Struggling with The Darkness

Today started out well. 6:34 always comes too early, but that’s what Costco muffins + cheese sticks are for.

The boys requested a “lazy day”, which around these parts basically means no one has to get dressed, we cancel all our plans, and most of the day is spent in my room, snuggling in bed (if you consider somersaults to be snuggles).

I like lazy days, I like the boys deciding how our day should go, or not go. I love when they take a break from gymnastics and come lay on and beside me.

Its like they know something big is about to happen. Like they can just feel it. And today it felt like they knew it was what I needed too.

It was great. We were great. Until it wasn’t.

Sometimes no matter how hard we try, the darkness can come out of nowhere and surprise you. It can force its way in, take you by the reigns and steal the lightness from the air around you.

It doesn’t matter if you grabbed all your “happy” oils. It doesn’t care if you wrote down 3 things you’re thankful for. And it certainly doesn’t care that you’re a parent with small children that need their mom at her best.

The darkness is unpredictable. It knows what thoughts to put in your head to make all the things you’ve been working on irrelevant. And what works to push it away one day won’t always work the next.

It doesn’t care how many Pinterest quotes you can recite or how much water you’ve had to drink that day, whether your sink is clean or bed is made.

And when you’ve been doing everything “right”, doing everything you can to “spark joy” and “be happy”, but it’s just not enough – it’s okay to admit you’re struggling. It’s okay to wish your partner wasn’t two time zones away so you could crawl in bed and fall asleep and hope the light outweighs the dark tomorrow.

Because it will, the light will always come back. But in the thick of it, when the darkness is so heavy it aches in your bones, that light you so desperately yearn for can feel so far away.