How do you do it?

How do you do it?  This common question I hear is ripe with connotation and ambiguity.

How.  Think of a job and here's my brief performance review.  I am resourceful.  I am hopeful.  I am maintain a positive outlook.  I accept contributions from others.  I give 110% 100% of the time.  If I have a bad day, I try to learn from it, leave it behind and move ahead.  I don't expend energy on needless drama and politics.  I problem-solve, triage and think on my feet 18 hours a day.

Do You Do.  These words illustrate a pattern; things happen all around me.   I get overwhelmed sometimes and hold my head in my hands.  And quickly thereafter I think of something I can do to get out of feeling cornered.  And I get to it as quickly as possible even if it's merely with the help of dear ol' Google.  Then I acknowledge that I am, in fact, confident and capable of working through seemingly insurmountable issues - one after another.  Also, please add HAVE FAITH to the paragraph above.

It.  Most people - I presume - understandably don't understand what it is like to take care of 4 small children, and they - I believe - focus on the children as the crux of my situation.  I do not.  I grapple mostly with logistics; how to fit together the time, energy and coordination required for managing laundry, grocery shopping, childcare arrangements, dishes, cleaning, bathing, changing diapers (of course), phone and email communication, medical appointments, visits with friends, school schedules, job expectations, financial obligations and maintaining my emotional awareness through it all.  It's an ever-evolving puzzle, and this past year it included a move from a 5 bedroom house to a 2 bedroom apartment, a new job, and a divorce (actually still pending - sigh).

My children are not the challenge.  It is important to me that they enjoy their childhood (after all, they only get one).  My children are at the heart of the issue because they ARE my heart, and I will do whatever is necessary to keep and protect them.  Anne Geddes has quoted Katherine Hadley in one of her adorable baby photography books, Little Thoughts of Love.  "The decision to have a child is to accept that your heart will forever walk about outside of your body."

Whenever people ask me "How do you do it?" what comes to me - to my mind, to my body, to my spirit which is all of me - is the energy within that drives me to prove that I CAN do it.