the strength of womanhood

Strength in surrendering

All I could do this past weekend was go for a walk in our serene Arb, communing with the trees and prairie grass. Then I got to a crossroads and I paused. I wanted to walk on, but I wasn't sure I had the time for it. A woman who'd been walking in front of me had sat down on a log and was overlooking the view, I thought, and I didn't want her to think I had paused just to follow her next move. So I explained. "I don't know which way I should go." I can't recall the order of our sharing past that, but it sort of went like this (condensed version; I talk fast, so a lot more went into it):

She: "I just want to take the path you don't take."
Me: "I'm just trying to figure out if I have the time for the longer route. I'd really like to take the longer route."
She: "I just want to be here in the Arb. I'm supposed to meet some friends at the college for a concert and it's supposed to be fun, but I just want to be here."
Me: "... I can't decide. I am coming undone."
She: "So am I!!!!"

So then I gave her a big hug.

And then we talked.

the f*ck is my life

This is no f*ck

I went to a friend's mother blessing yesterday and it was good. It was good, because it was real. It was good because it wasn't all about showering her with gifts and well-wishes, though we gave her those too. It was good because we also shared our losses and pains and our sorrows and worries, even as we celebrated the arrival of new life and the strength of motherhood. As a friend of mine pointed out, the fact that we can so genuinely share our times of heartache makes the celebration of our times of joy all the more heartfelt.

Pain and love always coexist, another friend commented.

I take great comfort in my circle of mama friends; we are the rock mamas.

I need this kind of communal comfort these days. Feeling the ground shifting beneath me, I find comfort in coming together to share pain — and joy. Just life.

There is a section in Cheryl Strayed's bestselling collection of advice columns originally published at the Rumpus Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar that really resonated with me. It's a column she wrote in response to a reader's query that simply asked "WTF, WTF, WTF?" Cheryl responds by sharing one of her own immensely fucked-up childhood experiences of her father's father having her jack him off when she was three, four, and five.

wild: staring down fear and aloneness

I picked up Cheryl Strayed's Wild because I so loved Lidia Yuknavitch's The Chronology of Water featuring one woman's journey from loss and hurt to empowerment and peace through the rugged path of alcohol, drugs, and a lot of sex. The marketing of Wild made it sound like the two women had some things in common (and in fact they belong to the same writers' group). And they do. All of us on healing journeys do. But this one was different. Like with The Chronology of Water I got hooked but not quite as viscerally. The waters didn't run as deep nor wild in Wild I thought whereas reading The Chronology of Water was an immensely cleansing experience.

Yet I couldn't put Wild down and I found it both greatly entertaining while also rather lovely and even poetic at times. Subtitled From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail it features memories from Strayed's childhood and recounts how her own first marriage as well as her family fell apart when her mother died from cancer when Strayed was only twenty-two. On the trail four years later, she is forced to come to terms with the aloneness and fear she'd sought to numb in heroine and sexual affairs. Tapping into her own strength, and detecting her connectedness with it all, she comes out on a quite beautiful note.

fighting the US resistance to taking a break

It started out slowly. The sigh-it-out feeling of relief; that things are coming together; my first book will soon be released (which I hope will free and inspire a lot of moms and women — and dads and men! — in general to claim, own, and explore their sexuality on their terms). Suddenly all the blogging and Facebooking and Tweeting just seemed less urgent. Plus, the days were getting longer, warmer, sunnier. And are still lovingly long, warm, and sunny, even if we've passed the solstice.

I grew up in Scandinavia, light and heat deprived and all: how could I not seize the moment to soak in pleasure and joy right now?

So I did. Like I've done many times before (though not last summer when I was crunching in work hours to get said book done).

Taking time off is definitely not an uncommon thing to do for me and most of my fellow Norwegians (who claim five weeks of paid vacation each summer), as well as numerous continental Europeans. On the contrary: we take pride in it. Which is so unlike most Americans who in the US take pride in their workaholocism though their production and achievement focused obsession shows no improvement is results from those of the Europeans.

the vulnerability of writing

I'm writing a new book and it makes me feel skinless. It's a painful and slow process and it's all I can to do. I write and I cringe and I edit and write and cringe over and over again. I become hyper critical of my writing. I look at old posts and I cringe. I look at new posts and I cringe.

Leighton reminds me it's always like this for me when I start a new writing project, that this is also how it was when I was in the early stages of writing my After Pornified book. I would write and go back and cringe and edit, over and over again.

getting up and going down

Lilly turned four last Friday: goggles was on the top of her wishlist. She tried them on in the bathtub last weekend as the rain poured down outside, and then when we went to the pool on Monday, she excitedly started jumping up and down, prepping to duck her head down beneath water. And then she did it! Just like that. She enthusiastically kept jumping and ducking up and down, over and over again.

It's not that she's fearless or reckless; it's not that there isn't some apprehension. It's just that this is something she's been wanting to do, testing the waters to do, for a very long time. Lilly, as a close friend of mine once pointed out, very much demonstrates a sense of caution and competence. The quality of standing back and observing, making judgment of what she may or may not be capable of doing; what may or may not be wise to be doing; what she truly would like to be doing or not. I'm quite impressed and invigorated by this modeling; I'd like to do the same.

So this week, I've worked on kicking up into handstand.

french parenting is not for me

Pamela Druckerman: wannabe French

I got interested in Pamela Druckerman's memoir Bringing up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting based on a couple of reviews that suggested I had some things in common with French moms. As it turns out, we got just about nothing in common. Nor do I care much for their approach to parenting.

Druckerman, on the other hand, does. Druckerman is practically drooling in awe over French moms' approach to parenting, from how they get their kids to sleep, eat, and behave so well, to their attention to adult time and sassy looks.

Of course, all these things sound great. But then take a minute to pause as Druckerman learns to do the French way with her children and consider this: practicing the pause in terms of (not) checking on their babies when they are learning to "do their nights" when only a few days or weeks old (and at least by three months) is the same as Ferberizing or even crying it out at a very young age. It only has a different name and since "everyone" in France practices it, nobody worries about it either.

people who never get angry frighten me

One of the things I respect the most in people is relentless honesty including on the less finer moments of life. Like couples' arguments, of which you don't see too many blunt personal anecdotes, despite their commonness and recent research finding couples arguing stay together. Which is why I ultimately fell in love with Poser with its forthright disclosure of everything, including marital bickering which the author, Claire Dederer, comes to see "not as the beginning of the end of the world but as just another way families communicate." "We bickered pleasantly," she concludes.

Recounts Dederer earlier in her book about a "not entirely successful" date night out, "that vaunted American custom," which, when you are married "buzzes irritatingly on the periphery of your consciousness, the way New Year's Eve does for single people." They were out on a date night to celebrate her birthday, but both were exhausted, possibly with the flu, and on deadlines. Feeling rebellion fomenting on her side of the table at the lack of her husband's courtship and conversation, she "glared briefly" at her husband.

witches and yogis: lining up my people in times of trouble

"In times of trial and tribulations, I line up my line of people," mused my therapist in last week's session. She went on listing sever spiritual leaders, some poets and a few philosophers. She explained that in situations like my own where there are no parents to "hold you" and "call you forward," one can find other figures to provide that sense of safety and support.

This sentiment makes such good sense to me; I left our session with a profound sense of hope. Until later in the week, I found myself floundering. Because, who are my line of people? Have I failed to do my homework here? Am I that alone?

attachment parenting and feminism

Photo: Chasing Virtue
New York Times review of Poser

I'm in the midst of Poser: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses by Claire Dederer, a self-conscious freelance book critic and new mom, surrounded by North Seattle's organically living attachment parenting moms. Dederer's voice is funny and often right on in pointing out how exhausting attachment parenting can be. Still, I find myself viscerally reacting against some of what she's saying.

What bothers me, I think, is how Dederer puts up this simplistic division between her mom's generation of women who, intoxicated by the women's movement, left their families to pursue their own lives, turning their children into attachment parenting moms with mommy brains on a mission. That just doesn't sit with my own experiences of attachment parenting as a feminist woman:

Which is why I found blue milk's recent post on feminism and attachment parenting, and why they’ve more in common than in conflict. Excerpt:

peace, love, courage: a yogi's mindful approach to birthdays

My birthday falls on the first day of spring, and spring is my favorite season, but not for that reason.

Spring has that ecstatic sentiment of new life to it—the rejuvenation of life—but also a tender, almost vulnerable, skinless feel to it.

Some spring days have me flying high, and I've been known to take my birthday celebration seriously. But this year I wanted a more mellow observation. Something sincerely true to where I'm at in my life right now. Which is a mixed bag.

Professionally, I really am flying high. I have a book coming out this fall; I got a new job; and I've been invited to give talks and readings from my book this fall in places around the world, including in Mexico, Norway, Germany, and England. I also have found more balance in my life, with more hours for me to work, and more opportunities for dates. I even got an extra special early pass at the gym, so my time working out there won't interfere with my work-work time.

different cultural approaches to parenting and uses of homes: books i'd like to read

Summer arrived this past weekend just in time for spring break, and it makes me want to kick back and relax in the sunshine with a good book. Of course, that's not so easily done when you have a 3-year-old home from preschool all week, but should the opportunity arise, these are a few of the books I'm eager to get my nose into:

• Bringing Up Bebe: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting by Pamela Druckerman.
  The balanced, laissez-faire style of parenting her memoir recounts appeals to my own approach to parenting. "Most French children, unlike many of their American counterparts, did not need to be entertained constantly by their parents," explains Druckerman to NPR. — "'French children seem to be able to play by themselves in a way.' Some might see this scenario as evidence that the French are less thrilled with having children and are more selfish as parents than their American counterparts who are constantly playing with their children. But Druckerman does not think this is the case. 'The French view is really one of balance, I think. ... What French women would tell me over and over is, it's very important that no part of your life — not being a mom, not being a worker, not being a wife — overwhelms the other part.'"

now, where was i? diagnosed with add as an adult

I almost leaped up from the couch when my therapist asked if I'd ever been tested for ADD. Back in 2006, after my second round of therapy, I was almost convinced by a person I met at a conference that I had ADD. It would explain so many things! Difficulties concentrating in numerous ways that I had worked so hard to cover up and compensate for, especially as a scholar and teacher, and even as a friend.

I immediately called a friend I thought would sympathize, but was brushed off with a "that's just talk." How could I have achieved so much, intellectually and academically, if I had ADD?

i could be tilling the soil

I am a stay-at-home-mama-writer who struggles with guilt. How about you? If you're a stay-at-home-parent who's also pursuing your own work, do you feel guilt too?

I posed this question to a friend and fellow mama-writer in town at a book reading she had from her hot-off-the-press stay-at-home mom manual earlier this week (cover pictured). She answered no, not so much; your standards sort of slide, she explained (as a mother of two).

I know I probably worry too much because I dread so much being anything like my mom. I also know it's my responsibility, and certainly not my child's, to set the boundaries I need to ensure I get enough done of what's important for me to stay sane.

We live in a more child oriented time than ever. Many of us structure our lives around our new babies (unlike tiger moms and French parents who apparently expect a baby to smoothly fit into the life they already have). I've written that:

i'm pregnant, but not in the typical way

I Am Not a Goner

This post is about giving birth. To a book. The two things I've been hoping the most for lately are a baby and a book. So, we've been having more sex (not a bad thing), and I've been working longer hours at night (yes; yet again). Now, listen to this: I submitted a query for my now soon-to-be-published book to the publisher (that has since offered me a contract) on the day I had penned down in my planner that I was probably ovulating. When I early one morning after that received a response telling me they were interested, and I jumped into bed to wake Leighton to tell him, his response was that it was just like when I jumped into bed years back to tell him my pregnancy test was positive.

And it felt the same way.

I really would like to be pregnant with a baby again too. I really would like another child in our little family.

But I really also want to give birth to a book. Recently, I've found myself intensely missing more of my professional self. I miss conferences and giving talks. Teaching college students. Having more patient students to teach. Engaging in more complex conversations.

balance, schmalance and sheet therapy

I’ve read somewhere that depression is worrying about the past, and anxiety is worrying about the future. I've been doing a lot of both lately. And aside from writing about it here now and then, I haven't done that necessary murking around, as my therapist calls it, not to feel like there's this huge tsunami brewing that will wash over and drown me.

So I went back to therapy this week for a third round of serious murking around. I realized when talking with my therapist that I had somehow fooled myself into thinking that my previous rounds of therapy had, if not fixed me, at least sort of allowed me to take care of business and put it behind me. Not true. The wound inside will always be there. I can distract myself as best as I can, but it won't make it go away. And the more I avoid going there, the more I refuse to let it be part of me, the uglier and more ashamed I feel.

did you set out to sleep train your child?

Working on my sleep question book again, I'm struck by the absence of the hardcore sleep trainer. Sure, there are several moms and dads who've shared their experiences using some form of the Ferber method with its recommended intervals of crying, or the Baby Wise sleep scheduling and cry-it-out approach, or Dr. Weissbluth's solution of "controlled crying" or "all crying" ("extinction"), but I have yet to find a first-time parent that set out to sleep train from the get-go. While some are quicker to turn to sleep training, and all seem happy with the results, most moms and dads who've shared their experiences with me, resorted to sleep training as a final recourse after much sleepless agony.

When I started my sleep question project, I imagined I'd find one camp of co-sleepers and nurse-on-demand mamas, and another die-hard camp of sleep trainers and child behavior schedulers. What I've found instead are these murky waters of a lot of in-between and a-little-of-all.

Which is why I now wonder: is there anybody out there who set out to sleep train their firstborn child from the outset? Did you or do you know someone who did? Please comment or email me at anne(at)lovesexfamily.com. And please pass this on to other moms and dads. Thanks!

i was nothing, no one, i was everything to her

As we approach the birth of a new year, I'd like to share one of my favorite poems about birth:

"First Birth"

I had thought so little, really, of her,
inside me, all that time, not breathing--
intelligent, maybe curious,
her eyes closed. When the vagina opened,
slowly, from within, from the top, my eyes
rounded in shock and awe, it was like being
entered for the first time, but entered
from the inside, the child coming in
from the other world. Enormous, stately,
she was pressed through the channel, she turned, and rose,
they held her up by a very small ankle,
she dangled indigo and scarlet, and spread
her arms out in this world. Each thing
I did, then, I did for the first
time, touched the flesh of our flesh,
brought the tiny mouth to my breast,
she drew the avalanche of milk,
down off the mountain, I felt as if
I was nothing, no one, I was everything to her, I was hers.

                                                                                        By Sharon Olds (Morning Song)

expecting

A couple of my friends are expecting, which made me think of this amazing poem, also from Morning Song: Poems for New Parents:

Grave, my wife lies back, hands cross

her chest, while the doctor searches early

for your heartbeat, peach pit, unripe

plum--pulls out the world's worst

boom box, a Mr. Microphone, to broadcast

your mother's lifting belly.

The whoosh and bellows of mama's body

and beneath it: nothing. Beaneath

the slow stutter of her heart: nothing.

The doctor trying again to find you, fragile

fern, snowflake. Nothing.

After, my wife will say, in fear,

go the fuck to sleep

I am returning to my Sleep Question book this week. In that spirit, I'm posting this You Tube video of Samuel L. Jackson reading the parody childrens book, Go the Fuck to Sleep, which has seen a runaway success.

If The Sleep Question won't be as laugh-out hilarious, I can promise you that it will make you feel as unjudged and not alone.