Stress in a mom's life

I have made a startling discovery! Stress is not a good thing for a mom with rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia to have. The bad news of figuring this out is that I really don't have a way to never have any stress in my life. I mean, hey, I'm a MOM!

I'm sure all of us struggle with stress on a daily basis. Between the kids, husband, work, bills, finances, holidays, birthdays, etc, etc.....what are we suppposed to do????  I find that if I'm getting too stressed, it actually makes me even more stressed out, when I realize that I have stress.  Last week I had a revelation along with my stress.  It is actually wiping me out a whole lot more that it used to.  I decided that I really need to find a way to deal with the stress and try to keep it in check at all times (well, most of the time).

My plan is this:

1. Take time everyday to exercise. I think this will be important in many, many ways.

2. Take time everyday to do something that I enjoy. If I crawl into my bed at night with a good book after the kids are in bed, that will definitely work for me. And I might get the huge stacks of books, that need to be read, out of my bedroom.

3. Spend extra time playing with my kids and snuggling with my husband. Nothing cures stress like the closeness of family.

4. Spend time working on my breathing techniques and try to start meditating. I've heard that this works really well....................

5. I'm also not going to worry about whether or not I'm getting everything done that needs to be done, because it will be there tomorrow.  I will also try to learn to say "no" on occassion, so that I don't get totally overwhelmed, when I'm trying to juggle a million things at a time.

Hopefully, I will succeed at a few of these and learn to manage my stress once in a while. Rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia are tricky diseases to actually manage, but with a little tweaking here and there, it is possible.