A note to self on a crappy day.

It's been a while since I've posted. It's been a crazy month and a half and I've given myself a pretty hard time more than once. I've had a few, okay maybe a lot, of bad days. That's just real life. So today was crappy and I was sick yesterday so I decided to write myself a little note that I will also allow you to read... Here tis.

Dear self on a crappy day,

It's okay to have a bad day. It really is. Sometimes there's a few in a row and you just do what you tell your kids to do, you suck it up. "Don't take your anger out on everyone else." Or is that just something you say to kids but don't really mean? Yeah, it was a frustrating morning and you were really tired and that happens.

Your kids were glad you were back at school because the substitute teacher was so weird. It's okay for you to file a formal complaint (as formal as you get) on him. It's also okay that he threw your kids work that they weren't even supposed to do in the trash can. Oh wait, that's not okay and yes, you were justified in giving them a free pass for a warm-up for a day. Your third period didn't listen to you, they usually don't but let's focus on the positive for a second. At least a few of them turned in their missing work and one of the girls you've been worried about did promise to bring everything she owns regarding school tomorrow. So yeah, you're a little disappointed about a few other things and you took a few things personally that probably shouldn't have been taken personally but sometimes people do mean for you to take them personally and you give people the benefit of the doubt a lot but you don't HAVE to talk to those people. So here's a few pieces of advice that maybe you'll remember on a crappy day...

1. People that aren't personal don't say things for you to take them personally. They're just saying things. You know what you know about yourself and that's done.

2. It's okay for you to get mad at a kid because they're treating you crappy because they just need to talk for a minute about what a terrible day they're having and they had a bad day yesterday too and you weren't there. And they sent you a message to make sure you would be at school today.

3. Talking to kids is like talking to brick walls 74.3% of the time. They're just hard to work with. Give yourself some grace, you're working your butt off.

4. You don't have to take everyone's advice because a lot of people don't know what they're talking about. Be wise in who you listen to and stop comparing yourself to other people. They don't make it any better. And comparing yourself doesn't make it any better, just worse, so take your own advice and remember that Roosevelt was right when he said, "Comparison is the thief of joy." You will never be someone else and those kids adore who you are.

5. One of your kids asked if you were stressed and he was definitely concerned. It's okay that you automatically thought, "Stressed backwards spells desserts," because you only ate a 60 calorie soup for lunch. What exactly were you thinking there?? So getting your ice cream after school was completely justified, even if it was out of your pocket money envelope. You still had it-- I'll show you Dave Ramsey.

6. There are a lot of people who care about you even when you don't feel like it. Sometimes we make choices over feelings and sometimes those feelings are really real. It's okay to be sensitive. It doesn't make you too much or not enough-- it just makes you YOU. And that's totally okay. That's what people already like about you anyways.

Now, go eat your dessert and cry a few minutes and take a breath and think of the small moments you missed today in stress and relive those for a while. It will get better, it always does. And you can still hate cliches and believe them at the same time-- that's completely normal.

Love, Melis