Our North Star Routine

Without a doubt a consistent sleep schedule is our go to routine! Whenever we get off track it is because we didn’t stick to the plan of a consistent bedtime and a fairly consistent wake time.

Yesterday was a hard day for me and just really long. I had a lot going on at work, my computer randomly shut down during a meeting and, of course, I had unsaved work that I lost. I ended up working until about 2:30 in the morning. So when I got up this morning I was tired and a little bit more snippy than I’d like to be because it just causes me to be in a bad mood all day. Today will be a mentally tiring day as I work to put up that filter that is so very thin because of my lack of sleep and stress.

Our kids are no different and I think as adults we have a hard time remembering that our kids have stress and things go wrong in their day too. When this happens they are short and have attitude or meltdowns and I think often times our minds immediately jump to the worst scenarios. Some thoughts might include:

“Oh please don’t let this explode and ruin our entire day/activity/plans.”

“Why does she always do this when I don’t have time? We are going to be late again.”

“How do I handle this? Last time things just got worse.”

One of the best ways to prevent these meltdowns is to make sure they have enough sleep consistently. We have found this to be the greatest help and why I call it our North Star Routine.

Want to hear more tips on how to Win with ADHD? Check out my podcast, Winning with ADHD. I’d love to share more with you!