Listen to Your Heart

Life has gotten to be one big series of going here and going there, and before I know it, I always run out of time to write. I miss it, but I have found other ways to be creative and express my feelings. Often through the eyes of my daughter.

At the end of every day, we try to ask Miranda to tell us her favorite part. That usually leads to a story or two. From there, other stories take form. We do the same thing before bed some nights. We set out a series of cards and have them aid in telling us a story. The imagination of a six-year-old is quite expansive, and she has a lot to say if you know how to listen.

I say "know how to listen" because while I always hear her voice, I sometimes do not listen to the context. There are only so many "mom, mom, mom, mom" prompts that I hear before I just nod and agree before I realize Miranda is putting something on the belt at the grocery store or trying to convince me to buy her a boa that she simply must own. I hear her, but I do not always HEAR her.

Miranda started first-grade last week, and we had such a fun time doing a photoshoot in the driveway before the bus came. We are so proud of her. Her milestones and accomplishments feel like "wins" to us, too. I know they are hers and she has earned them, but we burst with pride nonetheless.

I can't help but wonder what our lives would be like if we had a third-grader in the house, too. So much of Miranda is like me, even though there is no shared biology. Would Allie, who had my blood running through her veins and my curls upon her head, also be like me? Would she be more reserved like Gary? Or would she be like her sister, because so much of who you are is who you are raised to be?

Alas, we will never know. And that pain never goes away.

We were at the beach this past weekend with some family for a last hurrah of the summer. My sister-in-law overheard Miranda tell a complete stranger that her sister had died. I have to assume the stranger saw Miranda and her cousin in matching bathing suits and asked if they were sisters. It breaks my heart that at her young age, she knows so much about death. My sister-in-law said Miranda was very matter-of-fact about it and did not at all seem bothered. So that's a plus.

At the end of the day, we are who we are. And we are who we were meant to be. If we are not, we make plans to change it. In the meantime, I have to hope that the foundation we are giving our girl is solid enough that she can determine who and what she wants to be when the time is right. I also hope that I can take a small amount of credit and a large amount of pride in whatever path she chooses. I just have to make sure to listen to it all. Her hopes, her fears, her dreams, and hopefully, just a few tears.

Let The Wild Rumpus Start!

Last week, I submitted my clearances for my new job. This week I planned my outfit, went to the doctor, followed up with my plastic surgeon, did laundry, cleaned the house, and bought enough groceries to make sure I can pack my lunch the next few days. I even finished the Harry Potter series.

Ladies and gentlemen, the time has arrived. I am heading back to work.

It's a tough week to start since Gary is traveling (again). However, this trip should be his last one for a while, and I just did not want to wait any longer.

I cannot wait to walk in tomorrow, head held up high and start his next chapter of my life. I am a blank slate and can fill my narrative the way I want it to read. I am not a bereaved mom or an adoptive mom or a super cool mom. 

In reality, I am all of those things. My new coworkers will find that out in due time. Tomorrow, I am just me.

I am not someone who has struggled with weight gain and loss all her life. I am not someone who is still healing from a recent surgery. I am not someone who still watched repeats of Gilmore Girls whenever she can or someone who gets so nervous when she meets any kind of celebrity that she almost vomits.

In reality, I am all of those things, too. But tomorrow, I am just me,

I have a fresh start. I get be a part of an organization that is helping others. I get to be more than me.

I cannot wait.

Yesterday, while playing hide-and-seek with Miranda, I discovered she can hide in the dryer and close herself in. After I had a mild heart attack and explained to my her why that was NOT a good idea, I realized going back to work, even part-time work will hopefully make me more present when I am home. Or maybe not.  Time will tell.

There are things I will miss by being in an office 15-20 hours a week. Tuesday matinees. Naps. Time to take leisurely walks. I will have to find a different and more effective way to use my time now.

I do not want my writing to suffer. It's too important to me. My goal is to blog once a week and once I am in a routine, start to submit pieces to various publications. I can do more than one thing. I can be more than one thing. Now is the time to try.

So here goes nothing. Or here goes everything. My glass is half full, and I am ready to take a big, giant sip!

Moving Right Along

I can tell what kind of mood my daughter is in just by looking at her. A smirk means she's feeling feisty. A frown means she's feeling down. A smile means she is feeling adventurous. A blank stare means nothing good because that means she will surprise me with her mood and I am not someone who cherishes surprises. 

I plan her outfits each day with pride. Some days she wears what I choose, and other days she fights me something fierce. The days she wants to be a jaguar, for example. I have no hope of winning on those days. 

I sit in the backroom of her dance class and listen to her tap tap tapping to the music from the stereo. I talk to the other parents about activities and colds and birthday parties, and I always leave with a smile on my face.

I am a mom. I am an active, participating, involved mom. I love being a mom. I did not always know that being a mom was going to be my greatest role, but it has become that for sure. 

Lately, though, I have been feeling restless. 

Henry David Thoreau wrote, "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." 

Am I living? Truly? 

I decided I was, but not in the most deliberate way that I could. So I started to focus on going back to work. Right now, I only want part-time hours. I want my Mondays and Fridays home with Miranda, at least until she goes to Kindergarten in the Fall. 

I tried that schedule a few years ago, and I got burned out fast. So now I know what does not work for me, and I went on a quest to find what does work for me. 

I accepted an offer earlier today. I will be the new Volunteer Coordinator for a local agency that is working to end domestic violence. I will recruit, screen, and interview volunteer candidates. I will develop and arrange training and placement for the volunteers. I will help out with special events and make sure the agency is represented at community events, health fairs and more. In short, I will help other women find their way. 

I am not sure how I could be a better fit! Thankfully, I have no knowledge of domestic violence first hand. However, I know plenty about survival, and I have the non-profit and training skills from my past experiences that make me the ideal candidate for the job. 

To say I am excited is an understatement. I am putting myself out there, which is terrifying, but I am doing it to continue to be the best version of myself that I can be. With more of a routine and structure to my days, I also think my freelance writing will improve. I have been unmotivated of late, and that does not look good on me.

So here's to a new chapter of seeing what works for me. If I start to feel that this move was not the right one, then I will take steps to fix it. However, I do not think that will be the case.

Here's to taking chances, moving forward, and maybe - just maybe, doing some good in the world!

My motivation

Life's A Beach

My daughter looked at me before camp yesterday and said, “I am 100% tired.” She then rested her head on my lap. Unfortunately, it only stayed there for a minute before we had to rush out the door.

I am a planner. I plan my days out so that they can be as productive as possible. As a mom, I am in charge of so much. It falls on me to make sure the laundry gets done,  the meals get planned and often cooked, the house gets cleaned, and the activities get figured out. 

Am I guilty of over planning? Do I want to do too much?

My first daughter was delivered still born before I had a chance even to hear her cry. Her death devastated me changed the course of the rest of my life. I was unable to get pregnant again, even with medical intervention. After physical, emotional, and financial strain, we finally made the decision to adopt as a way to grow our family.

We were picked to be my daughter’s parents within weeks of applying. We passed the home study and background checks and had just started to get our hopes up when we got the call.

I do not take being a mom for granted. It was a much harder journey for me than I ever expected and because of that, I let me true colors shine, and I plan and plan and plan.

All the planning in the world will not bring my first daughter back. But that is not what I am trying to do.

I feel like I was given a second chance. And no way am I wasting a second of it.

My daughter is in preschool three days a week. She can get social skills and learning in that time frame, and I can work on my writing. It’s perfect for us.

On the days that she is home with me, we go to the mall or the library or the playground or the movies or the local pool or a play date or …oh wow. That is a lot of planning.

I want my daughter to want for nothing. I want her to have every opportunity in the world.

So why was she 100% tired? The day before, we drove about four hours roundtrip for just a few hours on the beach. It was worth it to hear her squeal at the waves. It was worth it to see her bury her legs in the sand. It was worth it to feel the way I felt when I watched her play with wild abandon.

So I will keep planning. And we will keep exploring. And when she is tired, I will make time for rest and naps. And when she is awake, then away we shall go. There is far too much to see, too much to do, to sit home and miss it.

Being a mom is the most exhausting thing I have ever done. But it is also the most rewarding. Every day, I look at her face, her shana punim as my mom would say, and I am reminded how lucky I am. 

The Mom Life

I expected sleepless nights. I expected less "me" time. I expected it to be hard.

What I did not expect, was how great it would be, too.

Not always, mind you. In the public restroom on the Ocean City boardwalk, cleaning poo from Supergirl panties, it was less than awesome. Getting puked on with fruit punch Gatorade while wearing a white shirt was not a lot of fun. Arguing with a three-year-old over pretty much everything is pretty awful. Tears, a lot of tears, of frustration and doubt for all of us.

And then she smiles. Or says she wants to be a writer like me when she grows up. Or I ask her for a kiss and she runs over and plants a juicy love-filled pucker right on my lips. Then it's pretty great.

I did not know I could love another being this way. So completely, so freely. While my child is stubborn and strong-willed and hard-headed and determined, she is also genuine and honest and open and fun. She makes me laugh. Hard.

I have had several jobs in my life. Without a doubt, being a mom is the hardest, but it's also the most rewarding. By far.

I miss her when she is not with me. I am sad when she is sick. I am proud when she does something well.

I wonder what kind of person she will be. I wonder when she will pull away from us and start to want to do even more by herself. I wonder if I will always light up when talking about her.

I want to protect her from everything. I want to not make a single mistake. I want her to be as proud of me as I am of her. I know that is a tall order.

I think about who I was before her and it seems hard to believe that she was not always in my heart.

I am tired. I miss the "me" time. Yet, I would not change a thing. #time2momup

Yesterday

I was sitting at my desk yesterday when my coworker told me that her daughter has a due date now. My coworker (we will call her Nice Lady), told me a few weeks ago that her daughter is pregnant. I will admit to a twinge of jealousy, but aside from that, I felt ok. I felt happy for Nice Lady and her family. Nice Lady started to ask me what tests I had when I was pregnant as she is concerned about some of the tests that have been suggested for her daughter. Concerned in that she did not understand what some of them were for. Since I was high risk (I was 36 years old), I had a whole barrage of tests and Nice Lady knew this since she often saw me come and go from various appointments. I was glad she asked me and did not shy away from talking about my pregnancy.

Next thing I knew, another coworker went over to Nice Lady’s desk and started to talk over me. This coworker, (we will call her Not Nice Lady), started saying some of the opposite of what I saw saying. In her opinion, all the tests put the baby at risk and are done for no reason but to scare the mother. I am not sure what else she said as she was rude enough to ignore me during the whole conversation. She butt into a conversation that had nothing to do with her because she felt like she had something to say. Not Nice Lady is not someone I am close with so I should not have been annoyed, and yet I was. She has not said one word to me since I have been back in the office. But she sure has plenty to say now. She who smokes a pack a day (and did during her entire pregnancy, too) is allowed to say what she wants because she has a living baby at home. Guess since my baby died, my opinion does not matter.

I am not sure if Not Nice Lady even knew she was cutting me off, but it stung. When she walked away, Nice Lady tried to talk to me again, but she must have heard something in my voice as she let it go. I put my ear buds back in, blared some Barenaked Ladies, and got back to work. Work, which is supposed to be my escape, turned into a place where I felt my experience meant nothing because my baby died. I lost the right to talk about prenatal testing because I do not have a baby at home. And that just sucks. I sit here with my stomach still stretched out from carrying a baby to term and yet I am not an authority on babies. Sigh.

The world is full of insensitive people. This is not news. But it’s still infuriating!

Monday will be 4 months since we lost Allie. That got me to thinking – do we want to celebrate the day we lost her or the day she was supposed to arrive in this world? Gary wants to celebrate the May date that she was due, but I can’t help but realize that she came in April, whether we like it or not. But regardless of the date, what do we do? A party? A balloon release? I have read so many posts from Baby Loss Mom’s and those seem to be 2 of the biggie’s. Well, a party with no baby seems hard for me and I am not sure how the balloon thing would work out logistically. A prayer service? Not my style. A memorial? Oh, that is so sad. I want it to be something positive to honor her and not something to make us all crumble to pieces. Will I be pregnant with Allie’s little brother or sister by then? I so desperately want to make sure that our first born, the love of our lives, gets the respect that she deserves.

Huh. I sure sound like a mom when I read what I wrote. Maybe I do know something about babies after all. And maybe I don’t. But please let me figure it out on my own. Let me talk about my pregnancy and my baby. It’s not the end of the world – unless I let it be. And I won’t.