The Contentment Challenge--Day 3

My daughter really doesn't like to hear me put myself down. If I say I'm not as good at something as someone else, she flat out gets in my face and says "No, you're better!" If I admit weakness in an area or lament my lack of talent, she looks at me like I'm crazy and says "Yes, you're really good at that!"

What a gift! 

Often we laugh at the brutal honesty of children as they point out blemishes in public and innocently air our dirty laundry. But kids can also see right through the bull**** of our self-deprecating remarks and tell us the truth that we find so hard to admit--that we are not only good enough, but we are excellent.

So, today I accept the "me" my daughter sees: a musician, a singer, an artist, a beautiful woman, a chef, a fashionista, a genius, a mother. I am content that she sees me that way for now. I am content with the fact that I am enough of those things for her to experience, even she is using a rose-colored magnifying glass. 

Thanks sweetie. :) 

Can you be content to see yourself as someone else sees you today? 

Mommy, you need hair...

Is bald pretty? Can a mommy be bald?

My 7-year-old daughter was playing with her doll collection the other day--a few Disney Princesses, a Skipper and her horse, and a couple Polly Pockets. 

 The dolls were having a party. Naturally, I hinted that I would like to be invited. The response was: "It's just for people who are pretty."  Ouch. "I'm not pretty?", I asked her. "Well, I mean you're not pretty like they are, because they have pink and purple...(voice trailing off)". 

I actually did have pink and purple on. I was in my pajamas, granted, but I had the required colors. 

A few weeks later, my daughter decided to draw a picture of our family sliding down a rainbow. 

I was at the stove, and all of a sudden she asks me, "Do you want me to draw you with or without hair?" Wow. I had never been asked that before! I told her to draw me without hair, since that's really what I look like. She ended up drawing me with hair (I'm up in the top left corner--can you see the curls on either side that look like short arms?) because "otherwise you wouldn't look like a mommy". 

I know my daughter loves me just the way I am and thinks I'm beautiful. She tells me that all the time. I know she meant no offense. But it hurts to hear those things, nonetheless. 

Still, I'm grateful (I think) for opportunities to challenge the "types" and the values we have absorbed from our culture. I'm glad my daughter will have to struggle with this concept of defining feminine beauty. I just hope Barbie doesn't win. 

Emergence of a Mean Girl?

I am terrified of my daughter becoming a “mean girl”. Her dad and I have blatantly tried to impose our values upon her, ceaselessly providing opportunities and challenges to appreciate beauty from non-traditional sources. This used to work just fine.

Now, at age seven, our voices are not the only ones she takes in. The voices on the playground are, sadly, louder at the moment. I have been watching this transformation in her, from a believer in the Veggie Tales gospel that “God made you special” to an impressionable social seeker rapidly moving toward the lemming-like tween years. I see her trying to reconcile messages she gets from the trusted adults in her life with messages from friends whose approval means everything right now.
I thought I would have a few more years to prepare for this.

But, here we are. Her behavior is very unpredictable at the moment. One day I catch her speaking with openness and affirmation to girls in a park about her mom, who “has alopecia and that’s why she has no hair”, and the next day I find out that she has made hurtful comments to a dear friend about her appearance. One day she is genuinely befriending a girl with severe facial deformities at her school, and the next day she is playing the “that girl’s scary so let’s run up to her, scream, and then run away" game at the same girl’s expense.

It’s hard to know how her sorting out process is going. Which messages will stick with her? Which will define how she acts and views people around her? She has a kind heart, but she is also desperate to be a normal kid with friends who accept her. What is my role right now as a parent? Do I keep trying to impose a set of values on her as a foundation for the choices she will make later in life? Or do I take a deep breath and a few steps back, allowing her to glean her own wisdom as she witnesses the consequences of her own actions?

This little incident with our friend happened just the other night. Apparently, Esther said something hurtful, and then my friend addressed it by explaining that the comment hurt her feelings. Fine. This is to be expected at my daughter’s age, and I’m glad my friend was able to talk about how the comment made her feel and why it’s not appropriate to repeat.

What is absolutely not fine is that my daughter did, in fact, repeat the comment again, immediately after hearing how it had affected this friend. Maybe she was trying to see how far she could push; maybe she was more interested in watching and learning about our friend’s reaction than in the actual content of the messages; or, maybe she really couldn’t really identify with the fact that her comment had hurt this friend, whom she loves.

After hearing about this, I got my “I can’t believe you did this, because I know you are not this kind of girl” face on, and I let her know, without a doubt, that what she said was not okay. If the conversation had ended after the first comment, I would take a different approach—something like sitting down, asking questions, explaining why the comment was not something we would want to say again, etc. The fact that she said it again after our friend talked to her about it is what concerns me. So, after the lecture, the “mommy’s mad” eyes and the finger wagging, I decided I had better engage her in a different way. I want her to know the seriousness of verbal insults, but I also want to make sure she is developing a worldview in line with the ideals of compassion and justice.

So, I made her draw a picture of our friend. I told her to draw this friend exactly how she (my daughter) sees her. Then I asked her to write “(Name) is beautiful”. Drawing on notes I have taken in therapy sessions, I figured a picture would help to make concrete the abstract notion of using words to build people up rather than tear them down. I wanted her to create an image that she labeled as “beautiful”, not only to associate it with our friend, but also to own the feeling of being able to be a definer of beauty instead of just a judge of it.

This journey is just beginning, I know. The years to come will be filled with similar instances of reconciling two different sets of standards. I have hope in the solid foundation we as parents, along with family and community reinforcement, have given our daughter—and our three-year-old son. I must also look on my daughter with as much compassion as I am asking her to show others. And there’s the rub—because having compassion on my daughter’s emergent “mean girl” tendencies, real or imagined, requires me to have more compassion on the corners of my own self/heart wherein lie similar tendencies.

I haven’t decided whether or not to give the picture my daughter drew to my friend. That forced apology thing (“Now, say you’re sorry, and tell her she’s beautiful”) has never sat well with me. I do want my friend to know what I’m working on with my daughter, but I would like to wait until my daughter draws a picture of our beautiful friend without prompting before giving anything to her.

Raising daughters. Raising little women. Lord, help us.

Let's Talk About Moms, Baby

Yes, let's talk about moms.


(Picture taken from Viking Jenn's blog--check it out!)

We know them all.

There is the mom who curls her daughter's hair, never goes out without makeup, knows all the rules of football and makes an amazing lemon tart.

There is the mom who homeschools her kids, sews her own clothes, only buys organic foods and meditates every morning.

There is the mom who hauls three kids back and forth on the bus all day, goes the laundromat twice a week, works two jobs and feeds her kids McDonald's.

There is the mom who brings her kids to school in pajamas, has the TV on all night, and leans out the window to smoke her cigarettes.

I mean, we know them all, right?!

Wrong. We don't know sh--. (Sorry for almost swearing, granny...)

Do we know anything about these women's lives? Not unless we live a day in their shoes. "Judge not, lest you yourselves be judged."

This morning I brought my son to school with no coat, no shoes or socks, and no hat. In the winter. I got some stares, for sure. But what these gapers don't know is that I dressed him three times, and each time he stripped everything off. I decided to let him feel the cold, so that tomorrow (hopefully) he will keep his winter gear on.

My neighbors have heard me yell at my kids many, many times. I threw my daughter's prized pink water bottle across the room the other day and broke it. I dumped an entire bottle of chocolate milk in the sink this morning. Then I sobbed in my room.

What "kind" of mom does that make me? Some would say, and have said to my face, that I am crazy. I have a mental illness and need to be on medication. I will end up hurting my kids if I don't get myself under control.

So that's the mom I am.

I have been put into a box and slapped with a label.


(Taken from http://www.clker.com/clipart-203947.html)

It's not fair. The label doesn't even begin to capture my essence. By looking at that label you would never know all the positive things I tried before simply losing my patience. You would never know the daily struggles I go through.

I confess, shamefully, that the moms I described above are stereotypes of my own making. I have labeled moms according to external appearances, and then I judge them according to my own limited experiences.

To you moms, I'm so terribly sorry. I'm in this with you.

Thank Heaven For Little Girls

"Sugar and spice, and everything nice..."

Is that what we want our little girls to be? I picked my daughter up from a playdate this afternoon at a local cafe. When I got there, she and her friend were pretending to be bunnies. It was super cute. The problem was, the bunnies were getting a little too excited...and loud. The other mom and I kept trying to say things like "Volume down, please" and "Bunnies underground", but to no avail. The excitement level kept rising. There were a few other people in the cafe, on laptops mostly. One woman in particular kept glancing at the girls. Once, when I said "volume down", she said (to no one in particular), "Yes, shut up girls, please".

Mama lion came a'roaring. I didn't think I had a mama lion in me, but suddenly there she was. I had enough self control not to make a scene, but I did directly address this lady regarding my daughter.

Now, I am a quiet person for the most part. I love having quiet places to read and think and sip coffee. I like my evenings at home to be spent listening to soft music, curled up on the couch with a book. I am hyper aware of how loud I am when there are other people around me (like my downstairs neighbors). But to have a stranger tell my daughter to shut up was the last straw in a large haystack of restrictive measures forced on my kids by other people. My daughter has some special issues going on, and lately I feel like all I hear is "Her issues are not tolerated here." And "here" is pretty much anywhere.

Be quiet at school and sit at your desk. Be quiet at home so the neighbors can relax. Be quiet in the restaurant so others can eat in peace. Be quiet in church (though I must say, our church is amazing when it comes to letting kids be kids in our worship space). Be quiet on the train. Sit nicely in the waiting room. Don't make a scene in the grocery store. Don't bounce the ball while the coach is talking. Be especially quiet on airplanes.

It just goes on and on. And I get it. I do. We can't let kids run around screaming all the time. What kind of world would that be?! I guess I'm just wondering where the more energetic, vocal and excitable kids get to be the ones dictating proper behavior. Now that I am dealing with more of these issues regularly with my daughter, I find that we are being pushed out of public spaces that exist to help people relax. Well, where are the spaces, especially in the middle of winter, where hyper kids can also enjoy themselves?

And how, as a mom, have I contributed to my daughter's socialization as a girl who must always strive for stillness and quiet, so that other people are not bothered? It shames me to think of.

We need to let our kids know how beautiful they are, even if they are not embraced in public life.

30 Days of Redefining Beauty-Day 23

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. I thought I be super productive and get tons of housecleaning done today. Part of that grand ambition included doing a load of laundry--pristine whites, to be exact. This load included my husband's undershirts, our bedsheets, and a brand new white shirt I bought last week.

Well, you may have already predicted what's coming next (hint: look at today's picture). Yes, there was a bright red dust rag in the bottom of the washer, unbeknownst to me. I'm not sure why, since I was the one who threw it in there earlier this morning after dusting.

So I have pink sheets, a brand new pink shirt, and I will send my husband to work with pink undershirts.

I suppose I should laugh. The thing is, this is only the latest in a long string of similar mishaps--stupid accidents that waste money and could have been prevented had I been paying just a bit more attention.

Here are a few of my recent "brilliant" moments:
--left son's potty seat in the locker room at daughter's swim lesson
--booked a flight under the wrong date
--left butter and cream cheese out on my counter all day after a trip to the store
--put chicken in a crock pot and then forgot to plug it in all day
--lost daughter's permission slip for a field trip (still can't find it, deadline is today)

...just to name a few. And that's all in a week's time.

So where's the beauty in this? That's where you, readers, come in. Today's post is interactive. I need your help to see beauty today. I keep having brief moments of confidence and contentment, only to be quickly reminded how close I am to the edge of a breakdown! I exaggerate...but not by much.

So help me see the beauty in my life and my crises. Because all feels futile right now.

30 Days of Redefining Beauty-Day 20

Writer's block again.

I really enjoyed my dinner tonight. Green beans, green peppers, mushrooms, onions, garlic and slivered almonds sauteed together and served over rice with Rosarita seasoned black beans and pot roast (leftovers, don't ask). But is that beauty?

I helped my daughter make a jellyfish out of paper plates and yarn. That was actually a great couple of hours. We found this amazing Paper Plate Crafts book at the library and the ideas in the book are right up my alley: cheap, relatively easy, and ideal for the "artistically challenged".

When it came time to paint the jellyfish, I had her pour a little bit of tempera paint on a plate, being careful not to let the different colors touch. Of course, the first thing she wanted to do was mix it up. I hesitated, not because I am anal about colors mixing, but because I know she can be. I went ahead and let her mix the colors, hoping she wouldn't mind the mess that would come of it.

She loved the unique shade she had created, so all was well. Then she decided to do another part of the jellyfish in a different style--stripes of vivid, separated primary colors. Now I was really sweating. I could see the blue running into the yellow before she noticed it. I held my breath and didn't say anything...

...and then it happened. The colors mixed as she was painting...

...and she was delighted!

She totally rolled with it. And I realized something. She wasn't painting a jellyfish. Not really. She wasn't going for some end result that she had planned in advance. She was simply painting for the feel of it. She loved feeling the paint under her brush, coating every varied surface of the paper plate. She loved watching the colors change before her eyes. She loved feeling that "exactly right" amount of resistance as she stroked with her brush.

It was all about the process, not the product.

Some days, it's about the product. I need to pay more attention to the cues in order to know which is which.

When it comes to projects like this, I am all about the finished product; and, not being very artistic myself, I am often totally frustrated and disappointed in what I come up with. It seldom matches the blueprint in my mind.

But my six year old beautifully reminded me today to be present in the process. The final product will carry within itself the story of successes, failures and lessons that the process brought about.

Are you a process person, or a product person?

30 Days of Redefining Beauty-Day 14

The wallpaper shown above is called "Girlfriends" (available at http://www.scenicreflections.com/media/264457/GIRLFRIENDS_Wallpaper/). I love this picture. I think it shows how girlfriends never grow old, how we lean on each other as we look at life around us, and how we rely on each other's perspective to color the scene before us.

I love my girlfriends. They are beautiful and all very unique. I have been appreciating them so much more lately. Tonight I relied on my girlfriends to help me out of a Mommy Guilt trap.

You see, this afternoon I was planning on writing an entirely different post. I was playing in the snow with my kids after school--and we had an unbelievable (and long overdue) wonderful time together! We made a snow turtle, we threw snowballs at each other, we were carefree. Part of why I was able to enjoy this time was because one of my girlfriends offered to take my kids for the evening so I could go to Zumba. I was going to write about how the afternoon was all the more precious and beautiful because I knew I would have time to myself later and I recognized how short my time with my young kids really is.

But...then came time to go inside. Let's just say it was a very different scene trying to get my kids safely up the stairs and into the house. They must have gotten tired, because they were completely punch-drunk. Long story short, I ended up losing sight of the precious time I had with them and losing my temper completely. It wasn't pretty. Later, of course, I felt like the last woman on earth who should be allowed to be raising children. I felt like scum for yelling at my kids, especially my daughter.

So naturally I cried to my girlfriends. They calmed me a bit, they shared their own horror stories, they gave me perspective. And in their company, the things that were eating me up inside suddenly didn't feel so toxic. I felt hope.

Thank you, my lovely friends. The ones who received my pain tonight, and others who have been there on countless other occasions to hold me through the most trying of times. You know who you are. I love you and am so grateful for you.

You are beautiful.

30 Days of Redefining Beauty-Day 9

Two moments of beauty today. And believe me, I need to dwell on them tonight.

Number 1: I took my daughter to the pet store and we watched all kinds of critters frolicking around (oh the things you can come up with on a freezing day in the city). I found myself really drawn to the textures on the animals' coats. There was this amazing dalmatian I couldn't stop looking at--aren't the patterns and contrasts on some animals just amazing?!

I also thoroughly enjoyed watching animals being groomed, losing what seemed to be pounds of matted, dirty hair and emerging so clean and light. Watching hair get shorn off relaxes me, what can I say.

Number 2: My daughter later had an old friend over for a play date. At six years old, an "old friend" means someone she hadn't seen since the end of kindergarten, last May. It was so beautiful watching her get all excited, then become almost painfully shy upon actually seeing her friend face to face, then lose all inhibitions and romp around with this girl like they were separated at birth. They really are two of a kind. It did my heart good to see my daughter interacting with another child in a way that clearly made her happy. And the changing moods and worlds of a young child are so fascinating to watch unfold.

So, puppies and kids being who they are. These things delighted me today. What delighted you today?

30 Days of Redefining Beauty: Day 1

Two recent thoughts have inspired this new project. One occurred yesterday as I was thinking about my status report on Facebook. I was going to report that I had a nice day, but I stopped myself because, to be perfectly honest, I can get more attention if I write about my troubles. I thought, how sad that I prefer to define myself as a victim, dragging others into my darkness just so I will be pursued. Where did I get the idea that beauty was not as interesting as pain?

The second was gifted to me during a session of spiritual direction that I attended today. This particular spiritual director, who is also a trusted friend, helped me see that the ways I have traditionally tried to care for myself and "rest" often have the opposite effect, leaving me drained and far from refreshed. Instead of seeking "rest", I might be better off asking "What will lead me closer to wholeness?" After all, there are activities that may sound exhausting beforehand but may actually fulfill and revive my soul once I dive in.

After contemplating my life recently and unpacking these two thought experiences that occurred within a day of each other, I have come to the conclusion that I need a new way of looking at my life and living in it. I'm tired of seeking beauty in places that look promising but turn out to be traps. And I'm tired of wallowing in the negative all for the sake of attention and affirmation.

So, to the project: For the next thirty days, I will write one post per day in which I describe something beautiful about my day. My hope is that I will set myself on the road to optimism by forcing myself to find beauty in unexpected places--and to take it in as a gift more valuable than mere drama.

I hope you will join me. Please feel free to add your beautiful moments in the Comments box each day.

TODAY: I volunteered in my daughter's first grade classroom for an hour this morning. I have not been looking forward to this, because it totally broke up my day and I was afraid I would feel like I hadn't gotten an adequate break from being a mom during the day, leading to a tense afternoon and evening.

The beautiful part is that I really enjoyed getting to know the kids in my daughter's class and watching her interact there. I saw her relative to other kids and realized that many of my fears about her socialization process have been founded on assumptions. I began to understand her teacher a little better--a woman I had previously judged to be much less personable than she actually is.

The lesson from today, I guess, is that I need to reserve judgement until I have seen "with mine own eyes". A simple truth that was illustrated beautifully for me today in a room with 28 six- and seven-year-olds.