Winter parenting

I don't know how real 'SAD' is. That's as in Seasonal Affective Disorder, which simply means one reacts very poorly to change in seasons, particularly to short, crummy days of winter. But I know winter makes me plain... sad at times.
I'm sure I have to own up to the fact that I don't make things better by choosing to eat junk and by wallowing in stressed-out thoughts instead of releasing at least some mental tension in the 'Let go and let God' kind of way.
This winter hasn't been terrible. At least I certainly believe last one just about had the best of me, and being then in my first trimester with Jack just made it worse. But this winter has its own twists.
Maybe it's not winter, however. Maybe life with two small children is simply ten times more challenging than with one, no matter what the weather is. My biggest challenge right now is a complete lack of time to, well, complete anything. I fall further and further behind on simple basics like keeping the house clean and paying bills on time, which snowballs into major internal crises. I feel unorganized, overwhelmed.
Not inadequate, however. I know if I had double the amount of hours in a day, and quadruple the amount of energy, I'd do it all and be caught up in no time. But those circumstances aren't going to pass any time soon, so without a way to seriously boost up resources, I grow frustrated at things left undone by necessity.
So I try to prioritize. Kids first. Food, hygiene, laundry, rooms clean (if not uncluttered), sleeping hours observed, noses wiped, doctors' appointments honored. I feel fine about taking care of them. But that by itself consumes most of the time I have outside of work. Plus I always, always wish to spend more time with them - just time playing or talking or hugging it out, not just orbiting them while having to do something else...
Work. Going back has been tough, and not because I don't like what I do, or because I would prefer not to work at all. Complications are in the commute that eats up to three hours a day (if daycare detour is involved) and how intense work was straight out of the gates. Intensity may subside on and off, but travel and getting-ready time doesn't...
Household. Groceries, cooking, keeping at least some areas in acceptable daily shape. Mostly kitchen and living area. Cats' stuff out of necessity because I wouldn't have time to clean up if they rebelled over dirty litter box and went elsewhere. Food because they'd make too much noise over that. I sound like a perfect animal owner, don't I? Don't tell PETA.
Anything that has to do with my own slice of life and things I need to do (hello, green card application!!) - by the wayside. Not in a drama kind of way. It's just a fact. I'm almost used to all of that, totally at the bottom of any totem pole - but the immigration stuff and not having yet done it stirs up the firestorm in me... I'm literally risking my job if this isn't done in a few days. Plus I have to arange for last year's taxes... this year's refund will take care of that, but if IRS doesn't know that, they're quite fond of sneaky maneuvers like wage garnishment - the last thing in the world I would need this winter/spring.
I feel like in a way I'm living out a soft lie... a $100K+ young professional on the surface, with a white-trash situation at the house (our Christmas lights are still on...), not enough well-fitting clothes to last me a week in the office (pregnancy pounds), floor covered in two months' worth of dust and debri, and dining room stuffed to the rafters with unopened bills and mail.
I'm feeling pretty low at the moment. I'm making it - but barely, and only in essentials. I don't have high expectations! But even with low ones, the current state of affairs is very depressing to me.
With Allan sick most of the last month, our marital bliss has been anything but. It's very tense very often, and it's definitely affecting at least Maya, throwing yet another stone into my pond of pessimistic life outlook.
I can feel myself coming up for short breaths amidst all of this, when a certain song on K-LOVE hits the spot, but it doesn't take much for me to sink straight back down - feeling slighted, overlooked, underappreciated, and simply overrun.
I keep writing, hoping toward the end of the post I would have conjured up a solution, would have realized something profound that moves me forward with renewed energy, and none of that is happening. I can't even feel or see God for these trees, not very often.
Jack's total adoration when we do get a couple of minutes together is the one thing that is most powerful to reset this failing mechanism of mine. His total, absolute lack of concern for all my concerns, but in a good, innocent way, restores me while I just look at him and realize the power and miracle of holding him, hearing him.
I really am surprised that my body has not yet failed me in a sudden, traumatic way with what I feel is a supremely weak immune system this winter. Maybe it's simply the fact that if I go down, there's no more recourse, and thus the flesh keeps powering through. Thank God.
I used to feel slightly better by telling, reminding myself that all this is temporary. Felt like knowing that should keep up my hope. But I have not had a good day, in some fairly ordinary definition of 'good', in what feels like a long time. And my resistance is starting to fray at the edges.
So now I'll just keep hoping that all of this is simply ... winter. That with the first warm day, things will miraculously clean themselves, file themselves, pay themselves, pick up themselves, heal themselves... and I'll have an unbroken night of sleep, while I'm at it.
Kiddos - since I started this as a parenting blog - I still love you more than life. I just have a presently strained relationship with just about everyone else.