Showing posts with label perfectionism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label perfectionism. Show all posts

Sunday 10 January 2021

When I do, I don't!

 


When I was a young woman, I ironed clothes as soon as they were bought in from the line. It was something as regular as clock work.

Gradually as the babies came and later on, spinal problems, it dwindled until I only ironed what was strictly necessary, that is- what was seen.

Twenty three years ago, my iron was kept in the linen press and only saw the light of day for service on a high holiday such as a wedding or funeral! 

As fibromyalgia overtook my life and abilities, my iron was boxed for posterity and now serves as a door stop to keep my back laundry door open when the dryer is in use!

Life for a sacrificial home keeper is difficult enough with what absolutely must be done to keep a home. There are things that must be done daily and goodness knows, there are little enough spoons or energy to do that, let alone lift a heavy appliance and stand or sit to iron clothes.

With sleep a precious but scarce commodity, coupled with tearing sore muscles, we must keep our home making simple. Ironing is simply too taxing on the chronically ill woman to seriously consider as part of a daily routine.

At first, I was particular about how I hung my washing out, in order to leave no creases and so minimise the visual effect of unironed clothes. But over recent years, polymyalgia rheumatica and arthritis vyed with fibromyalgia for first place in pain stakes.

I could no longer lift my arms to peg the washing out, and I was forced to make use of my dryer every time.

By doing just a load of washing a day, it doesn't build up and I find with less clothes in the dryer, that they come out almost wrinkle free. I try to grab them as soon as the drying cycle is over. All they require is a quick shake as I fold them and put them away.

Don't get me wrong! The OCD and perfectionist in me baulks at having to do this, but the practical and pragmatic inner woman says it is OK. It is simply my new normal.

There's plenty of tasks each day vying for first place in sucking on my limited spoons, so when I have a few spoons and I am tempted to drag my iron out of its' box: I don't!

Today's lists are:
  • Clean kitchen
  • Do a load of washing
  • Cook chicken garlic breasts and mashed potato for dinner


Sunday 11 October 2020

Play it in your own time!

 

As we shared before, I am supposed to be getting help in cleaning our home. But it has turned into a mess and I have fallen in the cracks. There was a woman who came for three weeks, but she was woefully indolent and a liar.

We are paying a co-payment to have her clean for two hours a week and sadly she wasn't worth the money.

For the first half hour she chatted and I had to bring her gently back to why she was here. Then she bustled around and "cleaned" stuff. 

When I say "cleaned" I am being generous. We could see no difference in our home cleanliness even after she was gone.

Chris was ill and in our bed, so I said to her that she needn't worry about changing it this visit. I asked her to pay particular care in the bathroom as it was looking like it needed a good clean. Particularly the bath. And I wanted the vinyl floors washed.

With half an hour to go, she came out and sat on the living room carpet in front of our beautiful backyard and watched the birds and played Candy Crush on her phone.

Knowing that she hadn't done much I asked her if she had cleaned the bathroom and toilet. She nearly shook her head off in affirmation. I had my doubts though.

I asked her if she had mopped the floors and she said "You don't really want them washed today, do you? They still look clean!" 

When her knock off time came, I begrudgingly signed the paperwork, confirming she had been.

Suspicious, I went into the bathroom. There was my hair still in the bath, the cap of the shampoo on the floor of the shower and Chris's whiskers in the hand basin. There was a cotton bud on the floor.

I took a quick look at the toilet too. How can I put this delicately? I can't. There was grunge still at the back of it. So without changing our bed or mopping the floors or doing the bathroom and toilet, she spent a total of one hour vacuuming our very small home. I was angry. I hate being lied to.

That afternoon, I rang my aged home care co-ordinator and told her what had happened. If they couldn't replace her, I would prefer none. I didn't want her back in my house.

So five weeks passed and I heard nothing. Turns out the home care case manager for me has been off for the last three weeks and I have fallen between the cracks.

So when I get someone to help me is anyone's guess. And for me, it can't come sooner. Not that our home looks like a burgler has ransacked it. I keep it tidy and it is always decluttered.

But my home is dirty. As any homemaker will tell you- it effects how you feel. And physically with the fibromyalgia flare brought on by driving a lot last week, it sucks even more.

There's not much I can do but wait again and hope they send me someone who has a decent work ethic.
Though from what I have heard, none of them does a really good job.

But as Sacrificial HomeKeepers know, we have to ditch perfectionism and accept that anything is better than nothing. Except the home carer who used our money to play Candy Crush in my living room. 

She should play it in  her own time!


He who is slothful in his work is a brother to him who is a great destroyer. Proverbs 31:9

Thursday 23 July 2020

In my dreams!


Ever since I was a young girl, I have dreamed of being an energetic housewife, baking and cooking from scratch. I would keep an immaculate house as well and my washing would be as white as snow.

Of course, I would iron everything that was on the line and my pantry shelves would be well organised with the spices kept in alphabetical order. And it was so for the first two years of my first  marriage.

But then much sickness came into my life, heralded by displaced discs and Scheurmann's Disease, and the dream evaporated as quickly as my energy and eroded discs.

This dream kept springing back in fits of discontent with myself and no small amount of false guilt. With the onset of heart disease, diabetes and fibromyalgia, the dream became a nightmare that taunted me. 

Perfectionism pointed its' knobbly finger at me, taunting me and demanding I try harder. It insisted that I find my worth in my homemaking abilities as a woman, and I was miserable as well as in pain.

It took until I was into my 20th year with fibromyalgia to realise that my worth as a woman was not on how well I kept my house. 

I decided to focus on the fact that God loves me just as I am and that helped remove the false guilt.

So now, in my 67th year, and my maladies worsening, I have had to put the dream to rest. I am never going to be the woman of my dreams. I have someone come to clean for me once every two weeks and I have learned to be grateful.

Only in accepting your illness can you find peace. Our womanhood is not only about keeping an immaculate house. And as I look at my clean house today, I am glad that we have the Aged care package that allows home care help. 

As I talk to you now, I smile at the irony: my energy comes through the woman who cleans, and my home is still clean. I have a maid in my later years- and that's something I thought would only come to be in my dreams! 

Today's lists of to do's are:

Make our bed
Do a load of washing
Fold yesterday's clothes
Make a sweet curry stew with rice for dinner


Wednesday 22 April 2020

June Cleaver's dragging her heels


These last few days my fibromyalgia pain has increased to the point I cannot function without assistance in the home. In fact, just talking to you now has been an effort and typing has seen my muscle and tendons cramp and spasm.

So I will be doing some minimal housework today, just to keep the wheels moving, but I have enlisted some help from my husband.

My focus will be on clearing clothes from my clean laundry tub and cooking something for tonight. Chris will vacuum a bit for me later on.

We both will be doing dishes from last night and whatever accumulates as we eat breakfast and lunch and I cook dinner.

This is the time when I find myself weepy and inclined to lapse into false guilt. For some reason my perfectionism increases as my spoons decrease, and I have to put into practice what I have spoken about and believe: it is not my fault that I am chronically ill and God loves me just the way I am. Thank goodness, it's not about how fast I spin my wheel! 

Today, fibromyalgia has won: I am on a go slow, pacing and napping mode. It is all I can manage to keep awake. Today is going to be a wash out. The wanna be June Cleaver is dragging her heels.


Monday 13 April 2020

The Queen of List Making


So I did it again! Instead of cleaning up after dinner, I went to bed with dishes in the sink. I hate when I do that!

I mean, with fibromyalgia robbing me of a good restful sleep, the mornings are hard enough to face. Having a dirty kitchen to wake up to is the pits!

Most would think that it's just laziness, but by the time I have cooked dinner my spoons are almost gone. Yes gone! I am so done in by the end of the day that even lifting my arms up to put my nightie over them creates pain.

Oh, yes, I make lists and read motivational blogs and You tubes, but to no avail. I am the Queen of List Making. Yet my limited spoons dictate that I do very little and I am left with ashes in my mouth.

I know I said before that I have been keeping busy and that's true, but I now have a rebound fibro flare and coupled with our autumn cold snap with rain, I am in a lot of pain.

You would think that I would have worked out this fibromyalgia lurk after twenty years. And for the most part although I hate it, I have learned to exist with fibro without feeling false guilt that leads to depression.

Most days I accept my disability, but deep inside is a perfectionist screaming to get out! On days like our current lockdown days, due to Rona, I try to nest and I overextend my limits. Hello, Fibro Flare!

I am grateful to my husband Chris. He is an mild mannered man who is happy with how I do manage to keep our nest. He and most people who come to visit- well in better days obviously- are happy with the state of our home.

It must be that I am my own worst enemy: trying to do the work of a much younger healthier self: everything in its place and a place for everything. But always straining, never achieving thanks to Fibromyalgia.  I need to accept what is and hang up my crown as the Queen of List Making.

Today I am doing just a few things:
  1. Cooking a chow mein in the slow cooker
  2. Doing those dishes from last night
  3. Giving in to the latest flare and taking a nana nap

Tuesday 3 March 2020

Grateful for my servants


So today has seen a slight improvement in my sugars. They were 9.5 this morning which is a lot better than 11.6 yesterday. I have been very careful of sugars in what I ate and the results are pleasing.

Also I have less pain and I think the fibromyalgia flare may be abating. So today I have added a few things to my to do list- things that will be a lick and promise only: I have had to give up on my perfectionism.

  1. Do a couple of loads of washing
  2. Cook some minestrone soup in the slow cooker
  3. Change our bed
  4. Vacuum and sweep an area of the house
  5. Order online groceries for tomorrow
  6. Cook curried sausages with rice for dinner
I am determined to do at least some of these things today and I have enlisted the help of some of my servants. 

Top of the list is my Dyson stick vacuum because it's not heavy, does a great job of picking up Xena's white fur and does not hurt my back.

Second favourite servant of mine is my dryer which saves me a lot of spoons in hanging the washing out then bringing it back in.

Having said that, I am also grateful for my slow cooker, my front load washer, my microwave and my toaster. I don't know how people managed in the past without these. I am grateful for my servants. 


Monday 2 March 2020

Not even on my worst day


So today is another day of pain, lethargy and lack of motivation. As soon as I finish this post, I am going to have a nana nap.

I once would have fought going back to bed, but these days I know I have to pace myself and rest or this fibromyalgia flare won't abate.

In accepting my fibromyalgia, I have had to cast my perfectionism aside and just concentrate on basic essentials like meals.

I refuse to give in to false guilt and that has been reinforced by my realising that as soon as I am able, my housework will be done. Besides, it will never ever get to look like these houses in the slideshow that I blogged about today- not even on my worst day. 

Today's to do list is:
  1. Rest
  2. Cook some devilled sausages, mash and veggies for dinner
  3. Do the dishes
This is the least I can do to make sure that our home never looks like one of those.


Monday 10 February 2020

Like a beetle on its' back




Today I have woken up tired. Fibromyalgia and angina are vying with back pain to see which is going to be the one to send me back to bed.

So far I have taken my medications, made some toast and tea for our breakfast and thrown some fruit bread out to our delightful birds.

I was planning on following Mondays' List but instead I will be following Thursdays which is a day of rest. God willing, I will be able to do Monday's List tomorrow..

I have a pre cooked slow cooker meal in the freezer for dinner tonight. So no need to cook. I don't like using frozen dinners, but I learned years ago to accept what is and not be a perfectionist...

We are experiencing thunder and rain and I am wondering if that is what is causing my renewed fibro flare, or if it was making the effort to go to church yesterday. Whatever it is, one thing is for sure: today I am as weak as a kitten and as helpless as a beetle on its' back!