This is too long a response to try and type and risk having my comment be erased, so I'm just going to write you a blog post. My first blog post in well over a month.
I have bad news for you.
You are human.
Some days being human just sucks. I know you know this already. To answer your question, yes, we all have days where we feel that we don't measure up. Even the perfect stepford wife looking parents all have moments where they don't feel that they measure up. IN FACT, it is BECAUSE they feel that they don't measure up often that they work so hard to create a facade that suggests that they have it all together. And if someone knocks a chink in that facade, it might all fall apart like a house of cards.
Flylady is a website that often reminds me of this. Not specifically relevant to the things you specifically mentioned, but it has a lot of people writing in about not being perfect, and always feeling that they're behind and that they didn't and don't do enough. In fact, their motto, on their hundreds of emails that they send is "You're not behind"
Part of the secret of life is trying to figure out how to (or if to) measure oneself, and one's life. At the end of the day, we must each find that way, that measure, that ideally will bring us happiness, or at a minimum, comfort.
I'll tell you a little about what works for me (and this from a woman who hasn't "worked" in the traditional sense in six months now; and I ain't no house-wife, either, my wife (God bless her) does 98% of the "housework" including the cooking and the dishes).
My goal is not to make things worse.
It's a real simple goal.
And this is an overall measurement. Overall in the day, try to make things a little bit better, not worse. Try not to offend people (that one might be hard for you... *grin!*), try not to hurt others, try not to add to the discord that is often swirling around us. AND, if I'm lucky, try to add a bit of good. Bring a smile to someone's face, a laugh (my sense of humor is one of my greatest strengths, I believe). Help restore someone's belief, if only for a moment, in the kindness of their fellow human beings.
And if I make it through the day and make someone else smile, alleviate their burden for a moment, make someone else feel loved, then it's been a pretty damn good day.
I'm not that ambitious. I prefer to think of myself as realistic. I realized long ago I was never going to make some grand scientific discovery (I dropped out of college chemistry a lab or two in... I am sure beakers were broken, but I can't remember). I will not develop penicillin (of course since it's already been discovered, it's kind of late now). I won't be a great explorer, a record holder, a great athlete, or even a (great) parent.
And the most freeing realization is that I don't need to be any of those things to be a good person. Neither do you.
I can list off like many would and you asked us not to do all the good things you've done. But me recognizing it isn't the issue, is it?
The short answer, though, is no, you are not alone.
(Really, have you NOT been reading your Twitter feed lately, or what??)
(P.S. Tonight I intend to check this off as my something good for the day, so-o-o....)
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