Irrational

I am in a bad mood today. Really foul. For no good reason.

No, that’s not entirely true. I think hormones are mostly to blame, with a side order of tired just to make things interesting. But whatever it is, it feels fairly irrational. And that makes me even more peevish.

I know the irrational, hormone-induced bad mood well now after my years of infertility treatments. I can spot it a mile off. It’s smirking and pointing and laughing at me for being upset at nothing, really, and KNOWING I have no rational reason to be upset makes me even MORE upset. Which makes it an even BETTER prank pulled by my stupid hormones.

Here are some examples, to illustrate my irrationality.

1. The neighbour provides music lessons in her home. Her students are, to a person, all really BAD at parking their cars. They cannot seem to grasp the concept that, while they are trying not to block the neighbour’s driveway, they are blocking MINE with the ass ends of their cars. This despite the fact that there is a 3-car-long length of curb not 15 feet away where they could park without annoying anyone. So, this morning, sure enough, one of the stupid people blocked my driveway. And I was almost enraged by this. Which would be fine, except my car is still on the fritz and so I won’t be driving anywhere today. So, really, I have no NEED for a clear driveway today.
2. I brought tears to my daughter’s eyes today because I snapped at her. She was covered in poop, and I was trying to change her, and had hoisted her up by the ankles a little bit. She was clawing at my hands trying to get them to let go. And that battle got a new clean diaper all dirty, so I wasted a diaper. That cost me, what, 10 cents? And I snapped at her to stop. For 10 freaking cents, I brought tears to my baby girl’s eyes.
3. I ate chocolate covered caramel snack cake at 9 am. Something I generally don’t even EAT. Something so sweet it made my teeth hurt. And I inhaled the damn thing.
4. My husband called me on the drive to work. And just the sound of his voice and him being kind to me made me cry.

It’s frustrating to sit back and look at this stuff, and KNOW it makes no sense to be upset or angry or whatever, and be unable to stop. Such is the power of the hormones. Most women know it well. And all you can do is ride it out, and do your best to keep an even keel.

It’s not easy. You have to come up with coping strategies. Mine involve baked goods.

As those of you along for the ride will remember, the hormones in my infertility treatment induced a baking frenzy. It was a veritable baked goods extravaganza around here. If there was the smell of fresh-baked bread emanating from my house, you just knew there were hormones at play. If every available piece of tupperware was chock-full of baked goods, the bank account was getting lower and my hormone levels were getting higher.

Well, thankfully, it’s not that bad. It’s not a bread-baking hormonal day. More like a batch-of-muffins type of day. Although it could escalate into a coffeecake-level of hormones type of day. It’s hard to say. It could go either way, really.

So, yes. Not only are hormones making me mental enough that I might need to bake to feel better, but to add insult to injury, my dieting means I cannot even EAT what I bake.

I hate feeling irrational. I hate hormones.

I’m going to go yell at the car blocking my driveway for awhile.