This is it.

Bear with me, because I'm about to get a little introspective here. Also, please keep in mind that although I have sacrificed my mindless Bravo viewing to jot down this mental diarrhea, I by no means expect you to do the same just to keep reading this, so if you're not in the mood, then skip to the next post, or go watch Housewives. If you happen to hang in there, well then, thanks for listening...here we go.

I was raised to believe, as I think so many young men and, more particularly, women are, that if you dream big and work hard and are kind to others, good things will come to you. Though not completely delusive, it's apparent to me now that this adage fails to mention perhaps what may be the most essential part of the equation in this tidy formula for achievement. I like to think that I've met all of the criteria above, and please, by all means, do not think for even one moment that my forthcoming pity party is in any way indicative of me being oblivious to the fact that so many wonderful things have come my way in life, because I lay in bed and thank whoever is listening out there for my countless blessings every single night.

With that said, I still find myself at thirty-something years old, struggling a bit to make ends meet and wondering to myself, "How can this be?" I did everything I was supposed to do. I worked hard in school and graduated with honors, and I've always done my best to prove I'm a valuable asset at work. But here I am, spending the day away from my kids in some ugly grey cubicle for a mediocre salary at a mediocre job, just waiting for someone to walk on over and give me a pat on the back and tell me how they just can't wait to give me that raise and promotion I so totally deserve. Just writing that out makes me so painfully aware of the fact that it sounds completely and totally pathetic and ridiculous. Really, I've known this all along, but still, there's this polite little girl inside of me- just minding my manners and waiting my turn.

So, I guess that's the other half of the equation- STOP waiting your turn. Work for what you want and then TAKE it. I know that I can't get what I want unless I ask for it, but there is something inherent in me, some timid little girl who was raised to look pretty and make people happy that finds voicing my needs to be completely and totally terrifying. I find myself imagining the discomfort I cause others with my various imaginary, but admittedly reasonable requests, when, in all honesty, the worst case scenario would just end in them saying "no" and everyone just moving on with their lives. I've always lived in fear of confrontation, and I am finally just getting so very sick and tired of it. This may be due in larger part to my personality, but I do believe that gender plays a somewhat significant role in this boat-rocking phobia. I could take this opportunity to bore you all with rhetoric from my inter-personal communication studies and tell you that women are raised to connect while men are raised to compete and blah blah blah, but still, I've met so many courageous women in my day who don't let their need to connect interfere with obtaining their personal and professional needs.

And so, it is with great reluctance that I admit- it's me- I am the only person standing in the way of getting what I need and I've decided that it's time for me to make a change.

So, for those of you who stuck around, thanks again for listening to what is admittedly a very obvious revelation on my part. I guess I thought putting it in writing would make me a little more accountable for my actions

Oh yeah- and encouraging words would be helpful here, because I'm just about eight months pregnant and that doesn't give me a whole lot of time to become superwoman before somebody's sucking on my boobs all day.

Happy Thursday People, let's make things happen.