Prayer (A New Year's Resolution)

 Last night, I prayed for the first time in what seems like ages. When I say I prayed, I mean I said a prayer other than “God protect us” or “In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit”. I prayed the Lord’s Prayer focusing intently on its meaning. When I finished with the Lord’s Prayer, I prayed a Hail Mary, trying desperately to feel the immediate presence of God.

            Before I was struck with crippling anxiety and depression, I had an overwhelming awareness of God’s presence in my everyday life. When life was difficult, sad, or at times lonely, I could feel, deep down in my gut, that He was present; that things were going to be OK; that I was not walking alone. During life’s most tumultuous moments, a sense of peace would settle over me. I experienced a certain clarity of mind. There was always a light at the end of the tunnel. The right people came into my life at just the right moments. People with whom I shared a special connection. God’s presence was not only felt but known.

            Unfortunately, anxiety and depression have a way of robbing you of your peace of mind, clarity, and connections. Even with medication management, I am in a constant state of turmoil, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, and for life to throw me a crushing curve ball. Most days, I feel unable to carry the weight of my responsibilities and feel as if I am deep within a mine shaft with no visible light. Anxiety and depression have robbed me of my peace of mind. They have exposed and exploited my vulnerabilities and fears, and in doing so have made faith, and trust in my gut nearly impossible. I feel as if I am simply a shell of my former self. Though I still believe in God, I no longer feel His presence. He is no longer a known entity. 

            Because of my mental health, and the battles I continue to fight, I can’t envision my relationship with God ever being the same as it once was. Relationships, even those with a deity, are complicated and require constant care. As the new year approaches, I have vowed to care more for myself, to nurture my relationship with myself. I hope that in doing so, I will have the energy to nurture all the relationships in my life, including my relationship with God. 

Back to School Stress

This week, parents throughout the country ushered their children back to school. Many parents were giddy while they packed lunches, bagged back to school supplies, and packed lunches. After a year, and a summer, filled with too much together time, these parents were relieved to watch their children step out of their houses and into school buildings. They are celebrating the friendships nurtured within the walls of school buildings, the student-teacher relationships being formed, and the academic progress their children will make. These parents happily kiss their children goodbye each morning, and cheerfully greet them at the end of the day. The schoolyear is, for them, a reprieve from the grind of parenting, and a time for their children to grow and learn. For me, the schoolyear ushers in a grueling schedule, afterschool meltdowns, and a year filled with sickness and stress.

I am not, and never have been a morning person. There is nothing pleasurable about rising before the sun. Getting up early is, however, a necessity during the schoolyear. Most evenings, I sleep, at most, in 3-hour increments due to Lily’s diabetes. Once awake, it can take me anywhere from 15 minutes to 2 hours to go back to sleep. Even with an early bedtime, an early morning does not allow me enough time to get the necessary sleep to feel refreshed and revived. Getting up at 6:30 am, 5 days a week, for 9.5 months, is exhausting not only for me, but also for my children, resulting in meltdowns and sickness. 

Meltdowns are a regular part of the schoolyear for my children. Not only are they exhausted from rising early each day, but also from “keeping it together” throughout the day. The addition of homework does not help their stress level, or mine. Completing homework is difficult on a good day, impossible on a bad day. Tears have been shed, math sheets have been torn in rage, and reading logs have been turned in partially completed just to save what little sanity the schoolyear leaves us.

Many parents are unbothered by their children getting sick. Fevers, vomit, and snot are just consequences of having children. Sickness stresses me the fuck out, and schools are cesspools. We have had years where my children have been sick more than they have been healthy. I have visited the doctor every week or two for months on end, and I am not a parent who takes my children to the doctor for every cough or sneeze. My stress is compounded by having a child with diabetes. Even the simplest cold can mess with her sugar and cause more severe problems. Living in the time of COVID is only exacerbating my anxiety.

For the past two years I have homeschooled both my children. We have had the ability to wake up late, form a work schedule that works for us that does not include homework, and avoid much of the sickness acquired at school. Though we made an effort to socialize our children by involving them in extracurricular activities, my youngest wanted to attend school this year to have more social interaction on a daily basis. I was not giddy packing her lunch and checking her backpack this week. I was, however, exhausted and anxious throughout the week. She was excited and cheerful. I can only hope that we have a year filled with health, happiness, and academic and personal growth. One that I can call successful, rather than stressful.

  

Finding My Footing: Eleven Years in Baltimore, MD.

 In 1998, I was living in Portland, Oregon with relatively few friends, 13 hours from my brother, and 3000 miles from my parents. I was going to school full-time, working part-time, living in an apartment with a roommate I hardly knew, and holding out hope that my ex-boyfriend would come back to me and willingly continue our relationship. I spent many a night on the phone with my parents crying due to a broken heart, which was made worse by a lack of support and an ex who continually fanned the fires with sporadic phone calls and requests to meet up periodically. 

Therefore, I was excited when my parents declared their intention of driving across country to visit me that summer. However, that joy turned to panic and a bit of chaos after a particularly heated conversation with my ex, resulting in my impatience with heartache and loneliness. Three days before arriving in Portland, I informed my parents that I was done with it all for the time being, including Portland. In the course of a week we packed my apartment and headed east on an adventurous cross-country journey. 

When I left Portland, I had every intention of returning. Baltimore was meant to be a temporary solution to my problems. If someone had told me that I would meet my husband and live there for 11 years, I would have scoffed in disbelief.

Baltimore is both an interesting and colorful place. The city is divided into neighborhoods, each with their own personality. In Baltimore stereotypes come alive before your eyes. Though a big city, it feels much more like a small town. You can’t go to the grocery store without seeing someone you know, and everyone is either related by birth or marriage. Baltimore is an incredibly Catholic city with an extensive private school system. When people ask where you went to school, they are referring to your high school, not your college. Every summer the city empties and the population flocks to Ocean City on the Eastern Shore, together. People born in Baltimore rarely leave, and if they do, they often return to the city to live. People either don’t change or embrace change very slowly in Baltimore. Baltimore is steeped in tradition. Because my California upbringing was so different, it is not surprising that in the eleven years that I lived there, I never really found my footing.

Within months of moving to Baltimore, I met my husband. Raised in the Baltimore area, a product of the private school system, my husband was, in many respects, a typical Baltimorean. He was raised in a conservative Catholic family, was working at his high school, and had no desire to leave the Baltimore area. Though I was in college building my own group of friends, fitting into his world was, at times, like trying to fit into a foreign country. Not only was I not from Baltimore, but I was a liberal, Protestant Californian with the continuing desire to move back to the West coast. 

Upon graduating from college, I had every intention of moving back to Portland. However, my husband and I were in a seriously committed relationship and I had to make a choice between the West or him. I chose him.

After several interviews, I received a job teaching at a girls’ Catholic school in Baltimore City. It was here that the difference in values between my liberal Protestant upbringing and Baltimore Catholicism became glaringly clear. I was not part of the Baltimore community, but an outsider who was asking for change where change was unwanted. I barely made through the year. 

When I took a job at one of the few secular private schools that focused on experiential learning, I thought I had found my people. However, I soon learned that I was not a liberal as I thought. The interim principal and I interpreted and approached experiential learning, as well as education, differently. I believed you studied a subject first and then experienced it later to further enhance knowledge. She was of the opinion that sitting in a field of flowers was all the experience one needed to learn all there was to know about flowers. I believed in raised hands and listening ears. When she taught, her classroom was a free-for-all. She wanted me to eat, sleep, and breathe the job, like she had done for many years. Once again, I found myself asking for change where change was unwanted. I knew I was finished when, at the end of the year, she expressed her desire for me return, if I could explain to her, in writing, how I was going to better fit into the school community the next year. 

Professionally, Baltimore was a bust. I had a hard time finding teaching jobs because I was a newcomer to Baltimore. I had not been raised there. I had not attended the private schools in the area, and I was related only to my parents, who were also newcomers to the area. I had neither the right connections, nor the right relatives. I wasn’t Catholic and could not embrace Catholic doctrine. I asked for change, where change was unwanted.

Though my eleven years in Baltimore were not without challenges, they also were not entirely wasted. I fell in love with and married my husband. I met several of my best, lifelong friends. My first daughter was conceived through IVF and born in Baltimore. I encountered colorful individuals. I experienced and learned from my mishaps and mistakes. As a result of my time in Baltimore, I changed, I grew, and I learned to let go of expectations.

The Woman By The Well: Learning To Love And Be Loved

          I grew up in a fairly religious household. We attended church each Sunday, went on mission trips and church retreats, participated in youth group, and read the bible before bed each evening. Growing up, my favorite New Testament story was “The Woman by the Well”. In this story, Jesus is resting by the well of Jacob when a Samaritan woman approaches. Jesus asks this woman to retrieve him a drink of water. Surprised that both a man and a Jew is speaking to her, she questions Jesus’s motives. Jesus replies by saying, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. But whoever, drinks the water I give him will never be thirsty again.” He then requests that she retrieve her husband. The woman answers honestly by saying that she has no husband. Jesus exclaims, “You are right in saying you have no husband. The fact is you have had five and the man you are living with now is not your husband.” Jesus then reveals himself as the messiah the woman knows is coming. At this point Jesus’s disciples return and the woman returns to the village, declaring the presence of the messiah, Jesus. 

            I would make my mother read this story to me over and over again. Not only did it capture my attention, but also my heart. At the time it fascinated me, though I was always unsure as to why. It wasn’t until last night, while lying awake at 1am, that it struck me. “The Woman by the Well” may seem to be just a story about accepting God as Lord and savior, but at its core is actually a love story. Not a love story in the traditional romantic sense, but a love story, regardless. Jesus takes it upon himself to not only acknowledge a Samaritan and a woman, but also engages her in meaningful conversation. He accepts the truth of her situation without judgement or disdain. In doing so, Jesus is saying, “Love and you shall be loved!” 

            As a child, it was easy to love, easier to accept love in return. However, as an adult it is often difficult to love others, and even harder to accept that I am loved despite my flaws. I was never a child free of fear. However, I did fear less. I remember how light and unburdened by responsibilities I once was. I remember my first love and the ease with which I was able to love and accept love in return. I remember the pure simplistic joy that love produced. Alas, time, age, and circumstances have resulted in a harder, more fearful, and burdened me. As a result, relationships, and the love that exists within those relationships, have become much more complex. Life has given me a version of myself that is both familiar and foreign, making accepting love challenging at the best of times and unthinkable at the worst of times. 

            I imagine that the Samaritan woman felt the same. Her life was, I am certain, not as she imagined. Five failed marriages must have taken a toll on her self-esteem. Life must have disappointed her. She may have even been disappointed in herself. Jesus offered her the uncomplicated, innocent, faith-filled love that one experiences as a child. He asked her to cast off her burdens to once again discover her lighter, less fearful, and hardened version of herself. Despite her circumstances, Jesus was declaring that she was worthy not only of loving, but of being loved.

            Each day I struggle to accept this version of myself; one so completely different, not only from the wide-eyed child I used to be, but also from the adult I dreamed I would become. I don’t always feel worthy of love. Accepting and loving others for their flaws can also prove difficult at times. They say with age comes wisdom. Each day is a quest to learn, to grow, and to love and be loved.