Sonya Bateson: I thrive on routine and organisation but adaptability is a precious skill worth learning

"Adaptability. It's such a precious skill, and the reason we as a species has survived so long." Photo / Duncan Brown

OPINION

It's amazing how adaptable you grow as a parent.

I am a person who thrives on routine and organisation. I'll make a routine of anything – the way I get out of bed in the mornings, for example, is structured in such a way as to get as much done as possible.

The second my feet touch the floor, I make the bed, get dressed, open all the curtains in the house, make my toddler's bed, then put the jug on.

And when that routine gets mucked up for whatever reason, it throws all my other little routines off and everything begins to feel a little out of sync.

The same goes for my writing. The day before my deadline day, I'll find a topic and research it, and begin to gather all the little threads that will form the structure of my column.

Then on deadline day, I'll fill in the gaps around that skeleton and flesh it out until I'm happy with it.

This week, as deadline day approached, I got to test out my adaptability skills. It started with a toddler who lost all interest in his toys.

Very unusual, the little guy will play uninterrupted for hours when he gets into the flow of a game.

But all he wanted to do was cuddle mama, throwing a spoke in my wheel. Typing isn't the easiest with a toddler in your arms.

Husband decided he'd better work from home in case he spread anything to his colleagues, which meant our computer was in commission for nine hours. Okay, that's fine, I'll write at night.

Not the best solution, but writing tired is better than not writing at all.

Then came the vomiting.

That, of course, created a whole other workload. Beds must be remade. Pyjamas must be changed. The toddler must be soothed and watered. Sleep is found in fits and starts, fitting into the rhythm of the sick child.

So, today, the careful skeleton I'd crafted has been abandoned, perhaps to be picked up next week, perhaps to be discarded forever, lost in the abyss of the changing news cycle.

Adaptability.

It's such a precious skill, and the reason we as a species have survived so long. We change ourselves to adapt to new information, new surroundings, and new threats.

Take the fluctuating variation of human heights for example. Forty thousand years ago, European males were about 183cm tall.

Scientists believe that's because of the physically demanding lifestyle of the hunter-gatherer population.

Then around 10,000 years ago, the male European population dramatically shrunk to a height of around 162.5cm, theoretically because of the introduction of agriculture and climate change.

Diets became less varied, crop failures introduced higher rates of malnutrition, and the domestication of animals saw more diseases spreading among the population.

Six hundred years ago, heights were around 165cm. Taller, but not by much. Today, those heights have grown to average around 175cm.

Our diets and healthcare have improved and our genetic diversity is increasing as we move further away from our home villages.

Adaptability. When our environments support our health, we thrive and, quite literally, grow. When our health is threatened, we adapt and survive.

In recent history, our population rates have skyrocketed as new discoveries have been made and technology has been invented.

Twelve thousand years ago, the world's population was about four million people. Around 1800, we hit one billion for the first time ever. Two hundred years later, we passed seven billion.

Throughout most of our history, humans have had a high birth rate, but that was tempered by high rates of child mortality.

There might be examples in your own family tree of women having sometimes 10 or more children, but only two or three of those surviving to adulthood. And those are the women who didn't die in childbirth.

The industrial revolution brought about huge improvements in medical knowledge and public health, as well as a more regular food supply. And that's why so many more of us are here today. Better healthcare.

In 1796, Edward Jenner inoculated a 13-year-old boy with the cowpox virus and demonstrated immunity to smallpox.

Two years later, the first smallpox vaccine was developed, and it was soon being given worldwide.

In late 2019, a new virus began its spread and in 2022, we are adapting to the everyday realities of living with Covid 19.

Most of us have been vaccinated against the virus and we've grown accustomed to wearing masks in public – although we're beginning to abandon those as we pine for a return to normal life.

There have been calls from public health experts to implement the lessons we've learned during this pandemic to battle other illnesses – even those we've lived with for centuries, like the flu.

"That's one of the big things we have learned from Covid-19, it's not okay if you get a respiratory infection just to go back to school or work or go out socialising until you've got over it," Otago University epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker said last week.

It's a suggestion worth listening to. That's how we as humans have learned to thrive – we battle a new threat, we learn new ways to combat that threat, and we change our lives in response.

We adapt.

- Sonya Bateson is a writer, reader, and crafter raising her family in Tauranga. She is a Millennial who enjoys eating avocado on toast, drinking lattes and defying stereotypes. As a sceptic, she reserves the right to change her mind when presented with new evidence.