There is always lots going on in the houses of everyone. Stuff you don’t know about. Everyone is busy in their own way and as a young family our house is always busy. Chaotic I would say. There are very few times in a day when I would describe my house as a place of calm, serenity. That being said, in those moments of relative ‘calm’, I often feel a sense of discombobuation- something isn’t quite right. It doesn’t sit comfortably with me…
This week the calm has definitely been absent. My son currently has an eye infection which is being treated with eye drops. Have you ever tried giving eye drops to a four year old? I would not wish it upon my closest enemy. After two days of it actually going quite well (we have had to do this previously which involved my husband and I having to practically restrain the child to get the drops in), day three was something else. It started off well with the agreement that we would do them after breakfast. This extended to when he was dressed for school. This extended to just before we leave for school. The catalogue of mistakes here was long. The belief the agreement would happen, misguided. We needed to leave for school in five minutes and zero drops had been applied. A mexican stand off ensued. The boy, according to him, was not to be having the drops this morning. Or ever, he informed me. Apparently I needed to throw the eye drops in the bin.
The argument grew and grew. I tried to calmly, reason with this child- “you need the eye drops so your eyes get better”, “you need the eye drops so they don’t get itchy”, “you need the eye drops so we’re not late for school”, “you need the eye drops because I am so angry right now you are not having agreed eye drops, that you have had without problem for the past two days, that if you don’t have them right now, I feel like I am going to explode”. Nothing worked. My son was crying, my husband was getting angrier and angrier, we were 20 minutes late for school already.
The conversation continued. “Why won’t you have the eye drops?” I asked. “Because I am scared”, came the reply. “Of what?”. “The eye drops. The eye drops stinging my eyes”. The same eye drops that haven’t stung his eyes for the past two days, all of which have been fine and no problems. The rationality behind children’s thought processes are highly confusing at times. None of us were in a good place now. My husband was furious, I was frustrated, my son was crying. A lot. This continued in a never ending cycle for another 10 minutes until my son announced the only thing that would help was to have some chocolate. The conditions were agreed. Chocolate for eye drops. “But only done by mummy and daddy needs to go away” the shrilled four year old’s voice screeched. Daddy went away and took the crazy dog, keen to ‘help’ with the situation with him.
Chocolate was supplied. One piece before and one piece after. Eye drops were refused. I burst into tears. “You made a deal” I said, loudly. My son burst into tears. “You hurt my ears” my son said louder. We cried. I talked to him about making agreements and letting people down and how this is not ok. I was so upset and frustrated and exhausted. Why is arguing so exhausting? In the end he finally agreed to the drops. He laid down ready. At this point, the dog runs into the room and jumps on the sofa, followed by an angry man shouting at the dog to get off the sofa shouting that she had ***t on her bum. The eye drops were postponed whilst the dog escourted from the field of play. Eye drop insertion resumed without further ado with no squabbles or problem, chocolate reward given. Why couldn’t this just happen in the first instant? We went to school 40 minutes late.
On our slow journey to school, we were already so late, it didn’t matter. My son said to me quietly
“I got in the way of myself”.
I asked him what he meant. He went on to explain that he was the one who stopped himself having the eye drops because he was scared even though he knew it would be fine. My daughter then proceeded to tell me about their school values- one of them being resilience “being able to keep going when things are hard”. I was quite amazed that they were both talking so eloquently about these ideas and think it is so interesting how they have learnt all this at school. I am sure when I was at school these things were never talked about. Amazing progress to help support positive mental health. We talked about this for a while and it made me think about when I get “in the way of myself”.
I know there have been many times when I have self sabotaged my own ideas. Given reasons and excuses for not doing things. Stopped myself from seeing friends, doing household chores, exercising, eating healthily, acting in a certain way etc because of a million reasons. It could be anxiety, tiredness, boredom, lack of self belief, genuinely not wanting to do something, procrastination, it seems difficult, the list goes on. But why do we do this? Especially in terms of sabotaging happy or fun events, good things, healthy habits or letting ourselves have a nice time. I know I am guilty of this. Sometimes the ‘I’ll do it tomorrow’ attitude is also another get out - it just seems an easier option. Really we need to just get on with it. And we know this. And the person that we are lying to most in achieving this ourselves.
So what is stopping us? For me I think it is often my own insecurities and thoughts of underachieving. Stupid really. I listened recently to Jimmy Carr talking with Steven Bartlett on his podcast Diary of a CEO. Jimmy Carr was talking about so many different things, one of them was the idea (to paraphrase) that everything is really the journey not the process and that feelings of imposter syndrome should be welcomed. We should not really be sitting easily as we are not being challenged and learning. In many ways, I understood this as not necessarily working to an end goal as getting there is often underwhelming. Instead keep going and see how what you do feels. Put the work in, be the best that you can be and keep going. When things get tough, sit with it and ask questions. Be curious. One of my favourite quotes is from Bluey, Chilli, Bluey’s mum says: “Have a little cry. Pick yourself up. Dust yourself off. And keep going”.
I think all of this is really relevant to the idea of health, fitness and wellness. Goal settting is good, in many ways nescessary for motivation and to feel like we have achieved something. But once we achieve our ‘goal’ what next? Is that it? Where to now? Really fitness and being fit for life is an ever ongoing process. Maybe not a popular thought, but true. Once you achieve washboard stomach/ toned arms/ bikini body etc (add whatever popular ‘goal’ you like ), to maintain it, the work needs to carry on. I think this is why, if we’re honest, for many, the idea of exercising is unappealing and really we know these particular goals are unachievable and unmaintainable. People give up. Or people don’t start.
We know we really should be exercising and living healthily and mindfully continuously for our whole lives. Balance is key. This gives us the best chance of a happy, long and healthy life. But the process of getting started can be hard. We get in the way of ourselves. But we don’t have to. Slight changes to mindset, belief and thinking honestly about the benefits healthy habits and behaviours can have on our life is a good starting point. Adding elements of fun, rewards and things that genuinely bring us joy can also help, in fact, I believe are imperative. After all, this is our life. Let’s make the most of it.
I later found out, when the dog ran into the lounge just as I was finally allowed to do my son’s eye drops, the dog had a stick stuck in her bum. My husband had been in the process of helping to remove it when she ran away. You cannot make this up. This is 100% true. I laughed. My life is ridiculous.
If you want help in making changes towards a healthier and happier you, I would love to hear from you, email amanda@radiatefitness.co.uk or try the free
(I cannot help you with managing the behaviour of dogs whilst administering eye drops though!!) .
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