Am I Allowed To Be Tired?

I am not a mother.  I do not own a house.  I have fish but no pet that demands to be walked or requires a lot of attention.  I have a husband who does *help* around the house.  And yet there are times, like now, when I am tired.  Exhausted.  Amazed I am still functioning.  But it makes me feel guilty, or ashamed.

Why should I get to be tired?  I have it relatively easy.  I can go to sleep when I want and wake up when I want (although work kinda dictates when I wake up).  If I want to take a nap, I can.  I don't have someone or someones demanding my attention.  I only have to cook food for two people.  I also work with people who at times can have very difficult and demanding lives.  In comparison, I have it easy.

It goes back to something I've thought before: no matter how happy you are, someone else is happier, and no matter how bad things are, someone else has it worse.  (There was a girl I knew when I was younger ... let's call her N.  She was always trying to 'up' other people.  No matter how good a day you had, she had a better one.  No matter how bad things were, it was worse for her.  I only beat her once.  She said she had one tooth pulled and I'd had four teeth pulled.  She then turned to me and said "Sara, it's not a contest."  Oh irony. Anyway, back to my blog...)  Does that mean we aren't allowed to feel what we are feeling?

I am still allowed to be tired.  I am still allowed to feel what I feel.  Even if my "bad" could not in any way compare with your "bad," does that make it "less" bad?  I say no.

And yet ... there are days when I still feel guilty.  There are days when I feel as though I shouldn't be allowed to be bad.  People tell me "it will be worse when you have kids."  Maybe so.  That doesn't mean I am not tired.

Who Should be Married?

When D and I got married, we decided in lieu of gifts/trinkets to our guests, we would make donations to charities that meant something to us.  Having recently lost my aunt to thyroid cancer, one of the organizations we chose was the Light of Life Foundation.  You can read more about the organization here: http://www.checkyourneck.com/.

The other organization we knew would create a bit of a stir.  We chose Freedom to Marry.  If you follow me on Twitter, you will see that I follow a few "gay marriage" or "marriage equality" Twitter users.  This is not by accident.  D and I are both avid supporters of marriage equality.  Now we knew people would react to choosing this charity.  Fortunately, all the feedback we heard was positive.  There probably were people who didn't agree with our decision, but they chose to keep it to themselves.

What's In A Name?

As I mentioned in my first post, I didn't think marriage would happen for me.  However, I thought if it ever did I'd probably be well into my mid to late 30s and "taking my husband's name" wouldn't even be a consideration.  I then went and got married in my mid-twenties.  Now it was decision time.  I don't consider myself a feminist (though some may say I am).  I guess I am somewhat of a 'modern woman' but not to extremes.  My husband, D, is what I would consider a feminist.  As a result, he didn't want me to take his name.  Or more accurately, he left the decision to me all the while secretly (or not so secretly as he told me multiple times) that his preference would be for me to keep my married name.

Now I did like my maiden name.  I'd lived 2.5 decades with it.  But it was my decision to make.  Although I didn't know whether marriage would happen for me, I knew kids would.  The idea of having kids with my husband and not all having the same last name sealed my decision.  Taking D's last name became my decision.

An Introduction

Growing up I'd always believed one of two things: I would never get married, or I would eventually find someone to marry but wouldn't stay married very long.  Many months ago, but less than a year, I married a great guy. I don't believe in fate, though there are times I wish I did.  I don't believe in "everything happens for a reason" though I will sometimes say that trying to convince myself it is true.  That said, there are moments in my life that had to happen in order for me to have met D.  I know that had I not had certain past romances, or gone into the profession I did, or attended the schools I did, I would very likely have never met him.  I also realize many things in D's life that needed to happen for him to be in the right place to meet me.  He's not 'from' my town so it really was a convergence of circumstances that led us to meet.  And meet we did.

I like to call our first date a 'marathon' date as it lasted much longer than either of us thought it would.  I'll dedicate another post (or three) to our dating history, especially that first date.  Suffice it to say, although I didn't know when I first met D that we would wed (Hollywood fairytales lie!), I knew something had changed.  I knew this would be an important person in my life.  Little did I know how important. 

Although I am a very happy newlywed, I have been craving a creative outlet.  Something to occupy my time.  I saw friends with mommy blogs and thought 'well, one day when I am pregnant I could do that.'  Then I realized, I didn't have to wait.  Although not an expert on all things matrimonial, I have a voice, opinions, life experiences, and a desire to write. 

I hope you enjoy what I write and ask questions if there are things you want to know that I haven't explained.  I think this is going to be a positive experience and I look forward to writing more!