Any planning is worth it.

Yes, the end of the summer may have you haggard, wondering how the hell you’ve done it, desperate for school to start, and frustrated.

or maybe you are dropping off your second or third…or first baby to a school that feels impossibly far away. Your grief feels so raw, you don’t know where to put it. Or maybe you’re ambivalent because this child has needed to leave for a long, long time.

or maybe you’re looking at your partner with judgement and bewilderment; were you always so different? How could they parent like this? Don’t they see? Don’t they know?

Emotions are high, tolerance is low, and your stress response is kicking in. You fight or you hide. You yell or you give up. You roll eyes or you sigh.

Creating a plan won’t take away the hard, it won’t extinguish grief or immediately ease a bedtime, but it will bring order to your mind. You will some relief in controlling what you can and letting go of what you cannot.

There are a million ways to make a plan (daily, weekly, monthly), but one of the key benefits is that you bring the family into the mix. Children of every neurotype and developmental age can be of help, and children thrive when they are of assistance. Stress often leads us to feel we are alone; a plan can bring in help. And once we are helped and supported, we see paths forward, we feel hope, and we feel lighter.

How can you create a simple plan? How can your family help? How can make room for your grief? Your frustration?