Stress? What's that?

Several weeks ago someone told me I didn’t know what stress was.  I have contemplated this statement ever since.  After careful consideration, all I can think to say is thank you.  I put great effort into putting the best foot forward and taking every day as a chance to do something better and not let my situation be a negative part of my life.  Apparently I am succeeding and that makes me feel good.  It’s not denial; it’s standing tall and making the best of things that are far from perfect.  I know stress very well, but I have chosen to rise above it and deal with it with as much hope and humor as I can.  I have some really awesome friends who help me get through the times when I don’t see the humor or the hope.  Your life is what you make of it.  So I may not seem like I don’t understand stress, but I do.  I just choose not to have it live my life for me. 

There are always going to people who think their own struggles and trials are more important than your own.  There are always going to be those people who never take responsibility for their own actions.  There are always going to be those people who will try to create unhappiness for you because they are jealous of your happiness-even when they don’t take into account it may just be a positive outlook or a brave front.  We can’t do anything about what they do, but we can do something about how we react to what they do.  Bullies come in all shapes, sizes, denominations, and preferences.

I have 5 kids.  We live in a bedroom in my mother's house.  Six people, one bedroom.  Seven people, one bath.  I have bills that exceed my part-time income.  My soon to be ex-husband (if he'll ever show up to get the divorce settled) refuses to pay court ordered child support.  He is currently $6547 behind.  He crawled off to another state to hide any money he could make in order to avoid helping take care of the children he claims to love and miss-although hasn't seen in months.  I go to school, home school the kids, and try to make a normal life for my children now that we no longer have a normal life.  My mother hasn't had a vehicle in about two years, so I've had -and I don't mind a bit- to take her whenever she needed groceries, household stuff, or whatever just to get out of the house for a couple of hours.  My children are 3, 7, 9, 12, and 14.  They have things they want to do, we can't.  They have things they used to get to do, we can't.  They have things they need to do, we can't.  But you know what?  We don't stress.  We don't blame things on other people.  Okay, occasionally, the kids and I will get a case of the, "If he would just send half of what he owes...." grumbles.  But, all in all, we're happy and don't live off the stress.  We make the best of what we have together and make our own fun.

Now the father of my children thinks he's teaching us all a lesson.  He's some cave wizard now, or something.  A Buddhist/Anarchist.  This is according to his proclamations, I couldn't make that up.  He'll probably attempt to take credit for their ability to adapt to their new situation-after all, he's partly to blame for it.  But the credit all goes to them, themselves.  They're the ones who have turned this sucky situation into an oh well, we're fine.

So when someone tells me I don't understand stress, rather than get my feelings hurt, or get mad at the how dare they think their problems are more important than mine.  I just smile and say thank you.  I'm blindly happy.  I'm a bit naive.  I've lived in a bubble for 15 years.  When the bubble popped I found a world much crueler than when I went in the bubble, but I intend to stay true to me.  Apparently it means I'm going to have people try to walk all over me.  Apparently I'm going to have people put me down and other bad things.  I'm tough though.  If anything, the stress we have gone through has taught me that my kids and I can handle tough situations with humor, grace and love.  And you know what, that's fine with me.  We'll get through this and when we do, the people who are thinking they have so much more stress than we do, will have more stress than we will because they lack the ability to deal with it.