What I've Learned About Mothering

Sometimes people say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger; I have to say, though, that that's a sentiment with which I cannot agree.

I don't feel stronger as a result of the challenges I have encountered, but I do feel changed - and I recognize that I have learned some things from those experiences.  Much of what I've assimilated is on the pages of this blog, and I suspect there is even more to come, from grief and perspective and just life in general.  Many of those things, I am realizing, can be valuable, useful lessons, serving to make me more solicitous, more introspective, and more appreciative of what I have - all of which are easily applied to perhaps the most challenging thing in my life: mothering.

From the road I've traveled, I've learned that the life I have won't last forever; it will change in many ways, some over time and some quickly, some for the better and some tragically, and that because of that I need to work hard to appreciate and remember each day.  

I've learned that it's easy to take it all for granted - and sometimes to wish it away.  I've learned that at some point there is an end to the sleepless nights, the piles of laundry, the hectic mornings filled with things like looking for a missing shoe and packing lunches and kisses goodbye, the nerve-wrecking parent-teacher conferences, the disarray of toys and books scattered everywhere, the lazy summer mornings that stretch into afternoons, the shopping for what I hoped was the perfect birthday or Christmas gift - the Tickle Me Elmo or the Jessie Cowgirl doll or the Furby that I stood in long lines to buy, ready to elbow my way to the front of the aisle to get my child what I thought her childhood wouldn't be complete without.

What I have loved most of all was seeing the trust and happiness in my children's faces, hearing their infectious giggles, feeling their hand in mine, and recognizing things in them that they had learned from me.  Little by little, those days of not being able to shower or go into the bathroom by myself have transformed into closed bedroom doors and teenaged eye rolls of embarrassment that only a parent can still interpret as love, and somewhere along the way it hit me that it's impossible to go back and do one single minute over; I can't take back words said in anger or exhaustion, and I can't rewind the time from even one day to allow myself to better remember or to better react.  All I can do is hope that what I've made up on my own and what I've figured out with the help of those who have advised me or in some way mothered me has been right, or at least right enough, and then try to do my best with what comes as time marches forward, as we go through more proofreading, conflicts with friends and teachers and roommates, texting, phone conversations, choices of class schedules and fashion purchases and even more important things, being sure to celebrate the victories - both big and small, and just trying to keep up with everything.

These days I'm amazed when I think about how I used to think that mothering a baby was so easily definable as the hard part; it's really all the hard part, especially, as I now know, letting go as they make their own decisions, watching them stretch their wings, realizing that they are their own people, swiftly moving towards adulthood and independence, despite the feelings of joy and relief I get when they occasionally come to me for help.

When I look at the hundreds of family photos from over the years, I remember and I cherish the special moments captured on film - the birthday parties, the school programs, the first days of school, the Christmases and the Easters.  But the moments that I treasure the most when I think back are those that no one thought to capture on film, the everyday moments, those from days that I think were accurately and brilliantly labeled along the way as perfectly ordinary.

I wouldn't trade them for dollers or barbies either!

On Being Lazy

My dad never picked favorites - whenever he was asked to do so he would flat-out refuse.  He always said that designating a favorite would just make one seem better than another and that there was no point in that. -  After years of hearing him say that, I knew better than to ever ask him to pick a favorite of one over another, but once during one of our middle of the night talks while he was sick, I asked him what he thought the worst quality in a person is. His reply: being lazy. I had to laugh, because that made me think about when remote controls first came out on the market for TV's and he thought they were ridiculous. "It's lazy enough just sitting there watching TV," he'd said, "but I can't imagine why someone couldn't get up off the couch every once in awhile to change the channel or adjust the volume!!"  When he said being lazy was the worst trait a person could possess, though, just out of curiosity I asked him if he thought it was worse to be lazy than to be a liar or a thief. He thought for a minute and then, with a half-smile of his face and in a tone that left me wondering about whether or not he was kidding, he said, "Well, at least when a person does those things, he's putting some effort into it." 

He also commented a lot over the years about how crazy (and by that I think he meant lazy) he thought it was when someone would drive around a parking lot in search of the perfect parking spot rather than just parking in the first available place they encountered and walking.  It just wasn't something that he could make sense of, I guess, and he often pointed out that the people who do it at the gym are the worst! 

I think Dad's distaste for laziness - which he thought of as a lack of activity or a lack of effort - made it harder for him to tolerate his physical condition and the challenges that came along with it when he was sick.  I'm sure he didn't like having to be helped or having to wait for help doing things, and it didn't surprise anyone who knew him that he wanted a plan in place so he could "do something" every day to work towards getting better.  When his health declined instead of improving as we'd been told it would with the treatment, though, I started to notice that he didn't comment nearly as much about wanting to have goals for himself or about needing help to do basic things. It was as if he had somehow resigned himself to his condition. I thought at the time that maybe he was just biding his time until he could be independent again.  Now I wonder if he somehow saw letting us help him as trying to help us. 

Sharing

One thing that I have been doing more of since starting this blog is reading the stories of other people who are facing battles of their own.  I guess I am intrigued by (and sometimes desperate to) learn about how different people are making their way through their challenges.  One common denominator that I notice in the stories that inspire me is that each person speaks in a direct way, from the heart, and that each of them has a positive attitude (like my dad), although none of it is too flowery or Fantasy Islandish.  

I recently came across the story of Suleika Jaouad (pronounced "su-LAKE-uh ja-WAD"), which I feel compelled to share; in reading what she has written about her battle with cancer, it is clear that she is nothing short of a badass, and I find her stories, her writing style, and her perspective to be both inspiring and empowering.   Suleika writes a weekly column for the New York Times called 'Life, Interrupted,' in which she chronicles her journey with acute myeloid leukemia (AML).  Her blog, Secrets of Cancerhood, includes links to her series of newspaper articles and her video journal, which she has been keeping since her diagnosis in May of 2011.