I was skimming the editorial in this month’s Woman’s Day magazine when I spotted “4 fast health fixes from Dr. Oz”.
The third one caught my eye:
Decompress – Fast.
If you can’t find time to take a break, Dr. Oz suggests slipping off to the bathroom. Turn off the lights and sit quietly for 5 minutes. It’s an easy way to calm your chattering brain.
Clearly, Dr. Oz is NOT a mother. (Brilliant deduction, I know. He is a man after all!)
What I mean is that Dr. Oz’s fast health fix won’t work for mothers. It needs some modifications, which I have made below:
Decompress – Fast.
You can’t find time to take a break, so be prepared to sneak into the bathroom, avoiding any interaction with your spouse or children. LOCK the door. Pull out a pillow or your stash of magazines, snacks, and wine. Enjoy the next 30 seconds before they find you. It’s an opportunistic and fairly labor intensive way to calm your chattering brain. But it’s all you’ll get.
Remember, this won’t work if they see you going into the bathroom. The kids will either come in there with you, or stand outside the locked door crying and whining. Be brave and be stealth out there!
How do you take a break?! Do you even get one?!
Umm… a break? That is crazy talk! Breaks come from going to the grocery store or mowing the lawn or announcing “I have to go #2” because no one likes to be around that! But other than those 3 things, I can’t think of any other ways. Lately, even my sleep time isn’t a break! Crying in the middle of the night, more than once, is a regular occurrence around these parts! To be clear, I’m the one crying in the middle of the night. *wink, wink* j/k
Ashley L recently posted…Ultimate Blog Party 2012
“I have to go #2” – classic! Hey, do what works!
Katy @ Experienced Bad Mom recently posted…How I’d Fix Dr. Oz’s Fast Health Fix
Oh, Katy (and Ashley…) – You make me laugh soooo hard – in a not-so-joyous life!! Remembering… ;-] Just know, though…(hopefully not for You -)…there may come a day when you are Totally Alone All the Time and would welcome the Interruptions-of Old… Those were The Good Old Days!!…hang on to them… (I do ‘get it’ – and surely Dr. Oz doesn’t!)
Lynden recently posted…Affection…
Thanks for the reminder to savor these times, Lynden. All of these times, including when they follow you to the bathroom. 🙂
My daughter is 15 and I still can not go to the bathroom alone. I ALWAYS hear “MOM”. She is homeschooled so I do take time between 12:00 and 3:00 to go to my office alone and grade papers while she studies. I also am the church secretary so I do those duties during this time also. That is really the only reprieve I get. As far as alone time…it is usually spent WITH my husband because he is the pastor so we rarely get time together.
I would enjoy a nice hot bubble bath once in a while….problem is …I don’t have a bathtub! LOL We have showers in our house only. My mother lives upstairs and we took the only tub out to put in her washer and dryer so she didn’t have to do the stairs.
Jeannie
Jeannie Davis recently posted…Sin Finds You Out
Eek! I was hoping for more alone time in the bathroom as they get older.
And, would a foot spa do the trick since you are tubless?! Probably not, but maybe you could close your eyes and pretend…