In August 2020, Sam and I realized the daily house rhythms were not facilitating my spouse’s self-care, and therefore were a problem for all especially with everyone working from home. So we experimented with dinner meal planning (to reduce daily decision fatigue - we’ve continued this one), blocking off time in the calendar to plan meals and camping (yeah this didn’t happen) together, and implementing family journaling after dinner and before bath time (this was fun for the 4 days it lasted), and family meditation before bed (ditto).

In January 2021, I wrote that my spouse and I are practicing methods for giving each other emotional space within our small physical space (e.g. not trying to fix someone else’s bad mood, trusting they will ask for help when they want and need it) and both continuing with our therapists.

In February 2021, I wrote: You’d think by now I’d realize it, but meetings before 9 am cause remarkable disruption and stress in our house. It means that Theo loses our attention and patience in the small amount of time he’s home with us before he leaves for school – in the evenings he (or we) are often overtired and less able to engage. But he loves us, and wants to engage, and Zoom meetings in his space and time interfere with that. It’s so hard to remember that and remarkably hard to remember to prioritize him over work meetings when those work meetings are an open computer away.