“I’m Funked Up”

For the past two weeks, something has been a little off.   I have been trying to put my finger on it, but its been hard.   Nothing seems to be really wrong. Work is good.   Beanie is good (aside from a little respiratory infection).   Money is good.   There’s nothing really to stress me out.   But still.   Things have just felt a little…well…off.

And that’s when I realized.   It wasn’t me having an off week.   It was Chris.   Chris is the one whose having a little bit of a patch.

This came to me when he started getting really stressed out over things that normally don’t even phase him.   Like driving to work.   He drives about 2 hours each way, but he does it every day.   Its just part of his routine and he hasn’t complained about it really since the first week of his job over a year ago.   But suddenly, this week the commute bothers him.

And he’s been really stressed out over Bean being sick.   Beanie is still waking up every night for a couple hours at a time.   Its been pretty rough, but its just one of those things you adjust to and deal with.   But Chris has really been stressed about it.   When Bean wakes up crying, Chris just paces back and forth in the nursery, wringing his hands and asking me what’s wrong and how we can fix it.

“Well, should we try this?”

“Well, how about this?”

“Do you think he’d like this?”

“What’s the doctor say about this?”

He just can’t seem to let himself calm down.   He’s just stressed.   You know that feeling.   When nothing seems to be easy and everything weighs on you and you just can’t shake the feeling that at any minute the sky is going to fall on you.

Tonight over tacos, I asked Chris if he was in a funk.

“Yeah,” he said.   “I’m funked up.”

This happens to everyone, especially when you’ve got a sick baby on your hands.   Lack of sleep can make just about any little thing seem 10 times more stressful.   But no matter how much I tell myself to be patient with Chris and give him some space to get over his funk, I just have a hard time with it.   When he’s in a funk, it feels like the whole house is in a funk.

On any given day, I can go from laughing hysterically to whacking someone’s kneecaps to crying like a hyena.   Usually within about a 5 minute time frame.   Chris is what keeps me balanced.   He is the voice of reason.   So, when he’s in a funk, so is my compass.   With him being out of emotional commission this week, its left me floating around with my emotions unchecked and raw.   I don’t know whether to kick someone’s ass or write a love letter.   I’m a wreck!

And so is Chris.   Walking around in a funk for too long can send a person spirally into a black hole.   Things will just continue to get worse and worse and weigh even heavier on you if you don’t knock yourself out of it.

Chris doesn’t get in these moods all that often, but when he does I know just how to get him out of it.   I snuggle up real close to him and nuzzle in his neck and I stroke his hair and I whisper to him.

“I know you’re having a rough few weeks here, Pookey.   But GET OVER YOURSELF.   I love you.”

Its tough love around these parts.   But sometimes, that’s just what you need.   Just like I need Chris to tell me to get off the kitchen floor and quit pitching a fit, he needs me to tell him when he’s had enough wallowing in a bad mood.   Its the unspoken rule of marriage.   You keep the other person from taking things too far.

If life were a bowling alley, your spouse would be your bumper.

So Chris will probably spend the rest of tonight wallowing good in his mopey, dopey, funked up mood and I’ll continue to laugh and then sob.   But tomorrow, we’ll start to come out of it.   Why?   Cause that’s just part of marriage.   Its having someone to pull you out of funks just before you cross over and become really weird.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go blow raspberries in Chris’ ear while he tries to watch the World Series.