Taking Breaths

The past three years of having a toddler in my life has put me face to face with my mortality. I doubt too many moms in their 20s wonder if they will live long enough to see their daughter marry or if they will get to meet their grand kids, but at age 45 with a 3 year old, there are moments that the panic and sense of sadness about the possibility of not being there take my breath away. 

January 15, 2012 was one of those days.

I have had a series of health issues and diagnosis over the past 20 years including PCOS, Fibromyalgia, Diabetes, and Hypothyroidism. However,  my blood pressure and heart rate remained healthy so when I couldn't quit yawning, felt my body going numb, my speech slowing, and my focus getting fuzzy, I wanted to believe it was anything but a stroke.  The ER doctor said otherwise. I was having a mini-stroke called a TIA (transient ischemic attack) -- likely in reaction to some new hormone medication. Luckily, it was minor and I had no permanent damage, but it was definitely the final wake up call I needed to throw my hands up and say "uncle" to losing weight on my own and doing everything within my power to be here for my Bean as long as possible. 


It has been 11 months since I was shaken to my core and made the choice to have Gastric Sleeve surgery and am currently down 50 pounds. Not only do I feel much more confident that I will be here for Bean, I also know that if for some reason I am not here, that her memory of me will not be the tired, overweight Mom sitting on the couch in pain and watching her child from the sidelines. It will be of the new Mom I have become this year. The mom that slides down the tall tower slide at the park; the mom that chases her down the street when she bolts away; the mom that agrees to carry her even though she is too big to be carried; the mom that lets her make messes with paint and glitter, and play dough because she isn't too tired to clean it all up.  A Mom that lives by this quote: "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take; But by the moments that take our breath away…."

 

Broke Back Mama

The one thing that every mama HAS to do for her little ones is pick up. Pick up stuff off the floor. Pick up stuff out of their mouth. Pick up laundry. Pick up dishes. And of course, pick up the little one -- all 30 squirming pounds of them. Somedays I feel like I have bent over 10,000 times and decide I can't do it one more time so I pick things up with my toes. Other days I just step over the crap on the floor and hope that someone else (read: hubby) will pick it up without me having to ask (read: doubtful).

In my 30s when I started seriously contemplating having children, I knew that all that picking up would be a challenge. I hurt my lower back in college by rearranging REALLY heavy dorm furniture by myself out of inpatience. After that initial healing time, my back would go out with heavy lifting or a fast twist, but I would do a few stretching exercises and it would go back in place. A few car wrecks, bad falls, Yahoo frisbee games, extra pounds, gravity, and decades later it took a few visits to my back-cracker to get things straightened out.

Amazingly, I have managed to survive two years playing the pick up game with only a few back episodes. But I really did it this time. And wouldn't you know, it wasn't even Bean that broke my back. Once again, I decided to rearrange some crap by myself out of frustration. Two days later, I could barely stand up straight. By day three I was in the chiropractor for a "tune up" only to find that things were not going to come back together as quickly as they had in the past.

Enter the DXR: (Blaring medeval horns here) a modern torture device similar to being stretched on a rack. For the next four weeks I will spend several days each week strapped down to a table that angles me backwards, shoves posts between my armpits to stabilize me, puts me in something similar to a rock climbing harness which caribeeners me to another side of the machine, adds weight to my lower body, bends me in half, and stretches out my discs for 30 minutes. So not a good look for me. And I am paying for this kind of torture. I am thinking they could at least offer a few entertaining variations such as a hot guy dressed in leather telling me how bad I had been or a handsome prince coming to save me from the torture chambers.

(True confession: my chiropractor is pretty cute, which makes the visions of me being splayed out on this machine even more garish in my mind but if he would dress up at least I would be distracted from this truth.)

The first day was yesterday. The procedure itself was not horrible. In fact, I would say dental work is far worse. Getting off, however was excrutiating. Something about the curve in my spine and the table fought the whole time and I thought I would never walk right again. This is what happens after all that stretching out: your body has to collapse itself back together. Like an accordian. All my breath left me with that pain. After ice and stimulation (another device where electricity is jolted thru my body) I thought I could make it home. However, once I got in the car I realized I could not lift my leg enough to move it from pedal to pedal. In fact, I was totally stuck in one position because of the angle of my driver's seat. I had visions of still being there the next morning, but decided to call Jeff. (Yes, I should have called the chiropractor to come help me, but at this point I was a hot mess of tears and snot and mascara. See true confession above.)

Jeff peeled me out of the car with the jaws of life. Okay, it was really with his strong man hands, but to me they were the jaws of life because I was dying. DYING. On a scale of 1-10 I was at a 20.
At home, I collapsed on our bed in a heap with an ice pack and wished I had on a diaper so I wouldn't have to get up until the next day. No such luck on that so I hobbled around with a cane a few times until 6 hours later when I was suddenly able to take more than a few steps without losing my breath. Hmmmm... maybe this was not permanent. And when I woke up this morning, I was pleased that I was able to get out of bed with only minimal cane-age.

Then I got to repeat the procedure. This time I took Jeff for entertainment; no costumes -- he was my Pandora DJ. The accordian collapse of my intestines and spine did not send me to tears this time and within 3 hours of the procedure I was able to walk without the cane. And 6 hours later I was actually STRAIGHT!! Not pain free, but straight up and down for the first time in 10 days.

So there is a glimmer of hope that this Broke Back Mama will be able to get back to picking up. For now I will keep using my toes, teaching my toddler how to pick up for me, and praying that my husband doesn't decide to trade me in for a better model.

(P.S. In case you are wondering, I have some fabulous friends who are helping entertain Bean for part of the day so I can get tortured without worrying about her. LOVE them.)

The Party is Here

Today my Bean is 23 months old. This is the last month I can name her age by months without someone thinking I'm a bit silly, but I may just do it to keep her my baby a little longer. Of course, she is blasting through this baby business lately and I am seeing a determined, confident little girl starting to appear. At mother's day out, they always say "the party is here" as she runs down the hallway to her class waving and saying hi to everyone along the way. A friend of mine says "This is Bean's world. We are just visiting."

And they are right. Bean is a beautiful child. (I have no qualms in saying this since we don't share DNA.) I see how strangers turn to look at her and how she lights up any room she walks into with a happy energy. She rarely meets a stranger and while she loves all the attention, she is also ready to "He'p" someone who is hurt or to ask if someone is "Okay." And each time I see her in action I think "don't mess this up, Julie." I have never felt so terrified as I do thinking about her future. I know all too well some of the things that can really hurt a girl's spirit. I am still putting pieces of myself back together years later. I so want to protect her from the bumps and heartaches of growing up, all the while knowing that is just part of it. But is it too much to hope for a few bumper pads to cushion the blow?

Raising a girl in this "modern world" is tricky business. I believe whether a girl is deemed beautiful or plain, girls are expected to be a long list of juxtapositions: soft but strong, kind but tough, smart but relatable, trusting but cautious, friendly but not inviting, safe but daring, mainstream but creative, etc. And don't get me started on how horrible girls can be to each other (at age 9 or at 40!)

And while i know I cannot control the future, I pray that somehow my life experience will prevent her from having to learn too much the hard way. I pray that her happy energy is not squelched by hard knocks along the way. I pray she can hang on to the self-confidence and loudly proclaim "Hello world! It's my party, glad you came, now get out of my way so I can lead!"

Messy Confessions

I have been so irritated with our home lately -- less storage, smaller rooms, etc. It was just barely enough house when Jeff and I moved here three years ago. We downsized and still ended up having to rent a storage room for some family antiques. Then we added Bean and her collection of toys and tutus has us bursting at the seams. For decades, families had a lot more people in a lot less space and one bathroom behind the house, but they had a lot less STUFF.
So lately, I have been convinced that if I had more storage and larger rooms (not to mention a maid) that I would be a much better housekeeper. Seriously, how is that as a stay-at-home-mom with less house to maintain that I do a worse job of it than when I worked and had more house?

But then I made this list:

True confessions:

• I am the child of two "stackers". (My father's home office was a mound of paper and my mom's trick for getting ready for company is to dump it all in baskets or make neat piles.)
• I had few chores as a child. (My father had so many chores on the farm when he was a kid that he was way too easy on what my brother and I were required to do around the house.)
• I hate to pick up. (When I was about 11, my mom went back to work and we had a maid once a week and I recall having to do a mass pick up to get ready for the maid. That seemed so weird -- cleaning up for the maid.)
• I was a very messy kid. (I still have a book my mom bought me called The Big Clean-Up to encourage me to keep my room clean. It didn't work.)
• I have been known to step over something 10 times before I will bend over and pick it up.
• At home, I am lucky if I can find my keys much less my favorite book or that watch I am still missing.
• My creative brain can be highly tolerant of chaos and rejects routine.
• I have trouble putting something back in the same place twice, but in jobs I am able to be very organized unless things get really stressful at which point my desk disappears.
• I sleep in a nest of 3-4 pillows.
• I appreciate my family heirlooms.
• I love to see photos of my friends and family on my table.
• I enjoy my art and collectibles.
• I tend to keep quirky things that bring back memories.
• I save pieces of ribbons, buttons, and cool paper to use in art projects.
• I find it difficult to throw away good cardboard, an old spiral, or the piece that I am not sure what it is but I may need it later.
• I always end up needing the one thing I finally sold, gave away, or threw out.
• I have boxes of clothes from when I was a baby that Jilly has gotten to wear and I love that.
• I have my mom's prom dress.
• I have my prom shoes.
• Trust me, my husband has just as much stuff!
  

Oops. There it is. The problem isn't the house. In college, my freshman roommate told me during a fight over decorating our room that I lived in a lot of space. Funny how that stuck with me, but as you can tell from the list above, it is true.

I found this entry in an old journal blog which reminds me why we bought the size home we have and what our goal was for living here. It is good to remember this when I have spent the last few days lamenting the wisdom our choice:

July, 2008: Jeff and I came to an agreement tonight that we wanted to make some changes in our life that buying a larger, more expensive home wouldn’t help us do. Sure, we can afford a house on the lake, but do we want to be slaves to a house payment and then never home to enjoy it? We’d like a little slower pace of life and time to enjoy it. If we buy a little away from the lake, but close enough to get there, we may actually be able to afford for me to stay home and start our family. At age 40, that dream is getting a little more time-sensitive, so if we are going to make this type of life change, the time is now.

And it was the right choice. We adopted Jillian in 2010. I am home with her. I am grateful for both of those things. My mantra needs to be "We have enough." Because we do. In fact, we have more than we need. I need to accept what I have as a gift and figure out a way to be happy with where I am planted.

Which leaves me addressing the stuff. How do we make a life for ourselves in the present if we are bogged down by the stuff of our past and overwhelmed by the stuff gathering as part of our future? I have friends that tell me just to get rid it. Take a photo of what you love and then the item is not taking up space. I have been giving away and selling stuff, but it is hard to let go (see above confessions) when I don't just want to see the item but I want to feel the wood smoothed by many hands touching it, study the scratches and tooth marks on it, and be reminded of how I tripped and scratched the back of that prom shoe. But I am working on letting go of all that so I can make room for what is to come.

I don't really have a nice bow to wrap up this package of thoughts; in reality if I was making a bow I would have misplaced the ribbon, lost the scissors, and stepped on a Duplo block while looking, so I am ending here:

Depression is caused by living in the past.
Anxiety is caused by living in the future.
Happiness is caused by living in the present.

Guess it is time to clean house.

A Gift just as I begin to fall... October 2008

My brain was flittering all morning. I couldn't concentrate and having to re-do work because I wasn't focused. Then it came... the news that my subconscious was anxiously awaiting and keeping me off my game: the pathology report.

Let me back up, with as little detail as necessary: I had a D&C last week to "vacuum" my girly parts due to a biopsy that showed some pre-cancerous cells. We were hoping that the report would show that the biopsy was not anything to worry about right now; we were hoping that we'd get to be the couple who could get prepared for one more round of Invitro in a few months -- something that we've heard often has more success after a D&C; we were hoping that the news would be more positive than not.

So, I'm trying to work with little success when I hear my cell phone ring. I'm on the phone with a co-worker, so I didn't try to catch it, but then it happens: a voicemail from my DOCTOR. Not the nurse; the doctor. Now when has your doctor ever called with GOOD news?? Perhaps they need to get into the practice of that just so you don't know what it means when they call you before you speak with them.

But I digress. The doctor reminded me that after surgery he had noted that the what he took out was too fluffy. Evidently, "too fluffy" to a doctor is what a pathologist says is "as bad as it can be without being called cancerous," but they can't totally rule out that I'm not developing endometrial cancer. The C word is scary enough, but when you are about to turn 41, been through tons of fertility treatments and procedures, and holding out hope for one more year to try for a bio-child, there is a scarier H word: hysterectomy. Soon.

I process this all while sitting in my cubicle facing the rest of the office and realize I'm about to totally lose it. Escape. Gotta go. Boss out, I email his Blackberry, call my husband to come pick me up NOW, and I nearly ran out of the building for fresh air and sunshine: my cure-all. I won't dwell on the tears that flowed when I saw my husband or the painful conversation that followed. What I want to tell you about next is the gift I got once I got home.

I NEED to be outside every day or I get nutso. And when I'm sad, I REALLY need to be outside. Luckily, today was cold but sunny and my back deck was the perfect spot to escape and soak up some of my personal medicine. I decided to grab my camera when little birds were jumping around the tree, but they flew off before I returned. Disappointed, but not without hope, I sat still in my chair enjoying the sunshine and colors of fall hoping to get a great shot of the birds when he came: the cardinal.

The cardinal is one of the regular visitors to my bird feeder but I never seem to have a camera when he comes by and he skitters off once I show up with one. But today was different. He landed on a tree not too far away and just looked at me. And he sat. And sat. And sat. I clicked. And clicked. And clicked. Then he jumped down a few branches closer. And sat. I clicked. My heart warmed. The photo was perfect!Watching me closely, he jumped to the tree by the bird feeder, peeked around a post at me and then quickly flew off, done with his modeling job for the day.

Next, I hear stomping in the leaves down by the creek and get to the edge of the deck in time to see a family of deer run up the opposite hill behind my home. I was so excited to catch a quick photo of one of them, although not too great (Can you see the deer in the bottom left corner?), and realized I was actually smiling and feeling better.

The gift.

The reminder:

The birds are cared for.

The animals are cared for.

God is still caring for me even when I feel defeated.

Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?....And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?...But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Matthew 6: 26, 27, 30 NAS

Faith. I need to hold on to the faith that God's plan will become clear to us as Jeff and I walk down this unexpected path. Not easy.

For I know the plans that I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. Jeremiah 29:11

FOOTNOTE: I had my hysterectomy December 2008 and although my pre-cancerous girl parts were horrible looking, it had not progressed to cancer. Some would think that was terrible -- that I could have had another chance at a child of my own. However, the chance of this turning to cancer were far, far greater than the chance of my getting pregnant and the fact that Hubby lost his mother way too young to cancer made the choice very clear.