Parenting Part V

        I have a friend who suggested that parenting is concentric circles: when a baby is born they are extremely close.  When they start to walk, the circle widens.  When they go to school it expands more.  When they start making friends it expands again.  When they leave for college it expands hugely, and when they partner with someone else, the circles in which we connect to our children expand once more.

        My youngest has a partner now, and Christmas break was an exercise for me in seeing just how far the circle of closeness that I share with my youngest child might expand.  Aislynn's partner came home with her for Christmas break, at my request.  But while Aislynn still managed to take whole days out of the month to spend time with her local friends, she could not do the same for me.  We caught moments together.  Little spaces in the midst of the busyness of the season to have open conversation. Still, by "open" conversation, I mean that I was open and Aislynn listened... as much as a 19 year old is willing to do. It was painful for me.  

    I didn't handle it well, becoming angry at her over little things because I was having a hard time sharing honestly about the deep grief I was feeling at her absence. At the time I felt she could handle my anger more easily than my grief and disappointment at the lack of closeness. I didn't want her to feel pressured to be closer than she wanted or needed to be. Reflecting back, that was undoubtedly a bad choice on my part, but it made sense to me at the time.  I'm aware that this is normal. Aislynn is doing what she needs to do at this point in her life.  She is making appropriate choices and stepping away as is to be expected as she pulls closer to her friends and her partner.  All of that is what we raise our kids to do.  But at times, I admit here in this safe space, it leaves me feeling a bit lost.

    I have always put my kids first.  I knew that parenting meant that my number one priority had to be to raise and protect my kids.  But when I became a solo parent, the only one to raise them and to care for them, this feeling of mama-bear, protect the kids and draw them close at any cost - that feeling became exponentially stronger.  They were no longer just my priority, they were my life.  Yes, I still worked: to support the kids.  Yes, I still had friends and connections: so that I could be a better parent and support to my kids.  I moved back to the Bay Area, because I felt they needed more family and support. For the last 14 years, almost everything I have done and chosen to do has been for them.  

    So now that they are all basically out of the house?  I realize I am still the bank for them: funding their schooling, supporting them financially.  But even that has a clear deadline to it.  Youngest will graduate college in 2 1/2 more years.  She plans to go to grad school but she expects to fund that herself and is working to save the money to do so.  I can see the next widening circle coming at the point at which they are no longer reliant on me for their funding.  And I'm preparing, as much as I can, for the even greater distance that will accompany that change.

    Yes, I have my own partner: David is an incredible partner and friend. Somehow early on, though, we set up a dynamic where I support the kids and he supports me.  That has to change so we have a more equal relationship, and that will take time. I have friends who are extremely important to me.  But of course they also put their own families first.  I have my job, my work.  But there are days, like today, when I question whether I am making any difference whatsoever.  I wonder what the point is when I clearly have not been able to persuade anyone who didn't already understand our call: beyond anything else we are to be about loving, supporting and caring for the least of these, for those who are in pain, for those who are marginalized, for those society rejects as unwanted, unneeded, unvalued.  I have not been able to convince anyone of this, and it literally breaks my heart in light of the damage and the hurt that is coming to our most vulnerable at this point in time.   And so I wander and wonder what I am doing.     

    I think all of these feelings are common as attached parents watch their kids grow up and leave the nest.  As I have said before, we celebrate their growing, but we also grieve it.  We delight in their independence, but we also miss their dependence on us.  We celebrate as they step into the world, but we also grieve the closeness.  These are all part of raising kids.

    So today I commit to doing something that is life-giving for me that is not about caring for my kids.  I signed up for a horticulture class at the local community college and today I will begin that class.  I've written many times about my love for plants, trees and gardening.  I am going to take this class to spend time learning and being with plants.  This is for me.  And I'm hopeful that it will nourish me.  My plants are my new babies, and I'm looking forward to learning more how to care for them, how to be a better plant-mother.  For those of you who are in a similar place to me, I encourage you as well to find a way to nourish yourself, to step in a new direction that can give you meaning and joy.  We will never stop being parents.  But we can learn new things and find new purposes as well.  Thanks be to God!

Parenting Part IV: What We Say Matters

     I've written a great deal about parenting lately, but it is, once again, on my mind so I'm taking to my typing once more, in part to process through some of what took place over the winter break.  Today will focus on Jonah once more.

    Jonah and I really had a wonderful time hiking and talking during the few weeks he was home.  I love that time with him.  I love hearing his thoughts and hearing about his experiences.  But, as I've mentioned before, we have a history of arguing. And while it is so much better than it was, occasionally those arguments still arise and they can be as volatile as ever.  This time there was only one big argument.  And it was not just Jonah and I who were involved.  Jasmyn and Aislynn were also present, and the argument ended up being the three of us on one side arguing with Jonah.  It was so intense that both Jasmyn and Aislynn finally stomped off in anger.  

    The subject of the argument is immaterial.  However, the next day when Jonah and I were walking, he said some things that were harder for me to shake, and which I really should not dismiss easily.  He told me that at one point in our argument, I had said something about him failing to be open-minded.  I didn't remember having said that, but I'm sure it is true that I did.  One of Jonah's greatest contradictions or paradoxes is that he is both able to think outside the box in creative and awesome ways, and yet at times he entrenches in specific beliefs that leave no room for other people's experiences or the possibility of things beyond his set determined belief. Do I think he is at times closed-minded?  Absolutely.  Still, I didn't remember actually voicing that, and found myself feeling horrified that I had called him a "name" in a way that was hurtful to him, and that stuck with him.  

    He also told me that when I talk about our relationship, I usually start by mentioning how much we have argued throughout his life, and how much we continue to do so, though he has worked very hard on this. Obviously this, too, is true.  Ironically, I usually mention it to say how far we've come.  As I said above, there was only one argument during the three weeks he was home.  I'm also aware that when I talk to other people about Jonah, I often describe him as my "miracle child."  He has blossomed into this absolutely amazing young man who is working on a degree in physics with minors in math and political science.  Despite being a full-time student, he also has a half-time job in the physics department at school and has won awards for his inventions.  He is published in several abstracts and is an active part of the physics research team, even as an undergraduate.  In addition to work and school, he has become quite the athlete: rock climbing, ice climbing, skiing, running, cycling, hiking and more.  He has numerous scholarships because of all he has done and continues to do.  And he chose to go to Norway for a year all on his own to study abroad, something I never had the courage to do.  But more than all this, he is kind, he is incredibly polite, he is compassionate and loving. He listens well, and tries so hard to do what is right by other people. My son who struggled so very much as a boy has grown into a young man I admire deeply.  He is my greatest pride, because he has overcome so many difficult and challenging obstacles.  He made good choices, and he is thriving as a result.

    Despite feeling so very proud of him, I feel I can take very little credit for who he has become. Jonah has always brought out the worst in me.  Or to phrase that in a way that doesn't put the blame on him, I have been with him, consistently, a version of myself that I despise.  The worst in me comes out when we argue.  I feel triggered, often, by what he says, and my parenting of him has always been less than what I would want it to be.  I would honestly give just about anything to go back to his childhood and do it differently, though I'm not sure I could do it differently even now.  Our arguments, though much rarer, still trigger me in a way that leads me to do what I know a parent should never do, namely saying hurtful things, such as calling him "closed-minded" despite the fact that he is a person I love more than I can possibly articulate.  

    The point? What we say matters.  I was surprised by what he remembered from the argument and more, how he heard what I say about him when I talk about him to others.  The little comments that he experiences as hurtful probably have a much greater impact than all the "I love you" and "I'm proud of you" statements put together.  They stick longer.  Like the barbed stickers that get stuck on my sweaters after a hike, they stay, while the compliments and expressions of love are more like flower petals that roll off.  Unfortunately, all the apologies in the world cannot dislodge those barbs from our spirits.  It is therefore essential that we work hard to avoid saying hurtful things in the first place.  When we are triggered, stepping out, stepping aside, breathing deeply, or whatever works for each of us to stop the flow of words is essential.  

    I'm so proud of my son.  I'm proud of him for being able to talk to me about what I said that was hurtful, too. It was a reminder to be more aware and to take the needed time to step back before speaking, especially when I'm angry.  As I said above, I wish I could change the words I've said that have been hurtful.  But I can't. All I can do is to use these lessons to work to do better. Love is action.  And my actions of love for my son have to look like working towards greater kindness when I'm angry with him.  Not easy, but essential.  Always.

Growing Up

        This post is going to be very personal. As I have mentioned before, if that bothers you, don't read on!!  I write about my own experience and share it to help you reflect on yours.  But if that is not helpful, please don't read.

        Today I want to talk about growing up, and in particular my own maturing.

        I did not grow up quickly.  What I mean by that is that I look back on who I was as a young adult with something akin to a sense of shame.  I was incredibly immature.  I made many errors, but more, I just didn't understand the world as most adults do or can.  I didn't know what was expected of adults, I missed a lot of social cues, and I behaved, I think, as many who were much younger than me probably would have known better than to do.  Honestly, there are many people I wish I could apologize to for simple things that I just missed, didn't see and didn't understand. I lost friendships because of that immaturity, but at the time I could not understand what it was that I was doing or failing to do, or why people disappeared.  I can see it now.  But it has taken a long time to understand their reactions and more, my own lack of maturity in specific situations.

    As I look back through my life, I can have compassion for my own slow maturity.  I had suffered serious trauma as a young child.  I believe that people often become stuck in the age of their greatest traumas if they don't deal with them in healthy, constructive, healing ways. As a young kid, I did not have the tools to do that work. And so, when I look back, I think I had become stuck in that early, young age in many ways.  Add to this that I've learned as an adult that I have ADHD, or, to put it another way, I was and am, "neuro-a-typical."  ADHD has some other issues that tend to go along with it, including something called Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria which I also had in spades. When I was a child, these were not diagnosed or understood.  Instead, the notes just went home to my parents: "She doesn't focus, she daydreams all the time, she's distracted, she's hyper, she's oversensitive and gets hurt easily."  Yep.  All those things.  But now there is understanding.  And while I find my ADHD to actually be very helpful in my current work (because my job has so many elements to it and it requires me to be "high energy" in order to get through the amounts of work I take on), it was not helpful as a kid.  It was a struggle, and the lack of understanding from the adults around me (because again, it wasn't understood then) meant that it took an enormous amount of my energy just to get through each day, each week, each month and each year, to cope, to be able to simply function in a world that was not set up to handle those differences.  Learning those coping skills meant that there were other things, like maturing in the ways others were, that simply did not get the attention that it did for other people in my peer group.  

         So what helped me to finally grow up?  Well, first I will say that I still miss some social cues. I'm aware of it. I work on it. I still struggle with rejection sensitivity dysphoria, though I now understand when that is happening and why. I have tools to deal with it now. But growing is a process, as we all know. And I still know that I've come a very long way.  

        Interestingly, while I believe trauma was a huge part of keeping me young for a long time, I also believe that it is the trauma I went through as an adult that helped me to finally grow up.  Then the question becomes, what was different about the adult traumas that helped me grow while the childhood traumas kept me stunted in growth?

        First, the amount of support I had while walking through the adult trauma was huge. I cannot look back on that time without still being incredibly grateful to my friends, my congregation, my family and my pastor-colleagues for all of their support as well as the help of a therapist and spiritual director.  That meant that I was working through it and processing it in healthy and appropriate ways while it was happening.  For all of that, I am, again, incredibly grateful!  

      Secondly, I think the writing I've done through and after the traumas was hugely helpful in processing through, healing, and helping me to grow up.  I continue to write, in part to continue to grow, mature and stay healthy.  It helps me to process the past and to stay in the present.  As many of you know, I've written a book about that time. I have yet to move on publishing it for the simple reason that I do not want to hurt anyone and I'm worried it might.  I'll get there, but it isn't time and I'm waiting until it feels right.  Still, the process of revisiting everything and editing what I had written at the time has been emmensely helpful both in growing, but also in maturing through it.  

    Finally, and I think this is a large part of it, despite the trauma, I had to continue to be responsible for caring for my kids and continuing to do my church work - to keep going and to do even more than I  had ever previously done to step up, to learn, and to figure out how to function as a full-adult. People kept saying to me, "you are so strong!" and my answer now is the same as it was then... "There was no choice in the matter."  I loved my kids.  I loved my church.  In order for them both to be okay, I had to figure out how to be okay myself so that I could help them and walk with them towards wholeness and well-being as well.  As I said before, I didn't do this alone. Thank God, I didn't do this alone.  But there also was no one else who could step into my shoes of being mother to my three kids, or to model what it was for their pastor to handle crisis with my congregation.  That forced me to grow up.  As simple as that, it forced me to do the work I had not done previously to be the adult I needed to be. 

       It's an odd thing: trauma.  Would I ever wish any of what we survived on another human being?  Of course not!  To say it was "awful" would be the understatement of my life, and I even "revisit" it with a PTSD reaction, though it has lessened a little with time.  At the same time, I find myself grateful for having survived it.  I find myself grateful that I was able to become the person I am today, who is so very different from who I was 15 years ago. I am grateful to have the strength, and the confidence of knowing my own strength.  I am thankful for my capabilities and for knowing what they are, as well as my limitations.  And I am grateful that I now know when I need help and to ask for it when I do reach those limits.  I am deeply thankful for my faith, which, while tested, came out much stronger on this far end.  It looks different now, and I'm grateful for that as well. Mostly, I'm appreciative of the fact that it gave me the chance to do the growing up that needed to be done. I come to this moment with a great deal more compassion, understanding, and grace than I had before.  I am more aware of what others expect of me and I am quick to try to give more than what is expected rather than less.  

      The truth is that growing up, I never liked who I was.  I didn't like me, but couldn't figure out how to be different.  Now, while I am very aware of my limits and my flaws, I mostly do like the person I am today.  I have learned to extend the grace, compassion and understanding that I have for others to myself as well.  That in itself has allowed me to grow up into a functioning, thriving, and for the most part happy, adult.  And that is something I can celebrate!