Finding time for yourself, when you have kids.
“To be your best self, you have to first take care of yourself.”
Here’s the deal…
Kids can be awesome, yet a handful too. It seems these days parents are working longer hours, which unfortunately gives them less time to spend with their children, and even less time to spend on themselves.
I always say, “to be your best self, you have to first take care of yourself.”
It’s important that us parents take time to recharge and nurture ourselves.
But let’s face it, sometimes it just feels like there isn’t enough time in the day to do so.
Below I’ve provided a few tips that you can do to increase the time you have for yourself.
Save your ENERGY!-
This step is overlooked by so many parents. Save your energy! You should not be riping and runing all day long. As you maneuver throughout your day, try not to over work yourself at work or at home. Your goal is to have a little extra energy left, so after the kids go to bed you can take some time to relax, have a nice bath, have a glass of wine, read a book, spend time with your spouse..etc.
Bedtime-
Don’t be afraid to put your children to bed early. School age children should have at least nine to eleven hours of sleep, but children younger than that should have more. Put the kids to bed a little earlier than usual so you’ll be able to squeeze in a little bit more time for yourself.
Reach out to your spouse-
If you’re like me, you probably love doing everything by yourself. Ultimately this can seriously be your downfall too. Children have two parents for a reason. Ask your spouse to play with the kids for a bit so you can catch up on sleep, run errands, go out with friends and vice versa. You both can take turns on different days if that works.
Plan, Plan, Plan-
Create a schedule of your daily activities and keep track hour by hour of what you typically do. Use this to figure out a naptime that works well for your children. When they take a nap you can do other things for a few hours until they get up.
If they love to fight nap time like my baby does, then depending on their age you can give them a book to read, or toys to play with, turn on some relaxing music and tell them they have to stay on their bed for one hour to “relax”. If they fall asleep, great! If they don’t, at least they’ll be sitting still in one place for a bit.
Whatever you decide to do, remember that you’re only human and you deserve care too.
I hope this helps! Best of luck
-Alexandria Cooper
