A Powerful Four and... waiting

We spend a lot of our life waiting.  Especially in the high- traffic area my family lives in, my family spends a lot of our time waiting in traffic.   My husband and I spent a lot of time waiting to find each other.  I was reminded of this when I visited with a good friend last week and remembered through her travails the not so pleasant parts of dating and yearning for someone.  It seems that I didn't find my husband until I had finally resolved to "lean into" waiting than running from it.  The waiting was for good purpose.  If I had met my husband earlier in my life, I wouldn't have been wise enough to see him for the gem he was and I wouldn't have gotten some things out of my system that I needed to.  Watching my young son wait, for Christmas and for his next birthday, is a reminder for me.

If we don't wait for something, if we get instant gratification, it's just not as special and we take it for granted.  I have the opportunity to review a great book by Jeannie Ewing, Waiting With Purpose.  It's a particularly relevant book this time of year and will be posting the review soon.

Many people try to skip past Advent and go straight to Christmas.  I smiled as my son reminded my husband as they set up a nativity scene, "Daddy, it's not Christmas yet so Jesus doesn't go on the manger yet."  This was a special tradition from my family as well as the Advent Calendar, Advent Wreath and encouragement to go to the Sacrament of Reconciliation at this time of year.  Not only do we get the house ready with decorations and prepare gifts for others and bake cookies, but it's time to get our hearts ready too.  Consider doing something special this Advent and "lean into" the wait.  Come Christmas, the wait and anticipation will be worth it.

Now that I've made you wait for why I titled this post... My son has been showing some signs of frustration with not being in control of things (I know this is a problem many of us adults have too).  I spoke with him and told him instead of throwing tantrums or saying hurtful things to others, when he felt like he wasn't being listened to, or was frustrated, he could throw his arm up in the air and declare, "I'm a powerful 4!".   I don't know where I came up with this idea, but this sounded better than the other things he was saying and I wanted to give him some feeling of self- empowerment.  Later on that night we were out to dinner at a nice restaurant and he was getting tired and wanted to go home.  He let everyone know he was a powerful 4!  The smile on his face made the situation slightly less embarrassing than it could have been...

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.  Trying to get some inner peace before the hustle and bustle of the holidays takes over.  God Bless!

A Bath and a Nail Trim

We are getting ready for the holidays here and part of getting ready is getting the dog ready.

Today,

I got to take him into work with me for a full "Spa Day".  I'm not sure if it was a "Spa Day" for the cat to get the house to herself...  The dog seemed to have fun, getting to ride to drop off my son at school and then another half hour to work.  Only Dewey can think traffic is fun..

Dewey got a full brush out, nail trim and bath and blow-dry.  He even got a pumpkin bandana.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Numbers...

As I struggle to remember numbers (I won't tell you how long it took me to remember my husbands cell phone number- the convenience of cell phones having numbers saved).  or remember the doses of often prescribed my medication, my son appears to be an ace at remembering them.

He impressed my husband  with looking at the crosswalk numbers and as they changed reciting baseball players that had the numbers on the crosswalk.

The other day my son blurted out, "Mommy, I know your phone number."  Yes, my four year blurted out all 10 digits.  I then decided it was time to teach him how to use a phone.  Not my cell phone, mind you, the good old fashioned wall phone.  I figured it wasn't a bad idea to teach him how to call me if there was a babysitter or some other type of emergency he needed to get a hold of me.

My mom was helping me out with some items last week, and she needed to
 access my phone.  She looked somewhat offended when I told her, "No, don't use my passcode, just let me give you my thumb print."  I feel quite confident that my son would have no problem remembering my passcode, figuring out how to open my phone and doing who knows what on my phone- the few times he's gotten a hold of it he's shown me features I never knew it had.  No- the last thing I need is my pre-schooler re-organizing my email and schedule.

Numbers- I should be proud (and I am) that he's getting such a good grasp on them, but it's also going to mean I need to keep a lot better tabs on what numbers I'm giving out..

Short Sleeve Time

We are not even past Thanksgiving yet and my son is already longing for summer.  We drove by a playground we just discovered a month or two ago as the weather suddenly turned cold and my son was caught without a coat.  He told me he wanted to return in "short-sleeves".

My son loves shorts and short-sleeve shirts, he's so active he stretches the time that it is still appropriate to wear them further than most people.

I told my son sadly- "it's not going to be short sleeve and shorts weather for a long, long time."  As I was sad as I said this, he chimed in, "well at least it's going to be Christmas and Easter soon!"  It's so intriguing to see how fast time passes for small children and they happily look forward to the passing of time, when I long to freeze time and hold onto it forever...

Childhood fears

My husband didn't realize it, but in his effort to try to caution me to be careful on a big bridge, he brought out a childhood anxiety.  Growing up in Michigan, at one point I recall hearing that a small car went off the bridge. I believe it was in the 80s, at a formative time in my life and it was a young woman.  High wind was an issue.  From that point on, I always had a fear of the bridge.  Not to the point where it would keep me from going across it, but definitely a fear.

I suppose, like my patients, fears don't get better with time, they get worse.  Anxiety gets worse if you don't deal with it.  My husband was shocked when I started searching the weather channel and found out there was a gale force wind warning for the bridge during the time span I was supposed to go across.  Combined with being in 3 days of sustained traffic jams and some inclement weather and my nerves were already frayed.

My husband had not seen me go into a state ever approaching a panic attack before, but I did last night.  I had a difficult night sleeping and was a little anxious approaching the bridge.  I had pre-programmed my phone so I could listen to the rosary as I went across.  I focused on the words of the rosary, even though saying, "Now and at the hour of our death" was maybe not the most comforting, but fleeing to my Blessed Mother was.  I made it successfully over the bridge both ways and even got to get a good view of the pretty water on my way back.  I guess I need to give the same prescription to myself that I give to my patients- counter condition yourself and an added piece of advice for myself.  Rest in the arms of a higher power.

Fasting

Generally, when one thinks of fasting, they think of Lent.  Fasting is such a rich part of our Catholic faith that has many seasons- Advent, fasting and praying for the end of abortion to fasting and praying for our own intentions.

Last year, during the chaos of the election, my husband and I decided to fast.  We did not have a particular candidate we wanted to win.  We just prayed that God's will would happen and our country would be able to get through these turbulent times.  While that is still in our prayers, the urgency and anxiety isn't quite what it was during election season.  We have continued fasting now for our own special intention.

When we discussed fasting as a couple, we d

ecided to do a "mix" of fasting.  I let my husband be the leader and decide what things would be good to fast from.  We are both avid football fans, so we didn't want to entirely stop watching TV and miss out on supporting our alma mater's.  We both have sweet teeth and we also spend a lot of time on our smart phones and I-pads.  We already fast on Fridays, and try to stay meatless.  We decided to continue our fasting on the weekends.  On Saturdays and Sundays we decided, dependent on the schedule and also the temptations to fast either from dessert, vegetating in front of the TV or getting lost in electronics.  While our nation is still in turmoil and our special intention has not occurred, we continue to reap benefits from the fasting.

Our fasting has brought us closer together as a couple, taken a little bit of weight off of us and have allowed for some organizing time, communication time and just time to remember that we don't have to be zombies in front of the TV to relax.

So the "giving up" has a actually been an additive gift.  Not only are my husband and I closer, but it has brought us closer in our faith.

Advent is coming up and that's a perfect time for fasting.

Competition

For some reason, this subject keeps popping in my head lately.  I used to be very competitive.  You pretty much can't be a veterinarian without any competitive drive.  I've had more than one of my own "human" doctors say they would have been a veterinarian, but didn't get in.  I also worked with a veterinary neurology specialist who did spinal surgery on people before he did it on dogs- not kidding.  But more recently I've found myself getting annoyed with competition.

I also was a competitive college athlete.  I don't know if part of my competitive nature is due to having a sister who was just 18 months older than me- I think the fact that I never wanted to miss out on what she was doing helped drive me to excel (she didn't like me being in her "advanced 5th grade reading and math" when I was still in 4th grade.  She's very smart, but I think she didn't appreciate her "little sister" being in the same class with her.  Sisterly competition also got me to be a runner- which I still am today (I was going to quit track and field but when she told me she thought I should quit, I showed her- and beat her personal record for the 800 meter dash).

I think between twice being told I might not make it by doctors (once when I was 21 and then again prior to having my son) and just growing up and maturing I have lost a lot of my competitive drive.  There's just something sobering about having your doctors pray before doing surgery on you.  You realize there's something more to life than competition.  There's peace.  For the most part I've lost my competitive edge.

I realized the other day, when I found out there's a possibility I might be elected as President of my Lay Dominican Chapter that I have absolutely no desire for elected office (yes- this coming from the girl who ran for everything in school and college).  I wouldn't put myself up for election, but I found out that the Dominican way is that you can't take yourself out of the running unless you have a terminal illness and I was told by someone they already knew they were voting for me.   Hmm.  Maybe they should have told me this before I took my lifetime promises.  Just kidding.  Hopefully the Holy Spirit will persuade my fellow chapter members that I'm not the best person for the job.  It's kind of rough pressure to realize that you can't defer from office, it seems a little like a papal election...  I realized that I've come a long way from where I used to be with competitiveness- people who are competitive actually annoy me now.  I guess I have to realize that's where I once was.

The other thing that brought competition to my mind was that as my son approaches kindergarten, we found that there were a very limited number of spots for incoming students at the school of our choice.  I've been active in our parish since we started going there, but I stepped it up about 2 years ago, have been doing everything I can to volunteer, including baking cookies for a school my son doesn't go to yet.  Yep- I'm for real.  Apparently when the Mother Bear in me comes out that competitive nature rages again.  Hopefully I can refocus though so my son can realize that peace is more important than competition (But it doesn't hurt to occasionally really step it up when it really matters or when your team or kid is depending on you).