Skip to main content

Realistic Resolutions

The hubby and I had a conversation yesterday morning about resolutions.  He said he doesn't make New Year's resolutions because most people he knows can't keep them.  I've known my husband for over 22 years and I didn't know that about him :) I asked him if it was because most people make unrealistic resolutions and he said yes. I was watching a story on our local news station last night and they were interviewing the managers of different fitness centers in the area.  They were saying that they get a big increase in gym membership at the very beginning of the year, but then after a little while it drops off.  The reporter was asking why and one of the managers said something like, "most people want instant results, if they aren't losing two pounds a week they get discouraged."  One of my resolutions for 2013 is to continue to strive for good eating habits and make sure I find time for a 20-minute walk at least three times a week.  During different times last year, I would come up with excuses not to exercise  and I wasn't always eating as healthy as I could be.  Having a couple heart "issues" means it is absolutely essential I limit my sodium intake.  I don't want to have to add another medication to the four I already take!!  As moms, it's not always easy to find times in our schedules for ourselves. Another resolution is to get our whole house less cluttered. I had planned on using the holiday break to get things more organized, but the last couple of weeks of December ended up being kind of chaotic. My hubby painted all of our kitchen cabinets as a Christmas present to me, so we had drop cloths all over the place.  After he finished with that, we got our new kitchen floor after two months of a subfloor. At one point, we had our refrigerator and stove in our family room and our washer and dryer in the garage.    Both Lauren and Dominic have been sick the entire Christmas break and are almost back to feeling 100%, but not quite.   Lauren has had pneumonia and Dominic has had both an upper respiratory and stomach virus. All of my focus has been on getting them feeling better before next week when they go back to school.  Once things get back to normal with the "kids",  I am spending part of a day organizing all my papers, one stack at a time!  When I look at something I need to do in it's entirety, it can be very overwhelming.  Instead I'm going to look at projects I need to do and break it down into smaller chunks.  It's seems easier to handle that way :) One last thing I want to do before 2013 is over is to finally write the cookbook I've been talking about writing for years.  Since it's only the beginning of January, I think it's realistic to think I can have it ready to publish in time for Christmas. My approach to resolutions for 2013 is to make them more realistic for myself.  I know I'll have a much easier time keeping my resolutions if I do that!!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Those "Steps" to Independence Can Be Hard

We are heading towards 600 orders for Dominic's business. Since our long-term goal for Baked Goods By Dominic is having a "brick-and-mortar" and hire those with disabilities, it is essential and imperative that I continue to teach him all parts of the business. Since I prompted Dominic for so many years for speech, he has become "prompt dependent." What that essentially means is that he will look at me for a prompt, like, "what do you do next?" I do that one a lot. Dominic has been going to a private speech therapist for over ten years and she reminds me often that Dominic usually will know the answer, if I am patient and wait for him. That has been a very hard habit to break! Dominic has an incredible memory, so I put it to the test this morning. I didn't write out the steps, I wanted to see how much he could do completely on his own. We have a customer picking up his order today, but the only thing that had been done is putting the cookies into t...

Why We Pursued Guardianship of our Son with Autism

Last Thursday morning, my husband, Dominic and I went to our county's Probate Court and had Dominic's Guardianship Hearing. My husband and I are Co-Guardians, and we were granted "Partial Guardianship," which means Dominic can make some of his own decisions (future educational and vocational placement options, what to wear and how he wants to spend his free time), but my husband and I will make his medical, health care, legal, contractual and major financial decisions. The subject of Guardianship in the disability "world" has been and continues to be a controversial and divisive topic.  I was a panelist for an Autism Conference this past summer and presented on what it's like to have a child with Autism. Towards the end of my presentation, I mentioned that Dominic had just turned 18 and that we were going through the Guardianship process. When the attendees could ask questions, the first person that went up to the microphone started telling me that I was...

Presume Competence

Since we have traveled outside of the United States since Dominic was very small, we have had to get him a Children's Passport every five years. Since his current one expires in February of 2024 and he is now 19, we had to apply for an Adult Passport. I don't know why my husband and I picked Dominic's first day of school and Michigan State University moving in their students, but the appointment was yesterady at 3 p.m. We had gathered all of the documents needed and then went into a special room in the East Lansing Post Office just for Passports. The three of us sat down and the clerk asked Dominic his age. He said, "19." Since we were also getting his picture taken for the Passport, he went into a separate room, where she took a picture of him and then let him look at it to make sure he liked it (it will be his picture for the next 10 years)!  He said he did, so he sat back down with us. The clerk filled out a bit more of the paperwork and then she let Dominic s...