Mental Health Day Itinerary

Because I had scheduled my "mental health day" weeks in advance, I asked close friends and family what I should do with my free time. The general consensus told me not to do work of any kind: job work, school work, house work... no work.

I talked to Richie about what my day off should be like, and he told me to do whatever the heck I wanted to do. Because of my Type A personality, I tried to map out a plan for that day. Sick, right? The night before though, I decided to throw any ideas of a plan out of my head and just go with the flow.

Here's what I did on that day:

7 a.m.: Hit the snooze button because while I thought getting up at 7 would be a good idea, my bed convinced me otherwise.

7:50 a.m.: Get up because cats are annoying and want breakfast. Make a huge cup of coffee, open the blinds in the living room, and sit and sip coffee while waking up.

8-11 a.m.: I ate breakfast, read a few chapters in one book, read two juvenile books, went for a 1.5 mile walk while listening to a church sermon I missed.

11-11:50 a.m.: Marinated in a hot bath with a magazine.

12 p.m.: Made lunch - Caesar salad, bowl of strawberries, pita with hummus.

12:30-2 p.m.: Watched The Giant Mechnical Man on Netflix. Loved it!

2-3 p.m: Browse through Netflix, begin to get restless, realize that I'm bored and need to do something remotely productive.

Aside from the no work rule, I imposed one more rule on my day: No gadgets. Yes, I did watch some TV, but I made a conscious effort to use my phone only for text messages (and I only texted Richie). I didn't touch my computer until 3 p.m. and I broke the rule out of boredom and wanted to read blogs and the news. While I succumbed to my computer, I never logged in to my e-mail, Facebook, or Twitter (except for one tweet that morning that said I wouldn't be around that day... did you catch that?).

I'm a little disgusted that I got bored by 3 p.m. I have never been the type to just stay home. I like being out and about, whether at work or just running errands. I think it's sad that I couldn't entertain myself the entire day without the help of my computer, but so be it.

The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent catching up on reading, making the effort to prepare something for dinner (i.e. not heating something up or making a sandwich), and getting into bed at a reasonable hour. This day was exactly what I needed to recharge and hone in my focus on what fills up my "everydays."

As an adult, do you take "mental health days"? What do you do/not do on those days?