Feet

Life here has been so over-the-top lately that it defies description. On Wednesday, however, a thin beam of sunshine made its way through the darkness. It is amazing how much  of a difference that can make.

I think sometimes about how a handful of stars in the night sky are a comfort, even if they don't illuminate your path. The thing is, you have to look up to see them. If all your energy is focused on your feet, on not-stumbling, you miss the solace and light that's given to you.

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I do believe feet are important, however. I mean, an awful lot is possible -- way more than we think -- when we concentrate on always taking the next step. Paralysis keeps you where you are, which usually makes matters worse. As Winston Churchill said, "When you're going through hell... keep going."

Sometimes our feet have more faith than our hearts. Sometimes, when hope is hard to come by, our feet keep us moving along the path of helping and serving and praying. They take us places and keep us doing the things we must do, even when we don't feel motivated or charitable or inspired.

People (myself included) make the mistake of thinking everything has to start from the heart. It's not so. Sometimes when we go ahead and do what needs to be done, eventually our heart catches on.

Odds and ends (again)

Andrew and I celebrated our 20th anniversary yesterday. It was a quiet celebration, crammed in between appointments and work and crises. Dancer made an almond cake from one of my favorite cookbooks, The Foods and Wines of Spain:

Big Guy helped me make Chinese Mango Chicken from the awesome Stir Frying to the Sky's Edge:

Andrew brought tulips and a bottle of wine. The kids raised a toast to us with sparkling cider. We didn't eat until late because of a plot twist with my PTSD child, who suddenly has intense paranoia. For a while we thought we'd be non-celebrating in the ER. And then this morning it looked again like we were on our way there. But so far we have squeaked past that. Could be a side effect of meds, could be something new.

You never know what the next ten minutes will bring. Sometimes it's peace. Sometimes it's not. Put a lot of ten-minuteses together, and somehow you arrive at 20 years.

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We had a piece of good news today: the College Board granted all of our requests for accommodations for the SAT for Big Guy. We'd been told the best chance of success would be to be able to include a letter from his doctor outlining the specific medical reason/diagnosis for each accommodation needed. Big Guy takes the test in June.

Which reminds me: I need to buy gauze today for his infected toes. Yes, I know that's a non-sequiteur.

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I haven't felt like writing lately, which is odd. There's too much going on, with too many people, on too many levels, to filter it all and order it into words and sentences and paragraphs. Yet one of the main ways I make sense out of chaos is by putting it in words. 

Also, I'm kind of fried from editing six masters' theses in two weeks. Dunno how Martin Luther nailed 95 of'em.

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Little Guy's end-of-year standardized test arrived the other day. I stared at it, astonished that I'd remember to order the thing. This is the kind of thing that, pre-children, I never would have known could make a mother happy. Really? You're proud that you remembered to do something that's been on your to-do list for a month?! Yes, really.

Recovering from fear

The subways in our part of town are deep underground, so deep that there are large elevators to bring you to the surface. On Tuesday night Little Guy, two Cub Scout friends, and a Cub Scout dad and I got onto the elevator on our way home. As the doors closed a white man suddenly yelled at a tall young black woman, "Why do you keep pushing me?" She smiled weakly and gave him an I-don't-know-what-you're-talking about look; it was clear she didn't know him, and was taking the New York approach to avoiding conflict. Then he whacked her take-home dinner out of her hands and onto the floor, and started yelling and punching her.

People immediately intervened. He stopped, but then started again. At one point (it felt like a long elevator ride!) four of us had him backed against the wall, and yet he was still shouting at the woman. I could smell alcohol on his breath. He barely seemed to notice that he was surrounded; he still wanted a fight.

The boys, thankfully, could not see what was happening because they were on the other side of the car. I could hear them shrieking, "I'm scared!" When we finally got to street level one said, "Let's get out of here!" and they took off. I was relieved; you never know which way fear will go, and it was better that they were out of the way than frozen in place. I later learned that someone told them to stick together. They did.

As the car emptied, five of us stayed to make sure the woman was able to get off safely. The drunk was still ready to charge at her. It took a minute or so for us to get off the car, then a couple of minutes to get out of the station vestibule. When we finally got outside, the drunk was still trying to continue the fight. At that point the woman took a picture of him with her phone; he whacked the phone out of her hand. I called 911. A young man took off his backpack and offered to fight the man if he wanted a fight. The assaulted woman urged him not to. He listened to her.

The police arrived, and the good people of my neighborhood, the ones who immediately stood up for the woman, who stayed to keep her safe, also stayed to talk to the police. It's not enough to just place the call; if the police arrive and no one is there to act as a witness, there's not much they can do.

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At some point in our lives, most of us accept that we can't control everything. There are people who do bad things and make bad choices, and the best we can do is choose to do the right thing in response. I was very, very glad to live in my neighborhood on Tuesday night. People chose to do the right thing. The woman will have to live with this crazy memory, but she'll also have the memory of people helping her, protecting her, sticking by her.

Little Guy is nine, and he doesn't have that kind of perspective.  It was a scary situation, and he was terrified. "I was scared the man was going to hit you, Mommy!" he told me later. Well, yes. That was a possibility. The guy, in fact, did take a swing at me (though my son didn't see it).

I told Little Guy this was the first time I've ever seen something like this in my 25 years in New York. That didn't provide much comfort to him.

Little Guy said, dozens of times, "I'm scared!" I eventually said, "You sound like a CD that's gotten stuck!" He laughed. I suggested amending the thought, as in, "I'm scared... and I'm okay" or "I'm scared... and everyone did the right thing." It was a good idea, and for a less-anxious kid it might have worked.

I talked him through all the good things that had happened: that people made good choices, that they helped the woman, that they came forth as witnesses, that no one was seriously hurt, that he and his buddies made a good decision to get out of there, that the police were helpful. I asked him to think of the things he could be thankful for. That took the edge off his fear... momentarily.

I had him do his deep breathing. We identified the thinking traps he was in ("it will always be like this" and "expecting bad things to happen"). We prayed for the people involved, including the drunk man. Finally, he went to sleep.

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I was talking to my PTSD kid's home therapist (someone comes to our house on the days we don't visit the regular therapist), who noted that if you have three babies in a room and a book falls on the floor, one may wail, one may startle, and one may barely notice the sound. We each have an innate sensitivity to things that cause distress. With babies, adults tend to respond to this sensitivity as a need, picking up the wailing infant, perhaps patting the one who startled, and merely smiling in the direction of the low-maintenance child. With kids, we tend to view it as a character flaw, or at least as an annoyance. As children get older, we somehow expect things to equalize. They don't, necessarily. At least not without help.

People also differ in how long it takes them to "return to baseline". If three babies respond with equal distress to a stimulus, one may recover in a few moments, another in a few minutes, and still another after ten minutes. It helps to know that this is innate as well, because it frames the problem of a slow-returner differently, perhaps lowering the likelihood of parental exasperation. We tend to expect that by a certain age all kids will get over an upset within some remotely reasonable timeframe. Not all do, or can, without tools to help them.

Note that none of this is a matter of the child being "not normal" -- their responses to fear are entirely normal for them. The issue to focus on is how to help the child become more functional. A baby needs mom to soothe her; a child needs mom to help her learn how to soothe herself. Kids who have a naturally slow return to baseline need techniques to help them re-frame situations and calm themselves a bit faster.

Fear happens. So does recovery from it. Eventually.  

Hope, in the moment

In recent years I've realized that much of what passes for hope these days is hope for an outcome. This is interesting (not to mention challenging) to me, because as a person of faith I'm called to have hope. Specifically, I'm called to have hope in God. That is different than hoping God will do something for me, like give me the outcome I want.

Last night I went for a walk with a neighborhood friend. She, too, is facing numerous  challenges. As I told her a bit of what was going on in my life, she rolled her eyes and said, "You must be constantly praying, 'Lord, get me through this!'"

"Well actually, no," I replied, surprised to hear myself say it, "I've almost completely stopped praying that." And it's true. Somewhere in recent months, as things have reached ever more ridiculous levels of impossibility, I've stopped the Calgon prayers. My first impulse is no longer to escape, but to be present.

A few weeks back I was trying to encourage/persuade/convince my PTSD child to break a large task (getting up and getting dressed) into smaller chunks. First, sit up. After that, stand up. Then take off the jammie top. Etcetera. We were aiming for the really basic stuff. The child refused to do any of it, because it was too scary.

I could feel my frustration rising, which is what happens when I don't know what to do. So I did what I always do in that (embarrassingly common) situation: I prayed for the words that were needed.

What came out was this: "I'm not asking you to do anything you can't. But I am asking you to do every single thing that you can."

Oh. Oh, yes! That was exactly it. If you can sit up, do that, and focus only on that one thing. If you can stand up, do that, and focus on the one thing. Do what you can, step by step, until you reach the point where you truly cannot go further.

It was exactly what I needed to hear, too. Because I think that's what God asks of us: to do every single thing we can do.

God doesn't ask me to handle this whole impossible thing: in this moment, I'm being asked to do what's required for this moment. That's all. And that I can do. It's the old, "Take care of the moment, and you take care of eternity" thing.

Here's the thing:
I can't do it if I'm focused on more than what is asked of me for that moment.
I can't do it if I'm focused on what I fear will be asked of me in the future.
I can't do it if I'm focused on how much I don't want to be in this situation.
I can't do it if I'm focused on the echoes of past difficulties or frustrations.
I can't do it if I'm focused on my lack of wisdom on what to do.
I can't do it if I'm focused on anything other than being 100% there, open to whatever I need to be open to, with a heart that yearns to do what is asked of me.

It helps me understand hope in God differently. And to have more hope, in general.

It makes so much sense to me. Does it make sense to you?

Life with a child in crisis

My child sobbed the other day, "Mommy, I'm sorry I'm broken. I don't want to create problems for the family."

I swallowed the football-size lump in my throat enough to reply, "Sweetie, I'm sad, too." Pause. Think. Pray. Then, "None of us want you to be broken. But you don't have to feel bad about the fact that you've fallen apart. And you don't have to stay broken, you know. We're all working to help you get put back together"

Oh, it's hard. It's hard to see your child suffer, hard to not-know if or when things will turn around, hard to manage a very complex situation. One afternoon last week I felt like a total failure. I told my child's therapist that it is wearying to try so hard and to give everything I have to give, and still not succeed. She replied gently, "Your child is alive. Your child is not in the hospital. That is success. That is because of you."

I dried my tears and thought, Okay. I can hold on to that. It's not much. On the other hand, it's everything.

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The child in crisis is perpetually cranky, snapping irrationally at minor things, melting down over next to nothing. Not surprisingly, this triggers the other children. They don't like being screamed at, they feel unjustly accused, they snap back. The family is a pinball machine of anxiety, with one kid pinging off another. The situation exacerbates Big Guy's anxiety issues, another child's anxiety issues, Andrew's anxiety issues.

I keep an eye on my own tension level. When others start to blow I whisper, "Use a gentle voice. Stay calm. Get through the next five minutes." I succeed at this a surprising amount of the time. This is not due to me; it's abundantly clear that I'm not capable of doing what I'm doing. Someone, somewhere must be praying for me. For this I am thankful.

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There is another snarling-screaming-weeping child incident and I dig deep, searching to find compassion. I know that somewhere behind my child's rank irritability lies pain, and I need to respond to that rather than react to the behavior it causes.

It is hard to shove aside my desire to scream, explode, snap back. I do it because although the short-term effort is exhausting, the long-term consequence of falling apart myself is too expensive to contemplate.

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At night I wrestle with my ego. It is hard to feel like a good mom when your child falls apart. I cringe at the thought that I've ever offered advice to anyone. Who, me? Me, whose family seems to be in perpetual crisis?

I grapple with the difference between shame and humility. Shame is the I don't want others to know piece, the fig leaf behind which I hide to preserve the image I want people (including myself) to have of me. Humility is honest nakedness, the here-I-am-ness, the willingness to say, "This is hard and I'm bumbling along, probably making mistakes... stay with me. Please."

Sometimes heroism consists of doing something as simple as crumbling the fig leaf. Sometimes, but not always, I can be heroic.

Staying calm, staying safe

A long while back I made up a list of things kids need to know before heading off to college. To this I will add the following:

        If there's national news taking place near you, call home.

Um... yeah. Eldest is safe. She was not at the marathon, she was not in the building where the security officer was shot, she is apparently not too distraught. I believe the colleges are all still on lockdown, and the wildest activity seems to have moved to different parts of town.

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In its own way it's easier to be close to a disaster than far away. After 9/11 the people of New York had the advantage of a) knowing just how bad things really were (which is far better than imagining), and b) hearing all the survivor stories. Walking down the street made one infinitely grateful to be alive. Seeing neighbors I barely knew gave me joy. For weeks what we heard about were the close shaves, the common experiences of survival. It was a lot of humanity; from a distance and in the news you don't hear about the many, many gestures of goodwill that follow in the wake of tragedy.

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Two FREE stress-reduction resources we've discovered, which may be helpful to someone, somewhere:

PTSD Coach is an app with a variety of tools for soothing anxiety. Worth having if you're prone to stress or panic; don't get scared off by the name.

Free guided meditation and relaxation MP3 recordings from NYU help bring down the adrenaline and refocus thoughts away from the negative.

A good day

We had a good day today. I am taking note of it, because we have been having such a long string of hard days that I felt almost giddy with repeating, "Thank you!" today.

There are things I want to write about but can't, out of respect for the privacy of my kids. Suffice it to say that Big Guy's 911 incident triggered some major difficulty for one child, who has now been diagnosed with PTSD. We're talking visceral nightmares, panic attacks, endless waves of anxiety, spurts of rage and irrational behavior. It's been a ride. At the same time, another child has been having aftereffects that flare up once a week or so, and trigger other problems. (What can I say? -- around here, it's hard to be a contender in the Crisis Olympics!)

One blessing: my dad arrived on Monday for an 8-day visit. He'd asked what he could do to help, and when I couldn't think of anything concrete, he offered to come and simply be. It is an amazing comfort. Plus he cooked supper for us last night. He's 80, and you may recall he broke his back two years in a row and then got hit by a car and still goes skiing.

Another blessing: we have so, so many good people helping us.

Another blessing: our state-sponsored insurance is covering crisis intervention, therapy, everything.

Another blessing: I think I have been more patient in the past month than any other time in my life. That isn't to say I'm approaching perfection, but I feel I've finally learned something. If I figure out what it is, I'll tell you. If not, I'm sure I'll need to learn it again, anyway.

Another blessing: All those years of learning to break big problems down into smaller problems have been really, really helpful. That's helped me develop the habit of focusing on what I can do instead of on what I can't. This is incredibly useful. A related thought: I love the point that the Heath brothers make in Switch, that although we tend to think a crater-size problem requires a crater-size solution, it doesn't. You can fill in a crater a pebble at a time. Sometimes that's the only choice you have: to do the little stuff that takes you a little bit closer to your goal.

Another blessing: I have had a ton of work, and somehow that has kept me sane (and driven me crazy, too, for lack of time to do it.)

Another blessing: The dog sprained his tail. It was one of those weirdnesses that makes you realize that life can be plain quirky at times. Although he looked pathetic and sad, shifting uncomfortably when he tried to sit down, the sheer ludicrousness of a dog spraining his tail kind of made life more bearable. (He's getting better now, and can wag again. Which is another blessing.)

I have no illusions that today is the start of a good trend; I can't afford to think like that. I don't know what tomorrow will bring. I do know that today brought thankfulness, and a respite, and a chance to be happy for a while. I figure my job is to treasure this day in my heart, so that on some bleak day in the future I can take out the memory, and remember that gray is not the color of eternity. There are other colors splashed into my life, too.