Couch Notes: A Call for Support for Challenged Productivity

Website design By BotEap.comIt has been mentioned that President Obama and First Lady Michelle try to work out at the gym and eat breakfast together whenever possible. Apparently, Obama is married to his daily workouts; an early-morning presidential stomach crunch is as sure as Obama’s attention to the faltering economy, participation in daily briefings, Oval Office meetings, and parenting of tween daughters Sasha and Melia. Amid economic briefings, meetings with top advisers, appropriations reforms and press conferences, Obama still manages to nurture his young marriage, check his Blackberry, dabble in the local culinary scene, contemplate dog breeds and oversee political agendas. important as the White House. Council of Women and Girls.

Website design By BotEap.comOur nation’s 44th president clearly brings more to the White House than his intellect, charisma, youthful energy and unwavering passion. If an idle brain is the devil’s workshop, then Obama is definitely clean. The mere thought of the presidential calendar makes me want to hide under the covers, curl up in a fetal position, and suck my thumb. Does the president turn around and hit the snooze button? It’s hard for me to imagine our prolific first lady leisurely wandering the halls of the executive residence dressed in plush slippers and a plush, oversized bathrobe. I imagine it’s rare for Barack and Michelle to kick back with a newspaper and a cappuccino or curl up in bed watching The John Stewart Show and sharing a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. I’m willing to bet that Michelle Obama, despite her constant access to an army of staff, is unlikely to find herself submerged in a bubble bath reading People magazine and Danielle Steel novels. Nonetheless, the Obamas offer us a healthy view of their seemingly well-balanced personal lives, where family affairs, educational pursuits, social and political endeavours, all have equal merit.

Website design By BotEap.comI’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of productivity lately. There are only 24 hours in a day, and so many important things to do. Feed the dog. Feed the cat. Clean up dog poop in the backyard. Concern for the economy. Do laundry. See patients. Market my practice. Read the newspaper. Return phone calls. Unload the dishwasher. Mop the kitchen floor. Pay the bills. Stay in touch with friends and family. Stop the dog from tormenting the cat. Prevent the cat from scratching the dog’s eyes. Clean out the cat’s litter box. Check email. Frankly, it can all seem pretty overwhelming at times. Sometimes I feel like an imposter in my own life and wonder how I managed to avoid the final collapse of this proverbial house of cards, landing on a park bench with my personal belongings stuffed inside an old shopping bag.

Website design By BotEap.comSpeaking of homeless, I vividly remember my annual visits to see my grandmother in Miami Beach during early childhood, where a homeless woman lived on a bench across from the public library on Collins Avenue. She dressed in thick layers of brightly colored winter clothing despite the Florida heat, and there she faithfully sat year after year, surrounded by an array of plastic bags. Every year she returned to find the tramp dressed in the same peculiar outfit, and she fought the urge to ask why she didn’t remove the extra layers of clothing from her and place them in one of her many plastic bags. Her existence seemed so magnificently simple with her tangible world reduced to no more than several plastic bags and a park bench. She defied social convention and lived on the fringes of it by standing still and watching the world go by. Here was a concept that I found wickedly intriguing: a life reduced to sheer simplicity, free from daily commitments and social obligations.

Website design By BotEap.comI often wonder how do ordinary people of average intelligence manage to sleep, eat, exercise, care for pets and children, earn a living, keep up with current events, run errands, pay bills, procreate, and do laundry without become completely delusional? crazy and leaving society? Also, why do some people juggle the many dimensions of life seemingly effortlessly, always searching for a new cause or pet project, while others wander around in a cloud of mental confusion, drop out of society, or perish under the weight of the relentless demands of life?

Website design By BotEap.comDuring grad school I paid rent for a while teaching preschool. In my three-year-old class there was a boy named Ariel; a petite redhead who wet her pants regularly and cried most of the time. The demands of school presented a difficult challenge for Ariel and she required a lot of comfort and reassurance. Then there was Raina, a feisty girl with a fiercely independent and confident personality. Raina refused to participate in meaningless games and organized a daily revolt against the monotony of finger painting, circle time, and morning naps. She can hardly be blamed, as Raina craved a sense of productivity. I tried to imagine what Raina would be like as an adult and envisioned her as a tall, sultry woman in stilettos and a red suit, her long red nails tapping the lacquered surface of a conference table as she dictates the terms of a corporate contract. she joined a group of skeptical businessmen sipping stale coffee. These individual temperament differences are striking and become apparent very early in life. While some travel through life blessed with bright sun and calm waters, others are tossed about in the strong tides, struggling to survive. Where does the explanation for such a drastic difference lie: in the hands of nature, nurture, or a complex interplay between the two?

Website design By BotEap.comSpeaking of productivity, I’ve been feeling pretty inadequate these days. Somewhere in California, a single unemployed 33-year-old woman thinks she can take care of 14 kids on her own, while I’m challenged enough to take care of a cat, the occasional houseplant, and a boisterous Labrador puppy. My husband swears I can fool around better than anyone I know; he often takes a whole day to accomplish what he can do in an hour. I find routine paperwork, returning phone calls, and other household chores more unpleasant than a colonoscopy, and I empathize with caged animals at the zoo when forced to face these things.

Website design By BotEap.comSince the arrival of our pup Charlie, the productivity scales have tipped even less in my favor, as I have significant challenges in the areas of multitasking and sleep deprivation. I’d rather take Charlie to the beach in the middle of a weekday than clear papers off my desk, a reality that horrifies my laser-focused efficiency-obsessed husband. Charlie’s many physical and emotional needs, in addition to my other responsibilities, have made me wonder, how the hell do most people get by? A puppy’s demands are small compared to those of a human child, and I humbly admit, the puppy has rocked my world and wiped out my previously selfish existence.

Website design By BotEap.comAs soon as I can find free time, I plan to approach the American Psychological Association with a special request that a new diagnostic label be included in the DSM. The label is Productive Challenge (PC) and the diagnostic criteria are as follows: an intense and debilitating failure to multitask, a prolonged inability to cope effectively with sleep deprivation, a repetitive hesitancy to perform tasks and projects and a chronic avoidance of everything. that is mundane and tedious in favor of leisure activities and hedonistic pursuits. These symptoms may occur with or without a strong aversion to routine paperwork, must be insidious and progressive in nature, and must interfere with daily functioning in personal and professional domains for a minimum of 3 months.

Website design By BotEap.comMy neighbor has four young children under the age of 7, has a part-time job, and has recently started gardening in her backyard. She always wanted to garden, but never found the time or the motivation to do it. In my defense, I never had a backyard until recently, but if she had, I’m sure my PC diagnosis would have prevailed. Place another check in the Productively Challenged column. If my neighbor can juggle four kids, one still in diapers, and a part-time job while finding the time to garden, then surely I can handle a puppy, a cat, a dead plant, a private practice, a column. of Mercury and an orchard. Now that I think about it, what is my excuse for continuing to avoid the novel that I know lives inside of me? I am proud to admit that I have already written the first 13 pages, although it took me 5 weeks hidden in the Costa Rican jungle to do it. If Obama can go to the gym every morning, I can write the stupid book.

Website design By BotEap.comIt frustrates me that there are plenty of support systems out there for parents of human children, but none for childless puppy owners with production issues. After all, aren’t the mothers of these furry, four-legged souls worthy of a support system? Here is another area of ​​my life that calls for follow-up. If the homeless woman in Miami Beach can endure year after year on a park bench in the scorching sun dressed in winter gear, then I can create a support group designed to help me feel less ashamed of my CP diagnosis. I plan to call the group Chicks and Hounds. All interested parties are encouraged to contact me via cell phone or email to schedule a Sullivan’s Island Frisbee toss right in the middle of the business week. To offset the guilt associated with a PC diagnosis, bring your business cards and we’ll treat this as a professional networking event.