The Great Moan Off - Day 7.

I have reread my insomnia post half a dozen times in the last day, and dude, I really need to get some new inner dialog. I am just blown away by how negative it was. I almost deleted it. When I got the idea to crawl out of bed and write down all the thoughts swirling through head I thought it might be interesting reading for me in the future. A chance to capture what I was fixating on at that particular moment in my life. For perspective on my silliness. I even thought it might be humorous, the mishmash thoughts of a sleep deprived mom. What I didn't realize until I read it the next morning was what a downer I am. And self abusive. It was very enlightening. Now the question is what to do with this new found knowledge. Other than, obviously, forgo any other attempts at stream of consciousness writing. Good Grief.

Anyhoo...Yesterday was the last day of my week off of complaining. The insomnia of the night before resulted in a massive headache that refused to die. That coupled with some minor irritations at certain family members, who will not be named, and I found myself on the phone with Melissa in a full on traditional Chaotic Joy rant. It wasn't until later in the day that I realized I had fallen back into my grumbling ways. I think this may partly be Melissa's fault though. She really shouldn't be such a sympathetic listener.

So, true to my pledge, I am going to do a quick list of the ways the things I was grumbling about were in fact, blessings.

1. I didn't fall asleep until 6:00AM. The blessing: The Man got up with the kids and let me sleep in until 11:00. And he didn't make even one "I told you so" comment about the late afternoon coffee that caused the insomniatic incident in the first place. He's a keeper, that one.
2. Clara was overtired from the night before and fell and got a fat lip making her generally a troll. The blessing: TLC ran a Jon & Kate Plus 8 marathon. God did not choose to bless me with 6 toddlers at once. Can we get a Hallelujah? (And really, Clara is a blessing in her own right. A very loud blessing.)
   
3. I had a butt-kicking headache all day. The blessing: Yeah, I couldn't really find a way that this was a blessing. However, my joint ailments have pretty much disappeared so that in itself is pretty.freakin.awesome. You'd think I would have been celebrating and not whining about my head.
   
4. AND, while this is unrelated, I also went out with two of my very best friends (one of whom was the infamous Melissa) for dinner. Including cheesecake. Kid free. Divine.
   

And therein lies the end of my Great Moan-off experiment. I admit that I didn't do quite as well as I had hoped. I lost momentum towards the end and kept forgetting to keep myself in check. I also noticed that I tend to grumble most when I am physically not feeling well. While that's understandable, it doesn't actually make me feel any better so I am going to try to do better about keeping my mouth shut. In fact, I am going to try to continue this whole moan-off thing. To at least keep checking in a couple times a day as part of my quest to become a more positive, grateful, person in general. I may do another update next week to help keep me accountable.

And, speaking of positivity, I just read this fantastic post by Meg and I think this will be my next challenge. Go on. Go read it. Hurry up....

Are you back? Wasn't it great? Don't we all just wish Meg was our mom now? I am totally a "No" mom and I think my kids, especially the middle two, could do with a little more "yes" in their lives. And since this is our first official week of summer, it's a good time to begin. Thanks Nutmeg for inspiring me. (Although I am still not sure I could let my children paint with mud and food coloring. Baby steps.)