Parenting

Saving Mr Banks

helpThe darkness and light of the never-ending questions.

Parenting is a marathon effort. Some days you’re running alongside your children and others leave you standing on the sidelines. Watching those stages from baby to toddler, child to tween and those awkward spaces where your teen suddenly emerges into adulthood and then casually slips back means you are constantly running to catch up with their changing needs. You walk that fine line between encouraging them to grow and then wanting to shield them from the tough stuff.

During the long school holidays I took my older girls – 8, 12 and 14 to see Saving Mr. Banks. A PG rated movie whose previews suggested a jolly old story behind a movie that’s on high rotation in most houses, and the houses of many parents as they grew up – Mary Poppins.

Once the popcorn had been purchased and the last pit stop to the toilet taken we settled down in the dark waiting for the familiar show tunes to pipe from the speakers. As the movie stretched on the darkness and light that sits behind that classic PL Travers novel – who quite proudly grew up in Australia – started to unravel and with it I began to squirm in my seat.

Saving Mr. Banks was inexplicably sad – telling the story of an enquiring little girl managing the harshness of rural Australia and the love for a Dad who just quite couldn’t get there some days. It explored the impact of alcohol use on a family, physical illness, mental health, death and what happens for those on the sidelines when the pressure of caring for three small children with an absent dad pushes people to their limits. My eight year old spent a lot of time whispering across asking what was happening, why the mum was crying so much and why the Dad was behaving like he did. I answered as best I could in hushed tones and asked her to wait until afterwards where we could chat in peace.

Raising children involves a lot of stimulating conversations . They are discussions that we plan for, that we try to up skill ourselves about in order to show them that the way we cope with life can transform our ability to get right back up when we fall down. They help to teach our children that to be human is to live with both the ups and downs, all at the same time.

Families often ask about the right way to answer the questions that sit on the periphery of our experiences. In working with families and in raising my own it can be helpful to ponder the following ideas:

  • Don’t apply additional layers to their questions – answer what they are asking. If they ask for more, answer more.
  • Link situations back to them as often as possible. Children see the world from their own lens; if you make it relatable rather than abstract they are more likely to grasp what you are discussing.
  • Be age appropriate, its OK to provide one layer of response and then provide further information as they grow and mature.
  • Choose your timing. The great conversations can never be planned but finding the right space for you – in the car, over the dinner table – can help you communicate what is required
  • It’s normal to worry that you haven’t answered a question the ‘right’ way. Remember that you know your child best – answer based on where they are at, not what others suggest.
  • Get support – ask your friends with children similar ages about how they answer the tough questions, check in with your Counsellor (if you have one) or go to some of the online forums and get some ideas.
  • Engaging your children in conversations about those spaces around stories of mental health, drug and alcohol use, premature death or trauma allows them to slowly paint a realistic picture of the world. Increasing their awareness at a slow pace can help them to build on their empathy for those within their family and in the wider community.

 

As our children grow older and life transitions from G to more PG rated ideas the inevitable questions about how the world functions come along for the ride. Taking a breath, finding a way to respond to their inquisitive minds can teach you about the marathon journey you are all on together.

For more information about asking and answering questions visit here (http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/ask_real_questions_pbs.html)

How do you answer the tough ones?

The nest egg.

I watched the family of this poor boy try to find words to convey their trauma and sadness on TV this morning. I watched the camera pan to his siblings sitting to the left of their bewildered parents and I wondered where would they go from here. Not in the years to come but today. Where would you turn if you lost one of your lights? The news reports explained that Thomas was out on his first night to popular area of Sydney, the CCTV footage showed him walking hand in hand with his girlfriend and then he steps out of camera. The power of knowing what happens next makes you want to press pause and rewind over and over again almost trying to keep him in view, keep him safe.

I can clearly remember sitting with a family a few years back in counselling. I had already been working for a few years with people living with life altering traumas – no two stories were the same, they all showed different traits of resilience, of strength. The family and I were talking about the grief of losing a child – replaying over and over the events that led to the sadness, the rawness of approaching anniversaries and that impending doom that nothing would ever be the same ever again. It was an uncomfortable place for me to be sitting too – I was heavily pregnant with my first child and trying my hardest to be supportive and engaging while my own baby squirmed inside of me. I remember as we catalogued the pain they were experiencing – both physical and emotional – that it was like a nest egg. Parenting is like having a nest egg – a giant fund that you contribute to for years and years only for to find yourself one day looking in and realising that it had all vanished in the blink of an eye. That all those years of juggling, of working hard and of hoping for that day that you could sit back and reap the rewards, were stolen from you. I cant imagine walking along one path for so long and then the world throw you a giant detour.

If you take a moment to read the blogs, the magazines, the news sites about parenting you find that the elusive work life balance gets thrown around on a daily basis. We wish away the early years full of sleep deprivation and tantrums, we struggle through the primary school years where it feels like the bell rings almost 5 minutes after school starts  and then we hold our breath as kids reach the years where they dip their toes in the world of independence.

There is no way of holding them back, of keeping them wrapped up at home because like many of us; we went out at night, we found ourselves in precarious situations and many are still here to tell the story. The randomness of it all means that there can be no preparation for it. No amount of counselling or supportive words changes what has happened. So sad.

How do you juggle the need for kids to assert their independence with your fear of what could happen to them?

 

baby faces

I loved this list from the late, great Nora Ephron. I think I have seen ‘When Harry Met Sally’ 72000 times.

It got me thinking what Id put on my list. It got me thinking about the anti-bucket list I developed last year. It also got me thinking about the impact parenting has on me.

Its Red Nose Day today here in Australia. Chrissie Swan wrote a lovely, eloquent piece on what she remembers from being a kid when she first released that people sometimes lose their kids. I was watching a TV show last night and my girl was perched on the side of the lounge. How is it that there can be 3 other seats available but kids have to sit right ON you? The story was about a mum who lost her little boy to SIDS last year. My daughter sobbed for about half an hour after the story – she asked to go in and check on her own brother to make sure he was OK. I kept asking her to talk to me while also thinking why the hell did I let her watch with me – but like Chrissie said I dont know how you hide the world from your kids – do you shield them from it hoping to keep all the yucky stuff out or do you open it all up for them to peer in to. Being asked questions that start with ‘why’ mean that I always stumble for an answer, because after 10 years working in the grief world there will never be an answer for those questions. I talked to her about life and love and we made a list of things that we should be grateful for, the things that will stick out when we’re old and wrinkly, the things that wont even rate…it went something like this.

Wont miss

Waking up early for swimming

Broccoli

Homework (that was me)

Bad Coffee

Bossy people

Miss

Hugs

Merit awards

Friends, best friends

Grandmas

Laughing  until your tummy hurts

Uno (or Unit as my girl calls it)

Snacks

I calmed her down and she opted to sleep in my bed until I popped her into hers later on. I carried those big, lanky limbs out of my room, around the corner to her bed filled with 100 toys and tucked her in. The face still looks like the baby I used to stare out, like most mums I held my breath after both my babies had started sleeping through the night worried as I stepped in the room that something dreadful had happened during the night. I still check on all the kids at random times through the night. Watching. Waiting. Admiring (and secretly relishing the quiet)

You can donate to SIDS and KIDS or to River’s Gift or just raise awareness where you can. Cliched as it as, hold your bubs tight, talk to them openly and wipe away the tears when they learn that it isnt all rainbows. Im not sure if I tell my kids too much, I also know that I cant take away their empathy for other people. I figure its better to have it, than not.

Share this post if you think that coping with loss is about sharing the message.

Whats on your hit and miss list?

 

Riding in cars with…kids.

Image from here

When trauma and loss happen most of us know what to do. We know who to call, where to seek help and what we can (kind of) expect about the ways to cope. I guess we’re the ambulance chasers of our own experience.

But what happens to kids when life and all its catastrophes happen?

Catastrophes in a kids world can be big and small – they’re not proportional to ours. They have different meaning and the lens by which they explore them doesn’t match with the life lessons we’ve endured.

Centuries ago when I started working as child protection caseworker I did a whole lot of training on how to talk to kids, the ways to build rapport with a small person that had never laid eyes on you before. I cant imagine how scary that would be for a small person to be expected to bare their soul to someone – but I do know that being a place of safety for a kid overrides that fear of stepping into their lives for the first time.

Every Friday night my daughter and I drive a small distance to her dance class. We changed classes this year to a spot that was a few minutes walk away but I realised that in doing that I missed the chance to talk. Its funny to watch a 6 year old grappling with her identity, how quickly some kids are able to reflect on the who’s, whats and whys of their existence. In the driving to and fro we created chances for random, but meaningful conversation.

We started back at that place a little further away this term. As each Friday night looms I think of 1000 reasons why Id prefer to be at home with my Ugg boots on but once we’re set, when a small person has been dropped to his cousins and bigger girls are OK to wait for Dad to get home from work I relish in the talk of the journey.

Its been on these trips that Ive been able to explain divorce, explain the difference between Daddy and Dada, the reasons why its Ok to be married to 2 people (but hey not at the same time. This isn’t Dr Phil) and about what makes us happy and sad. Its not all drama, its all the places in between.

It was raining on Friday, the streetlights were bright and they smeared across the windscreen, the singing between her and I to songs that probably arent suited to a 6 year old were belted out. She cleared her throat and said ‘mum, tell me about you as a kid…do you think you were as funny as me?’.

Riding in cars with kids can create the chance to stare out the window and solve the dilemmas of the world.

 

 

 

I am Julia Roberts…

In that movie Stepmom – except for the whole Susan Sarandon dying thing.

Ive been in a bit of a funk this week, all these thoughts swirling around my head about turning half way to 70. Yes, I have the tendency to catastrophize. Doesnt everyone?

I get stressed each May. Its a month of memories – some not so nice. I outrun them most of the time but then some days they catch up with me. I decided I was just going to treat today as a great day – I was going be grateful for my little family who made me brekkie, wrote me cards and let me sleep in…til 9!!!

I dont talk here much about my life as a step mum – its a private world full of contradictions, of highs and lows and its probably the hardest job Ive ever taken on – without even having a clue about how hard it was going to be. Its hard to split yourself between 4 people – 2 who dont understand my little quirks all of the time, 1 who is just a replica of me (and strangely has the same quirks) and a little man who donks everyone in the head with Thomas trains. He has quirks – we just haven’t claimed ownership of them yet.

This morning as I was swanning around in a haze of presents, FB messages and drop ins my phone rang and I missed the call.

When I looked back I realised it was my step daughter.

It was her call I had missed.

I rang her back and heard her little 12 year old voice on the end of the line, she cleared her throat and sang me happy birthday.

I think we’ll be alright – the 6 of us.

Im Linking up with Maxabella Loves 52 Weeks of Grateful this week…pop over here and read some of the other posts x

 

 

The Kings (and cherubs)

Some times I just dont get it. And by it I mean life. I dont understand why some people have to face so many heartaches and so many challenges. I was reading Naomi’s blog the other day and noticed a few people talking about Lisa King, so I jumped over to her blog and was struck by the beautiful picture of her with her husband and her four kids on the beach. I used to work with families who had littlies with disabilities – Id help out during arsenic hour with cleaning and dinner and baths and books. It was probably the most useful two hours of my day. Having kids of my own makes me remember those little families even more because my kids are healthy and well and yet I still struggle some days.

Lisa lost her husband Aaron last week, four months after she lost her 10 year old son Noah. In the blink of an eye he was gone and she has been writing and I guess wrestling with the reality of that moment in time ever since. She takes beautiful photos and has been recording the time since Aaron died for both herself and her three boys. One of the images was of her holding her husbands hand during her last visit to the funeral home the day before the service. I wept as I read her thoughts and I wondered how after years of parenting kids together how she would curl up in bed at night without the warmth of her husband beside her.

Naomi put out a call to other people who read her blog as so many wanted to help but didnt know how…in the week of collecting, the figure has skyrocketed showing that the urge we all have to help is so strong.

I often wonder when stuff happens how is the best way to help, the money, the thoughts, the food…they all help in some ways but I guess that stirring inside us to cry tears for people we will never meet is the most amazing part because it shows that you dont have to live next door to create a sense of community – caring can be done from afar.

Jump over here if you want to donate but also send your thoughts – it could happen to anyone, but how sad that it had to happen to her, again.

From tutus to two babes….a TSIB interview

Well! I’m having a bit of a run of goodluck with lovely people offering to be interviewed by me for a TSIB interview.

This week, just like last week, we have a blogger talking about her space in between. I actually got in touch with Amy about her call out for guest posts and then in a generous twist she ended up saying yes to having a chat about the impending arrival of a new bub to join her little (and big) man.

Take a break and if, like Amy, you’re about ready to pop eat some snacks and put your feet up. Here she is…

Ames…tell me a bit about you

I’m a stay at home mum to lufflump, who is turning three this year, and ready to give birth to sesame hopefully around her due date in early March. I live in Brisbane with my boyfriend, the mister, who works in hospitality while applying for the air force.

You’re coming up to the end of your second pregnancy. I remember before having my second babe that I was fine until the home stretch when I suddenly remembered about the birth…how are you managing?

So far this pregnancy has been so different to my last breezy pregnancy where I often forgot I was actually pregnant. I can’t wait for it to be over but at the same time I’m petrified about having a newborn and a toddler around the house. The birth doesn’t really bother me as I know the feelings after birth so will be using that as motivation to get through it all nicely. All babies are so different but I’m hoping that sesame will be a happy baby like lufflump was, that’ll make it easier to manage two children.

What about that space between your son going from being an only child to a big brother. Are you sad about what that means in terms of you having to share yourself with another small person?

I’m sad as this was an(other) unexpected pregnancy, we wanted to wait until lufflump was in prep (two years away) until we had another baby. At the same time though I’m excited. He’s at the age where he is happy to help, can to an extent but still wants mummy time. I’m an only child so never had to experience my parents splitting their time with someone else which I think will make it difficult and scary for me to do with lufflump and sesame. Everything in life is a lesson though and I think the mister and I will work together to learn what works best for our family.

If you could go back in time and tell the childless you what you’d learnt from being a mum would would it be?

Sleep! Sleep is precious, do more of it. Take long, hot showers. Pamper yourself often. All those things taken for granted that are such luxuries now.

What are you looking forward to the most.

Meeting sesame, getting to know her, watching lufflump be a brother, having a newborn in the house and watching the mister’s heart melt again.

Thanks Amy….Amy has a lovely blog that you can visit here. I can remember when my little girl (who was almost 5 when her little brother arrived) became a big sister…she struggled for the first few months and would pretend that she couldnt remember what his name was. Once he got a bit more interesting, she became a bit more interested. A bit like life (or relationships!!) but it all worked out in the end.

Pop back and read some other interviews if you’ve got a few seconds!


Harnessing the memory machine.

Every year my husband and I and the kids head here. Its an annual thing and its something that he has done every year since he was a kid too. I always remember Mia Freedman when she said that holidays with kids was really just moving the kids to another location without the usual props to entertain them. This year was no different, we almost had to leave a child behind with the amount of stuff we had crammed into the car.

Going to a place you went to as a child inevitably increases the stress to recreate the memories you had for your own offspring (or step-offspring). To visit the same holiday spots, the same twee amusement parks all with that rose-coloured glass nostalgia that makes you forget about vomiting after your first ride on the pirate ship or the sunburn that was so bad you had to shove cotton wool under the straps of your swimmers to relieve the pressure. I think its safe to say there is a space between the truth and what you really want the truth to look like.

On our way up the coast we stopped for the night at a place we’d been to for the last few years. The kids had scattered memories of it and most remembering revolved around the breakfast buffet and a dodgy pancake machine. I actually wrote this post in my head during that overnight stay – it was 313am and I was lying awake with a sniffing child to the right of me, a snoring husband to the left, an even smaller child in a port-a-cot directly next to the bed who was doing seal impersonations in his sleeping bag all night and two stepdaughters sleeping on the foldout lounge whispering louder than their actual voices are….its at this point that I wanted to yell ‘ARE WE HAVING FUN YET?’. But what stopped me from losing it was the need to harness the memory machine, to not sweat the small stuff so that in two decades time my son can turn to me, grateful for the memories we created, and say ‘remember that place we went to where we all slept together, ate pancakes and had a great time’.

And I’ll smile serenely and say ‘of course I do, that was the best holiday ever’.

How are your holidays going? Are we having fun yet?

cracks through to light…

I’d been following Kristian’s blog since I saw that snippet of his life on a big American TV show. I was impressed with his honesty , his integrity and his capacity to put into words what love meant for him.

It was with great sadness that I saw a little post on twitter the other night saying that he had slowly slipped away. I went back to his blog that I had been reading and was really struck by what a fast decline there had been in his condition – only a few short months ago he was talking about his hopes for the future but probably the most difficult post to read was how he was slowly answering his children’s questions. I kept wondering after I saw that little blip on twitter what his boys must be thinking and how they could slowly be sitting with that first layer of sadness hearing that their dad was now gone.

I did some creative writing prompts early on in my blog career (well September). This one played heavily on my mind when I read about answering stuff. It also played on my senses when I thought back to last week and the struggle I had in explaining how unfair life can be to my beautiful girl. I watched her struggle with the rawness of truth, the shitiness of how other people’s behaviours can impact the very core of you and how loss can be exaggerated at different times. Some of the year we happily skip about not noticing what is absent and then at certain times loss knocks at your day and you just cant turn it away. Difficult concepts to explain to little people.

I got an email from a research fellow this morning asking for some thoughts about how young people live with the loss of a missing person and I pointed out that there was so little (well nothing) written about it but that many moons ago when I had sat with some kids I did notice that no one should fear saying “I just don’t know’. It doesn’t provide the answers to any of life’s questions but it does give a response that is honest, respectful of the child’s need to know and the starter of a conversation that might lead to more uncovering of layers as time goes by. It provided an opening line to a very long dialogue.

Parenting in happy and sad times probably teaches me more about life, resilience and moving on than any book I could ever open.

Vale Kristian Anderson

 

The suit and other stuff..

My husband and I spent a fair few hours this week in various health-related waiting rooms…it made me grateful for all the usual stuff (health, wealth, happiness and all that jazz) but it also made me grateful for the art of stickybeaking….there is nothing better than a stickybeak with a fellow stickybeaker (aka my husband). Let me clarify here there is a space between sticky-beaking and busy-bodying…we never cross that line.

We were seperated from three other families by a thin curtain…it was still pretty early on a weekday morning but the hospital was humming with all those yucky disastrous things that happen behind closed doors. Across from us was a woman with a writhing toddler stuck to her chest, she was glued to her iphone, furiously texting, furiously scrolling – I did want to lean over and ask what she was reading but my son had fallen asleep on my arm (the arm is yet to wake up…should I seek medical attention??). The middle aged man to the diagonal was also reading his iphone (what did we all do without them??) and his tween-age daughter was trying to persuade him that her legs felt funny despite her 15 trips to the loo in a half hour period…he was very econominal with his answers…you could probably call them grunts. The couple next to us were fussing over a little boy who coughed like a seal and shuffled around like a little old man – his dad, lets call him the suit, spent the day ringing the office, reading out powerpoint slides to his assistant and then telling his son that his illness was in gods hands…I could have given his presentation by the end of our stay.

My partner in crime and I kept each other updated on the happenings of our roomies  – we shared how the furious scroller was going, what request the tween had come up with that hour and how the suit’s powerpoint presentation was going. We wondered where they had come from, we were happy for them when their kids were given the all clear and we were a bit bummed to not see out how it all unfolded when we got to go home.

Im grateful for a husband who secretly loves a good sticky-beak as much as I do.

Whats the most important skill for a good sticky-beak? Can women do it better than men?

p.s My husband was at the train station the next day, his text to me read…the suit is on my train.