Too Much Pressure

I'd like to forget today. No, I take that back. I'd like to remember today, to remind myself never to pack in a schedule like this again.

As I described my schedule to Anna today, picking something up at her house as I was 2/3rds the way through my busy day, she said she was tired just hearing it.

9:00 - GymKids w/ Eli
10:00 - Babysit Justin after GymKids
12:00 - Pick up Tobey, collect snow clothes people have been lending for our trip
12:30 - Pick up drive thru for lunch
1:00 - Meet tree removal guy for estimate
2:00 - Eli's preschool interview (<24 hour notice, ggrrrrr)
3:00 - Grab our preschool auction item (a bench I had to put into the car myself with kids in tow)
3:30 - Pick up ski bib 5T from Louanne
3:45 - Pick up sleds from Anna
4:15 - Swim class
(5:30 - Tom babysits for our friends)
5:45 - Pick up ski bib 3T from Eileen

I didn't pack it in on purpose. One of the appointments came in with only 24 hr. notice with "no other day" to do it, much to my annoyance. And appointments about the house are coming fast and furious, almost making me wonder whether to push our date back a little for sanity's sake. By the end of last week, the only two appointments we had scheduled for today were babysitting Justin this morning and babysitting tonight. But with preparing the house for sale and all this kinder/preschool contingency registration, and our last minute snow trip there are too many things to juggle. I'm slowly trying to abdicate my room parent responsibilities but as parents in our class have mentioned before, there's ALWAYS something going on in our class that needs the parents' help. Even our class is too busy! And I can't say that I'm always physically doing a lot for the class -- it's just a lot to keep track of in my mind.

I really didn't look forward to taking care of the kids myself tonight since Tom is babysitting for our friends (a long standing appointment). The long patience I've been having with the kids in the past week that Tom was sick is now wearing very thin. My body is starting to revolt to the stress, sometimes me feeling a heart palpitation (called the doc, they said to monitor but to do things to relieve stress like exercise and sleep well). Funny, when I get stressed, I'm not always outwardly visibly stressed, I never lose sleep, I still keep an upbeat manner in front of my friends to try to fool myself, not them, that maybe things aren't as bad as they really are.

Tonight the book I read to the kids was The Berenstain Bears and Too Much Pressure. In the book, the family was overscheduled with kids' activities and at some point, Mama Bear broke down crying from all the pressure, leading to a family meeting and paring down the schedule and happily ever after. Although today it wasn't because of kids' activities, it still gave me a chance to explain to the kids why today was hard for Mommy and got me thinking that I need to pare things down, somehow.

So now the kids are in bed and I'm almost paralyzed as to what to do. I could give myself a well-deserved break and rest. But knowing that there's so much to do, "resting" almost just ushers in more guilt that I'm not knocking off something from my to-do list. I could tidy up so that my physical environment doesn't induce more stress. I could pack for our car trip tomorrow. I could do the dishes.

Or I could sit and cry like Mama Bear.