Alone time. On steroids.

“I’m just checking to see if you are feeling any better?” 

I hear his muffled little voice trying to make its way through the solid wood door. His sweet seven-year-old spirit swells my heart to overflowing and crushes me simultaneously. I know he misses me terribly and he’s worried too.

“I’m doing okay, Buddy,” I call. “About the same as yesterday.”

How did I end up here, I wonder, shut alone in my room, isolated from my family, calling my husband, who is only downstairs, on the phone, reading Harry Potter to my son via a Zoom call? Knocks on my door, followed by scurrying feet signal a plate brimming with food is waiting outside, or the butter knife I have asked for, or if I’m lucky, a small stack of thin paper napkins. Apparently I am the only member in this household who finds that last one essential at mealtimes.

The sound of plate hitting bare wood floors has become our passive communication. I hear it and it alerts me to wait a minute until the footsteps disappear, and then come fetch what has been left me. They hear it, and it signals them to don gloves and take away what I have left them. When my trash is full or my laundry needs washing, I toss it outside my door and yell to my helper elves. I’m quickly learning this door blocks out the sound more effectively than I realized, at least in one direction. 

Sometimes when I need something between mealtime hours and my shout goes unanswered, I resort to texting or calling Graham. I rapidly discern that when his phone is on silent, I can use the “drop-in” feature on my app to communicate with my people via Alexa. I am relentless when a cup of ice or a fresh kombucha beverage I can’t taste is striking my fancy. It is through this modern technology mode of communication that I learn, well after bedtime, that one of our Alexa devices has relocated to a kid’s room, where I accidentally revive them (I guess they all sleep together now?) from near-slumber with new energy at the sound of their mother’s voice in search of late-night chocolate. Whoops. 

I woke up feeling achy on Monday, December 6th. It had been a rough night so I chalk it up to sleeping wrong. But was that a mild sore throat I was beginning to feel? Nah, surely I’m just reading into things. Tuesday morning greets me again with full body aches. Now it’s getting harder to shake them off. A quick Google search of “body aches and COVID” produces far more hits than I’d hoped. My throat is definitely sore, very mild, but undeniable all the same. A couple more clicks and I find myself on the CDC’s website where a brief set of checkbox symptoms inform me that I meet criteria to be tested for COVID-19. 

I get tested on Tuesday, and ask the doctor at urgent care about separating from my family. Her message is very much The-Damage-Is-Already-Done but I still feel squeamish about how to interact with them while I await my results. I don a mask in my own house, and make it a solid day of wearing it while homeschooling my kids, before deciding “this is overkill” and resume my normal mothering duties sans mask. I won’t let Graham kiss me, but he doesn’t get kicked out of the bed...yet. 

I’m feeling what I would describe as generally “not great” come Thursday afternoon. I’ve survived a 4-day stretch of homeschooling while feeling unwell and I get a hankering for a peppermint mocha. I know I shouldn’t leave my house with test results pending so I pull out the decaf and come up with what I decide is an extremely sad substitute for “the real thing” that is my occasional winter Starbucks treat. It tastes exactly like…..nothing. Did I not just melt a fresh square of peppermint dark chocolate into a shot of espresso? I might suck at coffee but surely I should taste something. 

I’m only mildly worried and decide to pivot and go the salty route for my afternoon pick-me-up instead. For some reason, I only allow myself the luxury of nachos when I’m not feeling well (a topic for another day) and today I’m not, so I microwave myself a small plate. Again, I taste nothing. I tell myself I’m just creating problems now. My imagination is severely compromised (according to my husband) but it is not entirely dead. Surely I’m dreaming up symptoms to justify the “overreaction” of my going in to get tested.

I text Graham that I can’t taste my snack and we laugh it off. But in reality, this is my “Oh crap” moment. At dinner that night, I prepare a new recipe, chicken breasts pounded thin, rolled around asparagus, and wrapped in slices of prosciutto. I’m sorely disappointed with the final result - it is blah and flavorless and when I pipe up to say so, my family looks at me like I have two heads. I shut my mouth quickly, realizing I’m alone in my opinion. I give Graham the eye and he laughs nervously.

I wake up Friday morning and grab my morning cup of Joe. Usually I enjoy it downstairs but, on a whim, decide to take it back up to bed where my husband is waking up slowly. It’s his day off from work, which means it’s my day off from homeschooling. Little did I know that was to be the last time I would leave my room for the next week. My phone rings and I’m suddenly swirling with exposure dates and quarantine timelines and being told to isolate from everyone in my household. By this point, Graham has roused himself from bed to get the kids started on their morning routines. He walks in the room while I’m still on the phone and I frantically flail at him and motion for him to back away and get out, as if he hadn’t just been in here with me, breathing the same air. 

Suddenly the switch flips. I am contaminated. The door shuts, masks go on. It’s surreal, going from unknown to known. This is how I got here, to this very strange existence. 

I start crying. I feel everything almost instantaneously. How did this virus crack it’s way through our caution? Why me? Where did it come from? I feel ashamed, embarrassed, guilty, burdened,  and sad. I feel like I’ve failed, as if COVID is a giant game of evil tag and I somehow misstepped and failed to avoid it. Now I have let my team (my family) down. Graham will have to call into work for weeks. And this, on literally THE DAY that vaccine gets shipped out for emergency use. Ten months of calculated decision-making and risk-tolerance assessing, ten months of saying “no,” being told “no,” and everything in between. Only to fall victim to this thing we’ve been avoiding in the final leg of the race.

I’m sad and all the other things. But also, I am angry. No, it’s probably more accurate to call it furious. I followed the rules! It was just us for Thanksgiving! We have had no one in our home! I wear my mask! I order my groceries online! We are homeschooling! Meanwhile, people all around gather, have others in their homes, celebrate in various Christmas-y ways. My internal fairness meter is alarming off the handle. It’s a good thing it only sounds in my head, otherwise neighbors for miles in all directions would need to be donning earplugs. 

The short of it is, this simply doesn’t seem fair.

I know I can’t stay in this headspace forever. If there’s any hope of sanity while I’m locked away in isolation, I’m gonna have to hit a reset. 

I start looking for silver linings. I pray and journal and practice gratitude. Friends and family in my life show up in such amazing ways. Every day someone reaches out to ask if they can run and pick anything up for me. Our porch is covered with deliveries every time my little elves open the door - meals, fresh loaves of homemade bread, magazines to keep me entertained, lattes, crafts for the kids, cookies, cookies and more cookies, fresh grapefruit, flowers, the most adorable little Grinch tree, chocolate, croissants, groceries, bottles of wine, gifts, a virtual reality gaming system (I’m not kidding!), a card table for puzzling, puzzles and nail polish. I could go on and on.

The love and care we received from so many filled our tanks to overflowing. Truly, it blew us away! Graham was floored by my friends and kept exclaiming things like, “Kelsie! You should get sick more often!” And quite honestly, the outpouring we received makes that ever-so-slightly tempting. Kidding! ;) 

One of the most eye-opening pieces of this whole ordeal for me was what it took for me to feel 100% permissed to go entirely off duty. No one expected anything of me. Zero. I can’t think of another time in my life where I was so free of pressure and duty. 

I didn’t realize the freedom I was experiencing until it was gone. Isn’t that so often the case? Once I was no longer contagious and my bedroom door was free to open again, suddenly I was forced to stare down all the “shoulds” and “coulds” in my life that perpetually fight for my attention. I no longer had strict, understood-and-respected-by-everyone orders to rest and recuperate. Now I would have to make those things happen for myself in addition to my obligations like feeding my family and raising my kids.  

As “unfair” as it may be that I was the one to get hit with COVID after all my efforts to fight against it, I’m (slowly!) learning “Is this fair?” isn’t perhaps the best question to be asking when I encounter hard circumstances like those the last couple weeks have held. As I tell my kids all the time, “Life isn’t fair!” And yet it’s so much easier to bark those words at them than accept them as truth for myself. This week I was challenged to ask myself a different question, a mantra borrowed from my pastor a few months back: “God, what are you trying to teach me in this?” I have a long way to go but I found asking myself this question helped me reset without discounting the hardship I was facing. (Important Kelsie-ism: never discount my feeling or experience, just ask my husband. ;))

Miraculously, none of my family members caught this nasty virus, despite interacting with me for a week before we knew I had it. As I type this, we are waiting for the final test results for a second round of testing so we can officially end this Christmas Season Quarantine and Graham can return to work (and get his vaccine!) Even though I would not choose to do this again, I’m grateful for a strange and unexpected way to hit “pause” on life and take an extended Sabbath of rest. 

THE END.

(Important author’s note: don’t let this get into the wrong hands but I actually didn’t mind a week of alone time in a small space without having to cook or take care of anyone. Which probably goes to show just how desperate us mamas can get who are with our kids constantly. Or it might just mean I’m a good candidate for jail. You be the judge).

Famous last words

Pop quiz time!

Kelsie is enjoying homeschooling because __________ .

1. She didn’t get enough connection with her kids over the summer.

2. She felt aimless and purposeless all summer and it gives her a job.

3. The structure of it is amazing.

4. She is getting to know her kids better. 

5. All of the above.

Okay, let’s test your Kelsie knowledge. If you guessed answer “e,” you are 100% correct and win the prize of knowing me well (or maybe having talked to me most recently).

Sorry if that was a spoiler alert. Now you know the jist of the rest of this post: I AM FREAKING ENJOYING HOMESCHOOLING!!! ???? !!!! 

These are words I thought would never be spoken. 

When Graham and I had preschool-aged kids, we discussed at length what our schooling selection would be for our offspring. Graham, a nearly exclusively private-schooled man, knew intimately, the benefits and drawbacks of said education style. I, on the other hand, could recite the positives and negatives of homeschooling, and so, as any sane couple might, we opted to go with the third option (that neither one of us fully experienced) that was public school.

As I kids grew older and I became wiser (and definitely more stubborn!), I can be quoted as having said, “I could never, ever homeschool my kids. I’m just not wired for it. We would butt heads and I would hate it. We need time apart from each other.” After unleashing these strong words, I added a small addendum in the tiniest of fonts, “...that is, I could never homeschool, unless me kids really, really needed me to.”

Fast forward half a decade, insert COVID-19, quarantine isolation from family and friends, strained relationships, and a whole lot of famous-last-word laughs, and here I am homeschooling and liking it. Most of the time. The times are strange, y'all. 

I realize I kind of went dead silent on the blog. Constant humanity surrounding one can do that, I suppose. For those who need an update and/or for whom the introduction to this post has not sufficiently clarified, as of August 31st of this year, I became a Homeschooling Mom! We officially withdrew the younger two (Isla continues with remote school - her choice) from our district and enrolled them in a program called Connections Academy in Washington State that is essentially public school homeschool. All the curriculum is pre-arranged and is shipped to our door (for free, I might add), and “all” I have to do is teach it. The program prearranges daily lessons for each kid, but we have the freedom to move them around and stack them to fit our schedule if we want a lighter day or a day off. 

Coming to this decision was not easy but spring made one thing clear in our household: remote school via Zoom calls does not work for a certain individual with whom we’ve been given the privilege of raising. Constant screen use was problematic, distracting, and resulted in undesirable behaviors. For the other young client, it seemed developmentally inappropriate to “do school” remotely, and, when he asked for me to homeschool him all on his own, it felt like a done deal. We realize it is an extreme privilege and luxury that I am home full time right now and able to do this. And let’s be real, if Graham hadn’t agreed to step in and take the Friday schooling shift so I could have a break, I don’t know that I would have been on board. But here we are. 

Please hear me though, our schooling experience has been far from rainbows and butterflies. I have yelled. I have walked out on my students. If you’ve driven by our house on any given day, you’ve likely seen a kid running laps around the house for unsatisfactory behavior. We’ve had lots of tears and most days are excruciatingly frustrating in some way or another. One kid (whose self esteem we were already tending to) failed their first math test and was gifted a literal “F” letter grade flashing on the screen...way to build that confidence, Connections! 

I would go as far as to say the first week of school was mild hell. No one knew what they were doing. We didn’t have all the textbooks (but we didn’t yet know that) so nothing seemed to be matching up. What was touted as being “only 30%” on screens was averaging about 90% on screens (refer back to missing textbook issue above) and we thought we’d made a horribly poor decision because one of the main reasons we chose this option was to be on screens less while at the same time not having to organize our own curriculum. 

BUT!

In the midst of the extreme challenges, here we are and I am giddy to realize we made the right choice for us. And things are going really well, if you choose to operate under a broader definition of that word. I realize that I often don’t write as much when things are going well. Hardship tends to fuel my typing fingers, I guess. So it felt important that I document right now, in 2020, the things that are going RIGHT for once. 

I knew we’d made the best choice for us when our district sent an email late last week stating they are beginning to work toward implementing a hybrid form of in-person school for certain parties IF the number of COVID-19 cases stays down. I had anticipated an email such as this would send me into a happy dance of elation, but instead, I felt really heavy of heart and borderline sad. 

“WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?!” I thought. And then “Omigosh no! I think it’s happened! I am actually LIKING what we are doing.”

I am still stunned that I feel this way. Let’s get back to the pop quiz that I kicked us off with. Summer was hard. There was so much togetherness yet very little connection with the kids at the same time. I felt so busy supervising, feeding, doling out snacks yet SO BORED. They were frequently occupied playing outside at home (a good thing!) but I felt like I lost a little piece of them that I was longing to reclaim as I brought them back under my wing. I think they would say they lived their best life but their mama did not. While they were much more independent than any season ever before, I was indefinitely “on duty” and rarely able to completely disengage and take a full break. It was challenging to deep dive into any projects or creative ventures because the inevitable interruption was only moments away. It felt like I was living on the surface and couldn’t put down roots.

I knew I wasn’t exactly happy during the Summer of Quarantine, but it wasn’t clear just how purposeless I felt until a new purpose was introduced to me: the role of educating my kids. While I am the first to preach the respectable, essential and important job of parenting, there’s no denying that, with the title of “Teacher,” comes a heap of universal respect that unfortunately is not present when one’s title is “Mother.” I had no idea how much I needed to be needed by someone until, well, I was. And reintroducing wake times and break times and start times and STRUCTURE to our days certainly hasn't been hurting anybody either. Suddenly I went from feeling aimless and bored yet haggard and tired to having a full-time job where the margins only allow for the occasional sweeping under the kitchen table, if even that. The days are taxing and they fly by, but at the same time, are incredibly rewarding.

Upon the encouragement of my seasoned-at-homeschooling sister-in-law, I stashed a small notebook in the drawer of our homeschooling desk where I record “payday” moments in our homeschooling experience. Since the compensation I am being offered is no better than in my prior role (merely the knowledge that I am doing something worthwhile), I am trying to record interactions, cute things the kids say, or “win” moments that act as my “pay” for doing this job. It’s a great lens for me to look at the day through. By default, my Type 1 Enneagram personality has me constantly seeing the world based on how it can be improved. But this view helps me see what is good and cherished about right now. 

Another thing I am enjoying immensely is the intricate challenge of “figuring my kids out.” One of them couldn’t be less like me and the learning curve is steep, trying to make sense of their brain processes. It’s super exciting to try to "crack the code" with new strategies and motivation tactics. If you would have asked me 3 ½ weeks ago whether hoverboards and trapeze bars belonged in the classroom, I would have said a BIG FAT NO. But time, 20 school days to be exact, has taught me that what I think makes a good learning environment doesn’t ring true for everyone. When my kid can recite back to me word for word what I just read while swinging on a trapeze, but can’t do so when seated at the desk, it causes one to become flexible prrrrretty quickly.  

So for the many of you who have asked the question of the month, "How is homeschooling going?", I present you my long-winded answer. And whatever you do, please do not forget the precursor that led to this blessed enjoyment: A GLOBAL PANDEMIC. Would I have enjoyed this role without the 6 months of isolation that preceded it? We shall never know. So I'm just gonna celebrate that, at this moment, I am enjoying my crazy hard new job.

I miss me

I miss me.

Perhaps that has always been the hardest part of motherhood for me. The feeling ebbs and flows, depending on the season we are in. It’s stronger in the newborn and infant years, worse when I’m on a long stretch of solo parenting, greater when I’m not in a good place with my own mental health and level of self care. I can now add to the list that the feeling is also strong when I’m faced with a worldwide pandemic.

I miss me.

Some days are better than others. On some days, I feel more energetic and confident under all the hats I’m wearing - teacher, wife, mom, supporter to a medical professional, acquirer of food in a war-time-like environment where store shelves often lay barren. Life is beyond strange right now for all of us.

I miss me.

I miss doing the things that fill my cup. I miss being alone. I miss having the kids GO to school.

I miss me.

I miss feeling like I’m good at something. I KNOW deep down that I’m doing an okay enough job with teaching my kids. In fact, I would even venture to say I’m doing a GOOD job. But my kids aren’t generous with their positive feedback. Mostly they fight me tooth and nail on everything. It’s hard to feel good about the job you are doing when your students make your every request seem like torture.

I miss me.

I miss feeling like I have time for something. I can’t even identify what that thing is specifically right now. Just something. Anything from start to finish. Uninterrupted. Yesterday it was gardening. I wanted to plant a few seeds, toss some fertilizer on my berries, edge the lawn. It was a beautiful day. It really didn’t feel like too much to ask. But it was. It almost always is. One kid wanted me to find and print sheet music for the Star Wars theme song because she has a budding interest in piano. Then she wanted me to spend special one-on-one time teaching it to her. Another kid was having one of her roughest pandemic days to date. Numerous emotional meltdowns. Everything was wrong. She was trailing me around for half the day, her high needs seeping from her every pore. The youngest was out shooting hoops in the culdesac when suddenly a crowd of neighborhood kids joined him. They were unable to maintain a proper “social distance” so I had to call him inside and help set him up with a new activity to keep him occupied. After the third interruption in 5 minutes time, I threw all my gardening tools in a bucket and gave up in surrender. There are some days (most days) when the requests are just too frequent.

I miss me.

I guess what I probably miss most is having lengthy chunks of time to remember who I am and to do the things I love. I get an hour here and there to squeeze in a run or read a couple chapters in a book but, as an introvert, “recharging” in tiny snippets is no longer working. It’s like we’ve all reverted to the newborn phase of parenting again - there are no guarantees whether this nap, this craft you set up to entertain the kids, is going to buy you three minutes or three hours. So instead of starting something, you start nothing and waste away the minutes scrolling through your phone, trying to fill the void. And then when the minutes suddenly turn into an hour, you silently berate yourself for not seizing the opportunity to do whatever it was you wanted to do. But you didn’t know. You never can predict.

I miss me.

I miss the version of me who doesn’t yell so much. Yesterday, after full-blown yelling at the kids for the third time, I had the wherewithal to recognize what was operating, and I narrated it aloud to the kids in live time. “Kids,” I told them. “I’m yelling a lot today which means that I’ve reached my limit and I need some quiet time. For the next hour, I need you to leave me alone.” I ran outside to the patio with a novel and pretended to be invisible. Aside from one kid who joined me outside but whisper-promised that she “would be quiet”, they actually obliged my request. This moment on this particular day felt like a win, but still I wish we didn’t have to get to the yelling point to get this mama what she needs.

I miss me.

I miss having even an inkling of energy at the end of the day to anything other than to eat a bowl of ice cream and drink a glass or 2 of wine in celebration of another day checked off the calendar. I’m often soooo tapped out at the end of another long day with the kids that I don’t even feel like spending time with my husband or jumping on a Zoom call with some of the friends I love dearly. I miss my friends. And yet sometimes I guess I miss myself more and that internal cry to go into my shell in hibernation wins out.

I miss me.

I’m learning about myself that it takes me a good long while to settle in to change. When things are hard and my feathers are ruffled, I’m slow to adapt. I spend a long time flailing before I’m able to don my lifejacket and feel safe enough to stop fighting the current and just let it carry me in the new direction. I exert massive amounts of energy trying to get everything back to the way it was before and in doing so, I often completely miss or overlook unexpected moments of joy because it “wasn’t a part of my carefully orchestrated plan.” I miss enjoying things and a lot of that is my own darn fault.

I miss me.

But things look different now. Maybe this means that I, too, like the world around me, am going to have to change. I don’t like the sound of that. I’m still here grieving my “Dream Year.” This was “supposed” to be my first year with all the kids in school full time. This was “supposed” to be the year I had loads of alone time to remember who I am. This was supposed to be the year I work on writing a book. This was supposed to be the year I revived and breathed life into the parts of “Kelsie” that didn’t revolve entirely around my children. Ha. Boy is the joke on me right about now!

I miss me.

Some days are certainly harder than others. I’m learning to accept the good and the bad. It’s a bit like riding a roller coaster blind-folded - you just never know if today is going to involve a lot of smooth coasting or a steep uphill climb. I know all you parents out there can relate. I hope that we can make space for every part of this crazy ride we are all on - the grief, the good, the hard, the terrifying.

When my husband gave me this chunk of time today to write (can I get a hallelujah!?), I was hoping to compose a post about putting down roots and “growing where we are planted,” but honestly, I woke up this morning kind of wanting to spit on that message. That’s my typical M.O. by the time I reach about Thursday or Friday in a long week of quarantine, I guess you could say. I’ll get back there at some point. I promise I will. Because I know there is a really good message for all of us in there. But some days are harder and that’s okay. There is space for both.

In the meantime, I’ll draw your attention back to the passage of Scripture at the beginning of this post. It’s been really speaking to me and inspiring me to dig deep and keep going during these days that feel oh so mundane and repetitive and exhausting: “Do not grow weary in doing good for in due time you will reap your reward if you do not give up.” Galatians 6:9.

Carry on, Weary Ones!

Fragmented time

My life as a mom feels like a long succession of fragments, short lumps of time, choppily strung together until a full day has passed. The transitions aren’t always smooth. There are a lot of awkward gaps. It doesn’t look like the average American work day in terms of productivity and time management.

First, there is that odd block of 30 minutes on school mornings where breakfast has been eaten and cleared, routines have been done, and we are essentially just killing time until we need to head out the door (thanks to kids who wake early plus a ridiculously late school start time of nine freaking twenty-five AM). I never quite know what to do with this time. Do I start a chore? Do I assign the kids a chore since their after-school hours are so fleeting and I want them to be contributing? Or do I let them play freely, since they have so few hours to do so? Do I just whisper prayers of thanks for the time and go hide in my room and read? Or should I pay bills or somehow spend time with the kids?

In the brief two-hour period, post-elementary school drop off, I temporarily become a “mother of an only child.” It’s enough time to do something small, but not enough time to venture far from home before we have to get back for lunch before afternoon preschool. Do we do something fun together? Squeeze in a quick playdate? Run errands?

When it’s errands we choose, we face the annoying 40 minute gap between elementary school drop off and the opening of the public library and Costco, two places we seem to need to frequent often. Do we go back home, take off our shoes and throw a load of laundry in the wash before leaving again on our errands? Do we talk the long way home from school and squeeze in a quick bit of exercise? Or do we drive around aimlessly for a little while and then pass the last ten minutes in the parking lot of Costco, grooving to Kidz Bop, so we can “beat the crowds” and be the first ones in the building?

After lunch, three days a week, I have the too-short blip of time, where all three of my offspring are at their respective schools. I can choose to spend this time in one of two ways – either relaxing or focusing on being productive. No matter which option I choose, there never seems to be enough time, and the two hours whiz by, leaving me dissatisfied and feeling as though I squandered my time.  

Next comes the awkward 20-minute chunk between the moment we arrive home from preschool pick up and the moment when we need to begin walking to the elementary school to get the older two. It’s just enough time to run one quick errand (if you take the “run” part literally) or perhaps empty the dishwasher to make the dinner prep hour a little easier.

After school, it’s practically dinnertime, because school gets out so late. But of course, the kids are “starving” and, if they are going to eat a snack, I need them to do it RIGHT THEN so they don’t completely spoil their dinner. So, I force them to bypass any neighborhood kids out enjoying the last hour of daylight and send them bee-lining straight for the table to eat a quick bite.

Then it’s time for homework. The only thing consistent about elementary school homework is that it is assigned with pristine irregularity (when the teacher remembers to put it in the folder), making it nearly impossible to plan anything for these minute-long afternoons.

If all goes as planned, snacks get consumed, homework is checked off (or not), and then the kids inevitably get distracted with some activity and forget that they wanted to go outside, leaving me with about 15 unspoken for minutes before it’s time to start dinner. It’s just enough time to start a chapter, but not finish, begin a board game, but not complete it, fold some of the laundry but not all. It feels vital that I use this time well, yet I lack a good definition of what “well” really means to me.

When I switch gears and focus in on dinner preparation, the kids naturally remember my existence and suddenly require my assistance in accomplishing the three individual tasks each are in the middle of. But by now, my rings are on the window sill and my hands are deep into a bowl of ground beef, massaging dried herbs, garlic and spices into the meat and forming them into meatballs. I exhale loudly, wondering why they couldn’t have possibly needed me earlier, when I had those 15 minutes to spare.

After dinner, we move on to the tasks of washing dishes and making lunches. It’s typically a family affair which means the kitchen gets messier before it gets cleaner, bread crumbs scattering across surfaces and onto the floor, surplus peanut butter gluing only a small percentage of them to the counter. When we have finished, it’s time for the littlest to get ready for bed, but it’s too early for the older too. We didn’t realize how good we had it when they were all small and bedtime was bedtime. Full stop. Now the girls want the times staggered, as they seek out independence and privilege, throwing down their “I’m older than you” cards. I really can’t argue because I know their elementary-aged bodies aren’t as ready for sleep as early the five-year-old’s is. So, now we have this unused 20-30 minutes, where one kid is down, but two aren’t quite ready to go, and we aren’t quite sure what to do with it.

Beyond the intricacies of the average day-to-day, there are also all the variables that shift, depending on what is on the schedule. There is the time spent waiting in the drive-thru line at the pharmacy or the time that passes when one kid has a before-school activity but the other one doesn’t, so you make grooves in the pavement driving the same route to school and back twice, with only 25 minutes in-between. Then there are the hour-long sports practices so close to home, just long enough that it’s hard to sit there and kill an hour, but too short to go home because you’d only have 40 minutes before you had to turn around and drive back again. There’s also all the waiting that happens at appointments, arriving early for check in, as requested, but then winding up with 15 minutes to burn in the waiting room.

My life as a mom feels like one long series of fragments of time (anyone with me on this?!?) And I don’t really know what to do with all these fragments. They make me anxious. I have a deep longing to be present, to fully invest, to start AND to finish, to check things off. It’s hard for me to do any of those things when I only have a 15-minute window. And so rather than trying, I make half-hearted attempts and end up squandering a lot of time.  

I used to think that the answer was to carve out more extended chunks of consecutive time, and I do this when I can, but I’m realizing that my time only seems to be growing more fragmented as the children age. We move from one thing to the next, to the next, with awkward lumps of minutes in-between. This challenge ain’t going anywhere.

So, what does that look like for me to be present and/or make the best use of my time when my moments are so fragmented? How can I invest in the now when I’ve got two or 10 or 60 minutes until it’s time to transition to the next thing? If you read this whole post hoping for some magical, quick-fix answers, sorry! I should have warned you that this was more of a “wondering out loud” sort of essay. I don’t have the answer here but for sure I know I want to quit squandering (which quite possibly is synonymous with “scrolling” – that dang smart phone is going to be the death of me!!)

Most likely the “answer” will involve making amends with my dislike of starting and not finishing. Perhaps the best thing for me to do would be to read a couple sentences of a book and then put it down. Progress is progress, right? And at least I got a second to read! Maybe I should go on more walks around the block. Just because it’s broken up, doesn’t mean it doesn’t “count” as exercise. Or perhaps I should take up tic-tac-toe (it’s fast, I think). Or just spend more time snuggling with whomever in my family happens to be nearest. I really don’t know. I’m sure it looks different for everyone, but I would so love to do a little online groupthink and hear how other moms out there manage their fragmented days. Please and thank you!

The hardest best thing

There was a time in my life when weeks like this one would have slayed me. Riding the roller coaster of therapy is brutal. Author Glennan Doyle writes about life being “freaking brutiful,” an intertwining of brutal and beautiful. That’s about how I would describe wading through the process of therapy. It’s freaking brutiful.

I used to think those in therapy were the ones most broken. Now, with three consecutive years of the stuff securely under my belt (plus all the “bonus” sessions with my kids), I realize how incredibly wrong I was. Therapy may be for the broken, simply because brokenness is synonymous with being human, but I believe it's those who face their brokenness head on, they are the some of the world's strongest. They are the bravest, the ones with the grit and endurance, the ones not just longing for healing, but going after it. They are willing to get down into the thick of the mess and do the hard and dirty work, the work that is brutiful.

They are the ones who are unwilling to stay the way they are.

And that, my friends, is beautiful. 

To those of who have gone before, I commend you. You are the definition of hardcore. To those of you currently in the trenches, solidarity! Stay in it. I'm (pretty) sure the "other side" of all this tough business is worth the work of getting there (if you get there before me, please confirm). And for anyone wondering if perhaps maybe it's time to do some work with a counselor, the answer is almost undoubtedly yes. 

It’s no secret that our family has been forking over a huge portion of our income toward this business of “addressing our crap” (also known more eloquently by most as “going to therapy”). It’s been one of THE hardest best things I personally have ever done, third only to marriage and parenting...which are two of the reason I’m in therapy…but I digress. 

Perhaps you remember back in the fall when I wrote about the struggles we were facing with two of our offspring? And then I boldly (stupidly?) stated we were “just waiting for kid three to show his cards” and then we’d get him enrolled in whatever form of therapy he needed? Why do I open my Big. Fat. Mouth? 

So we are 5 for 5 over here when it comes to therapy needs now...which is a perfect score, if anyone is keeping track (where do I pick up my prize??) When our third kid received his diagnosis, our pediatrician kindly made an attempt at consoling me by highlighting the hereditary nature of the various players in our household (OCD, anxiety, ADHD). 

“They are just like eye color," she told me. "No one is to blame. These things are inherited in the genes, just like tall stature or brown hair.” 

Awesome. 

“Sorry kids,” are the only words of comfort I can offer the offspring. The genes be STRONG in this clan.

Though at times, addressing each of our specific needs has been challenging and overwhelming, I’m so grateful for the massive number of tools “doing our work” together has equipped our family with along the way. In fact, we now have so many tools, we had to trade in our tool belt for a full blown tool shed in which to store all these dang tools we-never-knew-we-needed-but-now-we-can’t-seem-to-live-without. And we are all the better for it. I'm super proud of us. I stand witness to some really amazing change and powerful areas of growth. 

Technically, as the mother and in-house transportation and sit-in supervisor for all the these appointments, I have been the “lucky recipient” of all sorts of extra, “free” kid-sized therapy sessions to supplement my own. Quite honestly, sometimes there are more take-home nuggets when they are presented at a grade school-aged cognitive level. We have a vast supply of amazing resources available to us that are helping our kids conquer their struggles at such young ages. What a gift that they get to obliterate their mental beasts when they are still tiny, before they grow and invade and take over their minds and tell them all sorts of lies, reinforced over decades. It makes me teary just to think that they might not have wrestle with their struggles to the degree their dad and I have. 

The kids' progress is easy for me to see since I'm one step removed as the observer. But my own progress? Though sometimes it's harder to identify, I know I am changing too. So, as this new year launches, it felt like a valuable exercise for me to take a minute and identify just a few of the many things this brutiful process has been teaching me. I also know that vulnerability can work as a powerful adhesive to bind us together. I am not alone in my struggles and so I'm calling them out aloud in case one of you whispers "me too." 

I will start first with the things that therapy has revealed that have been more painful, the things that perhaps, at first blush, I would rather not have known: 

I struggle with extreme rigidity.

I am a very black and white thinker. There is always a right and a wrong. Your side and my side. The blameless and the one at fault. (And for the record, usually he is the problem, not me, of course).

I continue to struggle with a list of OCD tendencies longer than my daughter’s (who has been in intense treatment for her OCD for 5 months and counting).

I have anxiety. Not a heart-racing, panic-attack or scared-of-heights form that we often think of. But more of the crippling thoughts kind where I am perpetually worried I’m not doing enough, saying enough, being enough. My mind often torments me.

Since I seem to be feeling particularly open, I’ll throw this one out there: I have a lot of sexual baggage. Like a lot a lot. To this day, I am still fighting against the sex-negative messaging of my past. This is originally why therapy was initiated. But, as I’m told is common in therapy, one thing led to another and we’ve had to peel back layer after layer after layer after layer to work on adjusting the faulty foundation before we’ve been able to do more focused work in this area. 

I struggle with anger. I identify wholeheartedly as a “Type One - Reformer” (and perfectionist!) on the Enneagram but it always made me frown a little to read that one of my bigger struggles as a “Type One” was anger. I’m not really a yeller, I thought. I don’t really feel like an angry person. Sure, sometimes I certainly lose it with the kids but I don’t rage like some people I hear about. Very recently, I have realized there are other forms of anger, not just the explosive, yelling variety most of us picture. There is also the slow boiler, the one who gradually and quietly comes to a simmer. She doesn’t even realize it has happened until she is so seeped in bitterness and resentment she could swim in it. This is the kind of anger I identify with. 

I keep tally. Of everything. Tit for tat. I’m gung ho about fairness and equality, when the scale isn’t tipping in my favor.

I do much better “coming to realize” my faults on my own than when someone else calls me out on them. When I am critiqued, I’m prone to deflection and blame-shifting.

I work with a distinct ceiling above me. I only take on what I know I am capable of (and typically only the things I know I will also be successful in). My husband has no such ceiling. The sky’s the limit! Rarely does he take on something within his current capabilities. He is ever game to phone a friend and call in for reinforcements when he wants something done and doesn’t know how to do it. This makes doing remodeling projects together impossible (so far). I always have to bow out because his process is so different from mine. But we are working on this! Let’s just take a moment of silence in honor of the fact that WE NOW AT LEAST ARE AWARE THAT THIS IS HAPPENING. This is big, y’all. Stay tuned...we might have a little endeavour coming down the pipes.

This is the just the short list of some pretty tough, hard-to-swallow realities that therapy has brought to my attention. But it most certainly hasn’t all been hard. There’s the beautiful too. 

My time in (all the) therapies has also revealed an entire host of things that I’m incredibly grateful for like that: 

I married a really amazing person. 

I am capable. 

I am resilient. 

People enjoy my company (I really want to delete this one because it feels conceited to say so aloud but after a lifetime of battling insecurities and wondering if I was accepted and desired anywhere, it feels significant to name. Perhaps my next step will be to name it sans disclaimer?)

I can do hard things. 

I can change. 

I am so much stronger than I ever realized.

I freaking don’t give up. 

I can sit in discomfort. And it gets easier the more times I do it. 

I am a good enough mom. 

My kids know I love them.

I deserve pleasure. 

It is OK for me to take breaks.

Self-care is not selfish. It is exactly as it reads - the act of caring for ourselves. I am a mess without it. 

I can have an area that I need to work on and it doesn’t make all of me a failure. (This one is still a challenge but I’m working on it).

Sometimes “doing the work” looks like sitting on the porch in the sunshine, reading a novel. Seriously!

I have a right to everything I feel.

I have a voice. And it matters. 

I think I might be a bit of a feminist - who knew?!

I have HOPE!!!!!

There is power in naming and recording, seeing where one once was, and how far one has come. Especially when things feel slow and arduous, and you can't tell if the needle is inching up the scale. Even when prone to despair, the exercise of making a list like this of “things learned” serves as a reminder of all the movement, no matter how subtle. 

This process, it's freaking brutiful.  

What are you doing with your life?

Lately I’ve been feeling the pressure. Pressure to know. Pressure to decide. Just pressure in general.

I’ve taken a bit of a break from writing, perhaps because it’s summer and, with the kids around constantly, the only thing I can muster energy for during my alone times, which, by the way, I hire a sitter for in case you’re getting some crazy idea that I have magical children who give me personal space of their own accord, is reading. Reading only takes marginal effort. There are minimal thoughts involved, beyond the subconscious imagination types that produce the mental movie reel that runs alongside the novel’s plot.

I am practicing diligent avoidance with writing too. I’ve been wondering, for perhaps the billionth time, what is this writing thing for anyway? For so long I’ve felt these undeniable urges to pen words to a page, a fuzzy vision toward something bigger someday in the future, but the details have yet to be made known to me. In the meantime, I question, what is the point?

Two years ago, I attended a writing conference and it was there that I received the clarity and courage I needed to return home and quit my paid job. It was there where I was urged to identify “my reader” and then “write only for her.” I was told that all my words, social media posts etc. should be formulated with my reader in mind. While this bit of advice has, I think, resulted in some stronger final drafts of my essays, I’ve discovered that it is much, much harder to put forth words with any regularity. Short works take me weeks which turn into months, and it isn’t because my content is necessarily more complex. I think it’s actually because I’ve been editing myself out. I overthink each piece because I’m thinking of “her,” my reader. I want to make sure my words don’t come across wrong to this person, or that person, or offend this mom or that one. I have opinions, but I remove them because I know not everyone will agree and I don’t want to cause a ruckus on the internet. By the time I hit “publish,” I wonder if my words have been edited so severely that they have lost some of their meaning. Certainly, they have lost much of their depth and raw emotion.

I wonder if maybe this is the reason I have been struggling with writing. Suddenly I am writing FOR someone else. Someone else who does not compensate, who is often silent. And the words and their intent lose their luster. I am no longer putting words on the page for the joy of seeing words strung together. I am no longer stepping back in surprise as the words pour out and I think, “Huh, I never realized I thought that until now” (writing is black magic this way).

Writing that was once a mind-clearing, therapeutic outlet feels forced and inauthentic. Since I am writing “for my reader,” I feel the pressure to have a strong conclusion, a purpose to all my pieces, a take-home message to tie it all up in a nice bow. But there are many days when my life is just messy. There are no bows there for tying. My anxiety takes over and I can’t shut it down. I rage at the children. I practice avoidance with my husband. I leave the laundry for days upon days upon days on end. What I'm realizing is that I don't enjoy writing when I'm writing for "her." And so I'm going to switch gears and go back to writing again "for me." I don't know where that will lead me.

I was talking to some girlfriends, most of us moms in slightly different stages of early to mid-motherhood. We were discussing that largely celebrated (and for some slightly dreaded) day when our youngest child enters elementary school. When the earth goes around the sun for that final lap and the heavens hand you kid-free daytimes as your impending new reality, well-meaning humans begin to ask, “What are you going to do with all your free time?!” And then the inevitable follow-up question that, quite honestly, I wish to ban from existence is an eager, “Are you going to go back to work?!” It’s almost as if all of us overly exhausted moms haven’t been doing work of any kind for the last decade (insert major eyeroll here).

I hate this question because it operates under the assumption that I, as a mother, a) should have my upcoming life figured out and b) should obviously be prepared to do something with my time. I mean. We all will do something eventually but what makes me shudder is the assumption that we are all just antsy to head out and earn a paycheck again. Talk about pressure!

As my girlfriends and I went around and shared our thoughts about the future, we each had a unique idea on how we might spend our time once the kids were all of schooling age. There was some talk of hobbies, others talked about how their financial contribution to really benefit the family. But one theme was consistent: we all felt SO MUCH pressure to know what we were doing. And none of us had an answer.   

Let me paint you a picture. Imagine you just finished running a marathon. You are hot and sweaty and sore and dehydrated and tired, and you definitely stopped thinking clearly about 23 miles back. The only coherent idea you possess is as follows:

“I need a chocolate milk. I need a chocolate milk NOW.”

This thought circulates through your brain on repeat and you can consider nothing else until you amend the situation and find said beverage. (Trust me, I know. I ran a marathon once.)  

Despite the fact that perhaps you aren’t at your very best in this moment, someone hands you a Cliff Bar and tells you, if you are worth anything to anyone, you’ll reverse the route you just completed and run another 26.2 back to the starting line without so much as a rest or potty break or a hip hip hooray or minute to hydrate or tend to your blisters or missing toenails. No, there isn’t time for such luxuries. Once must always earn their keep, mustn’t they?

Ummmmm, say what now?!

Allow me to interject here, but has anyone stopped to consider the message this sends to a mother? She’s been through just a couple of major things in the past decade. First off, if she began as a career woman, motherhood likely propelled her toward job change – whether it was stepping out of the paid working world or trading a fulltime role for part-time. Even if she maintained her same position in the company, she experienced a considerable mental shift to create space for her new title of “Mom.” More than likely, she lost an identity or two, gained a new one, got run over a couple thousand times by unrelenting toddlers, had her body shrink and expand like a balloon (under all her layers it looks like a deflated balloon now too, BTW), and stayed awake far more hours than she slept. But heaven forbid she not have an answer to your eager query:

“And what are you going to do with your life now?”

GULP.

My “moment,” the day when my youngest enters kindergarten, is rapidly approaching (396 days to be precise), and I’ve been freaking out about it for, oh, the past nine years or so. This is perhaps why I’ve been considering and reconsidering and questioning what this whole writing thing I’m doing (and not doing) is about anyway. Is it a hobby? Is it a career option? Is it my own personal therapy? What am I going to do with my life?

One of my sweet friends said it so well when she summarized her future plans (and I’m paraphrasing), “Maybe I will just use the time to actually be a good wife and a good mom rather than barely surviving at everything I do.”

I LOVE that! It’s sounds so freeing to have space and margin, doesn’t it?

And so to her and myself and everyone else who has a plan for our "moment" (or whose plan is to have no plan!), I say, “Get it, Girl!” Let’s erase all this pressure and expectation and take things one day at a time, ok?

Rest is not high maintenance

My first recollection of a “high maintenance” experience took place when I was about 7 years old. We sat in a line atop the picnic table, legs dangling down, unable yet to reach the battered wood bench below. It was the third morning we’d spent this way, waiting. Breakfast of Krusteaz pancakes cooked on the Coleman, and sausage, a little too black with char, had long since digested in our bellies. We were antsy to start the day, ready to hit the beach or the miles upon miles of biking trails that looped the campground. But not everyone in our party was the wake-and-go sort. So, we sat there staring at the camper before us, waiting for the single occupant who was readying within, willing the door to squeak open, the audible declaration that the day could now officially begin.

We were camping on the Oregon coast with another family, a college buddy of my dad’s, his wife, and their two girls. They always camped in a trailer, which seemed rather luxurious compared to our meager tent, the six of us squeezing into a tiny square of nylon. We would sometimes stay for a week at a time. We rarely showered (that’s what the ocean was for!) On a good day, we may have brushed our hair. But that was the extent of our personal hygiene while living outdoors. Which is why it was utterly baffling for me to wrap my mind around what could be happening in that trailer as we sat there on the table. The blondes next to me seemed unphased. Apparently, this was the daily routine for them, waiting for mom to get ready.

Finally, when it felt like we could wait no longer, the doorknob to the trailer would turn and we’d jump to our feet eagerly. Out would step a perfectly pedicured foot, followed by the rest of her, eyes emphasized by carefully-applied liner, sky-blue shadow and mascara in a coordinated hue. Her lips were bright fuchsia and her cheeks smudged in pink, but I’m told it was her hair that kept us waiting the longest. She was a stickler for her hot electric rollers and refused to be seen in public with her hair uncurled, camping or not.

While I am in no way trying to peg this singular experience as the source of my issues surrounding this idea of being high maintenance, I am using this story as a tiny illustration in a bigger picture. Seven-year-old me wasn’t a fan of waiting for this grown up lady to finish her beauty routine. I didn’t understand why we all had to delay our day’s activities solely because of one person. I found it incredibly annoying. It was experiences like this (along with many, many others) that began planting seeds in my soul that led to my formulating the following logic:

High maintenance people are annoying.

High maintenance people have lots of needs.

Therefore, having needs = annoying.

Somewhere along the lines, this skewed logic grew and eventually cemented itself in my young adult brain as fact. I didn’t realize it was happening but, before I knew it, I had developed an intense feeling of shame over having any needs at all. Having needs meant I was weak and incapable. They made me feel self-centered. Certainly, having personal needs for space or rest or creativity also made me a nuisance to others. So, I stuffed away my needs, pretending they weren’t there because I wanted to be strong. And I didn’t want to bother people. Often, I plowed ahead without any boundaries. I said yes when asked (because obviously saying no would be "unchristian") and lived a very overscheduled, unfulfilling life with little space for pleasure (because to enjoy something means we aren’t toiling hard enough - please catch the sarcasm).

A couple weeks back, our family was preparing to head out of town for the weekend. We had nothing on the calendar for the Friday we were slated to leave. Well, nothing unless you count the scheduled alone/writing time that my husband and I have worked into our Friday morning routine to give me the break and creative outlet I need to feel like a real person. The fact that I continue to overlook this as a legitimate calendar commitment bears witness to the remnants of my shame. It took nearly a decade of tears and fighting (mostly against myself) before we finally set up this system of scheduling kid-free hours for me. And, though it seems to be about as essential as oxygen for my personal well-being, I’m quick to appear sacrificial and altruistic by volunteering to give it up. This, as it turns out, never bodes well for anyone. I don’t want to need this time. I don’t feel deserving of it. It makes me feel high maintenance. I don’t care for the jealous glares of other moms commenting under their breath about how good I have it. I want to be superwoman and be viewed as capable without doing the hard work of making space for my own needs somewhere in there too.

On this particular Friday, I assumed we would jet out of town right after breakfast since we had “nothing” on the calendar. But my dear and intelligent husband informed me that he had planned otherwise.

“We aren’t leaving until after you have your time in the morning,” he told me. “You’re a better person when you get that break.”

I could have let the bluntness of his words sting as they went down but instead I saw them as a sign of the deep love and understanding my husband has for me. He recognizes my needs and desires to protect them. And he is absolutely right. I am a much more functional, kind, and positive mom and wife when I have an uninterrupted chunk of time to myself each week. It’s simply a matter of fact. While we’re at it, I also need a moment to myself every single afternoon (thank you summer break for confirming this), to gather my thoughts, to not have anyone ask anything of me, in order for me to be a non-screaming, sane person as I enter the “Witching Hours” each day when the clock strikes four.

My need for quiet and pause doesn’t make me wrong or weak or a failure or bad, the lies I told myself for so many years. It makes me a human. And an introvert. It’s how I’m wired.

I used to (and sometimes still do!) feel so much shame about it. And I know I’m not alone. I’ve talked to so many women, moms especially, who are wrestling similarly. We are (generally speaking), a group of burnt out, stressed out, tired out ladies who are desperate for respite yet feel so ashamed for needing it. What we are doing to ourselves isn’t healthy. So, if you find yourself longing for rest yet experiencing guilt over desiring time to yourself, here are some words for you:

Having needs does not make you high maintenance.

You have permission to slow down, pull some strings, say no, learn to savor and rest and do all this guilt-free. You are allowed to have time alone. You are allowed to hire a babysitter and not for the sake of going to appointments and running errands. You have permission to enforce daily quiet times for your kids so that you can read a book in the hammock and NOT be productive. And guess what? You are still a good mom! You are allowed to take a sunny day off work and not cancel daycare just to go to the beach and enjoy a day of summer without being responsible for keeping small humans from drowning. We do not have to be “martyrs” for our families. I think the title of “martyr” loses its credibility when we are cranky about it anyway.

What’s keeping you from making rest a priority? Is it guilt? Perhaps feeling like you don’t deserve a break? That taking breaks somehow makes you weak or less than? Or, does it feel wasteful to spend your tight budget on something for yourself? Is it concerns over childcare or finances? Or are you worried that people might judge you? I’ve experienced each of these barriers time and time again but my conclusion is this: prioritizing your own basic needs is worth fighting for. You might have to make sacrifices to create space in the budget to pay for a sitter. You might have to get creative or put yourself out there and ask someone for help. No matter the barrier, there are steps we can each take to better care for ourselves, as well as others.

Pay attention to your physical needs. Incorporate rest. Sleep, wake and repeat. And may God release you from all shame and guilt, reminding you that EVERY PART OF YOU (needs included!) - are made in His image.