How To Take the Stress Out of Your Family Life

Life is stressful. No two ways about it. Family life can be stressful too, but that is not how it should be. Actively taking time to reduce or even eliminate stress from your family life has a whole host of benefits.

Establishing a stress-free household takes work and teamwork, but there are things you can do for yourself, as a parent, to reduce the stress on a personal level too. This, in turn, filters out to the rest of the family and you will find that the levels of stress, angst and tension will start to even out.

Here are some ideas on how to take stress out of your family life.

Be Healthy

Parents are often so concerned about the health of their children that they neglect the needs of their own bodies. When the kids are in bed do some yoga or listen to a guided meditation; although a little out of your comfort zone give yourself persimmon to embrace the relaxation period.

While the children are at their after school clubs do you have time to go for a swim or a walk or do an extracurricular activity of your own? Rather than sitting in the car scrolling through Facebook get your mind active, download a language app and get learning a new language.

Rather than nibbling on the children’s food make a conscious effort to nourish yourself too. There are countless 20-minute meals that you can make for yourself that are not only cheap and quick to make but super healthy too.

Go On Holiday

This may seem obvious and arguably a superficial solution, but it really is a good idea. We appreciate that not everyone is in a position to take time off work and school nor fork out thousands of dollars for a two-week vacation, but there are ways and means of creating a relaxing holiday for your family.

Look online for last minute, all-inclusive holiday deals, these are a great way to get the family away and unwinding, if you can afford them. Just make sure you’re looking at family all-inclusives, not adults-only resorts where your kids won’t be welcomed. Go camping of a weekend or find a cheap holiday in a neighboring city you have never been to and take a road trip.

The focus of a family holiday isn’t necessarily to totally relax in the traditional sense but to spend quality time together; talk, laugh and bond. By spending time together as a family you can re-establish those bonds and open up new communication channels that may have broken down causing tension and stress within the family home.

Yes, a luxury five-star African safari would be lovely, but thinking realistically a family weekend away or mini break can really help to take the stress out of your family life.

Create a Healthy Environment

Some households are naturally chilled out and others not so much. If you feel your family fall into the latter category take some time to think about why this is. Start a dialogue as a family and work together to try and solve it.

Take time to talk as a family, not only to air grievances but also to seek advice and guidance from each other. With such busy lives, it is not unheard of to feel lonely in your own time. Be each other’s friends, listen and help each other.

Reassess Expectations

When did we all have to start being perfect? When did we start being competitive rather than supportive? So what if the lawn hasn’t been mowed this week, so what if your bake sale contribution was shop bought, so what if the house hasn’t been dusted? Seriously, so what?

We don’t realize how much pressure we put on ourselves to be perfect, why be perfect when you can be happy.

By making a real effort to reassess our exceptions of ourselves we can take a huge amount of stress away. In turn, this takes the stress away from the children too. They don’t want to see their parents constantly pulling their hair out. As parents, we should be role models to our children in all senses, including in how to be happy and stress-free…or pretty close!

Sleep

Are you getting enough sleep? Sleep deprivation is expected of parents of babies but once they are sleeping through the night there are no excuses for you not to get enough sleep either. If you struggle to switch off check out some of these relaxation tips, download a guided sleep meditation or read a fiction book to help your brain get into sleep mode.

Write It Down

Keeping a note of all the things that you think are stressing you out and then write down what you did to reduce those feelings. By keeping a track of your coping mechanisms for stress you can easily identify what techniques work for you and when.

Courtney P.

I’m a 20-something stay-at-home mother and wife. I have an amazing husband, a beautiful daughter, two loving dogs, and a lazy cat. I wouldn’t change my life for anything! I love to read, listen to music, cook and blog!