HISMD: Program Coordinator in Higher Education

WFH. Partner (in office). 2 kids (“8yo is autistic and has ADHD, 3yo doesn’t have any diagnoses (yet...)”). North Carolina. WFH. 37.

Each Thursday, the “How I Structure My Day” series features women from different industries, with and without kids, with and without partners, with family living with/near them and not, wfh to 1+ hour commutes, etc. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I do!

Before we get to the good stuff…

For those considering the 10-week Bright Method program to learn a time management system designed for professional working women, please know that the last day you can jump in before September is March 18 (less than a week away!). Learn all about it here – and send any questions my way!

Okay, on to the good stuff!

The Snapshot

• Profession: Program Coordinator in Higher Education

• Partner: Yes (In office)

• Children: Yes - 2 kids (8 and 3 (almost 4!)) (“8yo is autistic and has ADHD, 3yo doesn’t have any diagnoses (yet, but I will not be shocked if she ends up with an ADHD diagnosis, too)”)

• North Carolina

• WFH

• 37

Typical Morning:

• I have an alarm that goes off at 5:30 am to take my medications and then I go back to sleep until 6. I am a late-diagnosed ADHDer (diagnosed after my second child was born) and was also recently diagnosed with secondary adrenal insufficiency, so basically I am non-functional until the combination of ADHD meds and steroids kicks in. Thankfully I have been able to move this "medication alarm" later as we have worked out my dosing - it used to be at 4am!

• From 6-7am I am focused on getting my kids ready for school/daycare: potty, hair, teeth, clothes, breakfast, medicines, pack lunch and backpack, unload the dishwasher.

• My oldest can do tasks independently but requires a lot of reminders and prompting about what is next, and my youngest needs help with everything.

• I will typically check work email and Teams messages while they eat breakfast (more on that later).

• If they are ready before 7, they play downstairs and I start getting ready for my day, but that doesn't happen very often.

• I am off-duty and starting my day at 7am unless they are really running behind or having a major issue. My husband leaves with them at 7:15 to do school drop off on his way to work (his commute is about 40 minutes on a good day).

• We have two 3-month-old puppies, so my husband is taking care of the dogs and getting himself ready for work from 6-7am.

• Part of his team is in Europe so he travels a moderate amount and occasionally has 8am meetings; on those days I am on my own with the dogs and school drop off unless I have someone staying with me.

Morning "Make Life Easier" Hacks

• Mornings are tough for us between my ADHD/adrenal issues, my daughter’s autism/ADHD, and the craziness of puppies and a preschooler, so I consider it a win if we are all ready on time with minimal frustration.

• I give the girls a looooooong runway to get ready because they need time for their brains to shift into gear in the mornings. Not trying to be efficient has been the biggest "hack" for us. I have friends whose kids wake up at 6:30 or even 6:45 and are ready to leave for school at 7:15; my kids and I could NEVER.

• A couple things I do that might be considered hacks:

  • I calendar my 8 year old's rotating specials schedule so that she can check the Skylight and know if she needs sneakers or her library book.

  • I also calendar which days she plans to buy lunch at school so that we can easily see in the morning if we need to pack a lunch.

  • We pack the 3 year old's backpack for the entire week and leave it at daycare until Friday so we don't have to deal with that every morning.

  • When I worked outside of the home, I had alarms for the most crucial points of my morning routine (especially pre-warming the car in the winter) to help keep me on track.

  • I know that a lot of people probably would frown on checking email and Teams messages before the workday begins while the kids are eating breakfast, but that gives me a little bit of breathing room once they leave for school so that I can still get a full workday in even if I need a few minutes to shower or decompress after they leave.

Transition Into Work Mode

• My husband and kids crate the puppies when they leave for work/school so that I have a couple of hours to really focus first thing.

• I typically shower at night, but if I need to shower, I will do that once the kids are ready for school.

• Otherwise, I make some coffee and a smoothie, quickly get dressed, and start my workday right away.

• I am rarely in meetings with people outside of my small team, so I typically don't bother with makeup or styling my hair beyond a ponytail.

• I work 7am-3pm so that I am able to pick up my kids from school and be present with them once they are home (this is why I do some light admin work while they are still home in the mornings, to account for those few minutes after they leave when I may need to take care of some personal tasks).

• I am extremely lucky in that my home office is completely separate from the rest of the house. We have a walk-up loft/attic that we converted to his and hers offices, and they are the only rooms on that floor. So once I go upstairs, it feels like I have "gone to work".

• I have lamps in my office with smart bulbs that turn on from 7am to 3pm to help signal that it is work time.

• Usually by the time I go up to my office I have already checked emails, responded to Teams messages, and have checked over my calendar so I can dive right into the most important tasks.

• The rest of my team works 8-4 or 9-5, so those morning hours are my most productive times of day with minimal interruptions.

What My Work Day Looks Like

• I typically have meetings 2-3 days a week, but not all day. Otherwise, I am just working through a long list of projects.

• If I'm really being bombarded, I will block time on my calendar as a meeting with myself to get certain tasks done.

• I previously was a school counselor at a high needs Title I school, and intentionally made a shift to a lower-stress, more flexible job (with a slight pay cut) so that I could be more present with my kids and have a better work-life balance. Because at my previous job I dealt with crises and emergencies constantly, it's a lot easier for me to manage a daunting list of tasks and job stress because nothing I deal with now is an actual emergency. I still get things done on time and will occasionally work late to do so, but I'm never running around like the sky is falling because no one is going to die if a report is turned in late. "No one is going to die" is very helpful mantra for me for managing my stress levels and responding appropriately to demands.

Lunch/Snacks

• My medications suppress my appetite and my adrenal issues sometimes make me too nauseous to eat, so I actually have to set alarms during the day to remind me to eat. I have a half hour block from 12:00-12:30 on my work calendar so that I can't blame "being busy" for not eating, and I use the reminders app on my phone as well. Something about being able to check off "eat lunch" is helpful to my ADHD brain!

• If I did skip breakfast or lunch, I will grab a protein shake and try to finish that before I leave to pick up the kids from school.

• I bring car snacks for my kids at school pickup, so I usually will bring one for myself too.

• I make the exact same smoothie every morning for breakfast and try to have leftovers for lunch. If I am not able to tolerate a real meal for lunch, I will make myself a "girl lunch" with an apple, cheese, crackers, and some nuts and snack on that for a couple hours. Intentionally limiting my choices for breakfast and lunch helps so much with decision fatigue and makes it more likely that I will actually follow through on consuming said choices. These are meals I know I can tolerate even if I am not feeling my best.

Breaks

• I have my calendar blocked for a 15 minute mid-morning and mid-afternoon break as well as 30 minutes for lunch/movement. Before we had the puppies, I would try to knock out some household tasks during those 15 minute breaks (flipping laundry, running the vacuum, taking the trash to the curb, chopping veggies for dinner, etc.) but right now those breaks are mostly taken up with puppy care. They are starting to get much more chill, so I can see the light at the end of the tunnel for when I will be able to get back to my regular routine. We are working on leash training so that I can walk with them at lunchtime every day to get some movement; I did this with our senior dog before he passed and it was the nicest break in my day!

Leaving Work

• I have an extremely tight window to pick up both girls from two different locations. I drive 7 minutes to pick up the 3 year old between 3-3:10 and then drive 7 minutes to pick up the oldest no later than 3:20. I cannot pick up the youngest any earlier than 3 or the oldest any later than 3:20. It's TOUGH!

• I have a hard stop for meetings at 2:45pm so that I can leave by 3pm. I have this period blocked on my calendar so that I don't get added to meetings at that time and people know I won't be responsive to messages.

Transition Out of Work Mode

• There isn't much, it's just time to run to get the kids! I try to take a couple of minutes to write down where I am in my tasks, shut down my tabs, etc. before I dash out the door.

After Work/Evening Hours

• On days that we don't have after school activities, we get home from school pickup between 3:30-3:45.

• Right away I put away backpacks and lunch boxes, the girls wash hands and change clothes, and I take the dogs out.

• We will often do a quick (10-15 minute) yoga or meditation video to help my oldest transition to being at home.

• I will usually check for any urgent Teams messages between 4-5 as a courtesy because I know my coworkers all work a later schedule than I do. I am incredibly grateful for the flexibility I have with my job to pick up my kids from school, be home with them when they are sick, and so on, so I don't mind doing a 10-20 minute check of messages "after hours".

• This year we shifted some of the girls' activities to the weekend instead of weeknights. I don't love spending Saturday mornings at ballet, but we learned the hard way that our oldest really NEEDS free afternoons/evenings and lots of downtime to decompress from the demands of school. We decided that those everyday needs she had outweighed the few times a year we want to travel or do an all-day event on the weekends.

  • Right now our oldest is in a musical, so she has rehearsals after dinner 1-2 nights a week, but that is only for about 8 weeks.

  • She is taking a break from violin lessons to accommodate the musical rather than try to cram even more things into her week.

  • They both have ballet on Saturday mornings and swim lessons on Sunday afternoons.

  • One day a week, the oldest has tennis after school; she walks home from school with a friend and rides to tennis with her, so I only have to pick her up.

  • Our oldest also has therapy every other week, one day right after school.

  • The youngest does soccer during the day at preschool.

• I typically get started making dinner between 4-4:30 while they play. We learned that if we wait to eat until my husband gets home from work (anywhere between 5:30-6:30), the girls are absolutely STARVING and cranky, and then we aren't able to get them to bed on time. So, I aim to have dinner served between 5-5:30, and I save my husband a plate. The time he spends with the kids when he gets home is much higher quality if they are fed than it would be if it was spent trying to have a family dinner with hangry kids.

• After dinner, we help the girls shower and get pajamas on, and if they have time they will play a bit before bed. Our girls LOVE imaginative play so we try to build in as much time as we can for that.

• As much as possible, whoever is not supervising showers tries to clean up the kitchen, put away leftovers from dinner, load the dishwasher, and maybe do a quick vacuum of the high traffic areas downstairs.

• We wash their hair 3 nights a week so those nights I am on shower duty because they both prefer me to wash their hair (and yes, we definitely plan the hair washing schedule around other activities/events).

• We try to have them in bed reading or listening to music between 7-7:30pm and lights out by 8pm.

• The girls' bedtime is a mess right now. Our oldest had a REALLY hard time falling asleep from ages 5-7, and we finally got her straightened out just for our younger girl to start having problems falling asleep. She has dropped her nap at home, but still falls asleep at daycare, so she's not tired at bedtime on school days. Some nights she is awake until 11pm! They both need someone to lay with them to fall asleep, so one of us will lay with them in their shared bedroom until they fall asleep. Whoever is laying with them, that's basically their entire night, because they are likely to be in there for 2-3 hours.

• Both girls also tend to wake up during the night and have trouble falling back asleep, and end up in our room.

• These kind of sleep issues are super common in kids with autism and ADHD and we are working with professionals to support both of them, but I also think we need to normalize that not everyone's routines are "ideal" because not everyone's kids are neurotypical. And that's okay! It's stressful but I know it's just a season and will get better eventually. I honestly thought the oldest would NEVER sleep on her own and she finally can put herself to bed with only a few minutes of snuggling, so I KNOW it will get better for the youngest eventually. It means that right now, neither of us really gets a lot of downtime in the evenings and a lot of tasks are left unfinished. Reminding myself that "it's a season" and "no one will die" if the household tasks don't get finished is really helpful.

• Once they are asleep, we are basically showering and getting ready for bed. My husband takes the night shift with the puppies - they currently sleep about 11pm to 4:30am before needing to pee - because a) I have them all day and b) my health is more fragile than his if I don't get enough sleep.

Dinner

• I mentioned meal times earlier but meal planning is a big part of my routine and keeps us on track.

• Dinner is the only time of day I am typically hungry so it's really important that we have fresh, nutrient dense, diverse meals at this time; we also don't have the budget to do takeout.

• At the start of each season I look at our routine and make a meal "queue" based on our schedule and the season (I got this idea from Kendra Adachi/The Lazy Genius). So, for example, on nights that the oldest has therapy and we will be home later, I plan leftovers or a crock pot meal.

• I try to plan a big "good all week" salad or veggie-heavy sheet pan meal early in the week so that I have leftovers for lunches for a few days. And I'll update the queue seasonally, so in the winter we have "Soup Saturday" but in the summer we "Grill and Chill" on Saturday. This keeps it fresh and manageable, but still reduces decision fatigue.

• I do all of my meal planning on Friday afternoons. I created a recipe index in Google Sheets that has all of our favorite meals categorized by how long they take to cook, protein, type of meal, etc. and the recipe is linked too if it's something that requires one. When I see a new recipe I want to try, I'll drop it onto the sheet with the link so I don't forget it exists.

• I have a standing Google calendar event at 5pm called "Dinner" and when I update our seasonal meal queue I update the standing event too. So, right now on Mondays it says "Dinner: pasta", on Tuesdays it says "Dinner: salad", on Saturdays it says "Dinner: soup", etc.

• When I do my meal planning, I scroll through my index, decide what we are eating each night, and add it to the calendar. I'll update the calendar event to say "Dinner: (meal name)" and link the recipe itself in the description if needed. Then I'll add all the ingredients to my online grocery order.

• I pick up the grocery order on the way home from ballet on Saturdays. ALL of this is designed to reduce decision fatigue and automate the process as much as possible so my ADHD brain doesn't get overwhelmed by such a complex process.

• Before I started working from home full time, we did a LOT of crock pot freezer meals. I'd prep 20-30 freezer meals on a weekend and we'd eat them all month long. Now, I will sometimes double a meal I am making for dinner and throw it in the freezer for a busy night, but we don't rely on that everyday.

Evening Non-Negotiables

• Before my youngest started having so much trouble with bedtime, the non-negotiables were:

  • load and run the dishwasher,

  • wipe the kitchen counters,

  • quick vacuum downstairs,

  • any outstanding cleaning tasks, and

  • some type of downtime like reading, watching TV, going for a walk, etc.

• Right now I'm just happy if we can load and run the dishwasher and get actual food put away.

• I try to listen to an audiobook while I cook dinner if I can, so I at least "feel" like I got some downtime.

Afternoon/Evening “Make Life Easier” Tips

• I calendar everything including driving time! That way we aren't late for things and I don't pick a complicated dinner on a night when we will be out of the house for two hours.

• I use Opal to block everything except texts and calls on my phone from 9pm to 6am. I recently made a DIY brick using an NFC tag and the Foqos app, and that has been working well for me to block distracting apps in the after school hours or if I need to buckle down and focus on a task.

• With at least 50% of us dealing with ADHD (probably 75% to 100% if I'm being honest), we absolutely rely on routines and try really hard not to deviate from them. Our older daughter needs time to decompress after school because her nervous system is completely fried, so I don't even so much as ask her to carry her own backpack in the house from the car. I try to give her 20-30 minutes of zero demands for a gentle re-entry into the rest of her day. It makes the rest of our afternoon/evening run so much more smoothly when she can reset properly.

Sharing the Load with a Partner

• I am the default parent during the day (including sick days or teacher workdays) and in the early evening, and I manage most of the household cleaning tasks, as well as household admin like scheduling doctor appointments and paying bills.

• My husband is the default dog parent (which is a lot right now!) and handles almost all of the yard work. He also does all of our home repairs and projects himself rather than hiring those out. So in the end, I think it's balanced, it just doesn't always look that way day-to-day.

• To be honest, we prioritize my husband's job because he has big career aspirations and also makes a lot more money than I do. I do not have a desire to try to climb the ladder right now; my biggest goals and aspirations are within the four walls of our home. After dealing with a high-demand, high-stress, inflexible job during a time period when our youngest daughter's health was so fragile, I realized that work truly doesn't drive me or bring me a lot of fulfillment. I am happy to take on more at home in exchange for taking the lower-paying, more flexible job. I enjoy my job and feel like I am contributing, but it is not my identity or my passion, and that's totally fine with me. So if a kid is sick, I almost always manage that instead of him working from home with them, I take them to their doctor appointments, I am the one meeting the pest control guy or taking the phone calls from school. In exchange, he knows that when I do ask him to leave work early or work from home to help with something, it's because I REALLY need help, and he always accommodates.

• I try to help myself balance my mental load by assigning certain tasks to certain days in the calendar.

  • For example, vacuuming on Mondays, washing towels on Tuesdays, etc.

  • I even assign bigger cleaning or organizing tasks to certain months; deep cleaning the bathrooms happens in April and October, cleaning out old paperwork in the office happens in February and August.

• I know that sounds rigid, but it has actually given me a lot of freedom. My ADHD brain notices something that is starting to get dirty and has a hard time letting it go, which used to result in situations like "cleaning out the pantry at 1am" or "in the middle of organizing the kids' clothes when it's time for them to go to bed". Using this system, I am able to say "not right now" to those things I notice are needing attention, knowing that it's already scheduled at a reasonable time and will not get forgotten or missed. If I don't get to it in the assigned time, I cut myself some slack, because everything is on repeat and I can get to it next time it cycles in.

Exercise/Body Movement

• This has fallen by the wayside and I haven't quite figured it out yet. I used to be quite active (running, HIIT classes, yoga) but my youngest child had severe and complex medical issues her first 2.5-3 years of life.

• Then I started having adrenal symptoms when she was around 2.5-3 that progressed quite a bit, becoming completely debilitating before I was diagnosed with SAI when she was 3.5.

• So between those factors, I just haven't had the time, ability, energy, or bandwidth to figure out movement aside from a lunchtime walk with the dogs. Maybe once the youngest starts kindergarten!

Outsourcing

• I almost exclusively use grocery pickup and auto-delivery for groceries and household items.

• Our closest Costco is 30 minutes away but on the way home from work for my husband, so he will pick up what we need from there on the way home.

• We used to have a biweekly house cleaner, but currently can't fit it into the budget, so the house is just... very lived in. Getting the house cleaner back is one of my top priorities for 2026.

• We are lucky that my mom and my husband's parents live within 30 minutes of us and are more than happy to jump in and help when needed; our moms are both retired but my mom works part-time. When my husband travels for work, they are happy to come over and be extra hands at bedtime, or if it's an extra busy week my mom will just stay here while he is gone. If both kids need to be in different places after school (rare), they will pick one of them up and take them where they need to go. Or in the rare instance where I have a later work meeting or doctor's appointment, they will pick up both girls from school. My mom will also take the girls for a weekend sleepover once a month so that my husband and I can have time to connect. We don't pay our parents to watch our kids, but we did buy them their own car seats for their cars and we reciprocate by helping them with things too. I feel really privileged that we have willing and able help nearby and completely empathize with those who do not; I try to be that person friends can call on if they don't have family help, because I understand how completely necessary it is to have a village for your kids.

What do you do for fun during the week

• I have season seats at our local theatre with a friend, so I go to see a show 8 times a year.

• My older daughter and I also have ballet season seats so we go to the ballet 3-4 times a year.

• Right now, I don't have the time or bandwidth for much else, but it's just a season!

• In the summer, the girls and I will go to the pool right after camp/daycare pickup two or three times a week. We eat dinner there (snack bar or I pack something), shower and put on PJs before we leave, and head straight to bed when we get home. We try to invite friends (mine and theirs) to come with us at least once a week.

Anything Else the Sharer Wants to Share

• I feel extremely privileged that I have a fully remote and pretty flexible job. The flip side of that is I worked very intentionally to find a job that was a better fit for our lives for about 2 years (while still working at my old job) and waited for the perfect role before saying "yes". I took a pay cut in exchange for more flexibility and have never regretted it for a single second.

• Letting go of the idea that there is a "right way" to do things has been incredibly freeing for our family, as well as being honest with ourselves about what our priorities are in this season. I love the idea of prioritizing family dinner where we can all connect over a meal, but realistically, making sure I have nutritious food in my body and our kids can spend time with their dad when they aren't hangry and tired is more important in this season. I love an ambitious, badass woman with a career that is important to them, but that is not my reality… AND the work that I do is still valuable. I may make different choices than someone else, but that doesn't make either of our choices wrong.

• Having a child who was incredibly medically complex and facing the possibility that she may have a life-threatening illness while working at an incredibly high-demand, stressful, inflexible job really forced us to take a hard look at our life and our priorities. It is so much easier now for me to say no to things and set boundaries because I have a hard-earned perspective on what actually matters (not saying that work doesn't matter or shouldn't matter... it just isn't my personal driving motivator). That time period also really forced me to grapple with the realization that there is so little in life we actually have control over. We can do everything "right" and still have horrible things happen to us. It takes a lot of the pressure off of me to try to be perfect or "put together".

• This perspective also helps during periods when my work is more busy or stressful because I am SO DANG GRATEFUL for the flexibility I have that I truly don't get upset on the occasions when I do have to work late or respond to a message after hours. It also helps me to be more empathetic when other people make mistakes or miss deadlines, because I understand on a deep level that I truly just never know what they are going through behind the scenes. Like for heavens sake, I was working and managing a household and caring for children while barely making enough cortisol to stay alive and I just kept trucking until I couldn't anymore. I never want another person to be going through something like that and be stressed about getting something turned in to me. Grace upon grace upon grace.

• And because I know people will probably be wondering... our youngest is strong and healthy now and even got discharged from her out-of-state specialists. We are still dealing with the trauma of everything we went through with her, but she doesn't remember any of it and is a happy-go-lucky, smart, and active kiddo with a bright future. We are so grateful.

That’s a wrap for this one!

Thank you so much to this woman for generously sharing. These publish every Thursday!

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• Encouraging comments always welcome!

• If you have questions or even hang-ups about what someone shared, you are welcome to ask a question for the sharer in the same kind, genuinely curious way you would if you were looking at that woman in her eyes. She might respond through me.

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• Thanks to the vast majority of people who are so kind!

New here? Welcome!

I’m Kelly Nolan, an attorney-turned-time management strategist and mom of two. After experiencing overwhelm as a young patent litigator in Boston, I figured out a time management system to help me show up in the ways that I wanted to at work and at home – without requiring my brain to somehow magically remember it all. I now teach other professional working women how to manage their personal, family, and career roles with less stress and more calm clarity using realistic time management strategies.

My system, the Bright Method, has been featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, and my work has been published in Forbes, Fast Company, Business Insider, and more. Learn more about my 10-week program here, come learn bite-sized strategies with me on Instagram, or jump into my free 5-day program.

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