Last night was cozy. I sat in bed, sipping sleepytime tea and planning out my calories for today. Then I laid down and spent some time thinking "What am I doing wrong here?" Because lack of desire isn't the issue. Daily I want to practice healthy habits, and I do some, but almost nightly when I crash into bed, I feel like an exhausted failure. I blog my daily rant here and I say things like: no exercise, not enough water, way over my calories, etc.......and I feel like crying, because I TRIED..and failed.
So last night I did some soul searching as to WHY???? Why can't I do it all right?
I am a list person. I have a bedtime routine written out:
Clean the kitchen.
Spend 2 minutes picking up the living room.
Change into pajamas.
Family devotions.
Wash your face and brush your teeth.
Blog.
Look at your calendar for tomorrow.
Set things by the door that you need to take with you tomorrow.
Prepare the diaper bag.
Make sure you know where your purse and keys are.
Set out what you are going to wear tomorrow.
Plan tomorrow's meals with calories.
Go to bed at a decent hour.
Isn't that a great list to help end a day and be ready to start the next day one the right foot?!
It sounds simple, doesn't it? 20 minutes and it would be done, right? WRONG. It seems that in the middle of all of this, SOMETHING always happens and I get interrupted and delayed! I usually get a FEW of these items done and then I give up and go to sleep because it is late and I am exhausted! Then the next morning, I realize SOMEONE in the family has no clean socks...or underwear..or whatever. And where are they keys? Or I run errands and the baby poops and I realize there are no diapers. Or we go to the library and can't check out any books because we forgot the books we checked out a while back and the library just can't renew them for the 8th time because it really isn't fair for a family to have a book for 7 months. :) You get the drift.
(How interesting---as I type this....at 11 p.m..........my teen son walks into the room with an armful of dirt clothes and said "This is what I want to wear in the morning" (We are leaving the house by around 8:30 to go to a TOPS event). I must have had the "You've got to be kidding me" look on my face because he said "I'll go do this laundry myself" woo hoo. That works for me.
So...........my thought was----instead of starting this after I put the baby to bed.........why not start this THREE HOURS before bedtime? It increases the odds that it will get done.
And so........that's my new plan. We will see how it goes.
Three quick notes on other issues of my life:
1. For a few days now, baby has been EXTRA fussy and it is wearing on everyone's nerves and making it hard to get up and get things done.
2. Tonight was mom's 60th birthday---and her first birthday since dad's death. I spent money that I didn't have to spare to take her out to eat. My sister came too and we had a good time.
3. I have come to LOVE sleepytime tea!
Today in recap:
Calories: I don't have an exact number since the restaurant doesn't have calorie counts but I'd say I went over some.
Fruits and veggies: 5 servings
Exercise: none
Water: approx 60 ounces
THANK YOU for reading!
I like making lists. Doesn't make me do the things on them though.
ReplyDeleteHave you heard of a BBC series/book called Red Dwarf? There is a third-class technician on a space ship called Rimmer who has taken the officer exam about 17 times. One time he was so stressed that he just wrote "I am a fish" over and over again. He thought he'd done quite well that time, too. Anyway, every time he studies for this exam he writes out a chart to plan his study time, all colour coded and beautiful. The squares are shaded with the colours getting more intense the closer to the exam they get.
It takes him so long to make this lovely chart that he ends up wasting a week or two of his study time. So he has to scrap the inaccurate chart and start again. And again. He spends the whole of his free time in the three month period making study charts instead of actually studying. Then fails again.
Well I thought it was funny.
Habits, proactive habits, are what make or break a family, in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteIf your purse and keys have a set place they go, then they are always there. Keep a pack of diapers in your car so you always have them. Do laundry on weekend, all of it, so family is ready for week. I do not go looking for laundry. I have laundry call - starting it now, if I don't have it, it doesn't get done. And I personally wash (mostly) by person so I do not have to sort. So small loads which are quicker. And once they go to college, even when they are home for summer or break, I never do their laundry again.
I love that you set things by backdoor, I do that too.
And by 9pm, I am done and settled for the night. So, everyone else has to plan ahead because if you have an issue after 9pm I am not going to be happy.
I have asked everyone, right after school, every day, for their whole lives pretty much, if they need something for the next day or later in the week, or the next week. Every day I ask, have asked that, about 3-3:30pm, while we are still out and about and it is easy to do something about it. So my kids (24 in grad school in another state now, 20 in undergrad in another town, 16 junior in high school) LEARNED to be very proactive. They learned to think ahead.
I have a desk blotter size school year (July - June, not calendar year) on my refrigerator. EVERYONE puts there stuff on that calendar. I save the pages to refer back to dates. EVERYONE texts me info so I have it in writing. For example I get a text from my 16 year old every morning confirming pick up time after school and any after school plans for that day.
My Christmas shopping is pretty much done. I try to be done by Thanksgiving. We have two January birthdays and one March birthday (3 kids) and I do that at same time.