to pick a fight with him. Why? Just to make myself feel better. Just to get it out. Just to yell at someone about something. But, I didn't. And if you knew me five or six years ago, you'd agree that that's an enormous amount of growth.

I told him that I just wanted my mom to come do things for me, because I just didn't want to deal with anything anymore. He asked me what I wanted my mom to do. So I started naming things. Load the dishwasher. Clean the apartment. Feed the cat. Buy my clothes. Pay my bills. Plan and cook my meals. Do my laundry. Make my doctor appointments. Put my clothes away. Buy my groceries. As the night went on and I began to feel better, I sporadically called out something else I thought of that I wanted her to do. It became an amusing game after a while, but I was immensely overwhelmed in the beginning. Crying that I just felt stuck. I drove past the college where I got my graduate degree, on the way home from the bookstore, and my thought was, "I should go back to school." Ben damn near had a heart attack. I feel overwhelmed with my hobbies; like I don't have enough time to maintain them all, even though hobbies are meant to be relaxing and not stressful. For days, I felt like I was one wrong word away from crying.

It's been a long time since I felt like that. When I was with my ex, my general state of being was "I just want to run away by myself for a weekend." I remember that feeling so strongly. But, I haven't felt it in years. And yes, I suppose I was overwhelmed back then, but I was always busy, always doing something, so I didn't even notice. When I started focusing on myself is when I started seeing how unhappy I was and how too much weight was on my shoulders. So, I'm not really sure why now I feel like I'm simultaneously too busy and not doing enough. Things are definitely easier now. I finally have someone who helps around the house (though, generally needs a gentle reminder). The entire state of our relationship doesn't fall on me anymore. And he maintains his own family relationships without needing me to remind him that it's someone's birthday or that there's an event this weekend. I'm also only working one job for the first time in a long time, and I'm no longer in graduate school. I have more time at home to myself than I've ever had before. So, what the hell is the problem?

I think I'm bored, to be honest. Like, I keep thinking about going back to my job at the bookstore, but then I think about having to give up my nights and weekends again and I can't do it. But, then the nights and the weekends come and I'm bored, and a little bit lonely, and I don't feel like doing any of the 5,000 hobbies I've acquired over the last few years. I'm just restless lately. I keep thinking, "I need to just have a damn baby and I'll never be bored again," but then I remember last night and wonder how that would have played out if there was a child involved. Is that a feeling that parents get? I would imagine so. But, like, I just wanted my mom last night. What happens when I'm the mom? Yikes! I have to do all the things I don't feel like doing for someone else. I'm so overwhelmed by my own monotonous life, and now I'm considering adding another human being into the mix? Am I actually insane?

And the holidays are coming, and my experience has only ever been a nightmare trying to squeeze in both sets of parents. With my ex, Christmas was the nightmare, because his mom required his presence on Christmas Eve, which was when my family did their thing (we were together ten years and spent exactly one Christmas Eve together). With Ben, it's even more complicated. Because both of our parents are divorced. So, that's essentially four stops we have to make on Christmas and Thanksgiving. His dad makes it easier by having his Christmas shindig in mid December, but Ben still hasn't outgrown the whole "I want to wake up at my mom's house on Christmas morning" thing. So, now Christmas day becomes the problem, when I have to see both of my parents and his mom. And I honestly wouldn't mind skipping my family's stuff every other year if he'd agree to do the same, but he won't. And I so appreciate how close he is with his family, but at what point do I become the priority? At what point does he try as hard to spend the holidays with me as he does to spend them with his entire extended family? I know, we see each other every day, but it's Christmas...

And I didn't even mean to go on that tangent, but that's where I'm at lately. I'm all over the place. I can't stay focused on one thing without becoming overwhelmed by something else. I used to pride myself on getting things done. If I had three places to be in one day, I'd figure out how to make it happen. It was go, go, go, and I thrived on that. It was like a puzzle to me; how can I make this all work? And I don't know if it's because I'm getting older now, or if it's because I got tired of being the person who was holding it all together, but I just can't anymore. I just don't feel like putting that much effort into every single thing. I want someone to just come do it all for me again. I was in such a rush to be an adult and call my own shots and have my own space, and I was so friggin' stupid. I want to smack sixteen-year-old Kim so friggin' hard and tell her to have some damn fun. And now I'm twice that age and I still don't know how to have fun.

Three days ago this post was going to be about whether it's possible to be an atheist and still believe in ghosts. And now it's this. Because that's how quickly things change. I might still write that one, though. In the meantime, tell me I'm not the only one who finds adulthood overwhelming.