Two summers ago I locked myself in my walk-in closet with my phone in hand and hid out from my children. I called my girlfriend, and in a low whisper, admited to her that my children were calling out for me and I was actually hiding from them. I couldn’t handle one more whining request or tattling monologue. I was on the verge of a mental collapse.  I couldn’t really pinpoint where my plan had gone wrong and how I ended up huddled between my shoe sorter and my long-hanging dresses. Weeks earlier I had been so excited about all of the time that we would have as a family during summer break because we wouldn’t be preoccupied with homework packets and early bedtimes.

We went to the beach on Mondays and the park on Fridays.The days in between were filled with trips to the zoo, playdates with friends, tea parties, and plenty of downtime having movie marathons. It was a recipe for success, or at least I thought so, until one of my children uttered the ungrateful words, “When are we going to do something fun? I haven’t been able to do anything I want to do!”

As I began to unravel and rant to my girlfriend, who was older and wiser in years, she pinpointed my demise. Simply stated,  You have killed yourself trying to make your daughters happy to the point of exhaustion and you haven’t spent a minute taking care of yourself since summer break commenced. As her wise words sunk into my 5-foot- 4 inch body, which was still hiding behind the closet door, I realized that I had quickly displaced myself on the backburner – again.

Each year, as long breaks from school approach, I remember that moment staring at my winter coats and knee-length boots in my closet, and I wonder how will I strike the balance between being the fun mom and losing all of my free time and personal space. Some days I actually tear up still when I drop my girls off at school. I watch the car door slam shut and it feels like their childhood is evaporating. I pick them up some afternoons from school and  it feels they’ve aged 6 months since the time I dropped them off 6 hours earlier. Don’t get me wrong though, there are plenty of days when I burn rubber out of the parking lot grateful I have a few hours of solitude to decompress.

With Spring Break upon us, I want to share a few things I do to stay sane over extended school breaks.

1)    Too much of a good thing is not a good thing. Packing every minute with fun, fun, fun is like taking a whirl-wind trip through Europe visiting 1.3 countries per day. It’s anything but fun and the bottom line is this: tired children are cranky children.

2)    Spring break is supposed to be a break. The whole idea is that you get a break from the normal routine and you relax. The words relax and children probably don’t seem like congruent terms, but again, balance is key.

3)    Have a family meeting. I like to sit down with the kids in the days before school gets out and ask them what their expectations are for the upcoming break. Do they need down time to vegetate in front of the TV or are they eager to take day trips to long-promised locations?

4)    Make your own game plan. Plan a girls’ night or a date night, or hire a babysitter to come in for an afternoon, but do whatever it takes to schedule in some time to get out of the house sans children. If you don’t put this planning time on your calendar, it won’t happen. It’s amazing what a better, more patient mother I am when I have the chance to miss my children for an hour or two once a week.

Question: What do you do to stay sane over Spring Break?