Parenting – Page 2 – mardihumphreys.com

Self-Care is a Thing

I recently discovered self-care is actually a thing. I’ve always equated it to “Treat Yo Self”, but I was wrong. It’s an entire sub-industry of wellness and mental health rooted in medicine. (Here is an interesting article on its origins.) Innumerable products can be marketed for self-care: Frappuccino? Sure. Designer handbag? Absolutely. New car? You deserve it! It’s easy to quickly spiral out of control. In theory, self-care is simple (though not necessarily easy): It’s making time to relax and do something you enjoy. But, it’s faster to buy yourself something than to carve out time in your schedule for a bubble bath. You need down time. It helps your brain make new connections between existing ideas, prevents burn out, and keeps you from stress-eating Snickers. We should take care of ourselves, but it becomes a task and that list is already too long. Attempting to decrease our stress increases it instead. Isn’t that counterproductive (and ironic)? Here are five low maintenance self-care ideas. Choose a couple that don’t stress you out.

Rest – Get ruthless with your schedule and prioritize sleep. Do you need to cut back on after-work girls’ nights? Can your partner take the kids to volleyball practice this week? Do you have to attend that Pampered Chef party? When I feel like I’m not following the Golden Rule, I put myself in time-out. I come home from work, put on my jammies, and take an evening to snuggle the dog and watch Jeopardy until I can fall asleep. If that’s 8:00pm, so be it. I ban caffeine, sugar, and social media. The next morning, I’m ready to roll out of bed and get back to the hustle.

Be Good to Yourself – or nobody else will (Shoutout to Journey). What clears your mind? Music? Exercise? Reading? Make wise choices regarding what you allow in your mind as well as your body. Be aware of what you think about yourself and how you talk to yourself. Carefully evaluate negative comments about you and discard opinions that are invalid. Choose what to believe and build yourself up. Don’t let the haters live rent free in your head.

Tune Out – I’m guilty of checking work email on weekends because I lie to myself: “I need to know if Joe Sixpack replied to the message I sent him on Friday.” No, I don’t. So, unless the sky will fall if I don’t check my work inbox, I’m not, and don’t you do it either. Sometimes I set my phone’s timer for fifteen minutes and journal, close my eyes and box breathe, or surf Pinterest for new chicken recipes. Whatever reboots your brain is how you need to spend your T.E.A.M.

Spend Money – I give myself a weekly allowance and save it. When I find something I want, I spend that money and feel zero guilt. Put a few dollars aside to invest in yourself. Go buy a new nail color, get a new workout outfit, or visit your hair stylist. The indulgence doesn’t have to be solitary. Take a friend out for coffee or take your mom to brunch.

Or Not – Self-care doesn’t have to cost money. Walk the dog. Take a nap. Get a book from the library. Watch a concert on YouTube. Sleep in an extra half hour on your day off. Take a vacation day from work. Stay in bed and watch movies. Go for a bike ride. Self-care is about time. It’s about taking a break to rest, recharge, and rejuvenate. Isn’t it about time you took a break? Please share how you manage self-care in the comments section below.

Yes, Your Honor

We don’t think about how much our parents sacrificed for us until we have children. We don’t realize how good our parents are until we do the job. We don’t consider the long term consequences of making career choices that favor raising a child until we have to make them. We don’t imagine the personal impact of staying up all night nursing a baby, staying up all night worrying about a teenager who is still not home, or staying up all night counseling an adult child whose heart just got broken, until we experience those things.

Merriam-Webster defines honor as treating people with admiration and respect and to give them special recognition. The Bible goes further: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. ‘Honor your father and mother’—which is the first commandment with a promise— ‘so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.’” (Ephesians 6:1-3 NIV) These instructions leave the door to interpretation wide open. When I was five years old, I honored my parents by obeying them. But now that I’m an adult, not so much. Unsure of what to do, I did what most communicators do: I asked them. My Mom said, “In a simple statement, make them feel like they matter, are important, and are worth your time and energy.” My Dad said, “Knowing parents in all stages of life, caring enough to note what is not being said, by noticing non-verbal communication, serving them out of love, not obligation.”

No pressure.

My parents had years to decide what honoring a parent looks like. Their definitions are filtered through their recent experience with my grandmother. During the last few years of her life, my parents honored Grammy by serving her. They, and my uncle, managed her care and her home as her health declined. That was a big ask. Grammy was fortunate to have children willing to serve her as they did, and I trust God will bless my parents for their work.

My parents’ answers indicate they feel honored when my husband, daughter, and/or I spend time with them. Time is a precious commodity both for them and us. I learned that from Harry Chapin. So, I set reminders in my phone to send “just checking in” texts. I encourage my husband and daughter to have their own communication with them and I encourage my parents to communicate with my husband and daughter directly too. I ask when we can get together and what can I do for them. I count on them to tell me, then do everything I realistically can to make it happen.

Not everyone is blessed with good parents. The bottom line is: Forgive them. Simple, but not easy. Forgiveness is for the forgiver, not the forgiven. It’s self-preservation. It doesn’t change anything about them, it heals you. If it’s just a matter of mistakes you think your parents made, communicate with them: “I feel like you favored my sister over me,” or “I feel like you criticized everything I did.” Have that difficult conversation. But if you were physically abused or abandoned, acknowledge the pain and work to let it go for your own peace of mind. If you have to distance yourself from a toxic parent in order to be emotionally healthy, the most honorable thing you can do may be to just leave them alone.

I can never repay my parents for the T.E.A.M. effort they put into raising me, but I can appreciate it by finding out what makes them feel honored and doing my best to make them feel loved. Please share what you do to honor your parents here:

College Educated

My husband and I helped our daughter move back to campus to begin her Senior Year last week. It made me feel nostalgic, but not in the “our-little-girl-is-growing-up” way. More like the “have-I-been-a-good-mom?” way. Our daughter is in college, but I’m earning a degree in parenting an adult child. Here are five things I learned and how I intend to use that knowledge this school year:

Boundaries: I’m going to stop feeling bad for setting and holding boundaries. For example: last Spring Break she paid for her trip. Following her return, she ate peanut butter and jelly for a week because she misjudged her next pay day. Sure, I could’ve given her $50, but what would that teach her? She’d learn she can count on me to bail her out of financial jams. Setting boundaries with an adult child is tricky. She still kinda lives with my husband (her father) and me. We have precious little recourse if she breaks our rules. If we ask her to tidy her room and she doesn’t, what are we going to do about it? Not help her pay tuition? If she perceives the house and everything in it as hers, then of course she’s offended when we bristle at her plan to invite a dozen of her friends over to cook a spaghetti dinner together. At midnight. On a Wednesday. I’ll stop making home comfy for her so she can look forward to moving out permanently and making a home of her own.

Communication: If she doesn’t ask me a question, I won’t voice my opinion. Communication is mostly listening. However, I need to limit how long I listen to her vent about a problem before suggesting she turn her thoughts toward a solution, and I must resist the urge to fix it for her. It’s hard to break that habit, but if I get hit by a beer truck this afternoon, she’s going to have to resolve it herself anyway. I need to train her to solve her own problems while she still has her parents to fall back on. Our birdie needs to know we think she can fly. Humans want immediate relief from crisis, but not every hard thing in life is a crisis.

Expectations: I’ll stop being offended when she chooses to spend time with her friends instead of me. She is finding her tribe and figuring out how to live in community. This is my opportunity to do the same. College is a natural time for her to pull away. I can make this transition easier for both of us by not wondering if she’s coming home for the weekend and making my own plans instead. Also, I’ll stop romanticizing my kid. It shouldn’t surprise me when she comes home to eat hot wings, pet the dog, and put items on the grocery list, not that there’s anything wrong with that. I need to see her for who she is and not whom I want her to be.

Sow, Reap: I will let her reap what she sows; both good and bad. When my daughter says she needs something, my first instinct is to find a way to give it to her. I’ll stop, think, and maybe ask a couple of questions before just handing over my retirement money. Actions have consequences. Adulting is one step up and two steps back. Letting her reap what she sowed is hard. But as difficult as it is to stand by and watch my child suffer the consequences of a poor decision, I have to remember that humans learn more from painful lessons than we learn from pain-free ones.

Lean On My Partner: I will step back and let my partner parent. Recently, something was obviously bothering our daughter and she refused to talk about it. Twenty-four hours later, she still didn’t want to tell us about it. She went to her room and after a couple of hours, I was worried. I started to check on her when my brilliant husband had a better idea: Bacon. Soon the irresistible smell of bacon frying on the stove drew her downstairs. She stated she didn’t want to talk about the situation because it made her sad. So I pulled an Elsa and let it go. Can I solve her problem? No. Is it her problem and not mine? Yes. Does the cold bother me anyway? Never. My husband has a different perspective on most every situation concerning our daughter. I’m soft on her for some things and he’s soft on her for others. Luckily, we’re rarely soft on her for the same things. Occasionally, I have to let him take the lead and support his management of the situation. Doing so is easier when it involves bacon.

How do you parent your adult child? Please share your story here:

Vulnerable to Extinction

When I ask young women what they want to do with their lives, I’m surprised at the number of whom say Stay at Home Mom (SAHM). Their answer saddens me because it’s such a tough row to hoe here in America. I think they are brave to admit this desire given the current state of the women’s movement. Speaking as someone who is reaping the consequences of choosing child-rearing over career, I have some news for SAHM wannabes:

Not News: Whether or not SAHM is a profession is highly controversial. Since women in America do not receive a paycheck to be SAHMs, for the sake of this conversation, I refer to it as a job. I think we can all agree that it takes skill to run a home: Time management, organization, budget balancing, crisis management, cruise director, chauffeur, nurse, maid, teacher, coach, cook, housekeeper, etc.

Also Not News: Plenty of women have to do all of the above while simultaneously working a full time job. A friend who is a wife and mother of a preschooler was excited to accept a position that pays $12.13 an hour to start. I’m smiling and congratulating while in my head calculating how far that money will go. When did food, clothing, and shelter get so expensive? Her situation is common. Are you married and need daycare so you can work because you can’t pay your bills with one income? In 2016, Americans paid an average of $196 a week to put one child in daycare, and the price just keeps going up. Of the parents surveyed, two-fifths said costs rose $1000 per year.

Actual News: Many women consider raising children a full time job, but America’s legal system doesn’t. Is it even possible to be a SAHM anymore? If you are going to be successful, here are three things you should consider:

Partner: You will need someone who is willing to support you and your children financially at least for a while. Be prepared to give up luxuries like eating out, expensive vacations, and designer clothes, for years. Work to maintain good communication. Regularly check in and ask how he’s doing and tell him how you’re doing. Go on dates so the two of you have bonding experiences that don’t include the kids. Acknowledge this is hard for both of you, and be assertive in expecting help with managing both the chores (cooking/cleaning/yard work, etc.) and the child care. It’s not “babysitting” when it’s your own kid. It’s parenting.

Gig: Can you work at home to maintain some sort of professional connection? Because while you may be a SAHM for around 20 years, eventually, you’ll retire and a 20 year hiatus from the work force is damaging to your marketability. Start now to prepare for life after your nest empties. What about starting a business? What about working part time? What about volunteering?

Network: Stay in touch with other moms and former colleagues. With all the social media platforms available, you have no excuse to let relationships go, but also make the effort to connect face to face. Meet for coffee, lunch, a walk, a book club: any activity that comes naturally so that you have adult relationships to cultivate for the future day when you have the bandwidth to pursue your life’s next chapter.

Do you have any advice for potential SAHMs? Share it here:

You Call THIS Having it All?

We’ve gone from Helen Gurley Brown in 1986 telling women we can have it all: career, family, social life, etc., to Oprah Winfrey in 2018 telling us we can’t have it all at the same time. I feel like the narrative of the American Woman is: Have a demanding career, a successful husband, active children, and manage all these things with no support; otherwise, you are not a “real” woman. And, it’s not men who are judging us. We do this to each other. It needs to stop. NOW. As usual, I have more questions than answers:

Why is this even a goal? I’ve spent the last 21 years hoping by the time our daughter was old enough to hold a full time job, marry, and start a family, the environment in America would be conducive to parenting while working full time. It isn’t and I don’t think it will be in my lifetime. Do we really need government policies that force companies to not fire a woman for taking time off to give birth and recover from it? Apparently so: FMLA. Now why would any company do that? Work for women is not a luxury. If we have to legislate to keep women employed, how about policies more like the ones in Great Britain ? When I gave birth to our daughter, I took a 12 week maternity leave. I saved up my sick days and rolled over my vacation days for two years in order to be paid for most of that time off. I trained someone to fill in for me while I was out, but mostly I trained him to call me when he had questions so I could log these calls and prove the company needed me to return. Yes. I’m one radioactive spider bite away from being a super villain.

Why do we assume women want to marry? I blame the media. I had this conversation with a couple of female friends on different occasions recently and both of them were hard pressed to come up with reasons why their daughters should marry their current boyfriends. We all finally landed on the African proverb, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” Marriage encourages couples to work out their problems and stay together. Relationships are hard. They require you to put the interests of your mate ahead of your own. Not every woman is willing to do that, nor should society expect her to.

Why do we assume women want to have children? Sometimes looking at Facebook feels like watching a mommy contest. I see posts of locally sourced organic meals served to the entire team after the pee-wee ballgame accompanied by a comment about rushing off to answer work emails after her player is in bed. I’m exhausted just reading it. If you’ve got one foot on the corporate ladder and one foot in the kitchen, you’re doing the splits, and that gets real painful, real fast. How do you excel at either one? As a society, we need to stop asking women why they don’t have children. Personal reproductive choices are no one’s business.

Is work-life balance an illusion? So you have to work and you want to have children. Why do women feel guilty for getting help? Why is it shameful to have a cleaning lady? What is wrong with hiring a full-time baby sitter? Why can’t a husband be the primary care-giver? Are women just control freaks? Do you want to control both doctor’s appointments and staff meetings? Why does childcare cost so much? How do we stop hiring managers from looking at women of child bearing age during interviews and think to themselves, “I wonder how long she will be on the job before she gets pregnant?” Now that I’m past child bearing years, I have advanced faster in my career since my daughter started college than in her lifetime up to now.

Do you teach your daughters to plan their futures? Have you laid out a schedule for them? For example, “Okay honey, here’s what you do. After high school, go to college. Graduate in four years with a Bachelor’s degree then get an entry level position at a corporation. Work there for three years and get promoted. Work three more years, then get married. After three years of marriage, get promoted to manager, then have your first child.” This makes your daughters about 30 years old when they have their first child, by the way. Why do you even have to contemplate giving this kind of controlling counsel to your daughters? Does it even occur to you to give that same advice to your sons? What skills should you teach your daughters to cope with trying to have it all? Should you warn them that their choices will involve sacrifice? For example: You can have both a career and kids, but both will suffer. How are women ever going to achieve equal pay for equal work if we can’t work? How do we promote more women to the C-Suite if we are penalized for child-bearing?

Share your thoughts, suggestions, and experiences here:

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (and Breakfast and Lunch)?

My friend was very excited her daughter’s boyfriend’s apartment was finally move in ready after a month’s delay. He’d lived with her family for almost a year. He had a job, but did not pay rent, utilities, groceries, etc. Nor did he help around the house. My friend cooked his meals, did his laundry, washed his dishes, etc. He accompanied the family to the grocery, put items in the cart, and went to the car when they got to the cashier. She didn’t feel like she could impose consequences on him because of his relationship with her daughter. She said, “I know you would’ve sat down with the two of them before he moved in and talked about expectations. I wanted to, but we never found time. Now it’s too late.” Honestly, I don’t know whether I would’ve thought to do that or not. Pretty to think so (she gives me waaaaay too much credit). Do you have adult children who need a place to crash for a while? Maybe you have a recent college grad and his girlfriend, or a daughter and her partner moving back to town and unable to afford two mortgages. If you have adult children coming to live with you, maybe try a before, during, and after approach:

Before:
Have a family meeting over lunch or coffee and discuss arrangements:

Sharing – If they are not married, are they allowed to sleep together under your roof? Are you an early bird and they are night owls? If they blast the television volume at 1:00AM, is that going to disturb your R.E.M. sleep? Do you need a shower schedule so everyone gets to work on time?

Eating – Will you buy all the groceries? Plan all the meals? Fix three meals a day? If they drink a pound of Starbucks coffee you brew at home every week, are you paying for it?

Cleaning – Will you clean up after them in your common areas? Will you put the used dishes they left sitting on the living room table in the dishwasher? Are you doing their laundry?

Working – Do they have jobs? If not, are they looking for employment? Will they use your computer, printer, ink, paper, Wi-Fi, to search for employment? Will they use those resources for free? Do both of them have to get jobs before they can move out? How long will they stay: Three months, six months, a year, indefinitely?

Paying – Will they pay rent? Will they pay the electric bill? Will they buy groceries? This is tricky, but important to discuss. They need some skin in the game. They are using your power, water, appliances, maybe even your car. Your household expenses will go up and part of adulting is figuring out how to pay your expenses.

If you have house rules, now is the time announce them and define the consequences for broken rules. Acknowledge that mistakes are inevitable and will be forgiven. You can be a gracious host and have harmony in your home if you set boundaries and steel yourself to enforce them. Human nature being what it is, they will most likely test your boundaries. Stand your ground and demand respect. You do not want to make your home so comfortable for them that they never want to leave.

During:
Keep talking. What are their plans for leaving? How are the job searches going? Can they make dinner tomorrow night? Don’t do their laundry, dishes, taxes or anything else. Show them how to use the washer and dryer, dishwasher, stove, vacuum, coffeemaker, etc. Give them opportunities to contribute to the running of the house. Enforce consequences and be specific. For example: If you have to ask them to wash their dishes, set a time limit: “These dishes need washed, dried, and put away by the time I get up in the morning.” Is much clearer than, “Please clean up your dishes.” If this becomes a habit, there needs to be a consequence: “You can’t use our dishes anymore. Buy yourself some paper plates.”

After:
If they are still living with you after the deadline you set has passed, have another family meeting. Are they ready to go? Are they stalling? Do they need a Plan B? Was the deadline unrealistic and needs pushed back? If so, what is a more realistic deadline? If they are packed up and ready to go, now is the time to settle up. Do they owe you money? If they do, but can’t pay at the time, set up a payment schedule. Was living together pleasant (or at least tolerable)? If so, celebrate! Take everyone to dinner, help them move out, or just be gracious upon their exit.

Are you currently living with your adult children or vice versa? Tell me how it’s going here:

Thanks Mom!

My mom once said to me, “I feel like I taught you how to be a good mother, but not a good wife.” I hope my husband disagrees with her on that point, but what I know for sure is she taught me how to be a good human. I apply her lessons to my roles as mother, wife, daughter, friend, employee, etc., everyday. I’m surprised how often Mom’s wisdom pops into my head at work. As Mother’s Day approaches, here is some of that wisdom:

People Come First – Mom was 18 years old when I was born. I was an unplanned pregnancy. She could have chosen not to have me. Instead, she raised me while going to college, getting her degree, then working as a nurse. Watching her journey, I decided to wait until I was 30 years old to become a mom. Yes, I watched her life and judged her choices. Your life and choices are being judged too; at your job. Do you put the interests of the company ahead of your own, or do you do as little as possible because that’s all you think it deserves? Do you enable the team’s success, or do you look for ways to take credit for the team’s work? Your manager will make decisions regarding your job performance based both on what you do and what you don’t do. The best practice is to both make sure your manager knows you “took one for the team,” and share credit for the success of the project with the team. Mom put my life ahead of hers. She teaches me that people come first.

Pick Your Battles – My Grandmother turns 90 years old this month and her health is fading. She lives on her own and Mom and my uncle share the responsibility of helping her stay in her house. They sometimes disagree on the best way to handle situations. Sometimes my mother chooses not to fight a battle that, in her place, I would choose to fight. Sometimes she lets my uncle take the lead and handle the task. I was reminded of this recently at the office. I kept getting frustrated with a colleague’s work. I thought, “Why does he do that? “Why doesn’t he do this?” Then I realized my circumstance was very similar to Mom and my uncle taking care of my grandmother. I chose to follow Mom’s lead and not only let the coworker do his job, but also offered to help. He took me up on the offer, which was a lesson in humility, but that is another blog for another time. Anyway, does this sound familiar? Do you have associates that can use your help instead of your criticism? Mom trains me to pick my battles.

Always Choose Generosity – Mom has a friend who is fighting cancer. She spends almost five hours every other week with this friend as she undergoes immunotherapy. Every Easter, Mom and her Sunday school class make “Widow Baskets.” These are filled with goodies they purchase like candy, lotions, and gift cards, then deliver to widowed ladies from her class. Mom volunteers tutoring students ages elementary through High School who need one-on-one attention in a quiet area in order to learn. I could go on, but I’m running out of space here. Does she reap any rewards from this generosity? Yes. People, particularly her Sunday school class, show their appreciation. But that’s not why she does all the things she does. Because she is a Christian, Mom always chooses generosity. At work, look for ways to be generous. Stop typing and listen when your cubicle mate is upset. Help colleagues with projects that are in your wheelhouse. Encourage your coworkers when they are struggling. Is someone’s mom sick? Set a task on your calendar to ask him about her once a week. Compliment your boss on a job well done. Use your company’s employee incentive program to reward team members for helping you. Generosity actually benefits you. People are more likely to help you when, in the past, you’ve helped them. Mom’s example inspires me to always choose generosity.

Be So Good At What You Do That You Are Impossible To Ignore – Mom is a life long learner. I vividly remember as a kid sitting at a desk in our kitchen with a blue colored pencil in my hand tracing veins in a picture of a human skull in Mom’s Grey’s Anatomy Coloring Book. She studied it for one of her nursing classes. Mom loves The Bible and has spent the years since her retirement from nursing studying it. She is also a natural leader. She is a wise communicator with both listening and speaking skills. This combination made her the obvious choice to permanently teach her Sunday school class when the need arose. Also, because of her years of training, Mom has a steady stream of women 40 – 50 years younger than she is asking her to disciple them. Her example taught me to hone my skills, work hard, and produce results. It’s difficult to be a woman in the workplace, but results are genderless. If sales are up 12% because of your efforts, the boss isn’t thinking about whether you are male or female. Be the Subject Matter Expert at something at your job: PowerPoint, customer service, patient follow up, whatever your passion is. If you to study it, practice it, and be the best you can be at it, others (your current employer or your next one) will pursue you. Mom proves you should be so good at what you do that you are impossible to ignore.

It’s Good To Have Hope – Mom has fibromyalgia. This makes every day unpredictable. Stuff gets on her nerves. Literally. She finds ways to cope like art journaling which has garnered her some attention and fans. What began as a coping mechanism has given her opportunity to show others how to use it as a creative outlet. When she faces a difficult day, she moves through it trusting God and hoping tomorrow will be better. She relies on one of my grandmother’s sayings: This too shall pass (again, another blog for another time). Mom’s approach teaches me to keep going and not give up. Don’t you throw in the towel either. Keep going to work. Keep looking for ways to improve process, to please the client, to give value to the customer. Whatever you do for a living, put in the effort and know it will eventually pay off and probably not in the way you expect. Mom shows me that none of us know what the day ahead will bring, but it is definitely more pleasant if you face it with a positive attitude. Mom knows it’s good to have hope.

What about you? What lessons did your mom teach you? Please share them with me here: