The Women In My Life

A few weeks ago my husband was out of town for work.  Not a huge deal…well it does mean I do it all alone.  When he is out of town, I am in responsible for morning wake up, breakfast, getting my girls ready for school, getting myself to work just on time, working a full day, picking my girls up, taking them to their activities, dinner, showers, bedtime…woooo oye! just that alone makes for one very exhausting week.  If that was not enough fun my oldest decided it would be a great time to get a fever and a horrific chest cold.  Add on missing three and a half days of work to care for her.  I just about lost it!

Then this happened. In between the lack of sleep, all my mommy responsibilities,  ugggg household responsibilities, a sick daughter and juggling work week this happen….a text comes from a friend checking in on me to see how I am handling it all, a friend sends me home with a dinner for that night, my sister shares with me a super awesome dream she went after, a friend helps with morning school drop offs, a friend listens through all my tears about a family problem and  gently and honestly tells me the words I needed to hear.  Through all the crazy, through all the stress, through all of what could have been a very lonely time, I was reminded of how very, very lucky I am to have these amazing women in my life.  I was reminded of the gifts they give and share with me everyday!

The Women In My Life By Carrie Baughcum

Teaching Her the Importance of Her Voice

I heard yelling from downstairs.  The kind of yelling sisters do at each other when they taunt and push each others buttons.  I walked downstairs to see a familiar scene.  My oldest (9 years old) upset and in tears and my youngest (7 years old) making her breakfast (doing exactly what she is supposed to be doing…as usual and totally trying to show up her sister and acting like she did absolutely nothing).  Mad and very upset at Tricia (my oldest) began to yell and get more and more upset while she tried to tell me what her little sister had done.

“This is not something we get this upset about T.  You need to go upstairs and calm down,” I told her.

“…but mommmmmm!!!”

“It’s ok.  Go calm down.  It’s not over.  We will talk about what happen but you need to calm down first,” I let her know and she went upstairs to calm down (not happily but upstairs).  

Ten or so minutes passed and I went upstairs to check on her.

“How we doing?…. Calm? “

“Yes, momma,” she smiled.

“So tell me what happened downstairs.”

“I had picked my show.  You told me it was my turn.  I started to make my breakfast.  While I was making my breakfast SHE took the remote and turned on what SHE wanted to watch.  Then SHE wouldn’t give me back the remote,” Tricia told me.

“Ok. Lets go downstairs and tell her how you feel.  Tell her you don’t like what she did!” I encouraged her.

“Oooookkkkkayyy Mommy,” she answered me not 100% sure what she had just agreed she was going to to or completely believing that she was up for what I had just proposed.

We walked downstairs and the TV remote was laying on the couch next to where Annabeth stood.

“Tricia, go get the remote,” I  whispered.

“What?”

“Get the remote,” I nodded and looked toward the remote to reassure her.

She went to take the remote.

Her sister went to  grab it to. Suddenly the remote was in Tricia’s hand.  She paused and starred at in awww….awww that she had won the grab off and paused in stunned disbelief.  As instantly as she paused in oh my gawd I beat her in the grab awwww, she looked at me with  “I did it! Stunning Awwww” smile and off she went running around the downstairs and into the kitchen, and around the living room and remote in hand as her not happy little sister chased after her.

“AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!” Tricia yelled at her sister as the both fought tug of war style over the remote. Tricia’s eyes connected with me screaming silently, “Ok Mommy I grabbed it.  Now what the heck do I do!”

Not breaking eye contact with her, “You took…” I said words to start her off.

“You took the remote from me when I was making my breakfast!!” she said loudly to her sister.  She looked at me for more words.

“That wasn’t…” I helped again.

“That wasn’t nice.  It was my turn to watch….” and she went on to tell her sister what she really thought.

Suddenly, with each word, each opinion, each feeling and thought she shared out loud with her sister her chest began to puff up.  It was an energy in her I had never seen or felt with her.  As she finished telling her sister she what she felt and thought, she paused.

In that moment  I saw a moment wash over her.

In this moment she had learned the power of her opinion.  She discovered the power of telling someone else about how their actions made her feel.  She unlocked the power of her words to tell someone what they did was not ok with her.  She revealed the power of telling someone what she wanted.

It was in that moment I suddenly made my own discovery.

When I became a mother I always knew I wanted to raise well behaved children.  I wanted to raise children who followed directions, were respectful, polite, happy and kind.  As I have grown as a parent and as a person I have learned that there are other traits and qualities I want my daughters to embrace and posses as adults….resilience, unwavering problem solving abilities, a risk takers spirit,  creators and a dreamers ambition.

In this moment I realized something brand new!

I realized that polite, respectful, thoughtful,  kind, independent, risk taking, problem solving daughters that I wanted to raise was not enough.  I learned, in this moment,  this new lesson would be one of the most important skills I would strive to help my daughters posses.   I want daughters who also didn’t hold back for fear conflict.  I want daughters who embrace the power of their words and their opinion.  I want daughter who share their  thoughts and words confidently, thoughtfully and kindly with others without fear or hesitation.  I want their feeling, opinions and thoughts not just to be had but to be shared because …they matter, their voice matters, their feelings matter and their opinions matter!!!

Down with Good Girls....I want So Mush More for My Daughters

 

I was inspired to share this moment with my daughters by Galit Breen’s Why I’m Not Raising a Good Girl and Pernille Ripp’s All Hail the Kids.  Thank you both of you for your words and for inspiring me to tell mine too! 

It’s Not Fair

“That’s not fair!!!!!”

“It’s not fair Mommy! “

“No I don’t want to.  It’s not fair!”

It has been the phrase of choice for my lovely 9 year old.

The one phrase in the entire repertoire of phrases she could pick from that she knows gets under my skin…it really gets me.

So last weekend as we stood in the kitchen… I reminded her of a chore she needed to do.  As quickly as I could tell her what needed to be done the words burst from her mouth, “IT’S NOT FAIR!!” and this time I looked at her I said, “You know that is not true!  If it was fair…

It's Not Fair

Lost for words she just starred at me.  While I hoped for her usual giggles, this time I got a stomp and a huff as she walked away.  I smiled to myself and then looked up to see who else was in the kitchen with me (I actually was a bit surprised at what had come out of my mouth).  I saw my 7 year old looking at me.  Starring at each other for a moment I smiled again and then……..ohhhhh the laughter!

I Had A Bad Dream

February was not my favorite month this time around. Life brought me experiences that made me angry, doubt things and just plan old sad. It gave me tales that I so desperately wanted to write about but couldn’t because they went against my blogging rules…don’t write when your emotional, don’t write anything you wouldn’t say to someone in person and don’t write about others very personal experiences unless they are your own.

So I struggled.

I needed to write. I needed to share but I hated the words that needed a space and I wasn’t happy. I was ashamed and mad. I was ashamed that I didn’t have answers and mad that sometimes we make mistakes that cant be fixed quickly. I was ashamed I was not finding the good in all of this and I was mad I couldn’t find a way to share it here so you could be here for me.

Then one night this happened…

As I slept a green picturesque hillside was decorated with red and white checkered picnic blankets. My friends giggled and talked as they soaked up the sun of this picture perfect spring day. Sips of the perfect red wine and nibbles of creamy cheese filled their stomachs. I smiled in all the joy that surrounded me. A blonde haired man approached our day. His hair sleeked back. His peach suit perfectly polyester, unexpectedly fashionable and oddly handsome. He whispered to us and coaxed us. His words made us want to come with him, follow him, trust him and we did. Then as instantly as we had trusted him, his eyes became crimson and his teeth transformed into fangs. Our happiness was instantly replaced by terrifying fear as our naive necks were plunged into. Our picturesque hillside was suddenly filled with fear. By body shook in fear and I began to cry… Nnnnoooooooo!!!! I screamed then suddenly awoken from my sleep.

I didn’t go back to sleep that morning.

I knew all the moments that had made me mad and frustrated and just plan pissed in February but I could not wrap myself around why I was so unhappy.

As the warm shower water flowed over my body that morning my mind searched to make sense of it all. Then as clearly and vividly as my dream had come to me the answers appeared too.

I wasn’t happy with things… duh right!! But what would I do next? Stay unhappy. Let what is, be? Well if you visited here enough you know that answer… hell no. Instead I would be patient with myself. Give myself some slack and reflect. Reflect on what had happened this month. Learn from what had happened, try to work on me and take time to understand others better.

So here I am working on me… imperfect, mistake maker, willing to change, still learning.