Yesterday I had my Remicade treatment, and next to me sat a woman with some form of cancer. It was her very first visit, so the nurse was going over everything she needed to know to make it through the harsh medications. The nurse talked about eating healthy, trying to stick to whole foods with lots of iron in them, switching your mouthwash (to something natural without alcohol--interesting), and about doing things that make you happy, among other things. Interestingly, though, she emphasized over and over that the number one most important success tool for a cancer patient was having a set schedule. She said that those patients who got up at the same time every day and practiced a flexible schedule (get up, eat breakfast, work out, go to work, go to the grocery store, come home and clean house, watch a corny TV show, shower, go to bed, etc) were the ones who always did the best. She said in all of her years working with cancer patients, she never met one on a schedule that didn't do significantly better than one off a schedule.
Then, during the same session, I started reading a book called Baby Wise: Giving Your Infant the Gift of Sleep. It had been recommended to me by a friend, and frankly, I scoffed at it. Come on, doesn't being a parent come naturally? Apparently not, or so it would seem. The book described, yet again, the importance of a flexible schedule for every infant over two weeks old. Not that you're supposed to go around with a timer strapped to your belt, but rather you need to keep some sense of consistency in your child's life. It described two types of babies--the first, one that has no set schedule. Naps and feedings are erratic, sometimes the baby nursing every hour, and at other times at five hour intervals. Sometimes the baby will sleep for thirty minutes, and other times it will sleep for hours on end. Baby Wise argues that this type of child, the one without consistency, frequently fails to thrive in its first year of life. They don't sleep well at night, and they actually develop at a slower rate than an infant that is kept on a consistent routine.
So the second baby, the flexible schedule child, eats consistently at 2-3 hour intervals, naps regularly, and approximately 90% of them are sleeping through the night (7 hours) by the time they are 12 weeks old. They are happier and healthier children.
Basically, the book stresses the importance of you dictating your child's schedule, and not letting them do it--because, after all, they're not born knowing night from day or right from wrong. That's what parents are for, and that is what millions of mothers have done in the past--they work their new baby into the family, not the family into the new baby.
Interesting.
So in a matter of three hours I had two different sources proclaiming that the most important part of being healthy and happy is keeping yourself on a routine.
I've honestly never thought about it before. I sleep whenever I can. If that means sleeping until noon one day and then staying up until three in the morning the next, then so be it. I've always figured my body knew what it needed. But what if that wasn't the case? What if this routine business was the key to my health? I mean really, who allows their body to dictate what they do? I don't just get in my car and let my feet figure out when to hit the gas or the breaks. No, my brain communicates that it really would be quite beneficial if I started to slow down before I rear-ended that huge semi.....ha. Know what I'm saying?
So today is my first day of waking up at the same time every day. It'll be my little experiment so you don't have to try it out (unless you really want to, of course). I'm curious to see how my body reacts, especially because I'm having a flare right now and I can feel it taking the usual toll on my overall health.
Here's to my sanity! 
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