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Episode Transcript

Let me start with a question. When was the last time you looked at your calendar and saw nothing? Not therapy, not a meeting, not a school event, not an extracurricular activity, not a social plan, just white space. If your answer is, I can't even remember, then this episode is for you. Today we are talking about [00:02:00] planning for overwhelm, and any white space in your calendar isn't just a luxury, it's a necessity. 

Now let's be real parenting a child who is neurodivergent or has additional needs often means juggling multiple therapy appointments each week. Managing NDIS reviews, school support meetings and reports, coordinating between siblings and parents and extended family, and often working or caring for others at the same time.

Even if it's all the good stuff like therapy and extracurricular activities, the mental load is relentless. What I often see, and maybe you find this too, is that families are running on empty, not because they're doing something wrong, but because they're not planning for the capacity that their family has. They're planning for time. But just because something fits in your diary doesn't necessarily mean it fits within your family.

So what do I mean by white space? White space can mean two different things. It can mean that [00:03:00] moment of time where there's nothing planned, there's nothing structured. It's just a moment to breathe and have some time to yourself. Or if you actually physically look at a calendar, you probably have a family calendar in the kitchen or use an online calendar or your old school diary. It's that space in between everything else that goes on that's just blank, that it can be what it needs to be. White space is that breathing room between commitments. It's unscheduled, unstructured time built in on purpose. So it could be an afternoon with nothing booked after school.

It could be a full day without appointments or errands, or minimal appointments or errands. Saying no to an event, even though you technically have time, just because you've got the time doesn't mean it's the best thing for you and your family. It's the pause, it's the reset, and it's the buffer between you and burnout. It's not about being lazy, it's about being [00:04:00] sustainable. 

 If you've listened to some of my podcast recordings or if you've been a part of my community, you might have heard me talk about the stress vulnerability bucket. I'll give you a quick rundown of what it is. Everyone has a bucket and this is their ability to cope.

 Everyone has a different size bucket. For some people and some kids, they have this teeny tiny little cup like the size of an egg cup. Or for some of the parents I work with, they have these huge bucket, like 10 litre buckets. But everyone has a limit, and each time we schedule something, we put a demand on ourselves or our family, even if it's a good thing, we add a bit of water to that bucket, and over the course of our day, over the course of our week, the therapy session, the play date, the work deadline, the shopping center. Grocery shop. If we keep pouring into our bucket without giving the opportunity to empty some of that [00:05:00] water, the bucket overflows. And this can be seen as a meltdown, shut down, exhaustion, tears, stress, everything really. So a strategy to empty some of that water is allowing white space, in our diaries to allow that opportunity to reconnect, to breathe, to have some time to ourselves, to let some of that water out of our bucket so that we can show up to that next appointment, or show up to work, or show up to school, whatever that looks like.

So how can we build white space into your week? And this is where we need to start. You need to audit your week, honestly. You need to look at what you've got on your plate and your family's plate and look at the schedule and see where there is space, where there is wriggle room. Where there some breathing space for you and your kids? Is there a single day or an afternoon or a period of time in your week where no one has to be anywhere or do something in particular? [00:06:00] If not, maybe it's a moment to have a think about what you've got on your plate and what you're asking your kids to do.

Next, have a look at red flag days. So these might be days that are known to be a mess. They might be the days at the end of the week of either Thursday or Friday, because let's face it, most people are burnt out by Friday anyway. Is it the days when there's a particular therapy appointment on. Is it Psychology is always triggering because it's talking about hard things and our emotions, is it on a Monday because , the kids are so stressed about going to school the following week that no one gets sleep on Sundays. Have a look and a bit of a reflection on your week and see if there are always notorious days that are really stressful. Try and protect those days and plan for chaos. Plan for the overwhelm. If Fridays are always a mess, then Friday afternoon should [00:07:00] be fairly quiet or Saturday mornings, but you need that counteractive time or that time to be given back so that you can reconnect and have some time to yourself and empty some of that water in that bucket. Plan for the overwhelm.

Next, you wanna look at buffer time around appointments. If your child is notorious for being late to appointments because they don't wanna go, factor that in, put that in the diary. If they've got an assessment or the NAPLAN or whatever it might look like, add buffer time, add that decompression time around appointments and the kids' expectations.

Another little trick when you are looking at your week to see if there's patterns of overwhelm in it, is be kind to yourself and actually prepare for the overwhelm. So not just give yourself time to decompress over the course of that day, but have. Little strategies in place [00:08:00] that reduce the stress of the day.

For you as a parent, it might be Fridays, and I'm just gonna use Fridays as an example because a lot of my family's find stress and overwhelm on Friday afternoons after school when everyone's done. And it's just, it's all too much. So maybe Fridays are takeaway nights because, that would help relieve some of your pressure in your cup to not have to cook on a Friday afternoon and actually feed the kids what they have been wanting to eat all week.

Maybe it's giving yourself 15 minutes before going to school, pick up on Friday, and you take a cup of tea and you sit in the car and you just stop. Build it into your diary, build it into your timetable to give yourself permission as well to have those moments of quiet and connection.

Is it booking yourself an evening of something to do? Is it leaving the kids with someone, be it hubby or grandparents or [00:09:00] your wife or whoever it might be to have them have the kids for the evening and you go to a yoga class or an art class. Give yourself that permission for you to take time out for yourself.

Have a reassessment of reoccurring commitments. So have a look at that swimming lesson, the piano lesson, the soccer practice and scouts. Is there something that's adding to your kids' week or your week that is more stress than joy? It's okay to take a pause and to step back from extracurricular activities. Is it the therapy appointment that's weekly on a Friday afternoon at 4:00 PM Is it worth the stress?

Be comfortable with saying no or not yet. And this is a big one because I find a lot of parents and even myself, we're all yes people. We wanna say, yes, we wanna do the right thing, we want to show up and connect. But you are allowed to say no. You're allowed to say no to a catch up. You're allowed to say no to a new [00:10:00] service.

You're allowed to say no to a therapy block because if your family hasn't got capacity for that sort of thing right now. Then that's okay. It doesn't make you a bad parent. It makes you a responsible parent because you know what your family is capable of and you know what your family's limits are in terms of what you can fit in their week.

Now I can already hear some of you saying, but if we stop, we fall behind. We are already on a wait list and we've just got to the top of the wait list, we don't wanna miss out. And I get it. I really do. But, kids can't absorb skills when their nervous system is on overload. So here is your invitation. Have a look at your calendar this week and see if there is a spot or a place to be able to create a little bit of quiet, an afternoon, an hour, 15 minutes, both for yourself and for your kids. Is there a nothing booked morning or a nothing booked? Afternoon. Reschedule a catch up if you [00:11:00] don't have the energy for it. Choose one place to give your family room to breathe and your nervous system and the kids' nervous system will thank you for it. You are allowed to slow down and you are allowed to do less, and you're allowed to protect the peace and your family. And just because you or your child has extra time doesn't mean you have to take it up at all.