Have you ever gone away for the weekend, even just an overnight stay somewhere and returned home feeling totally refreshed, recharged and clearer in your focus? That was me this weekend. 
My husband and I recognised we needed a break a few weeks ago. We were both feeling the ‘effects’ of being first time parents to twin 6 month old girls, plus the challenge of running and growing our own business (and sole source of income), we had delivered 2 presentations in the week leading up to the long weekend, plus we were working on staying on top of our own health and fitness which meant food preparation and time for regular exercise and we were staying on top of managing the household with all the washing, cleaning, sterilising and safety checking that comes with having two babies, expressing all of their milk and watching them starting to become mobile. Finally add into that time for each other to maintain and strengthen our relationship and we were pretty much filling up our 24hrs in the day…and sometimes it wasn’t all getting done. It is a lot and if I’m totally honest I was exhausted (I don’t admit that often but that is another blog).
By chance, we had invitations to two events that had us travelling out of the Perth metro area for the long weekend, we didn’t plan it but on reflection we probably should have!!
We stayed the Sunday night away from home and had the whole day Sunday and Monday was spent out of our house. We returned late Monday afternoon, so we put the leads on the dogs and took them for a walk.
While we were on our walk we both noticed how refreshed and refocused we felt. We chatted and were reminded of how important it is to get away and have a change of scenery every now and then. Not only did it improve our energy levels, we also felt connected to one another again, reconnected with our goals and mentally ready to make them happen. It was in this reflection that I realised just how ‘tired’ I had become. When you are ‘in’ a stressful or difficult phase, you don’t tend to notice it. The stress becomes normalised when it gradually builds as it had for us. Im sure you’ve all heard the metaphor of placing a frog into boiling water, it will jump out. But place a frog into cool water and gradually heat it, it doesn’t jump out because it doesn’t the notice the temperate change. The contrast is less severe and so no action is taken.
What happened next was the craziest part of our weekend. As we were walking, a man was standing out the front of his house, and as often happens he commented on our two dogs AND our two babies, saying we had quite the ‘collection’. We laughed but as we stopped to talk to him it turns out he is a father to 11yr old twins. I innocently made the comment that he had “survived” and he said “No actually we haven’t. We’re selling up” Turns out his marriage of 32 years was over and he was going through a nasty divorce. Before finding out the finer details I asked him what advice he had for raising twins…and he said “always make time for each other because it can be hard and you’re each important”. The bizarre thing about this situation was that my husband was sharing with me how he felt as a result of our weekend away as we approached this man. He had just said “I feel like we are a team again and that we are supporting one another” when the man made the comment about our tribe.
So remember how important your surroundings are to your health, your energy levels, your state and your relationships. Make the time to be in environments that make you feel good. Whether that be making sure your home environment is a healthy place to be in often and/or you make sure you schedule in regular time to be in new and inspiring environments.
Having said all this, the twins are the light of our lives and we couldn’t imagine life without them!
Until next time xx
Here we are, myself and my husband standing with my parents…do we look tired or what!! 🙂
