I'm doing better. I don't know if you can tell. Mental health is such an individual thing, I'm not sure if writing about my own issues is going to help anybody else. But it helps me, so here you go. This got a bit long. Save it for when you're in the mood.
As I told you last time we talked about this, my mental health issues are depression and paranoia. I think I will always be prone to them. It's like being headache-prone (which I also am). You can figure out the triggers, avoid behaviors that make things worse, and do your best to be healthy. But I'm always going to have headaches, and I'm probably always going to go through periods of depression and paranoia.
So understanding my "issues," and having the tools to deal with them and know when I'm headed into a spiral (of either headaches or depression), is only going to help.
I think part of what I've been going through is the longer-term adjustment to the empty nest. That kind of surprised me. MadMax left last week to start his senior year of college, so this isn't new. We've been empty nesters for three years now.
But there's the initial oh-my-god-my-children-have-moved-out part, which is hard enough but didn't last very long, and then apparently there is another longer adjustment that I am still navigating.
The first part, that wrenching feeling that you tore your right arm off and left it in that freshman dorm, is the more obvious one, the one everyone knows about, and it's not easy. But it's pretty fast. With each of our kids, by the time they'd been gone a couple of months, we were getting used to it.
And then there's Phase Two, which I was not expecting. Why should there be a longer term adjustment? I'm plenty busy. I'm involved in a lot of things in our community. It's not like my life revolved around my children.
But you know-- it did revolve around my children. I was never a helicopter mom, but having kids in the house was the organizing principle of my schedule from 1990 to 2016. That's a lot of years.
Apparently there is a longer term adjustment that I'm still figuring out. When you're a parent, you have obvious significance, even if it's just localized to your kids. You are that child's parent. You are needed. Even when they're 17 or 18, you keep at least some track of where they are, their dentist appointments, their parent-teacher night, their band concerts.
It's going too far to say it gives your life meaning, but it does mean that you've got a certain number of default things that can only be done by you, even if it's just paying attention and being there when they need you. There's a certain amount of purpose involved in that.
And figuring out what is going to take the place of that has been a longer process than getting over missing my kids. Whom I still miss, of course. It's not like you stop missing them, but you get used to it.
So, that's part of what's been going on. Another part of it is still related to something we've talked about before, which is that feeling that this is not the life I thought I was going to have. I guess it's regret, to put it plainly.
That has been a really tough one for me. I didn't think I was going to end up at age 58, living in a rural area with only a string of part-time jobs on my resume and no professional accomplishments.
This is embarrassing to admit, because it makes me sound like such a whiner. I have a hard time even typing it out without surrounding it with snarkiness because I know I sound like a spoiled brat. I am so blessed, so privileged. But the struggle is real, as they say, and pretending like it's not there doesn't help.
My adult life has been so contrary to the way we think these days-- if your life isn't going the way you want it to, change it. Get a new job. Move. Get a divorce. Have an affair. Join a commune. Take art classes, do yoga, change it up, make your life into what you want.
We believe we have agency, the power to make our lives into whatever we want. We believe what the individual wants should be, at least to some extent, more important than family or community ties.
But I couldn't do the life that I had mapped out in my head and have my husband, my children, and my integrity. I can run back through the decisions we made every time we decided to stay here and not move somewhere with more job opportunities for me (which we considered multiple times over the years), and even in hindsight, I would make the same decisions over again. At every stage, I made the decision that was the "right" one for me/us at the time.
It just was never the decision I would have made if I'd been single and childless and unattached. I kept deferring what I wanted to do, thinking someday my turn would come. But then I hit fifty, and I ran slam up against the realization that some of the things I had really wanted to do were not going to happen. Not helped any by the people I could see around me who at least appear to have it all-- family, career, living in the location of their dreams.
Then I had a conversation this summer that has really helped (beyond what we've talked about before, which is realizing how damn lucky I am). I had dinner with one of my college roommates a couple of months ago, the first time I'd seen her in thirty-five years.
I was talking through a brief version of this issue with her over dinner, the decisions I had made that weren't always the ones that I wanted to make. And she said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, you made those decisions according to your values. You made exactly the decisions you wanted to, because those are the things you value.
It's one of those ideas that was interesting at the time, but later, it bloomed in my head. It's re-framed the way I think about the past and let me begin to be able to forgive myself for (supposedly) not being "strong enough" to "create the life I wanted."
I've been so angry at myself for not following through on all the things I felt like I should have done, all the accomplishments I should have under my belt. (I should have just put my foot down and demanded that we move!) But I was strong enough to make the decisions that deep-down were the ones that I felt were right for our family. And that's something I can live with.
Refusing to forgive leads to bitterness and hardened anger, even if the person I can't forgive is myself. I'm working on extending grace to myself for not being the person that I thought I would be. I don't think I'm quite there yet, but the more I work on it, the easier it gets. Work in progress.
There's another piece to this, but this has already gone on long enough. More later.
Showing posts with label mom stuff. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mom stuff. Show all posts
Friday, September 6, 2019
Tuesday, June 7, 2016
We partied like it's 2016
Well, we survived and MadMax is now officially a high school graduate. Enormous graduation party, beloved house guests and RV guests, graduation ceremony, three and a half hour shift at the all-night senior party (that ended with me home and unable to sleep at 3 a.m.), and finally sending PellMel and house/RV guests off this morning.
Now I've proceeded to the collapsed-on-the-couch-like-a-truck-ran-over-me part of the weekend (I'm writing this on Sunday). Emotional rollercoaster times twelve. Expect no coherent thoughts in this post.
When MadMax was two, we moved across town to a neighborhood full of kids. They rode the school bus together, hunted for Easter eggs, decorated their bikes for fourth of July parades, fought and made up, grew apart and back together and apart again.
We moved out of the neighborhood (but still close by) a couple of years ago, and another family moved across town, but we're still friends. So when a bunch of them were all graduating the same weekend, we decided to band together and throw one big graduation party Friday night.
You probably know me well enough to know that parties are not my thing. But sometimes you have to do it, and when you're splitting up the work (and the expenses) between six different families, really it's not so bad.
We had it here since we have access to the biggest stretch of flat area for a crowd. My cousin was keeping a head count, and at one point we had 85 people here. Since there was quite a bit of coming and going, probably at least 100 people stopped by.
The amazing thing is, it was fun. The weather was spectacular, the food was great, there were kids from grade school through college tearing all over the yard, chasing frisbees and soccer balls and each other. After all the worrying I'd done, it was the most amazing thing.
Then there was their graduation ceremony, which was a bit too long-- have you ever been to one that wasn't? -- but otherwise joyously celebratory. I told you that MadMax was co-valedictorian, which is true, but because of the way they calculate GPA at their school, there were about a dozen valedictorians, so he didn't have to give a speech (much to his relief, he sadly inherited his mother's aversion to public speaking).
In the afternoon we went to another dear friend's party, then took my cousin and her husband up to Glacier NP for ice cream and a stroll along Lake MacDonald. Then I did my shift at the all-night community-wide senior party and came home and tried to get some sleep. Then this morning, PellMel drove off to get back to her studies, and my cousin and her spouse drove off to California, and I collapsed on the couch.
Where I may stay for days.
Now I've proceeded to the collapsed-on-the-couch-like-a-truck-ran-over-me part of the weekend (I'm writing this on Sunday). Emotional rollercoaster times twelve. Expect no coherent thoughts in this post.
When MadMax was two, we moved across town to a neighborhood full of kids. They rode the school bus together, hunted for Easter eggs, decorated their bikes for fourth of July parades, fought and made up, grew apart and back together and apart again.
We moved out of the neighborhood (but still close by) a couple of years ago, and another family moved across town, but we're still friends. So when a bunch of them were all graduating the same weekend, we decided to band together and throw one big graduation party Friday night.
You probably know me well enough to know that parties are not my thing. But sometimes you have to do it, and when you're splitting up the work (and the expenses) between six different families, really it's not so bad.
We had it here since we have access to the biggest stretch of flat area for a crowd. My cousin was keeping a head count, and at one point we had 85 people here. Since there was quite a bit of coming and going, probably at least 100 people stopped by.
The amazing thing is, it was fun. The weather was spectacular, the food was great, there were kids from grade school through college tearing all over the yard, chasing frisbees and soccer balls and each other. After all the worrying I'd done, it was the most amazing thing.
Then there was their graduation ceremony, which was a bit too long-- have you ever been to one that wasn't? -- but otherwise joyously celebratory. I told you that MadMax was co-valedictorian, which is true, but because of the way they calculate GPA at their school, there were about a dozen valedictorians, so he didn't have to give a speech (much to his relief, he sadly inherited his mother's aversion to public speaking).
In the afternoon we went to another dear friend's party, then took my cousin and her husband up to Glacier NP for ice cream and a stroll along Lake MacDonald. Then I did my shift at the all-night community-wide senior party and came home and tried to get some sleep. Then this morning, PellMel drove off to get back to her studies, and my cousin and her spouse drove off to California, and I collapsed on the couch.
Where I may stay for days.
 |
| The Party. This was early on before it got crowded. |
 |
| a bunch of amazing seniors |
 |
| MadMax and PellMel |
Friday, April 29, 2016
7ToF: You got a fast car, is it fast enough so we can fly away?
1. Years ago Tracy Chapman recorded "Fast Car," one of my all-time favorite songs, about driving off to a better life. Chapman grew up in the projects, and she said once in an interview that the fast car in the song was something like a Dodge Dart --in her mind at that age, any car that would run was a fast car, a vehicle for escape. (My original plan was just to explain the post title, but I started watching this video and was mesmerized, so I'm sharing-- we'll see if youtube lets me do this.)
2. We have motley crew of cars. The newest one is a 2011. My favorite, and the one I'm driving at the moment, is a 2005 Honda Pilot, and looky what happened this week (you'll ignore the dust, I'm sure):
190,000! This is the car I drove back and forth to Missoula for nearly three years while I was working on my master's, and I bonded with it in a major way. It's the old body style, more like a Jeep Cherokee than the huge Pilots they're making now. There were definitely days when it felt like I was in a fast car, escaping. Of course, there were also days when it felt like I was driving into the maw of hell. Either way, when I found out last week that its trade-in value was less than $3K, I decided I might as well drive it till it dies.
3. We're each firmly attached to our favorite elderly car-- my Pilot, Dean's 2000 pickup, MadMax's 2001 pickup, PellMel's tiny 2009 sedan-- and the advantages are obvious: they're paid off. Insurance is cheap. We know them well. And this cannot be overstated: you don't have to deal with buying a new car. But when you drive older cars, anything can go wrong at any time. It might be nice to have at least one car that is reliable for road trips, and since we're about to have a kid in college five hours away, many road trips loom. We're reluctantly considering our options. A pox on car shopping.
4. Remember awhile back when I told you about my clumsy experiments with finally, in my fifties, starting to wear makeup? Well, yeah. My need for full coverage has only grown. Now if I forget to leave time to put it on before I go out, I catch sight of myself somewhere and am horrified. Good God, I'm old. But as someone who is new to the world of makeup, there are all kinds of things I am still figuring out. Like--I swear I'm not making this up-- some people have two different shades, one for summer, when they're tan, and one for winter, when they're pale. Who knew? And how do you know when to switch?
5. We're throwing a party for our neighborhood seniors on the night before graduation. We're decorating with photos of the kids at all ages, which means I've spent several hours--and will doubtless spend several more--combing through old photos. *sniff* Good lord, these are some cute kids. Since I used up all my extra time in the rabbit warren known as YouTube looking for that Tracy Chapman video, I can't post any this week, but maybe next time. (How to win friends: force them to look at old pictures of your offspring.) How in the world did they grow up so fast? Except on the days when they're being so obstinately awful you can't wait to ship them off.
6. You know I've written at least half a dozen posts over the years defending romance novels (here's one). I will still defend to my last breath anybody's right to read whatever the heck they want to read whenever they want to read it, but I have to say I have not read a good romance novel in a couple of years now--the kind I used to put down with a sigh of pure satisfaction thinking that was a great story. I've pretty much given up. Other than my continuing intermittent fascination with Betty Neels (the most recent of which was published in 2001), I haven't read a romance novel in a long time. Maybe it's just me and I've moved on past the moment when they worked for me. But I want to blame it on the romance novel industry (the word industry used deliberately). The ones I read last year felt cranked out in a way they didn't five or six years ago, as if they were written based on what sells rather than what works as a story. But I do have three recently-published romance novels from favorite authors waiting for the beach in June, so maybe there is hope.
7. Since I'm running out of things to talk about, here is my Corny Thought For The Week, also filed under "Life Lessons I've Learned From Betty Neels." Don't smirk. She has one heroine after another who spends an entire book unable to believe the hero is interested in her, irritatingly lost in "He Can't Love Little Ol' Me" Land. But it occurred to me not long ago that I spend lots of time feeling unlovable, too. And if you can't believe you're lovable, you miss out on a lot of love, you know? And another thing that happens: it leaves her heroines (and me) open to bad advice. If you don't believe the people who clearly love and care about you, you end up believing the wrong person-- in Betty Neels, it's the cruel ex-girlfriend, the interfering busybody, the mean stepmother, the the people who are telling her he'd never love a little nobody like you. So there you go. Wisdom from romance novels. So, if the snippy ex-girlfriend tells you the ice on the pond is plenty thick enough to skate on, don't believe her. Just saying.
Have a nice weekend. Bonus video: Prince and Lenny Kravitz performing "American Woman," which is blatantly misogynist in a delicious sort of way, but somehow exactly right.
2. We have motley crew of cars. The newest one is a 2011. My favorite, and the one I'm driving at the moment, is a 2005 Honda Pilot, and looky what happened this week (you'll ignore the dust, I'm sure):
190,000! This is the car I drove back and forth to Missoula for nearly three years while I was working on my master's, and I bonded with it in a major way. It's the old body style, more like a Jeep Cherokee than the huge Pilots they're making now. There were definitely days when it felt like I was in a fast car, escaping. Of course, there were also days when it felt like I was driving into the maw of hell. Either way, when I found out last week that its trade-in value was less than $3K, I decided I might as well drive it till it dies.
3. We're each firmly attached to our favorite elderly car-- my Pilot, Dean's 2000 pickup, MadMax's 2001 pickup, PellMel's tiny 2009 sedan-- and the advantages are obvious: they're paid off. Insurance is cheap. We know them well. And this cannot be overstated: you don't have to deal with buying a new car. But when you drive older cars, anything can go wrong at any time. It might be nice to have at least one car that is reliable for road trips, and since we're about to have a kid in college five hours away, many road trips loom. We're reluctantly considering our options. A pox on car shopping.
4. Remember awhile back when I told you about my clumsy experiments with finally, in my fifties, starting to wear makeup? Well, yeah. My need for full coverage has only grown. Now if I forget to leave time to put it on before I go out, I catch sight of myself somewhere and am horrified. Good God, I'm old. But as someone who is new to the world of makeup, there are all kinds of things I am still figuring out. Like--I swear I'm not making this up-- some people have two different shades, one for summer, when they're tan, and one for winter, when they're pale. Who knew? And how do you know when to switch?
5. We're throwing a party for our neighborhood seniors on the night before graduation. We're decorating with photos of the kids at all ages, which means I've spent several hours--and will doubtless spend several more--combing through old photos. *sniff* Good lord, these are some cute kids. Since I used up all my extra time in the rabbit warren known as YouTube looking for that Tracy Chapman video, I can't post any this week, but maybe next time. (How to win friends: force them to look at old pictures of your offspring.) How in the world did they grow up so fast? Except on the days when they're being so obstinately awful you can't wait to ship them off.
6. You know I've written at least half a dozen posts over the years defending romance novels (here's one). I will still defend to my last breath anybody's right to read whatever the heck they want to read whenever they want to read it, but I have to say I have not read a good romance novel in a couple of years now--the kind I used to put down with a sigh of pure satisfaction thinking that was a great story. I've pretty much given up. Other than my continuing intermittent fascination with Betty Neels (the most recent of which was published in 2001), I haven't read a romance novel in a long time. Maybe it's just me and I've moved on past the moment when they worked for me. But I want to blame it on the romance novel industry (the word industry used deliberately). The ones I read last year felt cranked out in a way they didn't five or six years ago, as if they were written based on what sells rather than what works as a story. But I do have three recently-published romance novels from favorite authors waiting for the beach in June, so maybe there is hope.
7. Since I'm running out of things to talk about, here is my Corny Thought For The Week, also filed under "Life Lessons I've Learned From Betty Neels." Don't smirk. She has one heroine after another who spends an entire book unable to believe the hero is interested in her, irritatingly lost in "He Can't Love Little Ol' Me" Land. But it occurred to me not long ago that I spend lots of time feeling unlovable, too. And if you can't believe you're lovable, you miss out on a lot of love, you know? And another thing that happens: it leaves her heroines (and me) open to bad advice. If you don't believe the people who clearly love and care about you, you end up believing the wrong person-- in Betty Neels, it's the cruel ex-girlfriend, the interfering busybody, the mean stepmother, the the people who are telling her he'd never love a little nobody like you. So there you go. Wisdom from romance novels. So, if the snippy ex-girlfriend tells you the ice on the pond is plenty thick enough to skate on, don't believe her. Just saying.
Have a nice weekend. Bonus video: Prince and Lenny Kravitz performing "American Woman," which is blatantly misogynist in a delicious sort of way, but somehow exactly right.
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
bathrooms, independence, and watching your kid drive away
I just watched MadMax drive himself off to school--his first time driving since the surgery, second day back at school. The surgery was on his left knee, so his driving leg has been fine all along, but still he was radiating happiness and relief that he is independent of his mother's driving and attention once more. Yesterday, after two weeks out of school, he told his calculus teacher that he was probably the only senior in the building who was happy to be at school on Monday morning. I think the boredom has been at least as bad as the pain. Maybe worse.
It reminded me of watching our kids drive off alone for the first time after they got their license. They're both good, safe drivers. They'd done driver's ed, they'd driven hours with me or their dad keeping watch. But you can't help but worry, watching them drive off alone. So many things can go wrong, lots of them completely unrelated to their driving skills.
In other news....: We had an interesting conversation about gender and bathrooms over dinner last night, which made me think. I have to balance my immediate liberal-bias reaction about yet another fear-based assault on the rights of -- I was going to say "the trans community," but really, it's anybody. We react in fear and dismay when any of our cherished beliefs about race or gender or class are challenged -- I have to balance my immediate, genuine support of anyone whose right to be themselves is being challenged, against my (also genuine) reaction of ewwww to the idea of running into a visibly male person in the women's room.
Even in a dirty, unkempt public bathroom, the women's room has always had a slight air of sanctuary, a place where you could hike up your skirt and adjust your panty hose, or check your teeth in the mirror, or bum a tampon in an emergency--all the things we'd hesitate to do in front of men.
The only trans woman I'm aware of here locally is visibly trans, a big 6-foot-plus person, who nonetheless dresses elegantly and is always polite and, for lack of a better word, decorous. If I'm entirely honest with myself, I have to admit it would make me a little uncomfortable to run into her in the women's room at Target.
But that's the point. This is on me. It's my discomfort. How about her discomfort in having to deal with this issue at all? Like many in the trans community, she has probably spent far more energy than any of us can imagine organizing her day around not needing to use public bathrooms so she could avoid this exact scenario. We want to define anything that makes us uncomfortable as Wrong, and thus keep our cherished beliefs intact while shifting all responsibility for dealing with differences off on the people who are different.
That's just not acceptable to me anymore. Either we're going to do our best to make our culture accepting and tolerant of all kinds of people we deem strange, or we aren't. Presumably when a trans woman is attending to her bodily needs, she'll be well-concealed by a stall, just as I will be as I attend to mine. I'm willing to live with a little discomfort in order to try and make the world a safer place for everybody. People put up with my weirdnesses every single day, should I not return the favor?
The whole fear-and-panic thing about sexual predators in public bathrooms is completely unchanged by which gender is allowed to use which stalls. Years ago when our kids were young and gender identity was an invisible issue, a neighbor involved in law enforcement told us, "Don't ever let your kid go in a public bathroom alone. You have no idea."
This is simple when your opposite sex child is small, but there were several years when MadMax was in the 8-12 age range that I stood outside the men's room watching the seconds tick by on my watch until he came out again. More than once I was on the panicked verge of approaching a friendly-looking man to go in and see what was taking him so long (because it had been more than a minute and a half). (As if any man who is outside the bathroom is less dangerous than the ones that are in. Go figure. I was panicked.) I didn't want to scare him, but I wanted him to be aware. I can remember telling him, if anything seems strange, just come right back out. I confess I let him pee in the bushes a few times rather than go alone into a public bathroom in a deserted place.
In other words: This is not a new problem, and it is not a problem that has anything more to do with the trans community than it does with the cis community. Restricting people to the bathroom that matches the genitals they were born with is not going to solve this problem. Let's not confuse the issues here.
So, that's my .02, and that's probably all it's worth. You watch your kid walk into the public restroom, you watch your kid drive away. We can wrap them in bubble wrap and keep them at home, or we can live in the real world and manage its dangers as best we can. I hope we can keep from adding imaginary dangers to the real ones.
It reminded me of watching our kids drive off alone for the first time after they got their license. They're both good, safe drivers. They'd done driver's ed, they'd driven hours with me or their dad keeping watch. But you can't help but worry, watching them drive off alone. So many things can go wrong, lots of them completely unrelated to their driving skills.
In other news....: We had an interesting conversation about gender and bathrooms over dinner last night, which made me think. I have to balance my immediate liberal-bias reaction about yet another fear-based assault on the rights of -- I was going to say "the trans community," but really, it's anybody. We react in fear and dismay when any of our cherished beliefs about race or gender or class are challenged -- I have to balance my immediate, genuine support of anyone whose right to be themselves is being challenged, against my (also genuine) reaction of ewwww to the idea of running into a visibly male person in the women's room.
Even in a dirty, unkempt public bathroom, the women's room has always had a slight air of sanctuary, a place where you could hike up your skirt and adjust your panty hose, or check your teeth in the mirror, or bum a tampon in an emergency--all the things we'd hesitate to do in front of men.
The only trans woman I'm aware of here locally is visibly trans, a big 6-foot-plus person, who nonetheless dresses elegantly and is always polite and, for lack of a better word, decorous. If I'm entirely honest with myself, I have to admit it would make me a little uncomfortable to run into her in the women's room at Target.
But that's the point. This is on me. It's my discomfort. How about her discomfort in having to deal with this issue at all? Like many in the trans community, she has probably spent far more energy than any of us can imagine organizing her day around not needing to use public bathrooms so she could avoid this exact scenario. We want to define anything that makes us uncomfortable as Wrong, and thus keep our cherished beliefs intact while shifting all responsibility for dealing with differences off on the people who are different.
That's just not acceptable to me anymore. Either we're going to do our best to make our culture accepting and tolerant of all kinds of people we deem strange, or we aren't. Presumably when a trans woman is attending to her bodily needs, she'll be well-concealed by a stall, just as I will be as I attend to mine. I'm willing to live with a little discomfort in order to try and make the world a safer place for everybody. People put up with my weirdnesses every single day, should I not return the favor?
The whole fear-and-panic thing about sexual predators in public bathrooms is completely unchanged by which gender is allowed to use which stalls. Years ago when our kids were young and gender identity was an invisible issue, a neighbor involved in law enforcement told us, "Don't ever let your kid go in a public bathroom alone. You have no idea."
This is simple when your opposite sex child is small, but there were several years when MadMax was in the 8-12 age range that I stood outside the men's room watching the seconds tick by on my watch until he came out again. More than once I was on the panicked verge of approaching a friendly-looking man to go in and see what was taking him so long (because it had been more than a minute and a half). (As if any man who is outside the bathroom is less dangerous than the ones that are in. Go figure. I was panicked.) I didn't want to scare him, but I wanted him to be aware. I can remember telling him, if anything seems strange, just come right back out. I confess I let him pee in the bushes a few times rather than go alone into a public bathroom in a deserted place.
In other words: This is not a new problem, and it is not a problem that has anything more to do with the trans community than it does with the cis community. Restricting people to the bathroom that matches the genitals they were born with is not going to solve this problem. Let's not confuse the issues here.
So, that's my .02, and that's probably all it's worth. You watch your kid walk into the public restroom, you watch your kid drive away. We can wrap them in bubble wrap and keep them at home, or we can live in the real world and manage its dangers as best we can. I hope we can keep from adding imaginary dangers to the real ones.
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
Caretaking and the maternal urge
The topic of caretaking keeps re-surfacing. First there was my friend Andrea who received care from friends and family and hospice during her final weeks of life. Then my 18-year-old wiped out his knee, followed by surgery, followed by days of not being able to do much but lie on his back. Then there's the book I obsessed over mentioned on Friday by a guy who was the caretaker for his wife during her battle with breast cancer.
It's funny in an un-funny, exhausting sort of way that I've been thrown back into being a full-time caregiver right as I'm also preparing to be an empty-nester-- i.e., my days of being a full-time mom are nearly over. We have a 25-year-old, so I know that you're never fully done. But you know what I mean--the days of having young kids are nearly over.
I had forgotten how exhausting it is, to always be vigilant for someone else's well-being. The situation with MadMax is temporary--he is already way better than he was, and in another week we will be more-or-less back to normal (with the addition of physical therapy). But there were several days right after the surgery when I was having to get up once or twice during the night, fetch and carry every little thing, and worry, worry, worry.
Too many pain pills? Not enough? Post-surgery intestinal activity? lack thereof? (sorry, tried to word that as gracefully as I could.) The schoolwork he's missing, the track season he's missing, he's bored, he's in pain, he's getting better, is he getting better?
Ack. How did any of us survive having babies and toddlers? I am not a naturally maternal person, so that was a hard time for me. I didn't do well with the invasion of my space, the continual demands on my attention, the lack of intellectual activity. My spouse and I had a difficult time navigating how to divvy up parenting chores. Even in one week I found all that re-surfacing.
And I've started having the anxiety dreams. I never, ever had one of those "forgot to drop the class, haven't been there all semester, now I have to take the exam" dreams until after our first child was born, and then I started having them all the time. I mentioned this oddity to a friend of mine who started to laugh. "Well that's obvious," she said. "You're afraid of failing at being a mom."
Oh.
Uh, yeah. Last night I had a dream/nightmare that was so vivid it's stuck with me all day. I was headed off to college, at the age I am now but no one (including the dream me) seemed to find that odd. The daughter of some friends handed me her baby to take care of because she just didn't have time to deal with it. In the dream, I kept losing the baby and forgetting about the baby and then I'd try to find it. I woke up feeling horribly guilty, like I had done something absolutely awful, even though it was all a dream. Nightmare.
I think caretaking is not my thing. I do a decent job at it, but it takes a toll. I guess it does with everybody. But you know, sometimes a situation gets dumped in your lap and you just have to man up (woman up) and do it.
I don't know that I really have any big conclusions or wisdom here (obviously), but it's all I have to post about since it's been taking most of my attention since last Tuesday.
p.s. Ken Wilber, author of that book from Friday's post, wrote an essay about being a caretaker/support person for someone with chronic or terminal illness. It's wise, witty, and practical. Definitely worth reading, even if you're not a caretaker--because you never know when you suddenly will be (take me this past week for an example). You can read the essay here, or find it in a free ebook from Shambhala called Radical Compassion.
It's funny in an un-funny, exhausting sort of way that I've been thrown back into being a full-time caregiver right as I'm also preparing to be an empty-nester-- i.e., my days of being a full-time mom are nearly over. We have a 25-year-old, so I know that you're never fully done. But you know what I mean--the days of having young kids are nearly over.
I had forgotten how exhausting it is, to always be vigilant for someone else's well-being. The situation with MadMax is temporary--he is already way better than he was, and in another week we will be more-or-less back to normal (with the addition of physical therapy). But there were several days right after the surgery when I was having to get up once or twice during the night, fetch and carry every little thing, and worry, worry, worry.
Too many pain pills? Not enough? Post-surgery intestinal activity? lack thereof? (sorry, tried to word that as gracefully as I could.) The schoolwork he's missing, the track season he's missing, he's bored, he's in pain, he's getting better, is he getting better?
Ack. How did any of us survive having babies and toddlers? I am not a naturally maternal person, so that was a hard time for me. I didn't do well with the invasion of my space, the continual demands on my attention, the lack of intellectual activity. My spouse and I had a difficult time navigating how to divvy up parenting chores. Even in one week I found all that re-surfacing.
And I've started having the anxiety dreams. I never, ever had one of those "forgot to drop the class, haven't been there all semester, now I have to take the exam" dreams until after our first child was born, and then I started having them all the time. I mentioned this oddity to a friend of mine who started to laugh. "Well that's obvious," she said. "You're afraid of failing at being a mom."
Oh.
Uh, yeah. Last night I had a dream/nightmare that was so vivid it's stuck with me all day. I was headed off to college, at the age I am now but no one (including the dream me) seemed to find that odd. The daughter of some friends handed me her baby to take care of because she just didn't have time to deal with it. In the dream, I kept losing the baby and forgetting about the baby and then I'd try to find it. I woke up feeling horribly guilty, like I had done something absolutely awful, even though it was all a dream. Nightmare.
I think caretaking is not my thing. I do a decent job at it, but it takes a toll. I guess it does with everybody. But you know, sometimes a situation gets dumped in your lap and you just have to man up (woman up) and do it.
I don't know that I really have any big conclusions or wisdom here (obviously), but it's all I have to post about since it's been taking most of my attention since last Tuesday.
p.s. Ken Wilber, author of that book from Friday's post, wrote an essay about being a caretaker/support person for someone with chronic or terminal illness. It's wise, witty, and practical. Definitely worth reading, even if you're not a caretaker--because you never know when you suddenly will be (take me this past week for an example). You can read the essay here, or find it in a free ebook from Shambhala called Radical Compassion.
Tuesday, April 12, 2016
accidents, injuries, and mom panic
Three weeks ago MadMax was up at our local ski resort and he did one more three-sixty on his last run of the day before heading home. He fell. He heard a pop. He couldn't put any weight on his left knee. He almost passed out from the pain when it happened, but he managed to ski down on one leg, and by the time he got home, the pain wasn't too bad.
Several medical consults later, the decision was unanimous: ice and ibuprofen, don't stress it too much, and it will heal up in a few weeks. The option for an MRI was left open, but it didn't seem necessary at the time.
But two weeks later, he was still limping heavily and he kept saying his knee didn't feel stable, in fact it felt less stable instead of more. If you're in the know about this stuff, you already know what's coming. We finally got an MRI last week, and his ACL is torn.
We went in for the follow-up appointment this morning to see if surgery was recommended. It was, and by the way, the surgeon has an opening in his schedule tomorrow (which will be today by the time you read this), and suddenly-- like getting caught in an avalanche that started with just a tiny crack-- we're on an inescapable route that started with a simple fall three weeks ago and will end up with school absences, intense rehab, probably not going on the band trip next week, and the end of his senior track&field season before it even started.
MadMax has been remarkably poised and stoic about the whole thing. He's already switched from being one of the standouts of this year's track team to being a coach and mentor to the younger kids. He missed the last days of the ski season without complaint. He's made a few rueful comments about wishing he hadn't taken that one last run, but really, the trick he did was one he'd done safely a dozen times before. It was just an accident. An accident that is now having huge consequences.
I've been outwardly calm, but inside I'm not nearly as calm as I probably appear. We have not had to deal with many health issues with our kids. I've only been to the emergency room once, and that was just a couple of years ago. We've had a few bouts of flu, the occasional allergy or sinus infection, some sprains and bumps--nothing that even comes close to qualifying as major.
So I am very nearly approaching panic. This is my baby, I want to tell them. You better fucking take good care of him or you will answer to ME. I want to grab the surgeon by the collar, get right up in his face and make sure they know who they're dealing with. Don't you mess with my kid.
Of course I won't. It's a little silly to be so panicky because the guy who is doing the surgery is somebody Dean has known and respected for years, he's successfully done ACL reconstructions a gazillion times, including his own kid's. But I can't help it. I want them to give me an iron-clad guarantee he's going to be all right. YOU PINKY SWEAR YOU'RE GOING TO DO YOUR FREAKING BEST. IF ONE SINGLE THING GOES WRONG, I'M HOLDING YOU PERSONALLY RESPONSIBLE.
So, yeah, in the face of my moment of panic, the post I was going to write is seeming pretty unimportant. If you're a praying person, please say a prayer for MadMax and his surgeon today. And also a smaller one for my sanity. :-)
Several medical consults later, the decision was unanimous: ice and ibuprofen, don't stress it too much, and it will heal up in a few weeks. The option for an MRI was left open, but it didn't seem necessary at the time.
But two weeks later, he was still limping heavily and he kept saying his knee didn't feel stable, in fact it felt less stable instead of more. If you're in the know about this stuff, you already know what's coming. We finally got an MRI last week, and his ACL is torn.
We went in for the follow-up appointment this morning to see if surgery was recommended. It was, and by the way, the surgeon has an opening in his schedule tomorrow (which will be today by the time you read this), and suddenly-- like getting caught in an avalanche that started with just a tiny crack-- we're on an inescapable route that started with a simple fall three weeks ago and will end up with school absences, intense rehab, probably not going on the band trip next week, and the end of his senior track&field season before it even started.
MadMax has been remarkably poised and stoic about the whole thing. He's already switched from being one of the standouts of this year's track team to being a coach and mentor to the younger kids. He missed the last days of the ski season without complaint. He's made a few rueful comments about wishing he hadn't taken that one last run, but really, the trick he did was one he'd done safely a dozen times before. It was just an accident. An accident that is now having huge consequences.
I've been outwardly calm, but inside I'm not nearly as calm as I probably appear. We have not had to deal with many health issues with our kids. I've only been to the emergency room once, and that was just a couple of years ago. We've had a few bouts of flu, the occasional allergy or sinus infection, some sprains and bumps--nothing that even comes close to qualifying as major.
So I am very nearly approaching panic. This is my baby, I want to tell them. You better fucking take good care of him or you will answer to ME. I want to grab the surgeon by the collar, get right up in his face and make sure they know who they're dealing with. Don't you mess with my kid.
Of course I won't. It's a little silly to be so panicky because the guy who is doing the surgery is somebody Dean has known and respected for years, he's successfully done ACL reconstructions a gazillion times, including his own kid's. But I can't help it. I want them to give me an iron-clad guarantee he's going to be all right. YOU PINKY SWEAR YOU'RE GOING TO DO YOUR FREAKING BEST. IF ONE SINGLE THING GOES WRONG, I'M HOLDING YOU PERSONALLY RESPONSIBLE.
So, yeah, in the face of my moment of panic, the post I was going to write is seeming pretty unimportant. If you're a praying person, please say a prayer for MadMax and his surgeon today. And also a smaller one for my sanity. :-)