Chaos and Overwhelm

My mountain of laundry

Have you ever been so busy that you feel as if your life is out of control? I’m feeling it these last few weeks as I am finishing my last semester of college, graduating next week! I’m so excited to be done with my bachelor's degree and my college experience in my 40’s has been amazing. College is much different now, and better overall than when I started back in 1998. But it has been keeping me busy, on top of all of my other responsibilities. My current focus has to be on getting through the immense amount of schoolwork that I have. I'm writing two papers due at the end of this week and working on two large projects due in less than a week. And I’m studying for two comprehensive finals I have next week… I’m tired. My house is a mess, I have two sick kids, and I’m struggling to find 30 minutes just to fold the laundry that is sitting in baskets all over my family room. Not to mention washing the laundry piled up in my laundry room, which is right off of the garage so I have to look at it every time I come in. Sometimes I wish I had a magic fairy that would come in and bring peace to my house…

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 It’s not just the laundry, the whole house looks like a bomb went off because I have been so busy with schoolwork, raising kids, and trying to make dinner happen every night that I haven’t been able to keep up. It didn't help that my husband insisted on buying a new tv for the living room. There’s only one problem; the new TV is so big and heavy that he and my boys can’t safely lift it to put it on the TV stand. It's been sitting in the middle of my living room for two weeks driving me crazy. My desk, where I do my schoolwork, is in that living room. This is supposed to be my sanctuary room. Instead, it looks like a hot mess with piles of stuff everywhere, it’s hard for me to concentrate on my work when I look up from my desk and see nothing but disorder and chaos.

I'm grateful to my oldest daughter Kate for volunteering to fold the mountain of laundry

Lately I’ve found myself unable to concentrate on what I have to do and instead focusing on cleaning and getting rid of random piles of toys and junk just to clear my brain. Yesterday I called movers to switch out the tv’s because I’m at my wits end. They were able to come out today and switch out the tv’s - our old one went upstairs to our room. I have spent the last hour hooking up the new one. I’m happy it’s off of the floor, but now the real work begins-cleaning the mess of papers, boxes, and toys tossed about my sanctuary room. As if I have time right? Instead of trying to do it all, I’m going to set my timer for 15 minutes today to vacuum the room and do a quick tidy. Maybe it will save my sanity. Decluttering the house might have to wait until after graduation…