Barnmaven

The Language of Special Needs

I got a text this weekend from a friend.  She is a young adult "on the spectrum," as it were, and she had somewhat of a Facebook argument with another woman over a meme the lady posted about Autism.  My friend didn't like the implication that autism is not a disability but simply a difference and made her opinion known.  She wrote about the different issues children and adults can and often do have when they have an Autism Spectrum Disorder.  She responded from her own experience, in all earnestness. In response, apparently, the original poster called her a "bitch" and wrote that autism isn't a serious issue and said people need to stop complaining about it.

I have such a depth of feeling about this.  Its an internal conflict in a lot of ways,  because technically, my daughter's bipolar and ADHD and my son's Autism and associated disorders most certainly will cause them difficulties neurotypical people don't have or ever have to think about.  On the other hand, I think both of my children are capable of doing just about anything they set their minds to, and I refuse to let them use their issues as a crutch or an excuse.  Just yesterday, my daughter remarked in passing that her brother couldn't keep himself from fighting because of his autism. 

I told her,  "I'm not sure I agree with that.  Do you think he gets to just fight with people without consequences?  I don't.  I think he has to work harder than other people to control his behavior, but he doesn't get a free pass to just behave any old way he wants to, honey."   She thought about this.  "So its just like I get in trouble for fighting with Race Car Man even though I have bipolar?" 

Exactly.

On one level, I think that a cure for autism isn't necessarily on the horizon.  And no, for the record, I don't buy into Jenny McCarthy's assertion that her son has been "cured" of autism.  I think there are a lot of therapies and treatments and foods and supplements that can help kids and adults with autism function better and more successfully, but we don't know enough yet about the causes of autism and the inner workings of the autistic brain to be able to have a cure.  Should we be funding research for a cure?  Absolutely.  But at the same time, we need to be spending our time and our dollars making sure that we give kids with autism the skills they're going to need to live as adults with autism.  We need to be cautious of the words we use around autism so that we are not being derogatory or having pejorative overtones about a community within our larger community.  People with autism don't necessarily want to hear about the ways they are different -- they are looking for the ways they can fit in.  And frankly, some of the characteristics they bear as a result of their autism are truly gifts.   

I don't think you can look at someone like Temple Grandin, whose difference in executive functioning make it possible for her to understand animal behavior in a way that most neurotypicals can't begin to understand, and think of her autism as a 'disability.' 

There are a lot of conflicting opinions in the autism community about the language that we use and the way we portray people who have autism.  A lot of advocacy groups and adults living with autism are extremely opposed to the tactics of the group Autism Speaks.  The opposition stems from a number of reasons, primarily because Autism Speaks doesn't include a large enough percentage of adults with autism in their executive leadership.  Many parents and families of people with autism and many adults with autism also take issue with the way autism is portrayed by Autism Speaks.  They feel personally denigrated by videos and messages that talk about how terrible life is for families of kids with autism, by descriptions of their more challenging behaviors and thoughts.  There are hundreds of thousands of adults with autism living successful lives, managing careers and marriages and raising children. 

There are two sides to every coin, and autism is no exception.   The divisions within the autism community are understandable, impossible to ignore, and perhaps uncrossable.   Because autism is a spectrum disorder with greatly ranging degrees of affect, everyone's experience will be different.  Because no two people react to the same stimuli in the same way, one person's response to dealing with autism and their perception of how it impacts them will vary greatly from anothers. 

I don't believe autism has ruined our lives, I just think autism has given us some challenges we might not otherwise face.  But who am I to tell a mother whose marriage has failed and whose non-verbal child is a frequent eloper or who is physically violent that she's wrong if she feels differently than I?  Just as I would want her to understand where I'm coming from, I sure as hell bet she wants me to walk a mile in her shoes, too.  I also bet that there are times she wishes someone would find a cure right this fucking minute for the behaviors that make her life incredibly difficult and stressful. 

We take issue when a mother with an autistic child kills her child and then takes her own life.  We don't want the world to think that autism is this terrible, dark thing that can't be overcome.  We, as parents, don't want anyone to look at our children and think these things about them.  We want people to see the beauty and the strengths and the uniqueness in them.  Or at least, I suppose that we do.  But I don't know what the mother whose son was denied school placement was thinking.  I can't speak for her at all.  Clearly she was overwhelmed, probably under-supported, and desperate.  The mother of the adult son with autism was said to have a very loving relationship with her son.  What were her thoughts as she committed this terrible act?  We will never know. 

Parenting a child with autism or pediatric mental illness can be hard, terribly hard.  For most of us it is NOT the end of the world.  Having autism and learning to cope with a brain that is not wired to function in the typical world can be anywhere between 'okay' and 'devastating,' depending on the individual and their place on the spectrum and the support, resources and therapies available to them.   Holding your bipolar child's needs close to your heart as you deal with them on the days they are unable to be loving or likable isn't very easy. 

We can't forget the families of the severely autistic individuals who rely on lifelong care.  As with any condition that renders a person unable to take care of their own basic needs, life becomes far more challenging and difficult, stressful and scary.  But those things don't have to mean that the person with autism and their family don't also have love and joy and wonderful times together.   The thing is, we can't deny that at least for some families, the good days are scarce and the bad days are the norm.  Some people aren't as capable of handling that as others.

Is it just too pat to say "Life is what you make it" ?  Life isn't fair, certainly.  We are all born with different abilities, strengths and weaknesses.  As humans we have the same rights, but we don't all have equal capabilities.  We must acknowledge this basic fact and work upwards from there.  My kids have stuff they've got to overcome, and sometimes that's really hard to cope with.  But cope with we must. There's more than coping, though.  We work to meet challenges and we celebrate our successes.  We learn from the bad days and we are thankful for the days that are good.  We cry, we rage, we beat our fists on the concrete, and then we get up and walk out the door with our hopes intact.  Some of us, though, throw in the towel.  Some of us don't see the up side.  Their experience doesn't invalidate my own; nor mine theirs.

Both extremes and neither. 

Can we live with that?  I don't think we have a choice.

 

 

 

Dog + Bone = Me

As much as I throw it out there that letting go of things is a healthy way to exist, I'm not always so good at being a person who lets go of things.  I have a tendency to perseverate.  My husband and I will have a disagreement over something, and days later I am still stuck on a particular thing he said that I thought was wrong, and having repeated conversations with myself where in I roleplay both of us and stick my point to him over and over until he falls over from the sheer brilliance of my superior mind. 

Or some drama on the internet will settle hooks into my gray matter and no matter how useless it may be, I find myself idly drawn to hunting down more tidbits of information or opinion.  Sometimes its not even an issue I particularly take sides in, but part of me just can't help but watch it unfold.  I pick up nuance and opinion and data and start playing them on an endless background loop. 

My shrink said that I do this in order to distract myself from my deeper feelings of fear and loss, of self-loathing and shame.  I would counter that as I age I find less to loathe about myself, but I can't help but admit that I still struggle with all of those things.

If life were fair and if life unfolded according to my plan...probably we'd all fall off the surface of the planet because I would have forgotten to make sure we always had gravity turned on.

So then you'll agree its probably best I'm not in charge of this whole shebang.

I'm struggling lately with feelings of loneliness and fear.  By the time my husband comes home from this job he will have been gone...a lot.  Putting numbers on it doesn't really do anything but make it seem worse.  Lets just say gone more than he's been home.  And I'm selfish.  Even when I know that he, as a capital-M Man has the same drive that I have to shoot the biggest mammoth I can in order to provide for my family, I still at the bottom most layer of it just really want him to not be gone.  I want someone besides the Betta Fish on my kitchen counter to talk to in evenings when the kids are at their dads.  I want to go out to breakfast with SG, not alone and certainly not with the kids.  I want to come home to my husband's arms and his being glad to see me at the end of the day.   

And I find myself being childish and petulant about it. 

I think of my son, upset because he can't play his beloved game.  He makes it into a Supreme Court Case.  "If you really loved me you'd let me play."   "My life is ruined right now and nothing will make it better."  "I hate you."  "Global warming will end if you just let me play my game."  (No, he didn't really say that.  I made it up.  But how cool would it be if he DID say that? How utterly cool?)

I catch myself being dramatic even in my thoughts. 

I'm always alone.

No one will ever really love me.

We're all going to die in a fiery explosion because I have to be celibate for three months.

IF HE REALLY LOVED ME HE'D GIVE UP EVERYTHING JUST TO BE WITH ME.

You know, stuff along those lines.  Real sane, level-headed, purposeful CLEAR thinking.  Ha, I crack myself up.

And I'm not really sure how to make that thought cycle stop. 

Help.

Lady, you are so fired

There are three things it is nearly impossible to find when you relocate from one town to another: 

• Dentist
• Lady doctor
• Hairdresser

I finally found the right dentist and hairdresser in the last couple of months.  It took damn near five years, but I finally found the right fit.  Personality is a big part of it, but quality of service is important too.  I want care providers I enjoy interacting with and from whom I can expect not just a high quality of care but some personal attention.  I want them to remember who I am, what I've discussed with them in the past, what my kids names are.  I want them to remember that I never shut up about horses and special needs kids and that I hate needles and I also hate having my hair styled like I'm somebody's middle aged mother.  (Yes, I know that's what I am, I just don't need my hairdresser reminding me of it.  I want The Sexy.)

I had found what I thought was a great little practice.  It catered to mothers and children and was run by a Registered Nurse Practicioner.  They had a funky little clinic and even offered sick child care at a reasonable cost for mothers who had a sick child with whom they were unable to stay home that day.  I liked having a female practicioner for my female stuff, and I liked that she could also manage my ADHD meds.  I mostly didn't mind the long waits when I went in.  For one, OB practices are often like that.  A baby arriving might push all the appointments back.  And because she would take time talking to me, I assumed that she gave the same consideration to her other patients.  I liked that. 

Little by little, though, things changed.  And I didn't like it.  First she started offering the HCG diet out of her practice.  I'm one of those people who think that fad diets are dangerous and I wasn't impressed that my doctor was jumping on the fad diet bandwagon.  The waits started getting longer.  I waited an hour for an appointment, and it was pretty clear from the stack of people in her waiting room that she was trying to rotate too many patients.   And then, two visits ago, at the end of my visit, she handed me a business card with my prescription.  It was for a company that sells internet service and cable tv and wireless plans.  "I dont' know if I told you about this company I'm representing.  If you are in need of any data services please give me a call." 

I know doctors don't make a lot of money these days and I realize that its terribly expensive to run an OB practice with the burden of medical malpractice insurance, but really?  I'm a little more compartmentalized than that.  You're the doctor who looks at my vagina.  I really don't want you reviewing my cell phone usage, too.  And if you're trying to take care of too many patients at one time, its a sure bet every single one of us is getting a lower quality of care.

I guessed (correctly) at that point that finances were strained and she was looking to supplement her income in any way possible.  And of course, she has the right to do that.  I might not have jumped ship at that point, because I am human and I do try to be understanding.  But after the last appointment I don't know any other way to proceed.  I made an appointment for a prescription refill.  I hadn't been to her practice for three months.  I pulled up to the door with 10 minutes to spare for my appointment, only to find an empty office.  Empty as in completely devoid of furniture, phones and people.  A sign on the door only said that the office was closed, but didn't indicate if it had moved somewhere else.  I was confused.  I had made the appointment only a few days earlier.   Did they close their doors suddenly?  So I called them, and when the receptionist answered I was even more confounded.  "We moved offices." 

Wouldn't that be something you might have wanted to tell me when I made the appointment?  Or maybe added on to the "No Longer in Business" sign on your door?  So I threw the kids back in the car and drove to the new location.  I waited forty-five minutes to be seen, though the guy schlepping pharmaceuticals came in after I did and got to go back and have a few minutes of her time before I got to have my appointment.  I had to fill out all new paperwork because apparently my old paperwork didn't move to her new office with her.  And at the end of my ten minute appointment (that I had to wait a half hour for), she once again handed me her new business card with my prescription.  "I don't know if I told you about this company I'm representing."

Yes, yes you have. 

I suppose if I was interested in a dialogue I would let her know personally why I'm leaving her practice.  But the thing is, I never know if someone really cares that you don't want to be their client anymore.  Not if they don't care about telling you they've moved or remembering what they talked to you about the last time you looked at their cervix.  I mean, she'll figure it out when I don't come see her anymore.  I'm sure the request from my new doctor for my medical records will be a clue too.

 

Harder than it looks on film

I love how in the movies a character, usually portrayed by someone who looks a whole lot better than I do in blue jeans, will experience a transformative moment, immediately understand the whole point and the lesson in one fell swoop, and then BOOM!  Off she goes to live happily ever after.  More likely than not this is how she will cope with every new learning experience forever. 

OK, sometimes we'll see a character who takes the entire damn movie to learn the lesson, but what I never ever see is the character who learns it, forgets it, learns it some more, backslides, remembers, and continues to do this same tango forever ad nauseum.

Why is that?  Am I just doing it wrong?  Or are the people on the screen portraying something so patently un-doable that lamenting my inability to do the same is a pointless exercise?

Yesterday I wrote a completely tongue-in-cheek sarcasm-ridden paean to my ex.  No, it didn't go live.  Nor should it ever see the light of day.  But god DAMN it felt good to write it. 

It felt commensurately HORRIBLE to read it and understand how far I have failed to progress in my self-stated quest toward elightenment and compassion.

I continue to presume that I understand the reasons why people do things that affect me.  Good or bad, I assume intent.  Maybe sometimes I'm right, but how would I KNOW that?   Its not like I ask for confirmation or anything.  "Do you refuse to actually speak with me on the phone because you prefer parenting via text messages?"  And see, I'm still kicking around in the shallow puddles of hostility.

It still hurts, though.  I want to be better at this coparenting while divorced gig, and the truth is, the whole thing pretty much sucks ass right now.  My ex lately communicates solely via texts on the cell phone.   He still has yet to acknowledge the existence of SG.  On the rare occasion when he's had to be within the same vicinity as my husband, his main tactic is to simply avoid looking directly at him.  Is this because he hopes it will make him ACTUALLY disappear?  I have no idea.  And I assume intent. We speak on the phone and he speaks in monsyllabic monotone, and the writing on the wall screams "I DON'T WANT TO SPEAK TO YOU."

How do you parent your kids with someone who you've never been able to truly discuss problems with? 

I don't have the answers.  And I'm not really pleased with the way I'm reacting to things.  I don't feel I've grown very much as a person.  That bothers me.  I recognize so many times that I've ignored the high road, done and said things I take no pride in, wanted to continue to spread the pain around rather than let the healing begin.  I still seem to take an unreasonable amount of time wanting another person to be other than they are, which is a bloody useless effort.

If I had any balls at all, I'd calmly set some boundaries and leave him to respect them or not respect them.  If I gave some decent thought to what everyone's going through, I'd acknowledge that there might be a lot of reasons he's doing the things he does that have nothing to do with the motives I've so handily ascribed to him.  Maybe he's in pain.  Maybe his job is stressful.  Maybe he's having relationship problems.  Maybe the autism diagnosis is hard for him to wrap his head around.  Maybe a lot of things -- maybe none of them.  But the point I keep forgetting is that it isn't at all about WHAT HE IS THINKING.  It is a thousand percent about how I'm reacting. 

Maybe this is how the process of personal growth really goes.  Maybe I'm supposed to figure these things out one painful step at a time and everytime I think I have a grasp on something I'm supposed to then get complacent and lose sight of things. 

Maybe.  Or maybe I AM just doing it all wrong.

 

 

 

On understanding why life is sometimes a mountain of crap

I just posted a comment over on a blog I read fairly regularly.  If you want to read some exceptionally beautiful writing, go read Finding Your Voice.  Jennifer Lawler is a gifted writer, and everytime I read one of her posts there are three thoughts that go through my head.

1.  She has an amazing talent and prose that gives shapes to words, makes sentences into concrete things and describes feelings that punch you right in the stomach.

2.  My writing, in comparison, is crap

and 3., most of all 3., the petty things that I tend to complain about are hangnails taken in the context of what she and her daughter live with and go through.

Go read her blog, really. 

I was commenting on her most recent post and as I was considering what she had written, I thought of that old saying "you always get what you deserve," and I thought to myself, no, that's not really true.  And typed instead, Nobody ever really gets what they deserve, do they.

But then I wonder, what is it we really DO deserve?

Do we deserve anything?

And where do we cross the line, either way, into accepting what it is we've got or not got, or into being either smugly entitled or sadly feeling as if we earned some kind of terrible karma?  When is it OK to say "I earned this, I worked hard for it, and I'm proud of myself," and when is it better to just shut up and be thankful that you've had opportunities maybe other people didn't get? 

There's no universal great equalizer that I can determine.  There is always the potential of equalization, either via natural disaster, coincidence, or consequence, but the fact of the matter is that in this life, at least so far as I can see, there are always people who have more and people who have less.  And perhaps its a simple twist of fate that one person who has a great idea finds the right set of circumstances to turn that idea into wealth and fame, and another person who is also full of good ideas never finds exactly the right opportunity to make it big.  That one couple has lots of healthy babies and another couple can't have any, or they have a baby who is desperately ill or who dies.  That someone who is less capable gets into the college of someone else's dreams.  That one baby out of six other babies gets to go live with parents who were for the most part gentle and loving and the other five got a brutal existence at the hands of a pedophile and their abusive mother.  That one guy steals other people blind and lives the high life and doesn't get caught, and another guy can't steal a gallon of gas to get to work on time without getting nailed and jailed.   That a faithful spouse gets cheated on.  That some folks are unbelievably wealthy through no real effort of their own while others live in brutal poverty simply, each because they just happened to be born to a particular set of parents.

And what is it, exactly, that we are supposed to learn from this?  What's the takeaway, kids?

Damned if I know.

Or maybe, I'm not sure yet, but I'm trying as hard as I can to understand.

I am then reminded of David Richo's Five Things:

Everything changes and ends.  Things do not always go according to plan.  Life is not always fair.  Pain is part of life.  Poeple are not loving and loyal all the time.

Richo presents a philosophy that says "I can either be crushed, possessed, devastated by the circumstances in my life or I can become a witness to them."  This doesn't mean being a beaming ray of sunshine "Oh, hey, everything's great! Yep!  Never mind that my marriage ended or I lost my job or I have a terminal illness, don't worry -- I'm just FINE!"  No, what he means is that we neither stifle nor give in to the emotions that are an inevitable part of being alive and human, but that we feel them so fully that they move through us and move on. 

Neither stoic nor overwhelmed.  And accepting that there is a big pile of awful, unfair things that happen in this world that we have no control over.  Living with compassion for others and being moved by their circumstances, listening to their pain and caring what happens to them.  Caring about what happens to us. 

I don't know sometimes how I'll find that balance.  Richo and other writers like him often recommend meditation as a path to mindfulness.  Which sort of makes me feel left out of the game, because meditation and I are not close acquaintances, not now and not likely ever to be.  But I find myself more often turning the radio off in the car and using the silence to ponder life's great mysteries (and try to decide what I'm making for dinner).  I'm trying to be less of a "fixer" of other people's lives and more of a witness and a companion to their suffering.   I'm working on being willing to let my feelings be what they are and to let go of the need to assuage them somehow. 

Maybe I'll never get there, maybe I'll spend the rest of my life looking for pocket gurus to answer my questions and tell me how I'm supposed to live.  

I do believe that I'm never going to actually become a truly enlightened being, not on this earth, anyways, but I hope I at least grow and learn enough to find the beginnings of understanding.  Because I would very much like to understand. 

 

The End. Period.

It may surprise some of you (especially those of you who are friends on Facebook) to know that technically I am not yet divorced.  My ex moved out well over two years ago, but we didn't actually begin divorce proceedings until August of this year.  I don't know why we waited so long, but when I look back at the patterns in my life I note a definite tendency to postpone the inevitable, so I guess I'm just being true to form.   I will rip off a bandaid, jump into cold water, endure the artist's needle, but I will not lend myself readily to painful emotional change. 

The not-quite-yet-divorced status should, if all goes as expected, change tomorrow.  The final paperwork has been signed by my ex, his attorney, my attorney, and myself.  The hearing is scheduled for 8:30 AM (which really means all the lawyers will be in court at 8:30 AM, there will be check-ins for those doing status conferences and eventually the lawyers who have motions to be signed will line up for their turn, then the status conferences will take place and THEN motions that need to be heard will be considered and hopefully they get done sometime before armageddon.  I suspect this is why attorneys charge so much money, its recompense for the stab-yourself-in-the-eye boredom they go through in court every week). 

The final death throes of the marriage took place over a number of years for a number of reasons.  Tomorrow will be the final, gasping breath of the brontosaurus shuddering on the carpet of the rainforest floor.

 

I don't know if I ever really believed that marriage was forever.  I know that I hoped it was.  I don't think there are many people that enter into a relationship commitment planning for its eventual demise, though we all have to realize that its a possibility. 

I am looking forward to settling into a different phase of my relationship with my ex.  I think that now  that we are no longer debating over exactly how to split hairs and then assign ownerhip to halves of hairs that the bulk of the discomfort will be over.  Worrying about what would happen and who would get what if we didn't agree was a soul-consuming experience.  As much as I am trying to learn to lean back and worry more about the ride than the destination, I'm still human and still reacting to my fear more than I would like.  I've struggled with anger and hurt and jealousy.  I've had to learn how to walk away without voicing upsets or concerns that aren't capable of being resolved.  I've learned to let my feelings be felt with the explicit understanding that there isn't a happy-ever-after, there's no reward or prize or mountain summit, just a continuation of life that will undoubtedly serve up fresh suffering after some time passes. 

Falling in love and beginning a new relationship didn't really alleviate those feelings.  It just allowed me to ignore them for longer periods of time.  Ultimately, though, I've got to acknowledge them and allow them to work their way through.  If I don't, they'll just keep causing me pain and there's no reason at all to let that linger longer than it needs to. 

After tomorrow, my ex and I will no longer be husband and wife.  We'll be coparents.  We'll be once-lovers.  People who walked a path together, side by side for a time, and who will continue to parallel one another to a small extent because of our mutual ties to our progeny. 

As our children become adults, I hope that they will be able to comprehend that relationships are complicated and fragile.  I hope that they can understand - and more importantly believe  - that a divorce was never something we envisioned for our family until we actually reached the point where it happened. 

I hope they will learn that when you're an adult living in a world you are coping with your past and your present in ways that often do not make sense.  That unless you give your relationship the time and energy - and compassion - that it requires, it will not thrive.   That once you stop communicating you begin sliding down a hill that only grows steeper the farther down it you travel.

I hope that they will be able to recognize that in the end we both made some hard choices in order to preserve our sanity, healthy, and dignity, and more than anything, I hope that they will forgive us for the impact those choices had on them.

I hope very much that they will be able to see their parent's divorce not as an altogether negative experience.    Divorce is painful, but at the same time, my failed marriage gave me a gift.  Through it I found impetus for growth and change, seeking new ways of interacting with others, with myself, with the world I inhabit.   

The impermanence of things in life offer us gifts.  Tomorrow marks the end of one thing, but offers a new threshold to cross.  

 

Eye of the Hurricane

On reading it, I realize my last post sounded sad.  But really, I wasn't sad when I wrote it.  I was thinking what a positive experience I'd had, reclaiming my inner foster baby.  I had spent years thinking of that little girl as a separate person from me.  She had a different name, a temporary set of parents.  I separated her off and regarded her as a distinct individual who had nothing whatsoever to do with me.  As it turns out, that wasn't really true, and changing my perception of that was a very powerful thing.  There is more work I have to do, integrating and healing so that I can leave the past behind me and get on with the important job of living in the now. 

I'm remarkably calm right now.  I have a million things to do, and now that SG has hit the road, I've got no one to help me do it.  But I know I can do this thing called living my life because I've done it before.  I'm capable.  I'm strong.  And I have lots of support, both near and far, including SG, who is always just at the other end of the phone if I need him. 

Getting everyone out the door this morning was remarkably easy.  I made myself a checklist for every evening and every morning.  Lunches.  Meds.  Dogs, horses, chickens, cats.  Coffee.  Laptop.  All the essentials - and I still had time for makeup (thank you short hair for taking only seconds to be done).  And I was so relaxed I had to keep double checking myself to figure out if I was still me.  Because this is not the me I remember being before.

The me I used to be would have created so much drama around her man leaving her for an extended period of time.  I would have clung and cried and wailed.  His leaving would have been so stressful and miserable for him because I would have been all undone.  It would have been all about ME ME ME ME ME.  And sure, some of its about how I'm feeling.  Sad, missing him.  Lonely sometimes when I want to feel his touch and I know I will need to wait.  But its also about how HE feels and what HE needs.  No guilt, he's not leaving me, he's heading to his job.  He deserves to have a smile and a kiss and a loving sendoff, not a crap bunch of emotional mama drama.  My children (especially) deserve to have a mother who isn't sobbing in a corner because oh God I'm going to have to be alone!  They need a mother who is fully present and engaged. 

I don't think I'm feeling this way simply because its the logical way to be.  I think it has to do with love, faith, letting go of fear and the need to control the things that scare me, trust, and a whole lot of healing.  And its not that fear and hurt aren't there - of course they are.  But we can let go of our fear when we understand that we don't really have any control of the things that we are afraid of anyway. 

Fighting things, trying to make everything go the way we need it to is a terrible waste of our time and our energy.  It depletes our spirit, steals our joy, saps our strength.  Buddha said, "The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, not to worry about the future, or not to anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly."  If I am worrying about situations I cannot change, how can I live in the moment?   If I am afraid of how certain things are going to make me feel, how can I recognize the small joys of just being where I am right now?

In the hurricane's eye is stillness.  In the center of yourself, there is stillness as well.  Sometimes you have to stop listening to the rest of everything else, get out of the wind of your angst and your troubles, to find it.

It takes work, but it is so worth it.  My life isn't perfect or easy, but it doesn't have to be as hard as I used to make it.

Do what it takes?

The Interwebs are abuzz over Catherine Hakim's new book Erotic Capital.  Hakim, a British sociologist,  is best known for authoring books and articles centered around women in the workplace and gender equality.  A self-described feminist, Hakim has made a career of attempting to understand and iterate the social, political and economic impact woman have in the workplace and how pressures of conformity and patriarchal values create challenges for women.

Given her background, many feminists are perplexed by the assertion she makes in her latest book, that a woman's best bet in the workplace is to leverage her sexuality in order to even the odds.

Yep, that's right.  A feminist telling us to use our looks to get ahead. 

Not only that, Hakim asserts that women who don't take the time to maximize their sex appeal via diet, makeup, wardrobe and options like Botox are being are simply lazy and counter-productive.

To be fair, I haven't read the book yet.  Its sitting in my Kindle account, waiting for my droid to have a 3G signal to download it.  However, the salient points Hakim makes via her interview with The Daily Beast, are worth discussion and don't require the finer points of the book to be open to debate.

"Anyone, even quite an ugly person, can be attractive if they just have the right kind of hairstyle, clothes, and present themselves to the best effect...This isn't a frivolous spending of money.  It has real benefits."

In and of itself, nothing about this statement is truly offensive.  I remember attending a seminar geared toward women in business back in the late 1980's where we were advised to pay attention to how the senior executives in our company dressed.  If we wanted to succeed, an easy way to demonstrate our "acceptability" was to dress the same way.  If the men wore suits and ties, women should wear suits and low heels.  If everyone wore solid colors - black, blue, etc - so should you.  If the environment was casual, be the best-casually-dressed worker in the office.   I don't think its such a stretch to encourage people to look their best at work, it demonstrates a level of attention and ambition that assures higher-ups that you are someone who's not just marking time at your job, you're in the game. 

Social research doesn't lie; people make assumptions about other people all of the time based simply on how they look.  It stands to reason that a competent employee who dresses like a slob is going to be less favored than an equally competent employee who dresses well, all else being equal. 

Hakim asserts that "Everybody should use all the assets they've got, and this is one asset that women have often been told is inappropriate to use.   I think women need to stop having a chip on their shoulder, or feel uncomfortable investing in erotic capital.  Attractiveness and beauty has real value."   She claims that things such as Exercise, tanning, coloring your hair and even plastic surgery are necessary evils for career success.   She identifies social skills as another invaluable asset.

Its disconcerting to have someone with Hakim's considerable research behind them to bluntly advise us that we must look better in order to compete.  But is it true?

I wonder if the reaction to this book would be different if the title were less threatening.  Looking good doesn't necessarily convey "erotic" appeal.  Dressing nicely and maintaining one's looks don't necessarily insinuate that a woman is exuding sex appeal.  Utilizing a word loaded with not-so-subtle visual imagery as part of her hypothesis is certainly one way to create controversy and ensure a greater number of book sales.  But then, without having read it, I have no idea whether Hakim is simply advising women to make sure they look good at work and not telling us to show off our boobs in low-cut tops and wear stiletto's to maximize the draw power of our legs and asses.  Because truly, those are completely different concepts.

I've met plenty of women in the business place that easily fall into stereotypical categories.  I've worked with women who were gorgeous and marginally competent, who slept with or sucked off whichever man was required in order to get a better salary, a better bonus or a promotion.  I've worked with women who were incredibly good at their jobs but who were challenged either by less-than-stellar looks or a timid personality or both, and heard them degraded behind their backs by coworkers and higher-ups based simply on the scale of their physical attractiveness.  I've heard people say things like "Oh yeah, she's really good at what she does, but..." 

Then there are those women - the ones who have it all.  Either blessed genetically with good looks or having earned them via a lot of time in the gym or under the scalpel, these women also have the brains and the personality to boot.  And frankly, they blow the competition out of the water.  They work hard, they get things done, and they look good doing it.  That's pretty hard to compete with. 

I can see it from both sides, honestly.  I value a person's ability over their looks, and as a manager I know that I want to hire people who will get the job done.  But as a woman in the workplace who is also interested in cultivating my own success, I often must consider how my physical appearance might benefit or harm me.  One button too low?  Does this make me look too casual?  Am I over- or under-doing the hair and makeup?  What is it I want to accomplish today and what meetings do I have where I may need to generate a better impression?

I have had the (mis?)fortune in the past of supervising stereotypical office bimbos. Women that reported to me but who were also sleeping with other managers in the company or getting massive boob jobs and distracting the entire office with their low-cut shirts, I can tell you quite honestly I'd rather have someone who is a lot more discreet in their clothing choices, regardless of the quality of their work.  Its not that I resent another women for being pretty or sexy, I don't.  We come in all shapes and sizes, and just because someone looks different from me or is younger than I am doesn't mean I'm competing with her.  However,  in my experience, a woman who openly flaunts her sexuality in the work environment becomes a distraction, breeds jealousy and resentment in her coworkers.  Even if she isn't sleeping her way up the ladder, if she's wearing micro-minis and being obviously sexual in her behavior, everyone will believe that she is.  

When you're managing people, you need teamwork from your people, and the pockets of overt hostility that such a woman engenders, unless she is staggeringly brilliant at her job, aren't worth it.  On that basis alone, I'm going to assume that Hakim isn't telling us to "whore it up" to get ahead, but that she rather means to look and act our best and that success will naturally follow.

I'm inclined to follow my natural instinct that the inclusion of the term "Erotic" in the book's title and the somewhat inflammatory nature of Hakim's comments in her Daily Beast interview are deliberate and designed to increase interest in the book itself, and that what she's actually proposing to her readers is something other than what the book's title suggests.   And if I'm wrong, and that's what she's actually suggesting, I will less-than gently opine that she's got it all wrong.  Crossing a certain line when it comes to what you wear and how you act at work will do you more harm than good.   And the more women that cross that line, the harder they make it for the rest of us to remind the corporate patriarchy that we are competent, we are personable, we are capable of success without using our lady parts to get there.

 Edited and added:  There is no question that our concepts of attractiveness are largely culturally defined.  There has always been an existing conundrum for the career woman who is also a conscious feminist:  How do I work to change cultural concepts while also surviving within them?  If I attempt to change the culture yet still conform to it, am I damaging my message?  Hakim's new book does little, if anything, to solve this dilemma.

Talking to my daughter about race

Mr. C has had a belly ache the past two days.  We're not sure what's going on there, but it appears he may have a deepening milk allergy.  I dread the thought of doing an elimination diet with a six year old who already has a limited appetite and sensory processing disorder to boot, but I guess it can't be helped.  Hold my hand, yes? 

He got to stay home with SG today, and as SG called to inform me that they found a surprise batch of baby chicks in the rafters of the barn, I expect they are having a great time.

Because her brother stayed home, A and I had a nice long ride to work together today.  She's been having some trouble sleeping lately.  Talking about that led to talking about her dad and I, and that led to talking about relationships and being in love.  Thinking of SG and I, I offered her some of my thoughts on what I find to be important in relationships, such as choosing someone that you really like and enjoy beyond that sensational feeling of floating you get whenever you're around them, and choosing someone who really cares about you and who is kind and sweet.  We talked about what people look like and what makes someone attractive to you and how that's a really individual and subjective thing that changes with time and with deeper knowing.

And she says to me, Mom, there is someone that I really like. 

O.   RLY?

My little baby girl likes somebody.  Not the same way she likes her buddy from class that she hangs out with at recess, but the way you like someone when just thinking about them is better than eating ice cream.  Or at least, almost as good as that.  Because, Ice Cream.  Duh.

And I want to know who is this person who has snared the attention of this beautiful child who says EWWWWWW, that's gross! everytime SG plants a smooch on me and who says that boys are yucky.  So I ask some questions, like What is this person's name? which she tells me, and what does he look like? and she hesitates. 

Ummm, he's brown.

And I'm thinking to myself immediately that the time/space continuum must be really working in my direction, because there's this amazing conversation going on over at Kelly Wickham's blog.  When I read her first post on the subject I wanted to comment but didn't, then went back a few more times and commented yesterday, and today there's a great followup post that I expect will lead to more followup conversation.  We are talking about something important, here. 

I have white privilege.  I'm a middle-aged middle-class white woman who has never experienced a drop of racism directed toward me (that I was aware of) in my entire life.  I've been treated differently by others in business and in my daily life because of my gender, but to assume that I can as a result of that understand what it's like to be black or brown or golden-skinned would be utterly wrong.  I can never understand because I lack context. 

But that doesn't mean I don't care.  

So back to my daughter.

He's brown.  OK.  Is there a reason you are uncomfortable with that?

I don't know, mom.  I didn't know if you would mind.  He's not dark brown, like black people.  He's brown like Mexican people.  And he speaks Spanish.

And here is where white privilege comes into play and this is where we as human beings must learn to check our perceptions and learn to channel our conscious thought in new ways.  I live and work in an agricultural community where many of my neighbors are first or second-generation immigrants.  But my immediate assumption should not be that my daughter likes a boy who (poor thing) has a family who is toiling today picking onions in the hot sun.  And if it is?  Smack me in the face and send me back to remedial humanity class right now.  

For all I know his dad owns the crop circles that other people are working on and they live in a house three times the size of mine.  Or his mom is an administrator at the bank where I have my mortgage, or is a teacher at my daughter's school.    Yes, we make assumptions about people all the time based on what they look like, how they speak, what they do.  Part of overcoming the insidiousness of racism is to put our assumptions in check.  To hear ourselves.  To learn to think differently.   To hear the ways we minimize others and their experiences and to replace those thoughts with something better, something that doesn't pigeonhole people into other people's stereotypes.

How do we do that?  Expand your cultural reach.  Read books about black people that were written by black people.  Enjoy a community event in your town that isn't one born of your culture but of someone else's.  Recognize and appreciate how you are different, but seek the ways in which you are similar.  Listen.

I don't think I'm some hip white woman who is way ahead of the game when it comes to solving the intricate difficulties racism presents.  I'm only able to speak for myself and say that there are things I do not know and do not understand and there are thousands of small ways that my privilege has impacted my thinking and I need to be aware of that.  I need to be open to hearing what someone who IS black or brown or golden has to say about it and not be afraid to hear criticism from them about the way I think or react.  If I can do that, I can be part of the solution and stop being part of the problem.

Step one. My daughter likes a boy.  And until I meet him and I learn more about him, the only things I know about him are that:

My daughter thinks he's handsome

He speaks more languages than I do.

Its neither cool nor is it awful, except that oh god, my little girl likes a BOY and I'm not ready for this!

 

Promises, promises

  

 

I'm an utter fool for romantic songs.   The few who are persistent enough to push past my hard, crusty shell will find that I am a completely sensitive and hopelessly romantic marshmallow.  Lately, though, my romanticism is being challenged by my determination to end my old codependent ways, and its turning out to be something of a drag on my love-song addiction.

Have you heard the song Marry Me by Train?  The song where the guy falls in love with a girl in a cafe and envisions their whole life together?  There's this part where the singer says Promise me you'll always be happy by my side and then I promise to sing to you when all the music dies.  And as I contemplate what it really means to love another human being in the kind of way that causes you to plan a life together, I realize that even though I love this song, even though I love its romantic implications, even so, those words are utter bullshit.

Who can promise to always be happy with their partner?  Happiness is a wandering set of goalposts.  If your happiness is dependent on your partner always remaining exactly the way they are today, on the circumstances of your life being just like they are now or reaching some future planned out goal, I think you will likely be disappointed.  I can't promise to always be happy.  I know that I feel happy when I'm with SG - at least most of the time.  Sometimes I'm not happy one little bit, but it usually has nothing do with him and a whole lot to do with me or with something that's gone sour. 

I love Khalil Gibran, particularly The Prophet.   I've quoted him before, and I will probably do it again in the future because he is wise.   I love what he expresses about the nature of relationships between adults:

But let there be spaces in your togetherness, and let the winds of heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love. Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls

Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.  Give one another bread but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each of you be alone,

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.  For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.

And stand together, but not yet too near together.  For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.

I forgot before, if I ever really knew it, that my ex and I were not the same person.  I forgot that even if he did not like something I was allowed to like it.  I forgot that even if I really wanted to go to a certain place for vacation that didn't mean that he wanted to go there too.  I forgot that the life plans I laid in my head for the both of us weren't necessarily the ones that he had for us, and because we didn't really share them with each other, we were both doomed to disappointment.    After a while, when you expect the person you're with to be just like you, to be the one to fix what's broken within you, the reality that they are not and they can't grows bitter in the back of your throat.

And let's be honest.  Even if we love each other deeply and honestly and we have a wonderful relationship, there's no guarantee.  He might leave me someday.  He probably won't, but he might.  You can't make someone stay and you can't make someone love you the way you want to be loved. 

So what are we left to do?

I hope love will be forever.  I am not going to avoid love just because it could end someday.  I am going to choose wisely and I am going to check my expectations.  I'm not going to make promises I can't keep and I'm not going to ask my partner to make them either.  I'm going to accept the love he has for me at face value and I'm going to trust him.  I'm going to accept him as he is.  I'm going to appreciate him for who he is and for the loving things he does for me.  I'm going to value his opinion and respect his experience.  I'm going to be as loving to him as I am able because he deserves to treated with love.  I'm going to keep in mind that both of us are human and fallible and that it is too much to expect us to always have good days, always be at our best.  When I fail to be loving and he grants me the room to be crabby and then forgives me for the way I might speak to him then, I am going to be damn grateful. 

At least I'm going to try very hard to do that, but you know I can't promise.

 

We are who we are.  We don't need permission, but we do need acceptance.  We need someone who will forgive us our bad behavior but who will let us know when we have stepped on their feet.  We need someone who will see us when our dignity is shredded and walk beside us until we have regained our composure.  Love without boundaries, limits or control.   Promises are not love and love does not require promises to stay alive in our hearts.