Day 327: Mommy brain

According to my friends this brain deadness is "Mommy Brain" and is not conditional on hormones, just sleep deprivation and the fact that you now are secondary in your own life, or perhaps even tertiary if you put husband, job, house or pets before yourself, which I have a tendency to do. I used to be able to balance 5-7 tasks at one time. Or was at least able to be thinking about several things at once. Now I am lucky if I am thinking anything at all. I spend a lot of time just staring at people blankly, trying not to fall asleep or drool onto the desk. My first obvious screw up - Well, I mailed my stepsons the photo album and card I spent so much time working on for my husband's dad for his birthday. And he was VERY confused about why he got water balloons and squish balls. I almost cried. It took longer for them to get their packages than Chad's did to get to Iraq and now it is even more delayed because boys' mom and sister-in-law have to mail them to correct locations.

By Fridays most weeks, I have gone 5 days on 5-6 hours of sleep. My body feels rested at around 8-9. I am shorting myself 3-4 hours of sleep a night 5 out of 7 nights a week. I am just too tired to think by Friday night. And this just made me feel worse! I don't even remember doing it. I used to plan for every contingency months in advance, now I feel lucky if I get out the door with all her and my stuff and have managed to make sure we're both wearing pants.

At the last minute, I decided to invite a new friend over to the house for pizza and wine tasting. It was so nice to just hang out and chat. I really didn't have the energy to go out anywhere and sitting on the couch dishing about Grey's Anatomy and men and the army, etc. was really nice. She and I have a lot in common. It is about a million times easier to have people over than go anywhere, but I feel weird asking people to come over to my house all the time. It was nice to have her come and bring her dog who ran around like crazy with my Maggie dog. They had fun too.

It was just what I needed to feel like a real person and have some non-work related adult conversation. Mommy brain got to take a mini vacation. And now, if I can just sleep in tomorrow!!