Bringing Up Mommy: Only a mother can do this -- on giving birth Sept 28, 1988

An excerpt from my collection of 
newspaper columns, Bringing Up Mommy,

written 23 years ago, posted now in honor of the birth day of 

Christopher Harkness Hook 23 years ago, Sept. 28, 1988.

                                                                                    ---Photo by Ginger Pinson
 

During her pregnancy, a woman reads a lot of books and talks to a lot of mothers as she searches for answers: How will I know when it's time for the baby to come? What will I feel? Will it hurt? Can I do this? She clings go mothers who had good experiences, hoping for the same.

And yet, as author and childbirth educator Fritzi Kallop says in her "Birth Book":
"As inconvenient as it is to have labor begin spontaneously, it seems fitting to have inexplicable forces controlling one of the most important events in life. Scientists may marvel as they observe the wonders of our farflung universe; it is equally miraculous to contemplate the birth of a child. Not one is ever routine."

At some point, then, the mommy hopeful realizes there aren't any answers. Her experience is hers, alone, to endure.

I began feeling the intensity of this predicament two weeks before my baby was due. Big and tired, I had decided to take maternity leave from my job as a newspaper reporter to rest up for the days and weeks ahead. I thought I might enjoy this respite, sitting at home with my feet up, daydreaming about holding my baby for the first time. This was so very much not true, as it turns out. At least at work, I could try to be like everybody else. At home, I was isolated, trapped by Oprah, Beaver and a phone that rang incessantly. "Anything yet?" callers demanded, as if this baby was theirs, not mine.

Finally, on the morning of Sept. 28, while I toddled alone about the confines of my house, I felt the telltale trickle of water. The nurse at the OB's office confirmed what I knew to be true. "Your water has broken."

I must say I was excited as I arrived at the hospital. My husband and I settled into one of those Home and Garden delivery rooms that make you think you're going to have a cocktail party instead of a baby. Time settled into a warp as we lounged toe-to-toe on a mauve sofa under dim lights. We chatted intimately as contraction after contraction passed without a grimace. Perfect. We could have been in a movie for Lamaze.

But, oh, lest a laboring woman get too comfortable, the transition stage of labor, when the cervix opens that last little bit, was only gaining steam. Some women told me they moved up to this "real work" of labor gradually. For me, transition came fast. Nothing in the pregnancy books could have prepared me for the intensity -- or the aloneness I felt.

I remember thinking I was the only one who could do this. I remember wishing I hadn't said I didn't want an epidural. I remember getting up on all fours because the baby wasn't getting enough oxygen. I remember feeling scared. I remember forceps.

I especially remember my husband dropping his head to my shoulder and whispering, "Thank God" when we were told, "You have a healthy son."

Then he was gone. Because the cord had been around his chest, they whisked my baby into the nursery before I could look into his eyes, count his toes, feed him.

I didn't get to "bond." Steve didn't get to cut the cord. I didn't feel any of those miraculous feelings.

The experience I had anticipated for months was over, my baby was gone and so was my husband, who went to stand by the nursery window. And I was left alone with the clean-up crew who mopped up my body and wheeled me into a room where I choked down half a dry turkey sandwich and made a few phone calls. My husband came in and out of the room. He said I still looked pregnant.

Time settled into a warp again until sometime after dark, when Steve poked his head inside the door and said I had a visitor.

I grimaced then, wondering who would be coming to see us now.

Steve opened the door wide. A nurse came in, pulling a tiny cart behind her.

I cried out loud as my baby was laid in my arms while his father looked on.

There had been nothing in the books to prepare me for the feelings I had then, either.

I was not alone anymore.

~

Sometimes you gotta cry

My history with sadness is spotty.
~

Perhaps this, like every other human ill, can be blamed on my mother.
~

My undeserving mother suffered long and awful bouts of depression that she could not adequately address, except with inappropriate antidotes, including me. A happy me could pull her out of a sad her. I had the capacity, thus, to cure my mother. When I was a child, as long as I was happy, everything was good.
~

As an adult, I worried that sadness equaled clinical depression, a condition, which when lived into, would leave me never to stand erect again. If I ever let sadness in, I would be nothing but sad.

~
I didn't think I deserved to be sad. Oh, I could do collective grief. 9-11, for example, was easy. As long as everybody else was crying, I could cry, too. Even then, found myself thinking: What right did I have to cry, when others, like the family members of the victims, deserved to cry more?
~

And then there came real personal tragedy and grief: Grief over things, ironically, like the accident with fire that befell my mother, and ultimately killed her. Grief over hurricanes and personal illness and loss.
~
Grief like this, with a capital G, is different than sadness. Grief, I found, does not let you be. Grief, if you don't let it act the way it needs to act, will grab you by the neck and throw you in the ditch. Grief, untended, does become all there is, albeit manifest in odd ways, like drinking too many margaritas and falling in the ditch.

~
There came moments when I realized nobody else's sadness was more valid than mine. And so, I began. I allowed myself  to cry. And as I did, as I lived into this other emotion that also accompanies the human condition, I began to realize, ironically, that just the opposite happens/ed from that I used to believe: Allowing all my emotions room to breathe, released energy blockages and provided room for real joy. Wholeness -- realizing and accepting all that is inside my human souls -- not 24-7 happiness, is what brings this joy.

 ~
Sadness does not, in fact, last forever, I now know. Sadness, I dare say, at times can be a friend, into whose arms my tattered psyche falls. Ah, release. And when I come out of those arms, I am new. I am wiser. I am deeper. I am more connected to the truth of all that I am and all that I want to be.

~
Don't forget to cry, I tell my friend, Jan, who just lost her husband. And I won't either. Ok, Jan?
Blessings upon all of us who grieve this day, 9-11-11, and always.

Hot hands

It's about 10 p.m., I'm sitting with Benjie, helping him with a complicated science paper.

And my left hand starts burning. I mean really burning all over.

I know I haven't burned my hand on anything, and so I’m thinking I’m having a heart attack or a stroke. Left hand, left arm, up the jaw and straight to the heart, except doesn't it usually go the other way. Maybe I'm just tired

It had been a tiring day. I had gone with Steve to a complicated doc appointment that morning, then to my own unrelated doc appointment that morning. I had gone to Krieger’s and bought all kinds of organic goodies, including this batch of gorgeous, yummy – aren’t they cute – red peppers. I had gotten all the groceries in the house and put them away, which don't you know means cleaning the nasty refrigerator. I had further cleaned for two hours, cooked for two more, cut up and bagged all those red peppers. I had worked out, then come back home and cooked some more. In between, I picked out a color of siding for the house, did some writing and some photo editing and helped B with homework.

So yeah, I’ll just go to bed and it’ll be all better, I thought.

Nope. Got worse. It was burning like it was on fire and now it was moving up my elbow. Steve rubbed my hand and talked me down from heart attack fears. But still, it hurt.

And so I got out of bed and Googled. I know: Google is usually worse than what ails you. Not in this case.
I Googled "left hand burning sensation." Not a word about heart attacks. That was a relief. Still? What is this?

Peppers.

Post after post: “My left hand is still burning hours after I cut up a bunch of jalapeños...” “My left hand is burning after cutting up a bunch of red peppers, but not my right hand because the right hand was holding the knife..."



My new Google hand-burning community even provided a tip (Latex gloves) for next my next pepper-cutting experience and an antidote for now: Soak the hand in milk.

It didn't really help. Nor did the Vaseline, which I slathered on my hands and then wore socks on my hands all night. What helped was knowing I wasn't having a heart attach -- that and a good night's sleep. An added bonus: My hands, still slightly burning, are really soft today.

And you? What will you do for Mother's Day?

Yesterday was Everything Mother.

Child 1 graduated from college.

I threw a party for him.



















Child 2 went to prom activities at the high school. After the party,
I went to the prom and shot pictures
of the Homecoming Court and friends
for the local newspaper.














About midnight, having been up and mobile for about 17 hours
without sitting down, except when I sat and cried at college
graduation, I climbed into bed with my laptop and pictures
to edit, but not before seeing Child 3 return home, his having
been gone to a three-day choir competition in a neighboring state.

This morning: I think there are about 10 teenagers with Child 2 in the
basement, preparing to go home to their mothers.
Child 1 is helping one of his professors move this morning.

But after that, they're all here, like my own Mother's Day court, ready to do my beck and call. Still not sure what we'll do today. Don't really care, just so long as we're together. Maybe a walk in the beautiful spring sunshine. Maybe after that, nothing.The best part of my children being with me on

Mother's Day is that I know they are resting.
They -- we all -- go so hard and so fast. It comforts me when they are still.

And you? What about you? Who will be with you today, and what will you do? Strawberries and cream in bed? Homemade cards? Or just lots of hugs and good wishes? I hope if you don't see all your children today, you at least hear from them, and that they are kind and thoughtful and remembering that this is your day...Don't forget to call your own mother, if she is here on Earth with you. No matter your differences or past grievances. Today is a new day. Today is Mother's Day...

Every day is Mother's Day

"

My husband's father used to tease him when he would ask how come there's no Children's Day. "Every day is Children's Day,"  he'd say.

I wonder what he would say if he knew that I believe every day is Mother's Day.

~

This is not just because I have three wondrous children who lay out life's rich pageant for me every day.

~  

It is because of what and who motherhood has made me. It is because of the lessons in selflessness, tolerance, patience and boundless love that motherhood has taught me. It is because, in learning to interact with the people I cherish most in the world, I have become a better person in every area of my life, every day of my life. Through them and with them, on the pottery wheel of motherhood, my misshapen soul  has been molded into an expression of life I might otherwise not have known.

Happy Mother's Day to me. And Happy Children's Day to Chris, Emily and Benjie. 

It is, after all, their day, too. ~

All I want for Mother's Day

One more day in NOLA town
and then I hit the ground running:

Wednesday is radio with Regina Brett Wed, 7-8 p.m..

(I am honored to be on this show, talking about the status of motherhood with Cleveland Plain Dealer columnist, Regina Brett http://www.reginabrett.com/; historian and author Regina Jo Plant http://www.amazon.com/Mom-Transformation-Motherhood-Modern-America/dp/0226670201; also motherhood blogger, Tesa Nicolant http://www.2wired2tired.com/. Please tune into WKSU 89.7 http://www.wksu.org/listen/on your dial. Thank you for asking me on your show, Regina!)
 

Thursday and Friday, I will prepare for Saturday, for my firstborn child's graduation, for a party with his friends and the adult friends, neighbors and teachers who have supported him for 22 years. This is a big day. This is my child, of whom I am proud.
I adore this person with all my heart.

Then, well, then it's a day for me, as Sunday is Mother's Day.

I make no bones about the value of this day for me: If my children are the sun and I am their moon, then we must indeed hold in reverence at least one day celebrating that relationship.

My children know by now what I want on this day -- which is not to be taken to lunch and showered with gifts.         
  
                                                                                                            ~~~

They do give me flowers. My husband always finds something for the garden to give to me.

But it is the homemade cards that I cherish and adore, that my children still make for me, even though they are now 22, 18, 14.

It is their sentiment I crave.

And their time.


I no longer have to ask.

Sometimes we garden. One year we painted lawn furniture.

 Doesn't really matter though.

On Mother's Day, we are, all of us, together.

All day long.

~~~

Rest and New Orleans: An Oxymoron?

How could it be that I am in New Orleans? How could it be that the greatest, most happening international music, food festival is right outside my door?

Yesterday, the lineup was the soulfully yummy Amos Lee;

(Photo courtesy of somebody other than me)

the Grammy-winning Cajun, Terrence Simien and the Zydeco Boys; Fantasia; the Queen of NOLA, Irma Thomas; Robert Cray; Ahmad Jamal; Ricky Skaggs; John Boutte; Bon Jovi for those who care; and MORE MORE EVER MORE.

And I didn't go.

WE didn't go.

Fact is, me and my sister never get out of our PJs.

What was wrong with me?  Well, maybe  "gettin' up offa that than thang" is a metaphor. Maybe seizing life doesn't always mean boogying til your feet caint go no more.

I was tuckered when I got to NOLA. I was doing wayyyyyy too much before I came to New Orleans, what with Easter and my son's bday and Chris coming home from college, what with lots of photo jobs and packing; wayyyyy too much when I got to NOLA, what with Pahtaying 24-7. I had wayyy too much ahead to save energy for when I get home, what with a radio show to do (!!!) grad parties and more bday parties and Benjie graduating from 8th grade and more photos to take for people and a column to write and a garden or two to plant.

Yesterday, the day after our first day at JF, I told sister Sue I didn't think I could put on my dancing shoes.

She looked at me.

And then both of us, while Amos Lee was crooning a few miles down the road, sat and scrolled through Netflix and found some really dumb movies to escape into. While Bon Jovi was tearing it up for tens of thousands of drooling women, we moved in and out of naps, while intermittently sucking on crawfish tails in the air-conditioned comfort of Mama's former Katrina house, now Susan's beautifully comfortable home.

I didn't even take one single picture.

That was then.

Today, now, well it's time to get back stage with Charles and Deacon!; time to stand in line in the heat, waiting for rosemint tea and crawfish puff; time to take wayy too many pics til my fingers hurt; time to drool over John Legend and walk from stage to stage to stage until my feets cain't take no more.

The yin and the yang. Living life fully involves both shadow and light, rest and energy,  even in NOLA town.

Laissez les bons temps rouler. And laissez faire, too. See y'all.

First day of Jazz Festival 2011: A primer

8th Annual Trip to New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festval

Jazz Fest, 2011!!!

I cannot, will not spend my time in New Orleans on my computer. This is, after all, first day of Jazz Festival. Meanwhile:

  

WEATHER EXTREMES 

AND NOLA

 

The city welcomed me yesterday from the land of EXTREME rain

(20 of 25 days in April) and EXTREME snow (120 inches this winter) 

to EXTREME perfection. 

High 60s, breezes, clear. No humidity, which is virtually 

unheard of in this tropical land 

where bugs are the size of macaws.

But of course that's the day before JF. 

Today is another day, aka the first day of JF, aka I have been to JF when it's 90 and dripping EXTREME humidity. I have been to 
JF when it is torrential EXTREME rain. I have tromped in theEXTREME mud to hear the EXTREMELY sublime 
Stevie Wonder. I am afraid to look at the weather for today.

WATER EXTREMES AND NOLA

I cannot help but think of Katrina, of course, as I am in my Mama's house as I write that was flooded with Mississippi River WATER and now has been renovated under the design hand of Sister Sue.

This time last year,  as I was arriving, the city was dealing with oil in the Gulf WATER. The spill had just happened.

Today, the city, heavily under the influence of PTSD, is kinda panicky, as is everybody up and down the Mississippi about the possibility of flood WATERS and very soon,partly because of rains and snows from Yankees. (See first topic) The state of Missouri has just decided to bust the levee along Missouri farmland so as to save a tiny town upstream called Cairo, in the neighboring state of Illinois, though not before one senator insulted the whole little town.Watch this politically incorrect statesman at work http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQjqjhHAip.

To his credit, the senator has since apologized.

       

EXTREME FOOD AND NOLA

 If you've never been to NOLA, if you are planning to 

come again, please mark on your to-do list "Reconcile Cafe" 

on Oretha C. Haley Blvd. (named after a great 

civil rights activist in NOLA) in a severely distressed 

section of the city. 

Not only can you get the best crawfish bisque ever here, 

the best  bread pudding with banana sauce (might rival mine), the best crawfish salad 

and shrimp on white beans. 

But it's non-profit. AND it's all for at-risk kids. The restaurant

draws in at-risk kids and teaches them about the restaurant business. 

I saw James Carville here. My first celebrity sighting, except for Charles.

Oh, AND the recipes are all on line. Doesn't get much better than this.

Everybody wins, including me who got to eat there yesterday.

And of course, MUSIC!!!!

 Here's how each day of JF goes: Drink Susan's
special green tea with mint. Jabber with Susan wayyy too much.
Look at the clock! Oh no!! Hurry!! Shower. Try on
50 sundresses and 50 different earrings to get it just right.
Pour over the Jazz Fest lineup, to include,
today: Keb 'Mo, Tab Benoit, Jeff Beck, Mumford and Sons,
Avett Brothers AND my sister's husband, Charles and dozens more of all kinds o
different music that is completely impossible to choose from!!! Slather
on the sunscreen. Park.

Laissez les bons temps rouler
with raspberry tea and mango ice and catfish menuire and
crawfish puff and seafood merliton and just when you
can't stand another minute, leave the fairgrounds, go to
the House of Blues for Trombone Shorty tonight. Feets,
don't fail me now.

Bye y'allllllllllll!!!!!!!!!!!!

Food and well-being

I often patronize our local food co-op, Kent Natural Foods, where I am a member, which entitles me to 5% percent off. I don't buy everything there, because I often think our family can't afford it, even with my discount.  In fact, the whole organic thing is a big, huge, major conflict in my head. I think we should all be eating only organic. We should all be putting only organic shampoos on our heads next to our brains. We should be using oils to polish our furniture instead of chemicals, etc. But organic is so much more expensive; I have never been able to get my head around financing.

Recently, the co-op's Sheila Harko asked me if I'd be willing to be the volunteer photographer for the co-op! Every month, I'll shoot promotional photos, baskets of food that I put together, etc. For every hour I work, I get an additional percentage off for a month. And so for the month of March, I get about 9 percent off all purchases!

This offer happened right about the time I decided I can't take the conflict in my head anymore. I am going as organic as I can. I can justify this by knowing I will be better off as a result, and so will my family, when they eat what I eat. As for money, I imagine myself taking an organic PB and J on organic wheat to a soccer game from now on, instead of buying a Burger King veggie burger. I imagine myself preferring to make myself a cup of organic green tea, with steamed rice milk, which I can make here, instead of buying at Starbucks.

And so yesterday, I spent more than I've ever spent!

One hundred dollars, knocked down from $107, because of my discount!! Ta da!

I bought LOTS of avocadoes, lots of greens and veggies, a big bag of barley. I bought soy milk, firm tofu, tamari in bulk (rich-with-vitamins substitute for soy sauce and organic, which is very, very important for soy, as commercial soy is often genetically modified and heavily pesticide-d). For sweets, I bought dates and a bag of locally produced vanilla almond bars (sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, honey, apricots, tofu powder, almonds and vanilla extract). I bought organic yogurt and bread. AND I bought coconut milk ice cream. OMG. A little dab'll do ya'. I normally want to eat half a carton of commercial ice cream before I feel satiated. After a few tablespoons of this last night, I was done.

This, indeed, is the funny byproduct of healthy eating that I wasn't expecting.

Overall well-being. Not just physical.

I got up this morning and peeled back a tiny avocado that I ate along with a small bowl of barley. And I was completely satisfied!

And I think it was because my psyche and my body were in tune.

It was a strange feeling, leading me to think about eating disorders and bad eating habits.

Is this conflict half, if not most, of the reason we in our culture struggle with eating?
Hm. 

Also, yum. 

I feel happy today.

On Tucson: My gentle friend Jim Geisey speaks

Dear Friends,

"The well-being of mankind, its peace and security are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established."

This quotation comes from Baha'u'llah, the 19th century Founder of the Baha'i Faith, who spent most of His life in prison for advocating justice, equality, education for all, and urging humanity on the path toward peace.

He asserted that human beings were each "created Noble" despite our too-often turning our backs on this nobility; that the fundamental need of this age in human history is for the coming together of the whole human race. He taught that if religion causes tyranny, injustice or hostility, "the absence of religion would be preferable."

As a guide for personal action, these words of Baha'u'llah offer some concrete steps: "Be generous in prosperity, and thankful in adversity. Be worthy of the trust of thy neighbor, and look upon him with a bright and friendly face. Be a treasure to the poor, an admonisher to the rich, an answerer of the cry of the needy, a preserver of the sanctity of thy pledge. Be fair in thy judgment, and guarded in thy speech. Be unjust to no man, and show all meekness to all men. Be as a lamp unto them that walk in darkness, a joy to the sorrowful, a sea for the thirsty, a haven for the distressed, an upholder and defender of the victim of oppression."

I've been deeply distressed by so many acts of hatred, even as we start this New Year.  Rather than respond with more vitriol, those of us who wish for peace can do so much -- to love more deeply, seek to learn more openly, serve more generously, and be more mindful of the individuals around us, with the precepts above as a guide. We must begin somewhere.

Two slain politicians were outspoken as voices of reason and moderation, in Pakistan and the U.S., and admired for their conciliatory, can-do, passion for service.

How many wake-up calls do we need before we rethink our commitment to bringing opposing viewpoints together for the common good, so that differences don't spur violence? Is this even possible? As we start 2011, how can we do better?

On the Tucson shootings, politicians who used rhetoric including "lock and load," "the firing line," and other violent images can't be blamed for a mentally ill young man's violent actions. But at a time when we blame TV for childhood obesity, attention deficit, violent behavior and other social ills, taking greater responsibility for the repercussions of our language and actions isn't a political move, it's just acting responsibly.


I am thankful for my many friends who use moderation, dignity, and courteousness in their speech.  I wish to thank all of you for your kindness.

Much Love from Kent,

Jim Geisey