Yesterday, I stood in front of my house and wanted to cry. The thought of taking down my Halloween decorations was so overwhelming that I couldn’t even get started! I had styrofoam gravestones to pick up, lights to unwind, a bunch of decorative crap to haul inside, and, of course, about 10 pounds of fake spider webs to untangle from all of our trees and bushes.
I unplugged the lights and extension cords for safety reasons, and managed to open the front door and chuck them inside
But that was it. That was my limit. The rotting pumpkins stayed where they were. The plastic ghosts are still affixed to the bird feeder. It’s getting closer to Thanksgiving, and now I’m that lady who lives in that house who does not promptly take down her holiday decorations.
After barely managing to pull off Halloween (last-minute costumes, the slim pickings of hand-out candy), I’m already dreading Thanksgiving and Christmas. Normally, I am a very festive person, and after the past couple of years we’ve had, the community and my family deserve some holiday cheer. Like, let’s get silly with the reindeer hats and put up a bunch of lights to chase away the existential darkness. Yes! I’m on board for that.
Except… I just don’t wanna
I don’t wanna do anything.
I’m pregnant and I just wanna phone it in, folks.
I’m just barely past the “sick all the time” stage and I’m allegedly hovering in the sweet spot between morning sickness and when the baby is absolutely huge. Still, I’m exhausted all the time and can barely make it up a flight of stairs. The brain fog is palpable.
I cannot motivate myself to do much of anything
Right now I have the bare minimum going — make it to work (gotta save those sick and personal days for maternity leave), get my daughter to her activities, and stay just ahead of the disaster point on dishes and laundry. Forget the garden — everything’s dead and I’m just letting it sit there.
All those home projects? Nope. How dare the holidays come around and ask me to clean house, have people over (yuck), cook, wrap gifts, and generally make the stupid magic happen?
If I lived by myself, or didn’t have kids, I’d be so tempted to just leave
Hop a cheap flight and go somewhere else for Thanksgiving, and maybe Christmas, too. Sit in a hotel room or on a beach, read a book, and watch trashy reality TV all night. But the part that’s the hardest is that all of the work and preparation that moms do to make holidays happen isn’t for them — it’s for the kids and members of the visiting family. It’s busting your butt for the sake of the memories.
I think fleeing the scene is probably out of the question, but maybe I can phone it in on some other stuff. Pay a little more to have the gifts wrapped before they are shipped, buy pre-made food and appetizer trays, hire the neighborhood kids to put up my decorations. A few corners cut perhaps, but this is doable.
Maybe?
UGH! I’m too pregnant for this!
