-Kristin is interviewing Melissa who has sought help because she feels overwhelmed by her responsibilities as a student, mother, wife and in taking care of her house.  Kristin and Melissa talk for several minutes while Kristin gathers information about the stresses in Melissa’s life, and subsequently they focus on Melissa’s distress at the state of her house. Kristen then asks the miracle question following up with a question about what Melissa would notice was different and then:

Kristen: “What is the first thing you would notice is different after this miracle takes place?”

Melissa: “Okay.  My house is clean and I don’t feel stressed about it anymore. (Kristin: uhhmm). I feel like it, hm, well first thing I would notice is that, uhm, well, there’d be no dishes in the sink,  you know, that kind of stuff, and the toys wouldn’t be all over the living room, they’d be where they belong in their little appointed places in the kids room. (Kristin: uhhmm). Behind the couch, I wouldn’t be as scared to look back there anymore. (Kristin: uhhuh). Yeah, so I mean, all the basic housekeeping stuff would be done, it would be, there’d be no huge pile of laundry to be folded neatly in the drawers, coming out at the seams. That, and for me to know that I could keep up on it even with being busy. 

Kristen: “Uhhmm.  So your house would be in order, first of all, you notice there would be no dishes in the sink, and no toys laying around on the floor. What would your husband notice that was different? 

Melissa: “Hmm, well he would notice that, too. He would notice I wouldn’t be so stressed out, I wouldn’t be like ‘I’m going.’  So, lately, a couple times, I’ve been waiting in the driveway as he pulls in, with my books, ready to leave because I just can’t stand it (Kristin: uhhmm). So, I’d be, I don’t know, he’d notice when he got up from work, and when he came home from work, I wouldn’t be totally stressed out and irritated. 

Kristin: “Uhhmm. So you wouldn’t be stressed out and irritated.  What would you be instead?” 

Melissa:  “I’d have that feeling I had over Spring break of, like, ‘Oh, I’m a good wife and mother, you know.  I can have people over to my house and not be embarrassed.’  And I can, you know, my neighbors can pop in from across the stress and I don’t have to be like ‘Oh God, what are they going to think of me?’”  

Kristin: “Uhhmm.  So you would feel like you were a good mother.  What would tell you that you are a good mother?”

Melissa: “Well, I wouldn’t be as irritated with my kids.  I would be enjoying their play more. Maybe I wouldn’t, you know, I feel, uhm, I feel irritated, like, you know, when I know they are playing with things and I know I’m going to end up picking them up and you know I don’t even want them to get, you know, like, you know, it’s not appropriate for them not to play with their toys, I can’t expect them to sit there and be neat and clean all the time (Kristin: uhhmm) and I, I don’t know, I wouldn’t, I’d respond more positively to their play. (Kristin: okay).  I would be like, oh, you know, be more involved and not be like “what are you getting that out for now,” you know, (Kristin: uhhmm) so I’d be more, you know, not as irritated, you know more responsive to their play and more, you know, interested in their play and more supportive of them playing like that.” 

Kristin: “Uhhmm.  What would they notice after this miracle?  What would they notice that’s different about you?”

Melissa: “I wouldn’t always be saying the negative things like, “What the heck are you doing now,” you know (Kristin: Uhhmm).  I wouldn’t be saying, “Well, pick,” you know, yelling at them to pick their things up all the time, and, uhmm, we probably wouldn’t have so many arguments over what clothes to wear because, you know, they’d have a big variety to choose from, even ones that I approve (Kristin: uhhmm) of,  because they wouldn’t be lying in dirty clothes piles (Kristin: uhhmm). Uhmm, and they would notice that I’d want to than out with them more in the evenings and not rush off to school or wherever, just more of a relaxed atmosphere. 

Kristin: “Okay.  Would your professor’s notice anything that’s different about you?”

Melissa: “Uhm, I don’t know. Probably not.” 

Kristin: “Probably not.  Sounds like there would be a lot of changes in your life after this miracle takes place.”

This part of the interview starts with Kristin asking “What is it going to take in your opinion for this miracle to happen?”

Melissa replies “Summer break. (Kristin laughs). Seriously, I, uhm, I know that it, during summer it’s my goal, I’m going to get back up on this, but like as far as this, you know, if, I think if me and my husband do like a power clean and just try to keep up.  You know, I think your biggest problem is we’ll, we’ll just get exhausted with keeping up, it’s like constantly. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).   I mean it’s not like you can sweep the floor and it’s swept now, you don’t have to worry about it anymore. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  Ten minutes later you are going to have to go back and do it again. (Kristin:  Right).  I think being more consistent in, in picking up. (Kristin:  Uhhmm). You know, keeping up on the stuff, and being more consistent with the kids. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  Like maybe we should put some more of their toys up.  You know they have, they must have a hundred stuffed animals. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  And I, I don’t know if they really need that many.  You know I’ve heard like some strategies, like people rotate their kid’s toys (Kristin: Oh). You know, like they’ll just have some now out for a couple months and a couple months later they’ll rotate ‘em, so you don’t have so many things to get out in the first place . (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  So maybe that would help.” 

Kristin: “Is that something that you see as realistic for you to do before summer?” 

Melissa: “Probably not.  (Kristin: No). I think this is, you know, it could happen but I don’t foresee me having time in, it’s just a short time until the end of the semester. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).   Next year this is going to be a problem again, though.” Sheri then replies “So you have some ideas that might not work for this year but could work for next year? Are there any things that you might be able to do for this year?” 

Kristin: “Hmm. Do you see it being realistic at all to start anything before the summer that you’ve been talking about?” 

Melissa then replies “Yeah, I could probably.  You know, this, I’m going to have to do laundry before the summer. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).   There’s no way around that.  Uhm, so, yeah, I can do, I can do like some of the clothes organizing now that the season’s changing. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  And they’ve outgrown a lot of their clothes, too.  I can you know go through and do some of that. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  And since I got a, I got a good foundation sort of thing going Spring break, (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  I can kind of clean back down to that foundation, sort of.” 

Kristin replied “Uhhmm.  Spring break really motivated you (Melissa:  Yeah) to clean house.”

Melissa: “Yeah, it did.  It did.  I was so, that was a great week.  It was like (Kristin: Wonderful to hear), yeah, I got many things accomplished.”

Kristin: replies “So, you’re saying that until school ends, you might reorganize some of their clothes. (Melissa:  Uhhmm). How’d you go about doing that?” 

Melissa: “Well, as I’m doing laundry, just pull out the things that are too small or the things that I don’t like. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  You know we, we take a lot of hand me downs from the neighbors. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  Uhm, we’ve got like 3 or 4 sources and it saves a lot of money but, a lot of times they’ll get stuff that I don’t like. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  And I haven’t been real assertive in weeding those things out to just avoid the problems in the first place.  Uhm, but I’ve been doing more of that, like I’ll fold a couple of things and throw a couple of things in the garbage when they’re not looking. (Kristin:  Uhhmm).  And they haven’t missed it yet. (Kristin:  Well, great).  So, sly little things you can do.”

Kristin: “Right, right.  So before summer you’re saying that you see it realistic that you could reorganize some of their clothes while you are doing the laundry.

Melissa: “Yeah, and I think if we, uhm, we do a big power slam this weekend, you know,  we can do it in a couple hours, if my husband and I work together, we can get everything organized, and then it will just be a matter of keeping consistent (Kristin: Okay) on picking up and that is going to be harder, the consistency thing, because you know I get angry at having to always, you know, everything, to pick up myself (Kristin: Right).  You know it’s kind of hard for me to know sometimes how much to expect out of my kids (Kristin:  Uhhmm), uhm, as far as being responsible for their things. I mean my four year old not much (Kristin:  Uhhmm), my six year old maybe a little more but still, you know (Kristin:  Uhhmm). And I know that sometimes like at the end of the night when they’re just tired and ready to go to bed and I’m ready to have them go to bed and at the same time to look and say “Well, here, let’s spend another hour cleaning up first” (Kristin:  Right), when you’re crabby and ornery anyway, it’s, that doesn’t work real well. I, I need to think of a way to do it differently, (Kristin: Okay) you know.

Kristin: “So the consistency has been somewhat of a challenge (Melissa: Uhhmm) and you are interested in looking for a way to do that differently. (Melissa: Uhhmm). Have you tried anything that’s been helpful to add to that consistency?”  We both asked questions to get further details on what has worked to build on the solutions that Melissa has already developed.)

Melissa: “Well, actually, uhm, we had like an allowance chart with Katrina for a while. (Kristin: Oh).  And I would say, you know, cause I don’t want to pay her for everything she does (Kristin:  Uhhmm), that’s why I make it a point to say some things you do just to help out the family but, uhm, for a while I was, you know, saying things like “Boy, Katrina, if you get all the toys picked up in this living room you can go mark two dollars down on your allowance chart” and she would do it (Kristin:  Uhhmm) and, you know, she’d be all happy about, about that.  We’ve been slacking off of that, we haven’t being doing so much, at all lately actually.”

Kristin: “Hmm. But that was really helpful to you (Melissa: Yeah), to have that allowance chart?” 

Melissa: “Yeah, yeah.  And like a little bribery, like, you know, (Kristin laughs) seriously, it works, you know, like say “Boy, if you can guys can get these things cleaned up in time, we’ll all be, have time to go the dollar store and spend (Kristin: hmm) some of your allowance or…” 

Kristin: “So that really motivated your children, your girls to help out also around the house, which added to some relief for you (Melissa: Yeah) the cleaning up.” 

Melissa: "Yeah, and I always, whenever they are cleaning up, I always try to be right in there telling them what a great job they’re doing (Kristin:  Great), you know, doing that positive thing instead of always yelling at them for not, you know but saying it when they are, you know, and I tell my husband too that you know, you can’t just yell at them to clean up and then leave the room and expect them to do it, you have to be kind of in there saying “oh, that’s a great job.  Now you can put this over here (Kristin: Uhhmm) and he’s been doing that more too (Kristin:  Uhhmm).”

Kristin: “Well, I’ve heard a lot of what’s going on in your life right now and sounds like you’ve really been brainstorming so we’ve really been talking about a lot, so I’m going to go ahead and take a break and talk to my team for a while if that’s okay with you. (Melissa: Sure). And then I’ll come back and we can finish up, okay?”

Complete the exercise on page 40 in the workbook, in small groups, and then the groups will compare their answers.