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Relief

At least one or days per week I have a pretty bad anxiety breakdown caused by the stress related to taking care of the boys during the last three hours of my work day while Eri is at school. Some days are relatively easy, when Kenzo and especially Osamu take a long nap and play nicely and watch TV downstairs until 6 p.m. when I can wrap up and go down and put together whatever delicious dinner Eri prepped for us.

Some days are very hard, like when the boys refuse to take a nap and then proceed to do what little boy siblings do best: run amok, argue, bump, cry, yell, you name it. There are some days when I can't get anything done work-wise. If I have meetings I do what I can to schedule them before 3 p.m. but sometimes it's impossible. When I have a meeting after 4:00 and the boys are getting super needy or grumpy I start to break down. I can keep it together in front of the camera (Acting! Thank you!) but afterward I feel like a swarm of angry birds attacked me, in quicksand, with a burlap sack over my head, and bees in the bag.

Eri and I talked about it. We both agreed her career school is extremely important, and it's only until February. She's come this far and when she gets her credential she'll have lots more career options open to her. Quitting that is not a good plan.

I said I'll just stick it out, but Eri is worried about my health, mostly mentally. I'm already on the Zoloft and that's just for my usual neuroses, not other stress points like the current situation. 

So Eri did what she does best - she looked into things with care and concern for our family.

She found out that that there's a municipal childcare service run through the ward office where you can apply to be matched with a certified babysitter. And, being Japan, where we pay tons of taxes so social services like that can be subsidised, it's cheap. Eri applied and a nice retired lady in our general area got matched with us. She came over a couple of weeks ago for an "audition" to see how the boys reacted to her. Eri and I both talked with her extensively and we decided she's great. The boys approved too.

Today was the first official babysitting day with Zanma-san. She came over from 3 to 6 p.m., the prime hours when the boys are restless and I have to focus on my job. And it was a raging success. Kenzo and Osamu had so much fun. They watched less TV, played with a nice old babysitter who loves little kids, and laughed and carried on so wonderfully. Even though I was doing my best to stay focused on work upstairs, I could hear them downstairs and it made me so happy and relieved.

We're gonna ask Zanma-san to come again next Monday, my last day of work for the year. Then we'll set up a schedule through the end of Eri's career class in February. Not every day. Twice a week will be enough to give my sanity some relief.

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