Grey Hair Adventure

One of the side effects of having my sweet baby is that hair dye no longer sticks to my hair. Or at least it doesn't stick as well as it used to. I have dyed my hair twice since the baby was born and both times it seemed the dye just washed out. Within two weeks my hair was back to being the grey that it normally is. So on January 15, 2015 I dyed my hair for the last time.

I am about 5 1/2 months into my no dye / grey hair adventure. I love and loath the process. I found an excellent blog written by Lauren at http://howbourgeois.blogspot.ca/ where she chronicles her adventure with grey hair and gives a lot of good advice on growing it out. After Christmas 2014 and my second dye post baby I was looking for inspiration and Lauren's blog provided it.

I wish I could say that I had a grand reason for growing the grey out. The chemicals are bad for me, they are bad for the environment, the grey is more fashionable right now. But the truth is that my hair grows really fast, the home dye stopped sticking as well as it used to and I am too cheap to get my hair dyed at a salon every 6 weeks. Some might (and have) said that I am giving up in my upkeep department but it is a never ending fight that begins almost as soon as I have had my hair dyed. So au natural it is.

 I have had two haircuts since the process began. The first one cut my hair from beyond my shoulders to my chin and the second was from the chin to just below my ears. The hair cuts helped a lot. They restored my image to what I feel is the most 'me' and they have helped with the grey transition. I am not sure if it is because I see my minds eye image of myself when I look into the mirror with short hair or if it just makes it a bit less noticeable but it is helping. Most days I pin my 'bangs' away from my face which shows a lot of my grey. Its a challenge not to feel old with the grey but the reality is this is where I am at right now and that is ok. I think at the end of the summer I may look into getting a clear glaze done if the grey is changing color to a brassy tone.

Another side effect of having the grey hair is that people offer recommendations on how to deal with it, often at the strangest of times. I was getting a massage last week (so glorious) and the woman providing the massage said poor circulation causes grey hair. She recommended buying a wooden brush, it has to be wooden, and brushing my hair 300 times in the morning and 300 times at night with the brush. She says it will restore the circulation to my head. I believe it is an old wives tale but this week I will be buying a wooden brush because if anything it will provide me with shinny hair and the brushing will take my hair out rather than it falling out and causing tumble weeds in my hallway.

So this is my grey hair adventure. Most days I love it for its simplicity. Some days I loath it for its greyness. I am going to keep at it because there are other things to focus my attention on right now, hair battles are not that important.

6 Months of Change

We just passed the 6 month mark of having an infant and so far it is going alright. That is to say everyone is still alive and for the most part happy. Every day is a bit different and just when I think I have it under control everything changes. And I am not just talking about the baby.

When I wrote my post in January I knew I was feeling anxious and that it was a bit more pronounced than my usual feelings of anxiety. What completely passed me by was that all of the pamphlets that warn against Postpartum Depression also mention Postpartum Anxiety. So while I was looking for signs of the Depression I totally missed the signs for the increased Anxiety until one day I just couldn't take it any more. I have had anxious days, even anxious weeks before but nothing like this. Basically when you are alone, which I am about 80% of my time, you  have A LOT of time to think. Time to think about things that are bothering you, things that are worrying you and then to continually think about them until you realize it has been about  12 hours and you have not thought about anything else. Little life things (my grey hair), large life things (should I go back to work / finances / house things), things that would never cross your un-anxious mind (is my husband unhappy with me?) and things you should think about but not for 8 hours continuous (is my teenager ok?). I would wake up in the middle of the night thinking about my 'worries' and the next thing I would know hours would have gone by. I stopped getting dressed until right before people came home. I had (have) a hard time making the most basic of decisions. I stopped doing all the things I like to do. I would spend hours watching tv and feeling bad about things. Basically I fell into my mind.

After about three months I went to get some help. A nice women lets me come and talk to her occasionally and basically rehash all of my issues. Over and over again. I read lots of books on meditation but have not quite got to actually meditating. I do morning yoga, I pin exercise routines to start. I am working toward a plan to get back on track. Well I was but then I thought I was 'cured' because the huge-anxious-all-the-time feeling subsided. However, the thing I am learning is that it never actually goes away. I knew this before but now it is really in my face. I can keep it at bay with all my new 'tools' but it is there just below the surface. Ready to strike when I least expect it. A long day with out the husband, too little sleep, a bit of unexpected stress. Basically real life can turn me around in an instant. While I recognize that my  life is great and how lucky I am, once the mind starts to whirl I am unable to stop it for long hours. So after about 2 months of being 'fine' I am back in the midst of it. All it took was one night out too late, too little sleep, a large decision and I feel myself teetering. So changes need to be made to lifestyle, health (mental and physical) and outlook. Most importantly outlook. There are people out there who would love my life. While I am one of those people some of the time,  I want to be that person all the time.

While this may be a depressing way to get back to blogging it needs to be done. The purpose of this blog when I originally started it was to be honest. A public way to be held accountable for living MY best life. To be the best wife, sister, mother, friend, daughter and person. Hopefully a way for a vent, a way to be truly appreciative and focused on what I have and not what I don’t have and also a nice little chronicle of my life and daily struggles.

So hopefully you will be seeing more of me.

Unusual Occurance and Unexpected Feelings

When I walked into the baby's room Friday morning at 4am I was hit with the strongest wave of my mom's perfume. It was so strong I had to leave the room and come back in and it was still there. Hanging from the roof above the change table and the crib are large paper decoration balls and they were all moving. So there I am with a wide awake baby, strong smell of my mom and clearly something spooky going on. What did I do - well I started speaking to my mom. Asking her if she thought the baby was beautiful, did she visit often, basically crazy talk. And while I am certain I was delusional from the fact that it was 4am I would swear that I could feel her close to me. But I could only take that for so long so I got the baby and went upstairs, where I sat with all the house lights on for quite some time.

Even before this unusual occurrence I have been feeling very melancholic in regards to my mom.  I am really starting to miss my mom. I always miss her but since having the baby it comes in large waves that are sometimes difficult to weather. This weekend has been one of those waves. I'm angry because she didn't take care of herself, angry that she is missing this awesome baby and angry that I am angry. I thought I was at peace with my parental situation, which frankly sucks, but apparently I am not. Every time the baby does something cute I want to call a parent and tell them. But I don't really have a parent who would be excited for me, my stepdad tries but babies aren't his thing. I am blessed to have Aunts and Friend-Aunt's who love us and want to hear these things but it is just not the same. And so it just kind of sucks.

I think I will weather this wave and then find a way to combat them in the future. A better set of 'tools' is needed. Or I just have to make peace with the fact that I am angry at my mom, might be for a few more years and that is ok too. It is also ok to really miss her too.

Its a New Year, a New Life

It's been six weeks since our life changed forever. We welcomed our bundle of joy, a gorgeous baby girl on December 7.  The last six weeks have flown by with Christmas, holidays and family. It has been such a blessing. But as the New Year approached I began to feel more anxious. Worry set in. As I am a natural worrier this has become an issue. It is clouding the line between knowing if postpartum is setting in or if I am just having extensions of my normal issues. I am hoping for the later.

Parenting so far has been very stressful at times. The first four weeks were very difficult, not because of the sleepless nights and issues directly related to having a baby. Those I was prepared for. I knew it would be hard, I knew I would have to do the majority of it on my own and I knew there would be an adjustment. It was the worries of - am I holding the baby too much, what should we be doing when she is awake, is she feeding often enough, should I rock her to sleep, am I setting horrible patterns for later in her life, does it matter?  Those are the worries that kept me up with Dr. Google many nights. But since New Year’s, when my family went back to school and work I have been trying to follow my gut but in the sleepless night days my gut gets lost. And so the confusion and scared part of me comes out. The part I like least about myself.

So I have a quest to figure out how to keep my worries at bay. I should have started learning these tools years ago, how to not let the worries overwhelm you. Every morning I wake up and try and remind myself that it will be ok in the end. That the years of worrying about stuff has just caused acne and stress, not actually changed the outcome. That one of the worst things that can happen to a person has happened, followed by a pretty horrific sight and situation and I survived. It was hard but I survived.  

I need to not worry about the future, 6 months, 12 months, 5 years because I have no idea what that will look like. All I can do is treasure every moment of the now, be grateful for my husband, our healthy daughters and our life. 

Household Changes

I have reached the halfway point of my pregnancy and now the reality of the situation is settling in. With that reality is the ever increasing anxiety about our house, its organization and if it will be big enough for 3 adult sized people and a baby. We have finally, after much consideration, figured out the sleeping / bedroom arrangements for our bundle of joy. I am excited to have that settled and an actual place to call a nursery. We have decided on the best course of action for the rest of the house and we have begun working towards clearing out all of our 'must do' list.

But before this decision was made there was quite a bit of talk about moving to a newer house. You see we do not love our current house. Yes it is a nice size, manageable for both cleaning and upkeep. Our biggest issue is its layout (its a horrible bi-level) and the back yard, or lack of a back yard. So we began the search for newer houses in our little town. We looked at quite a few, some with huge walkout basements and the price point was crazy, especially considering we live in a small town. Even the more modest of homes were way above my comfort level.

All this made me think - why is our little 1200 square foot house not good enough? Will the extra space that a bigger, newer house provide be worth the extra expense of that house? I do not wish to be house poor again. Would I love a new house, sure I would. Do I want the extra expense, responsibility and frustration of owning a new house again? No I do not.

More importantly, in my ever increasing desire for minimalism, is getting a bigger fancier house in line with my newish way of thinking. I don't want to spend my spare time cleaning, doing maintenance and caring for a larger house. I want to spend it with my family, doing things, enjoying our new bundle of joy and our teenager. I want to be able to go to the park on a whim after work and have money for adventures.

The result of this rambling is that we are staying where we are. We will fix the house up, add extra features  and be happy with what we have. It is a lot more than some and the house is  a good little house.

Baby News

My family has had some exciting news in the last 4 months. We are pregnant. For a long time we weren't going to have additional children but we changed our mind around our anniversary in October. It seemed like a good thing to do. Now, almost at the half way point, I think we may have overshot the 'good'. The pregnancy is going well. I have been very lucky. I didn't get sick, was mostly just tired and lazy. But it has changed everything for me. From diet to household stress, everything has been amplified. To top it off there have been so many people just talking to me about the baby all the time.

I am starting to reach the point where I like being pregnant. Mostly because I no longer look fat, I look like I might be pregnant. Some of my previous issues have settled and some have been replaced with others and that is ok. I keep trying to remember I am building a baby and to take it easy. However, that is easier said than done when you put on your underwear and rip a hole in them during the day because your arse has expanded beyond the confines of the Large underwear.

My biggest issues have been as follows:

• I crave carbs right now in a way that I have never craved them before. Sure I was an apple fritter and candy junky but I limited that pretty well. I could overcome the mental cravings and just ate pretty closely to the weight watchers diet. Over the last year that has slipped a bit, but for the most part it was more veggies, salads and meats over pasta, cakes and candy. But this has changed. I need bread, cereal, bagels and french fries with gravy more than I need water. There are days (like yesterday) where it was all I could do to get through the day in order to have my fries. I know this is ok but darn if it isn't the hardest mental thing to over come - letting myself have what I want.
• Water - Pre-pregnancy I loved water. I could easily drink 200 oz of it a day. I preferred it cold but I could knock back a water bottle in record time. Now I struggle to get 100 oz of freezing cold water in a day. This is getting better but it is still such a radical shift.
• Veggies - Pre-pregnancy I loved peppers, celery, cauliflower. I loved almost all veggies cooked or raw. I had them with every meal, including breakfast. And I had a LOT of them. Now, I am lucky if I get 5 servings of fruit and veggies a day. 

Pregnancy should be enjoyed. I know it is a glorious thing that I am so lucky to get to experience. So far I have been really healthy and there seems to be no issues. My stress level is low, especially considering that there is a countdown to get a lot of stuff accomplished. I am trying not to complain too much about the small things. I notice changes but the only person I really tell is my husband and I try not to even think about the negatives because I am so lucky.

Home Organization and Minimalist Wishes

Spring is here and so begins the spring cleaning. It has been three years since we did a good spring cleaning, basically since I moved into this house. We are in desperate need of a good clean and in my opinion, a good purge.

Yesterday we began with the daughters room. We purged her closet of all of the leftover toys, clothing and stuffed animals from her childhood. Stuff she no longer wanted. It took 5 bags to goodwill, 3 bags to the garbage, and we still have stuff to purge. Her room is still full of stuff, but teenager stuff rather than child's stuff.

All of this 'stuff' we removed does make me question our materialism. It makes me wonder if we need all the stuff we buy. Sure some of it is convenient but is it stuff we enjoy owning or is it just stuff we buy to fill a void?  I have a room full of scrapbooking / card making stuff that I have collected for years and I feel guilty every time I look at it. I don't want it anymore but have no idea what to do with the thousand of dollars of stuff that is there. It takes up precious real estate in our home, a room that could be better put to use. Everywhere I look at our house I see the same issues. Books by the dozen on bookshelves never read, outdoor activity supplies for small children, hundreds of dvd's for movies never watched. How does one collect so much stuff? And more importantly - what does one do with all that stuff once it is no longer needed?

So I will begin the slow and painful process of spring cleaning with the occasional purging. I will try and get the house down to stuff we use and really enjoy, take pleasure in owning. We will keep the best of the stuff we own, get rid of those things that aren't used regularly, organize the home and generally overhaul it all.

Or I will get lazy like last year and leave it be.