My day has been pretty hectic today. I’m behind on my grading (as usual, not because I can’t organize it, but because it is tedious). I woke up at 8am, with my son making coffee (which is one of the sweetest gestures I can have). Then, after making myself a sandwich for breakfast, I started to work, in the living room since my dining room is a mess.

I get concentrated on my work, when it is lunch time, and my husband brings me lunch. I eat, and keep on working. While working, I start making a list that we usually do at school recording students’ grades, and a chart that is usually made for accountability records. Then, I realized, my children would be getting hungry, plus my computer got glitchy, so I turned it off and made my first “yaniqueques”, which is basically a wheat based Dominican fritter. I did them with help from my sister-in-law, since apparently the other 5 recipes on YouTube and blogs just didn’t do it justice.

My husband came home with some groceries, searching for straws to make “piña coladas”. While I finish frying and clean the food to put away, I hear my son complaining about something he stepped on. Who would have guessed that the cat had a softer than normal stool and was all matted on her fur? I told my son to bathe while I tried to get my cat out from under the bed. My husband shooed her from the other end, until I caught her. I cleaned her with baby wipes, and decided that she needed to get bathed. So, I gave my cat a bath. It was an ordeal nonetheless, but she cooperated. Once finished, my husband dried her while I bathed. Then, after all of this, I got back to grading.

This was my morning/afternoon, and from the title of this blog, you can come to the conclusion that I still have work to be finished tomorrow. During this quarantine, I’ve been more unfocused than usual, overwhelmed by what I need to do around me and the complication that I can’t just leave my kids to be watched by their grandmothers, since I don’t know what exposure they have encountered.

Scheduling helped for a bit, I do have schedules pinned where I can see it, but once I do, I realize that I’m behind, and get discouraged. This is where my ADHD overlaps with my Adjustment Disorder, and I start feeling depressed. If I only could have concentrated more. If only my mother wouldn’t have distracted me on Thursday. If I just wouldn’t get overwhelmed and discouraged the previous week. I just start blaming myself.

I had my session with my therapist on Monday, and although I keep on having the same problem, I am learning to just focus on what matters: my family. My son has made me coffee and heard his challenges with the video games he has played. I’ve cuddled with my daughter and she has had interest in women biographies, and I read to her almost every night.

Maybe it isn’t about the deadlines, the stress and the overload of worry. Maybe its about listening, feeling, seeing, smelling and tasting simplicity. What do you think?