Got Germs? How Moms Can Stay on Track With Their Health Through Flu Season When EVERYBODY is Sick
Kaitlyn Rimi
Everything was going well!
You had a routine you'd kept up with for weeks, you felt amazing, the scale was moving, clothes fitting better...
Then that sniffle turned into a cough and your kid spewed everywhere... the fever began shortly after.
You know it's only a matter of time before the whole household gets the plague!
Obviously your focus is on your family and their wellbeing... but there's a little voice in the back of your head that mourns the progress you were making. It wonders if this is what ends it all.
Because as mom, you shoulder the responsibility of caregiver and nurse. That's a full-time job with everyone sick and squeezes out room for much else.
So how DO you balance caring for your family (or yourself!) when illness hits and not falling off track of your goals.
Zoom Out
First, I want you to think long-term.
If you look at your life as a timeline, you're looking at years decades.
Weeks and days are just a small fraction of your lifetime, you would barely even see them.
Now out of the 52 weeks in just 1 year, if you spend even 4 of them sick, that's not even 10% of the year.
That means over 90% of the time, you're working toward your goals and staying consistent. That's amazing!
Let's throw in a few holidays and a vacation that was over-indulgent and let your consistency drop down to 80% consistency with your goals. That's STILL fantastic!
Maybe you're thinking, "Ugh, but Kaitlyn, that's not 100%!"
And I say "Nope! It's not! Could you keep up with 100% consistency?"
My guess is the answer is no, because you wouldn't be reading this if everything was always perfect.
That's the reality, you CAN'T keep up with 100% perfection all the time.
If you aim for constant perfect, as soon as a disruption happens (because one will, that's just life), you will fail.
Then you will feel discouraged. You will probably quit.
That drops you down to 0% consistency.
BUT-- Could you keep up with 80% about 80% of the time?
Trust me, I know this feels difficult and backwards. I was a straight-A, aim for 100's type student, so it's been a rough perspective shift for me too. But it's worth it to create long-term success.
If you hit your goals with 80% consistency, giving yourself grace for the 20%, you have a process that will endure. You can keep that up for weeks, months, years even. You WILL reach your health goals and you WILL stay there!
So the perspective adjustment here is to accept illness as one of the 20% times.
Shift Your Focus
So now we're accepting that illness as a time where we must give ourselves permission to slack off on consistency.
What does that look like? Do we just let everything go and allow it to be a free-for-all?
Not at all!
As I just showed you, there's room between 0 and 100, we just figure out where on that spectrum we want to be and what we need to keep doing to stay there.
That starts with prioritizing.
First off, this is situation and person-dependent.
What's top priority for me may not be top priority for you and that's ok!
And what's top priority during your current bout of illness may not be the same as it was last time. Life changes, situations change, priorities must change too.
The important thing is thinking it through and deciding what to focus on and what to let go of right now.
Let's say there's a list of normal mom-life responsibilities (obviously not a complete list):
Taking care of children physically and emotionally
Getting kids ready for school
Running kids to activities
Helping with homework
Cleaning the house
Cooking meals
Doing laundry
On top of this, you are working on your personal health goals and also doing:
3 workouts a week
2 walks a week
Food tracking
Eating 120g protein daily
Drinking 120oz of water daily
Aiming for 6-7 hours of decent quality sleep each night
You find a happy routine and are able to keep up with all of that (with 80% consistency).
But now everybody is sick.
Your list has to shift and prioritize.
You probably already do this to some extent (ex: letting the laundry pile up or opting for take-out).
Now just do the same with your health goals.
The question becomes: What is most important for you to stay on track-ish?
Again, this can vary from mom to mom, but I will share MY current priorities and reasoning:
Sleep, top priority. If I'm not getting enough sleep, my immune system, energy, patience all suffer. I need ALL of those to deal with sick kids. Sometimes sick kids don't allow me to sleep, but I do my best not to let anything else controllable impact it.
Hydration. Again, important for staying well, feeling better if sick, and overall health.
Protein, but without tracking. Now I like tracking, it's a really helpful tool. It improves my awareness and consistency, but when illness happens, it's just not the time for me to focus on it. Instead I shift to just getting protein in with each meal. UNLESS I'm dealing with a stomach bug, then it's whatever will stay down at that time. Any food is better than no food when fueling a sick body.
Workouts, aiming for at least 1-2. My workouts are done from home, so I don't have to worry about lugging sick kids anywhere. These help me feel on top of my routine, give me a mental break and help me physically feel good. If I'm sick though, this moves to the bottom of the list. No need to expend energy my body needs to fight off an illness.
Walking/steps. When sick kids need a snuggle or your not leaving the house, it's just not realistic to get walks or steps in. SOMETIMES I do opt for focusing on steps (by walking laps in the house) instead of workouts. It depends on energy levels and how capable I'm feeling.
Tracking. This is one of the first things I let go because of my personal experience, so I can switch to intuitive eating. It becomes less practical for me to track my food when I'm dealing with illness. However, if food tracking gives you accountability and keeps you from a food-free-for-all, move it up your priority list.
Now decide for yourself what your priorities are.
They may be the same things in a different order or maybe something totally different!
From this list, you know the top ones are what you want to try to keep up and the bottom ones will be the first to drop off. You can always add or drop things as needed, but now you know what order to do that in.
Be Flexible
The key to making things work long-term is flexibility. It's knowing when to focus on more goals, when to let some of them go temporarily, and letting yourself be ok with it.
It's something that takes practice, experience and learning (like most things).
And willingness to try different things, to see what works better for you and readjust.
If you can't be flexible, anything that interrupts your routine will break you.
Flexibility is the secret to creating a sustainable and long-term results.
Use that priority list to develop your flexibility.
Test the Sustainability of Your Process
Obviously illness can be really disruptive to lives and schedules. Trust me, I'm familiar with this! It can be really miserable and frustating.
But instead of thinking of illness as an interruption trying to sabotage your progress, think of it as a test of your process and your resilience.
To create long-term results - ones that don't fade away with time - you need habits that endure obstacles.
Your kids WILL get sick.
You WILL get sick.
You WILL go on vacations.
You will have life-altering events.
Can your routine survive these? Will you be able to pick it up again afterwards?
If your routine is flexible and allows you to prioritize and adjust what you focus on when life happens, it will.
Sights will stay on your goal, but you'll be able to live your life while staying on track.
If your routine is too strict, has no room to adjust, if you don't ever let it ease up... it won't survive.
Or maybe it will, but at a great cost to your mental health.
If you feel like you're going to break instead of bend, it's time to shift your thinking and adjust the routine.
Because the truth is, this illness didn't break your routine.
It just uncovered what was already broken.
So let's fix it.
It's Not Forever
It can be hard to remember while you're in the thick of it, but it's not forever.
You WILL come out the other side.
The question is, will you come out knowing you have a life-proof process or with the knowledge that something needs to change?
It takes more than a week to gain weight or build unhealthy habits.
It's going to take more than one week of illness to undo all the work you've put into your health.
UNLESS you let it.
If every illness and obstacle that interrupts your routine becomes a reason excuse to stop the journey- you will never see success.
Because interruptions are going to come. Constantly.
That's just life.
But if you focus learning from it...
If you focus on riding out the storm that is illness (or teething or moving, or other stressful situations)...
If you have the flexibility to adjust to this obstacle...
If you have the resilience to resume your normal routine on the other side...
You WILL see success and results you can keep, no matter what happens.
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