this woman’s work

This here? This is the ellipictal trainer my mom LOANED me (see mom? I remember it’s just a loan!). I don’t have the plug for it yet so I worked out on it without resistance, which obviously is a pretty dang low key workout but you do it fast enough and your heart rate will get up there. I woke up this morning knowing that I was going to get on it come hell or high water and I wasn’t going to let any stupid little forgotten power cord screw it up for me! Brett will pick it up later this week when he heads over to paint my mom’s kitchen. (He is a gem!)

This is my first chance to get down to my desk because I had my sister’s kids for the morning/afternoon. The boys disappeared into the basement but the girls bickered and bickered and bickered. And flounced out of the room at each other. And came whining to me. Then made up and put on princess dresses and danced around until it was time to bicker again. Bicker. Flounce. Whine. Dance. Repeat. That was my afternoon. Also? Nobody liked my PB&J stromboli. Next time I’m making them boxed Mac & Cheese. Hmph. (Actually I didn’t love the stromboli either so I won’t hold it against them. I’ll hold it against Donna’s Day although there’s no one to blame but myself for making the dough from scratch. What a time-wasting fool am I.)

I don’t think they fight as much at my sister’s house and I think this is because 1) Madison isn’t as good at sharing as Lucia is; 2) my sister plays with them or at least sets them up with stuff. I generally don’t do this. For a former preschool teacher I have a remarkably low patience level for playing with kids. I’m a great one for rolling my eyes and saying, “Work it out yourselves! I didn’t take your tiara!” I’m a reluctant referee.

To be fair to myself, I had a rotten evening with my own girl-child. She woke up an hour after she went to bed and stayed awake until after midnight so I was burned out as soon as I rolled out of bed this morning (naturally, she rolled out of bed with me and followed me around chattering while I groped for the coffee).

But now — ENDORPHINS! I love my kids! I love babysitting! I love my messy house and messy kitchen and the funny way my garbage disposal smells and the pile of dirty dishes I have to deal with before I can cook diinner! That, my friends, is the miracle of endorphins. It’s like crack only good for your heart!

Today was homeschool gym stuff for both kids. First Pennie came over to pick up our kitchen-aid mixer and while she was here Madison had an unfortunate accident that resulted in her tearing a scab off her knee (it’s spring after all with bare knees and all the threat that goes with them). There was blood. There was screaming. There was Daddy hopping on his bike to head to CVS and pick up band-aids (Hello Kitty). It was a morning full of drama and pain.

Then ballet class. Madison was so excited to turn four so she could take a REAL ballet class, which happens to be taught by a fabulous unschooled 15-year old of our acquaintance who is a very serious, quite accomplished dancer and who — as the eldest of four — has enormous patience and good cheer. Madison found the class TERRIFYING and alternately wept and whined her way through it. So I sat with her and whispered an ongoing narration about what the other girls were doing and she licked the snot from her upper lip and refused to do anything but also refused to leave.

This is very similar to Noah only a much younger Noah and yes, I see adoption here because it’s so out of character for her but again, it being adoption-ish doesn’t matter (fearful, clingy — literally clamped onto my hand or my pants, a twisted little bit of my clothing gripped tight tight tight in her hand) because whatever’s going on I handle it like this: I stay with her. I try not to get frustrated (or at least not show my frustration). I act as if she will eventually do it so I don’t try to talk her into it. I insist she stretch and at least sit with the girls (even if she needs to lean physically back so she can feel the heat of me nearby) and I am proud but not too enthusiastic when she does it. Because enthusiasm is embarrassing and can cause a setback.

So the other girls whirled and twirled from one side of the room to the other and when it was Madison’s turn to whirl and twirl (her two favorite things to do), I walked with her and one time tried to whirl us together like a squaredance but she cried and fretted and tripped us up. But we tried. And we did walk back and forth when it was our turn to dance so that we could sit with the other girls again. It’s a start. Next time she can wear her new leotard (courtesy of Gram Pam) because as horrible and awful as the dance class seems to be to her while we’re there, she still wants to go.

She just really really really seems to need one of us (me, Brett or Noah with me still being the clear odds favorite, which is sucky because of my sometimes work schedule) to be right there where she can see us. Unless she is the one leaving. Because she’ll head across an open field with a friend, she’ll run down the hall to get a drink and she’ll race across the gym away from us but she has to be the one to leave; we cannot do the leaving without panic setting in for her. This includes sitting her with a group of little girls in leotards and placing myself across the room with the other mommies to smile at her. Even that’s too far when it’s new.

We can get her to stay with Pennie or a grandparent with a long, careful set up across days but a spontaneous playdate with old friends she adores? We have to stay. And something new like ballet or gym where the parents stay but don’t participate? Horror.

I know it can be typical of other 4-year olds — Noah needed lots of time to warm to new situations — but he never displayed the bone-deep panic she does. And it was easier to get him to stretch. Sometimes his worry was sheer stubbornness that I could get around by not fighting it. She holds my hand in a death grip. Her knuckles go white if she’s gripping my pants leg and I shift my weight in a way that makes her think I might leave. She resorts to fiddling with our clothes — her comfort behavior she used to do at every bottlefeeding and that she still does to fall asleep.

So yeah. Adoption. I think her fear of being left has a different resonance and I’m more convinced after the workshops/lectures at the conferece. But I also feel differently — more positive — about them because — as I said before — I no longer think of them as NOT being normal for her. I mean, I say they’re unexpected given her character to explain how it feels different than what can be typical (for some preschoolers) but I do think it’s normal for her. I believe it will get better. I think next ballet class she may do a little more or if not, then by the one after. And this is what I tell her, too, that it’s ok to want us close but that she will feel better about it and that we will be patient.

Meanwhile, we will be there and she doesn’t have to have a playdate without mommy nearby or sit in the circle in tumbling class without Noah cheering her on. Because I think what she’s telling us is that she needs a little more reassurance around that than we realized but that if we give it to her, we will be giving her the strength to step forward on her own someday soon. It was true for Noah who went from cautious preschooler to super-outgoing tween and it will be true for her, too, I’m sure. ‘Cuz kids? I think when you meet their needs a lot of those needs go away. Which is why when they show us that they need something we might have missed, to me that’s a pretty fabulous sign that they’re healthy enough to point in the direction in which they need us to go.