Surviving stress in the family: tips
Do you feel overwhelmed, timeless and stuck in a life that is too hectic and always in a hurry? This decalogue could help you and your family. To find the right balance.
1) Identify the reasons for stress
Having a family is nice, but it can be very exhausting. What are the causes of stress in the family? Is it the glass of juice that spilled at lunch? The arguments for dressing in the morning, when the weather announces torrential rains and the little girl has got it into her head that she wants to wear the pink summer dress? Or is it the little time you have for yourself, which is necessary to regain your calm?
Each of us has something that stresses him in a particular way and that accompanies him in everyday life. Try jotting down on a notepad for a week the situations that cause you stress or make you tired. You may also be surprised: sometimes these are very trivial things that can be changed easily. In other cases, maybe you will come up with the right solution so that family life can flow without blowing your nerves.
2) Farewell perfection
According to a physical law, perfection in the family is inversely proportional to its size, as the number of members increases, perfection decreases. Before having a baby, order and cleanliness reigned in your home: the living room was always in place, the bathroom clean, the shirts ironed and the fridge full.
Then the first baby arrived and after the chaos of the first months you found more or less the right rhythm (and perhaps with the help of your grandmother or a maid or by shopping online): the house is a little less in order but all in all in acceptable conditions, the bathroom quite clean apart from a few diapers around, the shirts always ironed and the fridge full (baby food and baby food have been added). Has another child (or other children) arrived? Nothing is the same as before: the house is always in chaos, the shirts are not very ironed, the bathroom is barely decent and the fridge is either overflowing or over-empty (depending on the days).
Consulates: it is a law of nature that applies to all families.
3) Get help
Nothing remains, everything passes: in particular, the clean floor, the freshly washed windows and the tidy children's room. If you dream of ironing and washing windows at night, get help. Even if the budget is limited, the cleaning lady does not need to come every week, maybe just come once a month to wash the windows or do some washing.
Or try to collaborate with a friend: you take your kids and your friend's to the park for a couple of hours while she does the housework and then she does the same with you.
As an alternative, do not rush to the supermarket immediately to do the shopping when something is missing or to go shopping: the invention of online and online shopping also serves this purpose. It is the right time to get help without running left and right.
4) Don't expect too much of yourself
In the morning you take the kids to school, then go to work, come home, pick up the kids, take them to play sports, do the shopping, cook for everyone, and then put the kids to bed. Finish the day with some ironing. In short, wonderwoman, but stress is guaranteed!
Try to streamline your schedule, prioritize and plan only what is really important, or what absolutely needs to be done and that can't be postponed. Is there a bit of dust on the furniture? Come on, no one has ever died from a little dust ...
5) Don't forget your friends
Before having a baby, your social life was intense. Now completely absorbed in the family it doesn't seem that important to you. But be careful: if you have not answered the phone for weeks, you continue to refuse invitations, the day will come when the phone will remain silent and you will not receive any invitations.
So, even if you have a family, try to always keep in touch with friends despite the tiredness.
6) Carve out your spaces
"Happiness is given by freedom and freedom by courage": this phrase is attributed to Pericles, Athenian statesman of the fifth century. BC, under whose leadership the Parthenon was built. Not just any one in short, but it seems that he had a large family and some difficulty in carving out his own space. The concept contained in his sentence is also valid today.
So try to keep some space for yourself every day or at least two to three times a week. Read a book without anyone interrupting you, go to the hairdresser, or to the pool or out to dinner with friends. Are you a mom? So be a little bit of a mother to yourself!
Let your partner do the same. Would your partner like to play soccer or go out to dinner with an old friend? Let him do it. You both need to recharge the batteries.
7) Occasionally a short vacation
How does it usually go on weekends? Go shopping on Saturday, then do your laundry and go to the park with the kids. Your partner, on the other hand, cuts the grass in the garden, reads the newspaper and helps you a little around the house. Sunday maybe go to the pool or visit your grandparents. All right, but every now and then kick the routine.
It is worth staying in the car for a couple of hours to spend a weekend in a cabin, for a ride by the lake or to go to a friend's house by the sea. You can dedicate yourself only to children, sleep and go for walks. After two days you will have the feeling of having gone on vacation.
8) Plan your day
In the morning we have breakfast together at around eight, from 16 to 17,30 pm in the park to play, at 18 pm the bath and up to 19 pm games and reading. Dinner is ready at 19,30pm, then you put on your pajamas, brush your teeth and at 21-21,30pm in bed. Excuses are not allowed and children love the routine.
To some it may seem a bit bourgeois day, but giving a structure to the daily life of the family has many advantages. Regular meal times and activities throughout the day also help your child make habits and organize their day. You get the advantage of being able to predict the free moments and those in which you are busy.
9) Confront dad
Children can only eat candy once or twice a year, they have to eat at the table and after a bath they don't have to walk around with wet hair! Do you find yourself in any of these rules? Does your husband, on the other hand, think differently and are these differences of views cause for regular stress in the family?
Then you need to talk a little more about your children's education. These are not necessarily big issues, small differences of views are enough to trigger discontent.
Explain to your partner why you think it's important for your little one not to eat candy every day or to go to bed at the same time all the time. And why he better have dry hair. If you can't convince him, look for a shared compromise (life is made up of compromises!).
10) Stay a couple
Though it may sound silly: Mark on your calendar at least one night a week when the kids have a sandwich for dinner and then go to bed earlier than usual. When they're in bed, cook something with your partner or order something at your favorite restaurant. Or call the babysitter and go out.
This evening TV is banned, after all it is made on purpose to find time to talk about other things that are not asylum, diseases and medical care of children. Enjoy yourselves!
Article taken from the German magazine Eltern
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- stress
- anxiety
- concern
- depression
- couple life
- paternity
- mum
- creativity and children
- newborn 0-3 months
