How I do it

With little ones, you use picture schedules and fanny packs full of sensory toys. But what happens when you're 21?

This is the back of the basement door, which is in the kitchen. It's Lydia's organization central. It has: my calander white board, my weekly chore cards, my white board, and my blood sugar chart. Now, don't think that I'm organized, or anything. These systems all depend on one another for anything to get done... one reminds me to do something on the next one, and eventually, the end of the line reminds me to do what needs to be done. Does that make any sense?

Here's a close up of my calander board. Red is appointments, blue is blood sugars and insulin doses (I've had Type I diabetes since I was 3). Every Sunday, my chore cards remind me to transfer the blood sugars and insulin doses to the monthly record sheet. The cards also remind me to write my upcoming appointments/work schedule on the board. I do 4 blood sugars a day, usually, so they are written as breakfast, lunch, dinner, bedtime. The magnets line up on the day, and each time I do one of those things, I move them to the next day (er, in the case of this picture, because it's Sunday and Monday is this past Monday and thus full, I stuck them up top). The magnets are my grown-up version of a picture schedule, I guess. They are the things I do every day.



Here's Sunday for the chores that I need to do today. There is a list for each day, and I flip the cards each night before I go to bed. They gave me the idea at partial, then my mom made a list of what she wants me to do each week and which days to do each thing. Then, I made them pretty, so that I could at least get something enjoyable out of it :)




I also have a certain set of things that I have to keep with me while out in order to keep me sane, others that stay at home but I couldn't live without. First, the cats. The cats are 10 little laminated pictures with a key ring in them so that they flip around, like the cards above. My cat, Leigh's cat, Leigh's former cat, other cats I know and love, and two of just really cute but unidentified kittens. When I'm out in public and super stressed, out come my cats. I like to have a quarter on me at all times to spin and stop, spin and stop, spin and stop. I've become very attached to my iPod, and lately, my new sunglasses. Between the two, they don't do a bad job of shutting the world out. Also, people don't talk to me when I have both on, which is great! I also like to keep a squishy ball, that I don't quite know how to explain, with me, to keep my hands busy. When I'm around the house, or at college if I was visiting a friend's room, I have the other cats... a 6x12ish rectangle of fabric filled with a few pounds of rice. I looove the weight of it! I have a 15-pound weighted blanket that I sleep with, and if I get upset during the day, sometimes I hide under it for a little while. I have three books (a cat dictionary, a Big Cats book, and an animals dictionary) that I look at over, and over, and over, and over, that seem to help me calm down.






And this is Truby, the dog. She's a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. She is smaller than average, only about 12 pounds. Yes, she is a forever puppy and extremely cute. She's not all that intelligent, though, she's delicate, and she's terrified of everything. I like her, but she is very much my parents' dog. I want my dog. Anyway, she's adorable and sweet, so here she is for your viewing pleasure.