rhythm - /ˈriT͟Həm/ noun: rhythm; plural noun: rhythms : a strong, regular, repeated pattern of movement or sound.
Rhythm is one of those topics I love talking about (as you can tell by all my posts about it in the past. I still particularly like the one I did for Donni at The Magic Onions). It is something that saved me when I went from one to two children and has really helped my family to thrive. Without it we all feel lost. It's nothing short of wonderful in my book. But I haven't touched on the subject much since we moved to Idaho. I haven't wanted to, honestly. I am just going to put it out there - this rhythm loving Mama has failed. The fact of the matter is just this - our rhythm has gone out the window. I can blame it on a new baby, I can blame it on my lack of vitamin D induced depression (my levels were in the single digits until a few months ago), I can blame it on Kevin's sporadic work schedule, hey - I can blame it on the (lack of) rain. But the truth is, it's all on me. I am the one who sets the tone for our days and the example for my children. Since we didn't have a school to drive to, I let us slip into a no bedtime or set wake time schedule, the beginning of a downward spiral. The children have been sleeping in until ten or eleven each morning. I feel like we never accomplish anything in the day and no wonder - we lose half of the day to sleeping in so late! Each day is completely different from the next with nothing linking them all together.
The loss of our rhythm has been detrimental on all of us and I have been feeling it's impact even more so since Baby F was born. We haven't homeschooled at all since his birth and the feeling of overwhelm has taken over me. Last week after reading a bit in Lisa's Simplicity Parenting 101 course (that week focused on rhythm specifically), it became obvious to me that I had to take the plunge and get us back on track. I feel like I am starting all over again at the beginning, and in a way, I am. I knew what the first step was but I was fighting it, knowing it would not be easy. Then after talking with Lisa she kindly and wisely reminded me:
"Even if little F is not “going to sleep”, have a regular time for all of you for lights out, quiet (except for baby screaming) and a regular wake-up and breakfast time. These two touchstones of rhythm, on either end of the day, will really help this chaotic time feel a little more grounded."
That was what I needed to push me to reestablish our rhythm pillars. Yesterday, I sat down with my children and explained to them that we were going back to a set time to wake up in the mornings. Of course I received a few groans from this but I don't blame them. I have always been a night owl and late sleeper myself. I promised I would ease them into it so it wouldn't be a dramatic change all at once (and to help prevent the crankiness that I knew would come from early rising). I started today by waking them at nine in the morning. They resisted at first but came around. We got so much accomplished in our day - I even picked homeschooling back up with C (K to come soon!). I feel alive again and like I can tackle all that is put in front of me, just after one day! Now to just keep this momentum going and get our full rhythm back. Ha! I find it ironic that as I type this I hear my children out of bed when they are supposed to be sleeping. *sigh* Always a work in progress, right? I even feel inspired to work on a better housekeeping rhythm. But one thing at a time. Of course I need to mentally prepare myself for set backs (and there will be some) and our new rhythm will be very different from how it was in Oregon. Rhythm is always changing. I look forward to seeing how it will all come together for us in the here and now and taking responsibility for where we go from here.
Sorry, I am just rambling on and on but I feel better getting all of that out there, even if it is in a bit of a chaotic manner. Do any of you have (or have had) any rhythm set backs? How did you overcome them?
Logging you in...
uncommongrace1 22p · 465 weeks ago
We know a family who pulled their two high school age children out of school for a year and went to Europe just to explore (it helps that they could afford this). I had a brief moment thinking, "Oh, my, won't they be behind their classmates when they come back?" And then of course I realized, duh, NO. They will have had this extraordinary experience to travel and learn and see the world. The requirements of any school paradigm or curriculum are arbitrarily set. Of course they can just jump back in wherever. Thinking about this got me thinking again about learning and family and how we meet the important needs of our children—and it's usually not in the ways we expect it to happen. Not in the formal lessons, not in the carefully crafted schedules, but in the freedom swirl that goes on around and in and out of all of that. It's all part of how we are formed into the individuals we become.
You can get through this, Nicole. You have a new baby, which is such a beautiful, holy time for your whole family. Enjoy that! Drink it in! He is such a gift! This time will end up as such a deep gift to all of your children even if it doesn't feel like it now.
FrontierDreams 111p · 465 weeks ago
on a side note - how awesome would it be to travel like that for a year?!
Kate · 464 weeks ago
Naomi · 465 weeks ago
It took my little girl a long time to find her rhythm, and at two she still doesn't have a set daytime nap time, although it is slightly more predictable now. There was a point in the early months where it felt like every other baby in the world but mine had a schedule! It was a struggle but we got there.
During her early months I discovered the concept if Waldorf, and some of your posts on rhythm were the first I found and read and were so inspiring.
I'd say it's still a work in progress for us...some days I feel like I have got this nailed, and other days it feels like I couldn't be more wrong!
Sending love and good wishes for your new crafting of your rhythms, and looking forward to reading about them!
Dawn Andrews · 465 weeks ago
In my opinion these are important habits to begin now. Spring is the perfect time to start.
amyputkonen 25p · 465 weeks ago
I personally know just how you feel. I am not sure what gets me off track - I've often thought of this, trying to define what exactly it is. But that is wasted energy. The key is to just do one little thing at a time. Maybe it's waking up at a certain time, or reading them a story before bed every night. We all love routines because they make our lives predictable. It makes us feel safe.
Allison · 465 weeks ago
Katharine blair · 465 weeks ago
Christina · 465 weeks ago
Bora · 465 weeks ago
Bora · 465 weeks ago
cariemay 52p · 465 weeks ago
Bianca · 465 weeks ago
Carol · 465 weeks ago
Having just gotten out of a rough patch of feeling really out of control with things in my family, I will just say that a cleaning schedule really really helped me feel more under control. I just wrote down two or three small things for each day. Not the million little things, not the deep clean stuff I just will never be the type to keep up with, but just what was alway being pushed till later-- bathrooms, laundry folding, and vacuuming. So my house isn't clean. But the list helps me so much because I feel like I don't have to think about it anymore, ha! But every day something is accomplished, and I feel so much better seeing the mess knowing that later in the week it will get done again. My kids have helped, and yours are older, so they can help too I bet. I didn't make it their schedule, but just ask them to help get things done when I need it. Just the tiniest bit of a schedule helped my brain so much when there are so many kids and things to manage. I never remember what to do, just always look back to my list, and wrap into the varied seedless of our day.
You've got lots going on, be easy on yourself !!
Annie · 464 weeks ago
My husband switched jobs almost five years ago. At first, when his work schedule changed from stable to different shifts each week, we thought it would be a temporary thing. The story then was that once the rest of the staff was rebuilt, everyone would be put back on regular days and hours. I was off balance for months upon months while we waited for that to happen. And then instead, his employer made big budget cuts. The long and short of it: Those empty staff slots were not getting filled, ever. And everyone who remained would be bouncing from schedule to schedule so there was never a day with fewer than two members of that much-smaller staff on board.
I do crave consistency. For so long, I lived and breathed by what was written in my planner, and it was getting harder and harder to schedule my own work around the very regular schedule of my kids' school and the completely unpredictable schedule of Hubs's work. There were days when I felt like MY rhythm couldn't fit in there at all. A day when no member of the family had some outside obligation, a day when all of us could be together and not either away or home but tethered to work via the phone or computer? Scarcer than hen's teeth.
It was not what I (or Hubs) signed up for. But he liked his new position, and he found a way to live with it after that first six months or so. Me, not so much. I was angry about the upheaval for a long, long time. It was a good three years until my compulsive need for some kind of baseline ORDER AND PREDICTABILITY finally abated enough for me to accept that...this is just how it is. Roll with it, or get rolled over by it.
I can be a slow learner, but I finally have accepted that "just roll with it" serves me much better than all that anger ever did. While I would prefer to have a normal family schedule, I've come to terms. And I've discovered that within that larger chaos, there are anchoring rhythms that nonetheless hold my sanity together. For us, on work/school days or not, a fairly consistent bedtime, wake time, and supper time go a long way to keeping us grounded. For myself, more recently I'm finding that I have a sort of innate productivity rhythm, too--while I'm not a lark at all, I do tend to get far more, and better quality, work done once I'm up than I will after lunch. There's a second wind after supper, too, but I've finally learned to respect that my early- to mid-afternoon hours are just not my best ones and are the best time to just take a break and regroup.
I'll stop rambling in a minute, but first I would echo what cariemay above said. Finding (or not letting go of) a steady rhythm is not something you can do once and check off the list. It's a constant goal that's always in need of maintenance and adjustment.