To ask what is your daily routine if you live alone, have no kids and no family nearby?

[Inthetropics]

This is my current situation. I live alone, don't have children and my family lives very far from me. I work full time and don't have many friends and the ones i do have are occupied with work, small chidren and family life.

I've been finding it hard to establish a routine and often find myself feeling very lonely, living in a not so clean home, sleeping very late, eating crappy food, etc.

I don't feel sad, i just don't know how to set a nice routine without having someone else to keep me acountable. I also suffer from cronic pain, so i have a few good daya and a fez bad ones and cleaning it's not easy.

If you live alone, have no kids oa family near you, what is your daily routine? What are the things you do that you feel help create a nice life?

That should've been days few and *or

I am not in that situation yet, but it’s likely that I will be living alone in a few years time, so it’s something I have been thinking about. My ideas so far are:

• doing regular exercise
• volunteering somewhere local, to meet people
• cooking healthy food (I will have the time to do it)

I can relate to you OP. Although I’m in a relationship, my DP works away from home most of the times.
I also struggle to find a routine on weekdays, when I’m on my own.
For a record I also have no children and my family and friends live in another country.
My good days are when I find something to occupy myself with - such as a walk or cleaning. Then I will also eat more proper food and go to bed on good time.
If I give in and just sit around - I would end up staying up too late (just in my phone ir on tv), eating crappy food (just snacks), leaving dishes unwashed, drinking too much vine, feeling lonely and sorry for myself.
I havent managed to turn my good days in everyday. I still have most of my days my bad days. Weekend helps as then I pull myself together.

I agree about volunteering. This is the thing I would like to do. But currently I am not able to commit because of odd work pattern.

I also agree that exercise helps a lot (if you can pull yourself together for it)

Get a dog . Mine saved me

Hire a cleaner for the house. The first initial clean might take a while and cost a little more, but subsequent ones should be cheaper as single people don’t make as much of a mess.

Take up social / fitness activities closer to work to ensure you go. Go on meetup to join ‘new to town’ or book clubs. volunteer.

I used to be in that situation. I like to craft, so I took lots of classes. It wasn’t exactly social because I was still introverted me, but it gave me a routine outside of work and some chatting. It also gave me projects to work on or homework for practice depending on the class.

I actually plan to do it again when my daughter is older, but this time I think I will throw some academic classes in the mix.

I've no parents, spouse or kids and I fell into this habit for a couple of years. In my case I'm a classic introvert, so love my time in my own, but thanks to perimenopause starting at 44 I began to get a bit too used to it, if that makes sense. It took HRT and antidepressants to get me back on to an even keel and to organise my life and my days a bit better.

I used to come in from work during the week and just eat and vegetate - tv, read a book, surf the net etc. Then I'd end up spending the whole weekend sorting my life out - laundry, house cleaning, paperwork etc, and not have time to do anything nice. I ended up feeling like I'd never had a weekend off.

Now, I do things more spread out. I try and do something social one night in the week; a drink with friends, a power walk with a couple of colleagues after work, or a film. Three nights I try and do house stuff; washing and the kitchen one night, bathrooms and ironing in front of the telly another, and the dusting, hoovering etc on another. I finish at 1545 on Fridays so I do my supermarket visit. Saturdays and Sundays are now gardening, or shopping, or a visit to a friend with kids, or a day in the Lakes on a guided walk, visit to a museum, sewing class, etc. The trick is to break things down into a job a night, then things get done but don't feel overwhelming, and you have the weekend (or at least a day of it) to do something for you. If you have chronic pain, maybe try and get jobs done every time you feel ok, so that you have something "in the bank" when you are in pain and need to rest?

I work FT, no DC, one cat! I have a few chronic conditions so pain and need more sleep than most
Weekdays I work, come home and do 30 mins cleaning (organised mum method)
If I feel really shit then I nap instead
Cook, prep food for work, watch some TV, catch up on here etc

Weekends I'm usually riding my horse, but last weekend I went to the cat cafe and then to try a new burger place and pottered in TK Maxx

I get my food shopping delivered and always have easy stuff in so I prep boiled eggs and work food, have oats so simple with frozen raspberries for breakfast, frozen jacket potatoes and single steam bags of veg etc

A lot of great advice so far

I have two cats and a dogs, so this part is covered!

Almost 20 years ago I lived alone, worked full time, 200 miles from friends and family. Single with no kids.

I cleaned a lot, smoked cannabis and played a lot of guitar hero. 🤦🏽‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

Every Sunday I'd go running or hiking with my headphones in.

I do none of those things now!

At the weekend when work doesn’t dictate my time I’m up at 7.30am for exercise each day (fun and yoga Sat, bootcamp Sun) and have a dog that needs long walks in the afternoon. I then do yoga at 6pm each Sunday to prepare for the working week. Planning fitness classes in advance helps to give me a routine. X

Sorry for the ‘X’ Bad habits from texting!’

I've just started to go to yoga every Sunday morning.
I've started going to the library to get out a good 5 or 6 books at a time and actually read more like I used to do many years- I now make the last thing I do before I sleep each night is read in bed (instead of scrolling on my phone being the last thing).

go to 30 min gym classes whenever I can find gaps in my week- 30 mins sounds much more feasible when I can't be bothered than an hour would - I just wouldn't go if they were an hour.

Fit at least one thing in with a friend each week, e.g. dinner or coffee.
Spend an evening cooking whenever I feel the urge- and just cook loads and freeze it all.
I have got into the habit of getting myself to ring family in spare moments.

I will happily do a 1 hour walk to a place (eg to get to yoga, or to my once a week job) if I have it scheduled in as what I already do - e.g. yoga at 12pm, so I write it in my calendar as yoga, leaving at 11am. This is the only way I consistently make myself go for a walk - if it's a planned weekly thing

Because I'm on O2 they give you a code for a free hot chocolate every Tuesday or Wednesday - so I make sure I go every week

I'm an introvert who can easily get a tad to comfortable staying in, so I do am dram, which take my out of the house an evening a week, and also try to arrange regular nights out with friends, say at least twice a month. It helps that a lot of my friends are in the same boat - single with no children - so it's easier to find the time to meet up.

I try to get out of the house at the weekend, go for a walk, a lunchtime concert, a book signing, whatever, just because I know I need a bit of prodding or I'd just stay at home as it's the easier option.

Yes, in a similar situation and for me having a routine means everything.

Finding something you enjoy....yoga, followed by a sauna and a long swim with headphones in and fast music underwater followed by a power-walk round the supermarket...then allowed to relax for the rest of the day.

Doing that routine twice a week gives me some structure to build other things around it.

I make a wish-list for the year, adding things that I see and want to do, and I earmark one day a week as my official “day out” and do something on the list, carrying forward anything undone from the previous year.

Be a good listener - so different circles of friends might enjoy meeting up - and we all feel better afterwards for a chance to offload and have a giggle

I also let the weather forecast play a part in my routine....outdoors always when the sun is shining, and happy to keep the indoor and admin jobs waiting for those rainy days. Similarly, half price Tuesdays at the cinema in the winter months, but I don’t go in summer.

Taking myself out of my comfort zone and trying different things advertised locally (gong bath!)

Keeping a hardback notebook of household and other jobs that need doing, not pressurising myself with deadlines but completing one or two and ticking them off just as the mood takes me.

Will get around to volunteering for an animal charity at some point, but for the moment, just enjoying the freedom to do as I please after too many years spent indoors flying a desk!

First I minimised my house. I used the Marie Kondo method.

Then I treated the cleaning of the house like a job. I did this to get back on track and to break it down into smaller manageable tasks.

I was coming out of having CFS at the time, but still had pain.

Having the house on track does a lot for your Mental health.

I started to think about what my interests and likes were. I'd been ill for two years and during that time went fully through the Menopause, so treated it as a new phase of life.

I wasn't working because of illness, so made a point to go out the house everyday and I increased my walking.

I had five stone to lose, I've lost three. I started all this in March.

I put money into my garden, by paying someone to do the parts that I couldn't etc and I got rabbits. I need that connection with nature but wasn't well enough to do what I used to.

I don't feel that I can commit to a dog and you can't guarantee having company with a cat, so rabbits seemed a good choice. They are a fair bit of daily work.

I babysit for people and at times I'm not babysitting, I'm glad of the opportunity to do what I want/be alone. I'm no good if I'm not busy.

If I didn't know people that needed a babysitter, I'd go down the volunteer route.

I'm hoping to fit in a Tai Chi. 20 minutes of Tai Chi does the same for your body as 20 minutes of Zumba, but it's manageable for people with pain.

To get back into a routine I had to make a plan about what needed doing, how long it would take and what breaks I would need.

It didn't seem overwhelming then. If I couldn't follow the plan because of tiredness/pain, then I started it as soon as I could.

I need to do some painting before Christmas but I've got hospital appointments and other stuff to do. To stop me panicking, which is usual with/after chronic illnesses, I've planned it out and realised that I can fit it all in.

I've planned to go to a Christmas Market in another city. You need to do fun stuff, as well.

To do this I have to keep on losing weight and upping my energy levels. That means I need to eat well. So even if I'm struggling with tiredness/pain, I have tinned chunky veg soup and fruit.

All that gives me short, medium and long term goals, which we need.

Ok, so considering all your sugestions and my limitations due to cronic pain and some other personal stuff, these are some things i'm thinking of doing:

CLEANING

• Daily:

• Make my bed
• Feed and change my pets water. Clean my cats'a litter and my dog messes
• Go to bed with no dirty dishes in the sink
• 15 minutes cleaning/organizing the obvious stuff that needs doing

• Weekly:

• 3 laundry loads: 1 for bed and bath stuff, 1 for whites, 1 for my clothes
• Vacuum (this is hard for me because of the pain so once a week will be an achievement; hoping to be able to do it twice a week in the future)
• Take garbage out on tuesday, thursday and saturday
• Will also be hiring a cleaning service for maybe 3 hours a week (or whatever i can pay)

HEALTH

• I just got a Miband and plan on using it to track steps. Will begin with a modest goal of 4k and intend to eventually be able to do 10k. Does this sound ok?
• Will try to go back to No-S diet

SOCIALIZING

• Will comit to do one fun thing a week (movie, theater, concert, long walk in nature, etc).
• Will try to make more friends. Not easy, though. I'm an introvert and find it hard..

Is this ok?

Sounds like a great plan. I’m alone a lot and don’t work due to chronic pain. I need routine and I need to have human interaction regularly so I keep my diary relatively busy but with enough breaks for resting.

My Dyson wand is invaluable for quick cleaning as it’s quite light and cordless. Having a regular cleaner is a great inspiration for keeping tidy as they can’t clean if there is clutter everywhere. If you need to declutter just start, it gets easier and easier.

Making friends takes time. I’ve made excellent friends through dog walking. Even though I’m horribly slow it’s a fab way to chat and because it’s regular we have become close quite quickly. Maybe advertise locally for people to share a dog walk at the weekend, it may be popular.

Good luck and well done for making the effort.

Matilda, i've been decluttering for a long time and know it's easier to clean. Most surfaces have just one or two pieces of decoration and in my bedroom i have trays to gather stuff and make it less busy. So over my dresses i have ans orchid, a small plate with jewellery and a big wooden tray wirh toiletries, medicine, perfumes and stuff i use regularly. So if i need to clean i juat have to lift the orchid, the plate and the tray instead of a llt of small intens. I highly recomend this for everyone who wants to keep their home less cluttered but still need to have stuff in sight in order to avoid "out of sight out of mind".

I've donated tona of books, knick knacks and stuff that made cleaning hard. It's such a game changer!

I don’t now but I used to and I loved it. I went to running club twice a week and once I week I visited a lady that lived nearby with the Age Concern befriending scheme.