EXPECTATIONS AND LET DOWNS- Allowing for Personal Growth in Marriage.

Over a decade ago, I stumbled upon a life-changing article in Oprah magazine (still killin’ it to this day, Opes). I nervously tore it out, knowing it would necessitate repetitive reading and slipped it into my purse when no one was looking. I then waited for the nurse to open the door and beckon me in, feeling every bit a criminal. I'm soooo bad. Alas, I still have the paper, likely folded and stowed away into a tiny corner of a drawer or bin somewhere, but four moves later, I wouldn’t know where to begin looking, so you’ll have to bear with my memory. It’s subpar at best.

The article was written by a woman who became a therapist later in life, after a failed marriage to a man and a subsequent successful marriage as a lesbian. It happens, right.

It’s an article I think of often, because it’s wisdom is indispensable to growth and understanding in long-term relationships, not just with a husband but family and friends as well.

She was treating a couple and assigned them a special task. They were to take turns not speaking for one day. In other words, the husband could speak for 24 hours but his wife was not allowed to talk or respond to him at all and vice versa.

For the husband’s go around, his wife felt extremely insecure without the presence of his commentary, causing her to create her own version of what she thought he’d say to her in each moment. All day she narrated her behavior with things like “I just know what you’re thinking…” and then would assert what she assumed to be his judgment of her. When the sun went down, and the husband was freed from his vow of silence, he was able to share that all of her assumptions were completely inaccurate. He’d thought none of the things she’d put in his mouth, and the negativity she’d ascribed to him was also flawed.

The moral of the story is that over time we all evolve, inevitably learning and metamorphosing. But, often in marriage or within families, we remember who a person was when they were younger or when we first met. We don’t mentally allow for the growth that has eventuated, thus parents talking to adult children like they haven’t aged a day since moving out, forgetting their worldly experiences beyond the walls of their childhood homes, or wives saying to their husbands “you'll always” and “you'll never.”

Within each of us, an often invisible transformation is constantly unfolding. When I say to my husband “you’re not confident enough to…” I call forth a man who no longer exists, and in doing so inadvertently shame the man who is, effectively nullifying years of personal work towards progression.

When my husband avoids subjects that may incite conflict, because he thinks I’ll impulsively lose it, he doesn’t honor the massive efforts I’ve put into controlling my visceral reactions.

And, I so desperately want to be better for him.

We are dynamic creatures, and internal renovation is a constant. It’s happening within each of us right now. Something is shifting, and it may not yet be apparent to anyone but us.

For a long time, only I was privy to my desire to gain control over my hot-headed temper and biting tongue. That appetite for growth was the first step towards change. But, my husband couldn’t see my mental shift. His awareness was limited to what his eyes perceived.

Slowly, I’ve been able to confront that agenda and manipulate my behavior to match my desires. But, the part of me that was ashamed of my temper, the part that my husband knew well, had difficulty letting go. Knowing what he assumed about me, what reaction he expected, made it all the more challenging. I can’t fault him for this. We interpret our lives through what we’ve learned to be true via past interactions.

We can’t start over with different partners every time we want to make ourselves anew. And, we also can’t forget the past. But, we can bite our tongues and assume a position of optimism. When we verbally remind one another of all the ways we fall short, we invoke more of the same. Believing in our partner's ability and desire to always be more, to constantly be better, gives them the space to begin that most difficult separation from those undesirable behaviors. Labeling one another only creates an injustice, a war not worth waging, because the improved version of you won’t ever be seen if you’re invariably living in the shadow of she who was.

So, I try to remind myself that my husband, my family, my friends are full of love, for themselves and others. And that love propels an internal battle, an aspiration to step out of the shadows of ineffective behaviors. We walk that path together, and if we can quietly assume the best of one another, gently setting aside previous expectations, knowing our earthly challenges coupled with the fervor of our souls' desires to advance, we give one another wings, empowering an instinctive and beautiful expansion.

-Angi

HOME SCHOOLING IN THE CHIP AISLE.

We’re at the grocery store, and I know you from around town.  Maybe we have mutual friends but we’ve never hung-out together, me a gaggle-deep amidst my 4 kids, you alone with a yoga mat slung over your shoulder.  You look startled by us, almost like I’m doing something wrong, but you can’t put your finger on it.  I simultaneously disregard a child’s pleas to purchase Cheetos, while gently reminding another to ‘make room for the world around them,’ as an old woman squeezes past our budding shopping cart.  I examine the contents on a label of jelly, and still manage to talk to you.  I know it’s a lot, but you could have just pretended not to see us.  Instead you ask, “Whoa, is it a school holiday or something?” One eyebrow rises, as you survey my brood. “Right?!” I say, chuckling, as if no one has ever asked me that one before, “They are homeschooled,“ and then under my breath, “they NEVER leave.”  You laugh and acknowledge my response to be inclusive with your own judgment. Now we can talk. “Shopping with Mom is actually a highlight in our homeschooling. They get to talk to strangers and even practice their conversation skills with humans of different ages,” (even the ones that don’t know that public school is a relatively new institution in the scheme of things). One of my middles steps on the shopping cart, causing one side to teeter and slam back down as she jumps off, startled.  I put a hand on her shoulder and bring my gaze to hers, “I asked you to stay off the cart. Please don’t climb on there again.”  This time you inspect us with two raised eyebrows and awkwardly move past while saying, “Okay… well, see you guys around.” 

I push on towards the produce, and remember a time when I wanted approval for my perfectly behaved kids.  But they aren’t perfect.  And they aren’t the only ones having a learning experience at the store.  Each time I feel defeated by a less than perfect scenario with my kids, I have an opportunity to make choices.  It used to be that I would chastise them in the heat of my humiliation. Later I reprimanded and then apologized for getting upset or raising my voice. After a while, I was able to talk to them without referencing any spectator’s judgments. I confidently know now that I can use my words with them just like I ask them to use their words with the world around them; politely. I’m a living example of the people I hope they will be.  That doesn’t mean that I’m always doing it right. I just know how to embrace failure and make that part of the brilliant lesson (that we’re all having) at the grocery store. 

-Emily

MIRROR, MIRROR ON THE WALL- Changing Bodies, Aging, and Motherhood.

The morning after giving birth to my first son, I slowly made my way to the bathroom, waddling through the tenderness between my legs. Mostly unclothed from nursing, I knew the mirror was soon to confront me and tell truths I might not be ready to hear. I'd consciously avoided it's stares thus far. Inspecting the changes in my body elicited apprehension laced with terror. After a deep breath and internal pep talk, I let my gaze slowly shift toward the floor. My belly appeared to be stretch mark free and only slightly swollen. A wave of relief swept through, after months of horror stories and worry. Then the weigh-in. The scale granted more relief; I was 12 pounds heavier than I’d been pre-pregnancy, having gone to great lengths to ensure minimal necessary weight gain. I could manage 12 pounds. I’d put on 25 and run three miles daily, until the final month, stopping only to avoid the inferno that was August. I then sentenced my awkward body to 30 minutes of the elliptical machine for the remainder of the pregnancy. Hell-bent on giving my baby as healthy a start as I had control over and keeping myself in prime condition for a smooth home birth, I ate well throughout, only succumbing to cravings for pizza in the first trimester, when literally everything else sounded like a recipe for barfing. And, of course, I still wanted to look good postpartum, to retain my non-mommy body, clinging to the idea that I could and should exist as both, separately and simultaneously. Read on, lest you think me a fool.

My teens were awkward, at best. I carried extra weight after moving to a rural town in Wisconsin. I mean, it’s the cheese state, and the school cafeteria served unlimited homemade cinnamon bread at lunch. Sugar was a just reward for enduring teenage years at a new school with people who didn’t seem to want me there. Heaping bowls of Cheerios right before bed became a regular thing, cus it was fat-free, so why not? High school came to a close (praise effing be), and I sported minimal self-confidence with a Rachel cut gone terribly wrong. Think A-line bob with a long tail attached to it, seemingly from nowhere, because the 50-year-old hairstylist at the generic version of small-town Supercuts had obviously lied through her teeth when I asked her if she knew who Rachel from Friends was. I should have intuited that from the vapid stare she possessed after my description. Needless to say, attractive was not a quality I assigned to myself.

We moved back to California shortly after my rat tail was cut off, leaving me with a chubby, pale face framed by a not so flattering bob. My friends were all away at college, and I was alone. This led to mild depression, the shitty poetry phase, as I've mentally coined it. The melancholy halted my appetite and leaned me out. My hair grew. My pasty skin got a bit of California tan, I traded in my over-sized farm girl attire for feminine vintage finds and... started to get noticed. Late to the party, but nonetheless in attendance, I finally began dating.

That attention gifted a high like no other, something other girls had probably gotten in their early teens and were well over by 20. But, I needed it still, to build self-worth, to know that I held value to the opposite sex. I wasn’t just the “smart girl” anymore. My still malleable identity accidentally got intertwined with being stylish and thin. I had other attributes I was proud of as well, but it was all a jumbled up mess and remained that way beyond the birth of my first son.

And beyond the birth of my second.

Then came Indigo. A move. And 40. And no job. And no second income. And another body to tend to that wasn’t my own.

I had to skip workouts regularly because, Life. And because I didn’t want to throw myself back into adrenal fatigue from pushing too hard or pulling myself out of bed before the sun, sacrificing much needed rest in the name of fitness. Energy trumped skinny out of pure survival.

Botox wasn’t in the budget.

Cute clothes weren’t either. I was a stay at home mom for the first time ever, dressing up would certainly be lost on my toddler. And, I’d moved to a notoriously casual town. Think Patagonia- a puffer jacket, jeans, and tennis shoes, with a greasy bun on it. It sure helped that these new moms I was sharing a city with weren’t prioritizing the aesthetic either. My new local trendy was fleece paired with “don’t give a shit,” and the timing couldn’t have been more kismet. Don’t mistake this for self-neglect. These chicks get things done. It’s really just a shift in priority commingled with a more action-oriented definition of being a woman. I needed that.

For most, this epiphany doesn’t require three children. It took that many for me to officially lose the emotional space to give any fucks about going out into the world and being noticed. There was no conscious choice made. It was forced upon me by the requirement of caretaking. Cus, ain’t nobody got time for that (that referring to anything/everything and anybody referring to mothers).

Untangling the value of beauty and youth from motherhood, from womanhood, from personhood, was less angsty than I’d anticipated. I’d watched my mother come to terms with aging, often seeing a woman far less beautiful than was there, and I worried how I’d manage, what the mirror would reflect back to me, unwittingly imprinting upon my self-worth.

But, I see the grey hairs springing forth from my scalp for the first time this year, like tiny radars tuning in to a higher frequency as I level up, and I smile, not rushing to cover them with dye. I earned each one with colicky babies, years of late nights spent snuggling and nursing instead of sleeping, with the endurance of one temper tantrum after another, the hysterical refusals of eating seemingly benign dinners, three children crying in unison while my husband and I exchanged vacant stares, taking mental leave for survival, and brother’s turning on one another at a moment's notice, screaming in the backseat because someone’s unwelcome fingertip is resting upon their forearm.

I earned this shift in perspective. I’ve never worked harder for anything, and I deserve the new brand of beautiful bestowed upon me.

Now, the smiles on my children’s faces act as the most important mirror of all, reflecting a worth that is predicated upon the joy they experience, the fullness of their bellies, the love held in each beat of their hearts. Of course, there is so much more to me than motherhood, and I welcome any and all “nice butt” comments my husband has to offer, but the way I look and how others perceive the wrapping of my soul is of little consequence in comparison to my role as “Mommy.”

-Angi

WANT TO BE FRIENDS? Mothers discovering strength in numbers.

I leave the warmth of my bed at 5 am because there is someone I care about expecting me to. I wolf down a fried egg and complete the timely morning ritual of preparing coffee; I need the warmth from the cup in my hand as I brave another winter drive to the gym at five minutes after 6. My dear friend Charity will excuse my slight tardiness because she knows I’m good at other things.

Today she is already upstairs on the treadmill. Her long, blonde braid hangs down her back, swaying in rhythm with her steps. I make a quick wish that she is able to check out mentally for these few moments. I envision all of the remaining minutes left in the long day ahead of her; each action fulfilled in the company of her five, beautiful children. Through sheer endurance, she manages to homeschool, to nurture a supportive marriage, to expand her own mind as a student (who, I might add is pulling off straight A’s on her quest to becoming an LVN) and she does all of this and still finds things to laugh about with me on a Monday morning.

We wrap up our gym routine with 15 minutes of the worst racquetball anyone has ever played. We can barely connect two hits, but I’m sweating and in tears watching Charity ricochet a ball off the wall with the pent-up rage of motherhood, and then crumbling in retaliation as the ball shoots straight back into her lady bits.  We’re on hands and knees gasping for breath over the hilarity of it, that or we are just way fucking out of shape.

It wasn’t long ago that I couldn’t even imagine myself this way; spending the first part of a day away from the needs of my own little people, existing in an act purely for myself, and all in the blessed company of another woman. Early motherhood consumed many of the friendships I had as a younger me. The giving of oneself to children leaves a minuscule portion of time left to supplement any extra relationships. I had all but given up on the fact that there was a whole population of women just like me out there, somewhere, having babies and maneuvering what future friendships looked like.

Connecting with people while endeavoring to mother: breastfeeding, tending to crying babies, unsuccessfully sucking in an empty-womb-tire that now exudes over the top of my pants no matter what shirt I’m wearing…all this was foreign. And truth be told, making friends after motherhood was one of the hardest things I was yet to do.

My recollections of mommyhood with three tiny people are overwhelmingly magical moments mixed with spouts of intense loneliness. On normal days I existed tucked away with my brood, down a gnarly dirt road, doing my damned best to harvest my growing kids with a side of wild, but basically using the same techniques other parents did: potty training (that ultimately only trained me to lower my expectations;) the night-time routines that whitled me down to a hollow person who only read picture books, sang the same sought after songs, exhausted enough to fall asleep on myself while half standing beside a bunk bed; the adventures in nutritious eating that required every molecule of my creativity to be expended, and then every ounce of patience, as a meal made of complete amino acids was thrown to the ground on the whim of toddler refusal.

I often looked away from these moments of despair in search of someone who could witness the crazy amount of will I was expending in the act of not losing it; someone who wasn’t going to analyze what I could have done differently; someone who was there to validate the pure raw difficulty of being a caregiver; to just acknowledge that shit was rough but light was at the end of the tunnel… unfortunately, this person wasn’t going to drop out of the sky and find me. I had to brave the public world, a place that doesn’t welcome the regular outbursts of small children.

I wrangled my untamed babies into the car: 4 years, 3 years, and 5 months old, got them to a decent looking state, packed a sensational amount of necessities for a 20-minute ride, and headed into town with hope. Baby Gym was the destination; a warehouse filled with soft-cornered playthings, trampolines, balls, and moms with preschoolers. I saw four walls segregating me from normalcy. Pay $3 per kid and hang out with mothers who were once young women with friends, now morphed into messed up versions of themselves; no sleep, desperate to talk to someone, conversations funneled into the deliriums of child-talk.

There were clicks, and age gaps, and religious barriers and all manners of insecurities running the entire gamut of parenting, including but not limited to: co-sleeping, bottle-feeding, vaccinations, pacifiers, discipline methods… Our conversations consisted of how many times a baby barfs per hour, what kind of rash you think this is, how a baby’s daddy failed to man-up. I knew I fit the demographic. I knew I was supposed to fit in here. But I didn’t.

I had one hour in this one setting; 60 minutes out of a week of solitary mothering, to come to this place where little, loud, narcissistic people were actually welcome in public, to find a friend. There were many days that I drove back home, wiping silent tears from my cheeks, as Haven babbled loudly in the backseat alongside her brother and sister. I just couldn’t do this thing alone anymore.

The next week we tried again. I pulled into the parking lot beside another mother. We both read the sign stuck to the door from our cars. “Baby Gym, closed.” I remember glancing at her through the passenger window. Our eyes met, the same way you’d expect two strangers to fall in love at first sight. But what I saw in this woman’s eyes, mirrored there, was our shared desperation at this moment.

Someone suggested the park. I had know idea if that meant we were both going. I drove there resigned to wet slides and solitude with children (if there is a word for that, I’d love to know what it is). I got out of my car to see the woman from the gym doing the same. She unstrapped a baby from his car seat and my heart skipped to find a connection; we had babies that were similar in age. This could be a beginning, a talking point.

We walked the stretch of the bridge together toward the park. On one side we were strangers, meeting by chance, with a shared angst for parenting alone on a day to day basis. We traversed across each wide plank, slowly with the union of our stumbling kids, our shared struggles, our humilities turned to common ground. And on the other side, a new place opened up to me, a destination for both of us to be, together.

(You sally ass clown, you know who you are.) Courtney and I parted that day with the awkward request for exchanging numbers. I really didn’t know if she was in to me. We talked about snowboarding, and painting, and making things with our hands. We talked about the kids too, but I had almost forgotten what a conversation was like for two women existing as entities in a world of mothering. She reminded me.

This story has a happy ending, because good friends are few and far between, and Courtney and Charity are both dear to my heart still today. They have taught me that I am able to give and receive friendships with many women, on many levels. The public world is a scary place by yourself, with kids. It doesn’t make itself available to mothers with children, without ridicule. We need to pipe down and be nice in public, and it isn’t always possible.

Having a comrade in parenting opens up spaces that once felt prohibited. We free each other from that ostracized feeling, and normalize the joyful noises kids can make. We empower one another to be moms and women in life; to be mindful and mama. I couldn’t do it without you.

-Emily

EGO VS. REALITY- The pain of knowing that others are unfairly judging you.

In my divorce, nearly a decade ago, friends and family divided, each of us naturally gaining sole custody of those we’d laid claim to before meeting. As is standard, there were raw emotions and bruised egos. We each constructed a story of what went wrong that would help us more easily mitigate the personal damage. Those stories were facts to us but in reality only half-truths. Of course, they were shared with those we were closest to… and probably several others.

Childless and 30, the perception others held of me was of disproportionate importance, whether I feigned fortitude and apathy or not. It was incredibly painful to know that these people, who I’d done life with for 10 years, believed falsities about me. And even more difficult to swallow was the acceptance that I’d have to be okay with that.

I knew, as it was unfolding, that this was a gift in the making, the greatest gift of my divorce, outside of peace. I was keenly aware of the strength that would be gained, a strength my soul desperately craved. My mantra became the reminder that only I needed to know my truth. If I was operating from a place of personal integrity, the perception of others was moot.

Still, it hurt. But, cutting the strings of my delicate ego, with scissors honed from authenticity, won out. True liberation, even if it was scary as hell.

I breathed deeply often, observing negative thoughts slither in, that ego-crushing feeling taking over, and then I dismissed them. I was acting as the best version of me, even if it didn’t feel like it to those around me. I could answer only to myself.

It took tremendous effort for me to acknowledge that others responses to my actions, or what they believed to be true, were strictly owned by them. If I knew that I was operating from my highest self then I could do no more. The rest wasn’t mine.

It bears explaining that major soul searching and uncomfortable honesty are paramount to knowing if you’re operating from a place of authenticity versus ego. If you have anger towards another, that’s you. Authenticity and integrity are peaceful states of being.

Of course, over the years, there have been moments when I deserved judgment, when my ego stepped in and caused emotional bedlam. And, there have also been moments when the hurt wasn’t mine to claim. It’s my natural inclination to always question myself first, to check for ego activity. That means that I have to sit with the vulnerability, the ugly emotions. I have to pick apart my actions to search for signs of inauthenticity and palpability. This is difficult work, and I often erroneously take responsibility for the insecurities of others because of my uncommon willingness to wade the murky waters of my ego.

At this moment, intuitively, I believe that a friend has shared half-truths and misinformation with other friends. Emotionally, it’s my divorce all over again. I moved away from these women, so the friend gets custody of them. I have a choice- to confront or to be still. We’ve all been there, sat with the feeling of being misrepresented and desperately wanting to fix it, to heal the wound inflicted upon the ego. (None of them will see this because I know you’re wondering.)

But I won’t. I choose silence because I know my truth, and I have faith. It’s been a rough year, having to decipher what is and isn’t mine in various interactions. I have had to learn to trust my judgment and my growth, to see my heart clearly and then pardon myself because I know it is pure. I’ve learned that if I feel saddened, it’s probably not mine, but if I feel angry, I’m likely the proprietor. I believe that when the universe senses you’ve elevated beyond a learning curve you’d previously struggled with, you’ll be gifted situations that test your faith in that growth.

I hear you Universe, and I thank you.

-Angi