Music Therapy…

How do you cope with the return of the bad weather? Not that we had a brilliant summer, I know, but every year is the same story for me. As soon as the cold return and days are shorter, I get into a vegetative state. I just want to sleep, and eat, and eat, and eat more… not good when you are on a Yummy Mummy mission!

This morning I was up with my eldest son at 5.30 am. To cut short a long story, my husband wanted to help me this morning, feeling guilty for having a night out last night… :) at the first murmur of our son, he jumped out of bed, and took him downstairs. I realised when I heard Elliott screams coming from the kitchen! I asked my husband why he took him out of bed, if he’d seen the time and he said “no, what time is it?” well “5.22 am, dear!!!!”. He then tried to take him back to bed, but of course he had been too stimulated to go back to sleep. I felt bad for letting Craig to look after him with a hangover (he won’t admit he has one though), so after he came back to bed and Elliott had spent a good few minute crying, I got out of bed and took Elliott with me.

Here I was on the sofa half asleep with my little boy and his big puffy eyes… It was so dark outside that I felt a bit low, but then, I had an idea, I could get my ipod and play my good mood music!

10 min later, I was frantically dancing in the middle of the kitchen, listening to my “sunny songs”, you won’t believe how good it felt!! I am still full of holiday and sunshine feeling and I am going to nurse that feeling all day long… well probably until 1.00 pm when I will go for a well deserved nap!

So here is what I recommend you do, if like me the lack of warmth and sunlight is affecting you:

1. Make a list of your 10 favourite upbeat songs, don’t worry about the naf ones, they are usually the best one to lift up your mood.
2. Either download them or copy them, but put them all together.
3. Copy the disk or have them in your ipod in one album.
4. Play it every time you are feeling a bit low. You have to listen well to your songs, that’s the trick! It is not as effective if you put it just in the background. If you haven’t got much time do this with only a couple of songs and let the rest play while you get on with your things.
5. Dance like you never danced before, sing like you never sung before, or just lie down close your eyes and remember your holidays, that really fun night out you had or anything you like remembering.
6. Remember that those songs are supposed to lift up your mood, so avoid sad, slow songs.