Twinkle Toes, Shorts and Other Crimes Against Humanity

I'm the meanest mom ever. I'm unreasonable and strict. I blow things out of proportion that don't require the level of consequence that I impart. I enforce rules above the age level of my sweet, innocent child. I persist in punishing for an issue that isn't that big of a deal. At least that's what I'm told. But guess what?

I'm ok with that.

That's why we have a new rule in our house. Brynna loves to wear dresses. She will choose a dress when going to ride bikes, eating at a restaurant or playing at the park. Unfortunately, that playing (and sometimes just standing in line at the grocery store) ends in her panties being shown. Like most 4 year olds, she hasn't yet mastered the art of being ladylike. She is, however, Phi Beta Kappa in spinning and ending with a finale that includes flipping her dress over her head. Knowing that she's a little girl and these things happen, I invested in bloomers. They are the cutest little things with ruffles on the butt. Adorable. Good, new age parenting. I protected her from being inappropriate but didn't thwart her precious creativity and spirit. The problem is - she didn't learn anything. She didn't behave differently because she didn't have to. When I said "Boys don't need to see your panties," she responded with "They can't. Those are my bloomers." So our new rule is this: If you wear a dress and I see your panties OR BLOOMERS, the next day you wear shorts or pants. The result of this rule: crying and gnashing of teeth. You'd think I were shooting bamboo under her fingernails.

This drama has led to our second issue at the moment. Brynna is going for the academy award daily - in whatever category is at hand. She's even been known to attempt the Best Supporting Actress role when she feels her friend or cousin needs help turning up the showmanship. Recently during a tantrum, Brynna stomped her feet. Yesterday, she slammed a cup down on the table. Each outburst is met with a timeout or swat. Each time we discuss what she did and why it's not appropriate. That's how I know she's aware of her behavior. So today, when she kicked a door, a new rule was born. If you choose to show your anger inappropriately, you also choose to lose something. Before the door swung back to hit the wall a second time, I calmly reached down, took Brynna's coveted Twinkle Toes light up shoes off her feet and sent her to her room. Cue meltdown. After some time alone to recover, I went up to tell her to pick a new pair of shoes. Cue meltdown #2. She then had to put on the new shoes and have her hair combed. Cue meltdown #3. (Are you seeing a pattern?)

Is a cup on a table that big of a deal? Maybe not. She didn't throw anything, make a mess or break anything. Is seeing the ruffly bloomers of an adorable little butt so bad? Maybe not. She isn't making inappropriate gestures. She's just having fun. That's what little girls do.

But the reason I'm ok with holding the title of meanest mom ever is that I am more concerned about who she becomes than what she thinks of me in a moment when she's upset. I care more about being her mom than being her friend. I value being what she needs more than what she likes. And after Miley Cyrus made me and a million other moms tear up this week with the heartbreak of imagining our little girl feeling like that's what she needs to do for attention, I'm ok with that.

Do I like taking away the shoes that make her hop and smile with glee? Absolutely not. Is it easy? Never. Do I enjoy the argument that ensues each time she has to wear shorts? No. Would I rather skip the exhaustion and watch her joyfully twirling in a pretty dress? Yes. All day, yes. But that's not what will shape her character. So pardon my tiredness and haggard appearance. Motherhood is a contact sport and if my pain is her gain...I'm ok with that.

Just one

I never, ever, ever dreamed I'd have an only child. I wanted a big family. I imagined jockeying schedules and carting kids to other kids' recitals. I dreamed of backyard games where you don't even need to invite neighbors over because you've got enough for a team. I had plans, and as usual, God changed them.

Contrary to popular opinion, I don't have one child because I can't handle more. I don't have one child because I'm too selfish or too obsessed with what things cost. I don't have one child because I'm vainly concerned about what pregnancy would do to my body. I have one child because God asked me to trust His plan and His time rather than mine.

And while any number of kids has its challenges, let me tell you about having an only child.

Just one means I'm "the other kid." I don't go to the park and chat with other moms or get something done while they are in the playroom. I am the other side of the teeter totter, the pusher of the swing, the throw to someone's catch.

Just one means I do everything twice. I have a "helper" whether it helps or not. Laundry, dishes and putting on make up take double (at least) the necessary time because I do them each once with help and then once correctly.

Just one means I'm writing this while someone climbs my rolling chair like a jungle gym. Try typing while chasing your butt around the room. Seriously. Try it.

Just one means I am never alone. Ever.

Just one also means I get to savor every snuggle as long as she'll let me.

Just one means I get to see every gymnastics class, impromptu dance recital in the living room and swim lesson.

Just one means I am the nose she wants to nuzzle.

Just one means she knows how to make friends anywhere she goes.

Just one means she speaks confidently and clearly because she had to learn to do so for herself.

Just one means that as long as I make the choice to give her my attention, that attention is undivided.

For now, I have one. If there are more in your house, you could make a list about how sometimes trying but always rewarding it is to have 2 or 3 or 4 or more. Just do me a favor and remember that the mom you see with "just one" has a long list too. When you're tempted to think the grass is greener, just remember: it all has to be mowed!

U B U

I've always wanted to cut my hair really short. I've started to do it several times and always, at the last minute, I decide to go a more conservative route. I've grown it long only to look in the mirror and not know who's looking back. I can't make it look glamorous like other girls so I end up with a really full head of really blonde hair that's really BLAH. So...I cut it off. I get a short bob that makes me feel more like my spunky self but doesn't say it too loudly. A recent chop session was done in secret. I left for a weekend away with shoulder length hair in a ponytail and came home to surprise Brynna and David with it cut above my chin. Some husbands couldn't handle such a shock (let alone the weekend alone with mini me) but David just smiled and his first words were "You're more yourself when it's short."

That stuck with me for weeks. I do feel more myself. Maybe it's symbolic. Maybe my brain just needs less weight to function properly. Either way, it's freeing. And the more I thought about that freedom, the more of it I wanted. But we've all been there. You finally work up the bravery to do something out of the ordinary, and the first person who doesn't like it or turns up their nose, all the air rushes out of the balloon. You stop seeing what you saw in that moment of abandon and all you see is ugly. Maybe you don't use the word ugly. Maybe they said it was "too short for your face shape" or "too choppy." Maybe they said you're too old or too young or too dark or too light. I've heard and felt them all. But something broke open inside of me that day David said those words. I don't want something that looks great on someone else but doesn't seem to fit right on me. I want to feel like ME. I want to see ME in the mirror.

So I did what I never do. I didn't consult anyone. Not my husband, my girlfriends or my family. I didn't ask opinions. I made an appointment while out of town and I explained what I wanted. We discussed and then he started cutting. I walked out with the most drastic haircut I've ever had, and I care the least what anyone thinks. I love my hair not even because of how it looks, but how I feel. I fully expected looks. I prepared myself for how much people would hate it. And I know some of them do. But what I wasn't prepared for was the number of women who have stopped me, gone out of their way to tell me how much they love my hair. I was walking through the parking lot of Target today and a mom with two kids stopped me. She said, "I saw your hair and thought it was cool. Then I saw your daughter and realized you're a mom, too. You make me want to be more bold."

Wow. It sounds so simple, but how many things have I missed because I was trying to be like someone else when all I needed to be was me? How many things have you? How many women walking through Target could use a little bit of you? You're not just a mom. You're not just working. You're not just ______________. You're YOU. God made only one you. And that's enough to turn someone's day around. Your smile, your words, your help or maybe even your hair...someone needs you to be you so it gives her the courage to be her.

So take a breath, let go of what everyone else thinks and U B U!

...and I'll be ME

What Depression Taught Me I'm NOT: Part 5

If you've never had the experience of watching yourself go crazy, well...you have the first item on your list of Things To Be Grateful For Today. If you have had this displeasure, I'm sorry. But know you are not alone. I just got back from Looneytown. The weather sucks this time of year.

I have written during just about every stage of this crazy thing called depression - when I first had to admit "it," when I thought it was gone and when I finally had to call it what it is. I have admitted that somedays I hate that little white pill. I have been honest when faking it seemed easier. But in the end, I have come to grips with the fact that like some people take a pill for allergies or high blood pressure, I take a pill for depression. Well...I HAD come to grips.

A couple of months ago, I started feeling it around "that time of the month." I could feel the storm brewing but I was completely unable to stop it. It was like I was an outside observer - I was watching a movie and trying to yell at the character on screen to watch out for what was coming. But I couldn't hear me. It felt like all I could offer was a warning before I went crazy and an apology later. Then, it began to not just be once a month. I didn't have the energy to get out of bed on a Tuesday. I didn't want to go to the grocery store or do laundry because the thought of having to do it all again next week overwhelmed me. It wasn't every day (but it was a lot of days). I convinced myself it was a hormone issue and only then (when I thought maybe it had another name), I made a doctor's appointment.

I laid out the facts in perfect detail and then told the doctor (because I have a medical degree) that she needed to check my hormone levels and maybe change my birth control prescription. After asking some questions, she concluded that my hormone levels are perfectly normal and there's no reason to think the birth control needs to change. What she did recommend was increasing "the little while pill."

And this is where (in my head) the music stops and everyone stares.

It was like a reel of the past few months began to play through my mind in fast forward flashes. Not being able to get out of bed. Blaming David. (Seriously, poor David.) Losing patience with Brynna too easily. Being overwhelmed by EVERYTHING. The sadness, the lack of motivation, the uncontrollable outbursts. It was the same song different verse.

So I agreed. I filled the prescription and took the medicine. And you'll be amazed to learn that doctor and her medical degree knew what she was talking about! Each day I started feeling a little more normal and a little less crazy. I felt a little more present and a little less like a bystander watching everyone else do life. And today, as I drove home from taking Brynna to gymnastics, I smiled and thought that I finally feel like myself again. Same old me but different.

Depression taught me that I’m not who I once was. And that’s ok. I’m wiser.

My dad asked how I was doing recently and when I explained my initial aversion to the dosage increase, he said in his matter-of-fact way, "I take 7 pills everyday just so my heart works right. Your medicine isn't any different. If it makes you better, take it and get on with living." And he's right. I’m not who I once was. I’m better. I’m wiser.

Alone

I don't remember doing anything alone. By the time I was old enough to remember or able to do things, my brother had been born. Summer camp, elementary school...I did it all with a built-in buddy. I met my best friend Hope when I was 11, and I don't have many memories that don't include her. Brandy started completing my sentences when I was 15, and together, we went to college. I honestly think the 3 of us could take over the world if not for our day jobs (and the small mini-me's that follow us around). When I was 18, my family adopted my sister, Vikki. Somehow she was separated from us for the first half of our lives but I still don't understand how because while we couldn't be more different, our hearts share a beat. I was married at 21 - before I even graduated college. (Do I recommend that? Absolutely not. Do I regret it? Absolutely not.) Most people stop adding "best friends" after the teenage years, but I got a bonus. Janay and I became friends and then coworkers and then family. Most days, she knows me better than I know myself.

One of my most fervent prayers for Brynna has been that she find strong, long-terrm girlfriends to love and do life with. I still pray that, but today, I realized that God has been answering another prayer without my even asking. Brynna is an only child. I'm constantly aware that she doesn't have the built-in buddy I had. I'm ever-concerned that she not feel alone. But in the midst of my worry, I didn't realize that she doesn't. She doesn't feel alone because she learned very early to make friends wherever she goes. The pool, the playground or the park...she has learned not to be afraid of being alone and reaching out to the person next to her. Just this weekend, as I laid on the beach thinking about how much more fun it would be if my sister were here and BG had her cousins to play with, Brynna picked up her pail, walked over to a little girl building a sand castle and built something great with a new friend.

All this time I spent worrying about her being alone, she was becoming more rooted in who she is. All the prayers for God to bring people to her were unnecessary because she was doing something way more important - she was learning how to go to people.

We spend our days as moms trying to teach life lessons to our little ones. But when we take a step back, more often than not, they are teaching us...

Confessions

My arm is asleep and I have to pee but I'm going to tough it out because the alternative is that she wakes up...and you can't go back from that.

I'd rather give her back the Barbie than see her sad. I don't teach her because it's easy or it makes her like me. I do it because is't best for her.

I regret the day I showed BG how to do a sidewalk chalk outline of a person. I don't want to trace another person. Ever.

I have been known to bribe.

The older I get (or the longer I'm a mother), the more moody I get around my period. (Sorry if that's TMI. After delivering a child with 27 people in the room, modesty is relative.) I'm sure the moodiness means something about hormones. I'm just trying to give advance notice. Consider yourself warned.

My kid's feet smell. Bad. And I don't know how to help it so she just keeps wearing shoes that smell and making them smell worse.

I seriously considered having another child today just so BG would have someone else to beg to play Chutes and Ladders and leave me be for 37 seconds. But then I snapped out of it and we went to the park.

I think she's gorgeous and a genius. I know...I'm "that" mom. But I do.

Ok to Cry

I remember being in my pajamas. I remember laying on the floor next to my brother watching the Sunday night movie. (Remember those?) I remember not really understanding why I was crying even as I did so. As Pollyana fell from the tree and her spirit was broken, the movie paused for commercial. (Kids, that's a thing that used to happen throughout a program and you had to...brace yourselves...WAIT for the show to resume.) I remember my brother asking what was wrong, trying to figure out what alien life force had overtaken me. I remember sitting on my mom's lap - not something I did often. We talked about what happened in the movie and that it's ok to cry.

Fast forward 25 years...
I can't take much more animated television and it's hard to find a show these days that doesn't have inappropriate content. That's why Brynna and I have been watching Full House recently. Tonight after dinner, she went up and got ready for bed. She brushed her teeth and put on her pajamas, then she snuggled in next to me and we watched as Uncle Jesse prepared to leave the "full house" to live with his new wife. He sat 4 year old Michelle down and explained that he would still be near, and as the show went to commercial, Michelle and Uncle Jesse each had a tear in their eyes. I looked down to realize that my 4 year old had a tear, too. She sat on my lap and told me that when I went away this weekend, it made her sad like the little girl on television.

I'm sure she won't remember all the details. I'm sure she won't really understand or realize why she was crying. But as I held my little girl tonight and remembered being a little girl myself, I said a prayer for her. I prayed that God would protect her innocence, and I hoped that 25 years from now what she does remember is that her mama held her and assured her that its ok to cry.