A Work at Home Mom’s Blog

I haven’t gotten much work done today, but I did get a few things accomplished. Namely, applying for various types of public assistance. That’s something that I had hoped I would never have to do again, but the way things are going, it’s the only way I’m going to be able to keep my family up right now. I just have to keep telling myself that I’m not one of those people who sits on their asses and milks the system for all it’s worth. I’ve always worked for a living unless I had a legitimate reason not to, and I’ve paid plenty of taxes.

Same goes for Hubby, but he’s taking it pretty hard too. He’s in a lot of pain, and he’s had to rely on friends and family to get things done. Between that and not being physically able to support the family, he has been really depressed. I’ve been trying to spend as much time with him as I can, hiding my own emotions and doing everything in my power to take his mind off of things. Between all that and playing host to various visitors and houseguests, I’m seriously drained.

And now I’ve got to dig up all the information they need to process my applications for assistance. I need to tally up my earnings for the past six months, and find all of my receipts for expenses such as Internet access and office supplies. I also need to find utility bills, check stubs, and all sorts of other stuff. And with all that’s been going on for the past few months, I’ve hardly filed anything, so that’s going to be a job in and of itself.

There’s just so much that I need to do, and I’m having a hard time pulling myself together to do it all. All I can do is keep fighting the good fight and hope I don’t end up in a padded room when it’s all said and done.

Life has been really, really sucky (for lack of a better word) lately. Hubby has been very sick, and we’re not sure what the problem is. The doctor called it chronic diarrhea due to his lack of a gall bladder and muscle spasms in his back, but neither of us is convinced. He’s had to miss a lot of work because of it, and I’m sure they’ll let him go when he does go back. They’ve already fired him once when he came back from being out with an abcessed tooth, but he talked them into giving him another chance. I doubt it will work again, though.

Whatever the problem is this time, he’s been in terrible shape. He’s been in lots of pain, and has spent most of the time lying around. He’s even had to get his brothers to cut and split wood for him, and it’s about to drive him crazy that he can’t do it himself. At least his brothers are actually helping this time. Normally they would make up some excuse and he would be on his own.

We’re seriously scraping to pay the bills, because his pay has been next to nothing. And I haven’t been getting much writing done, either. My clients are getting less and less understanding, and really, who could blame them? There are plenty of crooks and liars on the Internet, and they really have no way of knowing that I’m not one of them. Sure, I’ve been honest in my dealings with them for years now, but people can change. I know that from experience.

My nerves have been in a shambles. Sleep patterns have been erratic - one night I’ll be out before my head hits the pillow, and the next I’ll lie awake for hours wishing I had some good natural sleeping pills in the cabinet. And I haven’t been very good company at all. But I’ve got to find some way to pull it together and get some money coming in. I don’t have any choice, because Hubby’s future is very much up in the air.

Today I’m feeling better than I have been in a while, so hopefully I can get something accomplished. Or actually, a lot of somethings. I don’t mind being the breadwinner at all, but it’s just a matter of whether or not I can pull it off.

Hubby bought me a back massager for Christmas, and it does a pretty good job. I have a lot of back pain when I spend much time in front of the computer. It’s not so bad that I need to consider ankylosing spondylitis treatment or anything like that, but it does get pretty painful and cramped up. A real massage is much better, but when that’s not an option I can hook up my massager, kick back in the recliner, and get some relief.

I haven’t used it much lately, because I have been away from the computer for the most part. But I’m gradually getting back into my work, and the pain is coming back. So I’ll probably have to fire the massager up pretty soon.

I’ve tried to get Hubby to try it when he gets backaches, but haven’t had any luck. I mean, he’s taken it for a test drive just to see how it worked, but he hasn’t used it when he was really having problems. Maybe if I keep after him he’ll eventually give in. I know he bought it for me, but as far as I’m concerned, what’s mine is his.

Well, here I am, at the keyboard again. I’m not getting a whole lot done, but at least I’m present and accounted for. And that’s an improvement.

I started writing this post three, count ‘em, three days ago. So you can see how much I’m accomplishing lately. I’m having a harder time than ever concentrating. Things were pretty quiet last week, but over the weekend we started having more water problems, and now the brother-in-law is back with one of his kids. I’ve tried to write, but it’s kind of like I’m watching matches at three or four different ping pong tables at the same time. Next to impossible to keep up with anything.

At least I’ve been managing to drag myself out of bed each day and make an effort. I guess that’s the first step toward getting back to my life. All I can do is hope that I can keep going forward and not fall back into the way things have been.

It’s been another rough couple of weeks here. It’s all been a blur of unexpected expenses, houseguests, time without Internet access, and other unpleasant surprises. But most of all, it’s been a time filled with tears, angst and incoherence. Fortunately, it seems that I’m slowly getting back to normal (whatever that is).

After I spent a couple of days last week lying in bed, crying, and not doing much else, Hubby asked me if I was having a nervous breakdown. I just kind of shrugged my shoulders, because I’ve never been completely sure what that meant. But it sounded pretty feasible. He tried to get me to go to the doctor, but I refused. I’ve been going to monthly appointments, and that has put a big enough strain on the budget. The weather was bad and the roads were icy as well, so I convinced him that it was not necessary. It wasn’t like I was a danger to myself. So I spent the rest of the week in much the same state.

Yesterday and today I’ve been able to do more, and haven’t been constantly in tears. I got my Internet back this morning and started contacting clients, letting them know what was going on and hoping they would be understanding. (For the most part, they were very much so.) And in between that, I did some research on nervous breakdowns.

What I found was rather interesting. As much as you hear about nervous breakdowns, they are not an official diagnosis according to the medical community. According to Wikipedia, the closest official diagnosis to what most people call a nervous breakdown is a type of adjustment disorder. If you want to spare yourself some of the formal medical mumbo jumbo, however, I prefer this little snippet from Mayo Clinic. I’ve experienced every single symptom on that list, so I guess I qualify.

At any rate, most of the other stuff I’ve read links the idea of a nervous breakdown to depression and anxiety. And I’m already on medication for that (although it would appear that it’s not exactly doing its job). For now the plan is to just hang in there and hope that I don’t have any more serious episodes before I get back to the doctor. And that when I do go in for my next scheduled appointment, that she either gives me something that works or refers me to someone who will.