10
Expect the Unexpected
Question of the day: Was there one specific parenting moment when you realized it wasn’t going to be as easy as you thought it would be?
“When my son was diagnosed with autism, and all the challenges that brought, that definitely showed me being a parent was NOT going to be a walk in the park at all times.”
—Sheila
“There wasn’t a specific moment, but more of a realization that I was spending more time washing clothes and cleaning up the house than anything else.”
—Ashley
“Giving birth.”
—Nicole P.
“Breastfeeding for sure!!”
—Collette
“Colic. I think I cried as much as my daughter did.”
—Cari
still remember the romance of my honeymoon. The beautiful waves, the tropical setting . . . the hurricane evacuation.
Let me back up.
Jason and I had originally wanted to go to the Caribbean for our honeymoon, but it was hurricane season, so everyone advised us against it. And we listened! We’re not crazy—we wanted calm seas and warm breezes. That seemed like a lovely way to start our life together. Our rabbi suggested Mexico, and we thought: Perfect solution. We’re there.
Our wedding was beautiful, a stunning affair! After the reception there was just enough time to pack up and go to the airport. I remember being on the plane, and how excited we were to be beginning this amazing new chapter in our life together. We were full of optimism, radiating happiness like light.
Our wedding day—truly one of the happiest days of my life
When we landed, we thought, Wow, it must have been a really popular time of the year to travel to Mexico. There were thousands of people in the airport waiting for flights out, wall-to-wall travelers and luggage. Somehow we managed to miss the signs of panic in the air—maybe due to our newlywed bliss. The greeter for the hotel seemed a little odd and kind of half-smiling as he packed our bags into the van, but we didn’t take much notice of that, either.
As we drove to the hotel, though, we got a little more observant. “Wow, it’s kind of cloudy,” I said. “Wow, it’s kind of windy,” Jason said. Meanwhile, tiles were flying off rooftops, and the trees were being blown perpendicular. All the greeter for the hotel would say was “Oh, it’s just a little bad weather.”
Yeah, it was a little bad weather, all right. It was Hurricane Mitch, the most powerful hurricane of the 1998 season, and by the time we’d driven a little farther through vacant streets lined with boarded-up buildings, it became clear that there was a full-on evacuation under way. When we got to the hotel, the only other tourists left were a couple of seventy-year-old storm chasers, and the waves were so high that they were actually crashing against the glass doors of our hotel room.
That was it for us. We rushed down to the lobby and said we wanted out—immediately. Anywhere in the world. The first available flight was going to Mexico City the next morning. We reserved our seats, and we headed back to the airport to wait it out along with all the other storm refugees we’d passed on the way in.
And that’s how it was that my perfect wedding was officially consummated in a tiny Mexico City airport hotel room. My godmother told me later that I should consider myself lucky—not because we survived Hurricane Mitch, but because a disastrous honeymoon trip was a very good omen for a long and happy marriage. So far, it seems like my godmother was right. My own personal theory is that our honeymoon is just one more example of fate laughing at our best-laid plans. We flew away from a hurricane . . . into a hurricane. Of course!
Life keeps teaching me to expect the unexpected. I can try to predict the likeliest possible scenarios, but I know it’s just a matter of chance as to whether I’m right or not. I know that if I’m flying with my girls, it doesn’t matter how much I’ve packed in my carry-on, it will turn out that the one thing I didn’t pack is the one thing I need. I also know that even if I changed a diaper right before we got on the plane, the second we’re up in the air and the fasten-seatbelt sign is on, my kid is going to poop. And there’s not a thing I can do about it but smile, deal with it, and pretend we’re all somewhere else, somewhere peaceful and quiet.
I remember the first time I thought Poet had seriously injured herself. She was a year and a half, running around the hallways of Jason’s office, and she fell. It was her first knot on the head, and I freaked. I thought the world was ending. We took her straight to the ER and called the pediatrician from there. His words were something like “What are you doing in the ER? It’s just a knot.” Just a knot? Just a knot? Oh.
None of the usual clichéd parenting advice could possibly prepare me for the realization that I will never stop worrying about my girls for the rest of my life. And I have story after story of close calls—enough to keep me awake for years. Like the time when Jagger was two years old and escaped from a hotel room in Washington, D.C. She was riding on the elevator downstairs, all alone, when my husband found her. And I will never forget the day I got a call from Poet’s preschool telling me that she’d fallen on the playground and severely cut herself right above her eyebrow. Our doctor sent us to a pediatric plastic surgeon right away (a brilliant piece of advice that made all the difference), and he did a beautiful job. Not only did he pick me up when I saw the cut for the first time and almost passed out, but he was so gentle and caring with Poet. In future years Poet will no doubt enjoy comparing her scar with all her friends’ scars.
What I’ve learned from these and other similarly insane incidents is that I have so much less control than I ever thought over what might happen in my kids’ lives. Each scary experience stops our hearts a little bit. No matter how hard we try to protect our little ones and keep them safe, they will end up with their own scars and scraped knees.
S.P.S.
What to do in those heart-stopping moments . . .
What do we do when we get one of those calls that stops our hearts, or we see our kids walking in with blood on them from a big fall? Take a deep breath and try to stay calm. Of course, I am also the mom who has panicked a hundred times, but I try my best not to. I nearly passed out when I caught sight of my daughter’s injury from the playground. But I definitely learned from that. Something else I learned? It’s amazing what a difference a fun bandage can make. Our girls have a tendency to get really upset at cuts and scrapes, so we keep them distracted by whatever cool bandage we have in the medicine cabinet.
You can’t predict everything that might happen. Even if you tried, chances are that life would still throw a surprise at you. So plan in advance as much as you can. Keep your pediatrician’s number in your phone, some ice packs or frozen peas in the freezer, and a first aid kit in the medicine cabinet. Take a CPR class or two like I did (yes, I’m a crazy mom who took two), and make sure your home is a safe place for curious little ones.
After you do all that, you’ll still worry, and you might even panic now and then. It’s the nature of being a parent. The good news? We’re all in it together.
What goes in my carry-on when traveling . . .
• Gum, lots of gum. Poet has super-sensitive ears, so having fun-flavored gum really helps.
• Books and a few toys. I let the girls help pick out a few of their favorite things from home to bring with them. This way it is not too much stuff, but they feel connected to what they are bringing.
• Mama’s first aid kit in case of emergencies. I made it myself. It has all of my must-haves: Band-Aids, etc.
• Wipes. I always find myself needing wipes for them and for me. Our last flight, chocolate M&M’s had melted underneath where the girls were sitting and you could see me scrubbing the seats with wipes as everyone was leaving the plane. It was a lovely sight.
• A change of clothes for both girls along with a hoodie or something warm in case they get cold.
• Writing books and crayons for them to draw.
• Snacks. Fun snacks that
you all love and can enjoy together. I don’t know what it is about flying, but the minute I am up in the air, I am starving.
Finding the right pediatrician . . .
We’re incredibly lucky that we found the perfect pediatrician for us. I know for myself that I need a lot of hand-holding. I also like to have a doctor who I can talk to openly and on a regular basis. And our doctor is comfortable with that. When you’re interviewing pediatricians, think about the connection you want to have with your doctor. Always ask the questions close to your heart. I’m a firm believer that there’s no such thing as a stupid question, and I don’t think your pediatrician should ever make you feel bad about asking. Most important, trust your gut, and when in doubt, get a second opinion.
11
What’s Yours Is Mine
Question of the day: How do you best handle sibling rivalry?
“Having a large family (seven children at home), sibling rivalry could easily get out of hand, but honestly it’s an easy one for us and doesn’t happen very often in our family. If a sibling hurts another or is saying mean things, the offender spends the day serving the one they hurt. They must play with the one they hurt and let them pick the activities. The offender will also take care of their sibling’s chore as well as serve their meals, get their drinks, etc. Our goal is to not only ‘pay restitution’ for their offense but to also help teach how your actions create reactions and consequences.”
—Retta
“We have three of them and sibling rivalry seems to work in our favor. Two of them will always gang up on the third, but you never know which two it will be! Recently my wife and I had to talk to a clerk at a sales counter. We told our 9 year old to watch the other two. Five minutes later they were both sitting perfectly still and quiet. We asked our 9 year old how he did it and he said, ‘I told (the 4 year old) I had a job for him, which was to watch (the 2 year old) and make sure she didn’t get off the bench, because she’d be in trouble if he told me. Then I told her the same thing.’”
—Allen
“Sibling rivalry is best handled by doing your best to assure your children you love them all the same and that everyone is unique and different and not everyone may be treated the same all the time, but the love is always the same no matter what. Even when you do not get along with your sibling love them as you want them to love you.”
—Paul
When I was born and my mother brought me home from the hospital, my big brother Meeno took one look at me and said, “Can brothers marry sisters?” Somehow, I was blessed with a sibling whose heart was so open to me that we were close from the moment I entered the world. Meeno is six years older, and in a lot of ways he’s been more than a brother to me. He was like a second father. My mother worked so incredibly hard to support us, all on her own. When she couldn’t be there, it was always Meeno. He changed my diapers; he tucked me in at night. He walked me hand in hand to my first day of preschool, and when I didn’t want to be alone at night, he let me sleep in his room.
I would love for my girls to have just that kind of relationship, but of course they’re a lot closer in age than Meeno and me. They love each other and they have great times together, but they also drive each other crazy. Poet adored her baby sister from the start, but it got a little harder once Jagger was old enough to take her toys away from her. Then things got a little more challenging.
Here I am with my big brother, who really helped raise me. He was my big brother, a second dad, and my best friend.
I know the whole sibling thing gets to be tricky at times. At least in our household it does. When the girls are fighting over something, sometimes I don’t even care what started it. I just want them to stop arguing. On a few occasions, I actually bought two of everything just so the girls wouldn’t fight over what belonged to who. If one got a coloring book, I would try to get the same coloring book for the other. If Poet was drinking from a pink cup, I would try to get the same cup for Jagger. Then I realized that even when there were two identical items, they would still manage to argue. One would decide that the identical thing that her sister had was better than her own in some way. I remember thinking early on in my new-mother bliss that when I had kids they would never fight. I would shower them with so much love that they would never feel the need to compete for my attention. Looking back, I just have to laugh at myself. Aw, the joy of thinking I could always make everyone get along. The reality of having two kids turned out to be totally different.
One day I must have been right at the breaking point, because I just sat in the hallway of the girls’ school thinking about all the ways I was surely screwing up my kids. When Carol, the head of our school, caught sight of me, she sat down and got the gist of my dilemma. She asked if she’d ever told me the shoe story. I looked at her sideways. “The shoe story?”
Carol said, “Soleil, when one of your kids needs shoes and you take them both with you to shop, do you buy each a pair of shoes or only the one that really needs them?” I admitted that I usually bought both a pair, because I didn’t want the other sibling to feel left out. Then Carol said an amazing thing, and it has truly changed my life. She pointed out that while I was trying to keep the peace by giving the same thing to both girls, I was actually taking attention away from the child who really needed it in that moment. Meanwhile, I was also not allowing the other child to be a part of helping her sibling. I swear, my head started to glow like a lightbulb. It was so simple, and it made such perfect sense.
The next week it was raining in Los Angeles, and Jagger needed some rain boots, so both girls and I went shopping. There we were at the store, and of course Poet saw a beautiful pair of pink rain boots that she wanted. But Poet didn’t need rain boots—she had a pair at home. It was Jagger who needed rain boots. In the past I would have broken down and bought that pink pair for Poet, too, but instead I thought about Carol’s advice. I gently took Poet aside and said, “Honey, you already have rain boots, and this is your sister’s first pair. Can we make it special for her?” She looked at me with bright eyes and said, “Sure, Mom.” Then we excitedly rushed over to Jagger and helped her put on her new rain boots.
Now, I’m not saying that this strategy will work every time. But it’s certainly worth trying. Almost everything is worth trying when you want to help your kids get along. Sometimes we just need to separate the girls—Jason will take one of the girls to go do something, and I’ll take the other. But that’s not always possible, and there are plenty of times that no matter what we do, the girls fight. And then Mommy curls up in a corner and cries. Not really—but sometimes I want to!
Thankfully, there are other times—quiet times, when neither of them realizes that anyone is watching. I quietly stroll by Poet’s room, and there she is, holding her little sister in her lap. Their love for each other is so genuine. At moments like that—no matter how many arguments there might have been during the day—I know we’ve done something right.
My two little girls in the crib together. One of their favorite pastimes: playing in the crib instead of sleeping in it.
S.P.S.
Be my little helper, please . . .
Ever since we first brought Jagger home from the hospital, we’ve included Poet in helping to take care of her. It has always empowered her and made her feel proud of being a big sister. So when the two of them are fighting over something silly, or maybe Jagger is having a hard time finding something fun to do, I’ll ask Poet to help me out. From the time Jagger was a newborn, I’d ask Poet to please grab some wipes for me, or bring a diaper for her baby sister. Now, I might ask her to draw a picture with her sister because she is such a great teacher. It might get me only a few minutes of quiet before they’re screaming at each other again, but I think it’s good for our kids to play an active part in keeping the peace. It also creates an incredible bond, and they are protective of each other while being both nurturing and still having a sense of independence.
Let’s all just get along . . .
I w
ish I could say that I have found one strategy for smoothing out all sibling conflicts. Life would be so much easier! Sometimes the best way to make sure your kids don’t fight is just to give each one a little space and alone time. There is a really great way to make sibling reunions sweeter, though. Sometimes when I have something special to do with one of my girls, we will make a point of bringing something home for the other sister. And it’s important to let your child pick what that is—it should be their gift to their sibling. It doesn’t have to be a big deal—a sheet of stickers or a ball. The key is that one sibling is doing something nice for the other, and they get to see how great that feels. And it makes them want to do it more often!
Sticky situations . . .
Poet takes a great theater class, and last week Jagger was invited to attend the class with her big sister. Jagger was so excited and she just loved it. Unfortunately, the next week there wasn’t enough room in the class for Jagger. She was crushed. I was at a total loss for what to do. Should I take both girls home and wait for a class when they could go together? I didn’t think that would be right, because it was a class Poet had signed up for, and she shouldn’t have to miss it. So we explained the situation to Jagger in a way that she could really understand, and—miraculously—she was cool with it. And she happily watched while her sister took the class. Amazing! Sometimes a little compassion for our kids can go a long way. Sure, lots of sibling conflict is over silly things like who gets the pink cup and who gets the purple cup. But often there’s a real reason for the conflict, and while you might not be able to completely fix the situation, you can listen and respect your child’s feelings. The outcome can often surprise us!
Happy Chaos Page 6