Tag Archives: Fatigue

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Goal setting, Not what I planned, Work
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I’m struggling

Goal setting, Not what I planned, Work Leave a comment

Good morning! How are you? Ready to hit it?

I got a text from a working mommy girlfriend yesterday. All it said was, “I’m struggling.”

We’ve all had those days, yes? You’re at work but things aren’t going well, and, on days like this, there also is a crisis of some kind at home that you are trying to work through and your heart is heavy and you can’t just start crying at your desk. But you can’t just up and leave at 11 o’clock in the morning either. Especially not if you are the sole bread winner. And yes, there are mental health days, and yes, you can take a half day every once in a blue moon when life gets heavy, but we can’t do that over and over again, or we won’t continue to be employed for long.

I called her as quickly as I could.

“What’s one thing you need to do today before you leave? Just one thing that has to get done?”

She told me.

“Okay, do that. Just do that one thing. You can do that. Set your timer for twenty minutes and then let yourself get up, maybe walk outside for five minutes, feel the sun, breath the air, and then go back for another twenty minute work block. Text me when you’re done.”

We talked about how strong she is and why she needs to be strong. We talked about setting goals in small blocks of time, it’s easier to see your way to lunch time than it is to see your way to the end of this crisis. I told her I loved her, because I do.

I encouraged her to also focus on controlling what she could control and just giving the rest to God. I suggested that she make a list of what-she-knows-for-sure to bring her peace and focus her back in on the good. We talked about seeing all tasks through her main life-filter (mine: what is good for my kids) and of making a list of resources that she has that support her.

Smart woman that she is, she put on headphones, put her head down and worked one project at a time, one time-block at a time. (Music brings her peace and headphones minimize the number of people stopping by one’s desk to chat.)

She made it. All the way to five o’clock. And she got the first project done. And then the next one. And then another one after that. And then she went home to her babies.

Life is not always easy, in fact life is rarely easy.

We’ve got this, sister. We can do this. Mommies are strong. You are. You are stronger than you think. When you are struggling, when it seems like the wave is threatening to overwhelm you and take you under, call for help, and then take your day one essential piece at a time.

With love,

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Exercise, Health, Mamma and God, Nutrition
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Mommy health

Exercise, Health, Mamma and God, Nutrition Leave a comment

Hello, Sistah! Good morning. How are you?

I think you know I have an auto-immune, er, situation. Just before Christmas I had a monster flare that was just not going away. Normally, I manage my health on the fly, but, if not controlled, this sh*t could kill me, so I was forced to, for once, seriously prioritize my health.

About six weeks ago I decided to circle the wagons. I had to.

I eliminated everything but family, work and my health. (Including Facebook, sorry.) I started sleeping two additional hours each night. I walked for an hour nearly every day. I completely eliminated sugar, wheat, dairy, coffee (so painful) and all commercially baked or fast-food fried foods. I ate nuts and old-fashioned oatmeal. I ate salads with multi-colored veggies, balsamic vinegar and extra-virgin olive oil. I did yoga twice a week. I prayed. (I prayed A LOT.) I took lavender baths with Epsolm salts and baking soda. I took all the meds my doctor prescribed and took them as frequently as she asked me to take them (instead of the mostly, every-other-day, sort of way I’d been taking them before).

I was scared, girl.

And, no surprise, because health really isn’t rocket science, this morning, for the first time in months, the skin on my legs looks almost normal. My breathing has been normal for weeks. I’m not getting dizzy anymore (scared the bejezus out of a couple of girlfriends when I fell to the floor while working with them in January).

I had lunch with a girlfriend this weekend and she commented on how gorgeous my skin looks.

So, thank you God, apparently I’m back.

Remember, Mamma, and I know you put your family first and so do I, but remember, they do need you alive and, ideally, fully functioning.

Take care of yourself. You matter. What you do matters. What you eat matters. How much you move in a day and how you handle stress, it all matters.

Hello, again. Have a glorious day.

With love,

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Exercise, Health
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Take care of yourself

Exercise, Health Leave a comment

Happy Tuesday, Mommy. Good morning and hello to important you.

You are the engine of your family, Mamma, you know that, right? Yes, even you moms with rock-star, full-partner husbands, most of the time, Mamma sets the emotional tone of the home.

So, how’s your energy, girl? Are you saving some smiles for when you get home tonight? Are you taking care of the engine who takes care of her family? That’s you, Mamma.

I know the days I come home and fall asleep on the sofa do not go as well as the days when I come home and scoop my kids up in a hug. Pretty easy math.

Make the little choices today that add up to a healthy you. An energized you. A you who can handle the stress without blowing up at the kids. (Yes, I’ve been there and I hate it and it sucks. I’ll do just about anything to avoid doing that to my kids again.)

So. Lunch today? Let’s go salad instead of McDrivethru, yes? Or simply an apple and a packet of peanut butter, that works. And go easy on the candy-bar hostess-pie type sugar. It helps for about fifteen minutes and then you pay a price in energy, mood and waistline. Be strong, be good to yourself. Go KIND bar or fresh fruit when you need a little something sweet? Or 70% dark chocolate, that works.

And maybe a walk at lunch? Or walk with the kids when you get home before dinner? Move your body, girl. Movement = energy and we need all the energy we can get. My kids still remember when I would do trot-trot-to-Boston with them on my legs. Laying on my back, knees up, bouncing a laughing kid on my shins. Quad workout while playing with your kids, does it get any better than that? Or piggy back rides around the house, love those. However you do it, move tonight Mamma.

Take care of yourself, girl. You are so important. Stay strong, stay healthy, stay in the game.

With love,

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Household Management, Parenting, Stay connected with kids
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Give yourself grace

Household Management, Parenting, Stay connected with kids Leave a comment

Good morning, darling. How are you? Hanging in there? Remember how you told me you feel like you “suck at everything” because you never get as much time to work as you need, and you never get as much time at home as you want? How is that going? Are you giving yourself more grace?

I know it gets tough sometimes. Boy do I know. Sitting-at-the-stoplight-crying I know.

Remember that no one gets an easy life. Remember that you are a whole person and that you are not meant or expected to be perfect.

I know you. You do great work. Your kids love you. You do more art projects (chances are) than my kids did with me. (I comfort myself that I read out loud to my kids in voices and accents, and we hiked so often that it became part of what-we-do, part of our family creed.)

Did you go to paper plates, like I suggested? The kids will think it’s hilarious. The environment will forgive you. I figure the paper plate pretty much equals the energy expended to heat the water and filter out the soap once it goes down the drain. It’s all good. And you’ll be sane, so there’s that.

Did you forgive yourself the unmade bed? I didn’t make my bed for decades. It didn’t bother me. Give yourself permission to let something go, it won’t all fit.

I was ecstatic to hear that you hired a cleaning lady. You were so apologetic about it. Honey, there is nothing wrong with getting some help cleaning the house. The woman you are paying probably appreciates the work, and you most certainly need the extra two hours in your week. Well done you, and no apologies. There is no commandment that says we must vacuum our own floors. Treat the woman helping you with gratitude and respect; she’ll appreciate that as much as she appreciates the money.

Keep your core values in mind, like, front of mind. Filter everything through those. Does this make my family stronger? Does this bring me joy? Does this make me feel safe?

Do you want to play in the dirt with your kid, even though the laundry isn’t done? PLAY WITH YOUR KID. You can throw one load in overnight. Seriously; whose laundry is ever done?You have my permission to say no to the things that drain you and you have my permission to say yes to the things that bring you joy.

Because we do this life thing one time. One precious go round.

It’s more than a little messy, and it can get a little hairy at times, but it can also be so very good. Not perfect, love, no, not perfect. But life doesn’t have to be perfect, to be wonderful.

With love,

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Household Management, Parenting
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Making time for what matters

Household Management, Parenting Leave a comment

Good morning, darling. How was your weekend? Wonderful, I hope. Mostly wonderful, that works too.

I am making my bed again. It’s been about twenty years since I made my bed on anything like a routine (or monthly, even) basis.

That’s how long it took between my first-born arriving on the scene and my youngest getting to the point where he is dressing himself, doing his schoolwork with no reminding, doing laundry and helping me to make meals and clean. That level of help will change a life for sure. All of a sudden, I have time to make my bed.

For years though, I didn’t. And I didn’t feel bad about it. I needed that five minutes in the morning. I needed every minute I could get. I would literally jog from my car to the building in parking lots to save the additional time getting into a store or a customer’s office.

I figured if I saved 25 minutes total throughout the day, that’s time I got to read to my kids before bed. And I LOVED that. It filled my soul. I needed that time with my kiddos.

Twenty-five minutes. That’s the difference between making dinner (even if dinner is sliced apples, crackers and peanut butter) and having to order take-out pizza because I’m out of time and energy.

For me, it was about priorities, and making my bed didn’t make the list.

You are the one who knows what your life needs. Do you like the way your day unfolds? Your week? Are you getting enough time with the kids? When was the last time you kissed your husband? Is the vessel of your soul, of your mommy energy full or empty?

If you aren’t happy, if you are yelling at the kids at the end of the day and hating yourself for it, if you feel thisclose to bursting into tears, look at what you can change.

Time. Priorities. Rotisserie chicken, goldfish crackers and grapes, that’s a perfectly fine dinner. There is no law that says you have to make your kid’s birthday cake (unless you want to). Neither does it list as one of the ten commandments “Thou shalt clean thy own house”. Make sure that you are living by your rules, priorities and expectations, and not someone else’s. Don’t give a damn what “they” think. Please.

Make room somewhere, sister. Make room in your life for what you love.

Because it goes so fast.

And I want you to enjoy the ride.

With love,

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Exercise, Health, Household Management
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Exercise give you energy!

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Good morning, girl! Tuesday, Take Care of Yourself day. Take the stairs, take the salad, take the break to walk outside.
Take the kids to the park (and go down the slide, you know you want to). Take the time to go to the gym, or pull up a yoga video, or show your kiddos how to do a push-up.

Exercise = energy. It makes no sense, I know, but it’s real. IF you don’t believe it, check out this quick WebMD article, it’s true!

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/exercise-for-energy-workouts-that-work#1

Twenty minutes, Mamma, you can find twenty minutes. Get your heart rate up, breath some fresh air, move your blood through your body.

It helps.
With love!

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Exercise, Health
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Fun and free workout – try this!

Exercise, Health Leave a comment

Yoga with Adrienne is my favorite youtube yoga channel. She is funny and sweet and offers lots of variations for different levels of athlete. This is a link to Day One of a thirty-one day yoga series. If you don’t have the time or money to get to a yoga studio, this is an excellent alternative. Bonus: you can do it at home with your babies or while your babies sleep.

Namaste 🙂

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioO8K653kMA

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Courage, Not what I planned
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Life is hard

Courage, Not what I planned Leave a comment

Hi, girl. Happy Friday.  How are you doing?  Well, I hope, but I know not every mom out there is having a good day.  This gig is hard, some days are heavy.

This goes out to the tired moms.  The sad moms.  With love and encouragement.  I’ve thought about writing about this for a long time, but wanted to be sure I could be honest about the dark while still reassuring you that you will get through it to the light again.

I love being a mom.  I love my husband.  I love my kids.  And even so, there have been days during these last crazy twenty years when I was so tired and so sad that I just didn’t know how I was going to keep going.  Some dark, tired days.

The good-tired days were when I could call a girlfriend and say, “my life is crazy my life is crazy my life is crazy” and she would understand and we would laugh and I would keep going.

But there were dark, sad days too. When life was too heavy for me to make that phone call.  (Why is it the hardest to call when I need help most?)   When work wasn’t going well (the pressure, my God the pressure); when every room in the house was a mess; when I had made some spectacular parent fail (way late to daycare, screamed at the kids, forgot kiddo’s event at school – like his BIRTHDAY).  When there wasn’t enough money, or milk, or time and the thought of making dinner just about killed me. 

At my worst, I worried about being a bag lady, my children gone, my husband gone, the house taken away.  Not rational, no, but who ever said our fears had to be rational?

If you are there today, for whatever reason, you are not alone and you are not a failure.  Even though I know it’s hard, pick that phone up and call your BFF or your mom or a therapist – whomever will help you carry that burden for a little while.  Write down five things you are grateful for.  Go for a run; even if it’s late, even if you don’t have the right running bra, even if you don’t want to, move your body for 20 minutes, it’ll help.  Prayer helped me too; there have been worried nights I prayed myself to sleep because that was the only way sleep would come.  And Cheerios for dinner are fine.  Really, better than fine. 

There is no magic pill for this, Mamma.  This is life.  It is hard sometimes, we screw up sometimes, the pieces don’t fall into place sometimes.  It doesn’t make you a failure, it makes you human.  There are ups and downs and unexpected turns.

I want you to know that it will be alright.  Here I sit, twenty years along that rollercoaster.  My kids still love me and my husband still loves me and we still have the house.  I have far, far fewer dark days now – probably because I can see that my kids are turning out to be good people.  And they can help with the dishes and the laundry now, no small thing.

Ask for help.  Sit with gratitude for a moment.  Move.  Pray.  Cut yourself some slack. 

And keep moving.  One foot in front of the other.  You can do this.

With love,

 

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Courage, Household Management, Parenting
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Big rocks

Courage, Household Management, Parenting Leave a comment

Good morning!  Life doesn’t have to be perfect to be wonderful.  And that’s a darn good thing because my entire household woke up late this morning.  You’ve been there, right?  So you can imagine the scene.  

That whole imperfection thing.  I’m getting better at making peace with it, but still, there are days.

As working moms we will never have enough time to be the perfect mom or the perfect employee or the perfect anything, and there can be pain in living that.  I remember days when the pain of it was just blinding.  Days when the kitchen was a mess and the report was overdue, and all I wanted was more time to sit and read to my kids and I felt utterly inadequate.  Pain, sister. This life is not for sissies.

It helped when I learned about Big Rocks.

Big rocks. Put the big rocks in first. You’ve probably heard this analogy from Stephen Covey, but just in case:  Imagine you have a big jar, and you are asked to fill it with sand and pebbles and small rocks and a few big rocks.  There is more than enough material there to fill the jar to the top, how can you get the most in your jar?  Well, if you put the sand and pebbles in first, there won’t be room for the big rocks. The trick is to put the big rocks in first and then fit the pebbles and sand in around them.

The big rocks for me are my family, my health, my job. Small rocks, friendships, our dogs, the compulsion I have to continually learn about the world around me.  Sand: Shopping (fine if I have time, but mostly I go with what we already own or, if I have to, have the new item delivered).

Big rock: Christmas gift for the kid.  Sand: Wrapping it beautifully.
Big rock: Family eating dinner together.  Sand: Fancy food.
Big rock: Major project at work.  Sand: Happy hour.
Big rock: Safe house.  Sand: Clean house.

Let yourself live this.  It won’t all fit in, it just won’t.  Especially in those early and fleeting years when your kids are little and they want and need so much from you.  Let the sand-little unimportant stuff go, and no regrets. 

When the sand-people complain or criticize you – and, sadly, it’s a when, not an if – let it roll past without touching your heart.  You can, because you know your big rocks are taken care of.

Identify your big rocks.  What matters to you?  Protect that.

You’ve got this.

With love,