This year, I’m not resolving to lose weight.

This year, I’m not resolving to lose weight. Instead, I want to work on another problem.

-deep breath-

I have a problem with being late.

It’s not like I mean to be late. I hate being late. I hate making other people wait for me. I hate the harried scramble to get ready. I hate driving white-knuckled down the interstate, referencing the clock every 5 seconds. I hate the annoyed looks from whoever I made wait.

It’s a chronic thing. It’s a cultural thing. And maybe it’s a genetic thing. I know if I make plans with my mom or one of my siblings, when they say 2 p.m., they really mean sometime after 2 p.m. and probably before dinner time. My brother texted me his itinerary at every layover (3) on his way home to Bangor for Christmas so we wouldn’t forget to pick him up. When my daughter was born a week after her due date, my friends joked that she takes after her mother.

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I’ve even written about being late in this blog before. I got in a big fight with a good friend over it.

When I thought this December about all the things I really wanted to change about myself this year — things that, like with running, I could look back and say, “I don’t really struggle with that any more” — it was timeliness. I would really like to be known for being reliable.

So 2015 is going to be the year that I am going to work at being on time.

My plan

Every day when I come in, unless there are special circumstances, I am going to write down what time I come in on a tiny Post-It note and stick it on one of two papers.

I am going to write down the time I sit down and write this message on this slip of paper. If it’s before 9:01 a.m., it goes on the “On Time” paper. Otherwise …

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No matter how many times I futz, another day is another opportunity to do it the right way.

On time, even with an infant.

In some ways, I have gotten A LOT better about this than I was before I was a mother. On one hand, it can be extraordinarily difficult to plan around an infant’s demands. On the other hand, I know that if I don’t plan around her schedule, I know that I can’t do everything I want and need to do.

“Transition anxiety”

I read an article about “transition anxiety” years ago and its stuck with me how much it speaks about me. I really struggle not with starting the thing I am late to, but from ending the thing I am doing before.

If you can’t stand making the little transitions, you may end up making big ones you don’t like.

Read more: http://www.oprah.com/spirit/Dealing-With-Transition-Anxiety-Martha-Beck#ixzz3Nz8L8eSE

I see learning to be on time as tangential to a lot of other things about my life that I’d like to change — I know if I would just make decisions early, even stressful ones, I will be happier than if I just let them linger. And that is going to be important as I try to juggle more things, being a working parent.

Here’s to a happy, timelier 2015. What was your resolution?

Pattie Reaves

About Pattie Reaves

I'm a new mom and renegade fitness blogger at After the Couch. I live in Brewer with my husband, Tony, our daughter Felicity, and our two pugs, Georgia and Scoop.