“Never trust a woman with a really clean house,” my mom likes to say, and we joke about how angry someone would have to be to scrub every inch so thoroughly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
I do like to clean up my space when I am feeling frustrated, confused, overwhelmed. Clear up my surroundings to help clear up my insides – as without, so within!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And it is easy for me to throw myself into cleaning and organizing, purging and rearranging, when I am angry. It feels almost frantic, like I need to regain control of something, I need something to be in order – and as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I feel I am a mess right now. I’ve been through a lot of changes, a lot of challenge lately (many stories for many other times, probably). A lot of it is very positive! A lot of things I have worried about have been coming together. I have many things to feel good about, many things to feel very thankful for, usually I am walking around with a full heart. Overflowing, even.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But one person can only handle so much. Perhaps I have burst open a bit. Perhaps it’s hard to keep growing and evolving, to keep creating and keep moving when I am adjusting to working, having so many new demands on my time and energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So I’ve felt strained and distracted, easily frustrated. And my kids, too, have seemed to be stressed and a lot less patient and cooperative. My house feels like it is exploding with half finished projects and half tidied messes. Energy so scattered, so distracting, so disturbing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’ve been struggling with my desire to reach out almost as a way to detach. I want to give myself some grace, some reprieve, some rest – but I can’t just turn away from what has become a burning pile all around me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’ve decided to follow my compulsion to do some deep cleaning and decluttering, and then I plan to cleanse the energy around here with some dried herbs I was gifted by a lovely friend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I started going through the kids’ toys the other day, with a donate box and a garbage bag, expecting that I was going to ruthlessly cut a chunk out of their abundant bits and pieces that spill out all over the house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I did do some cleaning, find a few things to go, got some of it organized and put away, but it had very little effect. I get stuck on their toys, now. I have decluttered them so very many times. There are so many playsets that they actually use and appreciate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the end, I stashed a bit more things away. We happen to have a crawl space that I can hide things in, in previous houses I would stack boxes up in closets. At least, not having all their things accessible at once limits the amount of mess that can happen at once time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have stuck away more toys three times in the last few months, now I do feel like I can see the difference. Whether it will change the amount of mess, only time will tell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m reminding myself that clearing space takes time. I am following through with this urge, though, and honoring Imbolc in this way – I am spring cleaning! Snow be damned! I am clearing space so we can grow!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a gesture of self care, I have cleaned under my fridge and my stove today. I spent a fair amount of time this afternoon putting things back in place, and wiping some areas I don’t usually get to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I still feel on edge a bit more than I would like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I still feel some uncertainty about what I need most from myself right now, and how I can accomplish more regular maintenance on myself than crisis management when I burn out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But, I have taken a step! I am doing what I can, taking more responsibility for my space and working on getting my kids to take more responsibility for themselves, as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I will update again as things progress!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thanks all, please feel free to share your own adventures in deep cleaning and\/or stress release! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“Never trust a woman with a really clean house,” my mom likes to say, and we joke about how angry someone would have to be to scrub every inch so thoroughly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[206,204,266],"tags":[8,9,225,34,45,57,76,82,116,125,207,127,139,150,214,170],"class_list":["post-976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-healing","category-parenting","category-seasons","tag-anger","tag-anger-while-parenting","tag-cleaning","tag-decluttering","tag-emotional-health","tag-frustration","tag-imbolc","tag-keeping-the-kids-fed-and-the-house-clean","tag-parenting-and-change","tag-parenting-self-care","tag-parenting-the-self","tag-parenting-with-grace","tag-releasing-pent-up-emotions","tag-self-care","tag-spring","tag-spring-cleaning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=976"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":978,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976\/revisions\/978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aluradawn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}