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Improving Things At Home.

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Parent/Carer Community Champion
Birdwings

Improving Things At Home.

While this forum is often about sharing what isn't going well with our teens and families, I wanted to share some incredible progress our family has made in the last couple of months. Our 14 year old daughter has been going out a lot and coming home late and we wanted her to bring her friends round here instead, but our loungeroom desperately needed renovation and we haven't felt comfortable having visitors for a very long time. I've had some serious, longterm health issues, but we also had a piano stuck in there and we couldn't get started til it went and we couldn't even give it away, and the thought of taking a piano to the tip was beyond me. So we were stuck treading water. However, with our daughter going out, we reached a point of no return and I actually managed to talk a friend into taking the piano frame to build furniture. As it turned out, he took most of the piano away but in pieces. We replaced the floor, painted the walls and have found ourselves with a really relaxing, spacious loungeroom which actually looks inviting. We hosted my parents for Christmas here and since then my daughter's had three sleepovers and our son's been bringing friends round and we had a total of 4 friends over on NYE thanks to covid restrictions, but we had a great time. The massive change in our loungeroom, also inspired our son to sort his room out. That's another story because it all proved too much and he got overwhelmed and took it out on the door and my husband spent too much time of his annual leave replacing it. 

I wanted to share our story here because we didn't realize how much the piano was holding us back, and there are big problems affe4cting many of us, but when you break them down into smaller pieces, they're so much easier to deal with. 

Best wishes,

Birdwings

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Contributor
Sophia-RO

Re: Improving Things At Home.

Hello @Birdwings, its so great to hear that things have been positive for you lately. Breaking things down into smaller, more manageable tasks is a a great way to look at things in life and just great advice in general. Things can definitely feel and seem less overwhelming when you take it one step (or task) at a time. It's great that you were able to renovate the lounge. Getting things done that have been on our minds for a while can provide such a great and motivating feeling. It sounds like things have still been hard at times with your son, so it is great that you are looking at the positives at much as possible Heart

Star contributor
Janine-RO

Re: Improving Things At Home.

Hi @Birdwings , 

 

I just had to jump in and say how much I love this post! It's so important to celebrate those wins, and I really relate to how those seemingly impossible to tackle tasks can weigh you down and hold you back. It sounds like you've done a great job at tackling that problem and creating a really lovely space in your home, and I love the idea of how the effects can then ripple out through your family... though I'm sorry to hear that it all  got a bit too much for your son, it's great that he was at least motivated to give it a go.

 

It sounds like things have really improved in the relationship with your daughter compared to where you were a few months ago- that is so wonderful to hear!  Are you finding that she's wanting to spend more time at home now?