Sunday, July 27, 2008

Modeling What We Want

Tonight Jon said "Mom, all my friends think you and Dad are cool." I smiled but thought, is that my goal? Is that a good thing? I'm not trying to be their buddy.

"Why?" I asked? "What makes us cool?" I mean, I really want to know. Is it because we are stupid? Are we stupid?

He said, "Because you treat me like an adult, and like they are adults."

This gave me pause. I do treat them like they are adults. If I expect adult behavior and adult respect, why wouldn't I treat them the way I want them to act? Of course. If I expect childish behavior, then I treat them like children.

T imagines them up there smoking pot and having orgies. I laugh at him, because why would they do that? They would be stupid to do that. They have no where to go. Besides, I would smell it, I would know. I think. Would I? I go upstairs and knock, not for that reason, but because if I yell upstairs, as usual, with 6 in the room and the fan, tv and computer going, no one can hear me. I can't yell that loud. "Come in!" they sing out immediately and I don't hear them whispering and saying "quick hide it" or anything. Good sign.

One is laying on the bed, reading. One is on the computer. Two are playing video games. They are all just hanging out. One is sitting outside the window on the roof, looking at the stars. It looks like where I would be. They all say hi. They are relaxed. They are not uncomfortable that I am there.

We talk a bit, I tell them there is no maid, I'm in class and they get to clean the bathrooms up stairs. They agree, and one volunteers. Another says he will empty the garbage. I show them the cleaning materials, and they are fine with it. I pull out paper plates downstairs and tell them. Easy.

No drugs. No smoking. No drinking. No sex. No wild abusive behavior. All in all, a rather boring bunch of young adults. But then, what else would I expect? These are young adults about to start their independent lives. I think they are awesome people! I really do.

Now, that's not to say that they haven't done it all. But not now. Not here. They have no reason to. Maybe that will change. And if it does, we'll see about it then. But for now, I'm well pleased to offer haven for awhile. They aren't asking us to fix anything. They want to do it themselves. All they really want is to be treated as if they have a brain in their heads. And they do.

Maybe this is waking them up to themselves? If I had a wish for them, it would be that they could see the light of who they are, the way I see them. Sometimes it takes a whole lifetime and sometimes more than one, before people get that part.

Awareness

I know that this is exactly what my Father did, and he would say "Why can't you listen to me. I know what's best. I've been there."

and I would say to him "You have to let me make my own mistakes. I have to learn this on my own." We would stand toe to toe. It was a difficult time. He hated my moving out, and I hated all his rules.

I've never understood the 11pm curfew. Here I was going to College and they wanted me home by 11pm, which was the same curfew I had in High School. There was no change for the fact that I had been in dorm living away from them for a year, and I had had a 2am curfew. Not that I utilized it much. Given my choice, and this is the crux, I CHOSE to come in earlier. But when he would demand it, I rebelled.

The lack of trust on their part, their belief that I was stupid, and that I would automatically make the bad choice was so angering to me! I still recall it. In Europe the standards were so different. We were in Greece, and my cousin wanted to take me dancing. Male cousin. He asked my father's permission, which thrilled him, and promised to have me home by 4am. Dad about keeled over! 4am? Sure. The discos didn't even get going until midnight. There the assumption was we were going to dance! And we did.

Why do we think because they are young, they are stupid? We weren't. And I know many many stupid adults. The only difference is chronological age, and that has nothing to do with maturity. How many of us have talked about raising our children? And my own mother said I was older than her. That I was her mother at times.

Maybe I am too sympathetic to this. I'm walking a fine line. While they are here, they aren't my kids, and yet they are under my roof. Are they guests or are they members of the family, or are they simply visitors passing through? My job is to create safety. I can't enable, but I can give them a respite. I can hold safe space. I can be here, present. I am aware that they are trying to be unobtrusive, noninvasive. I am also aware that they feel tentative. Concerned that they will be thrown out at the slightest provocation.

I also don't have permission to do more than offer readings and direction through such. A few moments in the long run-not alot of time to make an impact.

While my father screamed and yelled and threatened, I also knew he loved me. I was never hit. While he was bipolar and manic at times, my mother was pretty stable. She would disappear behind books, make herself invisible and my way of coping was to be home as little as possible. I threw myself into every activity. These kids retreat in other ways but it's the same bottom line-escape to make it more bearable.

Hours and days of video games. Numbing trance out to forget what is going on. Be not here.
So, how do they flip the switch and come back to life?
Sleeping beauties in the castle and I'm the prince wandering around stepping over the dead bodies. It's back to my original shamanic dream when I rubbed her cheek and said "you can wake up now".

Wake up-it's safe. Wake up-it's time. We're here now.
Like when the kids would fall asleep in the back seat on the way somewhere...

Friday, July 25, 2008

Healing Self

So what I am seeing is that the kids really want the opportunity to heal themselves. They seem to have a grasp about where their parents are. They really are demonstrating that we can self heal, given the right environment. What a wonderful demonstration.
When I was teaching parenting classes was to teach the parents that what kids really wanted and needed is to have the environment where its safe to make a mistake, its safe to experiment with who they are. Kids do want limits as small children, it gives them a sense of safety. The kids actually get the message you care enough to set a limit. With so many kids today this isn't happening. Parents don't know how to create a safe environment. The parents think that if they give the kids everything they want that it will create the safety, so that they love them.
I don't know where I am going with all of this...
So much of it is holding the space for the kids to figure it out. We have to give them the opportunity to figure it out.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

The Nest




Jac asked me what the nest means to me, finding it. I'm working on that.
I decided to put it back in the planter in the sun. Trust that they are safe, and where they are meant to be. Not try and protect them unduly. They already have become motherless in that the nest was removed from their mother, just as life is removing my son's from here.

So, my role isn't mother to the nest. I am God to the nest.

When I first looked in, I saw that there was soft downy stuff tucked in around the eggs as if they had been tucked into bed. The mother had done the best she could, and now she had to let them go, life had taken a new direction. The nest was taken from it's haven, and swept away by the elements, but it had come into my hands, and it was up to me to put it somewhere safe and love it for what it was; for its message to me, for the beauty and art of what it is, for the life held within, though probably not still alive after so long without sitting.

The nest showed me unhatched potential. Eggs on the brink of coming into life. A moment that exactly captures where my sons are now. Both are about to burst forth. I can read it many ways.

If I am in my pain body I might go down a dark path with it. Danger, taken away from what would have protected it, dead before stepping forth, alone, unhatched. Destined to never be. I couldn't keep them safe.

Whoa. That was enough! :)

Now, if I change that channel, I feel a whole new download of information that says to me "This is where they are. You've done your best. You protected, nurtured, and now you must trust that they are and will be delivered into loving hands that will honor and move them gently to the perfect place for them." It's a moment. Source is showing me that this is where they are, and that I must move them in my MIND towards seeing them as hatched, and not as fragile eggs. I am not mother to this nest and eggs, I have a different perspective. I am above, I am bigger. I have the power to move the whole nest somewhere safe.

Thank you wind, thank you winged ones, thank you Source! I get it! I've continued to see them as my little eggs, and that is done with. They aren't little eggs that we have to protect. Like those eggs, they don't require our protection, they are in God's hands. They aren't even baby birds we have to still feed.

I wasn't shown that. I was shown that they will be moved by the elements of life itself, and that I must move to a new position. I must trust God to keep them safe. WOW!

Thanks for the question Jac!

Monday, July 7, 2008

Arthritis

Arthritis is one of those things that I have heard about, and dealt with in clients, but hasn't been part of my reality-not in my body. We've said in Theta to be careful that we don't call things in to understand them. I may have done that. My mother has arthritis in her back, and a sister in law with a terrible back, and a nephew with a bad back and arthritis, and we hear that 'as we get older we will get it' where we have had injuries. I've been pretty lucky that way, but the contract that arthritis as a sign of aging seems to be everywhere, and 'they' say it's inevitable if we've had any injuries.

We've discussed the beliefs and emotions connected with it. Being rigid, set, stubborn. Lovely people always, but set in their ways, and when we make suggestions for change, they usually refuse. Why refuse to change something if it might help? Secondary gain-perhaps. Most likely. They want help, but they refuse to change, so the pain can't be bad enough to motivate. Pain is a great motivator for me though. I can't stand to hurt. I want a change and begin to look for some way to change it fast.

Just lately, the top joint of the pinkie of my left hand has been enlarging and paining, and I notice some mornings that I wake with my finger joints aching. It clears, except for the pinkie. The joint is definitely larger, bulbous and sore. The finger curves under at an angle when I type. How long has that been happening, that I hit the keys with the side of the pinkie instead of the tip? See, that's compensation, and our body does it so smoothly that we hardly notice it's happened.

There is a tiny faint scar across the top of the finger just under the nailbed and of course I don't recall an injury, but there was one, obviously. So now, arthritis is in my world. Now, it has my attention in a whole new way. Did I do this so I can understand it?

Tomatoes, potatoes and nightshade vegetables. But when I looked, there was more!
Red meats, all dairy, corns, wheat, oats, rye, barley.
Eggs, Citrus fruits, coffee, bananas, peaches
Star fruit (carambola), black pepper, parsley, poppy seed, rhubarb stalks, amaranth, spinach, chard, beets, cocoa, chocolate, most nuts, most berries, and beans.
Alcohol
Carbonated drinks
Foods that easily get mold-cantaloupe, honeydew, nuts, berries.

Wow. That removes most of the foods I do eat. And I resist immediately. Am I stubborn?!

But not everyone reacts to everything.
And we should increase other foods-
artichokes, asparagus, lettuce, spinach, broccoli, chard, string beans, squashes, sweet potatoes, tapioca, and taro.
Increase Vitamins C and E to help neutralize free radicals-which is what arthritis is about.
Eat brown rice, probably quinoa too
Try cooked fruits or dried instead of fresh.

And hormone imbalances can lead to joint pain.

Since the raw food experiment, I'm much more in touch with my body and food and how I feel when. I pay attention and notice. But that list above cuts out most foods I AM eating now, and if feels overwhelming.

I decided to experiment in a smaller way as list above is overwhelming in the whole, but since we have been writing down our foods and counting calories in the bbbu, I'm pretty conscious of what I am eating. So I decided to start tracking the pain mornings. Just to make note of it, and see if there is a pattern. How else would we know?

On the money with an increase in joint pain when we have had potatoes. All the joints in my fingers hurt. It clears, but I do wake with pain in my hands. (I wonder if it happens with french fries too? LOL)

On the money with reddening and swelling in the joint of my pinkie-tomatoes and tomato products. Ouch. In an Italian household that's a hard one to get around, but I'm going to do it, to notice if it helps. The days we've not had any tomatoes, I wake without any pain in my hands.

I'm choosing those to start with. Coffee may be next, and it's the only time I use dairy. I'll selectively remove that for awhile and see. It's all a grand experiment.

If you have any arthritis, perhaps do this with me and post your findings.

It's funny to notice that as soon as I say I'm not going to eat them, I sitting here craving them. That's fascinating to fee, but I'm stronger.

Animal proteins, dairy and nightshade vegetables...well the first two WERE eliminated with the raw food experiment, and I didn't have any pain in my hands until now...let's experiment!

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Greg Finley

The Secret Life of the American Teenager

This is who my son wrote his screenplay with-thought you might like to see him.
He's in the new ABC family show "The Secret Life of the American Teenager" which just aired July 1.