Yesterday I had my first day off in years.  I sent my kids off to my mum’s house, and I didn’t go straight to the office.  Instead, I had a day to myself.  It was luxurious.  And I didn’t feel at all guilty.  Well - only slightly!

Mum came and picked up the kids at 9am.  I then spent the next hour and a quarter sitting on the couch in the springtime sun writing in my children’s memory books.  I’ll write more about these memory books next week.  So stay tuned.

I then went to yoga.  I used to be a regular twice a week yoga goer before having kids. But for the last five years yoga hasn’t featured in my daily life.  And my body and mind have suffered.  So now I’ve bought a 10 week pass, negotiated with my husband to be home in time for classes on Wednesday night, and I’ve committed to going.

After yoga, I went to the pub for lunch.  All by myself.  I had a delicious ceasar salad and a virgin mary, and I wrote in my diary about everything that’s been going on in my life.  It was indulgent and highly therapeutic.

After lunch, I had a massage.  It was painful but again highly therapeutic.  My body had harboured so much stress it was overworked. The massage was only the beginning of what needs to be an ongoing commitment to my health and wellbeing.

After the massage it was time to pick the kids up from my mum and dads. 

The day was short. The day was sweet.  And like the massage, it is only the beginning.

I’m thinking that a mid week ‘me’ day should happen once a quarter.  If not, at least twice a year.

It is not the total answer.  Because the minute I picked up the kids, Jet started grizzling, and Wirra started whinging and I had to take a deep breath and deal with it - rather than react.

But it did help.  It said to me that ‘I’ matter.  I matter enough to spend time on me.

I didn’t think I had the time for a mid week ‘me’ day.  I thought I had too much to do.

But I realised that the consequences of not caring for myself were much more catastrophic than putting off today what could be done tomorrow.

Is it time for you to have a midweek ‘me’ day?

Jodie Benveniste, director Parent Wellbeing

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 9th, 2008 at 4:58 am and is filed under Parent wellbeing, Wellbeing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.