One Breakfast, Every Breakfast

I always try to look back and see how it started. For some reason, I think I can look back and find a point where something could have been different. 

This is not a lifetime story, but an every day, at least once a day story. 

Today, I heard Steve and Sally chatting in the kitchen while I was getting dressed in my bathroom. Soon after, I hear the bickering that includes Chaucer. 

It’s often the girls screams that get to me. Although I know deep down that they are struggling like Steve and I are struggling. What do I do when he walks by and hits me? I know its not hard; it doesn’t hurt.  It is aggravating and annoying, not abusive. What do I do when he snatches my cereal bowl? 

With us parents, he isn’t as physical.  It’s directed elsewhere. Kicking the counter as he sits on the stool.  We try to ignore it. But he does it louder and faster and louder and faster and LOUDER AND FASTER AND LOUDER AND FASTER AND LOUDER AND FASTER until we can’t ignore it and ask him to stop. And he will stop because I don’t think he really wants to be doing it.  And he really isn’t trying to be annoying.  

After he has stopped for about a minute, he will start tapping his cereal bowl with his spoon. First he taps the bowl, then the counter, then the cereal box. We are trying to ignore it, because it really isn’t that bad, and we don’t want to constantly be negative. But then it gets to be louder and faster and he’s tapping more things and wiggling his body and he just can’t stop and the milk ends up spilled all over the counter. 

So there is fussing about that and telling him to JUST BE STILL.  He is up because the milk is on the chair and walking around the room eating bites. We tell him to sit down and he sits down but forgets thirty seconds later and is trying to eat part of his breakfast while he is walking the top of the back of the couch as if on a high wire. He hasn’t eaten much, he is barely at an acceptable weight and soon his medicine will kick in. 

The medicine that will calm him. The medicine that will help him control his body.  The ironical (is that a word) medicine that is a stimulant, yet slows our boy to a normal speed. The medicine that we fret about giving him, wondering what the long term affects will be.  The medicine that makes him not hungry. The medicine that makes him go all day without eating.

His attention deficit disorder also makes him not able to read his body signals, which affects everything from eating to running to talking. So at some point, our happy boy turns instantly into a starving, crabby, not functioning human being because he hasn’t had anything to eat. 

With his medicine, he is successful at home and at school.  He doesn’t get yelled at, fussed at, and most interactions are positive and he is able to be the person he wants to be for about 6-8 hours. He has dyslexia, and school is not his strong suit, so this medicine is nearly a miracle in this sense. 

He is very physical, and very athletic.  His medicine slows him down, makes his reactions slower. This is not a bonus in the sports arena. Except it helps him focus, and stay in the game. 

He doesn’t like his medicine.  Not because of how it makes him feel, but because he knows we don’t like to give it to him.  He knows we are torn; we wish he didn’t need it. He wants us to be proud of him.  He wants to please us.  He senses that it is a bad thing to need this medicine. 

At a conference we attended yesterday, my eyes welled with tears at what my child is going through.  He wants to feel normal. He wants to settle down.  He wants to do well.  He doesn’t want to have a million negative interactions.  From what I understand, the serotonin (I think) needs to get from cell to cell to help us make good decisions, to help our brain function fully, to help us concentrate. In the ADHD brain, the serotonin can not make this transfer.  That is why stimulants help.  They stimulate the chemicals in the brain to make this transfer from cell to cell faster, which in turns make them able to make better judgements and stay focused. He literally needs stimulating to slow down. 

So when he is jumping, or kicking his foot on the counter, or tapping things, or chanting...... he is literally trying to jump start his body.  He is not trying to be annoying.  He doesn’t understand what is going on. 

So, back to him now not sitting at breakfast.  He has had several admonitions already and he hasn’t been up 15 minutes. He is upset and says he doesn’t want to eat. This happens many mornings.  His Dad is telling him he needs to eat.  He is a very little guy, and we know  he wont eat the rest of the day. They get into power struggles nearly every morning. 

If we give him his medicine before breakfast, he won’t eat at all.  The alternative is these struggles every morning. For several months, we had him sit at the table by himself to eat breakfast, away from the girls.  This seemed to work better for everyone, until I was talking with him one night in bed and he told me how much it hurts him not to be able to just sit and have breakfast with his family before he goes to school. He feels punished and isolated. 

I often feel like a terrible parent who can’t control her kids.  I have tried so many things. Somehow I need to change my attitude. I need to accept we have a different family and are fighting different challenges than most.  I am embarrassed that we can’t sit down and have a meal even though our kids are 12, 10, and 8. I need to let go of what others think. Almost every meal is a struggle and a negative, barking experience. 

My husband and I went to a talk on ADHD and executive function. They talked a lot about the make up of the brain and the things that didn't happen with ADHD - like self talk, and the synapses that didn't transfer from one cell to the other to help make less impulsive decisions and that adhd brains had normal feelings but not normal responses and other stuff like this. What we really wanted to know was how to keep Chaucer from dropping his dirty socks on his sisters breakfast plates and how to make sure he had shoes on by the time he got to school and how to teach him the difference between his backpack and a garbage can and how to walk past another person without trying to trip them.

I tried to google ADHD and always get descriptions and symptoms or technical brainy information.  Today I was searching for anecdotal experiences that might sooth my aching heart.  I couldn’t find any, so I sat down to write one of my own. I am having trouble closing this out.  There is no redemption here, no solutions. Just an ever present desire to help my family and my children. I take a minute to breathe deeply and show gratitude for our family. These challenges are better than walking through the world alone.

Searching for a Balance of Truth and Hope

Lindsey wrote an interesting, heartfelt essay about perceptions, misconceptions, and assumptions. Some comments were supportive, others enlightening. One stood out to me. It said something along the lines of why would we want to read about all the grueling crap (her words were more eloquent than this) - we already have this in our lives and don’t need to read more - its neither lovely nor inspiring to read. 

I remember a discussion years ago about Billy Joel’s song “Goodnight Saigon.” It never became a big hit in the United States or England, despite the powerful emotions it evoked. They were painful, too much of a harsh reality.  

In a writing class, the teacher gave some advice to a classmate. “You have had some bad things happen to you, but you can’t vomit on your readers.  They have had bad things happen to them as well. You must provide some sort of resolution or they will leave.” 

A therapist once told me that those that have harmed you must have a way out. There always has to be a way for them to make amends to you, just as there has to be a way for you to make amends to those you hurt.  There must be a way to move forward or everyone is stuck.

We all need hope.  We all need balance, and are constantly searching for it. We choose who we read. I try to choose writers that offer the right balance of truth and hope and light for me.

Herein lies one of the paradoxes in most writing: You can not tell the whole truth if you want to get to the real truth. I consider truth to be infinite.  Truth is relative and multi dimensional. In the written word, it is about the writer and the reader and their own previous experiences. I can write the sky is a beautiful blue that is a replica of my daughters eyes. You may look at the sky and realize its the color of your fathers eyes and may take you down a road of wonderful memories.  I have chosen the truthful path of a pleasant connection I have made. 

Just because I didn’t tell you that the blue is also the color of the water that a dear friend drowned in a few years ago doesn’t mean it isn’t there and I didn’t think about it. I might tell you about it later, and I might not. Short essay writing, blog posts, even books are just parts of the story.  That is all they can ever be.   

No Lost Irony

The irony is not lost on me of my latest consequence to my almost 13 year old daughter. The end of the year middle school celebration is a trip to Valley Fair, an amusement park full of rides and all other sorts of stimulation in which no one over the age of 20 should be subjected. My daughter does not want to go. 

I know, I know.  Some kids don’t like that sort of thing.  They are nervous in groups or it could get overwhelming. Some kids don’t have that sort of stamina. And blah, blah, blah other reasons. My kid IS NOT one of those. She is very social, has tons of stamina, and has always needed less sleep than anyone I know. 

But something happened this year. She stopped wanting to do group things, whether they were school sponsored or not.  It took a little while for us first time parents of a pre teenager to figure it out.  And by figure it out, I mean to take notice of it. She did a few things, but for the most part she stayed home.  

She is a complicated being and refuses to fit in any box that might help us understand her better. Although she is social and energetic, she often sits on the edge and watches.  She loves being in range of the action, loves to feel the buzz. But she likes to scope it out, watch others, get a good feel for whats going on in the fray. I must remember that she has always been like this.  She didn’t walk until she was 16 months old, but when she did she stood up and walked across the room and never fell. At her earliest Easter egg hunt, she stood and watched all the kids gather eggs rather then get eggs herself.  When she was learning to ski, her favorite part was hanging out in the lodge and watching everyone around her. 

I must remember that she was in the same small campus with the same few kids for seven years and middle school is a new routine, new kids, new campus. So, she has probably just been following her normal mode of operation as she gets acclimated to middle school. 

She is also an extrovert that has an incredible amount of energy that is not easily harnessed. This means that as a young child, she never played with toys but would rather us sit and juggle for her. Her energy is more emotional than physical. She loves to be engaged with people ALL THE TIME. 

When they were little and home all day, we would often do different activities together, like go to a park or go to a zoo or a museum.  When we came home, my other two children and myself would need to decompress, doing our own quiet thing.  My oldest was never able to do this.  She would be so energized by the outside world that when we came home, she had twice as much energy as before. She would go from me, and then to each of the other kids ready to do another major endeavor - write a play, make an obstacle course, wash cars, have a home art show. And we wanted to sit and read or have a quiet snack on the deck and watch how the leaves fell from the tree. 

Friday night, I took her to a friends dance recital that was amazing.  It was two hours of incredible dancing with loud, electrified music.  She wanted to stay afterwards and hand deliver six roses to each of her six friends in the show.  She wanted to congratulate them and inhale the after show excitement. They were all going out for ice cream afterwards and I just didn’t have the energy.  She was disappointed but handled it well and thanked me for taking her. 

I came home to melt into facebook or mindless internet surfing while she started cooking a full dinner at ten pm. She kept asking and wanting to review each piece and I had to pay attention to every move she wanted to try to emulate.  I always feel bad about these moments because I don’t want to deflate her.  I try to find the energy.  Finally I asked her, “Do you know what introverts and extroverts are?” 

She replied, “Yea.  Introverts are bad. And extroverts are good.” 

I smile and wonder if I even have the strength to go there. I try. “Well, no.  Extroverts love going out to events and get energized by all the activity and people around them.  It makes them want to do more.  Introverts can go and enjoy it, but they are recharged by coming home and being quiet and alone.  Thats what gives them more energy.” 

She replies, “Like I said.  Extroverts are better. Of course those things give me energy. And excite me.  Why would anyone want to be alone after something like that?”

I didn’t expect her to get it, but I thought an introduction was appropriate. I just told her the two were different and neither was better.  I asked her just to start noticing the difference. 

School is out this week and I am not ready. Several life changes have taken over the last month and I am not as prepared or, sadly, as excited as I usually am for summer. Yesterday, she needed so much and was so full of energy that it almost brought me to tears wondering how I was going to handle it this summer. 

So, yesterday, she could not entertain herself for longer than 10 minutes without needing me.  And then, when I couldn’t or wouldn’t oblige, the typical mouthiness of a preteen started to take over. After several warnings, I issued my judgement:

You will go to Valley Fair on Tuesday with the school. I need that last day of energy gathering before the launch into summer.

So, no, the irony of my child’s consequence of being forced to go on an all day, end of the year fun celebration to an amusement park is not lost on me. 

It's Not Fair

Earlier this week, a group of boys chose to play a stupid game that some ten year old boys might play.  It’s called “pantsing” in which one tries to pull down the pants of another.  Several kids did it, several kids got “pants-ed”.  My son happened to pants a child who, while actively participating, got very upset that it happened to him. He told his mother, who told the school.  The end result was my son having to miss an end of the year all day school trip and stay behind with the associate director of the school. One other child also had to stay behind.  The others involved did not have to stay behind or have any consequences. 

I agreed that he should have punished.  This was a very safe place for him to learn the lesson that actions have consequences. I did not agree that he was the only one to suffer the consequences because all the boys were playing. 

“It’s not fair,” I said to the director.  A woman I admire and have known and trusted for years, she could not hold back her disbelief that this 42 year old woman was using the words of a first grader. So she took an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper and filled the page with these words:  KNOWING WHEN TO STOP.

My son was waiting outside because I didn’t want him to focus on the not fair part.  I wanted him to focus on his actions and only he is responsible for them; and another child was hurt and embarrassed by his actions. The director asked that we be silent as she delivered his consequences. He walked in and sat in the hot seat, read her piece of paper, and kept his eyes down as she explained that he was getting consequences because he didn’t stop.  

I left the school in a hurry because I was angry, frustrated, sad, and couldn’t get over the fact that IT WASN’T FAIR. 

Over those three exhausting days, I had some very rich conversations with my husband, friends and son.  I called friends whose opinions I respect and literally cut and pasted some of these conversations back to my son.  I saw my son open, learn, evolve in front of my eyes.  

When I first asked my son about it, he responded, “But Nathan told me to do it.” I got to reiterate my regular mantra that “You, and only you are responsible for your actions.” This actually wasn’t that rich of a conversation because it was more like my regular preaching and him putting up with it.  I still have hope that one day it will seep in and register. 

But it was an opener. He asked, “Would you have called the school if I had my pants pulled down?”  

I pause and think before I slowly answer. “No.  But I would call the school if you were really hurt and feeling unsafe and thats why Mike’s mother called.  I would have asked you more questions so I could understand the circumstances. Once I understood that boys were all playing a game and laughing and having fun and then you got upset because it happened to you, I would tell you that now you know not to play that game. I would give you a hug and tell you that I am so sorry you got embarrassed, but I would point out that was part of the game you chose to engage in. I would ask you to think about this the next time a situation like this arose.”

My son then said, “Mike always does that. He always plays and then when he doesn’t like it or he gets tagged or something doesn’t go his way, he goes and tells and we get in trouble.  That’s why no one wants to play with him.” 

I refocused the discussion on his choices. “Do you understand that one of your classmates was hurt, humiliated, and embarrassed because of your actions?” My son  just wasn’t able to go there yet. 

“Mom, it was a game. It happened to Nathan and Jake and Tom. They didn’t cry. They laughed. Mike (the victim) even laughed so hard when it happened to them.  The only reason it didn’t happen to me is because I was wearing tight pants.” 

I tried a different lesson. “So you still don’t know how it felt to have your pants pulled down.  You don’t know what it feels like. Every person is sensitive to different things. These were his feelings. Yes, he was involved. Yes, it was his actions that put him there. But he also had valid feelings that he may not have been expecting. We all have our touchpoints and they need to be respected.” 

The ease of these many conversations ebbed and flowed over the three days. Some topics were easier than others. I was angry about the consequences and angry about how this child and mother and the school handled it.  I was trying to teach my son that people handled situations differently, yet I was mad they wouldn’t handle like I would. 

At one point, I realized the director was not going to change her position and the group would not be treated the same. I had to come to peace with it.  I could not let it absorb me anymore. I decided to use her lesson. My son does get in the middle of things, and yes, he does need to learn when to stop. This is an issue for him. Painful and frustrating, but the truth. We had long talks about KNOWING WHEN TO STOP. That very night he took my daughters head bands and started shooting them like rubber bands at her.  She asked him to “please stop” several times. I came up and gently reminded him that knowing when to stop is the lesson we are working on.  He responded immediately and picked up the headbands. 

My goal as a parent is not only to protect them, but to teach them to make the right choices when I am not around. He did not respond to his sisters requests, but when I used these words with him, it hit home  immediately. I explained to try to remember these words and listen to others. 

When I tucked him in bed, he spoke of thinking about stopping.  He was remorseful, but not saying much, but not wanting me to leave. I said I was thankful that the director took the time to write that down for us and explain that part.  It will help you as you grow up. I spoke of a pack mentality and how we sometimes make decisions in a group that we wouldn’t necessarily make on our own. I talked about the challenges coming his way the next few years.  I said there would be situations involving drinking and drugs and he could come back to this moment and remember  his lesson about KNOWING WHEN TO STOP. I talked about listening to girls and being physical with them and he better KNOW WHEN TO STOP and listen to her words.

He said, “Mom, I just don’t understand why I have to stay back and the others don’t.  It’s not fair.” Ahhhhh. My touchpoint. I had spoken with a friend earlier that day about this and I used her words. “Let’s try not to use the word fair. Fair is relative. Everyone has different ideas about what fair means. I will tell you this.  If I was the director, I would not have made that decision. I would have had all the boys have a consequence. But I am not the director.  She is and it is her decision to make and we have to abide by it because she is in charge.”  He has not mentioned this again.

The next afternoon I picked him up from school and we headed out quickly.  I was a little tired of all the deep conversations and the mood of the week, so I said, “Did you pants anyone today?”  My very funny lighthearted boy seriously told me, “It isn’t funny, Mom.” 

He was clearly hurting so I needed to turn it back on and be present for him. 

“Here’s the deal, Mom.  I feel really bad that Mike was embarrassed and hurt.  I really do.  And it doesn’t feel good that I was the reason he felt that way.  But I am still mad. I am mad that I have to stay back and the others don’t.  I am mad that he plays and then runs and tells.  I am mad that I am taking all the blame.  I wanted to apologize to him but I didn’t know if I could because I was mad.”

“What do you mean, you didn’t know if you could?”

“Well, would it still be sincere? If I have mad feelings while I’m saying I’m sorry. Can I have both of those feelings at the same time?”

My eyes became an instant dam.  It took everything to hold back the tears. How was he able to verbalize this? I finally said, “ Yes.  I think you can hold both feelings at the same time.  As a matter of fact, you just helped me to understand my feelings. That is exactly how I feel.” 

As I was driving him to school today, to spend the day with the director while all his classmates attended the field trip, these were my words:  “Here is my assessment of the week:  I think a group of boys was playing a silly game, and boys will be boys. I don’t think it was as big of a deal as its turned out to be. I think we are lucky that we got to learn some good lessons and have good discussions. We cried tears together and we got mad together and at each other. You got to learn about knowing when to stop and will always have that lesson in your toolbox.”

And finally I said:

You are my son and I love you deeply. I love your personality.  I love how happy and carefree you are.  I love your boundless energy and your endless enthusiasm. I envy the way you can instantly join  any group and have so many sets of friends. With that personality comes its challenges.  You will be impulsive. You made a mistake. You will make more mistakes.  Forgive yourself.  I love how you are able to admit your culpability, make amends and move on. Your integrity is inspiring. I love how you engage in life and I would not trade your personality for anything. I know it will be a tough day for you and I’m sorry. 

He gave me a hug before he walked into school and said, “It won’t be that bad, Mom. I love you.” 

And all of a sudden, I realized that IT’S NOT FAIR. None of the others had the opportunity to learn such lessons this week. None of the others had so many rich conversations.  No one else got to stop time and watch and experience both the magic and the searing pain of the deepening of their child’s soul before their very eyes. Yes indeed, IT’S NOT FAIR. 

The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen

I first heard of this book a few weeks back on an NPR show about books with a sense of place, books that make  you want to go somewhere. As I often do when I listen to shows like this, I made a long list of books I wanted to read.  Why I chose this one? I really can't say. Perhaps I was being a bit smug as I read the reviews.  Some of the reviews expressed frustration that it was slow, that there wasn't much action, that the title of the book was so misleading because he never even saw the snow leopard. The smugness I describe comes from thinking that I hadn't even read the book, but I knew these readers were missing the point. More probably, they weren't ready for the book, and perhaps, definitely even, I was.

There really aren't words for the beautifully descriptive writing that fills this book. I don't think this would have been possible without his scientific/nature background.  He knows so many different plants and flora, and animals. His relationship with light and dark and how that affects every day, every moment is enlightening.  His attention to detail and his ability to communicate what he sees and feels is nothing short of a miracle.  Rather than finish with a feeling of knowing the entire region he traveled around, I felt in touch with very specific steps he took; one step in one thousand. I felt this over and over.

I have rarely loved poetry.  I attribute this to a lack of patience mostly, but in my less confident moments, I can attribute to an unfeeling self or a less than average intellectual capacity for the medium.  Or perhaps never the right teacher.  This is not technically a poetry book.  I would describe it as a poetic memoir.  I had gone through a phase of needing to read fast paced books, and I had read 4 or 5 in a row, very uncommon for me. So I knew I was ready to slow down, and could absorb at least part of what the book had to offer.  I did read it slowly, sometimes only a page or two a night. There were insights, quotes to remember with every reading and I never lost patience with the book.  Often, I start these books but don't have the patience to finish. I put them aside, and eventually pick them up later. As with almost every book I read, I hate it to end.  So I stop reading and start another book, and get really into the next book.  And then I go back and finish, replete with the knowledge that when I am sad the book is over, I have another one already started. Well, I really couldn't do that with this book; I couldn't stand to be away from it long enough to get involved in another book.

Some of the reviews on Goodreads give nothing but quotes. This approach works very well with The Snow Leopard.  I have perused these this morning and will continue to do so. One can turn to practically any page for a good quote, or lesson for living.

There is a lesson, a moment, a connection on literally every page of this book. I can't begin in a quick review to illuminate my learnings. I will settle for an example from the end of the book, since I just finished it last night. Towards the end of his journey, he has several descriptions of, not mood swings exactly, but of being aware, content, able to fully realize his learnings of his physical and mental pilgrimage.  And then the next day, or even the next moment, falling right back into his former thinking and ways - discontent and frustration.  This expression, this truth, was a monumental discovery and validation for me. Often I am so hard on myself for not recognizing or living in a way that I have strived towards, and I spend so much time beating myself up about making these mistakes after I know better.  The next time this happens, I will refer to one of these passages towards the end - I'll finish with one example.

"A change is taking place, some painful growth, as in a snake during the shedding of it's skin-dull, irritable, without appetite, dragging about the stale shreds of a former life, near blinded by the old dead scale on the new eye.  It is difficult to adjust because I do not know who is adjusting; I am no longer that old person, and not yet the new."

Dear Soccer Coaches

I have not been able to get Tuesday night out of my mind.  With a couple of days behind me, I am still troubled.

I contacted you about the conflicts with the dance and soccer schedule ahead of time.  Dance is a year long activity that she has been working on since last September. Her recital is June 9, which accounts for 10 total days of conflicts with soccer.  We attempted to work with you and each of her dance teachers to see what the best approach would be.  Your response was:  

I completely understand that all these girls have other commitments, but playing time is based on attendance and effort. 

If she can get to practices by 7:45 that would be great! 

Please let me share with you what Chloe’s day looked like on Tuesday.  She set her alarm and got up at 4:30 am so that she could work on her schoolwork because she knew she had a busy night and wanted to make the effort to get to soccer, per your comment about effort above. We did not know she set her alarm - it was done on her own.  She is in the middle of her yearly exams at school this week.  She has a severe dyslexia, among other learning differences, that makes school and exams much more difficult for her than for her school mates. 

I picked her up at 3:30 to go straight to her tutor, which she has to have for above learning issues.  When I picked her up at 5, I had her dinner ready and she ate part of it in the car while she changed into her dance clothes.  She danced from 5:30- 7:30.  I picked her up at dance, 2 minutes from our house, to drive the 20 minutes up to soccer practice.  (I thought I could get there in 15.)  She ate the rest of her dinner while she changed into her soccer gear and talked about how proud of her the coaches would be because she made such a huge effort to get to practice.  She had me drop her as close as possible, and ran all the way to where you were practicing.  

“YOU ARE REALLY LATE. TAKE A LAP” is the greeting she got  in front of her entire team and parents. 

Chloe is not an over scheduled child.  She does dance and soccer.  That’s it.  It just so happens that there are 10 days in the entire year where the two overlap.  She has looked forward to this soccer season all winter.  She was at the dome for winter training every week since January 2. Each week, she was hoping to meet the new coaches because they kept being told we will get the coaches soon. She has been at all the practices this spring with the exception of one when she was sick - including the ones in the rain when not many girls showed up. 

This is an 11 year old girls team.  It is not college, high school, or even an elite team. She will probably never play in college as you did.  But she will put in more effort than most.  And give more energy than most.  And she started this season with extreme enthusiasm and commitment. 

When the parents were told that we were getting coaches that had never coached before, I WAS NOT one of the parents complaining.  I said, “sometimes it’s good to have the new young ones because they have new ideas and are usually energetic and are not set in their ways.”  I said this understanding that you had plenty of experience as a player, and understanding that you would learn as the season goes. Additionally, I understood that you didn’t have children of your own, and would not have that insight to help guide you. 

And so I write this letter with the utmost respect. The girls are thrilled you are here.  They are excited for a new season. They think it is really cool that you have played so much and really look up to you.  They want to please you, and want to do good for you. You are a role model now. Please try to remember that these girls are eleven and have a lot going on in their lives.  There are school pressures and social pressures, family pressures and extra curricular pressures.  They are absolutely committed and excited to learn what you have to teach them.  If you start to think they aren’t committed or you are frustrated with them, please take a minute to remember the day Chloe had and the effort she put in to get there.

Thank you.

The Power of No Words

It is said words are power.  Words can do anything, make anything happen. There are so many of them.  How to arrange them, pick them, put them in the right order is always the conundrum. 

Every now and then, people will say the right thing in an impossible situation.  Most of the time, people stumble over their words.  Or use words they know won’t help but are most commonly called upon when one must acknowledge an unfortunate turn of events.    

“I’m sorry,” or “How can I help?” or some other grouping of words that can, in no way, ease the pain or express the depths of our feelings. 

When I was 20, I had my tonsils removed.  I had been sick for a year, and finally the decision was made.  A tonsillectomy on a child is a day or two of being down, but on a 20 year old, with no complications, we were told two weeks.  I laid on my mother’s couch for a week.  Unexpectedly, my Daddy showed up.  He sat in the uncomfortable rocking chair next to the couch as I tried to be polite.  I guess I fell back asleep.  For the next week, my mother either was out or retreated to her bedroom - to give us space I guess. My Daddy rotated between the uncomfortable rocker or under my feet at the end of the couch for the entire week.  

And here’s the catch:  I don’t remember him saying ten words the entire week.  He would show up, ask how I was doing that day and if I needed anything. I never needed anything because my mother was doing all that work. Instead of leaving, he would then read, or watch TV, or nap, or just sit.  All day.  Every day.  Sometime in the afternoon, he would kiss me goodbye, and tell me he would see me in the morning.  

Then I started watching him.  He is not a touchy-feely man or very expressive.  He avoids conflict, probably because he doesn’t have much patience and can be short tempered.  But the way he can sit in silence is an extraordinary gift.  He holds pain for people, if only for short periods of time.  He can sit with the sick or the elderly, and click on a baseball game, and say, “I’ll bet you five bucks the Braves win.”  Even though I would bet he has never watched a complete game in his life, being that watching sports bores him.  In turning on that game and sitting there, he is taking the cancer away or lessening the loss of a loved one for just an afternoon.  He allows people to retreat to a happier place ever so briefly.  He has the rare ability to just BE with them. Few or no words are spoken. 

In the last months of my father’s father’s life, the Alzheimers had made my grandfather paranoid and anxious.  My Daddy drove the hour to his parents house several days a week to do his thing - just be with them. I was with him once and I was sitting in my grandparents now quiet living room with my Daddy and my grandmother and my grandfather.  My grandfather was upset about the kids hiding in the trees in the front yard.  My grandmother kept admonishing him that there were no kids out there.  The kids had been gone for years.  I was in silent shock at seeing this person who used to be my grandfather act like this.  This was the conversation for an indeterminable amount of time.  My Daddy wasn’t saying anything.  He was reading a paper or something regular that shouldn’t have been happening because we should have been trying to do something for my grandparents, something to help both of them.  

Finally, my Daddy got up, folded the paper, and walked outside without saying a word. “What the fuck?” was all my 20 something brain could come up with. “Don’t leave me here with them like this.  I am scared.”  But I was still frozen solid, words failing me.  

So I sat in the living room listening to my grandfather worry about the imaginary kids safety or learning that these kids were scoping out his house to rob him blind in the night. I listened to my grandmother tell him there were no kids - sometimes gently and lovingly, other times exhausted and exasperated. This is how it was with him - we had to tell him things over and over and over. I might as well have not been there - words were failing me.  I didn’t know what to say or do. 

After awhile, my Daddy came back inside.  He told my grandfather that he had talked to the kids and the kid’s parents.  Everything was ok.  They were just playing and there to keep them company.  My grandmother and I just watched in awe as my grandfather finally starting settling down.  

I was so ready to blow out of there at that point.  I was exhausted, frightened and needed to go.  

But my Daddy picked up his book and settled in on the couch, saying nothing.