Month: May 2020

A day with a 6-month-old baby

On By MarishaIn Family Time & Project Management, Organization & ProductivityLeave a comment

William, our son, turned 6 months, woohoo!!! He’s getting cuter every day, but he’s also becoming dangerous–he has two sharp teeth now!

He’s starting to get into a routine these days, which is music to my ears. It’s not super precise yet, but it’s much more predictable than in the early months. That feels good to me because it means I can structure my day a bit more.

The night

I’ll start with describing the night because it’s my least favorite part. Even though William sleeps much better now than when he was smaller, I still don’t enjoy being woken up in the middle of the night…

We put him to bed around 19:30, and he usually sleeps until about 22:00 or 23:00. When he wakes up, I feed him, put him back to sleep, and go to bed myself if I wasn’t in bed already. (If I’m really tired, I go to bed at 21:00 and get some sleep before he wakes up.)

Then, he wakes up around 2:00 or 3:00, so then I feed him again, and we both go back to sleep.

Finally, he wakes up around 6:00 or 7:00, feeds again, and goes to sleep again (or, like today, wakes up nice and fresh at 6:30). I usually wake up at this point–it would be nice to sleep a bit more, but I’m just not able to fall asleep again.

The morning

I love mornings, gloooooorious mornings with the suuuuuun coming in… I don’t think that’s an actual song, but I’d like to make one up. Seriously though, mornings are awesome!

I often have breakfast around 7:00 or 8:00. William usually wakes up between 7:00 and 8:00 (if he’s not awake already), and then we do his morning routine: feeding, diaper change, and get him out of his pajamas and into clothes for the day. We play a bit and go out on the balcony for some sunshine.

An hour and a half after he’s woken up, so between 8:30 and 9:30, we start the naptime routine. That includes reading a book together on the big bed and cuddling, so it’s a lot of fun! 15 minutes later, he’s in bed and soon falls asleep (on most occasions but not always!).

William usually sleeps for 1.5 or 2 hours at this point, so it’s his long nap. Not always though–sometimes he wakes up after 40 minutes, so his reliability is not 100% yet. I usually do laptop work during his nap such as writing a blog post, doing a financial review, checking email, messages, reading articles, or doing online tasks.

When he wakes up, which is usually between 10:30 and 11:30, we have a feeding again and change his diaper. We are also starting to introduce solid foods now, so he eats a little bit of that as well. Then we play, and I usually do household tasks and eat lunch around 12:00.

Two hours after he woke up, we start his naptime routine. Again, we read a book and cuddle on the bed for 15 minutes, after which he goes to sleep. This is usually around 12:30 or 13:30.

The afternoon

Once William’s asleep for his second nap of the day, around 13:00 or 14:00, I do my training. I exercise for 30-45 minutes with equipment we have at home. While I love going to the gym, I’ve found during the Covid period that it’s very convenient to train at home. Zero travel time really makes a difference and makes it possible to train a little bit every day. It also feels good to move my body, activate my muscles, and lubricate my joints every day.

In the afternoon, William sometimes sleeps for 1.5 hours and sometimes for 40 minutes. If he wakes up and I’m still training, I put him on his tummy in front of me, and we both exercise. He loves watching me do squats! He laughs like crazy–apparently, my head bobbing up and down is really funny!

Usually, William wakes up between 14:00 and 15:00. Once I’m finished training, I feed him and change his diaper. Then, I may try to give him some solid food, and afterwards we play together and call a family member or a friend to catch up. I may do some household tasks or online tasks if I haven’t gotten a chance to finish them before. If the sun is out, we may go out on the grass behind our building and chill there.

Two hours after his waking time, so around 16:00, we go out for a walk. He usually takes a 30-minute nap at this time, but, again, not always–yesterday, for instance, he refused to sleep that late. The man is starting to have preferences!

We take a good, long walk, about 1-1.5 hours. I really enjoy that because I get nice movement, and we both get fresh air. I either listen to a podcast while we walk, or I have a friend join us for some social time.

The evening

We get home around 17:30 and relax. I feed William and warm up dinner for the adults. Jacob and I have dinner at 18:00, and at 18:45 we start the bedtime routine. We change William’s diaper and change him out of his clothes and into his pajamas. Then, we read a book on the bed, cuddle, and put him to bed. He usually falls asleep around 19:30.

Once the little one is asleep, we clean up the kitchen and living room a bit and get things ready for the night and/or the next day. Finally, Jacob and I have some time together to talk or read on the couch. We tend to go to bed between 21:00 and 22:00, depending on when we get sleepy.

And that’s it! This is William’s (and our) rhythm at 6 months of age. It’s really nice to have some structure and predictability in the day. Funny enough, everything can still move +/- 2 hours: sometimes he wakes up earlier (as early as 6:30) and sometimes later (as late as 8:30); some days I wake up early (as early as 6:00) and other days a bit later (as late as 8:00). But the outline of the day is the same, which feels comforting and makes it easier to plan things.

Little one, soon you’ll be a creature of habit just like your parents, woohoo! Until you become a teenager and rebel against any routine, staying up all night and sleeping during the day… Ah, let’s enjoy the days of (relative) predictability while you’re still small!

Completing the challenge: The benefits of my first Whole30

On By MarishaIn Health, Mindset & Well-beingLeave a comment

I did it! I completed my first Whole30, woohoo! A Whole30 is a 30-day self-experiment where you take out certain food groups (grains, dairy, alcohol, sugar, any craving-inducing foods) and then reintroduce them one at a time to see how they affect you, i.e., whether you can eat them and feel good. I wrote about the beginning of my self-experiment here.

Today when I’m writing this it’s day 31, or day 1 after the Whole30 is finished. I’ve observed a couple of solid benefits during my 30 days of eating vegetables, fruits, meat, fish, eggs, nuts, seeds, and healthy fats.

Stable energy

Quite quickly, my energy became stable throughout the day. I used to feel sleepy after a meal, reasonably energetic an hour later, and then very tired as I got hungry again. This became especially exacerbated when I was sleep deprived (which is not uncommon when you have a 6-month-old baby).

On the Whole30, I wasn’t sleepy after meals, and I didn’t have that I’m-about-to-faint feeling when I was hungry again. That’s a huge deal for me! It is really tough to try to get through your day feeling groggy and/or like you’re about to pass out. It felt great to have solid energy throughout the day!

Stable mood

Along with that, my mood stabilized. I used to get irritated and impatient when I was hungry (a.k.a. “hangry”), and I was also just more dissatisfied with things in general. As my energy and blood sugar stabilized, so did my mood. I felt at ease and more mellow throughout the day.

This also has to do with the fact that before starting the Whole30 I was trying to battle sleep deprivation by drinking green tea and eating dark chocolate. While I love these things, they were making me a bit jumpy, anxious, and impatient. When I removed them, I was afraid that I’d be unhappy and groggy the whole time. But once my energy became even and stable, my mood did the same, and overall I felt relaxed and at ease.

Patience and “Zen”

Funny enough, I became more patient. It took more to get me annoyed (don’t get me wrong, I still got annoyed, but my threshold was higher), and I became better at keeping things in perspective. For instance, if William was crying when he was supposed to be sleeping, I thought, “Poor little thing, maybe he is teething, let me cuddle him” instead of, “I was supposed to have time to read now, I’m so upset that he’s crying!”

I felt like I had more leeway in my response to other people. Instead of immediately getting frustrated or deciding that someone is an idiot, I was better able to consider people’s circumstances and generally be more patient.

William is extremely excited by my Whole30 progress.

Improvement in William’s eczema

An unexpected consequence was that William’s eczema improved. (I should mention here that I’m breastfeeding William, so what I eat has a direct influence on what he eats. Duh.) I was wondering why removing green tea and chocolate would have anything to do with his eczema, and, after doing some research, it struck me that both are high-histamine foods. Once I realized that, I also stopped eating sauerkraut (which is a very high-histamine food), and his eczema has been improving even more quickly.

I wish I’d known earlier that this was contributing to his eczema! How great it would have been if I had figured this out earlier and he hadn’t had eczema for the last 3 months… But I didn’t know back then. I tried out a bunch of things, and they barely helped. Now I’ve finally found what seems to be the answer, so now that I know better, I’ll do better. And I’ll give myself grace for not knowing earlier.

Love for herbal tea!

Finally, this Whole30 experience has rekindled my love for herbal tea! I’ve discovered that Pukka teas are awesome! I particularly love their Chamomile and Vanilla tea, their Three Licorice tea, and their Night tea. I can drink these all day long… (By the way, this blog post is not endorsed by Pukka; I just like their teas 😀 )

What’s next?

Now that the 30 days are over, I should be reintroducing the foods that I excluded for 30 days and observing their effect on me. While I’d love to do that and see exactly how grains, dairy, and sugar affect me, I’m a bit afraid to trigger William’s eczema again. So I’ve decided to go slowly and introduce only a little bit of each food at a time. If I notice that his eczema is getting worse again, I’ll immediately take out the food again. I really hope he tolerates ice cream well! 😀

Create a system instead of searching for motivation

On By MarishaIn Habits, Organization & Productivity1 Comment

With so many people working from home during the COVID19 pandemic, finding motivation is an extremely common obstacle right now. Many of us are struggling to do our work, and we wonder why.

We assume that it’s due to a lack of motivation. “I’m less productive than usual, so it must be because I don’t care enough about my goals or because I’m not trying hard enough.”

But we miss the fact that we’re not in our usual work space, and our work habits have been disrupted. Literally nothing about our work life is the same: we don’t go to the office anymore, we don’t have set working hours, we aren’t using our comfortable work stations, and we don’t meet our colleagues, at least not physically.

Instead, we’re at home. (This refers to those of us working from home, clearly.) If we have a laptop, technically, we should be able to do everything we were doing before, so we expect the same productivity as before. But that’s not fair.

We may find it confusing to be working from home if we usually see home as a relaxation zone or simply a non-work zone. We may not have a working space set up at home, and our laptop may not be as convenient to work on as our work station. In addition, we may not have silence and/or we may be getting interrupted by the people we live with if we have a partner or children.

Alternatively, we may be lonely or bored. If we live by ourselves, we may have complete silence and calm, and that may be part of the problem. Perhaps we need the stimulation provided by many people working in the same physical space. What’s more, a coffee break or lunch break with a colleague provides much-needed social interaction, while also reinforcing the feeling that we’re at work.

Lots and lots of things have changed in the way we’re working right now. Sure, our motivation may be lower as well, but that’s probably not the main issue. Instead, we’d do well to address the changes by creating a system that gets us going.

Create temporal boundaries

Many people benefit from having specific times of day for working such as set working hours. This creates a separation between home and work even though the physical separation is not there right now.

To make this more tangible, in addition to giving yourself working hours, schedule something outside of those times: a call with a friend, a walk by yourself, or an online exercise session. In this way, you’ll actually have to stick to your self-imposed working hours because you have other things happening outside them.

For couples with kids where both parents are working from home, setting up shifts can be very helpful. One parent may work for 3-4 hours in the morning while the other parent takes care of the kids, and vice versa in the afternoon.

Whenever possible, try to create new work-related routines. In preparation for your workday (or shift), you may put on your work clothes, make a cup of coffee, and sit down at the same makeshift workstation every day. Then, once your work time is over, you can change into your home clothes, go for a walk, read a book, or cook dinner.

Create a physical workspace

If you have the opportunity, create a physical workspace for yourself. It’s great if you can work in the same workstation every day, thus distinguishing between ‘work’ and ‘home,’ which is the rest of your house.

Try to limit interruptions while you’re working. Leave your phone in a different room or on a high shelf and stop yourself from accessing social media (use an extension in your browser if necessary). Ask your partner and/or kids not to disturb you while you’re working (easier said than done… haha).

Create accountability

Many people need to feel accountable to someone or something in order to complete a task. Their own desire to do something may not be strong enough to propel them to action, but if they know someone else expects them to do something, they do it.

The most straightforward type of accountability is to have a supervisor you report to. You know what work they expect you to do, so you do it. In order for this to work, the supervisor needs to be familiar enough with your work and needs to check in often enough. Also, there need to be some sort of consequences that take place if you don’t complete something on time. For some people, simply not meeting an agreement is motivating enough; others may need more tangible consequences.

A buddy or a support group can also be a good source of accountability. You and a colleague may team up to tell each other what you’re going to work on today or this week and then revisit what you’ve accomplished at the end of the day or week. Support groups can work similarly where people share what they’re working on and then review their successes and challenges.

Whatever type of accountability you choose, make sure it works for you. You need to feel that someone is counting on you and that there is a real expectation that you will do your work. For more info on creating accountability, check out Gretchen Rubin’s extensive suggestions here.

Remember your ‘why’

Finally, remind yourself of why you’re doing this work. What are you trying to accomplish? Why is it important? Why do you find it interesting? What do you like about your work and why are you the right person to do it?

Once you connect to your ‘why,’ use the momentum and get going.

What helps you get your work done in these unusual times?