Catch Up Smash Up, I'm Such A Mom.

Have I told you that I compose blog posts in my head on a regular basis? Sometimes I even "talk to text" compose them as notes in my phone, then never go back to edit the horrendous grammar and spelling to turn them into actual posts.

Like this one, which I will edit for you now...

"Motherhood is the single worst thing I have ever done for my personal health. It started with pregnancy. Pregnancy was the most beautiful, rewarding experience ever, but it also happened to throw my hormones out of whack and make me more tired than I had ever before been in my life. Then, I entered the magical world of postpartum life. Being a new mom was amazing, beautiful, and rewarding, but the hormones were still out of whack, creating exhaustion and stimulating an autoimmune disease that completely messed up the metabolism of every cell in my body. Add to that the sleep deprivation, interrupted sleep, and general lack of sleep that comes with caring for an infant. I don't know of anything more stressful on my body or my mental health than lack of sleep. It suppresses my immune system, makes me forgetful, and makes me cranky. Add to that the new level of stress that comes from caring so deeply about another being that their hurt is also my pain, their fear is my fear, and their adventures are also my fears. Stress further suppresses the immune system. I'm ripe for infection just in time to receive extra exposure to viruses via sticky daycare fingers, Kindergarten coughs, and preschool kisses.
Motherhood. It's gross, it's exhausting, it's unhealthy. It's also my favorite thing ever."

Or this one that is fresh out of my brain right now...

Emma gets a shot once a week. Sometimes it hurts, sometimes it doesn't. Her arthritis isn't hurting her though, and that's all that matters. It seems to be in medicated remission, but the doctor doesn't say those words until we have enjoyed a whole year free of symptoms. So it goes.

Today, right after I poked her in the back of her arm, I repeatedly kissed her elbow. While applying light pressure with a tissue to the injection site to catch a mixture of medicine and blood that was leaking out of a pin-prick hole in her arm, I smooched her over and over. I told her I didn't kiss her enough as a baby and I was making up for it now. She said, "Is that true?" and my response was something along the lines of, "I don't know, but you can never have too many mommy-kisses."

The truth is, I didn't kiss her enough when she was a baby. I was scared of her. She was this thing that cried and didn't sleep well, this tiny person that I could accidentally break or mess up. I was so stressed as a new mom that I didn't enjoy her. I was so worried about breathing on her face, or bumping the soft spots of her head, or giving her too much food, or not enough food, or the wrong kind of food, and everything else that you can possibly imagine me worrying about that I didn't realize I could hold her for pleasure until she was like six months old. (I'm just picking that number out of the air. It might have been ten month, when she was even more sturdy and appeared less breakable.) Don't get me wrong, I held my baby, but I held her to meet her needs. I held her to comfort her, to soothe her, to calm her worries. In the midst of it all, I didn't realize that I could hold her so that she could comfort me.
I can't believe I missed that.

Somehow, I didn't screw her up. Yet.
Emma is a Girl Scout, a Brownie. (I am up to my eyeballs in Girl Scout cookie sales. I can't wait for them to be over next week so I can take a freaking break. Except that I won't take a break, not really, because I just don't know how.) She says that her favorite subjects in school are reading, science, math, and art. She likes to be a spy and pick on her brother. Also, she plays the piano like a champion. She is participating in the school district's science fair this week and I am beyond proud of her. She is a voracious reader, a friend to many people, and a teacher-pleaser like her mother before her. She likes the freedom she feels when the wind blows through her hair while she rides her bike. She is self-conscious when chastised by her Daddy. Her freckles are delicious pieces of my soul reflected on her nose and cheeks, and I adore her infinitely. I am trying to make up for every missed snuggle and kiss of her infancy because I now know that she is a healing balm to my soul.
*sigh*

I mustn't leave out my boy child. Do you know him? I don't think I have screwed him up yet, either. Thankfully, by the time he came around I was a more relaxed mother. I found quiet time in the day to enjoy him as a newborn. Plus, he slept and ate more and cried less than his big sister did when she was as small, so that made me less stressed as his mom.

Liam's eyes are still blue and magnificent, they have been so since his birth.  He picks up sticks whenever we go out and has an impressive stick collection in the back yard. He adores being outside and being around his Daddy. He falls down and scrapes his knees a lot. He loves all of the friends he is making in Kindergarten. I wish he ate more and slept in longer. He is a lean little guy. He is becoming a reader and I love the way he sounds out new words everywhere we go. Liam's Spanish accent is impeccable and when I hear him roll his R's I am both impressed and envious. His handwriting is atrocious in the stereotypical way a left-handed little boy's handwriting might be. He likes animals and climbing and burying himself in sand.

We cuddle. He sits in my lap at the end of meals, when we're folding laundry, or reading books. We laugh together. We make fart jokes together. I kiss his soft, round cheeks as many times as I can before he tells me to stop. Sometimes he just wants to be in the same room as me, even if we're doing different things, and I love that. I love his closeness.


So yeah, being a mom is hard work and terrible on my health. It is a tremendous sacrifice and I miss having time for myself to read, write, create, be alone when I pee, shower, or sleep. However, I know that these two incredible people are tremendous gifts in my life and that all the sacrifice is worth it.

Sadness

Some of my work-people call me Sarah-Sunshine. I have embraced the name because it's fitting. I usually bring a pretty sunny attitude everywhere I go. However, sometimes I have a sassy attitude, and that's fine.

I also think you should know that even Sarah-Sunshine gets the blues.
It's true. A few clouds here or there pile upon me and before I know it, I'm feeling sad.
Public Service Announcement: It is totally okay to be sad sometimes.

Did you read my last post? There are cruelties in the world that are unjustified. There are kids with the same genetic/idiopathic disease as my daughter who are financially discriminated against by insurance companies and drug manufacturers simply because their parents don't have jobs that provide private health insurance. It's crap and it makes me angry, but mostly it makes me sad.

The governments of the world refuse to work together, the world is being polluted by people who are in denial, and the education of our children is going to pot. It's crap and it makes me angry, but mostly it makes me sad.

Did you know that one of my close friends from high school died by suicide before she was twenty years old? Her birthday was this week. She would have turned 34, but she didn't because mental illness and drug abuse told her she wasn't good enough for this life and she left it too soon. It's crap. It makes me angry, but mostly it makes me sad.

Do you know that I have a big brother? He is two years and ten months older than me. I adored him and idolized him when we were growing up. I listened to his music (because he played it to loudly), had crushes on his friends, and copied his style of dress when I could (flannels, flannels, baggy jean, and more flannels). It is his birthday today. I won't see him. I won't hear from him. I can't call him or hug him or sing to him. My parents can't either. Can you imagine being a mother and not being able to embrace your baby boy on his birthday?!?!? I can. I can and it breaks my heart. (I'm here for you, Mommy.)
Mental illness and too many challenges within the family have made him seek isolation from us. I understand his reasoning, but not entirely, because it's downright impossible for a person like me to ever really comprehend a person like him. With his twisted, beautiful, brilliant mind that is so up and down and every direction at once, I can't keep up. But I miss him. I miss him and I wish him a happy birthday. It's crap that I can't tell him in person. It makes me angry, but mostly...
It makes me sad. 

The last time I saw you. 2/2012. xoxoxo and Happy Birthday.

Naiveté

Can you recall an experience that shattered your perspective or opened your eyes and totally rocked your world?

I can.
In fact, I can think of several. 

One of the first really eye-opening, paradigm-shifting moments of my adult life happened my freshman year of college during an honors medical ethics discussion class. (Did I say "honors?" Yes I did, and yes, I am tooting my own horn.)  One of the subjects up for discussion was health insurance. As a privileged, upper-middle class, white, healthy, American 19 year old kid who grew up having spectacular private health insurance through my parents' jobs, I thought that health insurance existed to help everybody. My dad's insurance was billed first, my mom's picked up the balance, and I left my doctor and dental appointments without paying a cent. 

I can remember the room where the class was held. I remember sitting with peers and probably a professor as we explored this topic... and my brain exploded. Insurance companies can deny covering a necessary medication that a doctor has prescribed?!? Insurance companies can deny coverage to a person based on pre-existing conditions? INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE FOR-PROFIT ENTITIES GOUGING PEOPLE FINANCIALLY AND SOMETIMES ROBBING THEM OF THEIR HEALTH? Whyyyyyyyy???!?!!? 

I'm still a privileged, white, mostly healthy, American kid (ha!) with spectacular private health insurance, but I am no longer blind to the fact that insurance is designed to help those of us who are privileged and that it screws over those of us who are not.
It makes me sad* and I don't know how to fix it. 

Another eye-opening experience happened when I was learning how to be a teacher. There's a saying amongst educators that I have heard many times, and have repeated many times since. "Fair doesn't mean equal." Think about that for a minute. If kindergarten student #1 is an awesome reader, and kindergarten student #2 is struggling to sound out letters, should I make them both read the same exact book? No. That's ridiculous. I want their learning experience to be fair, I want to challenge each child appropriately, so I would have them read books at their appropriate, yet different, reading levels. That is fair. Equality for equality's sake is not always the best solution. Mind blown. Cramming people into identical boxes is a bad idea. Who knew?

Remember when we were kids and the grown-ups taught us to share with other children? Also, we sang a song with the lyrics "Co-op-er-ation is the answer! Cooperation! We're working together." We learned that bullies are mean because they have issues and that we should stand up to them, tell on them, and stop the abuse. We learned communication skills that included "I statements," listening, and problem solving.  It was my understanding that these skills were possessed by all adults, particularly by those who ruled the world and controlled my life, and that we should all be striving to be cooperative, kind, open communicators.
Now join me in the present, if you would...
The two-party political system of the United States of America is totally crazy-pants because they apparently didn't embrace these lessons I learned as a kid! Adults from two separate sides actively work for their own agendas while poo-pooing on the other side's ideas. Really? REALLY? "Cooperation is the answer! Cooperation, we're working together!" Didn't these people ever hear this song??!?! Don't they know that the majority of their constituents will benefit when they work together. WHY THE HELL DO WE ONLY HAVE TWO POLITICAL PARTIES in this country when everyone knows there are more than two sides to a story?!?  
The fact that the government can't actually work for the greater good of humanity makes me sad* and I don't know how to fix it.

So, my friend, what about you? What have you noticed as you have grown as a person? What has blown your mind and opened your eyes? Share your stories with me, please. I'd love to know.

Meanwhile, I'll be here, paying less for outrageously expensive "specialty medication" for my daughter because of my private insurance and drug-manufacturer payment assistance program (not available for non-privately insured patients), while trying to convince my employer that fair doesn't always mean equal, while I shake my fist at the members of my government who seem to have the mental development of toddlers.

Ugh.






*Observation: When crappy topics like those mentioned above pop up on my Facebook newsfeed, my reaction is almost always a sad face and almost never an angry face. I don't know why I default to sadness over anger, but I do.