Hello again!

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Hello people! Long time, no blog, eh?  I haven't posted anything since before Christmas! This is partially because the holidays are a busy time.  We went to Hubby's parents' farm for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day only then returned home.  There was a lot of delicious food and about 40 to 50 lovely people there.  Christmas Day was hot and dry, with churrasco-cooked beef and sausage, and tons of salads and side-dishes laid out buffet style.  The most exotic food option was armadillo [but I chose not to partake]. Little Man was the star of the show with all of Hubby's girl cousins and I got a lot of help with holding him and carrying him around.

There were some tough moments, too.  For example, Little Man slept in a Pack n' Play in the same room as us on Christmas Eve.  I don't know if it was because of the close proximity to his favorite milk factory, but he woke up nearly every hour. The entire night. Needless to say, I was running on fumes.  On Christmas Day he was really amped up with all the excitement of the preparations that were underway for the guests that would be arriving later.  He refused to nap! I spent the entire morning nursing him, further adding to my exhaustion.  It's no wonder I inhaled two heaping plates of food later on.  In general, it was painful to spend the holidays away from home and my family as well.  Even if we don't always get a white Christmas back home, a chill in the air and at least a dusting of snow really says Christmas to me. My family isn't religious, so Christmas really is about the traditions [like stockings and new jammies to wear to bed on Christmas Eve], family, and food [cookies, fudge, sweet potato casserole, etc].  Family visiting and eating a big meal were really the only things that bore a slight resemblance to my typical holiday celebrations.  I sound like a giant complainer, I know.

Which actually leads me to the other reason why I haven't been blogging. I feel like I'm backsliding, people. For anyone who doesn't know, most experts agree that culture shock has four stages:

• Honeymoon stage: everything feels new and exciting, colors seem brighter, you get a thrill when you speak broken Portuguese to someone and they seem to understand!!

• Frustration stage: you realize that everything is unfamiliar and that you can't carry out even the most basic tasks. You realize that when you ordered bread in Portuguese at the bakery, you mispronounced it and actually ordered 6 dicks*. You idealize your home country and may even feel hostile toward the new culture.

• Adjustment stage: You start to find you place in the new culture and maybe even make some friends. Every day doesn't feel like a total struggle and there is some [dare I say it] happiness creeping in.

• Acceptance stage:  You totally fit in and can see the good and bad aspects of both cultures. You might feel like you don't want to leave your new life behind.

This process isn't like a ladder; people don't move from one step to the next until [yay!] they've reached acceptance and never look back.  Unfortunately, there will always be bad days and bad experiences that can bring you back down to one of the lower levels.  I seriously felt like I had started to move into the adjustment stage.  I missed home for sure, but I felt like I was making connections with people and starting to figure out how things work here.  I don't know what caused it, but I am definitely sitting right back in the middle of the frustration stage and it has been going on longer than a temporary blip.

I try to tell myself that I am strong and I can tough this out, but then I worry that I'm not really as strong as I think I am. The least complex way to describe it is that I feel like I'm in limbo here; I am not working and even as an English teacher I don't have enough Portuguese to feel comfortable working yet, I want to start trying to have another baby but I am terrified of being pregnant/giving birth in the public health system here, etc.  I am approaching 30 and I feel like I'm on "pause." In any event, I am working [again] on brainstorming ways for me to feel fulfilled. These include: blogging, exercising [I have reached the point where I'm out of breath going up stairs], and trying to look on the bright side.

Sorry for being a big old Negative Nancy on the blog today, but I'm trying to be authentic here, and I really have felt recently that I have been walking around pretending to be perfect for everyone else. It's exhausting. So, if this post hasn't chased you off, stay tuned for [hopefully] more blogging to come focusing on the brighter side of my life [I promise]!

*This didn't actually happen to me.  I think I read about this happening to another American expat blogger, Rachel's Rantings, formerly Rachel's Rantings in Rio.