Ep. 182 Create a Peaceful Morning Routine to Decrease Midlife Stress and Anxiety & Reduce Family Chaos With THESE Proven Coping Skills

Are your mornings setting the tone for anxiety—or for calm?
Peaceful mornings aren’t a personality trait—they’re a midlife leadership skill you can learn and teach.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

1.     How to use coping skills that shift your mornings from chaos to calm

2.     Why peaceful mornings begin the night before—with structure and buy-in

3.     How to lead your household like a lighthouse, not a drill sergeant

Start your day with more connection, less yelling, and a routine that actually works—for you and your kids. 🎧

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About the Host:
MJ Murray Vachon LCSW is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with more than 48,000 hours of therapy sessions and 31 years of experience teaching her Mental Wellness curriculum, Inner Challenge. Four years ago she overcame her fear of technology to create a podcast that integrated her vast clinical experience and practical wisdom of cultivating mental wellness using the latest information from neuroscience. MJ was Social Worker of the Year in 2011 for Region 2/IN.

Creating Midlife Calm is a podcast designed to guide you through the challenges of midlife, tackling issues like anxiety, low self-esteem, feeling unworthy, procrastination, and isolation, while offering strategies for improving relationships, family support, emotional wellbeing, mental wellness, and parenting, with a focus on mindfulness, stress management, coping skills, and personal growth to stop rumination, overthinking, and increase confidence through self-care, emotional healing, and mental health support.

Transcript

MJ Murray Vachon LCSW: 0:00

In this episode, you'll discover how to create peaceful mornings to decrease your family stress and anxiety.

Built-in Microphone: 0:08

Welcome to Creating Midlife Calm, a podcast dedicated to empowering midlife minds to overcome anxiety, stop feeling like crap and become more present with your family, all while achieving greater success at work. I'm MJ Murray Vachon, a licensed clinical social worker with over 48, 000 hours of therapy sessions and 31 years of experience teaching mental wellness.

MJ Murray Vachon LCSW: 0:32

Welcome to the podcast. As promised on Monday. Today's episode is meant to support you as you lead your family through the back to school transition. I'm going to share my Peaceful Mornings protocol created when my kids were five and seven, and mornings were anything but peaceful. You'll learn how calm mornings begin the night before, how to build a routine that works for your unique household and why your role as a steady, calm leader, your family's lighthouse can change everything. I'll also share some clinical stories of families who went from chaos to calm, so you can begin to imagine how to help your children master the essential life skill of a successful morning routine. On Monday, episode 180 1, I asked you to reflect on the emotional tone you want to lead with this school year. And to choose one word, a word to anchor yourself in. Maybe you chose peaceful, steady. Lighthearted, strong or present. You were invited to write that word on sticky notes and place them where you'd see them on the mirror, the refrigerator, your planner. Because leadership isn't about being the loudest voice. It's about being the calm center. You don't need to control everything. You need to lead with intention. And that's what Peaceful Mornings is about, creating a protocol, a morning routine that everyone understands, buys into, and helps execute. Let's be honest, in midlife, your mind is pulled in 10 directions Before breakfast, should I work out? Did I sign the field trip form? Who's doing pickup today? That's exactly why. Seeing yourself as a leader, the project manager of mornings is helpful. A leader sees the big picture and creates a process that gets the job done. You're not there to control the storm. You're the lighthouse. You're guiding your family by building consistent calming routines and assigning each person their role. In this case, the project is peaceful Mornings, everyone up dressed, fed. And out the door on time. I know this sounds impossible, but I have done this with hundreds of families and it is really worth your 10 minutes to listen to this podcast so you can ground yourself, not just in my experience, but their success. Before we begin, I want to clear up a common misconception I hear in my office all the time. Peaceful mornings are not a personality trait, they're a skill, and like any skill, they require a plan, practice, and repetition. When you hear this, what's your reaction? Yes. I can do this or, ugh, I'm not good at this at all. It's okay. If you feel overwhelmed, parenting often asks you to develop skills you didn't grow up with. If you're listening to this podcast, I already know you have a growth mindset. It's okay to learn while you teach. If you resist structure or accountability, I get it, but I'm going to repeat something. A former supervisor once said to me, when I was working with a mom who couldn't get her child to therapy appointments on time, she asked me to say to the mom, I'm inviting you to grow up. Your children need you to lead. And parenting, if you're brave, holds up a mirror to the tasks you resist. If you resist structure, you're teaching your child to do the same. That might be cute at age two, tolerable at five, but by eight it's a problem. So don't judge yourself. Get curious and ask, how can I learn to do this? Peaceful mornings is a process you are going to learn Two things. First, kids don't know much. They rely on you to teach everything from brushing teeth to packing bags so they can start their day successfully. Learning is a process. It isn't one and done. So all of these skills will require patience and repetition. The second part of the process is that peaceful mornings can be a family goal. Say it out loud. We are gonna get really good at the morning routine this year. The goal, everyone leaves the house fed, dressed, and prepared for the day. And this leads us to coping skill number two. Peaceful mornings begin the night before. One of the most effective midlife coping skills is solving problems before they happen. A peaceful morning starts with an evening routine that works 85% of the time. That routine is gonna include. Gathering backpacks, snacks, shoes and sports gear, laying out clothes, a quick homework check, and clear device boundaries. One. An insider tip that will make your life 1000. No, 2000% easier. No entertainment devices during the school week. The families that I have worked with who are brave enough to try this have reported less fighting, more connection, and a smoother rhythm overall in their house. Homework on screens, sure. But otherwise simplify, and that means you have to model it. Put your phone away until after your children are done with their bedtime routine. Remember, you are the lighthouse and nothing dims your light like checking your phone in front of your child. If your morning is going to be successful, nighttime routines must include a wind down bath. Books and quiet. And yes, a light bedtime snack, a banana with nutter butter or warm milk with toast, stabilizes blood sugar and support sleep. Avoid sugar and heavy foods and create a list of pre-approved snack options to avoid those nightly negotiations. Unlike adults, children need to eat 30 to 60 minutes before bed. The last and probably the most important part of the nighttime routine is a firm bedtime. After love and food, sleep is the best gift you can give your child. Real leadership looks like helping your child understand the importance of going to bed, no negotiations following their bedtime night after night. Let me share with you an example from the couch. A divorced mom with three kids set her weeks were chaos. I understood the challenges shared parenting. Inconsistent expectation, but I also knew from 21 years working a school that structure matters. I asked her to try something different. She bought a whiteboard for each of her kids' rooms and wrote at the top Tomorrow starts tonight. Then she sat with each child ages five, eight, and 12, and each one designed their own nighttime checklist. She didn't dictate. She co-created the result. Her youngest and oldest had solid routines. The 8-year-old struggled. Her word was Patience. After one week, mornings improved by a hundred percent. Expect setbacks when something goes wrong. Stay curious, ask, help me understand why your backpack wasn't packed, why you didn't make your bed. No punishment, just accountability. One dad asked that question and his son replied, I felt lazy. That launched a conversation on what to do with laziness. The dad gave his son two or three hacks. Peaceful mornings create these conversations. Not punishment, but problem solving. Which then leads us to the next obvious coping skill. Create the morning plan. Once the evening plan is set, have your child create their morning plan. Say nothing. Let them draft it. They've already created their nighttime routine and see what they've learned that they can apply to their morning routine. What time do they wake up? Do they use an alarm? What's for breakfast? When do they shower? Do they make their bed, pack their lunch? You've likely queued them a hundred times. This plan is your way to stop doing that. To be honest, when I was working with my family on this, that was the hardest part for me to not be their morning coach. And one thing that I learned that was really surprising I was giving my kids reminders of things to do. Don't forget to brush your teeth, did you feed the dog? And those reminders often distracted them. From following their own plan. So take it from me. The more quiet you are, the more peaceful the morning will be. When I worked at school. I saw how many kids skip breakfast in order to sleep longer. For some that meant 15 hours between meals. That's too long. They need fuel to function in my home growing up, my mom set out cereal and milk. Simple, efficient, but my daughter hated cereal, so I asked a nutritionist for ideas and she said, this may be a kid who needs hot food in the morning. I nearly fainted. I hate eggs, and I never imagined cooking at 6:45 AM But I told myself, MJ, it is time to grow up. And I did. I cooked and I learned to love it because I saw how much it helped her. These three coping skills really are the foundation of you creating a peaceful mourning with your family. But I wanna share with you two truths that can help you implement this truth, number one. There are two types of kids, and unless you have an only child, it is possible you have one of each kind. The up and atom self-starting and organized and the slow to rise, dreamy, distracted, and sluggish. I had one of each one was in the car reading 10 minutes early. The other needed time to do. Nothing. She played with her stuffed animals. She would make snow angels. She petted her cat. Unfortunately, for her, it took me two years to figure it out. She needed 15 to 20 minutes of quiet before doing her tasks, and once I honored that, she got ready. Just fine. Different doesn't mean wrong. It means learning how your child works and adjusting. Because I did that, our mornings became peaceful about 85% of the time. Truth number you the leader sets the tone. This part is essential. You can't lead from behind a closed door as the lighthouse, you go first. That means you have a bedtime routine too. You prioritize sleep and you wake up 5, 10, 30 minutes before your kids not to work. But to center, one of my clients started waking up 10 minutes before her kids. She lit a candle, made her coffee, and that tiny ritual changed everything. It grounded her and her kids. Noticed. One of her kids said, ever since you did that candle in the morning, you're so much nicer to be around. Remember, you don't have to be perfect, but you do have to lead. Leadership is not just about task completion. Leadership is also about how you relate to your children in the morning. So go back to your word, own it. Challenge yourself to stay peaceful. Organized or calm, whatever word you chose. Remember, you are the lighthouse. It's fine if your children get upset at the morning, it's fine if they are running late. It's fine if they forget something because that's how children learn. But as a lighthouse, you see farther than they do. The essential life skill of an evening routine, which sets up a good morning routine is what your goal is, not just for your children, but for you by building a structure that sets your children up for success. Staying in your lane, holding them accountable, knowing that sometimes your kids will forget their lunch or you'll run late, and there'll be natural consequences to that. So there isn't a need to emotionally explode. Will help your children understand that morning routines are a skill. They are learning, that they have to hold themself accountable for. In this episode, you discovered how to shift from reactive to proactive by leading like a lighthouse, why peaceful mornings begin the night before, and how to build a routine with your kids that's structured, consistent and calm and lastly, the power of curiosity modeling and a tech plan, not just for the night times, but to keep your morning on track as well. Thanks for listening, and I'll be back on Monday with more creating midlife calm.