I’ve made it through another work week. I am starting to sound like a broken record (or CD, 8-Track, or 45, depending on your age) in terms of the mental and physical fatigue I feel by the time the weekends arrive.
Some women are searching for the fountain of youth. Some women are looking for the perfect mate. At this point, I could care less about either one (I’ve long had my perfect mate.) I feel like I am on a personal quest to discover how to not spend every weekend looking like a spring slug, trying to recuperate from the work week.
I wonder if other working moms are this exhausted every single weekend?
Is it just me?
I am not new to my job so the whole notion of “getting acclimated” to the schedule shouldn’t matter.
I am not new to my kids, they’ve been around almost 17 years.
But, I feel like no matter how well I plan, no matter how many well orchestrated crock pot meals I make in order to save me from frantically thawing out freezer burnt chicken, no matter how many car pools I arrange to shuttle the kids around after school, when Saturday arrives, I am run-over-by-a-mac-truck exhausted. 
In my own defense, okay, maybe rationalization, I don’t have your normal sit-behind-a-desk all day job. I am in my car, rushing from one appointment to the next, answering messages at stop lights and in parking lots on that device that I have a love-hate relationship with: the Blackberry.
I’ve made a concerted effort recently to take deep breaths during the week when things get harried. It’s safer than red wine and I can do it while I am working. And, I feel like I’ve seen a slight uptick in my ability to manage my stress. But, another Saturday has arrived, and all I can think about is becoming one with the bed and my favorite pillow.
My husband is thrilled. Me? Not so much.
I don’t want to look back on my life and wonder where it went. And right now, I find myself looking back for last Monday, and wondering where that went, much less the last few months, or years. After all, I am not quite sure when I went from 20 to 40. I certainly don’t want to be 60 searching for 40! 
My plan for now is to put one foot in front of the other, and, if necessary, force myself to just move on the weekends, and find a few things that are just mine to do. One of the benefits of having teenagers, other than the fact that they can teach you all kinds of amazing eye rolling techniques, is that they are fairly self sufficient.
So, I’m going to embrace my barely 40ishness-working-mom life, remind myself to feel blessed that I have bigger kids who don’t need diapers or babysitters (not that they wouldn’t love a cute babysitter) and find some time to recharge the Shannon batteries.
Stay tuned. I am sure I will need regular recharging. If I disappear, it means I forgot to plug myself back in, and I might need a jump start.
Or, I was just too darn tired to try.
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Batteries Required. – via @twitoaster http://www.showmethemom.com/2009/11/dog-...
via Twitoaster
We haven’t even owned an ironing board in about 7 years.
Maybe you could just get a recharger station that you lay on while you sleep. Poor thing. Remember in our early 20′s we would get LESS sleep, work two jobs and party all night and still feel refreshed each weekend? Getting old sucks!
Ohhhhh that is GENIUS! I just need a recharger station for my bed! We could be RICH!
You must know me from an earlier life because yes, I have some really foggy memories of exactly what you described. Not even GETTING READY to go out until 10 pm? Good lord. By 10 pm now I have a blankey by my chin!
We all could use some regular recharging! This motherhood gig gets tiresome! Found you vis SITS because your comment caught my attention (and glad it did, great blog)!!! I am making the move to WP from Blogger in about a week. I’m hiring someone to move it. To me, it’s worth it having a pro handle it. I’ll remember what you said about the plug-ins. How do you back up the blog on WP? Is that a plug-in, too?
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