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SHE'S GONE - JUNE 29, 2009
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REGAINING MY MOXI - JUNE 25, 2009
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NIGHT MOVES - JUNE 22,2009
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EMBARRASSED - JUNE 21, 2009
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NOT LIKE MY MOM - JUNE 20,2009
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SHITTING MY PANTS - JUNE 19,2009
My friend Nathalie died this
morning. She was 39, and had chondrosarcoma. It finally killed
her after a long and hard fought 15 year battle. Her little girl
is eight years old, just 6 weeks younger than my son, and has
grown up taking care of her mom. Nathalie once told me that she
felt guilty about it, and I told her that I thought her daughter
would be (and is already) a very compassionate and patient
person because of her experience caring for Nathalie. I can’t
even imagine.
I take much less
for granted having known Nathalie and I feel very fortunate
having had the opportunity to be a part of her life and her
illness. She taught me to bitch less about my own life and get
on with living it to the fullest. I complained to her one day
about living in Waco, Texas, and she laughed at me and told me
to shut up. “Please, Jennifer. Find something better to complain
about.” She was so right.
I think of her often when I’m running. Before she died I would
sometimes imagine being able to transfer her pain into my body,
and the harder I ran the more I would be able to ease her pain.
These runs were often my best runs; t hey were powerful and
emotional and cathartic. Seeing her suffer left me feeling so
helpless and those runs helped me through the frustration of not
being able to change her circumstance, or really help in any
meaningful way.
In reality I feel relieved that Nathalie is free from her pain;
for that I am thankful. Life around me goes on, and my head is
spinning. Everything suddenly becomes sacred: a hand squeeze
from my husband, tucking my kids into bed at night. These
usually casual daily moments take on a whole new importance in
the light of Nathalie’s death, and I am thankful for the
reminder of how precious and beautiful life is.
 I
remember the
happy girl I used to be, and I imagine there are other women
out there much the same. You grow up, get an education, a
job, responsibilities. Maybe you get married and have kids,
like I did. During the process of raising my kids I’ve lost
a lot of my spunk, my zest for life, my MOXI. I’ve always
wished I had the balls to admit how difficult motherhood is,
how those crappy double standards suck – how you’re damned
if you do go back to work and damned if you don’t. Well I’m
done pretending that I have this parenthood gig figured out.
I’m hoping to create a community of moms interested in
exchanging thoughts and ideas about topics that affect all
of us sooner or later. This is the place to let it all hang
out, where you can find entertainment and understanding
about the reality of motherhood, and none of the glamour.
I have two kids, three dogs
and a very supportive husband, and I’m on a quest to regain
my moxi. On DailyMoxi.com I hope to explore topics both
mundane and taboo, from school issues like bullying to pushy
parents to puberty and having the sex talk. In my former
life I have been both a teacher and a school counselor, and
I hope I can help you navigate some of the challenges that
I’ll be blogging about. Join me in learning from my
mistakes, and laughing about them along the way, and maybe
you’ll be inspired to regain your moxi, too. I hope so.
This
photo was taken a few seconds after I recently flew 750 feet
across a ravine on a zip line, and I was feeling ecstatic. I
was also really happy that I didn't wet my pants while doing
the zip line. That harness was tight and pressing on my lady
parts (like my bladder, mostly, and that is never a good
thing) if you know what I mean.
It was all of the rush I expected and then some,
mostly because I dropped off the platform and did not use any
hands to hold my tether - that was a psychological experiment
and it was very difficult not to reach up and grab my pulley. The
second time I took a running leap off of the platform and
cannonballed it across the forest to get more speed.
Living on the edge, baby! Where are my kids, you ask? They were
in day camp from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., and that was great for all of
us, kids included.
While I can screw up any vacation plans and get lost trying to
find my way out of a paper bag, booking this trip to the YMCA
Camp of the Rockies in Estes Park is one of the best things I’ve
done in my stint as a mom thusfar, and I highly recommend it for
families with kids of any age. You can watch great footage from
our trip on the MoxiFilms page, and you can read more about it
under the MoxiFavorites tab. See for yourself how thrilling a
ride on the zipline really is.
Meanwhile, I’m off to the bathroom to try and empty my bladder
for the 4th time before bed, and that’s no joke. It’s
a nightly ritual. I’ll see what tomorrow brings and write about
it then. If you have any comments you’d like to submit, please
do so by using the ‘contact’ tab. I’ll post interesting and
relevant comments as I am able. Thanks!
For the past,
oh, six or seven years, my son has had me on the verge of
calling a priest for an exorcism, on more than a few
occasions. After about the tenth time it happened I finally
just chalked up his late night/early morning antics to night
terrors. And trust me, they are terrifying.
It’s been
months since his last episode, so I had conveniently
forgotten (more like mentally blocked my memory of it) how
freaky his night moves are. It starts off innocently
enough. I usually hear him moaning from his bed, so I hurry
in to try and prevent the build-up to a full blown night
terror throw down. Last night I was zonked from our first
day in the mountains, so my husband was up at bat. I woke in
a daze to see my husband cradling my son on the edge of our
bed, and my son had already reached that inconsolable
unreachable stage of his terror – the point of no return, I
call it. Once he starts screaming GET AWAY FROM ME in sheer
terror, eyes wide open, pointing to an invisible boogy man
in the corner, it’s freak out time. I never do get used to
it; I always get a serious case of heeby jeebies.
What’s amazing
is that he has no memory of the event the following morning,
and that’s a good thing for all of us, I’m sure.
So being up
here where the movie The Shining was filmed just makes
matters worse, in my book. Last night during this escapade
my son was in the living room, touching each chair, then the
loveseat, then the sofa, as if each were occupied. Freaked
out himself by this, my husband picked him up and ran back
into the room with me, telling me that if he was going to
die well then I was going with him. Funny as that is, I did
not laugh. There have been many nights I’ve braved these
experiences at home by myself while he was working an
overnight shift, freaked out and all alone. Having that
other adult is a major consolation, in my book, whether
they’re also scared stiff or sound asleep.
To help my son
snap out of it and return to a more mellow state of rest
we’ve found that speaking in a loud voice (without yelling,
although sometime I feel like it) while using his name and
asking him to count to three with me is actually effective,
and it’s better than yelling RENE YOU’RE FREAKING ME OUT SO
SNAP OUT OF IT BEFORE I SLAP YOU SILLY, which is sometimes
how I’m really feeling. In total his night terrors usually
last around 20 or 30 minutes, although it feels like much
longer. I keep thinking that he will outgrow them, and then
he has another. They do seem to be getting fewer and farther
between, so there is hope. I can’t really imagine carrying
him around while trying to console his in six more years,
when he’s 14. One night at a time, I suppose.
Tonight we arrived at the YMCA Camp of the Rockies in Estes
Park, Colorado, after driving for two days out of the armpit
of Texas. Imagine our relief as we drove into the mountains
right before sunset, just in time to check in for our cabin
and the kids’ summer day camp. Summer day camp is a
beautiful thing, especially after three weeks of
‘togetherness’.
We celebrated our arrival by indulging in vanilla soft serve
cones at the café, and while we were enjoying them I
remarked to my kids about an adorable little girl nearby.
I’m pretty sure they rolled their eyes before my daughter
remarked that I should not be staring, and furthermore, that
I was always embarrassing her. Always? was my response. She
thought for a moment before deciding that I only ever really
embarrassed her when we were in public, and I do that pretty
much every time we are in public. I quietly reveled in this
knowledge momentarily before asking her exactly how I was
embarrassing her so much, so I could continue in my twisted
pleasure. Well, she said, you are always singing and
laughing, and then you look at people sometimes and talk to
complete strangers, she pointed out. Guilty on all counts, I
confessed. My work here is done.
We finished our cones and headed uphill to find our cabin.
After unpacking the car and exploring all 300 square feet of
the cabin, we decided to mount our bikes and ride back down
into the main square, where we bummed some smores off of an
unsuspecting and very nice family from Kansas City. We
stayed longer than we should have and the kids were tired as
we began our trek back uphill to the cabin for the night.
Thirty seconds into the ride the whining began, and it
progressed into full on crying and yelling before we were
even halfway up. Wow. Talk about good birth control. I
quoted a good friend and told my daughter to BUCK UP and get
on with it. I try not to take the bait and get emotionally
involved when tempers run high, but it’s difficult after two
days in the car and less than 10 hours of sleep in two
nights. Again, day camp is a good thing, and what doesn’t
kill you makes you stronger, like riding a bike uphill when
you’re tired, or being embarrassed by your mom.
When I think about my own
childhood, I remember things like sitting next to my mom in
the back yard on a hot summer day eating liverwurst on
lettuce leaves. What the hell? Liverwurst?! No wonder I was
so scrawny.
Anyway, that was my mid-morning snack before mounting my
bike to explore the neighborhood, finding friends along the
way. “Come back when the street lights come on!”, my mother
would yell as I peddled off happily. After six or eight
hours of independence, I’d return home to the smell of pot
roast or fried chicken and a sit down dinner, which was a
nightly ritual. I’m pretty sure that as the fourth of five
children I either wouldn’t be missed too much or my mom was
too drunk to care about the dangers that lurked out there.
Either way, I survived and managed to make it back home
every time, usually unscathed. A car did run me off the road
one time, but the concussion was pretty mild. My sister
waited until I regained consciousness and then we pedaled
home together, and my mom said I wasn’t to fall asleep under
any circumstances, or I’d never wake up again. Those were
the days.
The lives of my own children are much different, and my
experience as a mother is just as different from that of my
own mother. My independence as a child gave my mother much
more freedom than I enjoy. What I’m trying to say is: I’m a
paranoid victim of scary media stories, and I hate that!
Hey, I like my kids, mostly, but DANG. They’re always here,
unless they are at a really overpriced camp that is usually
just glorified babysitting. I know I’m not alone. A woman I
know (who shall remain nameless) confessed that she allows
her children out on their bikes, but secretly follows them
in her car to make sure they’re okay. Seriously. Stalker
mom!
Maybe if I gave my kids liverwurst once in a while they’d
get out more, like I used to.
I’ve had a few slow motion moments of horror as a mom, and
this week’s was a doozy. We were preparing to go out for a
bike ride with our three dogs. It was a beautiful day; I
think the birds were even chirping. A chamber of commerce
kind of day.
While my daughter and
I were getting the dogs harnessed and leashed, my son went
into the garage to put on his helmet. Or so I thought. Well,
he did put on his helmet, but he also singlehandedly pulled
his new bike up and over the lip of my minivan cargo space;
a feat for a child his size. I walked out of the house in
time to see him riding circles on our upper driveway, and
just as I was telling him to stop, he rammed his front tire
full speed into the small curb separating our driveway from
our neighbor’s. His little body the flew up and over the
handle bars and he then landed on his helmeted head two feet
below on our neighbor’s driveway. I think I screamed, and I
might have even farted. It was one of those heart stopping
moments of horror and fear mixed with helplessness and
guilt. (I think the guilt part is just an added benefit of
being a mother).
I ran the width of our
driveway and my neighbor met me from his side; he had been
watching my son from inside his garage. My child was laying
motionless underneath his bike, face down. I touched his
back and called his name. “Rene!” Nothing. I began to sweat
and shake. I pointed my index finger and jabbed his
shoulder, hoping he’d snap out of it (what does that mean,
anyway?) “Rene!” He rolled over onto his back with his
tongue hanging out the side of his mouth. “Rene, that is not
funny!!” He laughed, knowing that he’d given me a good
scare. I was a mess, a steaming stew of mixed emotions.
Mostly I was relieved.
It was a perfect
opportunity to ask my neighbor if he knows CPR. He doesn’t.
I said, “Well, I’d feel better if you did because I’m pretty
dang sure that one day this child is going to give me a full
on cardiac arrest.” His reply? “Well, Jennifer, we all have
our crosses to bear.” What the hell does that have to do
with anything? I think he likes to throw religious
references at me because he doesn’t like my new bumper
sticker: What would Scooby do? That’s another story
altogether.
So Rene is fine. We
had a nice bike ride. He learned how to use his hand brakes
to stop (his old bike had pedal brakes). And I didn’t shit
my pants or have a heart attack. Not yet, anyway.
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