Resolute

I owe a huge thank you to all of you who, after my last post, commented, emailed, called, reached out to let me know you understand, that it’s going to be okay, to agree I needed something more for myself and to ask how you could help. I am an incredibly lucky woman to have so much emotional support at a time when I really need it. One of the most powerful things is just having other Moms say that though their circumstances are different that they know just how I feel. It’s such a simple, common human need - to feel like you are not alone, that what you feel is justified, real, and relatable. So again, thanks.

And now we’re in a new year and it seems a perfect time to really try to put into practice some change. This year I feel like I’m swimming in a sea of resolutions. Some of them are practical solutions to deal with what is going on with me, and others are just acknowledgements that I could be better, could do better. I’m sure this is just a list I can repeat every year for the next ten years, but here it goes.

1. Attain better physical health. Adopt a healthier eating regimen centered on more whole foods, more water, less caffeine and less wine. Get regular exercise.

2. Make more time for myself. Put into place a schedule by which I will have regular designated time to read, write, and decompress. For starters Mark and I have decided we don’t have to both do the bathtime and bed preparation ritual every night. Switching off nights allows the other person to have a personal hour a couple of nights a week – one I plan on using to read. Reading is therapy to me and I am in dire need. But this is just a start – I need more than three hours a week and I have to make a concrete plan on how and when to take them.

3. Be a better mother. Yell less. Breathe more. Get information on better management and coping techniques.

4. Be a better earthling. Make less trash. Learn to compost. Grow some food. Recycle more. Reuse more. Donate more.

5. Be a better person. Be more kind. Be more positive. Be more generous. Be more thoughtful. Be more thankful. Be more loving. Start with those closest - my husband, my mother, my family, my friends – but spread it further. Be less judgmental, less cynical.

6. Get it together. Reorganize. Take everything out of the place it’s just shoved and decide what is needed, what can go, what stays and precisely where it belongs. (Of course this is part of what I have been silently fixating on for over a month, driving me toward madness and yet I can’t even get my damn laundry folded. Ahem.) Make a plan for basic house cleaning – this worked well a long time ago and we have to put it back in place.

So a bit of practicality and a bit of shooting for the moon. I’m sure in loading up my plate I’ve diluted some of my ability to have an impact. But also I know some of these things are like dominos – better health means better disposition which means better mother which means better person, etc. Though it would surely take a miracle for me to find enough time to clean out cabinets AND read a book. Cleaner cabinets or cleaner mind? Seems an easy question to answer until you open a cabinet and lose your mind.