I need help with setting routine for myself. Its only me and my husband.
I work Tuesdays,Wednesdays,Fridays and Saturdays 8am-4:30pm so I wake up at 6am and leave by 7am. I come home around 5-6pm (depending on if I need to go to local shops for food or dome bits and pieces).
Trouble is, I come home. I sit down and do tea/eat tea or wash up and watch TV until bed which is around 1am for me (sleeping problems). That's it. Sometimes I leave the washing up for another day too.
The trouble is , as I have now been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, I've been told to try things like yoga,meditation and to do physiotherapy exercises. On top of this, I wish to get into a better house work routine and spend some time with my husband or to maybe get involved with a hobby or game etc.
I'd like my husband to help more but feel guilty asking for help as he does a lot for me. What small easy tasks can I ask him to do (he already has the job of vacuuming the stairs as I can't lift the vacuum up them)
I also think I suffer with CFS/ME though its not been officially diagnosed, which makes everything so much harder.
I just don't know how to organise my time. I feel so swamped!
Should I assign different days to do different activities or do I squeeze them into each day etc. ?
A sample routine would be a great help. I just can't think 😕
Best thing I ever did was employ someone to do my cleaning. Just fortnightly (only 2 of us in a Small Cottage!); in between, I sort of keep on top, but if I don’t get round to it, it doesn’t matter as its being done properly regularly. She ‘just’ does the cleaning - we change the bedding, do the laundry. BUT, it makes such a huge difference, and doesn’t cost a huge amount of money.
Pacing yourself is most important, whatever routine you try to put in place.
Maybe get a planner (or a4 pad lined paper) and split each day into hourly sections.
For each day, write in times and activities of things such as work, regular activities, appointments for the week etc
This lets you see where you have 'spare' time ... And then you can allocate time to do household tasks, rest periods etc. Larger tasks can be broken down into smaller chunks with rest periods. For example - I do housework for approx 30 mins maximum, then have a 15 min rest before starting again.
Also prioritise essential tasks and complete them first.
NannyNooNoo has given an excellent solution. You may be able to get someone for about £10 /12 an hour. My home help does the ironing, changing bedding. Husband does the vacuuming. Another idea is to buy a dishwasher. There are small ones available & table top ones. Maybe you could load it, Husband could empty it or visa versus.
I also work part time and have insomnia, 4 hours is good for me at night. My partner and I have had a few quibbles lately as obviously pain and fatigue are invisible. He also has a very physical job.
He does things in the garden, the bins, helping change bed,carrying shopping in from delivery. Anything that pushes my pain to far. On his days off he does bit more.
I try and just do one or two things a day when I'm off, like dishwasher and washing. Or light dusting and hoovering although since a fall in Jan this is even harder. I never do anything for more than 20 min before sit and rest as pushing yourself is worse thing.
I was very house proud but have learnt to live with reality that a bit of dust won't kill us. I would get cleaner for things like high and low cleaning but can't afford so just have as many gadgets as possible, steamers and long handled things.
My downfall is if have a ' good ' day will still push myself too much, and then suffer for days.
Thank you all for your advice. We're currently saving money for our house fund and hubs is cautious about people coming into our home due to Covid-19.
No room at all for a dishwasher, sadly. But I have asked if we can get one when we move into our next plac
🤗⚠️Update⚠️🤗
I researched a cleaning initiative called TOMM (The organised mom method) which creates a weekly cleaning routine/checklist. I used this to create a list of my own checklist with weekly and daily tasks. I split all rooms into zones and as a team, me and my husband would choose a room that need doing or which task needs completing (say if most of the tasks were done apart from taking out the rubbish to the out side bins, scrubbing the kitchen bin area).
The rules are simply that I don't mind when the tasks are done but must be mostly all done by the end of the week. And we both must do the tasks.
My husband really likes this system and is keen to try it. He's already helping out by emptying his lunch plate, putting his dirty clothes in the washing basket and has just been doing a general quick tidy.
He's totally on board and asked me if the goal was to not trash the other rooms after they are cleaned / tasks are completed whilst another room is being done but the goal is to deep clean and just keep on top of the tidiness so there isn't too much to do in the next week of cleaning.
I've also made myself a little routine to do certain tasks throughout the day and is in time period blocks (mornings, throughout the day tasks, evenings and before bed) . I find this the most flexible way I can keep on top of my goals and important responsibilities.
I didn't want to time block on this rota as I can shimmy on bad pain days.
I'm not expecting all tasks to be done daily for the pain reason but its a good little routine to try.
I've set the goal of 2 30 minute sessions of tidying with 15 minutes break in between.
I do however have a Passion Planner. This is useful for actual time blocking so I will definitely use that to create a
an hour by hour routine for the day, or just to see progress of running the house.
So far the living room is pretty much tidy, i need to move little bits into the kitchen and bags upstairs and bathroom is completely spotless.
Kithen is decent... these have never been so tidy!!
My husband is doing a great job and has a better understanding of my pain and how it affects me. I got him to read the spoon theory.
You are doing very well to work 4 days so I can see why you are so tired with your fibro, if you think you have cfs I would pursue it with your doctor as I did and finally got a diagnosis having both conditions is very wearing. I sometimes make 2 dinners on Sundays so Monday is already done and maybe tackle some ironing or change the beds, then if ive a slow day during the week I double up again, good old Shepard’s pie or lasagne, pasta dish, something you can use twice. Washing goes on after tea so if hubbies about he can hang it out for you, or choose days to do it when your not at work. Great you are working as a team that does help . Take time though to pace yourself on your days off , have lots of little mini breaks with a cuppa it certaintly helps me through my days. Xxxx
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