Coming to grips

I had a funky day a few days back. My emotions were low, and I felt like crying for the first part of the day. And I always have to figure out, why? I have learned that in the years since my bout with postpartum depression, that I have not wanted to feel sadness anymore, a crazy idea but you know, it's what happened. I think I get scared when I feel the need to cry. I am so so utterly terrified to go back into that deep dark pit again that I have kept sadness or any negative emotion, bottled up when I felt it. And then I ate it. There has been something "eating me up" for the last few years. There was a movie, Four Christmases
recently with Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughan and there was a scene of them looking at a picture of her from when she was younger and heavyset. She says, "I ate my feelings" and he says, "She must have had a lot of bad feelings" Really funny and a really good laugh. This scene spoke to me even though it shouldn't have as it was a crass line making fun of heavy people but I could so relate to that line as I've had a lot of bad feelings. And I also really like Reese Witherspoon!

I did have some reason to feel discombobulated last week. Summer is approaching and as a stay at home mom, my schedule is about to be ripped wide apart. Some moms look forward to summer with fervor. Not I. We will have a lot of time to fill except for a few hours here and there with camp and the like. Having this much time with my children has given me great anxiety in the past, as it would harken back to my motherload of anxiety time, that time I will now refer to as PPD. I know it's kinda crazy that I am a stay at home mom and the idea of spending all my time with my children sets me off into a panic. But I've accepted that I'm not a kid person, and a room full of kids wears me out and it only takes minutes, not hours. And taking care of these two young lives is mentally and physically exhausting. The constant abundance of energy, the noise, the demandingness of young children, it just gets to me along with the fact that I never am able to finish anything. And here is the disclaimer, I am very appreciative of the fact that I am able to be at home with them, I love them dearly but I still have feelings that I desire to stay sane. I am bound and determined though to keep my sanity and learn to handle all the togetherness, bit by bit (and in the meantime create two well adjusted, thriving children that I only want the best for, no pressure there)

Summer is here. There is a lot of free time to fill. I think the older my children get the easier I will be able to handle it. The problems will get bigger but I think what zaps me is the amount of physical and mental care that it takes to maintain from birth to around age 5ish. At least that is what some of my friends have said. What put me over the edge last week was that we learned my husband's schedule was going to change for the worse. He will now be on call every third weekend of the year, instead of fourth as it has been for the last nine years we have been in Baton Rouge. And this means more call during the week and longer work days as well. Second disclaimer, I am grateful he has a job in this economy. It's just a significant lifestyle change and I had to feel funky for a little while. I felt sad about it and I have moved on now. I realize I have to own the feelings, don't bottle them up, don't eat them, let them out and then figure out how to deal with it constructively.


These are my plans. I'm going to make it to yoga, somehow once a week. I'm going to park them each in front of a tv so that I can get on the treadmill for 30 minutes more days than not during the week or better yet, drag them to the YMCA and make them go to the nursery. We will get out of the house every day even if it is on small errands as I have learned that I begin to lose it without any outside world stimulation. I'm going to plan girls nights out and go through the hassle of finding a babysitter and coordinating friends' schedules. I'm going to keep blogging and letting my feelings out. I'm going to devote blocks of time for my children and play with them in their activities so that when I need time to myself, I will not feel guilty to turn them away. Those are my plans, I will let you know how it goes.

My IPhone said, "Pray"

Our church is in the middle of a major capital campaign to build a new youth building. We began a 24 hour prayer period on Mother's Day before we hand in our pledge cards next Sunday. Weeks ago, I signed up for a 15 minute increment of prayer time for this morning at 6am. I had figured out how to schedule it on my iphone calendar and set the alarm and then I forgot about it. I do not use this feature on a regular basis at all. I do need to learn more of the phone features besides uploading pictures to facebook, but I digress.

So I'm up early as George was coming home from work at 5:30 a.m. getting ready to go back to work. And I'm thinking let me get my coffee before I sit down. I hear my phone go off and go to find it, and it says, PRAY. It was just a surprising thing to see, I had forgotten what I had programmed. It just seemed like a divine moment. Well, a divine moment that I had programmed but nonetheless a moment. A piece of technology sought me out and said, "pray." Could you ignore that?? It made me think perhaps I should put pray on the iphone calendar more often and surprise myself.

Uncomfortable religious moments

This is a tough topic, very charged, very personal. Everybody has their beliefs, opinions, experiences, and convictions. This is my experience and I have been coming to grips with it and examining my relationship with God intensely the last couple of years. I have been coming to understand facets of my personality that I didn't before as a result of age, maturity and most importantly, therapy. Therapy has helped me understand psychological processes that affected my beliefs growing up. Who knew I would learn about my spiritual life when I showed up to talk about my inability to stop eating? But it has been broken wide open for me to get a handle on and I'm so glad to be going through this painful yet enlightening process and it is bringing me closer to God, a God that I can embrace.

I was in a church book study recently and the discussion rolled around to denominations, God centered vs Jesus centered and so on. I had an aha moment of all of the diverse and uncomfortable moments of "religion" that I had experienced. I felt I have been a little warped when it comes to religion lately and I think for good reason. These moments have been forever etched in my mind. I grew up as a Methodist but have had exposure to many different denominations including several Baptist churches, Catholic masses (including ones in a psychiatric facility!), Russian Orthodox, Episcopalian, Jewish services and then some non-denominational meetings that were not in a church building.

One of my first FEAR remembrances from church was sunday school talk of Armageddon and the second coming, with some devil thrown in as well. I think at this same time and continuing were some hellfire and brimstone style sermons. I had a major level of discomfort sitting through these services and distinctly remember them. It hit my psyche and not in a positive way and hasn't let go. Also, sometime in my tween years, I can still vividly picture sitting through revivals and at the end there were altar calls, where the pianist
played the last stanza of the hymn over and over and over again to goad persons to come to the front and accept Jesus. I had already accepted Jesus but didn't want to walk up to the front of the church in order to do so. I was a reserved, shy child and can still be a reserved adult. I was not comfortable in that service at all, but I continued to attend worship services like that for years because of where I lived, my family and who I dated. Some other experiences were a small group gathering where persons spoke in tongues (more uncomfortableness), attending a heaven or hell play production which gave me no further understanding of God but scare tactics and more calls to come down to the front and be born again. God has been with me from the beginning and the process is me becoming aware of his presence and relying on him and I don't need to be born again. These were examples to me of a god that was to be feared, not a God of love. I didn't understand all of this at the time, just felt it in my gut.

It has taken me a long time to let myself believe what I in my gut believe about God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. There were circumstances in my life that made me feel that I had to believe a certain way about the Bible and God and now I am slowly freeing myself of them and it is fantastic. I don't want to fear God, I want to talk to God in a relationship that is open, a God that is more about love than rules. There is much love with God, but also with that love is pain, and events in life that we have no control over. It is our relationship with God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit and our community of faith as well as complete strangers that help us survive, thrive and move on.
When I began understanding why I had felt obligated to believe in a certain way, and having guilt for not believing in those certain ways and judgement that I felt from others, I then turned it around and began to judge those whom I had felt judged by. Not a good move for me, but one of reaction. I have been working to let this go as well. The more secure I feel in my beliefs, the less all that matters. My goal is too let go of worrying about denominations, and what other people think. I am embracing for the first time, my own beliefs from my heart and gut. Peace to all. Amen!

The Sex Questions

As you can tell I watch Oprah and I just counted and have 32 of her shows on my DVR. I juggle to delete other things so that one day I can watch them all or when summer comes and everything is reruns, I can have time to catch up and watch the shows from the winter. I try to delete them but then I know I always find a little nugget of information in them so I keep them and juggle. But recently the shows that I HAD to watch were about telling your children about their bodies, and sex and all that entails with Dr. Laura Berman.

I don't know about you but when I was growing up there was no sex talk, and this is an area that I am going to have to prepare for as I have no roadmap in teaching my own children. And I really want to do a good job with my girls. They are young but I am trying to lay the foundation now for having open conversations when the time comes.

This show spoke to me for many reasons as well as for the above reasons. And I had a huge AHA moment. This show had two fourteen year olds that were ready to have sex, yes and they were on the telly with their mothers talking about it (and where were the dads???) They were a cute couple, and were in love, holding hands.
The parents had tried their best, (that's what we all do our very best) the girl's mom had talked AT HER, the boy's mom was very open and had many discussions WITH HIM. But the kicker was when Dr. Laura Berman, (I love her) proceeded to ask the couple several pointed questions. Why do you want to have sex now? What will happen the next day? How long do you plan to be together? That last question was the one that tripped it all up. They asked the boy and he said "a long time." She then proceeded to ask the clarification of all clarifications. (Give it time, don't rush it...Oprah had to intervene and make Dr. Berman slow down) "How long is a long time?" He pauses dramatically, and finally says "6 months to a year."
Close up on fourteen year old girl, who has just been given the shock of her life thus far. I feel for her. She had no idea this was coming. My aha moment was that I could put myself back in her shoes (not the part about wanting to have sex at fourteen) but the I'm in love, and this is going to last forever. A long time defined for a young girl is forever, and that means they will get married and have children together and a long time for a boy...six months.

They talked some more about it, and asked fourteen year old girl again if she was ready to have her first time with him and she said well, not if he was going to put the limit on their relationship at six months. Wow, lesson learned. The questions were so relevant and ones that as a mother you wouldn't think of and I need to write them down for later use (or maybe I will save these in my DVR for a couple of years!!) I hope that the discussion was now opened up more for this young girl and her mother. I hope that I am able to empower my girls and give them the right amount of information, guidance, and values. And as for the fourteen year old boy, I wonder if he wishes that he had not gone on Oprah with Dr. Berman???

Time has Changed

Time to me has changed now. I'm not sure when it did this but now I have noticed it. I was just listening to a song by Darius Rucker called "It Won't Be Like This For Long" about children growing up fast and I had this exact sentiment when writing about holding Riley's hand a few weeks back. A change has occurred in the way that I look at time.

Maybe because I'm forty now? I had all the time in the world in my youth, teens, twenties. The thirties were spent becoming a parent and having very young children. During that time some of those days crawled. An hour with a newborn and toddler at home seemed to stretch for days. I remember just trying to survive one hour at a time. It was quite unbearable at times, just feeding, cleaning, changing diapers, crying, them and me. Now it is different.

My darlings are growing up as am I. There is still some crying and temper tantrums and you can use your imagination as to who is having them but the childrearing is getting a tad bit easier. I sat with my youngest daughter in my lap watching a movie in the theatre and we were swaying with our heads together to the music. I reached over and held my older daughter's hand too. I was overwhelmed with emotion and thought it just doesn't get any better than this. I have to hold on to these feelings because I will turn around and they will be grown. Yes, the way I look at time has changed and I'm changing too.

Secrets of Moms

Oprah had on a very interesting show about motherhood recently, I don't know what the title was but there were some zingers from "real" moms. Moms admitted to "dirty little secrets." Some of them were really funny because they hit home, hard.

1- One mom admitted to skipping pages while reading to a young child at bedtime. In the past I did feel a little guilty that I would be messing up my child's ability to read and comprehend if I skipped pages or made up words to go with the pictures which sometimes was more work than reading the actual words. I realized that I am able to read complete pages correctly and have no idea of what I just read. I would like to thank my college education for that - that must be where I picked up the skill.

2- Another mom admitted to crying like there was an actual death in the family upon acquisition of a mini-van. I didn't cry but I sure felt sad. Mini-vans are so functional but hot, they are not. Maybe they are so cold, they are hot. All I know is that I'm already planning my next hybrid vehicle but my husband likes to drive cars for 10 years or more so, and he says he will drive the minivan. I can't allow that man to drive a minivan. It will damage his DNA in some way. I've already let my pride go, and he is already driving my handed down girly Highlander due to an accident. He gets the next car and it will be HOT!

3- a mom talked about how the nether regions were no longer an "in" site, they were an "out" sight as in, a human came out of the region and there would be no more incoming. This is an open blog site so I feel that I will not share a lot on this topic but there were times I agreed with her wholeheartedly especially when I was breastfeeding. That could be a whole topic in and of itself. I remember having to pick the nipples up and point them forward in the bra as they were so mashed up, they were heading south. Time and gravity are already doing that job but it seems like during breastfeeding it was amplified greatly.


These are my secrets:
4. My children don't always get baths everyday or every other day for that matter. If there is visible evidence of the need for a bath, that is what the leftover baby wipes are for.

5. I let my youngest child wear a nightgown during the day, in fact many different nightgowns over the course of the day. She just likes nightgowns. Who can blame her? They are very comfortable. I would wear one on the days we don't leave the house but I need support in the upper regions.

6. I really don't go goo goo over babies. I have a massive postpartum depression reflex and they scare the crap out of me. They are beautiful miracles (and I KNOW that) but I don't want to hold one. It brings back a boatload of anxiety.

7. I am very grateful that both of my children like yogurt because that seems to be the most nutritious food that they will get some days. Their diet is so limited to chicken fingers (or nuggets depending on the restaurant!), fish sticks, macaroni and cheese and let me not forget, GOLDFISH. I was actually delighted when Riley decided she liked a Lean Cuisine that had chicken, pasta and sauce, even with the salt it was more well rounded.

Those are some of mine that I can remember right now, do you have any mom secrets????

The Five Tibetan Rites

At yoga on Friday, I was introduced to the five Tibetan Rites. I have been going to yoga for a couple of months now, again. After the last yoga session, I told my good friend that if I ever hesitated in going to yoga again, for her to tell me. "GO." I will appreciate it afterwards. Why do I hesitate in doing something that I know will benefit me greatly? Yoga is beginning to teach me a lot and it's one of those exercises that is good for the body, the mind and the soul and you can't get much better than that.

It has taken several years to get to this understanding of yoga. At first, I took yoga to relieve stress so that I could try to procreate. (Just a little pressure there to relax!) I had a hard time as I had been conditioned to do cardio in the form of treadmill or aerobics, and this yoga practice was very foreign. I'm not sure how long I practiced but then I did achieve conception and that ended my ability to practice yoga for years! Now seven or so years later, I have begun the practice again. Last spring I attended several beginner classes which was just my speed, and I thought, hmmmmm, maybe there is something to this. Then the summer schedule blew away my opportunites to practice once again.

On Friday, the fabulous teacher, Carmen took us through the five Tibetan rites and I had never been exposed to this. She told us that if practiced everyday, these are anti-aging exercises. The Tibetans live, (have lived?) to 150 years of age. Well, now as an information seeker, I HAVE to do research on them. I have always read about the benefits of yoga as well as Pilates. I am now practicing yoga and Pilates each once a week. That is what I can fit in and last week I rearranged my schedule for something important(?) and missed yoga. I realized that I must stick to the schedule. I HAVE to do it for me. I really, really missed it, and I felt off. When I walk out of the Y, I feel like my body and muscles have been well used and are achy but also feel so renewed and refreshed. And now I realize I want to adopt some form of a Tibetan practice, and that a disciplined approach is good for staying young. But then the summer will come around and the kids schedule will interfere...but maybe I will be a little further along in my practice and be able to do it on my own until I can hold out for Fall.


I hope that I am able to keep up the yoga practice until I am old, really old. When I look around the room, everyone in there is calm and serene. Such a difference from Boot Camp, or Muscle Works. That calmness is something that I long for and will continue to pursue.


This is probably NOT a link to a sample DVD of the Tibetan Rites - but you can find it on You Tube if you want. The first step is twirling!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZLHIY06mqo