A Smell I'll Never Forget

I have a lot to do. I have my marketing strategies to work on, clients to touch base with, estimates to write, invoices to mail, my boys' school stuff to take care of, laundry, dishes, cleaning, and boxes to unpack. But all of this crap seems strange and foolish with the flooding in Texas, my home state. 

Since being in trauma therapy, I'm more aware of how my body physically responds to stress. I pay attention to how shallow my breaths are, how tense my shoulders are, how alien my stomach feels. And every time I think about Texas, these symptoms descend on me.

 My home was flooded in Hurricane Katrina. My husband at the time rode a boat to our front door. Our house was four feet off the ground and there was four feet of water in our home. We were newlyweds and had just bought our house. I was in Texas with my friends. Rob was on duty with the guard and was in the thick of it...rather, the depths of it.

 I remember my return to the city. The landscape was gray and damp. Grass was overgrown, debris everywhere, houses and businesses torn apart, no one was on the road except a few cars. But the stench is what has stayed with me. It was the stench of rotting meat from all the refrigerators that had been without power for weeks. It seeped into the ground. It clung to you like a bad habit. It was paralyzing.

You don't really know at the time the impact that tragedy will have on you. Its tentacles extend for years...weaving through memories and experiences. It changes how you react to situations. It changes your personality. All without your full awareness that it's even taking place. The brain is an amazing thing...it adjusts and puts itself into self-protection mode to keep from being injured further. My guess is that we all have just a little bit, if not a lot, of brain damage.

I feel you, Texas.  Even though I might be a bit brain damaged.

oh so quiet

I was unprepared for this single mom life I have found myself in. Nothing prepares you for it. You can do all the necessary things to prepare .... read books, talk with friends in similar situations, pray, hash it out with your therapist. But like everything else in life, until you are actually knee deep in it you don't really get it. I'm without my boys for a week at a time. Though I have grieved this, the sadness doesn't go away. I put off going in their room until the last possible moment. As I type this, their bed is stripped, their clean linens sitting impatiently on top waiting to be put on. Their room is a disaster. And in an hour or so I will drag myself into their room to prepare for the glorious week they are with me. Which begins today. Now that I am on my own, I have had to find myself yet again within this apartment that is too quiet at times. I like my alone time. I'm notorious for it. But being alone for a week has made this girl a bit squeamish. I've not yet mastered this life of providing for myself/cooking for myself/cleaning for myself. I feel a bit lost. This too shall pass...as all things do...and in a few weeks I'll be an expert at this quiet life. But for now, I'll leave their room a disaster and drink my coffee in uncomfortable silence.

He can reach the sink....

I was 35 years old and had never experienced this emotion before. I felt like I had just been pushed off a cliff into questionable waters, totally unexpectedly. I had just dropped my son off to his new Pre-K teacher. I watched him walk away with her, holding her hand. I felt like I couldn't breathe. My heart ached in an unsettling way. This was way worse than having a babysitter. He was going off to a new place to form new relationships all on his own. Without me. He would cry for the teacher when he got hurt. He would sit in her lap and hug her when he needed reassurance. Momma wasn't going to be around. He would have to navigate his little life and I was relinquishing that role as his primary care giver, at least for six hours a day, to someone I did not know well. I was petrified.

I felt in that moment totally and completely helpless. Scared to death. It was worse than the feeling of coming home from the hospital with my first newborn baby. That was more of a panicky "WHAT THE HELL DID I JUST DO" feeling. But watching my 3 yr. old walk into a classroom, the first of many for many years to come of his little life....ouch...still takes my breath away.

Being a mother is an amazing, knotty, perplexing, disorienting gift...not even sure "gift" is the right term. It changes you in ways that you are totally unprepared for. And regardless of the many books you read, the many mothers who have gone before you that you surround yourself with, nothing. Prepares. You.

I became a stepmother before I was a mom. I adore that little girl. I was an extremely annoying stepparent because I was so totally caught up in being a part of her life that I overstepped. Often. If I had been a mom, I would have understood how precious and sacred that role is. But I wasn't. It was pretty great actually...I had the love without the paralyzing fear of being her momma.

But now that I am a mom, I get to feel this crazy dichotomy of love/fear/responsibility. This crazy pain and fierce protection you feel for your kids. That initial instinct you feel of wanting to erase any pain they are experiencing. The urge to be a helicopter mom is intense. I have to force myself to let them figure some things out on their own. It's not an easy task. I'm a GET IT DONE QUICKLY kind of girl. So watching your kids struggle with a simple task teaches you an incredible amount of patience and self-discipline.

Being a mom has given me the ability to genuinely think of others before I think of myself. It just comes with the territory. Their well being becomes more important than your own. You have to work really hard at taking care of yourself as modern society instructs us to do (my nails and hair tell a different story because momma has mastered the self-care aspect).

My youngest son went to the sink at my mom's house and easily reached the water to wash his hands. I was totally confused by this small action. When did he grow that much??? How many years have I missed?? Will he continue to get taller?? I AM NOT OKAY WITH THIS!!! I feel at times that I have lived my life as a parent in the urgency mode of basic survival. I'm just thankful when my kids are alive at the end of the day at times. Parenting is exhausting and requires constant motion and attention. And worry. I worry about their health, their friendships, their character, how they spend their time, their school work, their spirituality, their teeth. My mind doesn't stop thinking about them.

If my mind is constantly thinking of them, how the hell did I miss that he can reach the sink??????

I'm currently concocting a remedy to this growing my boys insist on doing. So I don't miss the details.

French Pressed Columbian Roast

I was staring at mountains of stuff in my parents' garage feeling a medley of emotions. There was of course the I HATE MOVING emotion. And the WHY OH WHY DID I BUY SO MUCH CRAP emotion. But mainly it was MY LIFE IS BEING DRASTICALLY MINIMIZED emotion. We lived in a three bedroom house that was 1800 sf. Complete with outdoor furniture and a full attic. My new space is 800 sf and no backyard. I poured through my things and brought only the essentials with me to my new space. All else went in the dumpster or still lives at my parents. My huge coffee pot is now a French Press. It is the most fabulous, minimal cup of coffee I have ever had.

Living in a small space encourages simplicity. With the rubble I left behind, I also sloughed off unnecessary barnacles of my previous life. I left behind the WHAT DO I DO WITH MYSELF ALONE box. I left behind the DIVORCED CONFUSION box. I ditched the UNSTABLE box. And the PLEASE DON'T LEAVE ME box (that one was particularly nice to say goodbye to). The I'M A TERRIBLE MOTHER box is stored there...not entirely ready to close that one completely. But the others can go to the place where Woody and Buzz hopefully reside (please God, do we need another Toy Story?). Ain't nobody got time for that s**t. Here's to my fabulous, small, intensely tasty Columbian Roast.