Brave, Anyway

Tag: teenager

  • April Fool’s Birthday Girl

    Fourteen years ago, in the middle of the night, I was doing the exact same thing as I am right at this moment: laying in bed with my daughter just a few feet away, marveling about her.

    Ella was born not long after midnight, on April 1. After all the post-delivery chaos of Apgar scores and examinations and congratulations, everyone went home and I was alone in a dimly lit hospital room with Ella. I had a daughter, a little swaddled baby making faint sighing noises in her sleep. I was a mother, and it was really just remarkable and unbelievable that a life had come from me. We were a team now, me and this little being with giant blue eyes that had seemed to look all around my face when I whispered to her. We were a team and that little girl should have been terrified because the Mom on her team had absolutely no idea how to care for a baby or what she was doing.

    I wasn’t a child who’d dreamed of being a Mommy. I wasn’t a teenager who’d babysat to make extra money. I wasn’t a person who held other people’s babies. In the more than three decades of my life prior to Ella’s birth, I’m not sure if I held any baby other than my nephew – and that was always supervised by people who knew what they were doing. My poor kid had a Mom with a very short resume. I’d gone to a class to learn how to breathe consistently during her birth process, I’d learned in that class that I had to always always always hold and support her neck and head, I’d read a couple of books about babies and I’d even read ahead in the infamous What to Expect the First Year manual, and a nurse maybe 30 minutes prior showed me how to give her a bath. At any Mom company on the planet, I would not get the job.

    Ella is 14 years old today. So the good news is that despite my lack of qualifications and preparedness, I did manage to keep her alive. Although I’m not sure that’s really much of an accomplishment. What you learn as your child ages and as you have multiple children is that they’re built pretty tough and I could have probably better utilized my countless hours fretting about things like possible milk or nut or bee allergies, could she get botulism if honey was simply nearby, when to switch from car seats to booster seats, and even if french fries with pointed ends could be too stabby in her mouth.

    The real fretting settles in later, and seems especially heightened at this stage. The real question to fret over is am I guiding her toward being a good person? Or maybe it’s could her life be better if I did something differently? Or maybe it’s have I laid a solid moral foundation? Or maybe it’s am I properly protecting her from bad stuff and bad people? Or maybe it’s am I properly preparing her to inevitably face bad stuff and bad people? Or maybe it’s am I setting a proper example? Or maybe it’s have I prepared her to say no and yes at the proper times?

    There is no end to the things I can fret about, and sometimes I just get exasperated with all the fretting I cannot seem to relinquish and I think I should have stuck to raising cats – I am certain I can do that! And yet I must explore all these questions and constantly assess and reassess what’s missing and what’s off and what’s right and what’s wrong. I have to do that because I’m a Mom, and because my greatest responsibility and privilege is to be her Mom. No other responsibility or people or thoughts or desires or work are more important than her and Audrey, or than what I need to do as a Mom.

    I’ve never been one of those people that wanted to throw their kids giant birthday celebrations every year. It’s exhausting to plan and host those events and it’s exhausting to take your kids to them throughout the school year. Last year we had a party because Ella was finally a teenager and because I wanted to bring her joy in a time of confusion and sadness and anger. And so until about a week ago I’d expected to have a quiet birthday with her this year. She started talking about having a friend or two over and then another friend and then another, and then it was going to need to be different people on different nights and I found myself panicking at the thought of having very little time to prepare. And just as all the panic was at its peak, I realized that Ella has only four birthdays left in her official childhood. Four. Four is nothing. A tiny number. How could there possibly be only four childhood birthdays remaining?

    So we celebrated. We had two sleepovers, two cakes and a set of cupcakes, stacks of facial scrubs and masks, trampoline jumping way after bed time, shopping with gal pals at the mall, singing at Olive Garden, and countless pieces of candy. I’m exhausted and my house is even messier than the mess it was last week. I have a recycle bin full of empty pizza boxes, a basket full of laundry, a trash can full of makeup wipes and KitKat wrappers, and a Momma heart full of gratitude.

    I am grateful for Ella, a young lady who’s lovely inside and out. A kind and thoughtful friend. A super smart math whiz. A talented singer and actor and gymnast. A child of God who prays about everything, from the need for guidance about big issues to finding her phone charger. A young lady full of empathy and the desire to care for people who struggle. She may not keep her room clean, but she will take money out of her own wallet for CHKD or to feed the homeless or to buy a treat for a friend who’s feeling down.

    I am grateful for the village of people in her life. I am grateful for the choices she’s now making about what kind of people to add to her village – I may have made the initial choices about who surrounded her, but she’s old enough to make her own choices about those things now, and she’s choosing well. And I am grateful that she’s such a wonderful young person despite all my flaws and mess ups.

    In the stillness of night tonight, in a dimly lit room just like on our first night, I laid quietly by myself and prayed for sweet Ella. No matter what she may encounter in her life I want her to know deep inside and beyond a shadow of a doubt – or as my Dad would say “that she knows that she knows that she knows” – that she is loved beyond measure and that it is a privilege to be her Mom. I pray that she would love life and be filled with joy. I pray that she would get into the college she wants and have the career that she wants and get the life partner that’s just right for her and that she will keep her priorities straight. I pray that when she’s happy or sad or mad or has messed up or done something great, she will always want to call her Mom. And I pray that I will always have discernment about how to pray for her and how to guide her and how to be a blessing to her.

    Happy Birthday, Brave Girl. I love that you are 14 and still call me Mommy, even when your friends are around. In exchange, I will no longer publicly chase you to smother those perfect cheeks with kisses.

    Picture submitted by and approved by Ella.
  • Know Who You Are, Brave Girl

    Know Who You Are, Brave Girl

    Somehow the teenage years are here and I feel woefully unprepared. Woefully unprepared to navigate all that these years come with. Woefully unprepared to help her navigate all that these years come with.

    I realize this child lives in my home and I have planned a birthday celebration for her every year for the last *almost* 14 years. And so it seems like I’ve had ample time to prepare for her to be in relationships of her own, but this responsibility has really snuck up on me. If I’d thought about it carefully in advance, I might have prepared one long talk about how to behave and how others should behave, but I didn’t think of it in time – I didn’t think of it before I was in the middle of what I realized after-the-fact was actually one of many quick conversations about things that are really, really important. Things that need time to be discussed. Things that need to percolate, in my brain prior and in hers after.

    Because how your child treats people and how people should treat them is actually just a pretty small part of what you have to cover. I’d forgotten in the thirty-ish years since I was a teenager how much of our growth and learning actually comes by watching and “experiencing” the stuff that happens to and with our friends. Remember how it felt to be 13, 14, 15, 16 when everything that happened to your friends, whether it was good or bad or happy or sad, was soooo big and it felt like it was also happening to you even though it was sometimes just happening to one of your friends? It’s like we all group-experience a few years of our life.

    While kids are in elementary school, parents have the luxury of knowing most, if not all, of the kids their children are spending ample time with. But that changes as they get get older and suddenly you’re answering questions that really aren’t about what’s happening to your child, but about what might be happening to Tiffany from Spanish class.

    1. The first challenge is that you have no context – you know nothing about Tiffany’s life, her parents, her friends, anything.
    2. The second challenge is that even though something may be happening with Tiffany, young people feel the things happening to their friends really deeply and they don’t always separate themselves from it.
    3. The third challenge is that your child may never have had an experience like Tiffany’s but this is her first exposure to whatever it is and so she is going to learn a lot from it one way or another – so helping her process exactly what might be happening and why is important because it will shape her future relationships and her unconscious bias for possibly the remainder of her life.
    4. And the fourth challenge is that as a parent you are always missing part of the story because your child, who is learning, is missing large details when they tell you things – things that adults would ask or focus on, but she doesn’t even know are important yet.

    THIS. IS. SO. HARD.

    And you know what happens as you are mulling over your advice and wondering if you covered all you should have and you’re realizing all the other things you should have said or asked or focused on? You find yourself suddenly terrified that Tiffany doesn’t really exist, and this might actually be your child that had the question but they’re afraid to tell you.

    THIS. IS. SO. HARD.

    I now need so much more than the old “Don’t forget who you are and whose you are.” I need to cover so much more than the typical sex and drugs and alcohol talks we all give our kids.

    I’ve been keeping a mental list and an actual list in my phone. Multiple lists actually. A list of things we’ve talked about and a list of things to talk about and a list of things I need to go back and touch base on when the time is right. If I could just get out my phone and review my lists when it’s time to have these talks, things would be so much simpler.

    My lists may seem neurotic but one of the benefits to seeing what you’ve “written” down over time is that there are almost always a handful of bigger common themes. I don’t think my teenager is going to sit through a list of 37 things to remember while she and her friends are navigating first relationships. But maybe I can get her through a top 5…

    YOU ARE WORTHY. You are worthy just because. Because you’re human. You are likable and loveable, but you are not and will not ever be liked by everybody. It’s OK that some people aren’t your thing and that you aren’t their thing. That has nothing to do with your worth and value, and everything to do with the fact that we weren’t made to all like each other. We need to coexist peacefully – in middle school and all around the earth – and that happens when we understand that all people have worth, and we should treat them with respect as we want to be treated.

    DON’T LOSE YOU. You are whole all by yourself. You are not ever a half. You may be introduced in relation to someone to provide context, but you are not someone in relation to another person – who you are is not Tiffany’s friend or Thomas’ girlfriend. You have dreams and goals, and anyone you’re with should have their own dreams and goals. When you find someone who truly cares about you and who you truly care about, in friendships or romantic relationships, you will cheer each other on as you work toward all of those dreams and goals. Some relationships and friendships will end, and when they do your whole self keeps journeying forward because you have held on to the truth that you are not half.

    BE YOU, NOT SOMEONE ELSE. Be authentic. Feel how you’re feeling, speak truthfully, like things you like and don’t like things you don’t. Don’t act or be or feel a way for others. When you like someone who doesn’t like you back, trying to make yourself likeable to them is a trap. That’s called acting, and if you start to act like someone else you will have to keep acting to maintain that relationship. Acting will always result in a final scene. You need to find your people, the people who you love and who love you, when you are your real self. Everybody’s real self is a little all over the place sometimes, so don’t expect consistency. Your people will always love you, even and especially on the days when you haven’t washed your hair and you’ve been a total crappy-pants.

    CHOOSE YOUR GIRLS. Choose who your girls are wisely, and then choose them every time. You are all imperfect, but you stick together. A group of girls will make each other happy and mad and sad, and they will cry and shout because of each other. Even so, when you go out together you are a unit and you are responsible for one another – you all make sure the others are safe and not forgetting who they are. Be very careful about choosing a boy over your girls – you probably shouldn’t have some one(s) around you if you feel you’re in a situation demanding that. Your girls will be your girls throughout many romantic relationships and life-stage friendships. When one of you is mistreated, and this will happen, believe her. Believe her.

    BE ACCOUNTABLE. The way you behave is 100 percent about you. The way others behave is 100 percent about them. You are responsible for how you behave and you will make mistakes. When you behave badly or make a poor choice, there are consequences and you have to suffer through those. When you mistreat someone, you need to own that. However, you also need to fully understand what is not your part. You live in a world of girls and boys and men and women who sometimes try to make females responsible for things they are not, and you need to be aware when that bias and manipulation are in action. The way you dress is never the reason someone touches. Something you did or didn’t do is never the reason someone hits. Something you did or didn’t do is never the reason someone cheats. When people blame-shift or victim-blame, recognize it for what it is and call it out. Any female who victim-blames other girls should not be in your group of girls.

    Are those 5 really enough? I didn’t even say have fun (but not too much fun). Or, you have decades of adulting ahead so just embrace this time of learning. And x behavior is unhealthy but y behavior is OK. Don’t let your feelings or your fears override logic. You won’t like who you are if you allow yourself to sacrifice your values for your feelings. And you need to recognize the differences between first loves and for-now loves and forever loves. And it goes on and on and on. And suddenly my original list of 37 things is getting even bigger.

    Parenting sometimes feels like I’m tripping up stair after stair, just righting myself from not properly landing on one step while having to take the next step. The only step on which I know my feet are both firmly planted on this topic is this one: If you know who you are and stay true to that, you will be just fine.

    Know who you are, brave girl.

    You. Are. Beloved.