This Is What A Sleep Study Looks Like

First off, I'm sorry.

I really, really, really want to be done writing about sleep.  It's all I've written about for the last six months (okay, this is only the third post in six months, but still...).

Sleep, however, continues to elude me.  Initially, the sleep doc decided against a sleep study because I don't exhibit any signs of sleep apnea or restless leg syndrome.  The thought was to not do an expensive test if there wasn't anything meriting it.  I can get behind that.  But after several months of behavioral approaches with very little improvement, it was decided a few weeks ago that I should be scheduled for a sleep study.  Plus, I do exhibit symptoms of periodic limb movement disorder (PLMB).

So here's what a sleep study looks like:

Okay, I should clarify.  This is what the beginning of a sleep study looks like.  Why am I smiling?  Well, there are a couple reasons:

1. This is ridiculous.  I knew I'd be "hooked up" to some shit, but come on.  How is anyone supposed to sleep at all with this get-up?

2.  If I didn't smile, I would cry.  I rolled into the sleep study last night at 9:30, the appointed time, barely able to keep my eyes open.  I've barely slept in a week.  My sleep vascillates between waves of: kinda-okay to downright-shitty.  I'm squarely in the latter phase.  One of the downfalls of this latter phase (there are many) is that I cry at almost anything.  I get, well, a touch emotional when I haven't slept well in weeks.

So here I am hooked up to 20 or so wires (each wire on my head required a massive amount of paste in my hair - I really regret not getting an after shot this morning), a tube in my nose, a monitor on my finger, two wires running to my legs.  I was told I would be video recorded for the night.  Isn't that reassuring?

Somewhere in all of this is the idea that you might actually sleep, and maybe some people do.  I tossed and turned until after 3am, dozing off briefly a few times but never actually settling into sleep.  I had to call Amy, my lovely sleep tech, in because first I was freezing, then I was sweating to death, then I had to use the bathroom (yeah, you know it was ridiculous).  After all that nonsense I finally slept for a little over two hours.

Did they get what they needed?  Will someone be able to tell me what the hell is going on after that spectacularly poor night of sleep?  I have no idea.

The optimist in me thought I would roll out of the sleep study, go home, get ready for work and proceed to have a "normal" day.  Both of my bosses took one look at me and said, "Why are you here?  Go home."  I resisted for a couple hours and then gave in.  A crappy night of sleep is my norm, but last night was something else entirely.  It felt like a strange performance gone wrong.

You're given all the parameters, the dos and don'ts and encouraged to move through your nighttime routine to hopefully attain what is a "normal" night of sleep for you.  Part of me thought, hey, I'm going to sleep in a quiet, completely dark room with no children waking me up... maybe I will get a good night of sleep!  But then I got there and there was no window in the room (this freaks me out), it was clearly a hospital room (was hoping for some homey touches), the bed was horrifically uncomfortable, I was being monitored and videotaped, a sleep tech could come in as necessary to adjust wires or request over the speaker that I change sleeping positions, and I was uber-wired and could barely move without tearing said wires off.

I felt like someone's science project, like a lab experiment gone wrong.  The entire situation was so bizarre; I had entered the level of exhaustion that left me with two options:

1. Smile (okay, maybe with a touch of delirium)

2. Cry

I hope that in 10-14 days I can tell you that this little experiment was worth it.  In the meantime, I'm going to bed.  

And Then There Was… Slightly More Efficient Sleep

That's about as good as it gets these days.

Truth: The last few weeks have been terrifically difficult.

When the good doc told me I would need to sleep deprive myself further--in order to sleep better--she wasn't kidding.  At the time, I wasn't thrilled to begin this sleep schedule a few days before Christmas.  I wanted to enjoy the holidays, not slog through them in a zombie haze.  However, with the way the holidays fell, I only had to work one day per week for two weeks.  This was a blessing.

I've been a functional insomniac for nearly six years.  Despite every doctor I've seen telling me things would get worse before they improved, I still scoffed at their words.  How much worse could it get?

Oh, friends.  It can get worse.

But let's start with the good news:  At my appointment last week, I had improved my "sleep efficiency" by a great enough percentage that the doc granted me a 15-minute increase to my sleep schedule.  This means I now get to crawl into bed each night at 11:15 as opposed to 11:30.  It may seem insignificant to you, but it took all I had not to burst into tears of joy when this was announced.

It is so difficult to not go to bed when you are beyond exhausted.  To put the kids to bed, look at the clock, and realize you still have, at a minimum, THREE MORE HOURS until you get to join them in slumber.  It feels horrifically unfair.  It goes against everything my body is shouting at me (You're tired! Go to sleep!  Why are you up?!?).

The dreaded daily sleep log - to track my sleep "efficiency."

What else is there to do, though?  I've tried it all, and now will try this.

And, by the way, the only reason my sleep efficiency has improved is because I am not allowed to go to bed or get up when I want to.  Pre-sleep schedule I was in bed for an average of 9 hours a night, only sleeping about 6.  Currently, I am allowed to be in bed for 7.25 hours per night, and am sleeping less than 6.

So I am actually getting less sleep now than I was when I began this treatment.  But it's more efficient.

It sounds terrible, and it is.

There have been days where I can't get behind the wheel.  I am so tired I don't trust my reaction time.  I tell Vinny to stop me if I try to leave, because 10 minutes after I decide I am in no shape to drive, I will have forgotten that I ever had that thought and will try to leave.

Yes, that's another really fun part of sleep deprivation.  I am suffering from a serious case of Can't Remember Shit (CRS).  I've experienced CRS in the past, most severely during my pregnancies.  But this is worse than that.  This is like having absolutely no short-term memory whatsoever.  Vinny vacillates between finding it hilarious, annoying, and concerning.  I think. It's hard to remember…

So all of this to say that progress is slow.  Yes, there is progress.  I cling to the tiny bits of progress because without them I would be even more of a crazy mess by now.

What is shifting?  Well, when I go to bed I fall asleep much faster, almost every night.  I stay asleep for longer stretches, sometimes until 5am.  This is major.  Sophie was sick for a stretch  after Christmas, waking me up each morning around 5:30, and that has continued to be an off-and-on trend, enough so that when she doesn't wake me up at that time my body decides to do it anyways.

I am getting, on average, about 5.5 hours of sleep per night right now.  It's not ideal, at all, but it is "better" sleep.

For the foreseeable future, I will continue to slog through my days in a zombie haze.  I apologize if we've spoken, hung out, emailed, or otherwise communicated in any way, and then I had absolutely no recall of it later.  I swear I am not ignoring you or failing to pay attention to what you say.  I am failing to remember it later, and it's frustrating, embarrassing, and, hopefully, not going to be an issue much longer.  I have so appreciated everyone's patience and kind words through this.  Thank you, thank you.

"You Need to Sleep Deprive Yourself"

Trust me, these are not the words an already sleep deprived person wants to hear (also, apologies… this is the most convoluted post I’ve ever shared—and I’m too tired to make it more sensible). 

For those of you that don’t know, I’ve been struggling with severe insomnia for nearly six years.  I was never a great sleeper to begin with, but when I became pregnant with Eli things went off the rails, never to return.

For awhile it was easy to justify: back-to-back pregnancies, a Sophie that wouldn’t sleep, a body that was out of whack once Sophie did finally begin to sleep.  It wasn’t until a year or so after Sophie started sleeping through the night that I truly began to wonder if I would ever sleep normally again.

There were many stages during this deepening awareness that, yes, I have a sleep disorder.  Frustration was the longest stage.  When you are so tired you can barely function and still cannot manage to stay asleep for longer than three hours at a stretch, well, it’s hard not to go bat-shit crazy.

These days, I am resigned to the whole thing.  When I finally caved earlier this year and asked my primary doctor for a prescribed sleep aid, it felt like total defeat.  I despise taking medications and figured it would do little to help me in the long run.

Four different prescriptions later I am taking a medication that does help the situation, a little.  After that initial visit, my primary care doctor was wise enough to schedule, without asking me, an appointment with a sleep specialist.  You know, cause there was a FOUR-MONTH wait to get in to see him and she figured I might find some use in it.  I shrugged, hoping the sleep meds would help enough to get me back on track so I could cancel the appointment before it rolled around.  Not sure where this optimism comes from... 

Four months later, the sleep specialist told me that staying on sleep aids forever wasn’t the best option, but I could do that if I wanted to.  Um, no.  After ruling out sleep apnea and a host of other sleep-related disorders, his next suggestion was to see a sleep psychologist.  I had no idea what this would entail.  His explanation: It’s going to be hard, and things will get worse for awhile, but nearly everyone has success going this route. 

Vague, but what the hell… I’m in.

To give you an idea of the timeline here, I went to see my primary care doctor in May, finally got the sleep aid I wanted (after having to guinea pig three others) in July, saw the sleep specialist in October, and had my first visit with the sleep psychologist at the beginning November.

Insurance snafus kept me from having my first follow-up appointment with the current doc for nearly two months, until this past Monday.

It’s a good thing I’m not exhausted and desperate for sleep.  Oh, wait…

So finally, this highly anticipated appointment rolls around. 

It takes all of 10 minutes and goes something like this:

Doc: From your sleep logs, it looks like on your best nights of sleep you get a little over six hours of sleep.

Me: That sounds about right.

Doc: But you’re often in bed for 9 or more hours.

Me: That sounds about right.

Doc: That’s a problem. 

Me: …

Doc: When you’re in bed that long and not asleep, and doing things like reading or drawing before you go to sleep, your body doesn’t associate your bed with sleeping.

Me: Okay. 

Doc: What time do you want to get up in the morning?

Me: Well, in a perfect world I’d never get out of bed before 8am.

Doc: No, you need to get up before your kids wake you up.  When would that be?

Me: Uh, I have two small kids.  There is no set wake-up time.  Right now it’s anywhere between 6:45 – 7:30, if I’m lucky.  Eli gets on jags where he wakes up before 6.

Doc: So, 6:30?

Me: I don’t want to get up at 6:30.

Now she’s getting visibly annoyed with me.  I shut it.

Doc: We need to figure out your wake-up time, so we can figure out your bedtime. 

Me: Okay.  If I wake up at 6:30?

Doc: Your bedtime would be 11:30.

Me: Oh… so 7:00 would make my bedtime-

Doc: Midnight.

I used to be a night owl.  Not anymore.  Most nights I’m in bed by 10:30, 11 at the latest.  I need to cash out in bed.  To rest, if not sleep.

Me: Well, I guess I’ll take the 6:30 wake-up.

Doc: Right now you rarely sleep for more than 6 hours per night.  So you shouldn’t be in bed much longer than that.  You need to sleep deprive yourself so your body knows that going to bed means sleep and nothing else.  You need to make yourself so tired that your body will learn to sleep during that time because it’s the only time it’s going to get.

DID THIS WOMAN JUST TELL ME TO MAKE MYSELF MORE TIRED?  What kind of operation was this?  Was there a hidden camera somewhere?  Were they trying to make me go off my rocker?  My deer-in-the-headlights look and lack of response must have signaled consent on my part, because she kept going.

Doc: It’s not going to be easy.  You’re going to feel worse for awhile.  But you’ve been sleep deprived for so long that it shouldn’t affect the way you function too much.  If it does, let me know.  But you should be fine.

Me: …

And that was pretty much the appointment.  I’ve waited seven months for someone to spell out something that feels, quite honestly, very basic, although very torture-like.

I came home equipped with more sleep logs, very specific instructions on what I MAY NOT DO in my bed, and both a sense of relief and dread.  Whenever there’s a plan, something else I can try, a new path, I feel relief because it means I haven’t actually tried everything and there is hope that things might improve.  However, this stay-up-late, don’t nap, and get-up-early plan was daunting.  I’m so tired already.  How was less rest going to help me?

I can’t tell you yet whether it’s helping me or not.  Now that my mind knows there is a schedule and I only have limited time to sleep, my nights have once again become quite restless.  Since my days start earlier and end later I feel like each day is its own marathon.  Around 4:30 in the afternoon, when I hit the worst slump of fatigue, all I can think is: Fuck!  I still have to be awake for SEVEN MORE HOURS.  How am I supposed to do that?  But then I do. 

And there’s this: Waking up before everyone in my house is really quite wonderful.  It would be even better if I could sneak downstairs and actually start my day without waking anyone (we live in an old, creaky-ass house, and although Eli could sleep through an air-horn in his room in the evening, in the morning hours he is the lightest little sleeper).  I have been instructed to get up IMMEDIATELY upon waking, so for now I’ve hauled my meditation cushion up to our room, and I’ll sit and catch up on news articles I wanted to read on my phone, dick around on Instagram, do yoga, meditate, and sometimes just sit in the quiet and listen to my family sleep. 

The doc was right that waking “on my own” (with an alarm, of course) versus being woken up by a needy little one would give my day a different start.  When Eli and/or Sophie stumble into our room I am ready and happy to greet them, instead of waving them off back to bed, grumbling about how I need more sleep.  If nothing else in this situation changes for the better, I am thankful for that little slice of improvement.

Where will I be in a couple weeks?  I have no idea, but I’ll keep you posted.  Also, for those of you suffering from insomnia I hope you find some useful advice in this post.  Maybe you can get this figured out much quicker than I have… waiting for medical advice you are desperate to receive isn’t a great feeling, to put it kindly.  I wish all of you many restful nights of slumber, and hope I can join you soon.

These Writing Snippets Aren't Cutting It

Hi.

I know, I know (I’m glad we got that out of the way).

So, I recently had the pleasure of spending a week in Maine.  Why Maine?  Well, last fall I applied to a writing residency I really, really wanted to get (lady writers, you’ll want to check out the Hedgebrook Writer’s Residency here).  While I waited to hear my fate I decided I needed a consolation prize in case I didn’t get it.  You see, friends,  I have barely written anything for myself in, oh, years.  I was starting to get nervous that I wasn’t a writer anymore.  Hell, I don’t call myself a Writer.  I say things like, “I do freelance writing and editing work.”  This is true.

It didn’t take long to scheme up an alternate plan:  I would invite myself to my friend Irene’s house for a week.  I hadn’t seen Irene since graduate school (2008), I’d never been to Maine, and I desperately needed some quiet time and space to write.  She was, thankfully, all in.

It felt good not to pin all my writing hopes on the residency.  Good thing. 

So off I went, to Maine. 

This all sounds easier than it was in reality.  I’ve never been away from the kids for more than three days, and even that began to feel long.  I knew this would be different, though, and it was.  I arrived in Maine on a Wednesday, and while I missed Vinny and the kids each day, it wasn’t until Sunday that the pull really began to take hold. 

But that’s not what I wanted to write about.

What I really wanted to tell you is that I’m still a writer.  I know, I wasn’t sure about it either. 

I want to gush. 

I want to tell you how magical it was: the time and space needed to allow your mind to unfold creatively, to rediscover a long-buried love, to talk shop with someone who knows your writing intimately, to scheme future publishing projects, to reacquaint yourself with long-abandoned projects only to see new potential, to get outdoors and breathe in that ocean-scented air, to take hikes, to linger.

To linger… 

Yes, that’s it right there.

This is perhaps the part of having children that is most confounding to me:  the pull between being present to properly care for little people, and having the time and space to linger in your own thoughts without being tugged in fifty other directions.

Lingering, for me, is crucial to creativity.  If I can’t live in the writing, roll around in it, talk about it, examine it from ninety different angles, well, it’s tough to get to the heart of it. 

A huge part of the problem is that because I write so sporadically, when I do finally find a little window of time to sit down and do the work, my brain freezes.  What do I do with this snippet of time?  Do I start something new?  Do I haul out that fucking screenplay again?  Do I do some research for a book I haven’t started so I don’t really have to write?  Do I organize my writing folders?  Do I make a list?  Do I…?  It’s overwhelming. 

This nasty spiral often continues for the entirety of the Writing Snippet.  And then it’s over, and I’ve usually accomplished nothing, and feel further dejected.   

To have a week to bask in it all was the biggest gift I’ve given myself in a long time.  It felt at once selfish and utterly necessary. 

Re-entry back into regular life has been harsh.  In the week I’ve been back, this is the first real time I’ve had to think—and quickly type—any writing-related reflections.  It’s discouraging.  I told Vinny my time in Maine felt like a tease.  I discovered that yes, it’s still there, only to have it pulled away again.  So I’m left to chase it. 

The difference is, I’m motivated to chase after it now. 

What does my ideal writing practice look like?  It looks like time carved out each day to write.  I kissed this ideal good-bye a long time ago.  At this point in my life it isn’t realistic.  And I’ve come to accept that. 

Here’s the thing:  I don’t wish time away.  Sure, I sometimes think about when the kids will both be in school, and hey, won’t it be nice to have part of a day at home to work on my writing?  Hell yes.  But then this daydream is quickly followed by the sobering fact that Eli will turn five this coming Halloween, and I begin to wonder how this is possible, the way time begins to move at lightning speed the moment those babes arrive.  Soon enough I will be alone far too often without them, and that will be difficult in different ways.

I left Maine with a list of short and long-term writing goals (thank you, Irene).  Three of my short-term goals will remain on a permanent list:

1.  FINISH a piece of writing.

(seriously, this is more difficult than it sounds)

2.  Submit it. 

3.  STOP distracting myself with BS tasks to avoid writing. 

My current plan is to carve out a 2-3 hour block of time once per week to work on my own writing.  I can make that time for myself.  I deserve that time.  I need that time.

We all do, mothers or not.  So do it.  Linger.

What Do YOU Need Today?

Hi.  Yes, I'm still here.  

I fell off the blogging wagon (again) for, well, a long time.  The last few months have seen a lot of changes on the home front (a total kitchen demo, a new job, little one back to school, the other in speech therapy - you know, life).  In the midst of trying to juggle a new-to-me schedule, job and an in-home construction zone, I floundered when it came time to care for myself.

This is nothing new, of course.  Even before I had kids, I was an expert when it came to putting the needs of others before my own.  Most of us are experts in this realm; sadly, it becomes second nature to neglect ourselves.  

Well, after years of doing this, my body let me know about it.  Hello, adrenal fatigue.  You suck.  

I've spent the last year + trying to integrate self-care into my daily life as I slowly recover from adrenal fatigue.  In theory this concept strikes me as basic enough, but when you start to delve into self-care, the things you “should” be doing to take optimal care of yourself—and let's face it: depending on what you read or care to believe in, this could be just about anything—well, it can become another stressor in your life.  Am I eating well enough?  Oh shit, I shouldn't have eaten that fourth crab rangoon before I mowed down that entree.  Am I exercising enough?  Does running up and down the stairs ten times a day chasing the kids count?  It should.  Am I getting enough sleep?  We all know answer to that.  

A couple weeks back I came across this article:  “Is Your Self-Care Regime Turning Into a Stressful Job? 3 Ways to Practice Optimal Self-Care”

Oh, boy.  Did this one resonate.  Mostly, this:  

Ask yourself first and foremost, "What do I need today?"  This is a simple yet oh-so-powerful question, because it acknowledges that you -- your mind and your body -- are the expert and know what's best. We all too often trust other people's advice more than we trust ourselves, when in reality each day is different. Some days you might need grounding energy. Other days you might need airy, light energy. Give yourself the freedom to adjust your self-care regime to meet you where you are. Especially for us women, it's important to be in tune with our monthly cycles and acknowledge that our body has different needs throughout the month.

*  *  *  *  *

I've already put this valuable suggestion into action.  A few weeks ago Vinny was heading to his folks to deliver some prints and take winter photos.  My mind saw an opportunity to be husband and kid-free for a long weekend… for the first time ever.  Ever.  We went back and forth on him taking the kids, but that question, "What do I need?" kept creeping in.  What I needed was a break.  Some quiet.  

So I asked for it.  And it happened.  It wasn’t the weekend I had hoped for.  One ice storm, leaky bathroom ceiling, and tumble down our back steps later, I was a bruised and sore mess.  Still, it was a break, one I mostly spent in pain on the couch watching terrible films.  I relished every minute.

Listening to what your body is trying to tell you isn’t as simple as it sounds, at least not at first.  During this process, I have also discovered another by-product of asking myself "What do I need?"  It means asking for help more than I normally would - which is almost never.  I am terrible at this, still.  I like to believe I can shoulder it all on my own because that's the way I've always been.  I'm stubborn and independent, a good combo in some situations, but certainly not all.

I don't do resolutions anymore, for lots of reasons.  The last few years I've shifted my focus to setting an intention or a creative goal instead of placing a limitation or unrealistic expectation on myself.  This year, I will continue to ask myself, "What do I need today?"  The simple act of asking has been transformative, and I hope it becomes a deep-rooted habit over time.  

What about you?  What do YOU need today?  Give yourself some time and space to figure it out. 

I Suck at Structured Play

That’s the short of it. 

Sophie had her two-year well visit back in April.  She has been what is considered slow to talk and/or acquire language.  I haven’t felt alarmed about it, though as a parent, I would love to hear her little voice putting more words together.  Thankfully, we have a very laid back pediatrician.  She suggested that if Sophie wasn’t progressing or making a significant effort within the next two months then we might contact Early On, just to have her evaluated. 

This seemed reasonable, and is exactly what we did.  In late June, two women came to our house to evaluate Sophie.  When it comes to her receptive language skills, she tested out of the book (the book stops at a five-year level… at that point it is assumed the child is ready to begin school).  I know Sophie is intelligent and observant, but watching her follow through with complex tasks and questions blew my mind.  Her young brain has been very busy taking it all in. 

When it comes to her expressive language skills, however, she tested “just under” what is considered normal (although later it was talked about how she is nearly a year behind on her language development, so who knows exactly where she falls, although it is most certainly not in the “normal” range).

As a parent, I have struggled with labels and how they are so quickly thrown onto children at every turn.  I realize these labels are meant to have a constructive element: they allow children to qualify for certain services, give parents some relief in knowing what their child may be struggling with, etc.  With a label like speech delayed, however, it’s hard not to feel like I’ve somehow not done things the right way, or played with her enough, or, or, or…

Beating myself up is useless and counterproductive, I know.

Then there’s the part of me that wants to justify how awesome she is.  “Look!  Look at the puzzles she can do!  Look at her hand-eye coordination working with tools, screws, latches, etc.!”  Eli can’t do most of the puzzles that Sophie sits down and does easily.  He struggles with fine motor tasks that she breezes through.  Clearly, they’ve developed particular motor skills at vastly different rates.  But because Eli never stops talking it’s as if he gets a pass on the other motor skills.  And because Sophie’s “delay” is something that is quickly noticed as being absent, well, she doesn’t fly through.

On the day of the evaluation, a plan of action was laid out for us.  The women that came to visit us were so kind, and clearly understood how hard it can be to hear that your child is delayed.  They didn’t pressure us to accept their help or services and assured us we could take all the time we needed to decide how we wanted to proceed.

We didn’t need time to think about it.  Of course we are accepting their offer of help.  Why?  Well, why not?  What made me agreeable to this intervention and offer is that it is all based in fun.  We will not be drilling Sophie, or otherwise overloading her with language in the hopes that she’ll just get it one day. 

Instead, we have a speech pathologist that comes to our home and plays with Sophie, modeling techniques that we can then use with her.  It’s only been two weeks, and I can already see improvement in Sophie’s attempts to say words. 

This doesn’t mean it’s easy.  There are very specific ways to play with her, techniques to use, music to listen to (more on that in a moment).  I’ve had flashbacks to the days of physical therapy with Eli for his torticollis.  He was three months old when he began PT, and there was a rigorous schedule of stretches I had to do with him each day.  It was miserable.  I spent most of his waking time stretching him, and making him do tummy time.  When I didn’t do the stretches as prescribed, the therapist would berate me and make me feel like a terrible mom.  Needless to say, I switched to a different PT office, where things improved.  Still, it was hard to spend my free time with Eli doing things he so very clearly hated.  I just wanted to hang out with and enjoy my baby.  Instead, I had to reverse the months of muscle tightness that had built up in his neck because he was jammed in my belly with his head cocked sideways (asynclitic is the technical term).

When I look back, the PT seems easier.  I didn’t have to fake anything, I just had to do it.  With Sophie, the play is very specific, and there are certain techniques we need to implement (silence, listening, waiting for a response, trying to get her to use eye contact with us a lot more).  Then there’s the music.  On our first home visit, the pathologist handed over a CD of kid songs that are meant to encourage participation, repetition, and speech development.  She handed the disc over with a warning: “These songs are going to drive you crazy.”  I knew this before she opened her mouth.

I’m just not that mom.  The one that plays kid-centric music, cheerful sing-alongs, etc.  We love music in our house and listen to it all the time.  Just not necessarily “kid music.”  We’re just over one week of listening to this devil music on a daily basis.  The kids have slowly gotten into it and I, of course, have the most annoying song on the disc stuck in my head every night at bedtime.  I want to choke the guy that sings the Puppy Song (I refuse to look at the playlist and learn the actual title of the song).  It is, naturally, Sophie’s favorite song. 

So it’s slow progress.  My initial resistance to playing “a certain way” has begun to wear off (though it is hard for me when things are less spontaneous, when I feel like there is a purpose to play other than play itself), I’m dealing with the music (okay, and even like two of the thirteen songs on the disc now), and most importantly, feeling less caught up in the labels and tests and feelings of inadequacy and more focused on what matters: Sophie.

Finding My Way Back

I’m here.

I realize I haven’t posted in several months.  Every few weeks I start a post and then it falls to the wayside.  I’ve had every intention of “staying on it.”  But for awhile there staying on it = additional stress and fatigue.  Guess what?  It’s not worth it.

A childhood best friend passed away at the end of February.  It wasn’t a complete shock, meaning I had known about her diagnosis/prognosis for several months.  As much as one might think you can prepare yourself for such a moment, well, you can’t.  Her passing knocked me down, hard, and on so many levels.  She has two young babes around the same age as mine and for days I couldn’t even look at my own children without crying.  I felt pain for so many reasons and so many different people.  I thought about her laugh and the fact that none of us would ever get to hear it again (seriously, no one has a laugh like Janice, and I mean that in the best possible way).  There were so many reasons to be sad.

I’ve experienced grief before, but in a kind of way where I didn’t fully allow myself to be completely immersed in it.  I would dip a toe and then quickly pull back.  It’s not a difficult thing to run from.  It’s hard to embrace.

This time I didn’t even have a choice.  It held me down and kept me in its grip and there was nothing I could do to tear myself away.  I’m thankful, now, that this was the case, even though in the moment it was huge and overwhelming and oh-so-exhausting (did I mention Vinny was working in L.A. while all this went down?  A true test of grit if there ever was one). 

Since Janice passed, there have been so many things to write about.  So.  Many.  Things.  Writing is always my go-to escape, my way of making sense of my world.  And by extension, sharing my ramblings helps to keep things real, grounded.

So after several weeks I began to feel guilty and depressed that I wasn’t writing, keeping up with the blog, just generally pouring my thoughts/experiences/feelings out onto the page.  Even if it was just for my own eyes to read later. 

I tried to push myself to write, dammit!  You know how to do this.  You must do this.  It’s what you do. 

But there were no words.  Only tears.  Only sadness.  Only that empty feeling you have when someone is missing and you forgot what a big part of your life they were until they are gone. 

And so I sat with all that.  I meditated.  I cried.  I stretched.  I cried.  I doodled.  I cried.  Then I cried some more.  I stopped thinking about whatever it was I was supposed to be doing.  If I never wrote another blog post again, fine.  If I never explained what happened to me the last few months, fine.

Mostly, I’m not doing either of those things right now, even though it kinda looks like I am.  My experience of grief, what it felt like and continues to mean to me, is still too close to share in intimate detail.  My body is still so raw, though now I can walk past a blooming plant and smile with pleasure instead of dissolving into tears, or listen to some of my favorite (albeit sad) songs without immediately turning into a snotty mess. 

It doesn’t mean the grief is gone.  It’s merely giving me breaks now… escaping my body in more measured (and manageable) bits.  I still have moments that overtake me so sharply I can barely breathe, as though I need a reminder that yes, she is still gone, lest I forget.  Like I could.

So I am slowly finding my way back.  In fact, I have been more slowly everything lately.  Savoring moments with the kids, especially the tedious ones, the ones we tend to overlook because taking care of kids can so often feel like a monotonous routine.  I have never been more grateful to participate in a monotonous child-care routine.  More grateful to be healthy and mobile and aware and able to live my life.  More grateful to be awake.  To everything. 

A Call for Self-Care

A couple days after last week’s post—about asking for help, a concept I struggle with—I read a blog post by my friend, Carolyn.  She ruminates on several important topics, one of them being self-care.  Her post resonated with me on a deep level.  There is so much I would like to say in response/reaction to her post—but I won’t… yet.  I’m going to get out of her way, and thank her profusely for allowing me to re-post her words here.

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The Eyes on the Bus

by Carolyn Zaikowski

I want to know what occurs to you when you hear the term “self-care”. I want to know what happens when you hear: You exist and are real. That, therefore, you must live and take care of your container, your body.

I first heard “self-care” during my training as a rape crisis counselor. I was a feisty 21-year old with a lot of energy invested in my identity as a crusty vegan feminist. My fellow counselors discussed the importance of self-care, but I couldn’t overcome the notion that it was blasphemy to waste precious time on meditating, weekends off, and creative projects when I could be using that time to help others. How could I justify “indulging” in self-care, when so many humans and animals hardly get to live at all? Like most other things I know, I learned the hard way that in a society based on so many hierarchies placing one body above another, self-care might be amongst the most political and revolutionary ideas one can engage with.

As a rape crisis counselor and supervisor, I was working overnights on the hotline. During that time, I also founded an animal rights group and became involved with anti-war organizing leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. All these issues were embedded with each other in painstaking ways I couldn’t escape. My cells and heartbeat obsessed. Every day I made new connections between the hierarchies and violences permeating the planet, from the destruction wrecked by global capitalism, to that done against individual bodies on dinner plates. The choice I made in the face of this overwhelm was to starve. How could I stop for dinner when a shift needed to be covered? When I had to facilitate a meeting? When Iraqi children were being destroyed and I had the privilege of a voice?

Since adolescence, anorexia had been my default. Yet I hesitate to indulge some grand personal narrative around this. It’s true that I’ve obsessed in a manner, to a depth, that you’d only understand if you’ve had an eating disorder. Eating disorders are a purgatorial encasement comprised of out-of-control thought-patterns that incessantly generate themselves through your body, consuming your reality like a tyrant who may or may not exist in a guard tower. Eating disorders are torture. It doesn’t matter who you are; they don’t discriminate based on intelligence, bravery, strength, or political orientation; based on whether you are made out of love or hate. Anorexia doesn’t come from personality, yet it destroys personality altogether. It comes from a place before you, and it goes beyond who you are, infiltrates you from all sides and from around every external and internal angle. It makes you it. It becomes your only story. This is why I hesitate to write about it. I want to say things that go beyond a tired individualist tale and into the realm of helpfulness.

The best I can come up with is: I’m writing this, offering it, because, if you are so alone that you cannot even find your own body, I want to remind you that you are allowed to rest and be gentle, to hold yourself back into existence. I want to tell you that you are wonderful. I suppose I could say things like: My self-destruction arose from a message I’d internalized during my personal and cultural upbringing—that my existence, my literal and metaphorical body, had time to wait. There was only so much happiness to go around, and I had to sacrifice some of mine for the sake of those who seemed to have none.

So, you? How do you hold yourself? Do you see that you exist? Me, I lost so many pounds of myself that I couldn’t get out of bed. I vomited blood, broke bones, destroyed my stomach, lost my hair, got banned from the gym, fucked up my teeth, forgot where I was, got lost on my own street. Eventually I was forced to remove myself from almost all the political and social work projects I was involved in and enter treatment. Everything became its opposite. Maybe you’ve enacted a similar story. If so, I bow to you. Eating disorders override all things life-ward and good. If you’ve been to the depths of one, you have seen hell and known hell’s profound wisdom. Tell people about what you have found there. Tell people how anorexia puts a prison inside and outside you. It makes you into a prison and it makes a prison around your prison. Oppression is a prison in which we learn to police ourselves. Tell people how we can break the prisons if we decide to see them. To see our own prison bars and to see each others’ and maybe, if we are strong enough, to even see the prisons that encompass the guards. Tell about how in order to do these things, we need each other—desperately, profoundly, in ways that we might not have even conceived of yet.

When I was in that hospital that time–it was, unfortunately, far from the only one my eating disorder landed me in—there was one political project I rationalized lingering with, for it was mobile. I’d been helping a friend with some important research and brought all my materials and books with me to the locked ward. I could only use a tiny pencil to write, and I had to sneak it in, because pens and pencils are considered dangerous in these kinds of places. Two days later, my heart almost stopped. It was my 23^rd birthday. Because I was almost dead, I do not recall this happening. I recall waking up and my roommate on the ward swinging her fists at doctors. She wouldn’t eat because she thought they were poisoning her. It was then that I was persuaded to put the books away. At night my roommate moaned and I whispered to her: I know you know yourself. You exist. Keep going. Don’t let the bastards grind you down.

For months my life was consumed by all-day eating disorder treatment. I was essentially forced to eat food that, to me—someone who’d spent most of my life considering and advocating ethical ways to eat—was unethical. It was more than a year before I was able to re-engage with the things I cared about. This might seem extreme. Yet almost all the helpers, activists, and radical dreamers I know have at some point experienced a consequential degree of preventable self-neglect. Very few have truly internalized the vital connection between oneself and others that self-care sustains, a connection that evaporates with self-destruction.

I often turn to a story Thich Naht Hahn tells about the eyes of a bus driver. We’re all on and around her bus and our lives depend on her ability to see. On her intricate awareness of the road, how to move the machine and do the job. This is literal. If the bus driver closes her eyes, gets drunk, gets dizzy, goes blind, or has a heart that stops, we’ll all be deeply harmed. This is the nature of self-care. It’s intimately tied into the well-being of everybody around us. It is the opposite of personal indulgence because the self is not just the individual. We’re all riding on each others’ bus, whether or not we want to, simply by virtue of being alive together. Without a basic awareness of what we need, how we work, what our strengths, intentions, and weakness are, and how to be present and alive, we risk causing profound harm even when we think we are being neutral or helpful.

If I’d chosen to be healthy, I’d have been able to do more, and better, work. I’d have felt happy doing it, instead of guilty, depressed, and anxiety-ridden. I wouldn’t have had to spend months unbound, eating food I advocated against and using my time and resources trying not to die. I’m positive my self-destruction, reactivity, and poor health affected others in ways I’ll never know, because I was driving the bus with my eyes closed and I crashed. I experienced this crash and so did everyone around me: my loved ones, my colleagues, my clients and those I counseled, my cat, everyone I wanted to help, the folks who wanted to help me. Many of the political systems I was trying to name and break down—patriarchy, violent food production, hatred and destruction of bodies—were actually strengthened.

But to heal from anorexia is to grow yourself back. To grow yourself back is to grow others back. I was so terrified that I almost disappeared. I healed and I appeared again. I was so terrified that I almost unfastened my heart and dropped it in a cultural garbage can. I healed and grew my heart back. I dug my heart out of the war because I do not support the war. I stopped an entire war by healing.

At first, I brushed off self-care as inherently apolitical—some kind of sneaky twist on hyper-individualistic consumerist culture. And it’s true that self-care, like everything else, often gets channeled through Western culture as little more than a brand to consume—a quick-fix tweak of diet, a brand-name exercise regime, an excuse to disconnect. A solely individualist pursuit that should come at the cost of everything and everyone else; the other extreme, the rejection of the political for the unadulterated personal. But if we are to be effective mutineers, we must be able to mindfully contend with these extremes of relating to the self. To take care of ourselves in a manner that doesn’t reject the body for the politic or the politic for the body, because the two are connected in ways that came before and go beyond both of them, and beyond words and constructions altogether. If you inhabit a body that’s in some way been deemed unacceptable— if you’re a woman, a queer person, a transgender person, a person of color, a person of the “wrong” size or shape, a trauma victim of any gender— then to insist upon your own existence is one of the most revolutionary acts you can perform.

There are so many simple, free self-care practices that we can try to commit to: eating as well as possible, getting enough sleep, mindfully building breaks into our lives. Contemplative activities like journaling, developing presence and awareness through meditation, and spending time outside can change the entire game. We can set up childcare, meal, and work shares to help each other create space for rest. Whenever possible, we can ask others to take over tasks we don’t have energy for. On the path to radical self-care, saying “no” is sometimes in everybody’s best interest. It takes patience and awareness to create new habits. We must be so gentle and creative. But even just twenty minutes a day of self-care has changed my life. For those who are worried about losing their perspective, or their identity, to self-care, I promise: I haven’t lost touch with my passions—in fact, I’m a much better, happier, and more useful version of myself now.

Just like the rest of the sentient beings, we don’t deserve to starve, and we’re part of many systems that are affected by our starvation. For better or worse, it’s impossible to opt out of the reality of not being alone in this strange existence. If we don’t have health and awareness, if we’re unnecessarily starving in a societal trash heap, we can’t have ourselves and each other. This “each other” extends from our loved ones to all beings across the world. I believe this is spiritual, dharmic and karmic, but it’s also plain old physics, biology and evolution. Our genuine well-being is nothing but magnificent. It is in our ability to create enough well-being to go around for everyone.

The thing is, control is not the same as agency. Agency is big, it is empowering; control tries to contain and dominate things. Even at my worst, I have the agency to try to turn dominance into co-operation, power-over into power-with. When I am overwhelmed by personal losses, I can look at myself and be a witness. I can say, “I see you. You are in pain. Let’s rest.” We can say that to each other. When I am overwhelmed by my perceived powerlessness in the face of issues as big as wars, rape, factory farms, and ecocide, I remember that I do not have to contribute to the fucked-ness of the world by harming myself and, by proxy, those around me.

A beautiful person I was in treatment with once said, “Eating disorders are when you are busy dying. I want to be busy being alive.” Yes. That’s just it. We’re huge and ravenous and impossible to contain; this is terrifying. Especially as a woman in this culture, it’s supposed to be. When there is pain, sometimes it feels nearly impossible to keep my eyes open. But when I can move beyond the fear, I find myself in an inexplicable wellspring of wonder and reverence. It’s the kind of wonder where I can’t breathe, like when I saw the Milky Way from that deserted West Virginia field, or when I stood in a rainbow beneath Niagara Falls, or when I touched the Mississippi River, or when I find that pink tree on my block in the spring, or when it’s firefly season. Or when I met my nephew the day he was born. And suddenly I remember why I need to start being busy being alive. Suddenly I feel the need, with a desperation as big as my heart, to beg you, all of you who are in so much unnecessary pain: Come with me, come with me, come with me…there is so much to see on the other side! It is real. To heal is real. You’ve got to believe me. Look at yourself. You have hands and knees, a face, lungs. You have pens and paper. You, yourself, are as spectacular as everything you love. Do not listen to the tyrant—take up your own space. Come with me.

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If you’d like to visit Carolyn’s blog, go here.

Asking for Help

I am terrible at this and always have been.  I am stubborn and independent to a fault. 

The current situation: Vinny’s out of town working, I had an infection in my foot that was almost gone (I’ll spare you the details of how this fun event transpired), but after the furnace went out last Monday and I was up and down stairs way too many times, and then add to that some shoveling (which I actually like doing), the infection came back in a hurry at the end of this past week.  Basically, I’ve had great difficulty walking for the last three weeks, something that in and of itself is frustrating in ways I cannot adequately convey in words. 

This is how life works.  Sometimes it comes all at once, at a time when you wish like nothing else that it would simply leave you alone.  I never expect life to be easy, but there are times when I hope it might be a “little easier,” than others.  This has been one of those times.  Instead, I have been a medicated, hobbling mess.

Thankfully, I was able to retreat this past weekend to my parents.  They stepped in and took over childcare duties, as I sat for the better part of each day with my foot elevated as the infection worsened.  I can’t imagine how much worse things would be had I continued my normal daily routine, which essentially means being on my feet most of the day caring for the kids (and in case this isn't obvious, not great for foot infections). 

Still, there is a part of me that feels as though I am putting someone else out by sitting on my bum, letting someone else help me, take care of me.  I am simultaneously relieved, grateful and frustrated for not being able to do what I need to do each day.  And I know I shouldn’t feel this way.  The kids are having a great time, my parents are happy to help.  But me?  I am having a hard time sitting still, feeling like I am not helping or contributing in any way. 

I fully admit this is a tough concept for me to embrace.  You need help?  Ask for it.  If the situation were reversed and any of my friends or family asked for help, would I do it?  Absolutely, and without thinking twice.  Why is it so hard for me to accept it works the other way in return?  That those who care about me are willing to help, if needed?

I know I am not the only one who struggles with this.  And I wonder why.  Is it pride?  Stubborness?  Independence?  A fear that others won’t be willing to help?  I feel that as a culture we have been ingrained to “do it all,” and to ask for help is a sign of weakness.  But in the long run, we’re only hurting ourselves and those around us when we don’t ask for help.  And don't we want to model this behavior for our children, so that they understand there is no shame in needing help?   

So even though I have felt like we are overstaying our welcome, we have been at my parents since Saturday morning.  The plan was to leave at some point today, even though my foot is still a disaster, and then at lunch: a migraine.  It took me a few minutes to realize what was happening.  My vision was strange, not everything was in focus, I couldn’t see everything looking straight ahead.  As soon as the ring of flashing color showed up in my right eye, I knew what was happening.  Were it not so debilitating and painful, I would welcome the experience… I find the whole thing rather fascinating (how does the brain coordinate these things?).  But that's a whole other topic.

I have been lucky(?) enough to only experience migraine headaches when I’m pregnant.  And I ain’t pregnant.  Really, really.  So this was rather devastating today, to have my first, non-pregnancy-related migraine.  I hope it’s the first and only.

So my plans of leaving faltered.  If I can’t see properly, I certainly don’t feel confident getting behind the wheel of a car, especially with children in tow. 

It took the migraine for me to fully surrender.  To say, “yup, I’m an absolute mess and I am going to continue making an imprint in that couch until tomorrow morning.”  Which is what I am going to sign off now and do.

But first: Thank you, Mom and Dad.  I’m not good at accepting help, but thanks for being here to give it.        

Sit Down. It’s Time for: The Next Big Thing

I am lucky to have met some of the most amazing people I know during my time at Naropa University.  One of them is Carolyn Zaikowski, who invited me to participate in the Next Big Thing, and whose work continuously blows me away.  She’s the real deal, people.  Please go here to read more about Carolyn’s forthcoming book, A Child is Being Killed, from Aqueous Books.

So this week I am going to take a break from writing about motherhood/parenting and do something I rarely do: talk about my writing life.  

And so I give you – The Next Big Thing: An Interview with Stacy Walsh

What is the working title of your book (or story)?
How Film Destroyed My Life

Where did the idea for the book come from?

It’s emerged from a trickle of several different ideas.  Most people don’t understand how the film industry works, or what it’s like to work on a film production.  At all.  Most people I know think we stand around and fawn over movie stars (we don’t).  Then there’s also this thing that happens when you’re working on a project, where it takes over your life because it’s all you do at least 60+ hours per week.  So the fake world you work in on a daily basis becomes your reality.  It’s a tough pill to swallow and does things to your mind that can’t be undone.  Beyond that, you occasionally see movie star or producer “tell-all” type books, about behind-the-scenes drama, but you rarely see one written by blue collar crew members.  That, and I have so many ridiculous stories about my on-set experiences, it seems a waste not to share them.   

What genre does your book fall under?

I’d say a blend of creative nonfiction, humor, and horror.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

This is a trick question.  If this project were adapted (and I couldn’t imagine anyone in their right mind doing so… which means it probably should be), the entire cast would have to be unknowns, or even better, film crew.  Actors would ruin the entire thing.  Although, I do love Living in Oblivion, so maybe there’s hope?

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

Dunno.  I’m not one for precise pitches until the product is complete.  I’m probably an agent’s worst nightmare.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

When I finally finish this beast I will submit for representation (notice how I really sold it on the previous question).

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

This is a project I have worked on in starts and stops for the last five years.  I aim to have a complete draft by the end of this year.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Well, there aren’t many.  I’m definitely inspired by authors that write humorous nonfiction (David Sedaris and Laurie Notaro come immediately to mind).  As for books that deal specifically with the film industry, I enjoyed both Julia Phillips “You’ll Never Eat Lunch in this Town Again,” and “Based on the Movie,” by Billy Taylor.  One is a vitriolic attack from a bitter producer, the other a playful tongue-in-cheek look at the trials of living your life working in film.  They both give an insiders view, though their approaches are different, much more straightforward narrative than what I’m doing.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

Well, back in the day, when I was working on a film in L.A., I would frequently send these mass emails back home about the more wacky experiences I was having on set, as a way to educate, entertain, and horrify my family and friends, who tended to have these very lofty, Hollywood-esque daydreams about what my life must be like.  I enjoy shattering those misconceptions, for lots of reasons.

But out of those emails came a lot of encouragement about putting my stories down on paper.  Then during my time at Naropa University I had one instructor in particular, Andrew Wille, who thought there was much to mine creatively in these experiences.  And there is.  My struggle has been whether to stay the course with a nonfiction telling (where humor is my intention), or to dive into the uglier side of the industry and put down a fictionalized account so as not to endure the wrath of people I know.  Both projects have their allure, but for now, I’ve opted to stay the nonfiction route. 

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

Just a few key words/phrases to whet your palate: chupacabra (look it up if you aren’t familiar… good times), filming overnight with fake blood and sheep that looked like goats (also related to the chupacabra), working on a Mormon comedy, being holed up in a barber shop as to avoid a rumored drive-by (you know, cause the film was gang-funded), the threat of having one of my arms cut off, riding in a parade dressed as a Marine.  This just scratches the surface, people.   

Thanks again, Carolyn, for inviting me into the fold.  The Next Big Thing continues on...  Be sure to check out interviews with some other fantastic writers I know during the week of January 27th:

Jules Berner fills us in on her latest writing endeavor.

Chris DeWildt illuminates us on his forthcoming collection of shorts from Martian Lit.

Gina Caciolo tells us about – Stamped Your Face: handmade goods crafted with grateful hands.

The Space Between Good-Bye and Hello

I hate good-byes.  They’re the worst.  Even when you know you’ll be seeing your loved one again in say, four or five weeks, it’s still difficult. 

You’d think Vinny and I would have this down by now.  We’ve been together over thirteen years, have spent countless times apart thanks to work and/or school, and have had to participate in this song-and-dance so many times you’d think we’d barely blink an eye. 

But no.

I wasn’t even going to write this blog post until after he left because in many ways, it’s easier to get through the good-bye by simply avoiding it.  If I don’t think about the fact that he’s leaving and what that means, well, it’s almost like it’s not going to happen. 

Until it does.

It was easier before the kids.  Sure, we hated being apart but it’s not like either one of us would change drastically in four to six weeks (or three months).  And now that neither child is an infant, the changes are a bit more subtle, but they’re still present.

Now that we have two kids, I can say it was easier when it was just Eli, and he was young.  Now that he’s old enough to be fully aware of what’s happening (and Sophie is right there with him), it gets increasingly difficult with each absence.  There’s acting out, temper tantrums, moodiness… and it breaks my heart because I know where it comes from, but I never know how to assure him that Vinny will be back in a few weeks.  It’s still not a concept either of them can grasp.

In the meantime, I try to take all the changes of behavior in stride, trying my best not to get immediately frustrated and cranky, which is easy to do since I am also experiencing the after-effects of not having my partner here with me (I guess I’m not really selling the whole “come and visit us while Vinny’s gone” ploy by describing how wonderful we’ll be in his absence… oops).

I’ll say this much:  If you don’t have kids, or have never parented on your own for a minimum of several weeks, please don’t say things like: “Four weeks isn’t that long, it’ll go by in a flash,” or “I did that once for a weekend and it wasn’t so bad,” or “It’s okay, the kids won’t remember,” or “It’s good to know you can do it on your own,” or “__________________ (fill in your favorite snarky comment here).”

No, if you have a friend or loved one that is home bound in the evenings with no adult company in sight perhaps offer to stop by for an evening and partake in some adult conversation (and/or drinking), or invite said friend and kids over to dinner with your family for a change of pace, or offer to take the kids on a walk so that she might have ten minutes of silence during the day, or…  You get the idea. 

There are so many things I miss when Vinny isn’t here, but having interaction with another adult is on the top of my list.  I am lucky to have some fantastic friends that make a point of visiting when Vinny is away, or make me chocolate chip cookies, or bring me beer, or have me over, or just generally provide some much-needed distraction.  Single parenting becomes lonely, quickly. 

That’s really my point here.  Yeah, yeah, the good-bye part is always a kick in the pants.  There’s no way around it.  I dread it every time.  But the part that’s even harder is the quiet house you come back to (okay, so after the kids have gone to bed).  That’s when the loneliness tries to creep in.

So just be aware.  Do you have a friend that could use a hand?  An ear?  A beer?  I knew this was coming, so have been filling up my calendar with much-needed visits from my lovely friends.  It’ll make the space between good-bye and hello much brighter.   

Stop Looking Around

Yes, yes.  It’s the New Year (a belated Happy New Year to you, readers).  A good time to reflect on what was and what lies ahead. 

I’ll admit, looking back wasn’t much fun.  When I think about where I was a year ago: super sleep deprived, struggling to get Sophie to nurse or drink fluids of any kind, struggling in my quest to get her to sleep through the night, well, it doesn’t flood me with warm memories.  In fact, when I think about the first year-and-a-half of Sophie’s life, I realize that there are large chunks of time missing from my memory. 

For instance, I honestly don’t remember Christmas 2011.  Sure, we had just arrived in Grand Rapids from Los Angeles on December 20^th, Vinny going into his hiatus, and we had all of four days to throw Christmas together.  And we did.  But other than a trip to Target to buy our fake Christmas tree and ornaments, and a trip to Toys R Us to buy the kids a play kitchen, I don’t remember any of it (And seriously, these are the things I do remember?  Why?).

So looking back… not so fun. 

On the other hand, I cannot remember the last time I felt so excited for a New Year to begin.  I have a good feeling about 2013.  Now that I am back to maybe ¼ brain function, am sleeping a bit better, and have these fleeting moments of clarity, I feel as though some of my long-dormant creativity is anxious to escape.  Couple that with some ambitious business ideas = color me happy. 

But in the midst of this looking forward and looking back and getting caught up in all that end of the year/beginning of the next, top-ten lists of everything under the sun whirlwind, I begin to feel overloaded.  Somehow, the end of the year does that to us.  We want a recap in case we missed anything, or forgot about something that happened earlier in the year when we weren’t paying attention, or we need a preview of what’s to come, to feel assured that yes, this next year is going to kick ass all over the place.

Maybe it will.  Maybe it won’t. 

Instead of overwhelming ourselves looking in every direction, why don’t we do as Garth used to say and “Live in the now, Man!” 

Seriously.  While I like to take time to reflect on what has been and what is to come, it is a hell of a lot harder to live in the moment with any kind of regularity. 

Have you tried it?  Really tried it?  As in, not flitting about from one to-do to the next, not sticking to your schedule day in and day out, not getting it all done before taking a minute to enjoy what you have right now?  To look at your loved ones and truly see them?  To be fully present with them? 

I’ve always struggled with being fully present in the moment, long before I was a parent.  Becoming a parent only exacerbated the situation.  Now there truly are a lot of things that need to be done each day, because, well, the kids can’t take care of themselves and if we don’t do it then there will be some problems.  So I find it even more challenging to be present as I tackle the day-to-day demands of parenting.   

It seems silly.  What is my favorite moment of any day?  The moment where I sit down with the kids and interact with them, with no other expectation in mind, no lurking “this needs to be done” thought creeping in.  When I am simply with them I am happiest, and so are they. 

You’d think this would be reinforcement enough to make it a constant and easily-remembered habit, and yet it’s not.  Quite often, it takes daily reminding to stop, slow down, and be with them. 

So go ahead, reflect, plot what’s to come, get excited about the myriad possibilities that any New Year brings.  But then remember to sit down, take a deep breath, and live in the now.

P.S. This post reminds me of my favorite fortune cookie fortune: Stop looking; happiness is right in front of you.  

I Like Purple and Orange Santas

So, I have been substitute teaching.  There’s a lot I could (and probably will) say about this experience.  But for today, I’ll say this: Let’s allow our children to be the creative, curious individuals they instinctively are.

Last week I subbed in a large class with another long-term sub.  For part of the day we also had an aide (what a blessing, most classes I’m in do not have this).  I was thrilled to have the extra hands, although part-way through the day I started to witness little moments that were bothering me: condescending remarks to the kids, chastising the wrong kid when a few weren’t getting along, etc. 

But this moment stuck the longest: The kids were given a color-by-number Santa head to color.  It was boring.  There were only three colors involved, one of them being white (and might I add, the largest portion of the picture).  First off, most of the kids couldn’t read, so didn’t get the color-by-number concept anyways.  Secondly, there were only two colors for the kids to use.  Again, boring.  Not to mention there weren’t enough of these particular two colors (red and “peach”… when have you seen a peach crayon?) for each child.

So most of them began doing their own thing, coloring Santa how they saw fit.  Fair enough.  And might I add, the results were fascinating.  I didn’t interrupt the kids.  It was nearing the end of the day, they were happy and engaged… good enough for me.  I could care less if they didn’t color Santa the “right” way. 

I was alone in this opinion.  The long-term sub and aide both began to get after the kids about using the correct colors.  And when several of the kids began asking what color “peach” was, both the aide and sub would answer, “You know, skin color.”  I won’t even get started right now on that comment.

I’m torn in these areas.  I understand wanting kids to grasp a concept, to follow instructions, blah, blah, blah.  I’m just not sure how insisting that each kid color Santa the exact same way (and inside the lines, mind you) is serving a benefit.  To watch these kids color the way they want to when given the freedom is a gift itself.  So much of their young personalities spill out onto the page when given free rein.  They are all so particular in their coloring technique, their style, their strategy.  Shouldn’t this tell us something? 

What are we doing to these young imaginations by insisting they all color the exact same way?  Who wants to hang the exact same 30+ Santas on the wall outside the classroom?  Isn’t it much more interesting to have them all start from the same point and see where they end up?  Don’t you think they have much more pride and a feeling of ownership when they can quickly point out and identify, “Hey, that’s my Santa!”

It seems like a small point to fixate on, but I came home that day so discouraged.  We are so groomed to fit in, to conform, to do the “right” thing for most of our lives, and it starts young.  But let’s not take away the joy of coloring freely on a page from these abundantly creative minds.  We should all want to see what they come up with.  It’s stunning.

*  *  *  *  *

P.S.  I wanted to write a holiday-themed post, and this wasn’t my initial intention, but since this experience stuck with me (and at least had a Santa angle), I decided to share it.

That being said, I wanted to wish you all a warm Christmas with family and friends.  When the little ones you cross paths with break into those fresh boxes of crayons (as Eli and Sophie have already done) give them encouragement to express themselves however they see fit.  Don’t worry about the lines, the right colors.  I can guarantee they will show you a new way of seeing things.  One of the many gifts kids give us each and every day, if we’re paying attention.

We Don't Want to Know, News

I almost never watch the news.  As a rule. 

When I do, I am always repulsed, disturbed, or traumatized in some way.  It’s like hearing the digest version of the worst things to happen—in our city, state, country, world—in the last 24 hours.  Sure, there is the occasional lighthearted piece, the weather, sports, but… none of that outweighs the constant onslaught of terrible news.

This means I miss lots of “news.”  But there was no way to miss what happened this past Friday at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  I am grateful this news did not make itself known to me until after I was done substitute teaching in a K-2 classroom for the day.  In fact, there wasn’t a whisper of what had transpired anywhere in the teacher’s lounge, hallways, or office.  Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

But now… I can’t stop thinking about what happened.  I’ve cried a bucket of tears in the last three days.  I had a ridiculously hard time dropping Eli off at preschool today, lingering on the playground, hugging him too many times, zipping his coat a little higher, messing with his hat, asking him if he was okay (he was, of course), just not wanting to step away.

Because once again the blind faith we put out into the world when we leave our children behind has been rattled, to the core.  Because we all know what happened could happen anywhere, anytime.  Because we all know that losing a child is our worst nightmare, period. 

This tragedy brings up all manner of difficult, complex, and emotionally-charged discussions.  I could write for days about gun control.  About the need for readily available mental health care.  About the fact that we as a society are failing our children.

These are all important discussions, and they are happening all around us.  This is a start.

But I have to go back to where I started.  I don’t watch the news.  This means I gather my news from the internet.  Not that it’s any more reliable or less sensational, but at least I have some control over what I choose to read and can avoid the visual aspect traditional news brings along with it (in my mind, an added layer of trauma). 

I have been careful not to read too much about this tragedy, as it only serves to overwhelm me further.  Saturday morning as we sat around the table eating breakfast as a family, I couldn’t stop tearing up, was repeatedly overtaken by a suffocating mix of emotions: grief, anger, sadness, relief, helplessness, despair, all-encompassing love.

Still, I have been following this story, part of the incessant need to “understand” how someone could do something so unimaginable to any reasonable mind.  It’s foolish, because there is nothing that could be revealed to help me understand anything about this.

So when I clicked on the latest story I wasn’t expecting (why, I don’t know) to be met with specifics detailing how the children were killed.  And these nightmare-inducing details were just simply released out to the public, as though we are somehow owed this information.  As though we somehow want to know this information.

Another layer of trauma. 

Can we have a discussion about the role of media?  About their duty to the public and the instances where discretion might be in the best interests of the public?  I don’t care how many CSI-type shows you watch or how desensitized people have become to violence, what good is going to come of describing in great detail how these children were gunned down?

It’s not about me, though I would certainly prefer not to know these things.  I am an adult, long out of my youthful school days (though my current job finds me back in that setting).  I have accrued the wisdom, maturity and emotional strength to handle most of what the media decides to throw at me.  Children, however, are infinitely more sensitive to details such as these.  And guess what?  They’re on the internet, too. 

I can’t speak to what is being shown / talked about on television since I have avoided it, though I imagine these grim details are being played out there as well. 

What are we doing to our children?  How do we expect them to feel safe, to want to go to school, when we are so thoughtlessly painting a terrifying picture for them?  I don’t think we need to keep children in the dark, but no child needs to hear these kinds of details.  In fact, no one needs to hear these details.  It certainly brings no comfort to the poor families who have lost their children. 

No, all it does is underscore the depth of this young man’s diseased mind (I refuse to type his name—we need to stop giving these monsters their celebrity).  And the callousness of the media. 

Like I said, there are any number of difficult discussions happening around us.  In many instances I feel helpless, the what-can-I-do-to-make-it-better quandary I often find myself in.  Here’s a start:  Turn off your TV.  Stop clicking on every story about the tragedy.  I know it’s hard.  There’s an allure to this shared experience, a reassurance that you’re not the only one crying buckets of tears, not the only one who is heartbroken, or furious, or sad.  Let’s do this: Turn to your friends, neighbors and loved ones and start talking.  Start noticing the children in your life that may need a little extra love and help.  As hard as this is for us as adults, we need to make sure that our children are doing okay, too. 

I, for one, do not have the first clue how to talk to kids when it comes to tragedies like this.  But I’m (reluctantly) learning.  One of my friends posted a link if you need some help in this area, developed after the Virginia Tech shooting (thanks, Shane).  Go here for more information.  Let’s be there for each other right now, friends.