overwhelmed with planning for your big family? a calm, practical guide

what does being overwhelmed with family planning and activities actually feel like?

short answer: With multiple kids, running your family feels like being a manager for a job you never applied for. The staff are literal toddlers (instead of just figurative ones) and the KPIs change on a daily basis.

You wake up tired and your phone never leaves your hand, except when your kid grabs it and throws it in the river. Your family WhatsApp group is permanently pinned to the top of your chats.

I’m not a child psychologist or some kind of family planning expert - I’m just a dad with 3 kids. Probably like some of you out there.

The American Psychological Association’s Stress in America reports consistently show parents reporting higher stress than non-parents, with family responsibilities among the top-named drivers. If parenting seems like it’s harder than it should be, that’s because it is.

In Brigid Schulte’s book Overwhelmed, she talks about how feeling overwhelmed is not a personal failure - it’s structural. We all have unrealistic work expectations, we deal with (sometimes outdated) family roles, and we often live in a culture that undervalues rest and leisure.

A key concept of her book is time confetti - the reason you never feel caught up. Always feeling busy but never feeling done, not being able to get real rest, and walking around with a constant feeling of anxiety or stress. Does any of this sound familiar?

The key revelation in her book is that it’s not just the tasks - it’s managing the tasks. This includes:

• Remembering everything you need to do
• Constantly planning ahead
• Always acting as a coordinator for the lives of multiple people (both big and small)

I won’t summarize her entire book, but suffice to say I highly recommend it for anybody running a large family, and feeling the stress.

Sometimes it feels like I lose part of myself in the constant grind of helping the family run smoothly. Being overwhelmed with family coordination and planning can feel like an insurmountable problem - after all, you signed up for this, right?

I’m here to tell you that you’re not alone - and there are ways that have worked for me to reduce the burden, which I’d like to share.

family overwhelm is a compounding problem

short answer: Each kid multiplies logistics - activities, appointments, friendships, doctors appointments, and everything else. When you’re getting bombarded with updates, field trips, and new activities from 7 different places, context-switching alone becomes a full-time job. This is the data-scatter problem. My data lies in a million different places, and I don’t know where to find it.

According to Eve Rodsky in her book Fair Play, this is what’s known as kin-keeping, and it can cause severe repercussions to one or both parents, particularly to the parent carrying the mental load. It includes things like:

• Remembering birthdays, anniversaries, school events (Joey’s birthday is coming up!)
• Planning holidays, gifts, and gatherings (What are we going to do for Christmas?)
• Keeping extended family connected (when will we visit grandma next?)
• Tracking logistics (when are their appointments, did you pick up the kids, etc)
• Managing emotional dynamics (Did you write a thank-you note to your grandmother for your birthday gift?)

Pew Research’s 2023 “Parenting in America Today” reports 30% of mothers saying parenting is harder than they expected, with only 20% of fathers sharing the same sentiment. That gap is the mental load showing up in the data.

I highly recommend Eve Rodsky’s book, which lays out a clear and easy-to-follow system for helping share the load between parents and make invisible labor more visible, so it does not go unnoticed by the other partner.

In my case, with 3 little ones all going to school, participating in various activities, playing with friends, and doing homework, even the slightest hiccup in your schedule can feel like the end of the world. I have WhatsApp, Google Calendar, a different app for each of my kids’ schools, emails or chats from their various sports coaches, and lots more. When mental load reaches capacity, it can feel like you have lost control of your schedule, and even your sanity.

the three-minute reset (if you’re literally spiraling right now)

short answer: Pause, breathe, and write down 3 tiny tasks you can finish in 5 minutes each. the goal isn’t to clear your whole list - it’s to break the spiral and rebuild momentum with quick wins.

First things first - pause, close your eyes, and take a slow, deep breath. Breathe in through your nose, hold it for 5 seconds, and breathe out through your mouth.

I don’t know about you, but for me, this works every time. As soon as I get to my 2nd or 3rd breath, I’m already feeling calmer. My workload hasn’t changed, but my mindset has. I’m more relaxed, and ready to start killing that task list, thinking about how I would break down these tasks into manageable chunks, and tackle them in a structured and efficient way.

Take a piece of paper, open notepad on your computer, or just find somewhere to jot down some quick notes.

Write down 3 small, quick things you need to do today. These should be tiny things, each one 5 minutes or less, nothing too complicated or stressful. Just 1 step and done. It can be literally anything you need to do.

Here’s an example:

1. Find out when Joey’s spring break starts and add it to the family calendar
2. Make an appointment at the eye doctor to check Mary’s glasses
3. Order baby wipes from amazon

Take a look at your list, take one more deep breath, and attack that thing. 3 small things, 10 minutes, done. One less thing. Well, 3, actually.

taking the 3-minute reset 5 minutes further - how to get some real stuff done

short answer: Once you’ve knocked out the quick wins, make a second list of slightly harder tasks - ones that need 1-2 follow-up steps. Send this to your partner and split the work.

Now, let’s go one step further. Make one more list, but think about topics that are slightly more complicated. Not insurmountable things, but maybe requiring 1 or 2 follow-up steps to get done.

For example:

1. Pay Neil’s piano lesson fees - need to get bank account details from his teacher
2. Sign Lewis up for the next gymnastics term - need to find out the dates and whether there is a class in his age group on Saturday afternoons
3. Find out when Joey’s spring break is so we can search flights and make a booking to visit grandparents

Take a picture of it (or copy it on your computer) and send it to your partner with a collaborative note (i.e. “Honey - here are some urgent things we have to do today. How can we split this up?”).

Think about doing this on a regular basis - whittle down your list of tasks until it is in a manageable place - every little bit helps.

share the mental load - here is a script for the hard conversations

short answer: Make the invisible labor visible. instead of asking your partner to ‘help more,’ build a system where each person truly owns specific responsibilities with clear boundaries.

As Eve Rodsky describes - mental load is real, and making the labor visible is a key factor in helping to share and reduce that load. Avoid saying things like, “help me more” and rather focus on building a system that aims for:

• True ownership of specific responsibilities
• Clear boundaries for both parents (i.e. a split between children, or types of activities)
• Reduced mental load for both partners

For example:

Mom: I’m feeling overwhelmed right now. We have so many things coming up in May.
Dad: Let’s talk about it - here’s what’s on my list: Neil’s birthday on May 12th - do we plan a party - and Mary’s school holiday in the 3rd week of May - I think we need to book some kind of camp or activity, otherwise she’ll be home watching screens all day
Mom: There’s also Neil’s school play on the 5th - I have an important work meeting that day. And we also have to reschedule his soccer practice the week after, because we’ll be visiting my parents
Dad: I’d suggest we break it up like this - I’ll handle the school play and Neil’s birthday and activities. You handle Mary’s school holiday and her other activities. I’ll spend some time after work today, let’s catch up tomorrow on the details.

At the same time, think about whether everything on your list is absolutely, 100% necessary. In some cases, we’re simply trying to do too much. Critically reviewing what’s on your list can be a valuable exercise on its own.

Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks reframes this entire problem - we will never have enough time to do everything, so the question isn’t always how to cram more stuff in, it’s what to cut.

At least for me, simply by approaching the problem as a couple and talking it through together, in a collaborative way, I can already feel relief from some of the stress of carrying what felt like my own burden. Now the responsibilities are shared, the labor is visible, and we have a clear plan. Or at least, a plan. And any plan is better than nothing.

the 15-minute weekly family meeting

short answer: 15 minutes, 3 questions: what happened last week, what’s coming up, and what should we change? It’s the simplest way to keep everyone aligned and catch things before they fall through the cracks.

For some families, having a weekly family meeting helps with getting your thoughts organized and making sure everybody is on the same page. And if nothing else, it’s a great excuse to get everybody together, talking, and engaging with each other at least once a week.

It can be as simple as 15 minutes and 3 questions:

• What happened last week (and how did you feel about it)?
• What’s coming up this week?
• What’s one thing we should start doing, stop doing, or change?

I’ll be totally honest here: this is one thing I’ve been meaning to put in place in my own family for the longest time. We can all be overwhelmed with work and activities, and sometimes things fall through the cracks.

The kids are getting old enough now, and I think it’s time that we set this up. I’m going to talk to my partner, and given our busy schedules, discuss how this might work for us. More than anything else, it’s a chance to get together once a week, put all the devices down, and just focus on each other.

I’m excited to get started, and I hope that you are too! Perhaps I’ll post a story on the beanstalk about how things progress for us.

build one shared source of truth (not seven)

short answer: Pick one place where all your family info lives - one app, one calendar, one system. everyone agrees where it is and checks it first. The tool matters less than the agreement.

Stop - collaborate and listen. When you have data scatter, nobody knows where to find things. Sorry kids, I promise there will be no more bad Vanilla Ice impressions from dad.

Data scatter is the first step towards confusion and frustration. If I can’t find some information that I knew I had somewhere, it throws everything off, and I can’t do anything else until it’s found. Let’s address that issue once and for all.

Pick one place where your family info lives. Everyone knows where it is, and everyone checks it first. No matter where the information comes from, it goes into that one place. Everybody in your family is in agreement on where that one, magical, golden source of data lies for your family.

That place can be anywhere you want, as long as everybody agrees. It should be a place everybody can access, and understands how to use. Whether it’s beanies.family, a shared Google Calendar, Cozi, Skylight, Notion, or anything else is up to you - the important thing is to choose one.

Google Calendar is nice, because it has an easy to use calendar interface that is simple and intuitive, and most people in your family are probably already familiar with it. The main issue for me is that shared calendars can be tricky to get to work the way you want, and there is only a calendar function with limited fields. Most information is stuffed into the description, which can get messy.

A family planning app like Cozi, or a tool like Skylight can be a good choice, but keep in mind there is a cost, as well as a trade-off in terms of privacy - you are handing your family data over to a company that may use it any way they want, within the terms of their own agreement (which you agreed to, so you can use the software).

beanies.family (which is where you are now) is a family + financial planning solution that is fully local-first and private. It keeps data on your device, and it marries up your finances with your family, so to speak.

Obviously I’m biased, as I built beanies.family. Try several solutions, and see what works best for you and your family before you decide.

The important thing is to settle on a tool, app, or method that you all know and trust.

how do I get my partner on board?

short answer: Start with their pain points, not yours. showing is better than selling. Demonstrate how the tool solves a specific frustration they already have.

For me, when a friend comes up to me and says, “You HAVE to try this app” usually all I want to do is run away as quickly as possible. I don’t like when things are framed in a way that makes me feel like I am somehow “less than” for not using a certain app, tool, or product.

From my experience, you have to start with their pain points - not yours. Get in the mindset of the person you are trying to convince, rather than simply telling them about something that worked for you. The things that matter to you may not matter as much to your partner.

If your partner is experiencing pain with a specific thing - show them how that will become less annoying for them personally. Showing is better than selling. Shared tools fail when one person is the one who pushed it on everybody else against their will.

When I first discussed using beanies.family with my wife, it was a challenge. There are already so many apps to keep track of things, and this was just one more. But I already knew that Google Calendar wasn’t working for us - the “shared calendar” concept didn’t always trigger notifications reliably, or at the right times.

One of the specific pain points my wife had was remembering when it was her turn to pick up our son from soccer practice, and when it was mine. Messages would get lost in the fray. So when she discovered the pick-up / drop-off assignment duty capability in beanies.family, we were off to the races. Todos were icing on the cake - she now assigns todos for me (such as “buy fruit”) on a regular basis. I may actually regret making this thing so easy to use!

knowing when tools help vs when they hurt

short answer: A tool helps when it collapses 2+ existing surfaces into one. It hurts when it’s just another app to check. If it doesn’t reduce your mental load, get rid of it.

Tools, software, and other family planning aids are fantastic when they are easy to use and reduce friction for the person carrying the mental load. They hurt if they are simply adding another surface to check, on top of everything else. If the tool you choose doesn’t collapse or obviate 2 existing surfaces, lose it - it’s adding to your workload rather than detracting from it.

Ask yourself these questions before deciding on a family tool:

• Is this tool easy to use?
• Can everybody in my family use it?
• Does it get rid of at least 2 other tools that I’m using today?
• Ultimately, does using this tool make me happy, or annoyed?

Follow this framework for deciding on your family tool, and you will land on something that not just works for you and your family, but genuinely saves your time and reduces your mental load.

red flags that your “overwhelming feeling” has become something more serious

short answer: If you’re losing sleep, snapping at your kids, or experiencing constant fatigue, it’s time for a real conversation with your partner or doctor, not another productivity tool.

A lot of us feel overwhelmed or overworked at times, especially when we have large families. But how do we know when things have gotten out of hand?

Is your sleep being severely disrupted? Do you have a short temper with your kids? Are you experiencing physical symptoms, such as muscle aches and pains, constant fatigue, or regular illness?

At this point, you don’t need a tool - it’s time for a rest and a serious conversation with your partner (or doctor).

Family planning apps and other productivity tools can only do so much - collecting your information in one place can provide a genuine sense of relief, but they have their limits. If you simply have too much going on, and nothing is helping you feel any better, it may be time to seek deeper conversations with your partner and/or professional help.

if you only remember three things

short answer: One shared source of truth, a weekly 15-minute family meeting, and making invisible work visible. These three habits alone will transform your household.

We’ve discussed a lot here, so let’s summarize:

1. One shared source of truth - we all agree where everything is
2. A weekly 15-minute family meeting - get together, talk, and reset
3. Make the invisible work visible - this is the only way to redistribute it and reduce the mental load

If you take away nothing else from this guide, just remember the above things. If you’re anything like us, this will be your first steps towards a calmer, less stressful household. And we can all use that in our lives!

Best of luck, and looking forward to talking more on beanies.family. If you want to discuss or read more, join the beanstalk on substack and receive a newsletter every Friday (or, roughly, whenever I feel like it)!