Something I already knew

Last Thursday was the breaking point with my relationship with my beautiful daughter (and also my loving husband truth be told). She was crabby, never wanted to eat anything I fixed, never wanted to go down for naps (and woke up 45 stinking minutes later!), was only happy when I was currently holding her, and yet everything I did while holding her was wrong. I thought I just needed a break from being around her. I thought my husband wasn't helping me enough (which he totally was as it turns out). I thought we are going to have to make drastic changes in our home here. I thought, "We are NEVER going to have another one of these EVER again!" It was at that point I learned something that I already knew and should have been doing, but had let slip. What is this magical piece of wisdom?

A routine.

So simple. So beautiful. So scary. I don't know why I thought that doing things whenever it pleased me or on her whim would actually make for a fun time for anyone. It's hard to decide on a routine when you've stopped being on one for, oh, almost a month. Did my child take one nap or two? Does she still like to have four mini meals a day? I had no idea. And what about working on the house? How was I supposed to get anything done? Let's be honest here, every time I try going over there within 15 minutes Charlotte needs my attention and then I'm no longer of any use to anyone. That's probably not going to change.

In the past I would watch her closely for a few days and then formulate a schedule around what she was already doing. I had been so out of touch with her that I had no idea what she was doing. So instead I just decided what to do when. Arbitrary hours, activities and mealtimes. We'd put it into effect and then make changes as needed. I made her schedule fit around what I wanted to get done. This seems silly to admit it out loud, but I was so nervous about this. I was just waiting to crash and burn. I was changing so many things from when I could last remember we actually had a schedule.

Saturday came and Daniel and I implemented the schedule and surprise, surprise (or really no surprise at all) that day went so smoothly. So did Sunday. Not only has this helped my little darling, but it has also helped Daniel and me. He knows that if he wants to have a lunched fixed for him he needs to be at home at lunchtime. I'm only making lunch once. Same goes for breakfast and dinner. We get to sit down and eat together and I'm totally loving it. After dinner we get to divide the chores of dishes or getting the baby started on her bedtime routine. (We switch off on those two.) Charlotte eats so much better when there are people eating with her and when she's had enough time to get hungry. For a while there she would just go to the pantry and find something (usually crackers or cheerios) and just snack on it all afternoon. No wonder she never wanted any dinner. Also she naps. Glorious 2-3 hour naps in which she wakes up happy.

What I was really surprised at was the ease with which this new schedule went into place and the complete success we were met with. Daniel's happier, I'm happier, Charlotte's happier. Welcome back to sanity little family!