Change Starts With Me

Change starts with me. I heard this thought float through my head today. I have been ruminating on the life I live, the life I want, and life of my fantasies. I feel like I need change in my life. I feel like I went from contentment to discontent in a really short amount of time. I went from busy, and striving, and social, and motivated....to nothing. Now I don't want to see people, I don't want to exercise, I don't want to keep up on my home, I don't want to keep up on me. I need to take a moment to reflect on the changes that DID take place, that I have allowed myself to move into this mental state. Let's rewind 1 year. At this time last year I was reviewing my numbers for my spa business and coming to the realization that not only did I not earn the extra money I wanted, I didn't even earn back the money I invested; but I lost enough money that I couldn't pay for my son's birthday party. Nor did I have money for Christmas. December I stopped the spa business. January came and went. February came and went. March came and Kieshan decided because his grandpa's health was not well, that he/ we needed to be closer to Mt. Shasta. We sorted things out and decided to move to Sacramento after my 9 year old got out of school. My heart did not want to leave SB but my mind told me it was the right thing to do. I agreed to move but only when Kieshan got a job with benefits, so when I quit my job the insurance would not have gaps. I mentally prepared myself to move. I disengaged with the people I worked with. I started trying to figure out how to make the move work. I started applying for jobs in Sacramento. April was filled with stress. I convinced myself I didn't like my job anymore. I decided that I needed to get in shape before we moved. In May I started going to the gym every morning. I was exhausted at work every day. I was asleep by 8pm every night. I tried to interpret the reasons behind us not getting any job responses. I started to feel like we needed to move no matter what. I was offered a new position within my clinic. I studied the possibilities surrounding the job, the impact of the pay increase. I studied the pay rates of jobs in Sacramento and the surrounding areas. I studied the real estate, the rents. I started feeling really aware of the space we live in. I started to feel like I was not a good provider for my children because of the space we live in. I started to feel proud of the action we were taking to provide our kids with more space and opportunity than we had. June came along and we had no responses to jobs. We pushed our max move date out to July, and then to August. I stopped wanting to make dinners because I was starkly aware of our small apartment, our lack of money to get groceries, our expensive costs of living, the lack of parking, lack of outdoor space for the kids to play. As we entered into summer the heat in our apartment was unbearable. Days and nights of heat. Unrelenting heat. It was exhausting. I didn't want to move when I got home from work. It was too hot to cook, too hot to wash dishes, too hot to take to kids to the park. Too hot to enjoy life as we knew it. I struggled with the fact that we were not moving. That all of my planning and reading, and disconnecting was all for nothing. I tried to accept that we were going to be here for a whole nother year. I accepted the position at my job with the expectation that I would be leaving soon. I hate my new position. I am lonely and separated from everyone. I feel horrible that I am not taking action like I thought I was. My promises to my kids came up empty. I am not giving them more space to run free. Now I spend my days and nights trying to learn where I went wrong in my deductions. Did I plan for the wrong city? Should I just be applying for jobs still? Should we move before the end of the next school year? What if I fail again? What if I can't find a job somewhere else? What if my family is not happy somewhere else? If I can't find a job somewhere else... What is plan B? Stay here? In our tiny space? With the unbearable heat? And no outdoor space for our children to play? And constant frustration over parking? And fail my children even more? Plan B is definitely a cold back up plan. It is only slightly more appealing than staying here. I feel like I'm frozen in time now...waiting for the window of light to unveil this mysterious timeframe to start our plan to move again. This time I can't let it fail. I can't let this sit just solely on whether we get a job or not. This will have to be a: we move no matter what, situation. And then I feel another pang of sadness in my heart, because this is where I am successful. Yet I still failed in some way. I am still not providing a good home space for my kids. This burdens me and I can't seem to shake it. I need.......something. My kids need........something. I need time with them. All of this time I have spent working so hard to provide a home, has not been time spent with them. Now my heart aches for both sides of the coin. For not providing a good home space, AND for not being home with them. Now I feel like I not only need to guarantee a move, but now my heart wants to be home with them too. I can't do all of this. I don't know how. I don't know how to guarantee a roof over their head and have me home all the time. Now it is November again. This year I have money to have a party for my son. My sister is coming to visit and stay in my little home. I fear I will be judged again, for having worked so hard to get here. I am struggling with where I should aim my focus. I am torn between feeling good with my job and feeling bad for my home.