day 14 - mothers and daughters

sleepily turned off the computer before i remembered that i hadn't blogged for the day. oh so tired. brain is on shut down mode, but i am here. keeping my commitment and logging in. physically back to an even keel today, although the energy i awoke with depleted very quickly. woman at work told me that the norwalk virus is what is going around, that would make sense. this wasn't just the flu. so the exhaustion is normal.

nice at least to be back to an appetite and eating my 3 meals. my body feels more like itself again. i don't weigh myself, but it's still tempting. just happy to know that my appetite has shrunk and so has my body.

we leave on our mini vacay on thursday, not sure what kind of access i will have to internet, but i should be able to access wi-fi somewhere. daughter's friend is having hard time finding coverage for her shift. she is convinced more than anything that she will be disappointed. it's heartbreaking. she has the similar personality trait from liam of predicting all of the horrible things that could happen, or how someone will react negatively but throws in a bit of my personality trait that makes it highly personal and fatalistic in regards to her. liam is able to make it outside of himself, but her doom and gloom is all internal. how can she have gotten the worst of both of us?

she started therapy last month, just a casual interaction to monitor her. we have seen signs of some real struggle and knew that she would benefit, she was willing and i think it was a good move. this is a brutal time for her and she is socially so challenged. there is little i can do as i have always known that my influence and involvement would become peripheral and that others would begin to be needed. we have always been the people who were there for other peoples kids enough to know that we would need others around for ours too. so thankful that we have them.

i am just finding it so difficult to not take her moods personally. to rise above... i have seen mothers react tot heir daughters like they are siblings instead of mother/daughter - it is so tempting to want to give back in spades what is dished out, especially when i am not feeling well, but i have refrained.

am learning much to look back at my own relationship with my mother. giving far more grace than i have ever given. understanding that my emotional make up would have made it very difficult to navigate. i know it's why i spent very little time at home at this stage of my life... regretting that my daughter does not have the same outlets i did. a safe camp to work at, filled with people who will teach her how to work and grow. i want that for her. i tend to reinforce the weakest parts of her instead of strengthening. i hate that.

wish i had something pithy and intelligent to say to wrap all of this up, i don't. i am falling asleep at the keys. doesn't really matter anyway, it's just for me.

2 posts in one day...

need a place to vent. recovery friend is standing on my last nerve today and i need to organize my thoughts so that i don't have future amends to make...

it has also triggered mom memories and for that i am grateful, but i have been re-living some of my most painful memories with my mother this morning.

my daughter's best friend is this woman's daughter. and yesterday she called needing help getting ready for her graduation. my friend had taken a shift on the day her 8th grade daughter graduated from middle school. this young girl had no one to help her get ready for her grad and her grad dance and she asked my daughter to help. i knew my daughter might be stepping into a land mine, so i suggested she come here, instead of getting ready by herself alone at home.

i have sensed that this woman, who has lived in our community just under a year now, leans toward narcissism. last night it was confirmed and i watched as she humiliated her daughter in my home, blamed me for it and made it all about her. i relived moments of my own teen years as i saw the daughter fold herself into tight places, her joy of the event stolen and her mother shame, blame and excuse herself for taking an extra shift on her daughter's big day.

i had volunteered the night before to help her. it was brushed aside and was told she wouldn't need any help. i took the little time i had with my family before my meeting last night and cared for this girl. i fed her, flat ironed her hair, gave her little hippy braids to tie back her hair, painted her toes and finger nails - the whole spa treatment. mom came just as i was finishing her nails and crushed us both and had a temper tantrum in my home in front of my children.

i awoke this morning to a "i'm sorry you" email from her and it just iced the cake. i want to blast this woman a new one, but know that will only succeed in driving her further into her martyrdom and blaming. so i'm processing here so that i am calm enough when the next interaction happens...

this has re-framed so much of my childhood - helped me see why i feel responsible for everything around me. so much blame. so much shame. so much martyrdom. because mom was so sick it masked a lot of her worst behavior. her life sucked and we all knew it. but the blame for that suckiness was never her own. she never took responsibility for it. she always put it on me. always.

looking back i am amazed at how clear certain events are now. any large event that cast any light on me (or off of her) was regularly highjacked to be all about her and how difficult her life was because she had to help me with mine. she then used every excuse in the book to make her behaviour okay and mine intolerable.

this daughter is a joy. she is so helpful and sweet. she is being remade into the mother in this relationship and it's so obvious to me in watching this that is what happened to me too. while this was a total pain in the ass, i am so grateful for the living color illustration it has brought...

now where do we go from here?

i hope you dance

one of my fb friends put this in his update today - and i watched, thought of pink and got all misty.

i hope you dance too...

pushing through the crust

i have enjoyed a season of peace and tranquility recently and i am hesitant to move past it. it feels like the crust that cools over the top of the hot lava and begins to turn to stone. hiding the heat and tumult that is lying just below the surface. last fall was so intense. so deep and so important. what happened after was the product of the hard soul work i had done, but very little has been done since that time. i've been content here on the surface and have enjoyed to joy of looking forward instead of within. deep within. (photo source)

i sensed last week though that i was avoiding things. that i was disengaged somehow. it is not normal for me and i know it signals a need for the next layer of the onion to be examined.

our holiday was magnificent. we were honored and graced with so much abundance it made me giddy. i know it will be one of my childrens most cherished memories. they will never hear the waves of the ocean without being reminded of that trip. it was truly special and i am very grateful.

i am sure that the lava bubbling below the surface now has much to do with my father and my own personhood. if there was a low to this trip it was seeing how unhealthy he has become. not just physically either. some days we were like two flies trying to find their way out of a trapped room, both banging on the screens and trying to escape. a couple of times he snapped and it caused me such sadness.

there were some sweet moments, but so often they were clouded by his inability to be present and i was reminded far too often of my own proclivity to isolate and withdraw out of fear and insecurity. there were also far too many times when i saw the parallels between my beloved husband and my ornery father. and the ache that created in my heart as i realized i did marry a man so much like him in the inner places, and yet so very different on the outside. i was able to identify the deep wounds that seem to reopen so frequently in my interactions with liam - shadowed pain that i react to instinctively. there were times this was so clear it took my breathe away.

i tried to sit with it and understand the deep triggers this engaged in me without lashing out to hurt those around me. most of that time was spent looking at my toes in the sand, agate hunting on the beach. my mind a whirl with comebacks, indignation and the deep desire to escape the pain.

there was a moment my father lashed out at me publicly and my aunts were able to see my pain and sought to comfort me. i was able to process my deep desire to stand up for myself and speak to my father about all that i have wanted to say for years. i just knew that i didn't want to have any of it clouded by anger, cruelty or childish behavior that would taint my message and keep him from hearing me. talking with them, and liam helped prepare me as i knocked on his bedroom door.

i asked him if we could talk and he turned off the golf game. i acknowledged how difficult our relationship was and how simply he seemed to be able to relate to my sister. i spoke of the pain that comes from that, but understood that it was just as difficult for him as it was for me. he explained that his frustration with me stemmed mainly from my assumption that i always knew what he was going to say. i guess it was a bad habit i inherited from living together for five years. cutting to the quick instead of having to listen to his meandering instructions. i guess it was my way of reminding him i was really smarter than he was... i apologized and committed to trying to listen.

i then told him that what i had always wanted from him was for him to be proud of me and how i spent my whole childhood trying to reinvent myself to get his attention by doing the things that he liked, hunting, fishing and sports. i said that i was sure he always wanted a son because it seemed he was only able to relate to me when i was participating in more male activities and how hard it was for him never to just notice me for who i was and say things like "you're a really good mom and i'm proud of you." or things like that.

i left a gap hoping for some affirmation. it never came.

so i ventured into freedom. i knew that i would never get this chance again and that my motivation in this was not dad motivated, it was self motivated and i needed to separate myself from the subtle control i have let him exert over me in the past.

i then told him that most of all i wanted him to understand that my choice to use my gifts wasn't seated in rebellion. the most diabolical part of his control was the arrogance he lorded over me in judging that god was on his side theologically. it was never openly acknowledged, but i loathed the fact that in his mind i was thumbing my nose at him and god by making the choice for ministry i have made.

i was able, calmly and clearly, to talk to him about this and explain that there are many people in the kingdom who take scripture seriously who come down on the opposite side of his views. that i wasn't trying to change his mind and he could believe forever that i was mistaken, but that i wanted him to understand fully that i was not being rebellious. that was the burr that had rubbed me raw. i was really proud of myself for remaining calm, not hitting below the belt and not shaming him in any way. i spoke my peace, challenged him and his memory (especially of my mother and her gifts and spunk), honor myself and finally cut the unhealthy chord that tied me to him.

i left gaps in my explanation for him to talk and a few times i reminded him that i wasn't trying to change his mind and that i was okay if he never, ever supported me in this. strangely enough, i meant every word of it, and it became more true as i gave words to it. i realized that it is his loss. god will restore what the locust have eaten.

to his credit at the end of our conversation he did say that he would pray about it. i believe he will. i am more sure that the holy spirit, if he is open, can do far more than i would ever be able to accomplish.

so i didn't hear my coveted "i'm proud of you" or even a hearty "i love you", but i am truly okay with that. i just know that i have some inward work to do in this area to reclaim the places of me that have been lost to the many years of neglect and denial.

hodge podge post

i can't believe how long it's been since i've actually blogged. i've highlighted a few things here and there, but putting words down has been sparse. i have been journalling and answering step questions for my sponsor, but blogging has been non-existent.

it will be for the next couple of weeks too. we leave sunday for the closest southwest airlines airport (5 1/2 hours away) and spend the night in town and fly monday to portland. we've got 2 nights there and then a week on the california border at my aunt's house. my dad's 5 sisters will all be there and i am guessing that this will be the last time i'll be able to be with all six of them together. they're all getting old. my favorite aunt had a stroke this past year, my dad isn't playing basketball with the kids anymore. he can still shoot and coach, but he told me today he's done playing (which shocked me and broke my heart) and the other four are all just about as unhealthy.

these five women are the last ancestral links (except for one maternal aunt) i have on the planet... they are incredible women. some endured very difficult spouses, addiction, heartache and trials of various types. they come (i come) from pioneer stock. i'm hoping to catalog and record many of their stories this time. we've got a couple digital video recorders and i'm hoping they can just forget they are there and keep talking. i'd hate to think that their stories pass with them. there is so much i want to know.

at the end of that week we have all rented two reunion houses on the pacific coast for 5 days and a lot of extended family will be joining us there. i can't believe how the details for this trip have fallen together. it really feels like a god thing.

i'm hoping to have a real heart-to-heart with my dad while i'm there. i so long to talk theology with him. he still holds so tightly to that old plymouth brethren mindset. i know it was special to him. it gave him hope when so little in life did. but i'd love to show him where it has hurt both of us. i don't think that patriarchy serves the male species any better than the female. only the alpha males who bark and bite really get to thrive in that environment, the rest of us just feel inadequate. i think my father has spent most of his christian life feeling really inadequate. the truly "spiritual man" that was held out had more of my set of giftings than his. that was the diabolical part of this. my mother and i were given the gifts he lacked and required to fulfill his ROLE in life.

it's such an ill fitting cloak and i have shed it. i'd really love for him to also. and if he can't just to understand why i have without labeling me as rebellious, as i have been anything but.

i am also going to tell him that the only thing i have ever truly wanted in life was for him to tell me he was proud of me. i had thought for years (decades?) that it would spoil everything if i had to ask for it, but hope challenged that idea and reminded me that anything worth having is worth asking for. otherwise it may go unfulfilled forever.

the most difficult part of all of this is doing all of it for myself and not for his reaction or response. i am truly walking into this with the hope that i am able to empower myself to break free of the restraints, real or imagined, that have kept me feeling captive to his approval and control. i long to be free.

i don't know what kind of access i'll have to the internet while away, but i will miss your words. if you think of me any prayers for our safety and this situation would be so appreciated. have a lovely couple of weeks!

better stories

pink and i had an important conversation yesterday. she's 12 and we've been navigating this "tween" thing for a bit now. she's starting to individualize and define herself apart from liam and i - we know this is an important stage, specifically for us as parents. how to guide her through this process so she knows we're here and there are boundaries, but not to do so with heavy hands and push her into rebellion.

music is one of the ways she is defining herself - not uncommon for pre-teens. i have the itunes account, so purchases are "through mom" at the moment. our agreement is that we sit down and listen to the song together, i read the lyrics, if i struggle with them, she reads them out loud and then we watch the video together. if the song passes that muster the purchase is made. it brings a lot of dialog and interaction. yesterday it created a bit of friction that we processed out together.

she falls into the bubble gum, disney kids type of music. i was thrilled that branched into hairspray recently, but most of the music is "oooh he likes me", "gosh i think he's cute" and "oh, my heart is broken" kind of drivel. it's so difficult for me to watch this young, vibrant lady begin to define herself as a "half" person because her culture is beginning to tell her that without a man in her life she is not whole.

we listened to taylor swift and ashley tisdale songs and so few of them were empowering to her as an individual. it breaks my heart. i started to ask some questions and try to help her untangle the message these songs were telling her. i got the "you only want me to listen to christian music" feedback and i balked. so.not.true. i tried to help her understand that the movies she watches, the books she reads and the music she listens to are forming her stories. it is normal for a lot of those stories to be about relationships, even relationships with boys. but if every story she buys into keeps telling her that she's only 1/2 a person without a man she will begin to believe it.

too much pressure for a twelve year old. too much pressure for my single 40 year old friends. i loathe that kind of misinformation. i used the three taylor swift videos as an example (wow, she is a beautiful little barbie doll that one...)

first an adorable song about a boy who is her friend but doesn't know she exists. the second about the boy who scatters roses in her room and writes her love notes and the third about the boy who has dumped her and she wants to burn his pictures and she fantasizes about trashing his apartment and licking all of his utensils and spitting into his mouthwash. all really well done, all fun, interesting songs w/ intelligent lyrics - but in 15 minutes we have the scope of this little girls life. three relationships that burn bright for a millisecond and flash out with broken hearts and boatloads of pain. that young, beautiful woman will be shattered by mid life with these kind of rotating door relationships.

i got to tell pink that even if you do get the boy who writes you love notes and scatters roses at your feet it lasts for a whole 10 minutes. liam and i had a wonderful courtship. but was it reality? 25 years later, if feels like about 10 minutes. i just long for her to balance out the dreamy romance with stories that form her into her whole self. stories that empower her. stories that open her up past the doors of the school and the dances and show her the vast world that is waiting for her.

that is why bands like superchick float my boat. it's not that they are "christian" - most of their songs have little to do with "jesus" specifically - but whole life, facing the hard places and moving through them. those are the kind of stories i long for her to hear.

this is your brain on abuse...

oh. my. gosh.

research shows that abuse and neglect actually affects our brains. this is ground breaking.


Abuse Changes Brains of Suicide Victims

fathers and daughters

neatorama had a link to an unusual article for them, they're usually fun facts, funny videos and interesting stories - this is something i wouldn't have found on my own, but followed the link and read the full article. while not a father i fully appreciated the author's dilemma - how to raise his new daughter in a world where she is valued and honored for far more than the media tells women they should be:

Best Life Magazine: Family & Fatherhood - Bimbo Proof the Nursery: How to be sure your daughter doesn't turn out like Lindsay Lohan, by Steve Almond

It’s here that my old Dude Self and my brand-new Dad Self come to blows. Because as much as I want to check out Paris and Lindsay, I know I’m harming my daughter by doing so. For one thing, I’m sending her a very clear message: Daddy loves sluts. Be a slut and Daddy will love you. And if you don’t believe that a 1-year-old picks up on messages, you’ve never seen my daughter in action. She is intensely focused on everything in her environment, especially whatever I happen to be looking at.

But even if I ogled Paris in private, I would still be contributing to the Culture of Paris, helping to shape a world in which young women win adulation for making porn videos and getting arrested, rather than for, say, curing cancer or brokering peace in the Middle East or being a mom. If we all stopped consuming celebrity scandals, they would cease to exist. If a media slut goes to jail and no one’s there to film the perp walk, does it really matter?

...

I want Josephine to grow up in a world where her ambitions will be about what she wants, not what the panting men of the world want from her. My daughter is not a commodity. Her heart can be broken. Her spirit can be wounded. And there is no accessory that can rescue her from these dangers.

this reminds me a lot of a post i wrote four years ago that still seems to find it's way into a lot of google searches: daddy's girl - an open letter to fathers of daughters

parental bootcamp

i am hating this stage of parenting my daughter. she just turned 11 last month and we have begun to navigate hormones, mood swings and puberty and i am not doing so well. more than anything i want to raise a strong, capable, kind daughter - i don't want to crush her or bend her to my will - but dang, this is really tough to navigate.

as we did the examen last night as a family i shared that my worst was having 20 years of experience talking with young girls and helping them through this stage of their lives and being unable to do so with the one that i love the most in the world. i know it's time for her to have other adults in her life. i know that is why i had success with so many other tweens and teens was because i wasn't their mother. i was just a lady in their church who taught their sunday school class or was married to their youth pastor, or just plain cared. i know i'm not supposed to be everything to her - but i would give quite a bit to be able to not be the brunt of all of her frustration, the one she can't seem to stand and the one who she scratches at when she just can't figure out what she's feeling.

and i don't know if it is true for other mothers of daughters, but she is a window into my own soul and a flashback into my own growing up years. i know she is not me and i more than anything want her to be her own person, but dang, she is so me in so many ways - far too many ways that i hate in myself. i keep thinking "oh, if you're going to pick a way to be like me, please don't pick that!"

i realized when my kids were in their "terrible 2's" (which for me started at about 30 months and went until they were about 3 1/2) that this was more about me and liam than it was about them. this was boot camp for parenting. we were learning how to parent our children.

i looked at liam the other day and went "duh! THIS is bootcamp for the teen years". that's why this is so hard. we are now learning how to parent teenagers. and i'm sure at about 16 there will be a "boot camp for parenting young adults" too (hopefully i can remember that one is coming instead of being stuck dead center in the middle of it feeling like i'm drowning)...

i am learning how to parent my daughter as a teenager - it's supposed to be hard. it's supposed to take effort and intention. i can almost hear my own mother say "hey, if you're going to take anything from me, don't take shutting down, don't take pushing away, don't take withdrawl and feeling like your own failures are insurmountable here" - because, dang it all, i am so much like her too.

she smoked to make me go away. when things were hard and we were all nails and teeth with each other she would light up a cigarette and it would push me away. i hated them and she knew it. it was her way of controlling the situation. i never understood it then - but i do now. and yesterday i realized that i am using the computer as my cigarettes. i turn my head and loose myself in the screen and say to her "you can't ignore me, i choose to ignore you" - god help me. this is something i want to give back to my mom and not carry with me into my mothering of pink.

on sunday my counselor spoke at church about his father who had just passed away. it was a beautiful eulogy as he unpacked the wonderful things his father has handed down to him. he also was wise in speaking of the things that he didn't want to carry forward into his own life, the places where he saw weaknesses. he used this verse to explain that once we identify what those things are we are then able to choose to live a different way:

"In those days people will no longer say,
'The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
and the children's teeth are set on edge.'

Jeremiah 31:29

i know this is an opportunity to choose life and a new way. i don't know what that is yet, but i know what it isn't. it isn't easy. it isn't comfortable. it isn't natural. maybe i do know one thing that it is. it is worth it.

christmas power post

good christmas eve morning!

no, i am not in a puddle in the corner of the room, honest. sorry, life has just gotten full and i am truly enjoying the holiday season and emotions. even the melancholy ones.

i am way behind in my correspondence, book reviews and blogging. please know that i am not ignoring you, but my computer has decided to crash and i have wanted to wait until after the holidays to bug our good friend here who might be able to fix it for us. i don't think it's fatal, just more than we can manage on our own.

my christmas present is on it's way - a new screen. i will take a picture and post of the ANCIENT screen i have been using - it is HUGE and cumbersome, and my new flat screen will give me lots of space on my desk to do art now too!! and i won't have to play the "oooh, let's guess what the capture is on the typepad blogs 15 times so i can post a comment..." (that has been going on for almost a year now...)

we have had fun this season using our surprise baby bonus check from the government and are putting it to good use. i think it might be a bit of coping going on, but we're not going into any debt, so i'm not going to feel guilty, well, i'm not going to let the guilty feelings stay. we're being generous with it too and have got to help out some other families in our community have a christmas too.

pink and i celebrated our first 'santa lucia day' - she did so well and was a shining light in her white gown and wreathe (we need to get a 'real one' next winter). i've included a picture of the saffron/current buns we made together. we have also decided to embrace st. nicholas day next winter as buck felt very left out of the preparations, so we are doing research and finding traditions we can embrace that will allow buck to have 'his day' like pink has her's now with st. lucy day.

i am just loving the rhythm and flow of this first christmas without ministry or moving in the way. it is simple and beautiful and we are finding the things that truly matter to us. i do miss family, even liam's family, but i think our choice to stay close to home this season has been a good one.

i promise i'll write more soon. i've put together my top 5 post and will get that up as soon as bob launches the blog. you're invited to join - and this year blog readers can join too - find the top 5 posts (from any blogger) that you've read this year and send it to bob at the corner blog and he'll add it to the list!

have a wonderful next couple of days - please know that you have made this year more rich and far more interesting for me! merry christmas!

emotional osmosis

osmosis - noun - a gradual, often unconscious process of assimilation or absorption

i am a sponge. not the kind that takes from people and never gives, but the kind that soaks things around me up without discretion... i have known this about myself for a few years now, but i've not really known what to do with or about it.

this week i saw it in my daughter so clearly that i learned something, actually a lot of things about myself.

one of those things is that i need to learn what to do about it quickly. seeing those things we hate about ourselves in our children is great motivation to begin to find tools for making better choices.

the metaphor of a sponge doesn't describe exactly what happens though. maybe a mirror is a good additional metaphor.

i thought writing about it might be a good place to start to untangle this knot, to try to explain the process so that i (and anyone else who shares this tendency) can understand it and put a stop to it.

i know i've been this way all of my life. i take on others emotions, especially negative ones without thinking. i guess it was my role as first born in the family to watch the winds and carry much of what was not mine to carry. seeing pink mirror my emotions back to me the other day showed me in technicolor the dynamic that existed decades ago with my own mother and me.

i snapped at pink because we were running late (and that is one of the 10 commandments of our family growing up - never be late, only lazy, disorganized people are late - not us... sigh) and all of my shame kicked in and i vented it at her.

immediately she went from carefree, young, willow-girl to fire-eyed, stiff backed pre-teen. i became livid. 'oh no you don't,' i thought as i stormed out of her room. 'you will not take that tone with me young lady'... upon entering the living room i realized what had transpired there. it was like i was outside of myself watching what had just happened.

she internalized all of my negative emotions and was so overwhelmed by them that they spilled back at me through her own eyes and demeanor. she wasn't feeling that way before i entered her room. i was so excessive in my own emotions that i poisoned her and she mirrored that poison back to me. i did not like this, not one little bit.

you know those places in the movie when the back story is being played out and no time is elapsing in the present - that is what happened as i stood in my living room. i remembered all of the times my own mother would overwhelm me with the depth of her emotion and i would mirror it back to her. i would get in trouble and she'd be scott free. she was not responsible for one minute for poisoning me, overwhelming me and like a sponge i soaked it all in and assumed it was me.

everyone assumed that i was the over-emotional one. the one out of control. the rebellious teenager. no one could understand why i was so angry, so upset, so confused, so very confused. i realize today that it was because they weren't my emotions in the first place.

this all took place in a split second. it was like the penny dropped and so much made sense. in my childhood, in my marriage, and in my parenting. it was why buck and i have such a calm relationship, and why pink and i were beginning to have a tumultuous one. why my mother and i struggled violently to find a bridge to each other and my sister and she were so able to have calm interactions.

i was/am an emotional sponge.

my mother was an emotional sponge.

pink is an emotional sponge.

somehow we absorb the negative emotions for our family and mirror it back to them. it is some kind of sick, twisted osmosis and bad boundaries that cause us to feel responsible, overwhelmed and so very confused when we are in the middle of the storm.

i do this with liam too.

it's why no one in our home growing up was allowed to be angry except my mother. the only way she knew to put up boundaries was by manipulating all of us into not having any negative emotions around her - instead of figuring this out for herself we all had to walk on eggshells... yuck.

bigger yuck... i think i'm doing this to my family too.

god forgive me and help me figure out a way through this. give me better tools.

i think this is a big key to understanding my overblown need for control. i feel so powerless in the face of others grand, expansive negative emotions. it's so scary to inherit some one else's pain and not understand why i am feeling so crushed myself.

i tried to explain it a bit to liam like being an empath. that diana character on star trek who could feel others emotions. she got to use it as a tool - i just get to be bashed around by it.

i'm sitting here weeping as i look back at my past and all of the counseling and depression and wondering if some of it that seemed so unexplainable was really because there was no explanation - it wasn't my emotion to begin with. had i inherited the negative emotion of a boyfriend, my mother, my husband or the other people i was co-dependent with? what if much of that had nothing to do with me at all?

shit.

where does one learn boundaries for something like this? i have never heard this talked about before. i'm sure i didn't invent it, or discover it - so why hasn't this been covered in my past 25 years of counseling? does anyone have experience with this, know what it's called or have tools or books to suggest that i could read?

is this something every woman or eldest child inherits? or is it just as sporadic as being left handed?

i'm also wondering if this is why liam doesn't seem to be able to work through the negative emotions that have him stalled? is it because i haven't allowed him to feel them because i don't want to have to share the trauma too? shit. this feels big. like a big, fat key to unlock a big, fat door. damn. i feel like i've opened pandora's box somehow. i know it's not bad, it's actually good - but the ah-ha's keep growing exponentially and i'm not sure i can get my head around it all.

any feedback here would be really appreciated. i know this is where i'll be heading in my counseling now it makes so much sense, but i have so very many questions. thanks for listening, i think i really needed to get this out.

sleep overs, spa nights and 10 years old...

pink is having a sleep over tonight - and i agreed to be her 'spa servant' as her friend called me...

facials, pedicures, manicures... and tomorrow flat ironing hair and make up... sigh.

i'm trying to busy myself until stewart little 2 is over and i can go to bed!

i'm not ready for 10.

i had a boy, A REAL BOY knock on my door this afternoon and ask if pink was home and could come out to play! he was a real boy - not a playmate of my son (2 years younger) a REAL BOY. ..

i hadn't heard anything about him until about 20 minutes before he knocked on the door. pink was playing outside and he and one of her girlfriends came by and they played in the yard for a bit before she came in. i guess he came back because he enjoyed himself. A REAL BOY...

i can navigate the next part (i think) but this setting guidelines and being intentional RIGHT FROM THE START is just too much too fast. 10 is really 10 in our lives - we have raised our kids to be the ages they really are, not 10 going on 15. i know that pink will respect herself and us in whatever guidelines we determine together, but OH I WASN'T READY FOR THIS TODAY!!

it's like one of those 'life comes at you fast' commercials - wow... 10 years ago i never dreamed i'd be here. what a ride!

tgif!

wow - one week from today, if all goes as planned, we will be pulling into st. stephen. hard to believe!

pink's party last night was a wonderful time - girls are WAY more fun than boys, well, maybe not fun, but sure a lot more social. i served spaghetti and garlic bread with pineapple/orange punch w/ sherbert - it was so fun to wait on them hand and foot. pink was in her glory. i sat and filmed one of the games where she sat in the center w/ a blindfold and the other girls spun around her in a quasi-mulberry bush kind of game and was so moved at the metaphor of her being surrounded by her bestest friends, encircled in love before she launches out on this new phase of her young life. it was beautiful.

today peace is reigning in our humble home - thank you for your prayers and encouraging emails. they have meant the world to me. please know that although it sounds corny, they are truly wind under my wings! much love!

a mother's wait

pink drew this last year and i found it so moving i've kept it at my computer for the past year. i loved it's simplicity - mary, alone, worshiping at her altar. it's sacred to me. it makes me think that there was that time when the animals were put out to feed, the shepherds had stumbled home to share their good tidings of great joy and joseph ran out for diapers. and she was left with the sleeping jesus.

there is nothing like that first quiet nap - everyone else is gone and you finally are allowed to study the face of your baby. what must mary be thinking?

"such tiny fingers, and oh, those fingernails, could anything be more beautiful? well, maybe his lips, those lips. the face of god. this beauty incarnate came from my body, i carried this child deep within my innermost parts and now i must share him with the world. but just for this one moment, in this quiet time he's still mine. mine alone."

scott mcknight is blogging advent this year. it's helping me a lot. i feel so disconnected, so cut off, especially from ritual or anything communal. celebrating advent is helping. if liam and i could afford to both go to north park, and survive the cost of living in chicago we'd be studying with scott.

scott writes:

Zechariah and Elizabeth were both “upright in the sight of God” or “righteous before God.” That is, they were tsadiqim – those whose lives were conformed to the Torah. I sketch some of this in Jesus Creed (chp on Joseph), but there is force in the Jewish world in being described as “righteous” or a tsadiq. Profoundly pious, rigorously committed to the Torah, and enthusiastically obedient are the sorts of ideas connected to Z and E’s reputation.

In spite of their obedience, they are barren. This description in Luke 1:7 immediately throws us into the world of Abraham and Sarah (Gen 18:11), Elkanah and Hanna (1 Sam 1), and Manoah and his wife (Judg 13:2). Barrenness is a sign of God not blessing, and they were humbled by their condition. That they were aged complicated their condition.

Zechariah, in his bi-annual opportunity to perform the priestly function in the Temple and in his perhaps only time ever to get to do the incense offering, is met by Gabriel. Gabriel is famous for letting Israel in on the future plans of God (Dan 8:17; 9:20-21; 10:15). That future now includes two things that must thrill the hearts of Z and E: first, they will have a baby boy and this boy, to be named John, will be the instrument of God for a revival in Israel (Luke 1:11-17). In fact, he will be the Elijah figure promised in Malachi 3—4.

Zechariah’s experience occurs when all Israel is praying – this would be about 3pm at the time of the evening sacrifice. It is also the time when Israel gathered at the Temple to say its prayers (perhaps the ha-Tepillah, today called the Amidah, or something like it, perhaps also the Shema).While the people prays for God to come for redemption, which is inherent to these prayers, God is actually doing something about it – in a surprising way by bringing into the world a prophet destined for revival.

The boy’s name is to be Yohanan – “Yahweh has given grace.” But this boy will also be one connected with joy and delight and rejoicing and greatness and the Spirit of God (1:13-17).

Yearning is a theme of the first Christmas characters – they are all longing for the day when God would enter history and reverse the tides of injustice, violence, impiety, disobedience, and poverty. In the hearts of Z and E is a yearning for God’s promised redemption.

i've always felt more kindred with elizabeth than i did with mary. mary never really had to wait. she was the young virgin - didn't have to wait for a husband, didn't have to wait for a child. but elizabeth - oh, she is a sister to my story. elizabeth knows what it is to yearn.

i know what it is to yearn for a child.

we struggled with nine years of infertility before pink was born. every month i became a failure. my body rebelled against me. reminded me i was unfit to parent. unfit to be a mother. i can't imagine the yearning that comes both from longing for a child, and yearning for a messiah. to have both of these satisfied in john and jesus brings me to my knees. two women, related, but so very different - both become social outcasts because of their pregnancies - one bearing a child in her old age and one under mysterious circumstances that cause all to whisper her shame. connected by the fulfillment of the promise, tied together in a way that only god could orchestrate. the waiting of the world satisfied in the wombs of these two mothers who must share their sons in such extraordinary ways.

as we celebrate the waiting this season i will remember these mothers, i will remember their wait.

technorati tags: waiting, infertility, advent

talking to kids about sex - part one

cheryl left a comment on my post about sex and mentioned her concerns about talking to her own daughter about this topic. she mentioned her struggle when the instruction she was given was so very lacking, this is true in my life too. how can we teach what was never taught to us? it is the question of every adult raised in a home of addiction or dysfunction.

i am no expert here, my oldest child is almost 9, so i've never talked to 'my own' kids before about sex, but i have talked to 100's of other people's. this would be my 'free advice' on the matter.

i know that my 'learning' came from very distorted sources - on both extremes of the spectrum - pornography and the church - neither of those extremes help anyone to have a real, healthy, life-giving understanding of sex and intimacy.

the most damaging aspect to my 'education' was that both extremes were so shame based. being a female was objectified by the pornography and degraded and impugned by the church. (my experience - not all i know). neither equipped me to be female. i still struggle with this today.

so i think it's most important that when teaching is done that is filled with grace, truth and love, not shame and fear. first of all i know that i can't teach anything that i don't believe to be true myself. i am wrestling with my own female-ness in part because my daughter is blossoming into a beautiful young woman and i want her to accept her femininity as a god given blessing instead of resenting and fearing all that life has in store for her. we need to own our own brokenness in this area before we can teach it to our kids. remember they have a 'b.s.' (pirate warning) detector that can sniff out hypocrisy and inconsistency from a mile away.

the best answer sometimes is 'i don't know, but i'm going to find out'. liam and i have committed to answering our kids questions honestly and age appropriately. we figure if they ask, they are old enough to know the truth. preparation for puberty comes early now as they are developing much more quickly than we did at our age.

pink and i have been reading the care and keeping of you together since november. it's a great start that begins with things like brushing your teeth and combing your hair. all things that were totally left out of my education - no one every did basic hygiene with me - i always felt like i was trying to keep up, and watching my friends to learn and copy. it was a horrible place and made for a very insecure childhood and teen age years. i don't want pink to have to learn anything from copying - who knows who she will think is worthy of copying? i know the people i copied were definitely not the kind of people i want my children to model themselves after.

liam is on the lookout for something similar to begin with buck soon. he's only going to be 7 next month, but we know that being intentional with these precious things needs to be one of our priorities.

the book eventually will come to the place where body parts and feminine hygiene will be discussed. this will bring many questions (as it should) and i want to be there to be able to answer each and every one.

one of the other things that i feel needs to happen with children; is that they need never to be shamed for asking questions. parents who project their embarrassment with these issues on their children punish them for their innocence. too many times of shaming and kids will know they're on their own and search for answers elsewhere.

the other area of sensitivity that i would caution about is not punishing your children for telling you the truth - even if it means they have broken the rules or 'sinned'. there needs to be consequences for these actions, but not for the truth telling. punishing your children for telling the truth creates liars and sneaks. children are brilliant - they know the logic of relational math - [i tell you the truth] + [you punish me] = i am stupid and will stop telling you the truth.

most parents fail to realize the real effects of this kind of economy in their homes. thoughtful consequences vs. reactionary punishment will build the kind of relationship that will keep communication open with your kids in a way that keeps you in the circuit. it's not fool proof, but you've got a better chance of being the person they come to instead of going to places where misconception and ugly lies dwell.

the next item i've been realizing is that metaphor speaks truth into my life in a much less threatening manner that facts and figures. i think we can use story and metaphor to describe those things that are conceptual about marriage, sex and love in ways that honor our children's brains and souls, and in a way that stays with them into the times when they really need it.

the only equipment i was ever given was 'just say no'. it worked for a year or two, but when i realized i didn't want things to stop i was out of ammunition to fight temptation and the emotional/hormonal/societal pressure i was facing.

my parents, youth workers and the church couldn't admit that in marriage sex was fun, wonderful and something to be desired to themselves, so they were unable to prepare me any farther than they were willing to go themselves.

honesty and transparency without graphic details at age appropriate times is the best direction to take - speak the truth in love.

love casts out fear, is never shame based and honors the other person and yourself in a way that brings hope and life. it takes courage. most of the time we avoid it because it might bring up our own baggage - but when we take the time to unpack our bags and deal with those things that are holding us hostage our children will benefit, but more importantly so will we.

so, i guess it's taking longer to get to the 'birds and bees' - so i'll make this part one.

i learned something about myself yesterday

whoa. ever have a realization that is so big it takes you 2 days to absorb it?

i was just reading jen's blog posting about parenting madeline and i realized that the 'part one' that happened yesterday at the baptism was only 'part 1' and the 'part 2' just hit me. i marked her blog post unread and have started to type.

my eyes are closed as i type wanting not to miss any of the thoughts that have just opened up before me.

yesterday i was explaining pink's dyscalculia to a friend and how it effects her in other ways than just math. i started to tell of the difficulties with fingering on an instrument, dance steps, mixing up names and faces, being unable to make change (money) and other social difficulties. i bemoaned the fact that buck is able to follow directions, even complicated ones, and he's entering first grade this year, but pink just can't seem to grasp even simple 3 part directions.

cleaning her room ends up looking like play, and it gets me so frustrated. i come back and it's still awash in toys, books and mess. i think 'oh, you're so a.d.d., when are you going to figure this out?' i say 'pinkie, we need to do one thing at a time. first, pick up all the polly pockets and put them away'...

even accomplishing this is a struggle. she's a bright, capable girl, why is this so hard? and then it hits me yesterday - oh, this is the dyscalulia. this is why - she is overwhelmed and it affects her so drastically that she feels frozen. spinning.

then i realized 'like me'. i too can't seem to maintain a complicated mental list of things to do, it escapes me, my mind seems to have holes where the information just drops out, and so i spin around mentally trying to find the information, instead of completing the task at hand. so i've learned new ways of living, written notes, lists and check boxes. i never realized that i was doing this to compensate for the dyscalculia. i just thought everbody did 'lists'. i hadn't a clue that they were my lifeline.

case and point - yesterday our church had it's normal services and then we all headed out to a friend's lake for a picnic and a baptism (33 people were baptized, it was glorious). getting out of the house yesterday was hell for me. i can manage this poorly on regular occasions, but add 2 potluck items, swimming clothes and towels for the whole family, sunblock, picnic chairs and my sunday school lesson and i am a raving lunatic. character flaws... that was all i saw. i am lazy, incapable and just not as good as all of these other women who can pull this stuff off with grace and aplomb. i'm a sweaty, swearing, exhausted mess before the day has even started. how does this happen?

that ah-ha moment began yesterday at the picnic and has grown into the one that i had this morning reading jen, hearing myself in her words about mothering daughters, and then i have the next wave of the lightbulb while thinking about parenting pink.

i realize 'oh my gosh - it's me. this affects me this way too!'

i am a horrible housekeeper, overwhelmed and so distracted. i can't clean if someone else isn't around to keep me motivated. it's so immature, so broken, so childish. i never realized until RIGHT NOW (as i weep) that the spinning frozen feeling that i have, being overwhelmed and discouraged is part too of this baffling disorder of dyscalculia.

i've blogged before of the ah-ha experience i had in figuring out that i had a learning disability. i always just pegged myself as lazy and inept. figuring out that it's the way my brain works/doesn't work that has given me so much freedom, redeemed so much of my past scholastic shame and disappointment with myself.

this new realization is redeeming my inability to give myself a break with some character defects i have abhorred about myself. whoa. i can barely type for the weeping. i am awash with healing, redemption and grace. i can feel it pouring over me.

this is another reason why i isolate myself. to leave the house has so much involved in it - it's so mentally exhausting that i truly can't see how it's worth the effort, so i don't bother. i can manage myself, but managing others too is truly overwhelming, and leaves me screeching and giving orders. knowing now why that happens is so freeing. so fixable - so completely and utterly redeemable.

i also isolated by not having others into my home. i tell my friends that they can either have my house clean and a good meal, but me looking sweaty and bedraggled, or a good meal, and a sane host, and my house looking bedraggled... to get all three of them 'together' is such an enormous feat that i truly am amazed at those women who do it so well, and actually enjoy it! it has been a great source of shame for me. enormous confusion and something i laid at the feet of my parents so many times for their inability to prepare me for life.

today i have hope. i am a bright, capable woman. i now can lick this. i now can give myself some grace. explain to those around me who always looked at me kind of sideways when i'd complain about the overwhelming feeling i had in just 'getting there'. whoa. i'm still amazed and trying to get my head around this.

i realize that my mother (the other bobbie) and my grandmother probably both had this unidentified 'curse' too. it was isolating and baffling. THIS IS HUGE. it explains so much. it's like 6 pieces of the puzzle of my life have fallen into place this morning. i hope what i'm writing is even coherent. i know it's been so good for me to process this, i'm exhausted! :) wow. this is gonna change my life.

if you are having any 'ah ha' moments as you read this you might want to do some reading on dyscalulia. i think it's far more prevalent than anyone has ever acknowledged before. i truly think it's a major cause of much childhood/teenage angst and poor self confidence, and possibly a doorway to many addictive, comforting and consoling behaviors.

here are some links that i've found. if you find any more PLEASE email me - for myself and my daughter i'm trying to find out all that i can. great britian is farthest ahead in the research field, and i'm praying that more funds and research will be going into the works stateside soon. thank you!

dyscalculia symptoms

dyscalculia.org - best information available online

great britian Research and publishing on dyscalculia

dyscalculia interest group (great britian)

recognizing dyscalculic problems

learning disabilities online

assessment and testing materials

the mathematical brain

i will add any and all links that you know of, so please email me at emergingsideways at gmail dot com thank you!

daddy's girl - an open letter to fathers of daughters

dear father,

i don't have the courage to give this to my dad, but maybe, just maybe, something i say will help your relationship with your daughter, or maybe even a daughter's relationship with you and her heavenly father.

please know that more than any other person on the planet your daughter wants to be noticed by you. for you to be proud of her, for you to be aware of her life.

so many are hurting and lost and usually it's because their daddy doesn't know they exist, or doesn't have the ability to connect with her.

please remember, you are the grown up. even if your daughter is 38 years old like me, you are the adult in this relationship. it is never your daughter's responsiblity to mend the wall that you've let fall. never. she may begin, but will be unable to move forward without your full participation.

just once i want my father to turn to me with a smile on his face and say 'i am so proud of you!' just once. i know he thinks i know that, but i don't. i really don't. because if he really felt that way, he'd tell me, right? please tell you daughter how you feel, and especially how you feel about her. we are never too old for a hug or a kind word. wrap her in your arms, or hold her face in your hands and bless her with eye contact, deep words and time.

time. for most of us it's in short supply. what and who we choose to spend our time with tells those around us what's important. it appears that the newspaper or baseball game mean more to you than we do. i know you work hard, you deserve a break, and honest, we'll be the first one's to give it to you, but first, can't you please recognize that we are here? that we matter?

you more than any other person on the planet will tell your daughter what to think of herself. who she will be as a woman will be determined mostly by you.

scary thoughts.

if you have a problem with viewing pornography or hold that super model up as the standard for all women she'll know it. she'll try to be it, or like me, totally give up and go the other way. even negative attention is attention for the starving.

i can look at the girls we work with and identify the families where distortion is taking place. i can. i can tell by the way the wife dresses, acts and interacts, and the daughter rebels, exposes and challenges that the father is struggling with his sexuality, struggling with pornography or has a distorted image of women. i know from personal experience.

eating disorders, self mutilation, risky sexual behavior - most of it is based in the father/daughter relationship. we watch the way you treat our mother's, the way you touch or don't touch them, the way you talk to them, the way you prioritize them. we watch and learn.

i know when you held us as infants you never realized how much power you would weild over us, but you do. you even have the power to tell us what god is like. our first interpretations of god stand or fall by your example. that's a big responsiblity. what are you telling me about god? is he too busy? is he too distant? is he only impressed by the outside appearance? is he fickle? does he only care about accomplishments? you are telling me about god by your actions.

anything worth doing is worth doing well. fathering above all else is worth doing well. start today. talk to her. tell her you dropped the ball.

can you imagine the healing that would take place if men across the country would begin to apologize for the way they've dehumanized women? brought their wives or daughters up in front of the church and confessed and committed to better. can you imagine the walls that would fall down?

you are a team, you and your family. it's you against the world. act like your daughter is on your team. spend time with her.

for many of you it might be too little too late. the pain may be greater than than a quick apology can fix. but a true commitment to becoming a father that shows her what god is truly like will take time, but it will be worth it. grace, love, patience, kindness, commitment. care about what's happening between her ears, more than what's happening on the outside.

it's about her heart. it's about your heart. when the two connect great things can happen. when they don't things get ugly, distorted and broken. wash her feet. she'll never forget it.