I'll Be Honest

I haven't posted here in over a month. Why? I didn't want to. I didn't feel like it. I would think about it and then push the thought away. I also haven't cleaned my house in a month. That's an awful, terrible, embarrassing admission and you really have no idea how hard it is for me to admit it. Why have I not cleaned in a month? The same reasons why I wasn't posting. I would walk into a room, see what it had become, and then turn around and walk away. I'd try to build up my motivation, walk back into the room, and then my motivation - or what little there was of it - would come crashing back down. Walk away.

You see, it finally occurred to me on Friday that I was struggling with a bit of depression. That was the four week anniversary of my 23 year old cousin Ben dying in a horrible car crash. The three week anniversary of me flying out last minute to attend his funeral and watching his sister (my cousin Bethany) collapse in grief beside his grave. It tore me apart and that feeling hasn't really gone away yet.

No, this has nothing to do with organizing or simplifying or minimalism.....but I had to say it. To acknowledge that I've been struggling emotionally after the loss of a family member and that it's taking a toll on how I'm handling my home life. I'm slowly coming back. I even cleaned the kitchen today. I had to walk in and out of the kitchen over ten times before I could tackle it, but I did it.

We all struggle sometimes, but it really does help to be honest about it. Once I finally opened up to my husband and explained how I'd been feeling after Ben's death, a little bit of self motivation came back. I worked on our back yard a little and helped rebuild a portion of our fence. And it felt good! In my attempt to motivate myself to clean the kitchen, I was thinking over how to write this post. Thinking about my honesty with the situation helped to jump start the kitchen cleaning. It just took a few hours with a couple of minor breakdowns. I don't actually know if anyone reads this blog, but knowing that I was going to write it out helped - even if this blog is just for me alone.

I have a goal this week. On Thursday, I want to begin re-painting my kitchen. I don't expect to finish it, but I want to at least get one section of a wall finished. Nothing big and overwhelming. Just baby steps to get me motivated again.