E is for Expectations

How much are you expecting from yourself?  Are you expecting perfection?

I am really bad for expecting too much from myself everyday.  It's my Type A personality.  I have literally written two page to-do lists, and then I get so frustrated with myself when I am not able to get even 1/2 of one page finished.  It's nots a real moral booster.

Some realizations I have come to in the past few months:

As more and more sensory issues have been evolving in our lives, it has been like running into a brick wall.  Simple trips, are no longer simple trips.  Field trips have become a bit more difficult as my list of "comfort" items has grown.  I usually have 3 bags of extra clothes, headphones, snacks, water bottles and medications in the back of our vehicle no matter how far away we are visiting.  So I have come to expect crying, whining, and complaining.  I prepare for whatever we have seen and hope can handle from each kid while out on a trip.

I have come to the realization recently that I cannot attend all that I would like to take the kids too.  I do not have to teach them everything in the world in the next 3 months.  Life is a learning process.  I am almost 40 years old and still learning new things.   I have now learned to not over-plan our lessons.  If I am trying to cram in a lot of lessons, then I am expecting too much from our children.  They cannot handle learning that quickly at times.  So I am relaxing my old lesson planning approach and it's less stressful for both the kids and I.

I have to say No to all that people want me to do.  I have to start weeding down on the responsibilities and delegate out when others volunteer.  I know this....yep.  But it's still hard.  I love to be involved.  So this one is a work in progress.

I realize that we will never live in a house that will be featured in Better Homes in Gardens.  Maybe 'Recycling Furniture Today' will feature us someday.  But seriously .... we don't have to live in unclean conditions.  We might be cluttered, but we can be clean.  I do expect to have clean floors, counters, clothes.....I just don't expect the stack of favorite magnetic toys to be on a top shelf where the kids can't reach them.  Healthy clean is what I expect now...not just trying to rearrange clutter.

I have now come to Expect a constant roller coaster with the kids.  We never know each day if we are going to wake up to a calm day, a roller coaster day (where attitudes constantly change) or just a plain pure manicky uck day!  I have learned though that I cannot expect perfection.  I might raise my voice as I am being yelled at by an 8 year old or a 13 year old.  I have come to expect that I can sit on the garage steps whether it is 70 degrees outside or just 2 degrees in the garage.  I expect I need to walk away from the argument to remain cool.  Joe and I have both come to expect to rely on each other for support through these trying times.

I expect there to be bumps in our budget and mountains we have to figure out how to climb.  The hoops and obstacles that we are thrown daily are there to stumble us.  But I know that Joe and I will tackle them together and through prayer we will be shown a way.

I don't know what to expect in the future with the kids.  What I do expect, is that I need to learn to take it day by day.  Slow down and try and love the life we live, no matter how stressed I feel at times.  Because I need to expect that I am going to be frustrated daily.  I should expect tears of frustration right along with tears of joy.

So I really haven't lowered my expectations for myself, I hopefully have just shifted them to what is a more manageable and faith strengthening way to handle life.