As you look at the calendar, your heart starts to beat more quickly & the anxiety settles in. After two years of soooo much time with family (and going almost nowhere) the schedule starts to fill up again.
Birthday parties, soccer games, weekend festivals, work conferences & babysitters. We were sad for them to disappear for so long. But now that they’re back, parents of young children wonder how to balance it all.
It’s wonderful to be in community with others again, but the hectic rush-rush lifestyle was NOT missed.
So you think to yourself… let me get organized! That’s the only way I’ll survive. Organization seems like the solution to your household stress and overwhelm.
WHO’S IN CHARGE OF DOMESTIC LIFE?
Ready for an unpopular opinion? If you’re a mom juggling ALL THE THINGS, getting more organized will not solve your household overwhelm. At least, not on its own.
You know your annual New Year’s Day goal and first day of school vow? That THIS is the year you’ll get truly organized? But it doesn’t quite happen.
Maybe you recently returned to out-of-home work or went from part-time to full-time and panicked. How am I going to keep it together? You started to research “family command centers” on Pinterest in hopes that a perfectly organized calendar and fashionable bulletin board will solve your problems.
Believe me, I had a fling with pretty command center visuals, too.
But if you are the one fully responsible for everything that happens in that command center, it’s not the long-term solution you need.
WILL ORGANIZING HELP YOU JUGGLE IT ALL?
The allure of “organization” is captivating, I admit. Especially the way it is done in the world of competitive feminine domesticity – a/k/a on Instagram and Pinterest.
Wide pantries with shelves of clear bins hold flour and nuts and dried beans that have never looked so enticing. Suddenly you want to bake from scratch! Add in matching blue labels, curlicue font & a dramatic geometric wallpaper = and your heart flutters while the neat spice rack gleams.
“If only this could be my pantry…” you think.
“…maybe I’d finally have my act together.”
THE GUILT AND SHAME OF ORGANIZING CULTURE
Then the shame and guilt starts to set in.
I mean, how long would the ziti bin actually hold ziti until someone in my family dumped a half-eaten bag of pretzels in there?
And how much time would it take me to make these matching labels? I don’t have a machine.. Or a family seal. Is that required?
Not to mention I don’t even have a real pantry…maybe we should renovate.
See how quickly these “inspiration photos” can make you spiral? One second you’re admiring the beautifully organized toy room and the next minute you feel like you’re failing at everything.
ORGANIZATION DOESN’T CHANGE YOUR PARENTING DUTIES
But isn’t there a place for home organization?
Of course! This isn’t meant to trash home organization systems or home decor gurus. Not at all. For many people, it’s a hobby that brings out their artistic side. For others, having a dirty dish system that works with their neurodivergence is absolutely critical to function well at home.
Listen, when Toula from Bizzy Bee Organizing helped me realize that my kid’s socks would work better if they were stored near the door, rather than in her room, it was magic! That little change in placement has saved us hours of time in the last few months.
But if you are the only one who knows where your child’s socks go, the only one who washes her socks, and the only one who gets her dressed in the morning… it may not be enough to relieve your overwhelm.
Despite what Marie Kondo promises, tidying up may not be as “life changing” as you’d hoped if you are the “She-Fault” parent – the CEO in charge of keeping the home running smoothly at all times.
How Organization WILL help you
Let’s go back to the “family command center” example. Could it help relieve some of your mom stress?
Here’s how organization might help you:
1. It gets all the appointments and extracurricular activities out of your head. You can stop some of the nighttime head-swirling & mental list-making once it’s on paper.
2. It creates visibility for the whole family – everyone knows what’s happening.
3. It cuts down on surprises & conflicts. There’s a pediatrician appointment at the same time as my work conference? Conflicts will be less frequent if the family uses the command center.
What Organization Will NOT Help With:
Here’s why organization is NOT a magic bullet. A few questions to ask yourself:
1. Who creates the command center? (Who noticed that this was a need, researched ways to set it up, researched and ordered supplies, and color-coded each family member? Someone did the invisible work to create the system.)
2. Who creates the schedule? Meaning – who recognizes that it’s time to schedule a dentist appointment and initiates social gatherings with other families? Who figures out which extracurricular activities will work?
3. Who implements the family calendar? Who fills out school forms, takes kids to practice, donates to the coat drive, sets up play dates, etc.? Which parent keeps the family calendar up-to-date and checks it daily?
4. Have we fallen into traditional gender roles? If you and your partner both work outside the home, but you’re the only one who volunteers at school, how did that happen? Are you expected to purchase birthday party gifts just because social events & gift-giving are considered feminine? A fantastic command center won’t prevent you from slipping into unintentional gender roles.
(Related: negative impacts of unequal household work on both women AND on men.)
5. Is there an actual system? Organization is sometimes, but not always, a system. Putting pasta in tall canisters only works if everyone in the house understands and values the system. What happens when family members stick a box of pasta next to the beautiful canister it’s supposed to go in?
6. Do people know their role in the system? You can create a shared, physical calendar but it won’t work if your partner only consults their iPhone calendar, or vice versa. If your kids are able to participate, how will you engage them effectively?
IT’S ABOUT RESPONSIBILITY; NOT ONLY ORGANIZATION
So you see… the organizational “inspiration” is enticing. Who wouldn’t want their closet to look like a page in HGTV magazine? (Which, by the way, I subscribe to. Not throwing shade.)
But decluttering your house, buying 50 clear canisters & a Cricut machine isn’t going to lessen your load. It’s not going to reduce your overwhelm completely.
In college, one of my roommates also used to tidy up before final exams and it’s no surprise why. Psychologists say that underlying stress and angst may drive our desire to clean and declutter. Lots of us filled trash bags in the early pandemic to de-stress and gain a semblance of control.
So – – what’s underneath your desire to organize?
Will you finally be the mom who has it all together? Will you finally be able to “juggle everything” without collapsing?
Sorry to break it to you but… the pretty sock drawer, the immaculate pantry, and the color-coded Family Command Center can only do so much. If you continue to keep responsibility for almost everything going on in your family – you’ll reach a breaking point, with or without beautifully-labeled flour canisters.
MEET THE FAIR PLAY METHOD
What you need is an entirely new system to approach domestic duties. It’s not just about divvying up the laundry and the dusting.
The Fair Play Method, created by Eve Rodsky, gives couples an entirely new vocabulary to discuss the household load. It helps you to actually take items off your plate and re-distribute responsibilities in a way that makes sense for both partners. Most importantly, it helps you reclaim some time for yourself.
If you’re feeling like you’ve lost yourself in motherhood or that everything will come crashing down if you so much as get a headache, you need more than a pretty filing cabinet.
As a Certified Fair Play Facilitator, I support couples & individuals to learn and implement this method – through both coaching and workshops. Reach out if you’d like to discuss how your life can be easier with Fair Play!
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