- What is your favorite color? red
- What is your favorite toy? Don't know
- What is your favorite fruit? mango
- What is your favorite TV show? Phineas and Ferb
- What do you like to eat for lunch? Sandwiches
- What is your favorite outfit? I don't have one
- What is your favorite sport? karate
- What is your favorite snack? Sun chips
- What is your favorite animal? penguin
- What is your favorite song? Southern Nights by Glen Campbell
- What is your favorite book? The Bridge Home
- Who is your best friend? [M] and Sunshine
- What is your favorite cereal? peach oatmeal
- What do you like to do outside? practice karate
- What is your favorite drink? water
- What is your favorite holiday? Christmas
- What do you sleep with at night? Nothing
- What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? oatmeal
- What do you want for your birthday dinner? Shrimp
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My Sweet Monster,
I’ve been trying to write this letter for a while, but I seem to be lacking the words. I guess I’ll start with Happy Birthday! It does not feel like 17 years have passed since you were born. You are still my sweet baby. I’m so very proud of you and all you have accomplished. I was so worried that you wouldn’t get involved in high school and would be lonely, but you are far from that. Next year, you will have leadership positions in three clubs as well as being involved in at least 3 more. I know you’re a bit nervous about how some of the classes next year are shaking out, but it’s only 36 weeks. Then, you will be off to college. This past year has been full of accomplishments. I could not be prouder of you. I know that the accomplishment you are most proud of is your third degree black belt. When you started this karate journey 9 years ago, I was so nervous. Would you listen? Would you like it? Would you remember everything? It turns out this was your thing and it’s become one of your passions. I love that you have had the opportunity to work in a job that you are passionate about. Most people don’t get that as their first job. This next year is going to be a rough one for me. I still see you as my little baby who needs his mommy. Yet you are on the cusp of adulthood and ready to be completely independent. I hope I have taught you the skills you need to be out on your own. This summer is going to be a lot of life skill training just to make sure! I’m sad that I will not get to celebrate your birthday with you and your friends, but I’m so happy for you that you get this time to relax and have fun! Have the best time tonight! Happy Birthday, Little Man. I love you more than you will ever know. Love, Mommy I am terrified that I’m just like her.
I spend so much time trying to not be her that maybe I’m turning into her. I don’t want to push my family away. I don’t want to become bitter. I want my babies to want to come see me and talk to me. I try to be kind. I try to be forgiving. I try to be selfless. I try to be nonjudgmental. I think I’m failing though. I see how she looks at me. I see the disgust. “It gets better” is what they say. But what if it doesn’t? What if it turns out our stories are the same? “We control our destiny.” But what if we don’t? What if all of this is for nothing? But what if it changes? What if it does really get better? What if we do control our own destiny?
Dear Sunshine,
This year, Daddy wanted to write your letter. Love you. Always. Mommy Dear [Sunshine], Today, you are 14. You are growing up so fast and in such a complicated world. I know you are trying to navigate your family, friends, school, and activities. Sometimes you will make mistakes and need some help. We are here if you need us. All of these things will get harder. You will need to use your heart and try to decide what you need instead of what you want others to think. Life gets so much easier when you learn this. People learn to trust you because you are an amazing person. I have never met anyone so full of life when you are here. You can be so happy that everyone around cannot help but to be happy, too. It is like your superpower that you have always had. Next year it is off to High School. You can do this. Let the people who care about you help you. Mommy, Daddy, [Monster], and your friends can help you with school work, and social challenges. Remember to be kind because all of those other kids are going through the same things. I know birthdays have changed. Parties and cake have given way to hanging with your friends. That’s OK. Just remember that we love you, and want to be with you. We can still see that happy little girl that played soccer in a fancy dress in the mud. I love you, Daddy In the past several years, especially since 2020, we’ve been flooded with information about how mental health matters. Yet, it’s just words and words mean very little when actions show the exact opposite. From companies that want everyone to take a meditation break in the middle of the day for 30 minutes but still expect you to accomplish the same tasks and stay later at work so you can accomplish said tasks and then send out emails scolding people who missed it so they could just go home a normal time and get their stuff done, to schools who send out all sorts of newsletters yet pile so much work on kids that students are averaging less than 6 hours of sleep a night.
In this society, we expect people to be productive 100% of the time, even sleeping. We have watches that monitor our sleep and tell us how good of a job we did or didn’t do sleeping. If mental health truly mattered to people, things would change. It’s about the rich getting richer in this society though. Do you see CEO’s of companies working as hard as their employees under them? No. You see vacations and golf outings and “business” dinners and drinks. While their employees can’t take time off if they are sick for fear of lost wages. For some reason, everyone is good with this system. Those CEO’s worked hard to get where they are…well…..for the most part, no. For the most part, their parents worked hard and they were handed things on silver platters. For the most part, they already had enough money to take risks and it didn’t matter if that risk didn’t pay off because there was more money. Society reveres these spoiled adults and wants to be like them. Here’s the hard truth, 90% of people will not be like them. According to CNBC, “The top 1% owned a record 32.3% of the nation’s wealth as of the end of 2021, data show. The share of wealth held by the bottom 90% of Americans, likewise, has declined slightly since before the pandemic, from 30.5% to 30.2%.” What’s this got to do with mental health? Everything. Money is the largest stressor for Americans. It ranges from, “Will I be able to afford food and rent?” to “How will we pay for college?” and everything in between, including mental health care. Have you ever noticed that most doctors work bankers’ hours? This means for basic, people need to miss work, therefore losing pay. Even with “good” insurance, every time you step foot through the door for a doctor, it costs money. And we’re just talking physical care. Mental health is a “specialty” which means that co-pays are higher. What that breaks down to for an average Joe with above average that they pay out the nose for is that when you walk in to see someone regarding your mental health, you’re paying about $50 each time along with missing pay. Then, of course, they want to see you every week, or maybe more. How does this relate to children/teenagers? Even though it is this difficult for adults, it’s even harder for kids. In this day and age, kids are expected to be involved in all sorts of activities. The busier, the better. In fact, they need to be the best, so they will do these activities year round, 3-5 days a week on average. They are expected to be social, so they need to maintain and build friendships. When old enough, they are expected to get jobs. They are expected to get good grades. Children go to school about 7 hours a day, 5 days week. High schoolers get 3-4 hours of homework a night. Those is harder classes, get more. My son has days where he comes home from 7 hours or more at school (if he had club meetings) and does homework for the next 7 hours. That’s a 14 hour day. Adults are not expected to work 14 hour days. On average, my son, who is in all advanced classes, has 5 hours of homework a night. He also works. He would like to go to sparring class at karate, but normally does not have time due to homework. One of his best friends averages 7 hours of homework a night due to his class load. Every after school activity thinks they are the only activity these kids have going on. Band practices a ridiculous amount, including all summer. These kids are expected to do more than adults, all while their brains are still developing and they are trying to navigate the world. If mental health actually mattered, my kids wouldn’t be terrified to miss a day of school because it would be too hard to make up the work. There are no longer books that kids can go back to and read what they missed. All the information is given to them in class which means if you miss what a teacher said, you could miss a huge chunk of material and be lost. Teachers have so many additional responsibilities and are burnt out, that they don’t care to take the time to help students who have missed class. If mental health really mattered, the district wouldn’t send out little newsletters to parents saying sleep is important. They would change things at the building level so that kids didn’t have crazy amounts of homework and didn’t have practices for hours upon hours each night. It’s all about appearances and not about the actual issue. Everyone wants to look like they are “doing something” to help people’s mental health when what people really need is a break. People need time. In this country, we focus so much more on productivity than health of any sort. It’s a sad world that we live in where teens are burnt out before even entering the workforce. People wonder why there is such poor work ethic among the younger generations. It’s because they are tired. I would love to say that we can make a change, but we can’t. It’s the 10% of people holding all the wealth that have the power to make the changes. In the educational system, it’s the same. Change comes from the top down. If all students protested and didn’t do homework, the only thing to change would be their grades, which would drop. People in power need to actually care about others rather than appearances and money. Until this country actually makes a real change, I’ll keep being open to my kids taking time off from school when they need to and feel comfortable doing so, not filling our schedules so full we don’t have time to just be, and making sure we take time connect with not only each other but nature as well, because nature heals our souls. I’m thankful Spring Break is next week because we could all use a little extra time off. Christmas. I’ve written about having a love/hate relationship with it. This year seems to be especially difficult. Whatever differences I have with my mother, she made Christmas magical. Christmases as a child were truly spectacular. It had very little to do with gifts that I received. It had everything to do with how my mom made me feel.
In the weeks leading up to Christmas, we would decorate the house. She used to have these figurines that I loved setting up and creating different Christmas scenes. We would listen to Christmas music and sing around the house. My mom and I would sit in front of the tree and drink tea and talk. That was probably my favorite tradition. Just the two of us sitting by the light of the Christmas tree. Long after I stopped believing in Santa, she kept the magic alive on Christmas morning. She took a great deal of care in picking out the most perfect stocking stuffers and Christmas gifts. Stockings were always my favorite though. She always seemed to know exactly what I liked and filled my stocking with amazing surprises! I had always believed I would be the kind of mom who made Christmases magical. This Christmas, I learned that I failed at this. Christmases have always been different for us. We are never home. In the past 16 years, we’ve spent two years at home. The first being Monster’s first Christmas because, as new parents, we were terrified to travel with him! The second being 2020. When my father in law lived in Florida, we would ship gifts down and do a full blown Christmas in Florida. After he moved and we started renting houses, we would do Christmas when we got home. We would ask Santa to drop our gifts at our house in Ohio. This meant that Christmas for us would always be sometime after Christmas when we returned home. 2020 was the first Christmas that Sunshine did not believe in Santa. Since we were home for the first time in her life, we went all out. It was a Christmas like I had when I was a child. Yes, gifts were harder to come by that year with supply shortages, but we managed to get the top things each child wanted. Christmas felt more like Christmas again. It felt like when we’d ship gifts to Florida and the kids would wake up with magic and wonder, rather than us just throwing gifts at the kids when we got home from vacation. This year, Sunshine commented on how after you stop believing in Santa, Christmas just isn’t magical anymore. This stung more than I ever thought it would. I have failed at Christmas. Society has failed at Christmas. This Christmas, Sunshine sat around, with no gifts, watching everyone do their gift reveals on Snapchat. This person got this super expensive gift. This person got this super expensive gift. Seven people got this particular necklace that I had never even heard of before Christmas day, but you could see the disappointment on her face. There is nothing worse than feeling as though you disappointed your child on Christmas. If I was a better parent, I would have been making Christmas magical like my mom did. But, how can I compete with all of the people opening their expensive gifts and getting everything they want? Maybe if we didn’t come to Florida each year, we could afford to get more gifts and we could open gifts on Christmas day like everyone else. Maybe if I was a better parent, I could figure out how to make Christmas more special with no resources. Maybe what I lack as a parent I’ll make up for as a grandparent. Maybe I can help my kids make Christmas magical for their kids, even long after they stop believing. I should probably start trying to figure it out now since I’ve failed for the past 16 years. Maybe if I start pinning ideas now, I’ll have it figured out by the time I have grandkids. Or maybe I will just always suck at Christmas. Or, again, maybe society sucks at Christmas. Maybe everyone else sucks at Christmas with making it about getting their kids every last thing they want, regardless of cost. Maybe social media has failed at Christmas by glorifying stuff rather than love. Maybe Christmas has become more about greed than giving. Maybe we’re all failing our kids and failing at Christmas, regardless of what we do for Christmas because no one remembers what it’s about anymore. Maybe kids get so much throughout the year that Christmas doesn’t mean anything to them and I just put too much pressure on myself because no one else even cares. Whatever the reason, Christmas has lost its magic. Lost its spirit. This year, the love/hate relationship has definitely tipped over into hate. Maybe I’ll never get the love part of the holiday back, but I still believe in magic. I still believe that maybe, someday, I’ll be good enough to bring my family a truly magical Christmas like my mom gave me year after year. A mom is expected to be the Keeper of All Things. We are expected to know everyone’s schedules. We are expected to get everyone moving and ready on time. We are expected to know where our kids put random crap. Not just our kids, but our husbands as well. Only moms know that the pickles were put in the wrong spot in the fridge, not because she put them there, but a family member did and now no one other than her can seem to find them because moving stuff is way too hard. What started me thinking about this is that things are starting to fall through the cracks. And it makes me angry with myself. But, I’m the mom so I have to suck it up and just do it. Take right this moment for example. The girl needs to go to dance. The boy needs to go to karate. The girl needs to take pointe shoes, regular ballet shoes, and water bottle. The boy needs to eat dinner. I sat down at my computer thinking, I had a little time to write, but no. Mom, can you fill up a water bottle? Mom, can you find my dance bag? Mom, what’s for dinner?
When I got a free second, and I came back to this, I truly thought about being the Keeper of All Things. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that, while typically, yes, it’s the mom, that’s not always the case. Growing up, I was always the Keeper of All Things. I was always the one who knew everyone’s birthdays. I was always the one who knew everyone’s phone numbers. I was the one who could find lost fridge items. I was the one who knew what days I was supposed to be where and what activities I had. While my mom had her calendar and wrote stuff down, I was always the one who knew it off the top of my head. While my mom was organized and could find someone’s birthday or phone number, I never needed to look it up. I was the one who would remind my mom what I had going after school and what time I would need to be picked up. I promise, my mom had no idea what I needed to take to soccer practice with me. Occasionally, I would ask where certain things were, mainly clothes, and they usually turned out to be in the wash. The difference is, if I asked for the green shirt, my mom would have no idea what green shirt I was talking about and then tell me to check the wash. My kid asks and I not only know if it’s been washed, but know the state of wash-in the machine, in the dryer, in a basket waiting to be folded, or had been folded and should have been put away. I only get tripped up when it’s something that was worn for 5 seconds and put in the hamper before I saw it being worn. When I thought about being the Keeper of All Things even more, I thought about how it’s probably more of a personality trait. I have a male friend who is the Keeper of All Things in his family. Not that his wife isn’t the keeper of a ton of things, he’s the one who knows the schedule, knows what to pack, knows where everything is. I also see this trait coming out in Monster. We used to call him a space cadet. His head was always in the clouds. I actually wrote about going to soccer camp early to get him to start gathering all of the stuff he had taken out of his bag and left all over the place. Now, he’s the organized one. He still can’t seem to move items in the fridge to find anything, but he tends to know where all of his stuff is, what activities he has, etc, etc. A lot of it he does by memory, but he also writes everything down. Then I started thinking about this even more. Has me being the Keeper of All Things made it so no one tries? Just ask Mommy, she’ll know. In the rare instance I don’t know, I’m met with frustration and anger. How dare I not know something that was never told to me?!?! The frustration goes both ways. Sunshine has taken dance since she was 5. She always needs her dance bag and a water bottle. How can she not seem to get those things together? Why do I always have to do it? The answer is because she knows Mommy will do it. My family has gotten lazy because they know I will handle it all. They also know that I have guilt, so I will make it happen. The other week, Sunshine forgot her water bottle at home for dance. It was a 2.5 hour dance day. She told me it was fine and didn’t need one. It was her fault for not grabbing it since I had filled it up and set it on the counter for her. Still, I had Mom Guilt that my baby was going to dehydrate. I didn’t have time to run home, so I ran to the coffee shop on the corner that sells bottled water as well. Thankfully, I’m in there a lot and know the people who work there. The line was long, I grabbed a bottle, told them I’d be back to pay for it and ran back out and ran, yes, physically ran it down to the dance studio before class started so she would have water. I then ran back to the coffee shop to pay because I didn’t want them to think I wasn’t coming back (though they know I’m always there!) The guilt had me running around to fix a mistake she made. Being the Keeper of All Things is exhausting. The guilt that comes with things falling through the cracks. Trying to keep up with everything going on for not only everyone in my house, but now for my parents as well. I try to write down important dates, but I get sidetracked by all of the things that need to get done. I’m starting to forget what I was supposed to do or where I was supposed to be and when. It’s never my kids’ activities, just mine. My poor Husband, every day, he tells me where he plans to be the next day, yet, each morning I ask, Where are you today? It’s not that I don’t care, it’s more that I know he can get himself where he needs to be. The days he’s going to be out of town, I remember because I know I’m then the one in charge of all early evening stuff. When it’s whether he’s in Cleveland or Canton, I tend to forget because both of those usually mean he’ll be home at a decent time. I told my family something needs to change. I can’t keep going at the pace I’m going. Monster has been very helpful. He still can’t seem to find anything in the fridge, but he’s the keeper of his own schedule, he gets all of his stuff together, and he tells me when he’s down to only 3 pairs of underwear as opposed to the other two, “I don’t have any underwear left”. Husband has taken the burden of cooking dinner off my plate. I still need to figure dinner out and shop for it, but he makes it. Nights I forget to plan dinner, he takes over. I know my personality is to always be the Keeper of All Things, but it’s nice to have a little help remembering now and then. Also, a shout out to my friends who keep me in line saying, I thought your kid had this or that today after school? Yep, you’re right! Thanks for the reminder! We all know that there is a first time for everything. But there is also a last. My kids are at the stage in their lives where they are experiencing a lot of firsts as well as a lot of lasts. There were always lasts, but they were too young to grasp them. Now, they feel the impact. This past weekend was my daughter’s last soccer game….ever. Between the two kids, we’ve been doing soccer for 13 years, which is approximately 26 seasons, not including indoor, with my daughter playing 11 of those years. Five days before her last game, she decided she was done with soccer. I honestly was not prepared. In our league, she could play one more year before she ages out. The issue is, the majority of her friends have aged out or moved on. It’s not that she doesn’t like playing, it's that she would like it better with her friends. I understand that, it’s just hard to say goodbye to something that has been part of our lives for so long.
This got me thinking of all the lasts my kids and I will be experiencing. My son will be driving soon. That means I’ve driven him to his last school dance and didn’t realize it. I will be dropping him off for the last time at work, but don’t know when that last will be. Unless the weather is really bad or we need to use his car, I will have taken him to school for the last time. All too soon, I will have more lasts than firsts and I’m just not ready. Soon, there will be a last time I yell at my kids to clean their rooms because they won’t be living here anymore. There will be the last time I tuck them in. There will be a last time I wake them up in the morning. The last time I pack their lunches. The last time I watch them splash in the pool. The last time we take random walks together. They are about to experience so many firsts, which I’m excited to have them experience. Yet, those firsts for them lead to more lasts for me. I know I still have so many firsts to experience as well. My children’s first boyfriend or girlfriend. The first time they head off to college. The first grandchild. I’m looking forward to all of the wonderful firsts they get to have, but I can’t help but to be sad for all of the lasts. I know they are a little sad for the lasts as well. Everyone says time goes by so fast and to embrace each moment. It’s hard to embrace it all when you’re in the middle of it, but it’s so true. Sometimes the moments hit you like a ton of bricks and other times you almost don’t catch them. My son treats each time he sees someone like it’s going to be the last time. He focuses all of his attention on them and is present in the moment. I feel as though we should all be a little more like him. Appreciate the moments so when it’s a last, it doesn’t hit so hard. Mistakes. We all make them. Some people own up to them. Some people cover them. Most people get over it and move on. I’m one to own up to my mistakes. I apologize if I was wrong. But I never forgive myself. I will dwell on my mistakes for years.
My daughter had tennis camp for two weeks. Last week it was Tuesday-Thursday. I thought this week was also Tuesday-Thursday. I was wrong. It was Monday-Wednesday and I missed Monday. There are no words to describe how mad I am at myself. How disappointed I am that I let something fall through the cracks. How frustrated I am that I wasted a beautiful day and money. Most people would get annoyed with themselves and move on. I can’t. All my mistakes are like this. I forgot something at the grocery store. I’m the stupidest person in the world. I left something at home. I’m the worst, most irresponsible person ever. Each mistake makes my anxiety take a little tighter hold. I check and double check grocery lists. Before I go anywhere, I triple check that I have everything I need. After this, I will start triple checking dates and go back over them daily while the event is happening. I know this because I already have that as a plan. When I make mistakes, not only can I not let them go, but I need to have a plan to correct them so they aren’t made again. Yet, even with a million things in place, mistakes still happen. No matter how I feel about my own mistakes, I remind my kids that everyone mistakes and we have to learn from them. I remind them that mistakes are made every day. I remind them that mistakes don’t equal failure. I’m terrified they don’t believe me since every mistake I make I feel like a failure. We are definitely tough on our kids about some things, which makes me even more worried that when they make a mistake, they will feel as if they are failing. There is a fine line of correcting mistakes and shaming one for the mistake. But sometimes that line can get blurry. How can you make your kids not feel like they are failing when they keep making the same mistake over and over and you feel as though they just aren’t learning from their mistakes? There comes a point where you need to learn to correct a behavior. Maybe feeling like a failure helps correct that behavior. I don’t know since I have unhealthy coping mechanisms. There are so many things that I think I’ve done a great job of not taking my insecurities out on my kids. When it comes to mistakes, I think I’ve ruined them. I want to be the person they come to when they make a mistake, not the person they hide that mistake from. Each day, each mistake, I try a little harder to not do to them what I do to myself. Maybe, one day, I’ll start forgiving myself for not being perfect. Today isn’t that day, though. Today, I’m going to be mad at myself for screwing up tennis camp. |
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