Day 111: Stress Makes A Great Maid Service

I’ve figured out how to have a maid around here. Simply channel my stress and tension into my house. In just two days I have washed and put away all of my laundry, cleaned out my closet, decluttered the bathroom cabinets, and scrubbed the entire thing including the floor by hand, scoured the kitchen counters and floor, and cleaned the miniblinds. All the while keeping up with the vacuuming and dusting. I id everything short of cleaning things with a toothbrush. I’ve decided the next time I feel anxious and stressed I’ll just clean stuff. At least it’s productive!

And ya know what? It felt good when I was done. like scrubbing the house scrubbed away some of my more negative feelings. Anyone that knows me knows I hate feeling negative. It does me no good, it does my kids no good, and it does Hubby no good. When he can get the time to talk to me, I need to be at my best. I need to be thinking positively, and upbeat. As I’ve mentioned before, that is very important for his well being over there. We have always fed off of each others moods. In fact, he posted about it back in 2006 during our extension, in a journal only him and I read and write in. Here’s the quote from his message back then.

This was from Aug 7, 2006, during his extended deployment in Iraq.

"The truth is I couldn’t do any of this without you. I don’t think I’ve ever realized that more than I have lately. FOUR DAYS bfore I was supposed to be on a plane home I’m told I gotta be here for a few months more. I was pissed off, depressed, and felt like I just got kicked in the gut about it. But seeing your attitude about it how could I stay down? Now I’m at the point where I say fuck it, lets go do what we came to do and go kick some teeth in and go home. I still see guys here walking around moping and feeling sorry for themselves. In my opinion, it’s because NONE of them have a wife that can pick them up like you do me. Every single soldier here should be jealous of the support I get from my wife. Because my wife don’t sit around the house feeling sorry for herself and sure as hell wont feel sorry for me. You remind me all the time why I joined the army in the first place so why should I feel sorry for myself now? I was down for a while but you picked me back up with all your possitive attitude. Now I can go where ever we end up and know in my heart no matter what happens I never let you down because you didn’t let me stay down. I don’t want you to worry too much when we do go either because I am determined to go do my job AND come home to you and our 2 little girls. If ANYTHING good comes out of this whole thing I just want you to know it’s all because of you and the love and support you give every single day.
I love you baby!"

I’m glad I went back and found that. Sometimes even I need a reminder that my attitude is contagious. And it just reinforces my desire to do whatever it takes to not let myself  give in when things get hard. If that means turning myself into some kind of Flylady Martha Stewart Betty Crocker Rachel Ray hybrid then so be it!  I truly believe that if you THINK negative you GET negative. And I don’t want that. Not for any of us. Thank you Hunny for inspiring me, I couldn’t do it without you.