Cleaning the House After an Illness Part 2: The Plan

First off, I just wanted to thank you for coming back!  I am so glad to know I didn't scare you away yesterday :).  Fact is, I've got housekeeping issues, so if you are a 'normal' person you may read over some of my cleaning posts and think 'people don't automatically think this?'  Actually, you may think that of ALL my cleaning posts. 

I know I have issues, but I'm hoping that documenting my recovery efforts can help SOMEONE.  And, if so, then it's worth it (and yes, if that one person is me it's really, really worth it!).

So, when I left off yesterday, I was coming up with a plan.  I'm REALLY GOOD at planning.  You should see my school lesson plans!  They are awesome!  Now, the execution of a plan....yeah not so much.  Knowing this, I had to be sure I came up with a really simple plan.  That, of course, was boring.  At least I knew I had tried detailed plans in the past and lost, so I was a little more willing to try simple.

Keep in mind, also, that I wasn't fully recovered from being sick.  Often, I would get up and be great for a little bit of time (maybe and hour, maybe 3 or 4) and then I would be DONE for the day.  D.O.N.E. 

Another consideration was that I didn't want to work so hard that I wore myself out and was unable to work the next day at all.  In the past, my idea of cleaning involved organizing and decluttering.  There's many reasons for that, but the biggest was probably because I like to do things 'big.'  Big projects produce big results that everyone can see and complement me on.  So, if I worked hard, everyone knew it.  

I couldn't clean that way this time.  I didn't have the energy.  Knowing I would be working hard (because working for even 5 minutes could wear me out at first), but no one would know and no one would applaud me.  This made it VERY hard to get motivated.

There was, however, something different motivating me this time.  While being sick there were SOOO many things I couldn't do.  I couldn't fix meals for the family, I couldn't teach them school, I couldn't take them to practices or art classes, I couldn't take them to church, and many times I really couldn't even spend too much time cuddling or talking with them since touching and talking made me nauseated.  It certainly makes you feel like a failure when your children are crying because you can't do things that you used to.  

The motivation this time was that I HAD to succeed.  I was so tired of feeling like a failure.  I couldn't start taking them places yet, nor could I start planning school or even cooking dinner.  I could, however, start doing SOMETHING to help.  

Tomorrow I will tell you about my first day of the plan.

God Bless,

Lisa

If you would like to read my plan from the beginning, start here.