Category Archives: in the news

recycling

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In spite of all that is going on in the world around us, it seems that this is what the media is doing lately…at least when it comes to parenting, marriage and family in the news. The tried and true “Mommy Wars” between SAHM and WOTH moms is recycled and beaten like the proverbial dead horse so they must move on to something “new” like this new-fangled idea called “attachment parenting” and just who is truly “mom enough”…which totally worked and is still working two weeks later.  So now we have everyone getting their panties all bunched up over a survey that reveals that 75% of mothers admit they love their kids more than their spouses. And people are not surprised. Yet some are willing to speak up and admit that, surprise, they love their partners more than the children they share with them.

Sidebar: I love Casey. She is such a lovely person and oh so wise beyond her years. 

But really…this is new…like the concept of attachment parenting?

No, not really.

Seven years ago a mommy shit storm was stirred up thanks to Ayelet Waldman’s New York Times article titled “Truly, Madly, Deeply” and she further explained why her children were not the center of her universe on Oprah just a month later. Women on the show had some very strong, differing opinions as did a lot of other women everywhere. Even I had an opinion back then too.

Ms Waldman further explained this all again when she wrote Bad Mother: A Chronicle of Maternal Crimes, Minor Calamities, And Occasional Moments of Grace where she further explained the fact that she did indeed love her husband more than her children. And again it was like this was a new, awful thing for mommies everywhere to get all bothered over.

And now, three years later, it’s being talked about everywhere again, as if it is something new. The majority of moms I know are jumping on to Team Kids because “husbands come and go” and “our children must be the center of our universes” because “our husbands understand”. Yes, I added my two cents to the discussion siding with Team Husband.

Sorry kids.

Don’t get me wrong here. I desperately adore and love my children…and now my grandchildren. I would totally catch a grenade for you all…and all the other things that Bruno Mars sang about in that song. But the fact of the matter is that none of my wonderful clowns would be here, be in existence were it not for the fact that I truly, madly, deeply loved their father way back when before any of them were thought of or born and now.

Yet another sidebar: Some might question then why even have all of your kids. Someone did and messaged me that very question right after I first hit publish on this particular blog post. Well, I could explain basic biology and sex ed here along with what happens when  birth control fails…then my kids would groan “Gawd! Mom! No!” Then I would remind my children that it takes much more than mom and dad hooking up to make a family and our family is prime example of that (adoption works too). Still it is the truth of Mom and Dad loving each other first why all of you beautiful clowns are here…and how lucky we, Mom and Dad, are that you are here.

And now, after celebrating our 29th wedding anniversary, I am glad that I do work so hard on this love we have shared. Two of our children, our babies, are grown and moved on to their own great adventures including love, marriage, kids (not yet please dear Zoë) and moving even farther away from the Big Top (ahem…Zoë). Abby would LOVE to move out on her own I am sure…and I imagine that she will as soon as she can. Meanwhile Jodie is thisclose to getting her driver’s license and is just two years from graduating from high school with big plans that most likely will take her far from home. At the same time, she and Daniel now have a lot of busy-ness going on in their lives even while they are still but children…teenaged and school-aged. All this happening under and around the Big Top finds my darling husband with more time alone together than in a very, very long time where it is just us.

Thank goodness we have worked hard…very hard to put each other and our marriage first. yes, some days it was hard to put it all first…really, really hard…no, really…so very hard. Some days while in the trenches of baby poop, diapers, potty training, unimaginable loss, homework, after school activities, sibling fights, exhausting teen-aged drama, health crises, financial stresses and woes and all the other stuff that is being parents it would have been very easy to just put one another and our relationship in an old cardboard box in a dusty corner. It would have been very easy. We both would have understood because we both desperately love our children. Perhaps we would be able to find it later too…behind all the useless junk that we save and pile up because we might need it someday or we can sell later on Craigslist. We would have had a lot of support from a lot of other parents too…you know, the GOOD parents…the really good parents who have done the same thing…some of whom are still together…for the kids.

But I’m glad that we didn’t. It has not always been easy to not put the marriage and us aside in favor of the kids. But I’m glad that both of us stuck as best as we could to the heavy lifting and hard work that is absolutely necessary for cultivating a great love. I look at our kids, one by one, stepping out on their own and I am so glad that we didn’t. I find myself alone with just Bill some evenings as the kids still living here under the Big Top have better things to do than hang out with Mom and Dad and I am really, really glad that we didn’t.

I see comments like this

My parents said they loved each other more (we asked :) ). I always felt so safe and secure knowing that they loved each other so much. Their strong marriage has been an example for me. I never ever doubted their love for me, and really did feel so secure knowing that they were a team. They were truly two become one.

and I am even more glad that we didn’t.

To my kids, my wonderful, amazing children and grandchildren whom I would do anything in my human power for because I love you so much, I am so glad that I love your Daddy and your Papa more because, yes, I did and do…not only for me and for him but for all of you too…I love you all that much…just in case you ever wonder.

blotted out sunshine

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I bet a fun thing would be to go way back in time to where there was going to be an eclipse and tell the cave men, ‘If I have come to destroy you, may the sun be blotted out from the sky.’ Just then the eclipse would start, and they’d probably try to kill you or something, but then you could explain about the rotation of the moon and all, and everyone would get a good laugh.
Jack Handley

Did you see it, the Annular Solar Eclipse?

The last time I witnessed a solar eclipse, I had set my alarm for so that I could get up mid-day (after working the night before) July 11, 1991 so that I wouldn’t miss this event. I got up and watched it with my pin-holed piece of cardboard and was in awe to have witnessed such an event. I then threw up because I was just beginning my pregnancy with Zoë. Thus began my seven month long adventure with hyperemesis gravidarum.

Yesterday I was able to watch it with my two favorite guys and managed to get some pictures while we watched in our neck of the woods.

Dirty window compliments of Buster, Betty and Hazel. Do you see the eclipse crescent shadows?

Do you see them now?

It was great to catch this event this time with my two favorite guys. It was even better that this time I didn’t throw up after.

 

 

 

not nearly mom enough

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So Time Magazine prints an article about attachment parenting…like it is this new-fangled thing…and places on its cover a picture of a mother who, OH MY GOD, is breastfeeding her child. No, not her adorable, dimply, sweet-smelling baby, but her nearly four year old child.

Oh!

My!

GAWD!

And once again, we mommies, being the tools that we are, react, respond, over-react…just like the media knew that we would.

Seriously?!

Perhaps I was “mom enough” to breastfeed 4 of my 5 children. Perhaps I was “mom enough” to carry my children (and grandchildren around in a sling. Perhaps I was “mom enough” to cloth diaper my children. Perhaps I was “mom enough” to have a family bed. Perhaps I was “mom enough”. But the way I see it was our parenting style was what we did because it worked for us…for our family.

Nothing more.

Nothing less.

No judgments.

But regardless of what worked for us, for our family, when our children were small we find that we are not done when they are all grown up, or nearly all grown up.

CRAP!

We’re never going to be done with this!

It is then that I am faced with the reality that while I might have been “mom enough” to breastfeed my children for nearly ten years of my years of being a mother, I am not nearly “mom enough” for the rest of it all…the part that the parents of the younger ones can not see…have no clue about whatsoever…the part that the parents of younger ones imagine to be the part where they are all done. Take note…

YOU ARE NOT DONE THEN!

This part? This part is hard. This part is exhausting.

But it doesn’t get better. Sorry. No.

Are you “mom enough”?

Perhaps we need to stop with the discussion, the judging, the sniping, the shaking of our heads. After all we are all on the same team.

that’s not Jesus

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Four years ago when I found out that I was going to be a grandmother…four years BEFORE I thought I was ready to be a grandmother and most definitely four years BEFORE I thought my first born was ready to be a mother, I found myself confronted with a real parenting dilemma. I always promised my children and myself that I would love them unconditionally…no matter what…even if they did disappoint me…or seriously messed up…or ended up being someone I didn’t want them to be. I did promise that and I meant it. Truly. But when my child came and told me that she was alone and pregnant, I found myself faced with just that.

How should I react?

What do I say?

What do I do?

I hugged her and told that no matter what she did her Daddy and I were going to be with her. She would not be alone.

Here’s where I confess that inside I was beyond upset, stressed and worried for my little girl. I wasn’t 50 yet…which means I wasn’t old enough to be a grandparent…which means she wasn’t old enough to be a mom…she needed to finish school first…she needed the baby’s daddy to be there for her. WTF?! This is not what we planned or what we expected or what we taught her to be or do. What were we all going to do??!!

As the weeks passed and we began preparing for Holly’s Coming Attraction, she shared with me that her circle of friends were genuinely shocked that her parents weren’t angry and had not kicked her out or something like that…for getting knocked up…and being alone…and not being done with school…and not having the income to support herself and a baby…for choosing to have the baby…because that is what their parents would totally do. That made my heart sad to hear that. I mean, what would that solve? She would still be pregnant, alone and vulnerable. The way I saw it was this was definitely a time when she needed her parents’ unconditional love more than ever. It was that time that I began to really realize just how hard that promise could be…would be…and yet how important that promise would be to my children…no matter what they did or who they were. Then I resolved to continue to uphold that promise because I was doing it for the first born child…you KNOW I was going to have to do it with the others because they do carefully compare everything.

No, really.

They do.

All.

The.

Time.

But in all seriousness, I stood by one kid in such a situation how could I not do the same for all my children because, like it or not, they often do crazy things that you don’t plan for like flunk out of school or wreck your car or end up being young, single and pregnant or fall in love with someone you can not stand or tell you that they are gay or join the Tea Party or the New Black Panther Movement, or decide to major in Quidditch…or…or…well, there can be so much more worse things. Still they are your children. They still need you. They still need to know that you love them no matter what.

Who said this parenting thing is so much easier once they get out of diapers? Fools! It is harder. Factor in the fact you are nurturing thinking, brilliant human beings whom you raised and nurtured to believe that they are brilliant and they can do anything. Trust me. You are not done…oh, and you could be screwed.

In the news this week was a sermon preached by Pastor Sean Harris of Berean Christian Church in Fayetteville, North Carolina about marriage. His message was timely because next week’s state vote on an amendment to the state’s constitution that will effectively ban gay marriage in the state of North Carolina. Don’t get me started on the whole idea of preaching politics from the pulpit while expecting government to respect the First Amendment rights. That’s another discussion. This is about Pastor Harris’ exhortation to his congregation on how to deal with their children.

So your little son starts to act a little girlish when he is four years old and instead of squashing that like a cockroach and saying, ‘Man up, son, get that dress off you and get outside and dig a ditch, because that is what boys do,’ you get out the camera and you start taking pictures of Johnny acting like a female and then you upload it to YouTube and everybody laughs about it and the next thing you know, this dude, this kid is acting out childhood fantasies that should have been squashed.

Dads, the second you see your son dropping the limp wrist, you walk over there and crack that wrist. Man up. Give him a good punch. Ok? You are not going to act like that. You were made by God to be a male and you are going to be a male. And when your daughter starts acting too butch, you reign [sic] her in. And you say, ‘Oh, no, sweetheart. You can play sports. Play them to the glory of God. But sometimes you are going to act like a girl and walk like a girl and talk like a girl and smell like a girl and that means you are going to be beautiful. You are going to be attractive. You are going to dress yourself up.

Here is the audio clip…trust me it is disturbing to hear…and here is the sermon in its entirety.

Thank goodness he was just joking and he really didn’t mean it. And thankfully, he apologized, er, retracted it.

But the damage is done. In the name of Jesus he stood before a congregation and said exactly what he says he didn’t mean to say. And it got spread all over the webs. The thing is some people do believe it. In one moment their lips and voices are praising God and the next those same lips and voices are condemning…hating people who are different. I see it all the time with people I know and am acquainted with…people I have sat with in a church. For years I reminded myself that this was not Jesus…not at all. But it is getting so much harder to believe…to ignore. How can one reconcile the promise to their children to love them with an unconditional love like that of Christ when they are agreeing with, amen-ing such hate speech from the pulpit? Imagine that one child sitting in that church last Sunday who might be thinking maybe…or perhaps they know they are gay and are trying to figure out a way to tell Mom and Dad. My heart hurts for that hypothetical child much like it did when Holly shared with me her friends reactions four years ago. The way I see it this might be one of those parenting moments where your child needs to know that you love them no matter what.

And here is where I reiterate my promise to my children…

It is at this moment, this very moment, my son comes down stairs with a goofy grin on his face as he models one of his sister’s girly blouses that he grabbed while “helping” his sister fold her laundry.

And just as Pastor Sean predicted, here I am taking a picture of it and putting it here on my blog…because it is funny…because we are a bunch of silly clowns…because we all laugh over Daniel’s silly sense of humor and the fact that he is the only boy-child in this house that estrogen built. And because we are so damn lucky that this child is our child. And because here under the Big Top we celebrate the normal, the love, the silly all the time.

Don’t worry Pastor Sean, his Daddy stepped up and told him to “get outside and dig a ditch because that is what boys do”…while he laughed, hugged and tickled his silly boy.

Why is it that I am imagining that if Jesus was here right now he would be laughing along with us at this amazing, remarkable child of God?

the new hunger games

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In this news this week…and pissing me off on so many different levels… is the K-E Diet for the blushing bride-to-be who desperately wants to lose 5, 10 or even 20 pounds in just 10 days…no exercise necessary. All you have to do is have a doctor insert a NG tube (naso-gastric tube) into your nose, down your throat, through your esophagus and into your stomach. The tube will be taped securely to your face and attached to a feeding pump that will slowly drip a unique 800 calories/day formula of protein, fats and water.

“It is a hunger-free, effective way of dieting,” Di Pietro said. “Within a few hours and your hunger and appetite go away completely, so patients are actually not hungry at all for the whole 10 days. That’s what is so amazing about this diet.”

Slipping into a wedding gown for a dream wedding is a moment of truth for most brides, but as many say that there is a real fear that it will not quite fit. That’s how Jessica Schnaider says she felt with a June wedding approaching and 10 pounds she says she couldn’t lose. She was desperate for a quick fix.

“I don’t have all of the time on the planet just to focus an hour and a half a day to exercise so I came to the doctor, I saw the diet, and I said, ‘You know what? Why not? Let me try it. So I decided to go ahead and give it a shot,” she said.

I watched this news report sitting next to my son, Daniel…you know, the kid who was fed by feeding tubes the first four years of his life. The kid who could not, would not take food by mouth for those years for so many different reasons…medical and otherwise. The kid who had to learn how to safely chew and swallow food protecting his airway because his left vocal cord is paralyzed. Yeah, THAT KID! He shook his head, while watching this report, and asked why would anyone do that to themselves on purpose…if they didn’t have to. “That is so dumb!”, he declared. And bad mommy that I am, I didn’t chide him for judging someone so harshly…because he is right. He is so very right. Yeah, Jessica Schnaider, my ten year old son thinks you are dumb.

I get the pressure some women put on themselves to achieve an impossible ideal…sort of…kind of. I get the desire for a quick fix that does not involve sensible dieting and exercising…god forbid a bride-to-be actually WORK AND SWEAT to be physically something she really isn’t…something that her fiance did not fall in love with. I do. Or at least I try to imagine what would drive a woman to do this for no other reason than to be skinnier. Okay, fine! I DON’T get it. Not. At. All.

My precious child was fed by an ng tube for most of the 132 days he spent in the NICU. It was only the last three weeks of his NICU stay that he was able, with great difficulty, to take infant formula by a bottle to satisfy his neonatologists who directed his care. But just two months after discharge he abruptly stopped and refused the bottle…completely. There was no other choice but to resume ng feedings…even if his pediatrician thought he was right: that in spite of his extreme premature birth, his chronic lung disease, his reflux and his paralyzed vocal cord there was no reason why an infant would not eat…would starve himself.

This was our reality.

Our life with our beautiful baby boy was all about feeding him by a tube that was placed in his nose that led down to his stomach and was taped securely to his soft cheek.

Strangers would stare, ask what was wrong with our baby and offer all kinds of unsolicited advice and solutions…because it couldn’t be possible that a baby simply would not eat, would starve himself.

Everything I ever believed, learned or did as a mother regarding nutrition and feeding my children I had to let go of with this experience with my child. I had to accept the scrutiny (and sometimes judgments) of professionals and lay-people alike. I had to be the one to re-insert his feeding tube if it was accidentally or purposely dislodged by my baby boy…sometimes daily…and I had to listen to him cry as I did it. Daniel was fed by ng tube until he was 9 months old when his pediatrician and GI specialist reluctantly agreed to our request for a gastrostomy feeding tube. They would only agree because I refused to give continuous 24 hour feedings by ng tube because of the potential for dislodging of the tube and aspiration of feeding into his lungs. It wasn’t until 4 years later that he was finally able to be tube feeding free. Feeding this child still remains a struggle and I imagine it will always be so for him. I hated the feeding tubes…I despised them…but I remain grateful for them because at one point in his life it was the only way to feed him. Having cared for, cried for, prayed for and supported Daniel on this journey I have to wonder like he did…Why? Why would anyone do this to themselves on purpose…just to be skinnier and prettier in a dress that they will wear for but one day?

ABC

Why?