1 — Send the husband and children off to school and work.  This is crucial. I can not stress enough the importance of not having to attend to little people and/or big ones.  They must go.

2 — Eat something for breakfast.  Put something in your system. This morning I had a Clifbar, an apple and coffee with milk, coconut oil, and coconut sugar. Don’t knock the coconut oil in coffee until you try it. This is even better if you have an immersion blender. Heaven in a glass, or in my case, a large recycled peanut butter jar. Yep, cheers to embracing your quirks!

3 — Retreat back to bed and sip your coffee leisurely.  You will likely beat yourself up for such behavior, but stop that right now. Life can wait. I pampered myself further this morning by turning on my very loud space heater. I need to be warm.

4 — Chat with a true friend even if you’re only texting.  This perked me up even though I didn’t confess how hellish and depressed I feel.

5 — Take your meds.  Yesterday I convinced myself that the very low doses of Strattera and Adderall were doing absolutely nothing for me, so I skipped them altogether. This is a bad idea. If you think your medication needs adjusting, wait until you’re in a better state of mind and discuss with your doctor. Today I took mine as prescribed.

6 — Look at a random cookbook.  Until you begin beating yourself up for the insignificant number of home-cooked meals you’ve prepared in the last week. Then you should put the book down immediately. You don’t like cooking anyway. What made you think looking at a cookbook would make you feel better?

7 — Have a conversation on the phone with your husband about taxes and tax forms.  Get irritated that he’s interrupting your much-needed Zen and then remind yourself of that jar you made that’s supposed to house little slips of paper on which you’ve written all those things you love about him.

Practice gratitude and add to the jar — He does our taxes and I don’t have to. Take it a step further and actually tell him how much you appreciate him doing the taxes. Sense a genuine smile in his voice. Then silently appreciate that he truly loves you even when you’re difficult beyond reason.

8 — Wash a load of clothes.  It’s easy enough. Dump in like colors that have been covering the floor of your laundry room for days; throw in some detergent and turn on the washer. Bonus:  you cleared your floor. Okay, who are you kidding. You’re so far behind that one load barely made a dent.

Remind yourself that you were productive; close the door so you can’t see remaining clothes covering the floor.

9 — Sit on your front porch and watch it rain.  Instead of focusing on the rain, concentrate on your nice, covered porch and the swing that your husband built. Be thankful.

10 — Straighten the porch furniture and wonder why there is a soccer net and two golf clubs on said porch.  Consider putting said items in their rightful spot, but decide that it takes too much effort when they will most likely not stay where you put them.  Begin to get irritated and then remember that we’re trying to focus on gratitude.

11 — Go inside and think hmm, it smells like corned-beef and cabbage, and those are not good smells.  Remember to be thankful that not only did your husband cook dinner last night, he made a point to theme it up with a St. Patrick’s Day dinner, and it was delicious. Deal with the smell.

12 — Begin to get crabby because it’s still raining — so much for exercising outdoors, then again remember less attitude, more gratitude.  Go down to the messy basement and get on the elliptical machine. Anyone can stick with this for twenty minutes.

Decide to listen to Aerosmith Radio on Pandora. Hear songs like “Tell Me What it Takes” and “Every Rose Has it’s Thorns” — and yes, I know Aerosmith does not sing this song; I once belonged to their fan club.

Start thinking about making out in the movie theater with your ninth grade boyfriend who now plasters his divorced self all over Facebook with pictures of him and his flavor of the month participating in the latest workout craze along with physical therapy pics — mud races, back injuries, crossfit, shoulder injuries, on and on and on.

Thank your lucky stars you two didn’t make it past the four-month mark.

13 — Begin to hate the elliptical machine.  But again — GRATITUDE!!

Remind yourself to be thankful that you and Gil got crazy when you were pregnant with Piers and bought it from the surfer dude in Miami.

Smile when you remember the wacky road trip and even though you had to drive to Miami, $100 bucks was a steal for this baby.

14 — Pet the Retriever.  She smells like dead-ass in this weather, but she’s really good for the soul.

15 — Search YouTube for Yoga for Depression and find chill, happy, Adrienne in Austin, Texas.  Begin to feel sad because you love Austin and would love to be there instead of here, but then you remember…. you would be with you in Austin and right now you would be miserable most anywhere, so it’s best to be thankful for technology.

16 — Do the thirty minute yoga sequence.

17 — Stay in savasana for eons.  Try not to fall asleep.

18 — Feed the cat.  Consider showering and getting dressed, but decide it’s entirely too much trouble.

19 — Play with essential oils.  Hmm, peppermint oil is rather energizing and you certainly need energy, so rub some on your palms and inhale and exhale deeply.

Decide that even though you’re energized, your eyes are starting to burn, plus you don’t want to be anxious, so you add calming lavender to the mix.

Then you think that lemon oil makes you feel happy, so you add some of that as well.

20 — Take a shower and put on clothes that match.  I thought this was overrated until I did it. I even threw on some green. St. Patrick’s Day is big down here and even though none of us braved the parade, the green brightened my spirits.

21 — Try your best to NOT focus on how little you’ve accomplished today.  And hope you don’t get fired, and try to not run yourself in the ground trying to catch up on work that didn’t get done today.  

And the goal for tomorrow is to actually leave the house.

What do you do when you’re feeling blue?