A Lesson in Joy

I was at The Salvation Army recently to pick up something for a client. As I was walking in the doors, there was a young man walking out with his grocery box. in his small box of groceries, they had placed a single, small bottle of soda in the box(which I've never seen before). 

This man, who appeared to have intellectual disabilities, was as happy as anyone that I've ever seen in my life. He showed me his bottle of soda and delightedly told me that he hadn't had a soda in years and that he was going to drink this one today. He was grinning ear-to-ear, his glee contagious to all around him. 

After a moment, he paused in his giddy dance of joy and noticed my empty hands. He asked, somewhat somberly, if I was getting a box of food, as well. I explained to this sweet young man that I was a nurse getting a car seat for a client and was not picking up food for myself. 

He looked confused and asked me if that meant I wouldn't get a bottle of soda. I replied that no, I wouldn't. His face, moments before filled with absolute joy, fell and he began waving back on forth on his feet as if in absolute misery. I tried to explain to him that I didn't need any soda and was not upset in the least. 

His face then lit up again with an idea. He asked me with excitement if I wanted to share his Coke. He told me that we could sit in the sun and share his soda and was so excited at the prospect that he was shaking with joy. 

I didn't, of course, share this young man's soda. He deserved to enjoy every bit himself. His soda didn't fill my stomach but his kindness fed my soul.

That afternoon, on a day in which I'd been incredibly stressed before, I sat on park bench in the sunshine and had shared some conversation with a kind, young man. This complete stranger sipped on his small bottle of soda and grinned as we talked. He was drawing every ounce of happiness out of that simple moment that he could.

After he drank the last drop of the carmel colored soda, we parted ways. I have never again had the privilege of meeting that young man again but this memory will forever be a reminder to me: that gratitude and joy are both choices that we make on a moment-to-moment basis. 

I will never be the same. 

Parenting and the Hell of September

Ah, summer- days with little to no schedule, all school alarms on my phone turned off and, at the end of the day, easy dinners on the deck with no dance/soccer/boy scouts/tumbling classes to rush off to after the dinner plates have been scraped clean.

Summer is such a lovely season, especially as a parent. I can feel my blood pressure drop and my limbs become loose and bronzed from being in the sun and enjoying life with my children.  Easy-breezy livin'.

And, then...September.

Ugh.

With the end of August and beginning of September(the word is nearly a swear word in my mind), comes back the rush of school and sports and scouts and parent meetings and rushed mornings and rushed dinners and strict bedtimes and early wakings. Phew!

There is no easing in period. No slow moving transition. It is as if a switch was flipped and we go instantly from the ease of summer into the rush of the fall in a single breath.



September- second only to the holiday craziness of December- is a crazed, frantic month. And, not only are we rushing head forward into the busyness, but we are doing it with children whose bodies are not acclimated to the schedules of the busy school year. Bedtimes can take hours as they have become used to chasing lightning bugs in the night of the summer and falling into bed exhausted hours after the time they would have needed to be in bed during the school year. Likewise, waking our children in the wee hours of the morning before the school buses come screaming down our street is like an olympic event, requiring many reawakening and much patience by kids and parents alike.

Each week requires careful planning of activities, school events, meals and the rush of extra activities that September brings- meet the teacher nights, parent meeting for each sport and school, fundraising, school pictures and whatever the heck else is on my schedule that I'm too tired to remember right now.

My iPhone calendar looks frantic underneath it's carefully color-coded schedule. I feel frantic, too.

Don't get me wrong- I'm grateful to have three happy, healthy children that get to experience attending a wonderful school and to be in the sports and activities that they love. I really am. I live a blessed life.

However, I am also so exhausted. Tired in a way that makes me teary and cranky. Too tired to fall asleep at night(before I had children I had no idea that one could, indeed, be too tired to fall asleep. It is a cruel fact). It leaves me gazing into space from exhaustion, daydreaming of summer days past and hopeful for fall days that have moments of rest and joy within them. 

There are days of wonderful joys ahead- playing in the falling leaves, drinking apple cider by a campfire and trick-or-treating through the neighborhood. I was do my best to stay grounded as we rush through September and keep an eye on the simple joys immeshed within the moments between scurrying to and fro. There will be many lovely moments, I am sure.

If you're a parent and are joining me in the harried craze of the September days, I honor your exhaustion. This parenting business isn't for weaklings. And, take heart- summer will come around again soon.

The Woman Beneath the Mother

In the years after my three children were born, I lost myself. Slowly and then all at once, the parts of me that I had always held sacred began to slip away.

We aren’t supposed to talk about this loss though, are we? Mothers are to be blissed out in Motherhood, sacrificing all willingly in order to serve our brethren. And, I am blissed out, sometimes. I am grateful to be a mother to the best children on the planet. However, underneath the love and gratitude, aside the constant stream of needs of my three children and husband, and beneath the expectations of what a modern-day mother should be, I was losing myself piece-by-piece. Losing myself so slowly that I did not realize it until the woman that I once was inside was completely gone.

A few years ago I found myself inside a deep depression and was lost for hours each day inside the darkness of contemplation of my life. I realized that I had slowly let go of all of my friendships, so shamed to spend any time away from my children to maintain any semblance of even a solid acquaintanceship with anyone other than those whose circles intersected with my children’s school or other activities. I had stopped writing a decade before and the words that used to spill out of my fingers without heed were now stoppered up somewhere out of my reach. Every moment of my day was about my children, my husband, my patients in my work as a nurse. I was lost inside the rote and rusty movements of service of others, in a pattern so familiar that I no longer had to think much about anything. I felt much like an empty vessel and did not know how to fill myself up again.

At the same time that I was realizing how deeply I was immersed in a sadness and emptiness beyond my own help, a co-worker noted my writing in a presentation that I had given. She asked if I wrote professionally. I had not written more than a professional document in more than ten years. The poetry, short stories and essays that used to spill from my hands unto the page had stopped so long ago that I no longer considered writing to be one of my strengths- my strengths now were all tied up into helping others in a non-creative way. That simple question, however, made me wonder if the words—the words that I used to string together that brought me untold joy—were still somewhere deep inside.

I began to write again, the words rusty and unwieldy at first but slowly coming out of my fingers again like the constant, easy stream that I once remembered. I found myself again on the page. I found that the more I wrote, the freer I felt—unburdened, lighter. I was redeemed slowly, letter-by-letter. With this newfound freedom, I found myself reconnecting with others and burgeoning friendships abounded in my writer’s group and with those that reached out after reading my published work.

My greatest worry—that I would be less of a mother if I spent time away from my children doing things that I love but that did not involve them—were greatly unfounded. On the contrary, I now connect with my children in a more authentic way then ever. I now communicate with them as myself, not the shell of a woman intent on martyrdom of motherhood.

I’m certainly not saying that writing regularly has made motherhood or life simpler in any way. In fact, it is another item that I must find a way to cram into my already frantic schedule. It has not made life perfect in anyway. My children sometimes grumble about me typing away desperately on my computer instead of spending those minutes with them. They also know that Mommy has a passion for writing, a passion for something outside of them.

I am whole again. I no longer feel empty and void of any purpose outside of my work as a nurse and my work as a mother. I am more that any one title that society has slapped on me. I am a mother. I am a wife. I am a nurse. I am a writer. I am so many more things than just these labels.

In my actions—in the late night tapping of my keyboard that lulls them to sleep after I have tucked them in, in following my heart, my passions and my dreams—I am reminding myself with each keystroke of who I am and am, hopefully, inspiring my children to live their lives as who they are not as the one dimensional being that society may expect them to be if they choose to be parents themselves. I will always be Mommy first—always. However, I choose be everything else that I am too. I choose to be me.

Are We Taking Modern-Day Criticism Too Far?

I always know that an article that I have written is doing well and being widely shared when I open up my messages to find cruel remarks inside. It is simply a fact of writing on our modern-day internet. The internet is full of trolls that thrill in sitting in anonymity behind the glow of their computer screen and writing cruel things to others. 

The past few months have been a time when I chose to dig deep, push past societal stigmas and come forward with really painful things in my life. It has not been easy for me, even though I feel that if I helped even a single person that it was worth it. 

When my article about being a suicide attempt survivor went live, I received messages saying that they wish I "would've been successful" at killing myself, that I was a "loser and an embarrassment to their country" and that I will be going to hell. This was my first article to go "viral" and was my first experience with how ugly people can be. I sat vigil through the night that first night, reading the messages and weeping. Very few times in my life have I felt as alone as I did that night. 

When my article about being a rape survivor went live, I received messages stating that I am "so ugly that I should be grateful that I was raped", that I should've "relaxed and enjoyed it" and a few pornographic pictures mixed in(Hey, boys- unsolicited dick pics are never cool, Man. Keep your pants on.) I was not prepared both for the vulnerability that I felt in the days after that piece first hit the internet(and still feel to some degree today), for the few friends that turned away from me and made me feel shame and for the onslaught of feedback, mostly wonderful but with some powerfully hateful things missed in. I became physically ill and I truly believe that my body could not handle the immediate and overwhelming emotions that I was not in any way ready for. I went to bed for days and when I finally was able to emerge from my self-imposed isolation, I can tell you that I was not the same person than I was when I went into my cocoon- in ways both wonderful and awful.

Yesterday, when an article that I wrote to bring awareness to CMV(a virus) went live I received messages stating that I'm a "fear mongering bitch" and again that I'm going to hell( what is it with internet trolls and hell?). This time, I was rather shocked by the hate even after growing a thicker skin through these past months. I was simply trying to help others to not suffer in the way that my friend and her family has. I still can't wrap my mind around why someone can find fault with that. 

My core belief since childhood has been that I am not worthy, a belief that many of us struggle with. These comments play on that fear, strumming the tight strings of my misery and giving evidence to that belief that I've tried to hard in my life to eradicate. It always amazes me how we seek and gather evidence to support any of our beliefs, even the ones that we wish we didn't have. It is so painful. 

I can receive dozens of lovely messages(thank you to those that have sent them!) but it is those awful comments that pluck at my heart and leave me feeling stuck. I find myself on a roller coaster of emotion as I swing from the highs of having a successful article and the lows of reading through the name-calling, criticism, and general ickiness of cruel messages and e-mails. 

Years ago, these comments would have made me take a break from writing--out of fear, out of that place of unworthiness, out of pure shame. I would have believed each and every unkind word, too mired in shame to refuse to acknowledge the cruelty. 

However, today-- even after shedding a few tears-- I am celebrating my response to these comments as a win. Why? Because instead of choosing not to write, I'm going write more and write harder in spite of the naysayers and in honor of myself. In the words and advice of the great Cheryl Strayed, today I'm gonna "write like a motherfucker." 

Write on criticizers of my work-- I will use your hate to fuel my flame. I am truly sorry for whatever circumstances of your life have led you to such a low place that this is the way that you choose to spend your days. I refuse to concede to your assholery. You may think of me as your nemesis--wherever you choose to bring darkness, I will bring the light threefold. The war has begun. The light will win. 

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Hospice Nursing and Lessons in Parenting

We all know, as parents, that the days are long but the years pass quickly. Any parent has had a myriad of people remind them to enjoy the moments when your children are young because they pass so quickly. I imagine the reason that these words are so often spoken is because they are true, if over spoken.

I realized as soon as my first child was born 14 years ago that it was true. It seemed as if he would grow before my very eyes in that first year. However, as I added two more children to the mix the days seem to pass with an ever faster and alarming speed, I imagine due to the busy days of chasing after three children and shuttling them all to their activities.

The largest revelation for me was not in my own experiences but in watching my elderly hospice patients. Yes, observing the end of life had many lessons for me about the middle of my life.

Most of my nursing career has been in pediatrics, but there was a brief year and a half span where I gave hospice nursing a try. It had been something I'd wanted to try since nursing school and the perfect opportunity presented itself and I went for it. Hospice nursing was a temporary career turn for me, but the life lessons were forever imprinted on my heart.

Several of my elderly hospice patients were lost in a world all their own and no longer recognized themselves in their current form nor their family members. What was very profound for me was that nearly all of the women in this state that I cared for found themselves lost back in the days of their early motherhood, many of them carrying around baby dolls that they were convinced were real and would spend most of their waking hours caring for the dolls. I asked a staff nurse at one nursing home I was working at why she thought they all became lost in the same imaginary world. I remember this old, battle-ax of a nurse tilting her head at me as though she couldn't believe the question and replying, "Why honey, why wouldn't someone want to be a mother again? Those were the happiest days of their life." I was immediately struck with reflection into my own life, the frantically busy and sleep deprived life that was mine when I wasn't wearing my nurse's badge. I knew with every ounce of my soul that I was in the midst of the best days of my life and had not realized it until this moment. 

A staff member at one nursing home had a drawer of baby dolls that she would give to any woman who was comforted by this. She told me that she had found that women who had been mothers could not bear to be without someone to care for and if these plastic dolls brought them peace in their final days, who were we decide that it was a strange thing for a grown woman to tote around. Her observation was that the woman who lost themselves in this imaginary world often died in peace, happy to relive the long days of caring for their babies.

At the end of my shift I would go home to my children and I realized that I had a renewed sense of myself as a mother and how important these days were to me- not only now but for forever. I knew that I needed to squeeze out every moment of this time as well as I possibly could and the memories of these years, busy and exhausted as they are, will be looked back onto for the rest of my life.

I am exhausted. Weary to the bone most days and collapse into my bed at the end of the night with the exhaustion of one who has run a marathon. It is often hard. It is also blissful. I am harvesting as much bliss as I can out of every day in my home full of children. I can thank those women in the nursing home for the reminder of just how lovely these days are, even when I am bone tired and worried.

These are the halcyon days of my life. I must make memories to sustain myself for the years when my home is not so full. I am so blessed to have been given the gift of a house full of love- I will not waste this time.

Live every moment, Lovelies. This life is short and full of wonder.

Technology, Connection and Modern Day Prisons

The above picture showed up in my Facebook feed this morning. It is an older Twitter post by the artist Banksy(click photo to be taken to his original post). It is an iPhone depicted as a prison.

I was frozen by this image.

At the moment that I came upon the picture, I was sitting in my bed with my two girls while they watched a Disney movie- waking from their slumber slowly and cuddled around me. I wasn't present in the moment as I should have been. These moments of my children's childhood are fleeting and I have been painfully aware of how quickly they are growing lately. Yet, instead of basking in the warmth of their cuddles and laughing at the cartoon along with them I was... on my iPhone.

My morning tradition has become browsing through my social media feeds while my first cup of coffee swims into my veins. Usually, I do so before my children wake up. However, it's not unusual on weekend morning for me to do this with a sleepy child on my lap.

Has my smartphone become a prison for me?

The thought swam through my head with fervor after seeing the Banksy image. I believe that it has. Social media has allowed me to connect with many people, both personally and professionally. It has been a blessing in many ways. But there is another side, isn't there?

I wonder if I am losing the ability to be present in my life, to experience joy without sharing it with my myriad of friends and followers. I no longer appreciate the beauty around me without pulling out my phone to snap a picture, edit it and post it to Instagram. If I have a thought which seems to me to be profound, I share it on Twitter. If my children have a program or a ballgame or a dance recitals, the photos are loaded onto Facebook for all to see.

I find myself wondering...

When is the last time I stood in front of a sight of great beauty and kept the image only in my heart and mind, trusting memory to hold it for me?

When is the last time that my children had a great accomplishment and I  did not share it publicly but instead trusted that my fervent praise and pride would be enough for my children, without sharing it with the entire world for their praise to be added?

When was the last time I stayed off social media for an entire day and trusted that anything that I missed did not matter at all? After all, important news always found its way to me before Facebook and Twitter, didn't it?

I am losing myself and many precious moments in the time spent in front of my phone, mired in the harsh light streaming from my iPhone and missing the life that is happening beyond the screen in the moments of now. 

The photo that I posted on Instagram of a summer's day cannot replace the memory. My memory is complete with the feeling of the blades of green beneath my bare feet, of the smell of summer- hot sun and sunscreen, of my heart singing with the magic of the day. And, I cannot have that memory if I stand at the corner of the world and hide behind a camera screen.

The status that I posted on Facebook of my child's latest accomplishment will never light up my child's heart. The moment spent writing that status would likely be better spent hugging my child and telling them how much I love them, accomplishments or not.

Browsing trending Twitter hashtags will not help me to better understand the world. If I want to have a better understanding of the world and the people in it, I must be present.

Here's to a life of breaking out of our many prisons, Dear Ones. Life is too short to be trapped inside anything that does not serve you. A life trapped in the hypnotic trace of social media is little life at all. I demand of myself to be more present and less a slave of modern, shallow connections. I want deep connections, moments of wonder and a life lived to the fullest.

 Let us all live every moment of today. 

Tips from the Zen RN: May Cause Miracles

I am starting a new series of resources that have been really helpful to me in search of the zen life. This book is at the top of my list.

I have had a really negative inner-voice for all that I can remember of my life. A REALLY negative inner-voice. If I were to be truly frank, I would say that the voice in my head is a raging bitch. She tends to criticize me in every way that she can.

*sigh*

A few years ago, I happened upon some podcasts of Gabby Bernstein's and fell instantly into adoration for her candor, kindness and optimism.

In the spring of 2013, I found myself deep in a depression and anxiety filled darkness. When I saw this book on the shelf at my library, I snapped it up and began the work the very same day. My life was completely changed in that forty days- no exaggeration.

The daily work(taking only a few minutes per day, preferably in the morning) truly transformed my inner critic into a more loving voice(hey, it's not complete magic- the bitch still rears her head but now I know how to turn my fear around). It took my anxiety from a 10 to a 2. Those changes alone were true miracles for me and I have now purchased the book for a multitude of friends, who reported similar dramatic change.

This book is now in my toolbox of tricks to make changes when life overwhelms me and I have read it three times now. Highly recommended if the voice of fear has taken over your mind on a daily basis.



                                                   

What books have you read that have changed your life? I would love to hear from you!

Sunday Night Anxiety

*Sigh*

I love weekends. Especially lazy summer weekends spent soaking up the sun and enjoying time with my family.

I also love my job. I am grateful to be able to work as a pediatric nurse and to do so part-time and with no on-call hours.

Yet...Sunday nights, even starting as early as Sunday morning, I always get the same anxiety. I want another day, another week, another month of weekend days. I don't want to wake in the morning to face my work voicemail and e-mail full of crisis. I don't want to leave my kids with Grandma- I want to be home with them.

I don't usually speak much about my Sunday anxiety. I feel terribly guilty about it. After all, I am blessed to have a job at all- let alone one that I am passionate about and I am also lucky to work part-time and have a Mom and Mother-in-law who take turns taking care of my children. There are so many blessings. I know this. Yet, the anxiety- sometimes mild, sometimes sickeningly strong- persists.

Recently I tentatively broached the topic with some friends and co-workers and found that they also struggle with the Sunday Night Blues. It felt sadly freeing to know that I'm not alone.

I don't remember having these feelings before I had children, but I imagine that I sometimes did. I think what brought my anxiety to a whole new level was the myth of work/life balance for working Mamas. I call it a myth because it is- there is no possible way to balance both working a high-stress job and being a Mama, although we each do the very best that we can. So, I spend my weekends trying to conquer everything that couldn't get done during the work week- housework, errands, bill paying, etc. all while trying to pack in as much precious time with my children as I can. When Sunday evening comes, I am often exhausted and feeling every bit of a failure as a mother because it never seems to be enough and work is looming in the morning.

This Working Mama(and stay-at-home Mama) business is rough. Rougher than I could express verbally to someone who isn't deep inside the grind themselves.

However, I'm ready to turn the Sunday Night Blues on it's head. I'm going to do my damnedest to be the best nurse and the best Mama that I can be and I'm also going to do my damnedest to let go of the chorus of "not enoughs" that are always running through my head. These years, hard as they are, are quickly passing and I am tired of spending one night every week in misery. I am determined to push aside the worries as much as I can and be present with my ever-growing children. They deserve for me to be present with them and I deserve a break from worry and self-flagellation.

Beyond the worry and persistent "not enoughs" that run through my mind is an opportunity to tap into the present moment and mine every bit of gold out of the precious seconds of the here and now. I am ready.

Present Living

 

 

Do you ever look at the holiday aisles stuffed with the accoutrements of Christmas in August(Yes, August- I haven't even lost my summer tan yet!) and shake your head?

Me, too.

However, I think it is more than just a symptom of the endless marketing, consumerism and commercialism of the holidays. I feel that it is indicative of our inability to be in the present.

Aren't we endlessly planning ahead?

Counting the days to vacation? To retirement? To the next holiday? Sacking money away for our children's education, our own retirement?Making to-do lists for tomorrow?

And aren't we also endlessly lost in the past?

Constantly purusing social media for updates on what our friends and acquaintances have done on Facebook? Seeing pictures of what they've seen on Instagram?

We are bombarded by news every time we log into a computer or phone as if we really need to be kept up to date minute by minute of the happenings of every half-rate celebrity, or the latest terrorist attack, or school shooting.


My God. Its exhausting, isn't is? To keep up with the past and the future at every moment.


Let's try something different today.

Let's just be in the present. The PRESENT. Have you met her? She is the moment you are in right now and she is FABULOUS.

So, take a deep breath, Dear Ones. Meet the present where she is. Have a dance with her under the fall foliage. Find gratitude in this moment before searching for joy in a past or future moment.

All we have is what is here now. This second. This moment.

And, isn't that enough?

Shine on, In this moment and in the next.