A GOOD MANY DRAMATIC SITUATIONS BEGIN WITH SCREAMING

At my x husband...?...

Just as Brian was getting really good at football and showered with attention, he decides to stop playing.

His backstage dad and the main coach were driving him nuts.

You can always tell the over-involvement of a parent in a child's life when the child makes a decision the parent doesn't like.  I was trying to pound home the point to my x husband that he was behaving like a fanatic-lunatic-over-obsessed-football-x-jock dad. Of course my x disagreed (as he tried pulling on Brian's jersey to see if it fits him) thus let the arguing begin.

I tried warning him.

Brian is self-aware and rather like an engineer, a type of man my x husband cannot understand.  When Brian has had enough of something wild horses cannot drag him forward.

So, Monday night Brian comes to me and says "Dad is driving me crazy.  I think the coach is scary\weird (he is) and I am starting to hate football.  I want to stop."  I grin to myself as I picture my x husband's head exploding when he is told this.

"Are you scared to tell your dad?" I ask him.  "Sorta.  He acts like this is the NFL." he looks at me like he is about to ask me to jump off a mountain.

Then ... he asks me to tell his dad with him.  OIY.  Can we wrestle a bear instead?

Are these the times we love parenting?  

At least Brian is to the age where we can talk openly about different subjects and negotiate an outcome.  However, this time it is about delivering news to his dad he isn't going to want to hear.  It is often hard to explain to some dad's that children don't belong to them, they come from us, but we don't own them.  If we are lucky, we can manage our children into adulthood and teach them to make positive choices in their lives.

Forcing a child to be what we might want them to be makes for one very screwed up adult later in life.  A kid has to find his or her own passion.  The kind of passion for something where they nag us to take them.  Tiger Woods wanted to golf and bugged his dad to teach him -  not the other way around.  So Brian has decided football isn't his thing right now.  It isn't like  he went out  a lit someones house on fire or  robbed a bank.

The season has not started, positions have not been picked.  It is an ideal time to withdrw from the team - before he is given a position they count on him to play.

To me - no biggie.

To his Dad...

We just ruined Christmas.

It isn't like I don't understand this.  What if I don't like Brian's wife someday?  I can't imagine this, but if it was a problem I'd find a way to be a Tour guide and travel the world.  I'd go get a life and leave my son to his own.  We need to understand that if we REALLY love someone, we must let go.  Love is always about allowing space for people to breathe - to be themselves.

Isn't there a song "Hold On Losely"?

Why do we treat our partners better than we treat our kids?  Why do single parents show compassion and understanding with their dating partners and then be closed off and rigid when it involves their kids?

C

http://journals.aol.com/rapieress/Aweekinthelife/ 

ONE WEEK AND SHE ...

It is interesting what can happen in the contents of a week.

My niece went away to college in Colorado.  Can we be this old?  It was just yesterday when she’d crawl up into my lap and order me to read a book, comb her hair or let her direct what I am doing.  She fascinated me.

Now, my brother is suffering at the empty nest left by her absence.  He is fighting the urge to get in his truck and go beg her to come home.  It has just been a week.  We never understand how much we love our family until we are separated.  Why is this?

I, in turn threw my back out.  At the age of 19 I was in a bad car accident.  I have had this back “thing” ever since.  Every now and then I abuse my back and it lets me know who is boss.  I spent two days in bed until I thought I was going to scream from boredom.  I then practically crawled to my truck, drove myself to my x husband’s condominium, and got in the hot tub in my gym clothes!  My aching muscles began to relax and I got up, went into the pool, and began to swim for hours.  Later, Brian joined me and I was able to change into my suit and continue swimming.  I love water.  Water took the bulk of the pain from me.

It is intriguing how water can eliminate pain.  By the time I was done I was able to walk upright and the pain was bearable.  Today I got up and was able to walk 3 miles.  The only thing one can do with unbearable pain is to work through it - just like I fight my thyroid symptoms.  We must never give up or give in.

Every time I look in the mirror...all these lines on my face getting clearer...

Brian is in 6th grade and hating the idea of being a boy trapped in school.  What do I say when I think the system absolutely sucks at teaching boys?  Let alone kids who learn differently.  Funny how in school they want the kids to learn the same, not think out of the box and work alone.  When you get into corporate America they embrace those who are mavericks who push the envelope and can motivate a team effort.  School can be terribly diconnected from the real world.

Most of the successful businessmen I know either never graduated from college or dropped out.  However, this said, I want Brian to have a love of learning.  I am hoping school doesn't beat this out of him.  And college is important, even if you only go a semester.  It creates a canyon between high school bullshit and a more profound life.

I want him to see the magic, wonder and possiblities of searching out an amazing life.  Just like my niece has these possiblities stretched out to her like a long wide open freeway for as far as the eye can see...I want him to go experience the same - and then some.

I gues at that point I will have to really let go and get a life.

Holy shit.

Until next time-

C

http://journals.aol.com/rapieress/Aweekinthelife/

ODE TO BRIAN

Sharpened pencils
No swimming pool
Peanut butter sandwich
It's back to school

Parents rejoice
Brand new shoes
Stuffed backpack
It's back to school

Yellow buses
New pants, cool
Oh God - homework
It's back to school

Another teacher
Recess rules
Screaming girls
It's back to school

Stuck indoors
It feels too cruel
Summer is over
I'm back in school

~ C

I love you Brian.

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MANGERO LE MIE SCARPE ROSA!

Lately, I haven't written much about my Hashimoto's disease.  I guess it is time for a check in.  I want my story and struggle to be a part of this blog so that anyone else who is a single parent that gets sick may come here and get inspiration.  I still have my good days and bad days.  I am better when the weather is warm.  I notice when the fog moves inland here my symptoms seem to kick up a notch.  Honestly, it can be depressing and I must fight through the urges to stay in bed.

Many of you who have been reading my blog over the past year know my fight to find the right doctor and correct combination of thyroid meds to be able simply to function.  I was lucky enough to find Dr Gardner and have been working on me ever since.

He was the first doctor to acknowledge the correlation between how cold I always am to lack of functioning free T3 in my body.  He told me I wasn't nuts.  I was cold.  It angers me to think of the men I have dated who shrugged off the fact that I was often freezing cold - even in layers of clothes.

I still get brain fog and with all the exercising and careful eating I am having on hell of a time loosing weight.  Sleep comes and goes, as I have good nights and bad nights.  But I am better with T3 than without and now a new study finds -

The National Library of Medicine and the National Institute of Health has published the following:

"Supraphysiological cyclic dosing of sustained release T3 in order to reset low basal body temperature.

• Friedman M,
• Miranda-Massari JR,
• Gonzalez MJ.

Friedman Clinic, Montpelier, VT, USA.

The use of sustained release tri-iodothyronine (SR-T3) in clinical practice, has gained popularity in the complementary and alternative medical community in the treatment of chronic fatigue with a protocol (WT3) pioneered by Dr. Denis Wilson. The WT3 protocol involves the use of SR-T3 taken orally by the patient every 12 hours according to a cyclic dose schedule determined by patient response. The patient is then weaned once a body temperature of 98.6 degrees F has been maintained for 3 consecutive weeks. The symptoms associated with this protocol have been given the name Wilson's Temperature Syndrome (WTS). There have been clinical studies using T3 in patients who are euthyroid based on normal TSH values. However, this treatment has created a controversy in the conventional medical community, especially with the American Thyroid Association, because it is not based on a measured deficiency of thyroid hormone. However, just as estrogen and progesterone are prescribed to regulate menstrual cycles in patients who have normal serum hormone levels, the WT3 therapy can be used to regulate metabolism despite normal serum thyroid hormone levels. SR-T3 prescription is based exclusively on low body temperature and presentation of symptoms. Decreased T3 function exerts widespread effects throughout the body. It can decrease serotonin and growth hormone levels and increase the number of adrenal hormone receptor sites. These effects may explain some of the symptoms observed in WTS. The dysregulation of neuroendocrine function may begin to explain such symptoms as alpha intrusion into slow wave sleep, decrease in blood flow tothebrain, alterations in carbohydrate metabolism, fatigue, myalgia and arthralgia, depression and cognitive dysfunction. Despite all thermoregulatory control mechanisms of the body and the complex metabolic processes involved, WT3 therapy seems a valuable tool to re-establish normal body functions. We report the results of 11 patients who underwent the WT3 protocol for the treatment of CFS. All the patients improved in the five symptoms measured. All patients increased their basal temperature. The recovery time varied from 3 weeks to 12 months."

Well Halla-feckin-luah let me eat my pink shoes.

C

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THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN...

It is said that my mother taught me about weather..."It looks as if a tornado swept through your room!"...

If I had a dime for every time she said that to me I would have retired in opulence at age 30.

I am trying these years to take on more of a parent role with my mother, which my older brother scoffs and tells me to forget.  To him it is like trying to tell a hungry tiger who is boss ... eventually you will realize who really has the power...as you are being rushed to the hospital.

So this week I find out that my mother is planning on calling a cab to her house at 3am in the morning.  One of my cousins is getting married in New York and she is going.  Should I tell you that she is 78 going on 20?  I think it is great that she is so active, but if I told her that I was calling a stranger to my door at 3am she'd comment with one of her famous quotes like, "What in the hell were you thinking when you thought that was a good idea?"

I was thinking of a ride...

However, I would never ask her what she is thinking.  I do want to live to be 50.

I did volunteer to go to her house and stay the night and get up at 3am to drive her to the Airporter.  Call me nuts.  I don't want her riding in a cold cab (with a stranger) oat the beginning of her vacation.

It is rare that my mother allows us kids to take care of her.  She is so damn independent, and treats me and my brother like we are still teenagers.  I love her to death though.  This was a chance to take care of her for a change.  I cannot begin to count the number of times she picked me up and dropped me off at the airporter during my days of past work travels.

Walking into my mothers home is like walking into a time capsule.  I often think of the scene in "Peggy Sue Got Married" where Kathleen Turner goes back into her old home and suddenly it dawns on her that she gets to spend time with her family again. Her reaction as she moves down the hall is surreal.

My brother and my high school graduation photos greet me at the entrance to my mother's home,along with the living room furniture we never could sit upon growing up.  It smells of "welcome home" and the comfort food of love.  Everything is always the same - the furniture, the figurines, the photos and the lighting.  There are no surprises.

Stew is cooking on the stove as the smell of all day home cooking fills the room, making me feel spoiled before I give her a hug,  Her petite frame stands over the kitchen counter as she reviews her latest Irish catalog.  Soda bread rests on the counter, a martini next to the stove.  I collapse across from her on a bar stool, just like I always did growing up.  She reaches for a wine glass and pours me a glass of wine, anxious to tell me the details of her trip.  I sip my wine and return to 21.

I love watching her.  She pushes the Irish catalog over to me as we eye the Gaelic jewelry.  She is already thinking of my Christmas gift.  Hell, I haven't even shopped for Brian's school stuff yet.  I enjoy the moment and show her the watches I like.  We talk of Ireland and travel.  I am my mother's focus.  Funny how we still enjoy being the center of our parent's attention - even at my age.

Her dinner is wonderful, as she fuses about me - refusing my help.  We retire with tea to her computer. I check for it to be in working order.  Suddenly at 8:30, I feel exhausted.  I retire to the spare room to dress for bed.  You'd swear my mother spent time in the military for the way her beds are made.  It is this perfect origami of sheets and blankets combined with the fresh scent of outdoors - like bedding should.

I pause for a moment to smell the pillows.  My old rag dolls grin up at me.  Their imaginary voices fill my head.  They are glad to see me home.  I decide to lay on the bed and hug my old favorite doll.  The next thing I know I awake to a dark room.  For a minute I can't figure out where I am.  It dawns on me that I fell asleep.  At some point my mother covered me up and turned the lights out.  I am still curled around my old rag doll.  Somehow the sight of her 46 year old daughter in bed with her rag doll doesn't seem to phase her. 

I am overcome with a sense of peace and drift back to sleep.  It is the best nights sleep I have had in years.  My mother gently shakes me awake at 2:45.  So much for taking care of her.  I get up, throw on my sweats and place her luggage in the back of the truck.  It looks as if she has been up for hours.  i see her off on her bus and drive back to her home.  I could have returned to my place, but I still wanted to languish a little longer in the feelings of security I experience in her home.

I sleep until 11:00.  Holy crap.

C 

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THE BAREFOOT CONTESSA

Ah see...here I go again...

It has been a week since I have laid my fingers to this keyboard and added my latest thoughts here.

There now is ...life from the back of a bike...

I like it.  It is funny when we move past age 40; past worrying about the silly things we think important the first 30+ years of our lives.  We enter into this stage of life where we just don't give a shit what people think.  We have a rather amusing comedy going on our heads about this world we travel through.  It's like it suddenly becomes this game of how odd we can make strangers think of us - and even a few people we would like to leave us alone.

Maybe this is what happened to Mel Gibson?  HA!  I doubt it - poor chap.  Nothing like telling the world how ugly one really believes it is and showing how ugly one is inside.  I have been on the receiving end of such an ugly drunken tirade from someone who called them self a friend.  It makes one ponder, "How long have you hated me this much?"  Then you shrug your shoulders, figure it is their demons and get about your life.  Mel sure has some religious demons... maybe he knows this so-called friend?

Bigotry. (Sigh)

Back to bicycling.

Yes, I have become one of 'those" women who rides in a skirt, flip flop sandals and hair blowing in the wind.  No football helmet or riding gear.  Just the wind and me.  It makes me feel eight years old. Back to the days of riding my stingray with its banana seat, high handle bars and those long summer days.  Two of my best friends could ride with me on my bike.  Down the streets we'd go screaming and laughing.  There were no helmet laws - only the wind flow and motion of energy from the back of a bike.  If I could ride in my bare feet these days - I probably would.

This bike has made me realize how long I have beentaking life oh so seriously.  For someone to whom one's friends find to be the comedian in the crowd - I have been stoically serious within my soul.  Maybe when we get sick, bundled with our responsibilities to our children - we forget to do the silly things.  The little pill bottles, which line the windowsill, in my kitchen, remind me daily of the gravity of my disease.  But when did I forget to kick off my shoes, put on a skirt, hop on a bike and coast down a hill - legs extended wide to my side?

My son Brian loves it.  Hopefully I won't break my baby toes - like I did so many times growing up.  My ballet coach was forever harping at me the danger of going bare footed outdoors.  I never listened.  I still prefer to be bare toed.  We came into the world this way.

I have found myself yelling "Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" as I race down hillsides, racing swiftly by cars.

I don't think I have ever yelled that during sex.

No matter how much I liked it.

People do yell how much they like my bike.  People in the neighborhoods I ride through are beginning to yell hello and my name.  We miss so much in the world from behind a windshield, talking on our cell phones with music playing.

I think they enjoy seeing this nut of a redhead cruising by on her retro bike with her Channel purse and flip flop sandals.  Some days Boonie the dog races at my side.  Nothing like a dog to show us the pure fun of racing through the wind.

I bumped into one of the Curves instructors who was concerningly apprehensive with me.  I was lost until I realized a neighbor probably directed her to my comments on this blog.  I forget this neighbor enjoys hunting down those I write about.  Talk about ones need to get a life.  But hey, just one more reader to this journal, right?  I find it humorous that some just cannot stay away.

This instructor is a nice person, just caught in a job she needs to support her son.  I like her, in spite of the silly Curves ways.  Hell, it isn't her fault - she is just doing her job.  And if it wasn't for the place I would not be riding my bike for an hour every day....right?

My bikes name is Betty.

Maybe that is what the guys are liking as I speed by ... girl on girl.

I am sensing some of you think I need to get out more.

Football season began for Brian this week.  It is back to nightly practices and sweaty gym socks.  I have missed the other parents and the kids.  It seems Brian is the boy with the largest chest and has proceeded to push every kid off the line.  This year'scoach is all over him, and the boys are gathering around him - shocked at his strength.  He is puffing up like a peacock.

So much so, that when the group of boys noticed that sometimes he can't get his words out, he was not daunted.  They asked, "Brian, why is it hard for you to get your words out sometimes?"  There he was - exposed -in front of his peers.  His answer, "I sometimes think faster than I can get the words out.  It happens to really smart people” The other boys, without missing a beat answer, "Yeh, that happens to me sometimes too".  And that was the end of it.  Later that night I asked him if that moment hurt his feelings, He responded, "No, they were just curious and probably want to help me".

Now that, my friends, is a big change.

I asked him if he thought I was a nut on my bike to which he replied, "No, I like your bike - you look cool."  I think he is really hoping for that new XBox 360 this Christmas...

We enjoyed a little rockin and rollin last night to the tune of an earthquake on Roberts Fault.  Somewhere a redhead was having sex...

I have become so used to them through my life. I rather think they are fun.  My very first earthquake experience was in grade school one night when my parents let me stay up late.  "Then Came Bronson" was just starting on the TV.  I was sitting on the couch next to my mother and the house began to shake.  I remember all the loud popping noises.  Our family stood under the front door frame.  There was a large blue flash over the Northern night's sky.  I was hooked.

Last night's ride was more the rolling type that comes without sound.  It even caught all the pets by surprise, as they did not respond until about 5 seconds into the quake.  Of course, I then had one hell of a time getting Brian to go to sleep.

School is just around the corner.  Brian is now in 6th grade.  Where do the years go?  It was just yesterday I was on the blue stingray bike with the banana seat riding up the middle of Alta Avenue ...

Bare feet and all.

Until next time-

C

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