Once you have a child, your relationship with time changes pretty drastically! Since the majority of what you’re doing is being done for your precious bundle of joy, it can feel like time is snatched away from you and doesn’t even belong to you anymore. Even though there are still just as many hours in a day, the demands on your time increase exponentially!

When you add the hours spent breastfeeding, wiping bums, picking up toys, watching cartoons and reading every single one of your tiny tot’s favourite books to them, the time left to do just one thing for you works out to be all of about 5 seconds, if that! Exercise, hobbies and sex get branded as “overindulgent” and are often pushed to the side unless you make a conscious effort to include them as part of your daily priorities.

Your previous neat routine goes out the window – 9 til 5 at work, out with friends by 7 and some sexy time at 10 – because, for better or for worse, babies couldn’t care less about routines and schedules!

So let’s take a look at how, despite the baby chaos, you can make some room in your routine for you.

How do I free up time?

Even though it may not feel like it, squeezing a bit of extra time out of your day just for you is totally possible. If you’re the mother of a newborn, you may look at these suggestions with a raised eyebrow thinking to yourself “yeah right!” – especially as going to the toilet by yourself feels like a victory – but if you can try and implement even just one of these suggestions at a time, it will make a huge difference to your quality of life.

So, how do you go about it?

Get your grocery shopping delivered. Going out to buy food and other household goods is time-consuming. Getting your shopping delivered will change your life and will save you minutes if not hours going up and down the aisles lugging your trolley around, and trying to find everything on your shopping list.

Cut unnecessary costs and prioritise hiring help. One of the best ways to allocate funds is by hiring someone to help you with house cleaning, chores, gardening, day-to-day errands and of course babysitting, preferably someone who can give you one day off a week to babysit. This may mean cutting down on unnecessary costs (just temporarily) such as alcohol, sweet treats and going out for dinner.

Order a takeaway. We know we just advised cutting unnecessary costs but if it frees you up some time, ordering a takeout is definitely a necessary cost. But if you want to kill two birds with one stone and free up time while also saving, tell your friends and relatives that the best gift they could give you is a home-cooked meal. So tell everyone you know to get their baking hat on before their next visit!

Your house does not need to look immaculate. Get comfortable with a messy house and let go of the judgements others may have about it. In the end, your well-being is all that matters and is essential to the well-being of the rest of your family. So leave the dishes and use those 10 minutes to do something nice for you.

Cancel unnecessary appointments and meetings. If you find that your week is looking heavily booked up with appointments and meetings, see if you can cancel one or two of them and use that time to spend with yourself, your friends or your partner. Also, tune in to how you feel when you think about going to these meetings. If it doesn’t excite you, and it’s not important, don’t do it!

Reach out to friends and family. We know the previous point touched on this but we cannot stress enough the importance of asking for support with babysitting. We know many mothers have reservations about this but if you learn to leave your child with a trusted adult, they will grow into engaging, social and emotionally intelligent little people. And you’ll also be able to retain some autonomy. It’s a win-win! Consider taking it in turns to babysit with friends, and ask relatives and any teenagers you know and trust.

Final thoughts:

Although you adore your baby, continuing to put someone else first is a huge sacrifice and sooner or later will drain the life out of you. You don’t have to spend time alone but at least spend it the way you want to.

The silver lining to not having enough time is that when you do finally get that time to read the newspaper, go for a solo walk, have an interrupted movie night, or make love with your partner, you savour these moments so much more. Your appreciation level for small pleasures skyrockets. Learn to take advantage of these small sensual moments throughout the day by becoming more present with the here and now.

Sometimes, having time for yourself is more about mindset than anything. Instead of segregating your time into “feeding time”, “relationship time”, “exercise time”, “reading time”, and so on, try to think of it all as your own time. You necessarily don’t have to wait for peace and quiet to enjoy yourself.

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