F or as long as I can remember, I've always been a little ( a lot) particular about the way I did things.
I remember only writing on the right-hand side of my exercise books at school because the left-hand side would have indentations from the previous page and the ink would show through, not really allowing a clean space for me to write.
I used to polish my school shoes before I went to bed each night, and then sometimes I'd sneakily polish my sister's shoes as well.
As I got older, I would make endless lists. At one stage we had a total of EIGHT lists on our kitchen and pantry walls! They listed the maintenance and cleaning jobs for our home, the days they were due to be done and the manner in which they were to be completed. In addition to this, we also had the usual lists that some people may have in their homes - meal plans for the week, grocery list, 'to-do' list for the day and a 'Week Ahead' list (Those ARE normal lists to have.. RIGHT?!).
When our second child was born in 2014, my husband became extremely worried about me, suggesting that I go see a doctor as he feared I wasn't coping well with the recent birth.Of course, I felt like everything was fine, but I was happy to have a doctor confirm it for us.
The following week, I found myself sitting in a psychiatrist's office, talking about my life.
It wouldn't be long before I was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder.
MINIMALISM & OCPD
My brand new psychiatrist suggested "minimising all the areas you could comfortably minimise". Well cheers for that, Rosie! I have two children under three, trust me, we NEED our 'stuff'.
Her reasoning behind this was simple; "The more you have in your home, the more stress you will be under to keep it clean, tidy and in order. The less you have, the more time you have for the things you love because your time is no longer spent on getting through your lists".
I wasn't really convinced that this would fix everything, but we were paying good old Rosie here a large fee to be good at what she does, I had to trust that she knew what she was doing.
I headed home & sat on the kitchen floor next to a big empty cardboard box. "What the heck do we NOT need? We need all this crap!" I sat there for a while before I just started grabbing things & putting them in the box. I remember holding onto this one item. It was a wine decanter. It was given to us as a wedding gift. It was expensive and held sentimental value. I felt bad. It was a gift! A gift that cost a bit of cash! ..but we don't drink red wine.
..and in two years, we hadn't even opened it.
Finally, I put it in the box to give away to someone that would use it.
Removing those items made me feel lighter. It made me feel in control again.
I was finally doing something to take back control of my life and how I felt on a daily basis.
THE HAPPY ADDICTION
I began to feel 'addicted'. The happiness I felt from removing items that didn't serve a purpose, that we didn't love, it made me feel like I was on a high.
I began to look forward to rubbish day. "Make sure the bins are full when you put them out!" I'd yell to John, running towards him with another bag of items to throw away.
"Any of this stuff mine?" He'd often ask.
Eventually, decluttering turned into a habit. Then, before we knew it, it was a lifestyle choice. It was the way we chose to live our life.
I'd never been so happy to have empty spaces. Less items to dust. Less stuff to care for and maintain. Less to make me feel obligated to keep in our home.
BONDING WITH MY CHILDREN
I always had a great relationship with my daughter. She was the 'easy' baby. She slept when I put her in her bed, ate when I fed her, was happy when she woke. My son was a little different. Born three weeks early, I'd had a rough pregnancy, a rough labour & an even rougher postpartum period.
I spent two weeks in the hospital after a postpartum hemorrhage.
Although my son was ok to be at home, he was exclusively breastfed and wouldn't take a bottle, making it hard for anyone to care for him. Thankfully, the medical team at the hospital were encouraging and allowed him to stay with me. I had to rely on the nursing staff to help me feed, change & bath him during my entire stay, making it extremely difficult to truly bond with him. I love him and his sister more than anything, but for some reason, I didn't have that same happiness. I panicked when he cried, which seemed to be all the time.
I was exhausted. My body was already struggling but my mind was struggling too. I felt like I couldn't do it.
After a solid 6 months of minimising and decluttering, I finally found the balance. I finally found a point where I could let go of all the 'to-dos' and focus solely on my children and the kind of mum they needed me to be.
We started having breakfast together, reading books and playing on the floor with every single toy they owned - which no longer made me anxious because it was no longer an excess amount.. it was acceptable.. easy to tidy. I became closer to both of my kids. Finding special little things that only we did. I was finally the mum that I wanted to be.
MY HUSBAND GOT HIS WIFE BACK
Kids change you. They change everything. Every little aspect of your life is forever different because of these tiny little people.
They give you perspective. They give you hope. They give you love.
They give you all these things in a way that you would never have imagined. But with the PTSD & the OCPD, John lost a piece of me that didn't look like he would ever get back. He lost a piece of his own happiness because he could see that I'd lost mine. Overwhelmed with the constant need to have everything everyone else has, the constant fight to organise the clutter; he lost me.
Minimising our possessions maximised our life.
We created space. We created time.
And just like that, my husband got his wife back.. and I got my life back.
Minimalism doesn't have to be a life of less. It's a life of simplicity.
It's a life of necessity, not of greed & consumption, or fear of missing out.
It's a life of happiness.
Erin Michele .x
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