Don’t Push and Keep Breathing

My children are slowly edging toward teenager-dom. A scary time. Perhaps now, before all hell breaks loose, I’d do well to find some coping techniques that might work. Yesterday, at doula training, I had an epiphany, directly from labor and delivery, which I think is perfect for life. This one I intend to use: Don’t push and keep breathing!

We were discussing a phase of birth called transition. In this phase a woman moves from the early and active phases of laboring to the second stage, or actual delivery, of the baby. Transition is the hardest and most painful part of the birth. Contractions are coming in greater frequency and are longer and stronger. The baby’s head is lower in the mother’s pelvis, ready to make its way out to the world. It is putting a lot of pressure on the mother’s bottom, but the mother’s body is not yet ready for delivery, and she needs to practice this fabulous lifelong lesson: Don’t push and keep breathing!

What a wonderful lesson for the future! It is a lesson all us parents would do well to remember when the time comes for the baby’s first steps and her first attempt to go up and down the stairs. It is perfect for our son’s first day of kindergarten, his first playdates at a friend’s house, and the first time he goes to the neighborhood store by himself. It’s invaluable for our daughter’s first car ride, her first date with a boy, and for when she asks us for help with birth control. And later, too, this lesson remains: when our boy goes to college, marries, and has his own child. Don’t push and keep breathing! Let go! Stay calm!

Parenthood is a hard road, paved with mistakes, crises, and love. It can teach us so much about ourselves, some that we like and some that we really, but really, don’t like. In the doula class yesterday, we learned that one good position for a laboring woman in transition to be in is to lie on her back in bed with her legs resting on the birthing ball. The blood is flowing easier in her body. The pressure is there, the contractions are strong, but she is in a position of relaxation, and she cannot push.

Keep breathing. Don’t push. Let’s lie back with our feet on the ball and at least try to relax. Let the blood flow to our brains. Soon enough transition will pass. It’s the hardest phase, and after that, at least till the next transition, we can get some relief. The daughter or son who we brought to this world and who had taught us so much will soon be all grown up and doing just fine. Like our road, so theirs is paved with mistakes and with love. If they stumble or fall, we parents are there, ready to kiss and hug and give our support. Don’t push and keep breathing. I know we’re going to be all right.

Scooby Doo, Life, and the Joys of Parenting

This was one of my daughter's favorite films

“Mommy,” my daughter asked one night on the phone. “Can you tell me a Scooby Doo story that you make up?” I groaned. Making up a Scooby Doo story is not terribly hard -- there are elements which are sure to repeat in every tale -- but making one up still requires concentration and energy. It was 9pm, and her phone call had dragged me out of bed. Not my most creative and imaginative time. Despite that, I sat back in my rocking chair and began: “One day Scooby, Shaggy, Velma, Daphne and Fred went mushroom picking in the forest....”

As the tale unfolded, I added in all the expected twists and turns: a ghost appeared warning the friends away, Velma lost her glasses, Fred ran away in terror without looking out for the girls, Shaggy and Scooby required two Scooby Snacks in order to become bait, the trap the friends set up failed, and Scooby and Shaggy accidentally trapped the villain while attempting to ran away. In the end, after exposing the ghost (it turned out to be Red Riding Hood), the friends went together to eat mushroom pizza.

I told the story and smiled to myself. It occurred to me that a Scooby Doo story is not that different from life. Am I not often warned away by mysterious fears? Do I not bumble about most of each day feeling near-sighted or blind? Embarrassingly, I can think of occasions where I (metaphorically) ran away without assisting someone under my care, and chocolate is without doubt my most effective motivator in any situation in life. When I succeed in solving whichever mystery I struggled under for days, it is almost always by stumbling on the solution and after making a lot of mistakes, and I’ll always consider eating pizza (not forgetting my gluten/dairy free restrictions) the very best finale.

GF/DF pizza

Taking my reflections even farther, a Scooby Doo story can be a metaphor for parenting as well, and as such it offers me great comfort. Scooby, Shaggy, Fred, Velma and Daphne always have the very best intentions. They are there to support those in need, solve mysteries, and expose fears for what they really are. Not that different from the work of a parent. Perhaps the gang does bungle most every thing they touch, but in the end, they are still somehow successful, and good intentions triumph over evil ones.

As a parent, I stumble in the dark more often than not. The only real tools I can depend on are my good intentions and the love that I bear for the kids. Scooby Doo gives me hope that those will be enough. “Those meddling kids!” The villains always complain at the end. “Those meddling parents!” My kids might say. But I hope that in time, over the course of their lives, they will end up appreciating what I’ve done, remember the good intentions and not the mistakes, and continue the tradition by enjoying their very own families, pizza, and Scooby Doo fun
.

Messing Up

Lately, I’ve been trying to encourage my kids to mess up. “Messing up is the best thing you can do, and making mistakes is the only way to learn,” I preached to Eden who cried after forgetting to do her homework. She threw me a deservedly suspicious look. My sermon was another example of the famous “Do as I say, not as I do.” “Be quiet, Ima,” the child said. Perhaps the wisest words heard that day.

How I wish to be always perfect, patient, polite, empathic, wise, thoughtful and kind. Never yell at the kids, never make a mistake, always treat other human beings with patience and respect. How I wish each of my actions and words came from the heart, out of love and compassion and trust.

The perfect imperfection of nature

Why is it so much easier to be kinder to another person than to myself? I look at Eden’s forgetfulness of her homework and see it as a path to growth, a lucky break from which she can learn so much. But when I make a mistake, especially if it is about the kids or my writing, it is an earth-shattering disaster, a trauma unlikely ever to be healed, a case for putting more money in my savings jar for the psychiatrist, the horrible, terrible end.

In The Willpower Instinct, Dr. Kelly McGonigal writes about research that shows that people are less likely to repeat their mistakes if they are treated with compassion. Subjects of an experiment who were told not to worry about their candy consumption, because everyone sometimes eats too much, ate fewer pieces than their counterparts who were not given the reassuring message. It takes so little, it seems, to make us feel happier, loved and secure. It takes so little, just a few words, to make us remember to cling to our higher self’s dreams and goals.

But how to change habits of a lifetime? I am so used to dance to my inner Critic’s music that I can barely hear any tune other than his. Even trying to talk to the Critic seems to fail. A long list of grievances spews from his lips, and as I listen to him, I find myself questioning myself: Could he be right? Am I really like this?

“If I don’t push you, you will never do anything,” the Critic says. And it seems to me to be true. And yet I wonder: what if he could learn to push with compassion? What if instead of criticisms, he could provide gentle, empathic reminders? Seems to me my Critic and I have a lot in common. We both of us wish to be more patient and kind. Perhaps, if I could forgive him his messes, he could forgive me mine? Perhaps if we joined hands, something, finally, can be done?

To all of this joins another desire: to be an example to my children. To be able to say, “Do as I do.” I would love for them to grow up criticism-free. And perhaps, with that, as with everything else, I need to remember: don’t worry, everyone messes up. It's the best learning way.

Holding On to Letting Go

Last night, as I was getting ready to go to sleep, an overwhelming sense of dread and loss crept over me. I paused, trying to analyze what precisely was scaring me, and discovered to my surprise that I was stressing, thirty-six hours in advance, about Wednesday morning when the children go, as they always do, to spend their allocated days with their father.

Nearly eight years have passed since the divorce, but the anxiety over my time without the children returns at regular intervals, usually on Tuesday, the day before they are to leave. Wednesdays, after dropping them off at school, I walk around the house like a ghost, not quite knowing what to do with myself. There seems to be no reason to cook, which I suppose is understandable, but why do I not use this “free” time to write, paint, garden, or -- the fairies save me -- have fun?

Every week I ask myself the same question: why can’t I just let go? The custody arrangement is not about to change, and it is high time to accept that and move on. And yet, somehow, it is my very identity as a mother that is in a crisis. I cannot be a mother only half of the week, but how am I a mother during the days when the children are not with me?

Parenting and life itself, it seems to me, are made up of letting-go bumps. The moment of birth and the cutting of the umbilical cord. Weaning and moving to solid foods. Sleep training. A nanny. Preschool. Kindergarten. The first playdate without mommy, then the first party without mommy. Overnight field trips. Overnight camp. Puberty. And before us, always, the scariest moment, the end of high school, the beginning of college. Soon, they will be moving away, perhaps to the other side of the world, finding a partner, getting married, having their own children. And us no longer needed. And soon, gone.

I cheer myself up by saying that letting go is a life-long endeavor. I look ahead, and I can see that my road leads me straight toward these bumps. No matter how much I twist and turn, how much I struggle or try to avoid a particular bump, life relentlessly pushes me on, forcing me into greater and greater letting go's.

This morning, before school, Eden and I listened to music together. I felt the warmth of her little body against mine, admired how big she got, how long her legs and arms, how cute her little nose is, and the sparkle in her eyes. The next moment I was walking her to school, getting a brief hug. And then I was alone. No matter how hard I try, there is no way to stop the clock. I find myself holding on to these wonderful moments of connection, forcing myself to remember to let go of all but the memory once they are gone.

The Case of the Brussels Sprout Soup

On Monday I made Brussels sprout soup. We ate the soup for dinner with mixed results. Dar and I loved it. Uri was ambivalent but finished his bowl. Eden said that the soup looked disgusting. I got her to take a tiny sip by telling her that I’m sure the soup doesn’t taste as bad as she thinks it does. She tasted, spit out, and said only: “It does.”

When we got back home on Tuesday. Uri requested that I heat a bowl of the soup for him. I was busy prepping for dinner and suggested that he get the soup out of the fridge and heat some for himself. He is twelve, after all, and knows how to use the microwave. But Uri wanted me to get him the soup. He nagged, stomped his feet, told me I was a bad mother, complained that he was dying of hunger, and finally stalked off to his clarinet lesson with many an accusatory glance. After the lesson, weighed with guilt, I heated him some soup.

Parenting experts often say that a mother (or father) should not do for the children what the children can do for themselves. These experts would probably be appalled by the amount of indulgence going on at my house. I twist water bottle caps open for the kids, bring them clothes to bed, wake them up in the morning, make them breakfast, lunch and dinner, help with homework, carry Eden’s backpack to school, and I always, always, bring forgotten lunches, projects, homework folders, and jackets to school.

Every once in a while, as in the case of the Brussels sprout soup, I try to stand up for myself, thinking that I might teach the children some independence and self reliance. And as in the case of the Brussels sprout soup, more often than not the result is total failure. On Tuesday, for example, I found myself guilty that the child had his clarinet lesson without food and then guilty for giving in and heating up the soup.

Wendy Mogel, in her fabulous parenting book Blessings of a Skinned Knee, suggests that calling a family meeting and announcing that “things are going to change here from now on” is not the way to implement change. Instead of drastic reorganizations, it might be better to make subtle changes.

In recent months, I taught the kids how to use the microwave, make themselves a bagel with cream cheese, and put clothes in the laundry machine and the dryer. They’ve also began to do homework much more independently than before. True, I have more failures than successes in my attempts to get them to become contributing members of our small family community, but the general direction is good. I am hopeful that by the time they go to college, they will at least have an idea of how to wash their own clothes. Perhaps they’ll eat more than just take-out pizza, and (to quote an amusing example from parenting expert Madeline Levine), they won’t feel that they need to call me in order to find out where their next class is.

Brussels Sprout Soup Recipe

Ingredients:
One pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed and with the top leaves removed
One onion, diced
One large potato, cut into cubes
One zucchini, diced
Garlic to taste, sliced
About 4-6 cups of vegetable soup broth, just enough to cover the vegetables

Directions:
Sauté the onion and garlic till caramelized.
Add Brussels sprout and diced zucchini and pour in vegetable broth till covered.
Let boil and then cook for 20 minutes until the Brussels sprouts are soft.
Mash together till smooth in the blender and return to pot.
Cut the potato to cubes and add to soup, let it boil again and cook for 30 minutes till the potato cubes are soft. Stir every few minutes to make sure the potatoes do not sink and stick to the bottom of the pot.

Enjoy!

For more on this topic:
Wendy Mogel's Myths about Raising Self Reliant Children
Madeline Levine's Website

Recognizing Resilience

Don't worry, be happy!

A few days ago, a friend came up to me while we waited for the kids in the schoolyard. He’s been going through a tough time lately, getting a divorce from his wife of many years. We stood for a while as he told me about how hard for him was the separation from the kids, from his wife, and from mutual friends who have been choosing sides. I felt a lot of empathy for him, and, wishing to cheer him up, I told him that divorce is considered one of the most difficult things people go through in life. “After you go through this,” I said, “you’ll be able to handle anything else in life.”

My friend smiled half-heartedly, not consoled, but for me the world paused and (metaphorically) tilted on its axis. My own words struck me with incredible force. Wait a second, I thought, didn’t I also go through divorce?

I do not see myself as an especially resilient person, or rather, perhaps I should say, I am more of a worrier, an anxiety-monger. Some fears, especially late at night, strike me with an unbearable, overwhelming dread: losing the children, Dar, or my parents, sickness, and plane crushes. And one thing is clear to me: if it happens, I will not be able to survive. Many other fears hover around me, and though smaller than death, they do not feel at all small. I am worried about the children’s social and intellectual success at school, my parenting mistakes, the dogs, the chickens, and more.

Worrying about these, I suppose, means that I think there is something I can do about them, solutions, even if I don’t know exactly what those solutions are. And so every once in a while I get very overwhelmed by all this responsibility of keeping everyone healthy and happy and well, and I find myself (though not threatened by any danger to life) living in survival mode and under a lot of unnecessary stress.

But wait a second, I too went through divorce, one of the most difficult things people can go through in life. And according to my own words to my friend, that means I can now handle anything else. So... does surviving divorce really mean that perhaps I do have some resilience, some ability to survive other difficulties in life? In a potential Hunger Game situation, could I find that I would not, after all, be the first to die?

To tell the truth, I’m not entirely excited about my potential for survival because I want to be clear with God: no more of this suffering stuff, ok? I want the kids and Dar to be healthy and happy and well, my parents to grow healthy to a very old age, my friends and my family as well. So perhaps I’m resilient, so what? There’s no need to test if it’s true. Let the sun shine all over us today and everyday. On you too.

Matters of Opinion

My recent haircut garnered lots of attention. My daughter flew out of the classroom, her eyes wide with appreciation, “Hello beautiful woman!” she exclaimed. My son took one look: “Why did you do that?” he asked. “It looks terrible.” Other moms stopped, pointed to their hair and mine and smiled. Dar said: “It looks great.” And an unnamed someone pronounced: “Too many highlights.”

When first I saw my new cut, I loved it. But that first, pure, unadulterated enjoyment in my new hair dimmed under the heaping commentary. I began to wonder: Does the cut make me look older? Should I have kept my hair longer? Do the highlights look artificial? A bad haircut is serious business. As an unhappy customer who once had a second haircut on the same day in order to salvage a horrid first one, I would not think to downplay the importance of even a single hair. But in the end, as I find myself face to face with my reflection in the looking glass, I can shut out everyone’s opinions and decide: I look okay.

Nowhere do other people’s opinions seem to matter more than in my parenting. Every day I ask myself: Am I a good parent? Do I make good parenting choices? My questions, sadly, rarely get answered in my heart. The children’s opinions, my parents’ words, friends’ comments, even the looks of strangers all affect my perception of my decisions and actions.

Not surprisingly, Uri and Eden have opinions about my parenting. “You yell all the time,” is a common complaint. “You’re always impatient.” “You don’t make us good food” is a particularly dreaded grievance. I care about their opinion of my parenting. After all, they are the main beneficiaries (or in their opinion, victims) of it. They are the ones who will need to see a psychologist for years to come in order to undo the damage my well-meaning but disastrous mistakes engender.

And yet, I doubt that the children (or my parents, friends, and strangers) are the best judges of my parenting. The children, caught in the transitory and yet all-encompassing moment-to-moment childhood life, cannot appreciate the big picture, the bigger plan, the one in which I am hoping that they will turn into healthy, self-sufficient, independent adults. The unsuspecting strangers in the grocery store cannot appreciate my bigger plan either, the one in which the tantrum-engrossed candy-deprived child lives to be 95 with all her teeth intact. And my parents, no matter how much they care, still live at their own house and only see part of the picture, and even that is colored by their own parenting hopes, regrets, and dreams.

Still, when a friend tells me that I am a marvelous parent, my heart sings. When the children criticize me, I wish to crawl under the bed and disappear. But somewhere deep in my heart I know that I am doing the best that I can, and I have to trust that love is enough. That, and putting a dollar or two in the savings account for future psychologists. After all, it is best to be prepared. I consider it insurance for a satisfactory life.

Life with a Light Laugh

I take myself too seriously. I take my writing seriously, my parenting seriously, my exercise routine seriously. I analyze my mistakes in all areas of life seriously. What have I done wrong? Why have I gone wrong? And most important of all: how can I fix it? Heaven forbid that I should make the same mistake twice! And if the fix for a problem has not worked -- I tremble to think of the consequences to my state of mind.

It’s like having a judge next door who works around the clock to give his opinion: what I’ve done well, what I’ve done wrong, and how my solutions are working. This judge is ingrained in me, ever willing to step up and pick up responsibility for evaluating my performance. He never sleeps, never pauses, is ever alert and ready for business.

I like to think that I get along well with my judge. He (yes, he is male) pronounces his opinion as to my laziness, my failures, my inactivity, and I return the favor by becoming depressed and not doing anything whatsoever. If he’s going to be so difficult about every little thing I do or say, why, in all the fairies’ names, should I even bother?

In the past few weeks, however, I started a conversation with the judge. Perhaps if he stopped pushing so hard, there will be room for me to write, grow, laugh. Turns out that the judge is quite willing. I never knew how much he longed for me to have the freedom to do. “I feel so frustrated,” he says. “I just want you to fly, to reach the sky, for your writing to flow.” He looks at me, confused rather than critical, almost ashamed of himself. “I don’t know where it all went wrong,” he says.

Fortunately, at this juncture, my friend Rebecca came for a visit. We decided that since we were having a girlfriend to girlfriend, heart to heart talk, there is no better place for us to sit than the treehouse. The sky slowly darkened as we laughed and shared stories. Moths fluttered about our heads. The grasses crinkled, and I thought deer might be near. I felt happier than I have felt in a long time.

Life is not a one-key door, nor a treasure chest with seven different locks. The keys to life come at random, when we are ready, fitting the keyhole with an unexpected precision and serendipity. And last night, sitting and chatting in the tree house, Rebecca gave me a key that was just right for what I am dealing with now.

“My teacher, Chophel,” Rebecca said, “always says: ‘We are all wrong. We might as well take ourselves lightly.’”

To laugh at myself is perhaps the greatest lesson I wish to learn, to take myself lightly. Next time I get all serious, critical, and dramatic about my life, please remind me that I'm all wrong. That it’s just so much better to take a breath, and let it out in a laugh, lightly.

Take a breath and admit that you're all wrong. Laugh about it.  Take yourself lightly.

The Creative Zone

The creative geyser -- must release the pressure

The last two weeks have been tough. My days, thoughts, my sleeping hours, were consumed by stress: I wanted an answer for what was bothering me. I wanted it now. And I wanted it to be the best. I found myself bursting into tears whenever anyone offered a kind word. I cannot tell you what my problem was. Perhaps it is enough to say it was related to parenting and to wanting to parent well.

From below the chaos, Perspective would touch my shoulder with its light hand, reminding me: “Be grateful. You are healthy. The children and Dar are healthy. They are happy and they love you. You are all together. Concentrate on what’s good, and more good will come.” In my heart I knew this was true, but then the moment of gratitude would pass, and fears would take over, and the ever-relentless drive to find a solution now.

Lacking peace of mind, my creative zone zoned out. Unable to compete with worries, it became dormant, hiding below layers and layers of protective parts. This time, however, sleeping through the chaos was not enough. The Critic directed my thoughts away from writing by asserting: “You will never be a writer. It’s never going to happen for you. You better give up.”

I’ve been listening to Tolstoy’s War and Peace. “You will never write this well,” said the Critic. “I have no need to write like Tolstoy,” I argued. “Only Tolstoy could write like himself.” The critic scoffed: “You will never be able to create a world like this. You will never be able to create a story of so many characters, so real, so colorful, so simple at the same time.”

The Critic looted every coin of confidence, burnt every standing wall, painted graffiti over my most treasured pavements. Instead of resting till the storm passed over, my creativity found herself engaged in a survival war. “Is it true?” She asked in a timid voice. “Is it really over?” And then, as though disappearing into herself: “Why do I exist at all?”

No matter how often I affirm that I am a writer, still doubts and fears assail me. I turn on the computer, my fingers trembling, eager and yet afraid to pull my document up on the screen. A huge weight settles on me. I am unable to begin. Then I remember. In the beginning was the word. I type a single letter, and then another, and suddenly, without knowing how or why, what or where, I am sitting here and writing again.

Relief.

Blooming into beauty -- simply and easily

I still search for the answer to that parenting question I mentioned, but perhaps for now the crisis is over. I can raise my head over the storm and find perspective, allow the Critic to calm down, listen to my Creativity hum as it goes about its business, and let my fingers move over the keyboard, bringing my fairy tale world to life.

What do you do to quiet the Critic? How do you keep your creativity free to work its magic?

The Price of Passion

Uri's main competition for my love.

Writers often claim that they write because they must. Why else would we write? Riches and fame, after all, are rarely the results. I have struggled with the inexplicable need to write for at least ten years, writing in bursts and sinking into doom and gloom when no writing comes. Having noticed the connection between not writing and my bouts of depression, I’ve made an effort to get some writing time every day. I channel my creativity into the blog when the novel seems too complicated an endeavor, and I’ve come to realize that the feeling I called depression was actually frustration in disguise.

Realizing how important writing is to me was only one tiny step. Ahead loomed a greater obstacle, so great, in fact, that terrified and ashamed, for a long time I preferred not to look it in the face. Even now, it seems to me both a ridiculous and crucial obstacle: my all-important mother-hood. Turns out that after all these years, I still doubt that I can be a mother and a writer at the same time.

My imagination, my creativity press on the dam of fears I’d built, lashing against it, trying to force a way out. When I write, I often don’t hear the children talking to me. I forget to tell them to go to sleep or to make them food. What will happen if I let all the passion of writing out from behind the carefully controlled dam? What if writing and novels and ideas will come rushing out in a great flood, overcoming everything? Will the mother mountain stay intact?

Yesterday my son accused me, “You love your book more than you love me.” I burst out laughing. I spend so much energy on being afraid that the kids will suffer because of my writing, and here he is blaming me for exactly what I fear the most. Except, he wasn’t talking about my novel, the one I am writing. He was talking about the ultra fascinating and unputdownable Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore.

Okay, so I admit that yesterday I was reading Bitterblue instead of playing with him lacrosse. And I was reading Bitterblue instead of paying him attention. And I was reading Bitterblue in the doctor’s office while we waited though he had nothing to do. But in one moment, with those funny and yet truthful words, Uri gave me glimpse of perspective about my great parenting-writing fear. Just a glimpse, mind you.

I have a feeling that if I let the dam loose the mother mountain will still stand safe and sure. I have a feeling that if I stop putting on the break with my writing, I will have more energy to spend both on my writing and the kids. And I have a feeling that it’s good for the kids to know that there’s more to their mother than just being a mother. It’s just a feeling. But I think perhaps it’s true.

Do you have a passion in your life, that makes you oblivious to the rest of the world?

Legitimizing Writing Time

Here I am, sitting on an airplane flying thirty thousand feet above a sea of clouds. The sun is just rising in the horizon, an orangy-yellow presence outside the oval plane window. I am flying to Los Angeles, where, for the next three days, I will attend the Society of Children Book Writers and Illustrators conference. Yesterday I was all mother. For the next three days I get to be all writer, guilt-free.

Guilt defines much of who I am. Since the children spend only half of the week with me, I want to give them my entire attention when they are around. Partly I do this to make up for not being there the other half of the week, and partly because I want to give them so much, but I don’t have enough time. My writing, therefore, takes second place (or even third and fourth) when the children are around.

A writers’ conference, however, is a different story. It sounds so..., well, so legitimate, so important. It sounds real! Engineers, teachers, people with real jobs go to conferences. And once in a while so do I. I go to the conference and feel that I’m doing something to further my career. I’m making contacts, deepening my knowledge of the business of writing and publishing. Then, after three days of taking myself seriously, I go back home to writing on a desk surrounded by pecking chickens, barking dogs, and attention-deprived children.

The quiet before the storm -- conference main room

The truth is that at home I doubt the legitimacy of my writing. I minimize my computer time when the children are around so as not to encourage them to spend time on their computers as well. Except, here’s what makes no sense about this: I am not playing on the computer or watching a teen series with too-beautiful photo-shopped young people. I am working! I am writing, and someday someone will want to read what I write. Right?

Am I working, or am I playing around? Am I indulging in a hobby which might never become a job? Certainly, I don’t treat writing as a job. I do not sit at my desk 9 to 5. And if part of the definition of a job is that it earns the worker money, then I am not exactly up to standard in that. I do what I love, and I feel privileged and grateful to be able to do that. But with an inexplicable fear of what others, my children included, will say, I don’t follow my writing ambitions, yet, with the same single-minded sense of purpose that I do other goals of my life. Motherhood, for example.

My son tells me: “Why are you on the computer all the time?” “Blogging,” he answers his own question, and a tone of hurt (or is it contempt?) sneaks into his voice. Once again I realize how important it is for me to feel the legitimacy of my writing, make room for WRITER in my definition of self. It’s ok, I think, frightening though it is for me to say, not to be 100% mother all the time. I wonder what will happen when I stop being afraid of being more than mother, and give myself permission to feel sometimes all writer inside....

The Chore of Chores

Doggie bowl

Last night, my daughter and I returned home from her Hebrew lesson tired and hungry. Dar was in the kitchen, preparing dinner, and Uri was outside playing lacrosse. The dogs hadn’t been fed yet. Lately, after reading Blessings of a Skinned Knee by Wendy Mogel, I’ve been trying to implement a system of chore sharing in the house. By Ms. Mogel’s recommendation, I’ve been going about it slowly and gently. I did not sit everyone down for a talk to say: “From now on things are going to change around here!” Rather, I’ve been suggesting more participation to the kids when the chance arose.

One of the chores I’ve been trying to shift to them is the feeding of the dogs, which we do twice a day. The entire process take two minutes, and it is a chore which the children are happy to do. All it takes is a reminder that it is time for the dogs to eat, and one of the kids volunteers to feed them.

The kids can do laundry too!

Perhaps volunteer is the key word here. I have not yet formally assigned the job to the kids. I still remind them of the need to do it every morning and every night. Sometimes, like last night, I end up doing the feeding. I find myself overprotecting them with thoughts like: she’s so tired, he’s still playing. According to Ms. Mogel, however, the modern parents’ reluctance to assign chores to their children is equal to withholding from them the blessing of work. We all, Mogel explains, are required in the Bible to take care of ourselves. When we protect our children and allow them to escape chore-free, we’re going directly against the will of God and taking away from them the opportunity to learn how to take care of themselves and others.

My inability to follow through with the assigning of chores exists partly because I see it as an extra chore for myself. I know I will be responsible for reminding them to do the dishes, clear the table or feed the dogs. Attaching consequences to incompletion of tasks adds yet another layer of responsibility. Now I need to follow through with those! I also, however, see the benefit of having the children participate more in the everyday doings of the house. I feel more appreciated and loved when I receive their help. I enjoy spending time with them when they help me cook or set the table. And they, I think, feel more connected, more grounded in the reality of our life.

Eden has been known to wash the dishes

There are other chores, responsibilities, which I’d like my children to assume eventually. I would love it if they cleaned their room, practiced their instruments more, walked the dogs and cleaned after them. These are duties to aim for, and I understand that they cannot be accomplished in a one-day coup.  I also have some empathy for myself. As it is I work quite hard to get the house functioning well, and adding the chore of chores to it: policing the children’s execution of their duties, adds yet another strand of straw to my camel’s back.

The Infinite Degrees of Suffering

Peace, by Eden.

There is a story about the wise men of Chelem who always kvetched about their sufferings. Finally, God told them to pack their troubles in a sack and bring it to the village square in the evening. There, said God, they can exchange their suffering for someone else’s lesser pain. The men did as they were told and came to the square at the appointed time, but when they took one glance at everyone else’s troubles, they quickly picked up their own sack and ran back home.

When faced with a true representation of the suffering of another, the story seems to say, we are likely to prefer our own. Why then is it that we compare our troubles, judge them, rate them on a scale? Is my suffering greater or lesser than yours? Do I deserve more or less pity, empathy, sympathy, or attention? “Beware of Pity,” my mother likes to quote this title of Stefan Zweig’s novel. But is it beware of feeling it? acting on it? or receiving it? And how do I distinguish between pity and a higher sentiment like empathy and love?

“Suffering is,” says the Buddha, words of wisdom which I find myself returning to again and again. Everyone suffers, young and old, rich and poor. We suffer from unrequited love, pains, ills, neglect, injustice, loss. But, true to the saying “The neighbor’s grass is always greener,” I too often measure my suffering against another’s, except, in my case, I usually feel I don’t have the right to suffer. After all, I live a comfortable and convenient life, surrounded by people I love, and mostly enjoying good health. True to the character of the Jewish Mother, I put my own pain at the bottom of the pile.

Our hike in the Galilee where my son got sick

Two years ago, my son got ill on a trip, and I wished to return home. I was dependent on two other families, however, because I had not come in my car. They hesitated, wishing to enjoy one more day of vacation, not really understanding my concern. “I would do it for you,” I said in anger, and one of my friends, who has lost a child a few years before, has not forgiven me since. How can I be so selfish, she said, to spoil the trip for everyone for such a little illness, when she was there, and her own child was dead.

Another view of the hike

I felt guilty but was not sure why. I was (and still am) sorry for my words -- knowing her sensitivity and suffering, I ought not to have spoken them. But I also feel for my suffering at that moment and my need to protect my child. When I spoke those words, her years of loss were far from my mind. All I felt was worry for my son. It was our comparative perception of pain which left us both with another sprinkling of suffering. And I still wonder, why did we feel the need to measure which one of our sacks weighed more, or less, at all?

The Blessing of Love

The first time I remember listening to the Beatles’ “All You Need Is Love” and really hearing the words was when I watched the movie Love Actually. Perhaps the movie had something to do with it, or the song, or books I have read, but for many years now I have been a one-solution woman. For every situation, from raising chickens to potty training the dogs to the academic progress of my kids my solution has always been love.

I believe in the power of love. With my dog Percy, I watched as he softened, calmed, settled into our home. I experience the same effect with my children, family and friends. Love works, but not always dramatically. Sometimes, I thought, love is not enough.

Love was not enough when I realized that instead of respect I receive complaints, anger, and frustration from my children. I know they express negative emotion at home because they know they are loved. I, however, end up feeling under-appreciated. I needed help, and I found it with Wendy Mogel’s The Blessing of a Skinned Knee.

Mogel divided her book into nine blessings: acceptance, someone to look up to, skinned knee, gratitude, work, food, self control, time, and faith. She supports each blessing with teachings from the bible, showing how the three principles of Jewish living, moderation, celebration and sanctification, help in parenting.

While reading, I identified some of my parenting mistakes and potential ways to correct them -- in moderation, of course. In the Blessing of Acceptance and the Blessing of Self Control, I learned about accepting my child’s temperament and reframing their most annoying trait as their strength. Mogel gives the same warning about perfection that I hear from friends and other experts: stop pressuring myself, forget perfection, enjoy ordinary moments.

In the Blessing of Having Someone to Look Up To and the Blessing of Work, I found how important it is that I be the head of the house and that I assign the kids chores. I had a hard time assigning chores to the kids because they move from house to house and because I felt that policing them into doing the chores was harder than doing the chores myself. It did not occur to me that for my children chores are a blessing indeed, a way to feel more grounded and settled at home when they return from their father’s house. Mogel emphasizes making little changes, not sitting the kids down and announcing that things are going to change from now on. I’ve been implementing changes slowly, encouraging the children to help me with cooking, setting the table, feeding the dogs, and looking after themselves (which Mogel says is a mitzvah -- a good deed).

In the Blessing of a Skinned Knee, Mogel reminded me to stop overprotecting the kids, let them make mistakes and learn from them. I am one of those parents who will rush to retrieve a forgotten lunch, book or backpack. Mogel says: let them discover the consequence of their actions so that they learn.

Mogel points out in the Blessing of Time and the Blessing of Longing the importance of finding time to connect with the kids and appreciating little moments. Hand in Hand Parenting calls it special time. Gratitude, Mogel says, must be cultivated. It is so easy to slip from expressing appreciation to thinking about what I don’t yet have or what I fear. In the Blessing of Faith, Mogel talks about the first time she saw a double rainbow with her daughter. The two held hands and recited the Shehecheyanu, the prayer for special moments. I loved how in one instant, Mogel and her daughter experienced three blessings: gratitude, being in the moment, and a connection to God.

Wendy Mogel’s book added many tools to my parenting toolkit, and what I love most about it is that none of them ended up being heavy. By emphasizing moderation, Mogel makes each and every one of her recommendation accessible to all of us. By advocating celebrating our children, ourselves, ordinary moments, and the holidays, she opens up a world of enjoyment in parenting. In the overarching umbrella of sanctification, she tells us not to forget the preciousness of it.

Be a Team Player

In the secrecy of my heart, I’d like to be a lone wolf, complete in myself, free of the desire to please others. I am proud of my eccentricities but also ashamed of them. I have a hard time finding my place in crowded parties, and I enjoy being alone, but not for too long. I want to be an individualist, but I’m also aware of where my character differs, those corners that make me unsuited to becoming a Howard Roark or John Wayne, the perfect lone wolf.

Solo backpacking

As a writer, I sit by my desk and whatever happens -- tears, laughter, frustrations -- stays between me and my computer, at least for now. I needn’t cooperate with man or woman, except perhaps the characters in my book. Striking out on my own is not just tolerated but expected and preferred. At the same time, I am not writing in a vacuum. I’d like my books to be read and appreciated by an audience. I love the instant gratification of posting a blog and getting a response. I write to find a common ground with others, to discover that I am not so weird after all.

Like a good mama -- I’ve established my Jewish-Motherness on this blog yesterday -- I’d like my children to be more than I am. I’d like them to be individualistic, to differentiate between what they want and what society wants for them, to know when to say yes and when to say no. But I’d also like them to be team players, cooperative, reliable, and committed, to have that team spirit which I try so hard to have and have yet to succeed. And what better way to find a team spirit, to learn the qualities of working within a group, than through a team sport like lacrosse.

My children, however, appear to have inherited my wolfish traits. They resist any sort of team activity, refuse group after-school activities, and change direction at any sign of competition. I try to explain to them why joining a team is so good, encourage them that they’re talented at playing lacrosse, but nothing. They appreciate the skill that they have, they enjoy lacrosse, but they have no desire to test their skill against others or to use it to support a team.

The path least traveled

I wonder if we’re missing the gene that allows people to work together for a common goal. Reason tells me that an individualist does not have to be the opposite of team player. My emotional, impressionable self, however, the one who read The Fountainhead at far too young an age, does not believe this is true. That part of me resists any tying down. All it knows are the open skies and fields, the path least traveled. And it occurs to me as I am writing this, that if I want my book to be published, I’ll need to guide a group through those open skies, fields and that little-known trail. I’ll have to decide whether to be part of the group -- the leader, it’s true -- but also a member, open to criticisms, opinions, and good or bad reviews. And scariest of all: open myself to the ultimate risk: that I’ll lead but none might follow.

The Suffering of the Jewish Mother

The combination “Jewish Mother stereotype” generates 47,800 results on google. But what, exactly, does it mean? The definition on Wikipedia, drawn from Margaret Mead’s research on Jewish Shtetl life, describes a Jewish Mother as “a woman intensely loving but controlling to the point of smothering and attempting to engender enormous guilt in her children via the endless suffering she professes to have experienced on their behalf.”

The Western Wall, Jerusalem, Israel

Oh dear, that’s not me, is it? Am I the stereotypical Jewish Mother? I’ve given birth to two beautiful and smart children and so I’m a mother. My mother is Jewish, and that makes me a Jew according to Jewish law. But though I’m Jewish and a mother, I’m not sure I’m ready to submit to the stereotype. Is it my destiny to be an overprotective, manipulative, and overbearing mother?

Of course, I am overprotective. I spoil the children with gifts and sweets, and I don’t get half as much respect from them as I would like. I know I am a dominant force in my children’s life, but I’d rather not consider myself overbearing. I hope I don’t guilt them into behaving the way I want them to, but even as I write these words I can see my son’s contrite face after he has done something that disappointed me. And my conscience produces a ton of pangs, that’s for sure.

Treats for Eden's birthday

My mother did not hover over us, nor was she more overbearing than my friends’ parents, or prone to generating enormous guilt. Every year, however, there was one day on which she amassed enough guilt to last a year: Yom Kippur. My mother religiously fasted on Yom Kippur, refusing even water. Wandering around the house, her head aching, wan-faced and near fainting, she made all of us feel guilty about every single bite of food that came into our mouths. As Yom Kippur wound up, she’d sit with a cup of tea and some toast, the image of righteousness.

Celebrating the last night of Hanukkah

I was never able to fast. An uncontrollable hunger, the likes of which I never experienced on normal days, seized me whenever I contemplated fasting, preventing me from skipping even a late dinner on Yom Kippur eve. My sister sometimes fasted in an effort to decrease her feelings of guilt about our mother’s suffering. My brother, who never ate unless food was placed directly in front of him, probably never noticed the pressure, and my father, who claimed (and still insists to this day) that he doesn’t need to fast because he never sins, appeared to consider my mother’s Yom Kippur agonies an expression of insanity best ignored.

To this day, I’m certain my mother’s purpose in suffering so much while fasting was entirely altruistic: she wanted to ensure that we all of us were written into the Book of Life. We felt the pain of her pain, and I guess, for the purposes of the Book of life, it was enough.

Night Owls in My House

Eden's night owl

My two kids come to life after dark. At 9pm, they eat cereal and ask me to read them a book. They research historical figures like Snowflake Bentley or Mae Capone. They search for countries and places on Google Earth like ancient Troy and the islands of Canada. They discuss the possibility of life after death, share their feelings about the divorce, or tell me stories about their day.

At 10pm I remember that much though I enjoy their company, I want to go to bed. I herd them to their rooms and breathe a sigh of contentment, just as if I don’t know what’s going to happen next. From one room, a call: “Ima, come. You forgot to tuck me in bed!” Rounded arms snake out of the blanket and capture my neck. “Ima, stay with me.” And so I sit there, hugging, hoping that the stronghold round my neck will weaken with time, but it doesn’t. I tell the little one that I am also tired. I also want to go to bed. I take two steps, trying to ignore the complaints behind me when “Ima, come!” sounds from the other room: “I’m afraid of dying,” or “can we fly somewhere this summer,” or “which football team is your favorite?”

View from my office window

At 10pm no football team is my favorite, I don’t want to go anywhere, and for all I care death can come and take me. All I want, at 10pm, is to go to sleep. I am not a night owl. My brain stops working at 7. I am that strange form of human being: the morning person who wakes up with the first rays of the sun and bounds out of bed, ready for all manner of fun. I am most alive at 6 in the morning. I love the fresh morning air, the pinkish tint of the sky, the dew that covers the plants, the chirping song of the birds.

What to do, when two such extremes live in the same house? Patience and shouting, the two solutions I have tried, do not work. They feed off each other and make no change in the children’s behavior. I shout, they cry, I vow to be more patient. I’m more patient, they stay up later, I shout, they cry, and I vow to be even more patient. And before long it’s eleven, I’m about to fall off my legs from exhaustion, and the likelihood of patience the next day decreases with every tick of the clock.

Morning light hits our hill

I sit with my two night owls who are interested, creative, and eager to play in the middle of the night, and my gratitude for this special time knows no bounds. I go to sleep late and wake up early, and my head feels ready to fall off my tired neck. They go to their dad, and I get rest for one night before I start missing them and wishing they already came back. And so it goes, again and again. My favorite little night owls.

Repainting Body Image

In the early morning, I had a dream. I threw away my bad opinions about my body and decided: I accept the body I have. I felt elated when I woke up, but staring in the mirror, I saw the same saggy middle with the wrinkles, a gift from those two pregnant bellies that also gave me my two wonderful kids. Reflected to me was the same face, the furrows splitting my forehead and the one right between my eyebrows that makes me look like I’m concentrating all the time. I saw the same feet and hands, eyes and nose. I began to have the exact same critical thoughts as before. But then I said: enough. It’s all good.

My nine-year-old daughter recently began to say she was fat. Hearing her say those words terrified me. "Why would you say that, my little angel? How can you think you’re fat?" I asked, and my voice trembled as thoughts of anorexia, bulimia and other obsessions invaded my mind. “Oh, I’m not fat fat,” she answered, “but I have a big belly.” And she pushed out her middle so it stuck out of her body like a toddler’s belly. I looked on with bafflement, not knowing what to say or do.

We are different, Eden and I. I dress in my hiking or gym clothes every day. I rarely put on jewelry and never any make-up. Eden, in contrast, loves to dress up. She takes a long time to choose what to wear to school in the morning. When we go to Shabbat dinner at my mom’s, Eden will often put on make up, lipstick and powder which she found in my drawer and appropriated for her own use. Her jewelry box overflows with necklaces and bracelets which she wears on a regular basis.

I’d have thought that she would not consider me a model for fashion sense or body image, considering how different we like to look. But I guess that though her choices of dress are more elaborate than mine, the way I speak of my body filters down to her and gives her ideas for criticisms of her own. Turns out that Vera, my esteemed pilates teacher, was right when she said (in response to my comment that I look fat today): Would you want anyone to say that to your daughter?

I don’t. And that’s why I’m making a commitment to myself and to my dream to be better at accepting myself as I am, to appreciate the beautiful body in which I was born, the only one that I have in this life. I will no longer complain of being fat or wrinkled or old. And maybe I’ll dress up a little nicer once in a while. Or put on a necklace. Or allow Eden to brush some powder on my cheeks and spread some lipstick on my mouth.

What do you do to accept and appreciate your body?

Independence and the Absent Mother

Yesterday afternoon I sat by the kitchen table and cried as I finished reading Sharon Creech’s middle-grade novel Walk Two moons. I had picked it up the week before in a used bookstore. On the back cover, a quote from the School Library Journal promised “A richly layered novel about real and metaphorical journeys.” I started reading the novel wondering what it will be like.

Sal, the narrator, tells of the trip she took with her grandparents to Lewiston, Idaho to see her mother who had left on a bus trip a few months before. She promised to return but hadn’t. Sal hopes to arrive on or before her mother’s birthday and to convince her mother to come back home.

As they drive, Sal tells her grandparents the story of her friend Phoebe and her family who are all “thumpingly tidy and  respectable.” Sal describes Phoebe’s mother as “ Mrs. Supreme Housewife” and her father as “Father with a capital F.” But Phoebe also notices that underneath her enthusiastic baking and cleaning, Phoebe’s mother is unhappy. When Phoebe’s mother disappears with merely a note promising to return in a few days and a freezer filled with prepared meals for her family, Sal has a bad feeling. It is her experience that mothers promise to return but don’t.

Another friend, Ben, lives with his uncle and aunt, with no mention made of where his family is. Three absent mothers: Sal’s mother, Phoebe’s mother, Ben’s mother. And questions abide. Why did Sal’s mother stop writing to her? Why did she leave? How could she leave? And as a mother, I could not help but feel upset. Why all these absent mothers? How could Sal’s mother, who so clearly loved her, leave her? What is this story teaching children? I asked myself. That mothers are not to be trusted? That they can leave any moment? That mothers are inherently unhappy being just mothers? That if the child does not notice the mother’s unhappiness, does not appreciate her, then the mother might leave?

In children’s literature, parents are often missing: dead, or emotionally unavailable. This allows the main character to solve problems on his or her own. Thus Harry Potter is an orphan and his adult helpers either die or are incapable of helping him. Taran, of Lloyd Alexander’s Prydain series, is an orphan. The children going to Narnia live apart from their parents (and Aslan either is not present or is presumed dead). In the novels, these characters move from youthful dependence to independence. But at what cost? 

Sal’s story takes her on a journey halfway through the United States and inside her own heart, through anger, guilt, denial, fantasy, and finally acceptance. I cried at the end, and I forgave Sharon Creech for the missing mothers. And yet my question remains: could we as writers find a way to allow our young characters to grow with the support of a family behind them?

What do you think?

Good Mornings

This morning was perfect. I woke up before my alarm rang and took the dogs for a brisk walk up and down the hills near my house. Breakfast, prepared by Dar, included fresh-squeezed orange juice, eggs, waffles and fruit. I cuddled with Eden through the school’s  T’filla, the morning prayers, and now I am sitting at a nice cafe, writing to you. Perfect!

Sunrise from Bear Mountain at Coe

Mornings are my favorite time of day. I love the lightness of the air before the sun rays strike. I love the slight chill, left over from the night. I feel alive in the morning, vibrant, energetic, calm. The children, sadly, disagree. They like to go to sleep late and wake up even later. Especially on weekdays.

Lately I have taken to waking Eden with a song. “Little rhinoceros,” I sing to her sleep-puffed cheeks and determinedly shut eyes, “Wake up, little one. The sun is shining! The deer are running! Wake up little rhinoceros, wake up!” So far my songs have failed to convince her to awaken. From deep in her blankets, Eden commands me to hug her and tries to convince me that it is best for her to sleep for a few more hours. I remind her to wake up till finally, grumpy and cross, she rolls out of bed, all memories of our hugs and my song gone.

Pink-tinted sunrise at Coe as I start hiking down

She sits at the table, a veritable volcano in her pink pajamas, waiting for me to say one more word so she can explode. But what can I do? She needs to eat, get dressed, brush her teeth, put her folder back in her backpack, put on her shoes, and tell me what she wants for snack. Trembling with trepidation, I attempt to steer the little rhinoceros, my Karnafon whose nickname so fits sometimes, to do what I want so that we can get to school on time, hoping against all hope that like Scheherazade I will live to tell the tale for another day.

Uri likes to sleep late too, but he wakes up right away, gets ready down to his shoes before he sits down to the table to eat the meal which he ordered the night before. He often puts his alarm on for a much earlier time than I like. He may not be happy about rising with the sun, but getting to school in a timely manner is important to him.

I try to create a morning routine, thinking that order and clear expectations will bring about an easier morning. But Eden is a creative type. If she’s already up and not too grumpy, she wants to draw, dance, sing, tell stories. But there’s no time on a school morning for all that.

I haven’t found a solution yet, if one even exists. Sometimes there’s too much prodding and scolding in the mornings at our house. But other times, like today, there’s mornings full of love. Ups and downs. Like the hills. Like life.

What’s your morning routine like?