lack of sleep, hormones, heaps of change - or maybe all of it together

I've been unreasonably irritable lately and I'm starting to get really tired of it. I'm getting tired of myself and this attitude I can't seem to kick. It could be a combination of a lot of things. I stopped taking my birth control a few weeks ago with the hopes that maybe, just MAYBE I was allergic to it and it's what was causing my ear issues...The answer to that question is clear. I feel like I'm hormonally imbalanced, over tired, ridiculously homesick, and just all around unsettled. It's an adjustment to have Josh gone all the time again after having over 6 weeks of him around all the time. That being said, I tend to get a LOT more done when he's NOT around all the time, but I prefer more time with him than we are getting. Our time alone together consists of unpacking or cleaning. We aren't getting much quantity time and it seems very little of it is turning in to quality time. The hardest part of that is that there's really no end in sight. Orientation is the easy part. There's all sorts of activities around here to occupy my and the kids time, but unpacking is the sole priority right now if only to get settled in a feel....settled. If we don't feel settled the crazy days will simply not subside. Unpacking with two kiddos is a serious challenge. No wonder I get into such a groove at night after they are in bed. I don't want to stop - I could unpack all through the night and be happy as a clam. I cranked up the techno in our bedroom last night and unpacked every box in there all in a couple hours. It's all fine and dandy until Judah chirps for the first time at 6am. Then I'm sorry - and it happens all over again the next day. Josh unpacks and cleans here and there but has been assigned study material and spends much of his time in the evenings occupied with that. The sooner I can get this silly house done, the sooner we can sit and relax and be together in the evening with little else to do. In the meantime I've taken to drinking caffeinated tea in the morning and catching a quick nap in the afternoon before dragging myself through another box of belongings and packing paper.
Settling in to a new house is an adventure for sure, but I just prefer it to go more quickly that it is. It gets aggravating trying to find new places to put things that perfectly in our old place and seem to have no place here. The bathrooms here have NO storage space and we have boxes upon boxes of medicines, cleaning supplies and other bathroom related sundries that were happily nested in the endless cabinet space in our place in Colorado. My outlet at home is decorating and painting and making our home beautiful and comforting. I simply have no time for making this home ours. It's just a space that we are occupying at this point. I'm not complaining - I do love the house, it's just not OURS yet. I've got creative energy bursting at the seams and no time to do anything with it.
I'm sure it doesn't help that I haven't sat and had a quiet time since we moved in to this place. I always make the excuse that it's because my Bible is buried in one of the storage areas under the boys seats in the van, but I know better than that. I just haven't made time for it, and there's no excuse. It should come as no surprise to me that I'm such a raging grump. I've had little contact with the very being that I get my energy and will power from.
My patience with Elijah wears more and more thin every day as he increasingly becomes more and more precocious and rebellious. He's really coming in to his own and as is typical with most kids his age, he has NO idea how to control/manage/handle it. He seems to waver a lot day to day. Some days I am surprised at how much I enjoy him and then the next it seems I don't know where he came from or who's been raising him these past 3 years. He's either a complete show-off or a complete emotional mess in public and it's RARELY anything close to a happy medium. He show-off tendencies get him in trouble, like when he threw the cantaloupe I can sitting next to him in the cart. Or when he's wildly flying his helicopter toy around as a show for a stranger and catches Judah, who is strapped to the front of me, right in the eyes with it. He's deliberately disobeying and being deceitful more and more and it's getting exhausting. I figured this would all slow down as he approached being 3, but it seems to be reaching it's peak - or at least I HOPE beyond all hope that it's reaching it's peak, or HAS peaked for that matter! I keep telling Josh that I want to adopt a girl next because I feel doomed to producing ONLY boys and Judah is showing little promise of being less spirited than Elijah. He is as dramatic as the days are hot! I'm not sure how I would manage 3 boys if I can hardly manage 2.
It seems we are just managing and surviving from day to day with little break and I really do detest that feeling. Even when we do venture out of the house in search for a break from the monotony, Elijah manages to spoil it in some way or another while Judah is fussy fussy fussy because he typically doesn't sleep well, except at night. I am not without fault in our outings not ending well as I seem to find it hard to keep my cool and laugh at things instead of winding myself into a tight little wad of short tempered anger and frustration.
The moving process always ends at some point. It has to. We are here for 3 full years, so I have plenty of time to settle. We'll get there. It's going to be a long summer of really HOT HUMID days and finding more and more tar balls and sheen float ashore onto our beloved beaches that are much of the outlet we have found. Am I a pessimist? At heart, yes! I find it really hard to pull my head up above the table top and look at something other than the half empty glass sitting before me. This has been a battle for me since I was a very small child. I tend to fret, worry and stew about nearly everything. God is growing me and I will get to a point, one day, where I am positive in all situations. Right now, I work hard at just being positive hour to hour.