Another Trigger.

A couple of weeks ago, I broke my son. During a very weak moment, I shattered his little heart in a way I thought would be irreparable. Though at the time, I didn’t think he’d really take notice what I was saying. He did understand, and took responsibility for all of my misery. We spent the evening trying to repair what I’d broken. His words of comprehension struck right through my heart, as my words of despair struck right through his. He understood so much more than I would’ve thought possible. I prayed for forgiveness and prayed for his heart, which I’ve always said is one of the biggest hearts I know.

In the morning, he told me his heart was in one piece again. He told me that even though we couldn’t fix it last night, sometimes, you just need to keep trying and eventually it works. I basked in his wisdom that day, rehashing everything we’d said and done, and figuring out if I could permanently undo the damage. We had another heart-to-unbroken heart that night, and I knew it would be okay. He sprang right back to normal, a whole lot faster than I thought he would.

After those two days of emotional turmoil, I wanted to shop. Shop, shop, and shop. I had unloaded all that gunk and wanted to get back to my normal.

Several days and tons of wasted internet-shopping time later, I recognized it as a trigger, that post-upheaval time. I figured the misery itself would be a trigger, but no, the desire to shop came after the emotional repairs were underway and everyone was feeling better. Interesting, and unexpected.

My other shopping triggers have been a surprise as well: sheer exhaustion and sunny, bright weather. I would think that melancholy, gloomy weather, or boredom would be triggers for me, but they don’t seem to be.

I don’t go through emotional upheavals very often, but I’ll be keeping an eye on this one. I’ll also make sure not to break my son’s heart again.

Partial Cave-in.

I don’t really know what category to put this in. It’s not a failure, but it’s also not progress. So, both for now.

I did shop, but not at the sale that was tempting me. Let me explain, though I think I’ve mentioned this before and am not trying to gloat about it. I’m down five sizes from last spring/summer and could not make any of my existing things work for me this year. I choose not to wear ill-fitting clothes, but would do it if there was a bit of wiggle room (as I did last summer… I made do with slightly too-big shorts). No, this time it was way more than wiggle room, it was a problem of ankle pants. As in, pants (crops and shorts) that ended up down by my ankles.

I’ve been freaking out about this ever since the warm weather started. I bought a couple of pairs of shorter shorts early on that are still in my drawer, but what I really wanted was cropped pants, as I tend to live in those in May and June and then again in the fall. I also wanted dressier longer shorts that I can wear to work.

I know, want.

And, I know want.

This was not the second of those two. No rush of feelings, no gotta-have-it, no lets-just-take-a-look-and-see-what-they-have (and end up buying what I don’t need). No want just for the sake of fulfilling the urge to shop.

It wasn’t really an emergency, because I do have full-length pants and jeans to wear. But I’ve been looking for the above items for a couple of months with no luck. It struck me to try a local store that is closing its doors. Not for the bargains, but because I’d already exhausted my usual resources. It was a 20-minute mission to stock up on basics, and was successful.

And a failure to hold out just a bit longer. Time to restart the count.