Taking the Long View

One thing I've never been particularly good at is taking the long view.  When I was pregnant with my first daughter, throwing up nonstop for months, I never really thought about the fact that time would end.  It felt like it would go on forever.  When that baby then had colic for about six weeks, again, I never really thought about the fact that it would end; I only felt the stress of the moment -- of the many moments my baby cried and cried and wouldn't stop.

I've been trying, lately, to take the long view more often. Teaching my daughters to drive, for example, is nerve wracking in the moment, but the skill will last them a lifetime.  They'll drive themselves to college and then to their first jobs and then drive their own children everywhere. It takes about a year to teach driving to the point that they can drive themselves safely, but they will keep that skill the lifetime.

My younger daughter is getting her braces off today.  We put the braces on because she had a huge gap in her two front teeth.  When we put them on, I didn't think about the fact that I was setting her teeth up for a lifetime -- not only so she can look good in school pictures, but so she can look professional in job interviews when she is an adult.  It's been a long two years of brackets breaking and coming off, elastic bands flung everywhere, wires popping out at the most inopportune times,(almost always on the weekends) causing pain.  And even though I knew they would come off someday, I didn't think about that "someday" much, not really. But here it is.

The long view comes in handy while raising teenagers. When we're going through a tough time, I try to remember that they will grow up, they will become adults.  They will go to college (one already is in, so I'm more confident about this now!) and they will move out and on. Someday I will be the mother of adult children.  This will happen.

I'm trying to apply the same long view to my writing.  Recently I finished another manuscript, and it's time to get ready to send it out to the world.  I like it a lot, and my beta readers like it a lot. I now have to decide -- in the long view -- what the best thing is for it.  And how to get to there. I'm trying not to short view this one -- to be patient as I make my way towards the goal of seeing this book out there, for readers to enjoy. 

Taking the Long View -- I'm trying to do it, every day, in every way.

One Face of Autism

I went to a very special graduation last week. It was for Greg, a twenty one year old young man with autism.  He was graduating from the children's program he was placed in seventeen years ago at the age of three, a year after he was diagnosed.

We all think we "know" autism. There are certainly many stories in the media about kids, who, despite autism, are able to go to regular school, or college, or interact with family.  But rarely do we see someone like my friend Greg.  Greg is nonverbal, meaning he doesn't speak, and he works hard to achieve basic skills, along with an aide who stands or sits right beside him, guiding him. He has a seizure disorder that is common to many autistics, a disorder that has led to his hospitalization.  He hums and makes strange sounds sometimes and has trouble interacting with other people. He can answer questions with a nod and he loves to give high fives.  He loves Thomas the Tank and video games and puzzles and his parents and his grandparents and his extended family.

There were two boys at this graduation, Greg and A., another twenty one year old who is also leaving the children's program.  It's now up to the state and Greg's parents to find an appropriate setting for Greg.  His parents are eager to get him into an adult program with similar goals -- teaching Greg life skills, such as emptying a dishwasher or setting a table, and helping them to be able to work.  But it's not that simple.

For one thing, adult programs for these special individuals are limited, and for another, they are extremely expensive.  Greg's parents want, like all of us want, the best for their son, so he can contribute to society.

Last week, Greg and A were led into the graduation by their amazing teacher, who has guided them through adolescence since they were thirteen. They were wearing caps and gowns. Although it is very difficult for Greg to smile -- I think I've only seen him smile once or twice in his life -- he was beaming, so proud of himself that day.  The two boys sat in the front of the room, eyeing the candy and cookies on the table set for the reception. Their teacher told us how they would go on to do great things. That led me to think about the great things I expect and want for my own healthy daughters, like college and careers, and happy marriages and children (if they want them) and the great things Greg's parents hope for him (skills that will help him be independent, the right medications so he won't seize, caregivers who will treat him like family). 

Then the teacher allowed anyone in the audience who chose to do so the opportunity to speak.  Greg's mother got up and talked about how the program helped her toilet train her son, something she never thought would happen.  His father got up and talked about how he saw pictures of Greg working at Staples one day -- this program is not shy about taking individuals with autism out into public, and they have, over the last few years, brought the boys to some work sites, for example, to a restaurant where they rolled silverware into cloth napkins for a few hours -- and how he just wants his son to be able to work, like everyone else.  Greg's grandmother got up and said she was glad that Greg was able to live at home and be in this program, because in her day, people like Greg were institutionalized.

Then the teacher played a slide show with many pictures of Greg from the time he was very little until now, pictures of him with his teachers at the beach, (he loves the water) at amusement parks, in the classroom working on a daily living skill like sitting still for the dentist....Afterwards, at the reception, A stuffed his cap with Twix bars while Greg looked at a picture album his teacher had made.

I don't know what's going to happen with Greg next because his future lies between the state and his tireless parents, who, for the past eighteen years, since he was diagnosed, have fought every step of the way to give their child the best of everything, just like every parent wants for his or her child.  But I do know that Greg will continue to be loved and cherished by family and friends and that he continues to teach all of us how to appreciate a full life.

Mothering as a Career

So last week I talked about how soon my daily parenting duties will be ending as my older daughter is now off at college and my younger is in high school. I've been a Stay-at-Home-Mother (and fledgling writer) for fifteen years now, the longest I've been in any job.

And yes, I consider mothering my career.  A lot of people look down on Stay-at-Home Mothers.  It's nearly impossible to find a job after any period of time as a Stay-at-Home Mother.  Employers assume you have no usable skills.  They assume you've spent the last three, five, ten, however many years you've been home wiping noses and making peanut butter sandwiches, and yes, you've done those things, but you've done so much more.

You're run a household.  You've managed a budget and paid bills. You've managed the schedule of two adults and one or more children. You've dealt with teachers and school administrators and advocated for your children -- time and again. Maybe, like me, you've sat on dozens, if not hundreds, of PTO committees, planning programs, interacting with staff, coordinating events.  Maybe you developed academic goals for the entire school or managed committee budgets or written and edited a newsletter -- all for free, as a side thing, because you wanted to, because you wanted your kids to see you involved in their lives, because modeling volunteerism, because making a home-school connection, was vital.

You've helped your kids through everything -- from their first steps to the first day of school to first friendships that have ended badly to adjusting to new schools and new friends and new classes. You've edited their essays and proofread their college applications. You've advised them on sex and drugs and drinking, and all this has happened at any hour of any day, including at two a.m. and on Thanksgiving.  Parenting is, literally, a twenty four hour a day job, and it's made you one of the most patient people in the world.

There is nothing -- no book I've written, no other relationship I've had, no other job I've ever held, that has been more important or worthwhile or fulfilling than my job as a mother.  I'm raising the people who will take care of you in your old age.  I'm raising the people who will shape whether you will still have social security when you retire, who will develop new technology so you can be more efficient in your chosen career, who will stand up and protest if their political leaders try to take your freedoms away, who will respect you because you've lived longer than them.  Yet this society doesn't look at my job as particularly valuable or important.  Society wonders why I haven't "gone back to work" -- why I am not earning money.

I'm doing this job because I love it, and because, and I'm so aware of this, I am very fortunate.  My husband works extremely hard at his job so I can do this one. I think about this a lot.  I believe I've been a better, more effective mother because I've been with my children full time.  I believe that I am the lucky one. And you, readers, have benefited, too.  I'm sending two caring, smart, hard working people out into the world to make it better.  Better for you.

On Being a Stay-at-Home-Mother

Sixteen years ago next month, I made the momentous decision to become a Stay-at-Home Mother.  I had a three year old and was about twelve weeks pregnant with my second child and I was tired. Tired of commuting from my home in New Jersey two days a week to my Managing Editor position in New York, and then squeezing in the other three-days-worth of work when she was napping or at night or when she was watching Elmo. I was tired of getting up at four a.m., tired of having to scrounge for a sitter when my sitter's three year old son was sick (which seemed to be often), tired of the company I was working for, which, I had discovered accidentally, was paying my two male counterparts more than me, tired of working with another manager who was constantly undermining me....I was just tired.

My husband and I did not think we could afford to live on one salary.  In fact, we knew we couldn't. We had run the numbers before, and we had always concluded that there was no way we could afford it. I was miserable enough, though, that we decided to do it for a year and a half, from that point of my pregnancy until that child would be one, and then I would go back to work.

A year and a half later, we were living on one salary much more comfortably than we ever though we could. We had given up many of the things people say they need or want, like dinners out, and I budgeted very carefully.  We decided that it was working out so well, I would just stay home another year.

And another year went, and a year after that, and before I knew it, I had two kids in the elementary school and was the PTO President and involved in a million of the school and kid activities and was loving it. I had finally found something I was really good at.  I was a Mother with a capital M.

Around the time my younger daughter finished elementary school, people started asking me when I was going back to work, so it felt like, well, that I should go back to work.  I looked for a job halfheartedly but I kept coming back to the idea that I really liked what I as doing -- Mothering -- and that we were all happy.

And I was writing. And wondering what would come of the writing.

More years passed. Last year, my older daughter graduated from high school and left for college.  My younger daughter is in high school, so the writing is on the wall. I'll lose her to adulthood in a few years, too.  With my writing career started, I'm definitely on the edge of another new phase of life, much like I was sixteen years ago, when I decided to become a Stay-at-Home Mother.  But unlike last time, this time, I'm very aware of the huge shift my life will take.  I'm very aware that their adulthood is not temporary; that my goal has been to raise happy, healthy, productive adults and release them into society.  So when someone asks me what I do, even though I'm a published author, and even though one of my daughters is essentially an adult, and the other clearly on her way, I still say Stay-at-Home Mother.  Because I can't imagine ever being anything else first.