Every day is like Sunday

Busy, busy, busy.
Too busy to post? Nah. More like too lazy and too unwilling to do anything in the evening other than vegetate.
I have had a sudden increase in anxiety and intrusive thoughts again. Not surprisingly this has coincided with a terrible week of sleeping on W's part. Usually the worst days I have are the ones where I get very broken and little sleep. All of this business started after a night where W woke up every hour on the hour a few months ago. I was talking in therapy yesterday that sometimes I don't even feel like I am really here. Like my life is just some sort of dream from which someone will eventually wake up and then I will be no more. I told my therapist that on days when I feel this way I have strange impulses to do things to get back inside my body.
Like pulling over to the side of the road and rolling in the hot, dry grass.
Squishing my toes in mud.
Running my hands along something roughly textured.
I told her that I have been resisting the impulse to do these things because I am afraid that I am just opening a doorway for more crazy impulses. She said she thinks I am smart enough not to do something unsafe. She encouraged me to give in to my impulse the next time I have one because it will ground me.
So I did.
On my way out of her office I had the impulse to run my hand along the rough stucco of the building. I knew what it was going to feel like because I have done it before. But the impulse to feel something, anything (even something I knew would be mildly unpleasant) was too strong to resist.
I touched it.
It was what I expected. Bumpy, scratchy, and unpleasant to the touch. But it was good to be back inside my body again for that moment and connected to my feelings instead of having this sense that my life is a movie and I am just watching it on the big screen in a movie theatre.
Something my therapist said really resonated yesterday. She said that most people move through life with a cloak of invulnerability around themselves. They know bad things happen but figure that they usually just happen to other people. My cloak has been stripped away and I am shivering, naked and exposed. I think that sums up how I feel nicely. Exposed.
On a brighter note, HAPPY 1/2 BIRTHDAY TO MY BEAUTIFUL LITTLE GIRL! I can't believe that she is 6 months old. It has flown by for me.
It is amazing how different she is in comparison to her brother. She started babbling last week and even the noises she makes are girly, more like a high-pitched "Squeeeeee!" A was always lower registers and more grunting noises with lots of "Ooooohs!" W is army crawling and rolling all over the floor, much to the chagrin of my aforementioned fat and lazy animals. She is not a good sleeper, but will put herself to sleep when she is tired. It is the staying asleep part that she doesn't quite get. Her disposition is very sweet and all in all she is a very relaxed baby. I love the fact that every time she sees me her face lights up. There is nothing in the world that feels better than that.
Here we are on the hayride to the pumpkin patch

And here is A jumping like a fool on the haycovered trampolineSuch wholesome family fun. If you had told me ten years ago that this is where I would be and this is what I would be doing I don't think I would've believed you. I certainly feel lucky that everything has turned out how it has .
Except for the whole rolling around in the mud thing. That is a little weird.