stress | baby proofed parents

Just Say No to Holiday Stress :: Tuesday Tip

December 2, 2014 By: babyproofedparentscomment

I frequently get asked if my counseling practice slows down during the holidays. The answer is No. The holiday season is notorious for being a stressful time and my clients can attest to that. Expectations are sky-high, schedules are jam-packed and family members get testy as a result of all the togetherness. Even I can feel bogged down by my mile-long To-Do list that does anything but put me in the holiday spirit.

When my husband and I started a family, I assumed that my babies were going to hand me a one-way ticket to holiday bliss. I couldn’t wait to introduce them to all of the little traditions that I remembered from childhood. My littles clearly did not feel the urgency that I did. In spite of the calendar indicating that it was a very special day, our boys still required naps, still got the sniffles, still had nuclear meltdowns and still got into squabbles. I quickly realized that I needed to simplify the holidays more than ever in order to maximize enjoyment and minimize stress.

When you are a new parent, here are some things you might want to Just Say NO To:

Traveling back and forth between separate family events on the same day.
Lugging the whole family to faraway destinations to celebrate with distant relatives.
Feeling like you have to keep up with everybody’s extravagant gift giving. (Consider asking friends and family to set a price limit, do a gift exchange or skip gifts for adults all together.)
Hosting the whole clan at your house (including your single neighbor and your Great Aunt Marge) on the big day.
Wanting your home to look like it popped out of a Better Homes & Gardens magazine.
Cooking the turkey, dressing and pies all by yourself for your holiday meal. (Consider catering or potluck.)
Sending out perfectly designed holiday cards with matching address labels.
Feeling like you have to shower your young children (who aren’t even quite sure what is going on) with loads of presents.
Thinking that everyone’s holiday is merrier than yours. (Cuz it isn’t.)
Having breakable ornaments or decorations anywhere within reach of your toddler, because they WILL be shattered.
Participating in any activity or event that you don’t find completely delicious.

I’m going to insert a big UNLESS here. Say ‘no’ to all of the above UNLESS one or more of the activities bring you joy. I’ll give you an example: Cheryl is a superb cook (as you can probably tell from the Foodie section on our blog) and truly enjoys preparing a feast. I, on the other hand, am no Julia Child and would much rather kick my feet up on the sofa with some spiked eggnog and A Christmas Story playing in the background. While Cheryl might say ‘yes’ to hosting a big holiday meal and might even do most of the cooking herself (and might create a spread worthy of the royal family), I am more likely to head to my parents’ house or ask everyone to contribute a dish. Say ‘yes’ to what makes you happy and ‘no’ to anything that sounds draining. You have our permission.

Other things to consider Just Saying YES To:

Structuring your schedule around your baby’s sleeping and eating routines so you don’t have a grumpy child the rest of the holiday.
Staying home if you want to. (Being a new parent is a great excuse. Use it!)
Starting small family traditions that will stick in your children’s head more than any gift will. (Examples: We fix a big Christmas brunch and stay in our pajamas most of the day. We love looking at neighborhood lights in a convertible mustang with hot cocoa. I awkwardly play holiday music on the piano while my kids throw out exaggerated groans. Some of our friends set up a puzzle on a card table or go see a movie.)
Pushing the commercialism aside and reminding yourself and your kids about why the holiday was created in the first place.
Maintaining realistic expectations of the day. Your little ones don’t have a built-in calendar app in their head. Expect them to still act like kids.

I have to admit that our holidays have become more and more enjoyable as my boys have gotten older. They anticipate the holidays with excitement, they look forward to our silly little traditions and they keep their hands off the delicate tree ornaments. (Yes, this can be a reality for you too.) But they still end up in occasional fist fights or start the “I’m booooored” chant in the afternoon. When you have kids, your holidays might look like any other day with a handful of sparkly extras. Enjoy the sparkle and try to roll with the rest.

Here’s to Sanity and The Christmas Story,

Kirsten

My Children Come First :: Monday Musing

November 10, 2014 By: babyproofedparents2 Comments

My memory holds a snapshot, rock-bottom moment from my daughter’s bout with colic. I was emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted. I’d isolated myself, even pushing her father, J away. I felt I was the only one who could comfort her, even though I often couldn’t, because, well, she had colic. I stood there holding her, swaying as she howled, no breast-milk left, no known options left. Finally, I too began sobbing, thinking, “I’ve got nothing.” And it was true. I had reached an end. Facing this reality was in direct opposition to what I thought was THE reality, that as a mother I would possess an endless, cosmic supply of love and nurturing, and everything would be always be okay.

Most women are socialized to nurture, learning at a very early age to smile, be sweet, be “good girls,” and put the needs of others first even when said others are being a-holes. This naturally carries over into mothering, as we pressure ourselves to be boundless sources of comfort, milk and serenity. Many fathers and parenting partners also feel intense pressure to protect their growing families, and put aside personal needs to keep pace with the rapidly changing needs of both mother and baby. This pressure can overwhelm partners to the point of withdrawal and emotional shut-down.

Imagine a grocery store line. A well-groomed parent pushes a cart containing a sweet newborn asleep in her car seat, surrounded by organic food. If this parent says out loud, “My children come first,” most people will nod their heads in approval. Now imagine the same parent with spit-up all over her, holding a screaming newborn in one arm while pushing a cart containing an empty car seat and a maxi-pad-throwing toddler. This parent will likely feel too overwhelmed to say anything out loud, and will receive silent judgment from at least a few around her. That’s the rub. We feel pressure to have it all together, but to have even an illusion of control, we have to take care of ourselves.

Self-care. To many, this concept feels foreign and selfish, but let me be a voice, among the others I hope are around you, to argue vehemently for it. Give yourself permission to put your physical and emotional needs at least on the same page as your baby’s needs. You can and will run out of resources if you don’t also parent and take care of yourself. In the early days with a newborn, sometimes self-care is brushing your teeth, once, while the baby cries and cries. Sometimes it’s stepping outside your front door for one minute and taking in a big gulp of fresh air, once, while the baby cries and cries. Take any resulting feelings of guilt or selfishness as positive signs of the soreness accompanying your internal growth. Trust that the end result will be a more grounded version of you, capable of nurturing your baby and partner from a surplus of actual strength, instead of a pseudo-supply based on the obscene pressure we place on ourselves and receive from society.

My self-care story might repulse you, make you smile knowingly, or both. The night after I’d reached my limit, we decided to reclaim a moment of “normalcy.” Our daughter, inexplicably, occasionally relaxed when lying on her changing table in our bathroom. I sat on the lid of the toilet, with J facing me on a chair, knees squished together, plates of food on our laps. Baby girl was next to us, in her zen space, calmly staring at the ceiling and listening to us laugh at how disgustingly beautiful the moment was. Our first family dinner, and the beginning of my fight to factor myself in again.

BPP Sanity Savers:

Remember that self-care is the pre-requisite to your sustained ability to care for anyone else.
Notice and push through any guilty feelings that keep you from factoring in your personal needs. Talk to a therapist or other supportive parents if you feel stuck.
Talk with your parenting partner about ways you can generously support each other with your self-care efforts.

Here’s to Sanity and Self-Care,

Cheryl

3 Ways to Get Your Post-Natal Snap Back :: Tuesday Tip

September 23, 2014 By: babyproofedparents1 Comment

About 6 months into my daughter’s life, I still felt tired, fried and puffy-eyed, while she thrived, rosy-cheeked, done with colic and ready to explore. She was sleeping through the night, and most nights I was too. We had breast feeding down, most of my anxiety had subsided and I had returned to work part-time. Our little routine seemed iron-clad. So why did I still feel so crappy?

Once a week, my next-door-neighbor and I would hang out between our houses to share a brew after our babies were down for the night. Her youngest was 2, and she seemed to have it so together. I asked her when she got her snap back, and she laughed, responding, “Ummm, ‘snap’? I STILL don’t have it back!” This helped me more than she knew. She had normalized how long it seemed to be taking me to feel like myself again.

You WILL get yourself back, but it’s a gradual process. It’s like coming out of a depression. You don’t just wake up one morning and think, “Phew – glad that’s over! I’m so HAPPY now!” Recovery is a slow reclamation of small joys. You catch yourself singing along to the radio, savoring the smell from the taco truck of onions cooking, catching your image in the mirror and thinking, “Damn, girl!” Bit by bit, snap returns. As your little one begins to develop a sense of herself, you also REgain a sense of yourself.

Here are three practical ways to speed up the process:

Schedule a Girl’s Night Out. Choose a new restaurant or bar you’ve wanted to try, and get dressed UP. Go out, laugh, relax, and talk about non-parenting things. Be a woman and friend instead of a partner and mommy. A few hours of time with girlfriends, even if only once a month can make a huge difference. Dads/Parenting Partners – do this for yourselves too! You need time away to regroup and remind you of life beyond your baby.
Schedule a pampering treatment. Get a massage, pedicure or facial – something that relaxes you and helps you feel pretty. Treat yourself to a new outfit that fits and looks gorgeous NOW. There’s a road of fit between maternity and pre-pregnancy clothes. Don’t deprive yourself of new things while your body readjusts post-baby, especially if you’re planning on having more.
Take note of even the tiniest physical and emotional improvements you feel. Did you get a full night’s sleep, without waking up to check on your sleeping baby? Did you feel the energy to walk a little further with the stroller? Did you double over laughing at a story a friend shared with you? Did you find yourself in the mood for sex with your partner? Good job, Mama. Mark it.

Looking back, the first noticeable reemergence of “me” occurred around my babies reaching 4 months of age. My kids are now 3 and 5, and I still find myself recovering layers of strength and energy. Hang in there. The road back to yourself can take time, but it’s a beautiful one.

Here’s to Sanity and GNO,

Cheryl

Delicious Laundry :: Tuesday Tip

July 15, 2014 By: babyproofedparents2 Comments

Hang out with other mom and dad bloggers on Twitter for a day and you’ll pick up on an amusing theme. A noticeable percentage of tweets have to do with the subject of… wait for it… laundry. Piles of laundry, loads of laundry, drowning in laundry. Even Cheryl and I have penned a few 140 character quotes about the subject. Super funny ones, I might add. Twitter is overflowing with great parenting links and hilarious toddler quotes. But I’m not kidding when I say that a sizable portion of groans revolve around the subject of washing clothes.

I get it. As my family has expanded, the amount of laundry has exploded. Washing, drying, and folding clothes has become a regular part of my daily schedule. IF I get to it. On the days I don’t get to it, my kids nickname the growing pile waiting to be folded, Mt. Underwear, and find it amusing to jump in the middle, coaxing the cat and dog to do the same – creating more dirty clothes to be washed. Lovely. I remind myself regularly that laundry is a First World Problem, but dang, if it isn’t a time consuming problem that eats up a ton of my day.

Which leads me to two other frequent Twitter subjects for parent bloggers: stress and exhaustion. Most moms and dads feel tired and overstretched – there are simply not enough hours in the day to get it all done. In a society that encourages individuals to have it all, do it all and yearn for more, we often feel saturated in clutter and an overly full calendar. Guilt and “should’s” cause us to hold on to activities and friendships that are more draining than energizing. We fill our lives, stomachs and day-timers with gunk that is not meaningful or balanced. The result? Our bodies and schedules get bloated by the extra weight we are carrying.

The anecdote for all of this busyness and stress is a concept that Cheryl and I refer to as the Delicious Philosophy. It goes something like this:

If we inserted “laundry” into the above flowchart, there would be some obvious answers: No, laundry is probably not delicious. Yes, you have to do it. But yes, you might be able to make it more delicious. I like to turn on NPR in the evening and have a big laundry folding session while my mind is being enriched. Other times I’ll flip on some tunes and invite my husband in to do some folding with me. A little linen date, you could say. Many of my friends commit to doing a quick load every evening, so that the laundry stays manageable. Of course, cleaning out your closets and drawers regularly can help. Do whatever you can to make the task more appealing.

The delicious decision matrix has infinite applications:

How many times do you eat something just because it is front of you, but not because it tastes great?
Do you have any relationships in your life that drain your energy more than contribute to it? Perhaps it is time to examine why you are holding on to them.
How about Facebook – are there connections that bring you down with toxic energy or negativity?
If you look at your calendar, are you committing to more than you have time for?

The more we clear the draining and unwanted clutter from our lives, the more energy we have for the things we have to do and for deliciousness.

You might be thinking, Well, chocolate is delicious. But you’re crazy if you think I can eat it for every meal. Right. In fact, if you had chocolate for every meal, it would probably lose some of its delicious qualities. Same goes for alcohol – too many drinks equal a hangover, and that is not very appealing. Moderation and balance are a natural part of this system. The point is to make more conscious decisions about what we consume and how we fill our daily lives.

Play with this concept for a while. Think about ways you can make the mundane activities in your life more tasty. And then think of any unsavory things that you can cut out. Spring is long gone, but it isn’t too late to do some spring cleaning and clearing. While you ponder that, I’m off to tackle Mt. Underwear, with Pandora playing in the background. Don’t want to let any dirty feet beat me to it.

Here’s to sanity and folding,

Kirsten