lately...

i have been feeling overwhelmed. stressed. overcome. sorry for myself. drained. worked up.

not all the time. but a lot.

one of the reasons is that i have not felt well. for a good 2 and a half weeks i have been coughing, and having headaches and a very sore neck and shoulders.  not sick enough to be in bed or even go to the doctor, but not well enough to function properly. i am getting better, but not yet 100%.

also, i have been stressing. about how quiet the shop has become. business has become difficult. i know that it is not only me. lots of businesses have closed down or are hanging on by a thread, and lots of scrapbooking shops have disappeared. we have had to cancel many classes the last few weeks, due to lack of interest. it is cold, people do not have money, and lots of people are feeling down and blue and overwhelmed. i know it is not personal. but it is still me who has to pay my rent.

and i am stressing about how expensive everything has become, on top of having less to spend. everything has gone up, and by a lot!

and just when i thought it could not get worse, the tenants in my house are moving out next week. so i have to spend a lot of money painting and fixing and improving the house, and so far there are no tenants for next month. the rental income from that house is a large part of my salary. thankfully i am blessed with a talented and willing and able handyman, who is working long days at fixing and cleaning and helping me out there, to make the house close to perfect again. but dipping deep into the rainy day fund, and finding tiles and paint etc, at a budget and in very limited time, has been difficult.

sean has to go to high school next year, and we have to apply to schools. one school in particular is very demanding - filling in those forms and collecting all the certified copies of all the necessary proof of everything is quite a challenge. not to mention the expense that lies ahead..

and of course, when things become a little stressful, i start stressing about everything, even the things that are not a crisis at the moment. you know, all the loose ends, that we all seem to have in our lives. suddenly they become overwhelming to me.

generally i can cope with some level of stress, and normally i am quite a positive thinker. i can see the silver lining, the light at the end of the tunnel. but lately i have been finding that harder than normal.

so, why am i blogging about this? what is the point of this whiny post?

as i have found many times in the past, when i write all my worries and problems out here, and read through it a few times to edit, and press 'publish', i feel a lot better. blogging about it all is more effective than therapy for me.

also, when i look back at this post in weeks or months to come, i will be reminded that what is almost too stressful to bear right now, turned out quite ok in the end. i remember reading a while ago on allie's blog about a worry journal, where i write down what is stressing me right now, and when i look back, i can see that it was a storm in a teacup. and so i would be reminded that no matter how difficult things seem at this moment, it will be fine in hindsight. well, this blogpost is like that worry journal. a reminder that no matter how difficult things may seem in the middle of the night, this too shall pass. and i have been through so much worse, and come out better on the other side.

so, i apologise for dumping this all out here for you to see. but, as mel mentioned in a recent post on her blog, i realised i will not be able to return to regular blogging until i mention the elephant in the room. i need to get this all off my chest. because i could not blog around it, and i did not really want to blog about it, i stopped blogging all together.

so, you don't need to leave me cheesy 'chin up' comments. i know. i know!

edited to add: i found a post on karenika's blog that says this all so well!

on a more positive note: how awesomely clever is this:

i wish i had thought of it..

jacki janse van rensburg - SCRAPPIN TIMES scrapbook shop, benoni, gauteng, south africa