All That I Want For You My Son, Is To Be Satisfied

Be a simple kind of man.  Lynyrd Skynyrd is pulling at my heart strings today.  My boy, he’s out in the world and I find myself so desperately wanting to pull him back in and protect him, to swaddle him like when he was a baby, to be his momma bear all over again and do it right this time.  I want SO much for him and I want to be there to share whatever wisdom I can, to help him through the hard time.  Growing up sucks, it’s so hard.  I desperately miss him, his childhood and have days where the regrets are overwhelming.  He grew up before I even got a chance to understand what it really meant to be someone’s mother and try to be it.

Needless to say, Empty Nest is kicking my ass.   I work so hard, so very hard, to remain in the moment.  To leave the past behind and look to the future with promise and enjoy the journey.  It’s taken me a long, long time to even begin to understand what that looks like for me.  I love to abuse myself and suffer through all the times I could have been a better parent, all the moments I missed because I was trying to grow up and into myself, all the times I lost my patience and was selfish. This is really ugly thinking, it cracks at my heart and I have to physically snap myself out of it to avoid being a blubbering mess on the floor.  After all, the reality of the past is simply too painful to bare on some days and making amends to my past (and my son’s) really doesn’t change it, now does it?  I keep telling myself, all I can do is be a “good” mother today and maybe if I’m lucky, I’ll have the chance to do so, tomorrow.

The struggle now is that I think I’m wanting to cling to my son and “mother” him to the point where he wants nothing to do with me.   He’s trying to find himself out in the world, he wants to grow up and cut the strings, yet I know I must remain in the background for when he does need his momma.  Which, like most children, ultimately will need at some point and I’m poised to be there for him.   But, I know I can’t make him pay for something that is my doing.  It’s not his fault I have regrets about the kind of parent I’ve been.  It’s not his fault that I wasn’t more present, that I want some how to do it all over again with what I know now. 

What a horrible cliche this sounds like.   Yuck.

 I used to think, I am not defined by being a mother.  I am many things, a mother is one of them and a very important aspect of who I am – but it doesn’t define me.  Now, I wish perhaps I’d thrown everything into being a mom and worried a little less about trying to find myself.  Because now, I have all the time in the world to find myself, but M’s childhood is gone.  I can’t get it back.  And he’s easily at one of the most challenging times in a young person’s life, a young man’s life – which I really can’t understand the dynamics of what it means to be a man in our culture – and this is when he needs a lot of space from mom.   To breathe, to grow, to experience life, to become himself. 
 

OH THE HUMANITY.  How is any of this fair?

I’m also trying not to hate his dad.  None of this is his fault, but it’s so convenient to blame him.  I could harbor all kinds of anger about the example he’s setting for our son, but he is who he is and M needs some kind of relationship with his dad, whether I approve or not.  Again, another real rub in the whole mommying thing, I mean seriously?  Who the hell made up these rules.  Boooooo hissssss

So, as I wrangle with all this emotion and emptiness (let me clarify here that I’m thinking this will be the last time M will be living with me and that other than the comings and goings of any young person, he’s probably pretty much out of the house)  I’m fighting, I’ve got to figure out how to be me again.  How do I define my life, what it looks like, who am I?  All over again.  I’ve run myself ragged since he moved out with work and the pugs and domestic duties and even I know that can’t last forever.  Eventually, you have to face the music.  And face it I shall, but growing up is a bitch.  Even when you are pushing 40. 

Childhood

Recently, some friends of mine had begun sharing some pics of themselves in childhood within our social circles on and on FB.  It started out as silliness (these things often do) to one up one another on who has the goofiest childhood photos, of course I could not resist and jumped right in, looking through old photographs and trying to find the silliest of them all to parade about and get a good laugh out of.  Only, in doing so, I experienced something I hadn’t really considered before.

I have gone through periods of such painful loneliness.  Questioning myself and my existence, feeling unloved and having a variety of pity parties depending on the current situation at hand.  I experienced, and continue to experience, the full range of emotions about my childhood, including everything from convincing myself it was just fine, everyone did the best they could with what they had at the time and I need to forgive and get over myself to what I can only describe as the kind of rage that burns holes in your soul.  And as always, somewhere in the middle, rarely is anything on one extreme spectrum or the other.  There are gray parts, middles parts, different shades and flavors.

Firstly, I looked at some of these images of myself and saw a really beautiful and innocent little girl, things I’d never fully been able to believe about myself.  I’ve always felt incomplete physically, like there’s something haunting my reflection every time I look at myself in the mirror.  I’ve also felt damaged, like the situations and experiences that have shaped my life made me an adult or put me into adult situations long before I ever even got my first period.   “Innocent” is not a word I would have used to describe myself, because I’ve NEVER felt anything close to child like innocent that I can really remember.  Surely, I’ve been able to call on that innocent little girl, when I work at it, but it takes real effort and isn’t really a natural state of being for me.  Looking through these images of myself, with family members, in school pictures and so on, I finally, for the first time maybe in my whole life - saw a really pretty and sweet little girl, with blue eyes, freckles and very often smiling, in fact most of the time, smiling.

Secondly, I am now able to look at these images of myself in childhood through the eyes of a parent.  A parent who can reflect on her child’s growth and development and what the love between mother and child is like.  A parent who is only just not beginning to feel truly like she’s becoming the mother she was meant to be.  A parent who has many, many children she loves with every nook and cranny of her heart.  My son, B (my “niece” K’s daughter), M’s got 2 friends from  his younger years that I absolutely love with all of my heart and would pick up in the middle of the night should they need me and they know it,  my nephew whom I automagically feel all this tremendous warmth and love towards even though I’ve not gotten to spend a lot of time with him yet I feel a strong urge to be involved in his life, even K’s niece whom I cannot get enough of.  Bailey and Bella have also opened my heart up so very wide to the concept of loving ones children, I can’t even begin to describe that love.  I think of how deeply I love these children, how they fill my heart up and how I would do anything for them.  When I see these images of myself, with my Mother and Father, Aunts, Uncles, Grandparents, family friends – even my dogs growing up – I can clearly see that I was loved in this way.  I now am able to truly understand how passionately and completely adults love the children in their lives and that SO many people in my life loved me as a little girl, with that same intensity and enjoyment that I feel for my own children.  Yes, it is true that we do the best we can with what we have within that moment and I have come a long with in learning the skills involved with true forgiveness, probably because I am more able now to identify with the challenges of being parents and that at the end of the day, parents are people too and humans are on a never ending quest in growth and we ALL screw up huge sometimes.  After all, mistakes are proof that you are trying, right?   But I CAN see, even within photo’s of my mother with me and the few I have of my dad and I – that she, he, THEY loved me so very much and had a support system of family members who would’ve done anything for me. 


Somehow, this experience has helped me to further heal and while I know everyone smiles for the camera, I also know what the face and smile of love looks like and I can see it – it is evident.  It also feels wonderful to reminisce on my childhood, via photographs and feel warmth and happiness.  I came into this world a beautiful little girl, with my own characteristics (warts and all) and is/was loved by many.  That little girl has grown up and is finding her way, her life balance and while I’ve always known I am loved, I think I am now more able to understand the depths within the heart that this loves goes.  It is unlike any other kind of love and wow am I a lucky, lucky little girl.

Pug Poses

Oh I can SO relate to these..............

ISFJ

http://www.personalitypage.com/ISFJ.html

Truly fascinating exercise in self-evaluation.  I’ve done these a number of times but this time, it was different.  I am taking a training through my employer that delves into crucial conversations and part of that process is to identify some level of self-evaluation in advance via the Meyers Briggs testing.  While I believe there are probably many socioeconomic and racial biases within these tests and I honestly view it as tool more than the gospel on Sarah – but still interesting nonetheless.  Truth be told, I can relate to this description more than in the previous several I’ve taken in a way I hadn’t acknowledged or fully realized before.

Good stuff, will document the upcoming training at work – really excited!

and excerpt from an email thread between a friend of mine and myself on the subject of man children and the issues at hand....

The thing is, he KNOWS he's loved by many in Colorado, he KNOWS he's got a solid support system here.  I don't think he cares, he just wants what he wants and he wants it right now.  Damn the consequences or who it hurts.  Weren't we just talking about this on text Sunday?  About how we knew everything and no one could tell us otherwise?  The only way to learn is through experience and as painful as it might be for those who love us to bare witness to this, it's how most of us are built.  Most of us with the curse and blessing of true independant and free spirits anyway.  It took me a LONG, LONG time to figure out how my actions and choices impact others, but mostly, how they impact me.  Because really, when you hurt others by being selfish and irresponsible with their love, your only hurting yourself.  But I had to hurt a lot of people to figure that out, thankfully for me they stuck by me anyway.  Max deserves that same opportunity, to fall down, to break sh*t and to still be loved. 

That doesn't mean I don't have my own boundaries.  They might change, but for now, I know what I have to do and it's funny, it seems like my boundaries are really only hurting me.  Isn't that a rub?  Max seems to have no conception of what I'm really saying here and how badly it hurts me to do so.  Meanwhile, most everyone around me (with a few exceptions) are like "Well DUH Sarah, he can't be your baby forever" and I'm like well why the hell not?  Motherhood seriously is the most enlightening and painful experience I believe I've ever known.  No one in this world can fill my heart up like that kid and then break it in an instant.

Some of this, I know, is me having to do this work on myself. I need to learn to let my hopes and expectations for him be maliable and stop trying to push him into what "I" want for him. Even if everyone knows what "I" want for him is the right thing :)  I'm also having to manage the change of it all, which I'm not known for doing very well to begin with.  Even when he makes me CRAZY, I'm still 100% happier when he's with me and to have that ripped away again, well it hurts.  An awful lot.

Today is a day of celebrtaion for me anyway, I'm working from home and taking the opportunity to plant some more things that make me smile in honor of a years worth of clarity and internal growth.  There was a time when this kind of thing with Max would've put me into a tail spin.  And it is has, but I have learned how to look inwardly and find the root of what's pushing those buttons and deal with them instead of hating on everyone else in the process.  I did not handle all of this as well as I'd hoped and really started a lot of negative self talk about how this all must be me.  There's something wrong with me, my mother hates me and my son doesn't want anything to do with me either.  That kind of really horribel self defacing stuff.  I shut that b*tch up right quick.

Kids.  They can fill your heart with love and break it all in the same day.  The boy is opting to return to Wyoming for the summer and forgo school this fall.  Just like that.  Last night he announces this, out of the blue, after a graduation party and starting the process of registering him for vocational school, including financial aid subsidized by mom, just *poof*

It’s a cycle sadly.  I wish it weren’t.   Things get to “deep” or “hard” where he’s at and he bails, runs like the wind.   I know he’s got to go his own way and become his own man and blah blah blah, but after a lot of tears last night and feeling REALLY hurt that he’s just not buying what I’m selling, today at least I’m not feeling mean.  Last night, I felt mean.  REAL mean.  Like, how dare you pull this crap after I’ve tried and tried and gave and gave.  What gives you the right to change your mind after I’ve put SO much into trying to help you.

That’s a mom’s mantra tho, right?   We love and love, we give and give, we sacrifice, we martyr (LOL) all for our children.  MY dream for him, may not be HIS dream for him.  Do I feel a little used?  Yes.  Do I feel a little manipulated?  Yes.  Do I think he did it on purpose?  No.  I think he’s a young man, out in the world, trying to make his way.

What I DO get to do though, is choose how “I” will react and my reaction is this:

I will no longer provide a roof over your head, food, financial support of any kind unless you are in school.  If you choose to hit the road off to Wyoming and NOT return for school in the fall, the gravy train is over my friend. 

He’s still going.  He wants what he wants.  Too bad momma’s hearts break so very easily, huh?

I’ll get there in time, but right now, I’m riding the waves of how I feel (I’ve learned this is ok to do that, and then get over it) and wishing him the best. 

Pugs and pugs, oh my….

Thought I’d share a few of my favorite pug sites! 

I check this one daily, so very funny:
http://bahhumpug.blogspot.com/2012/06/hurry.html

http://www.pugvillage.com/

http://pugspot.com/

http://dailypuglet.blogspot.com/

http://wilmathepug.blogspot.com/

Life is good otherwise, albeit a bit on the wild side.  Things have picked up at work considerably and I am thrilled, other than it being right before Max’s big grad party coming up this weekend.  Jeesh, the Universe has a funny sense of humor sometimes eh?  I thrive on being just on the verge of too busy, so luckily all this activity keeps me focused and full of energy.  A body in motion stays in motion and all that.

It is HOT already in Colorado and we are challenged with keeping the pugs cool during the very hot days and nights.   I’m feeling anxious about it until we find a solid solution, which I know we will with time.  Until then, they get lots of cool wet towels and ice cubes.

Life is good, a nagging issue to report but not feeling ready to do so publically.  So for now, will sign off and wish you all a happy happy day!

XO
S

Pain, part 2

Well, the ole toothers is gone.  No amount of root canalling, crowning, antibiotics or pain medication was going to manage that puppy.  Fractured teeth typically aren’t salvageable and we’d suspected all along it was fractured, but went ahead with doing what we could to save it.  No dice.   Such is life and while I feel strange having this hole in my head where my tooth should be (bottom left farthest back molar btw) I feel just as strangely relieved.  It’s actually smarting quite a lot today, pretty angry.  That makes sense I guess.  I’ve heard up to 2 weeks for the pain to really subside, luckily though, my body is being kind and it’s not bleeding like there is a hole the dam, as a lot of people have reported.

Here’s the real rub though, and yes I can hear all of you sighing and rolling your eyes, but it is my reality.  Since I am again, hopelessly addicted to nicotine, I am about on my last nerve from withdrawals.  Yes, I’m still smoking ever ever so carefully.  Packed with gauze and then immediately rinsing with salt water.  This is only twice per day and let me tell you, I’m about to come unglued these past few days.  Addiction is such an ugly thing and I know smoking is H.O.R.R.I.B.L.E for me, but let’s tackle one thing at a time, yes?  I’m still learning how not to have a drink in my hand every Friday night, so I’ll take what I can get.  Which now that I re-read that sounds like addict talk, making excuses and living in denial.  I hate you nicotine.  Truly, you and I must part ways eventually.  But for now, I’ve got to get through another few days with very limited intake and between the pain, the antibiotics and smokers withdrawl, I could gnaw off my own foot if I had the chompers to do it with.

Oh well, at least I can have my other favorite drug in the world – COFFEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!  Oh latte’s, how you light up my life.

In other news, I have a major working session next week at work on Monday and Tuesday.  With all of the managers, attempting to get buy in on a new process I am proposing. Through hashing out this new process with my team, I have gained some valuable insights on how things function and the culture and frankly, I’m feeling a little discouraged.  I’m trying to remain positive and insightful.  Growth takes time and I was brought on, in a very open manner, as means to try and curtail the circumvention of process and get things more in line, especially since we are legally bound to do so.  This isn’t just about best practices, this is real deal being held accountable type stuff.  BUT - SO much of what I do is about processes.  I feel I am losing my technical grasp slowly but surely.  I have a ton of skills that are being underutilized and I’ve brought this to the attention of my supervisor, but one thing I’ve learned is that change is slow go around here.  There are a lot of steps and approvals required before something, anything gets put into motion.  It’s a touch frustrating.  I’ve vowed to give it a solid year here and I will do so, but I can’t deny that I’ve already begun considering looking elsewhere.  Then I feel like I’d be crazy to do that.  On paper, this is my dream job.  I am doing community work, that at the end of the day, helps people and in amazing ways.  The employee benefits are outstanding and when I say benefits I mean the full spectrum of benefits, pay, flexibility, medical, dental, vision, retirement, etc…etc…etc…why would I leave such an incredible opportunity and there surely is that here, for me to grow and potentially move up should I so desire.  Right now though, I think I’d have to really ride it out for a long while to get there and things like disorder and bureaucracy drives me crazy and there is a lot of that.  A lot.  Isn’t that every where tho?  There is no “perfect” situation.  At least I can be in the same room with my boss now without cringing, yes?  That is progress if you ask me J

Well, I ought to get to it.  I’ve got to march through the day and then try to come up with an awesome meal on the fly for my company tonight.  My energy level has been poo this week, so it’ll be a mad scramble to pick up the house and cook something edible.  Thank the good sweet powers that be that I have really tolerant and understanding friend.

 

Happy weekend!