The phone call every parent dreads.

The phone rang at 11:30pm.  A phone call after 11:00pm is never a good thing.

I immediately felt something internally grab my stomach, and I couldn’t breathe, and my intuition was correct.  It was the call no parent wants to receive…the call telling me my son had been in a car accident.

I jumped out of bed and started asking a million questions.  The nurse was put on the phone, and she replies with, “He is lucid.”

This was the longest night I can ever remember.  

Jordan was able to talk with me, but he was extremely anxious about everything.  His legs were aching terribly, his head was hurting, his chest was hurting, and he couldn’t remember much about the accident.  I felt that was a good thing.  The good Lord above protects our minds until we are better prepared to handle all of the details in such traumatic events.  That is my belief anyway.

I don’t ever think I have felt more helpless.  My son, Jordan, was in Dallas, Texas, which was many, many miles from Winchester, Kentucky.  He was in his 3^rd week of flight academy training with American Airlines.  All that I could do was depend on Jordan’s friends to keep me updated on all of his test results, and they did.  One friend, Caity, will forever be on Santa’s good list if I have anything to do with it.

In between phone calls, my mind wandered to that baby boy I brought into this world 26 years earlier.  I saw pictures of him in my head taking his bottle, or playing with his big brother.  I remembered his first birthday.  I remembered his first day of school.  I remembered band concerts, and I remembered a special lunch we shared at Ramsey’s in Lexington, KY.  I felt fear like I have never felt fear before, and I felt completely out of control.  Yet, I had to be strong for my son, my baby boy. 

After Jordan was a little calmer, he was able to tell me he was on his way home after a very late class with 4 other friends, and that he was in the middle of the backseat.  A car in the left lane beside them came over on top of them and pushed them off the road.  The driver panicked and overcorrected pulling the car back onto the highway, and the car began flipping.  That was all he could remember until he woke up to paramedics.

He then said the hospital had to cut off his clothes and shoes to get to his injuries and that he would need some new clothes.  Really?  Really?  That is what you are concerned about in this moment.  I was sure it must be the meds talking, or his way of thinking about something else.  I assured him we would get some new clothes.  And, I told him to try to relax and think about other things…hoping to lower his anxiety after such a traumatizing accident.  But, that didn’t work very well.  I could hear the trembling in his voice.

Throughout the night, test results indicated he would be fine.   He had lots of bumps, cuts and bruises, but nothing that seemed life threatening.  He did have a strong headache, and the doctors asked friends who were taking him home to wake him up every two hours to make sure he was ok.  This created a situation where Jordan was afraid to go to sleep.  But, I do think he got a little sleep.  I, on the other hand, did not.  I was up thanking The Good Lord above for taking care of my child.  Oh, how this story could have been so different.  

The next morning, Jordan was beginning to remember pieces of the wreck his mind had protected him from.  He remembered the car was laying on its side, and the young man to his right being on top of him.  He could hear screaming.  And, he could remember trying to reach up to push the door open at the top.  That is all he remembers.  He still does not know how he got out of the car.  However it happened, God had a big hand in it.

My son has had an on-going headache, his left leg has a deep cut and is very swollen…he has many aches, pains, bruises and cuts throughout his body, and his nerves have been on an emotional roller-coaster.  But, he survived.  He even got up the next morning and made himself go back to class.  I was not too happy about that.  The momma bear in me wanted him snug as a bug in a rug…getting rest.  I lost that battle.  He is nothing, if not determined!

I was so inspired by the strength my son demonstrated that next morning.  I would like to think he got some of that strength from me.  Well, he would have received that strength from a younger version of me.  I only made it through a half day of work the next day.  This menopausal mom cannot run on zero sleep!  I went home and went to bed. 

But, my son has taught me a valuable lesson.  When I feel, let’s use the word, “witchy,” I will step back and think about how blessed I am, and that I need to keep the “witch” in me, in check!  And, when I have minor aches and pains, as older women do, I will remember how much he was suffering when he got up and went to class the morning after such a horrific accident.  And, when I have those days where I feel I cannot take anymore, I will remember the Lord above is with me, just as he was with my son.

May your hot flashes be mild and your wrinkles even milder.
Kim York

  

Ok, now I believe you. There's a stretch when you won't recognize your teen.

There are certain things that we Moms, menopausal or not, simply don't share willingly with each other. Did someone, anyone, come to you when you were pregnant and tell you that your feet would never been the same size again? Did your best friend or sister let you know that the shoes in your closet would forever be a reminder of your pre-pregnancy glass slipper size as your newly evil step-sister sized feet will never again squeeze into.
No.
No one tells you.
I've never told anyone.
I don't have the heart. The baby-making mammas are so excited. I can't stand to point out any of  the downside.
They'll find out soon enough.
 Giant feet. Raw nipples. Lack-of-sleep psychosis. They'll find out.
Along the same vein, no one tells you while you are growing a human that someday that interloper will think you are an idiot and actively show their disdain for you. Eyes will roll so far back into their head you aren't sure they will ever unroll. This may be because you suggest, perhaps, wearing a coat to a high school football game because with the windchill factor of -15 degrees.
Apparently it is a part of the developmental process. The paperwork given to me by my mental health counselor -- if  you don't have one you should totally get one -- shows that it is a child's job to separate from their parents. My personal experience is that it is especially painful or dramatic between mothers and daughters and compounded exponentially between Menopausal Moms and hormonal teen.
No one told me.
Ok, that is not true. A couple of people told me and I didn't believe them. One of the them was the sweetest, kindest, most Christian woman I know. She swore her daughters were terrible as teens. She didn't recognized them. The got better when they were young adults. I didn't believe her. Her family was so adorable it couldn't be true. They looked like the families that come in pictures frames when
you buy them at fancy stores.
My fellow Menopausal Mom, Kim, told me of the Dark Times with her now grown, and awesome, children. She also said it will fade and my girl will come back to me.
I'm not sure I believed that either.
So, I have been taking two informal polls in the last few weeks. One is of mothers whose daughter's recently travailed adolescence. I don't even have to really know you. I just have to know you have a young adult child. I just say something like: My daughter and I are at that stage where she acts like she hates me.
They nod and look sympathetic.
The other is among any unfortunate young woman who I encounter between the ages of 20 and 35. Did you hate your mother at 15? I ask. They all say yes.
What about now?
Generally, it's something like "Oh, I totally love her, I talk to her every day. She's in Bolivia and we FaceTime every night."
So I take some solace.
This being the holiday season every sitcom I watched this week seemed to have an over reaching mother shaming, begging, manipulating their children to spend time with them And, sitcoms being what they may, in each instance the child, often grudgingly but most genuinely as a sitcom can manage will see -- gosh darn it-- I love my Mom too much not to spend an evening
around the Christmas tree with her if that's her hearts desire.
Oh, if life were wrapped up like a sitcom.
But I realize I have to adjust my thinking. This developmental stage isn't personal.
When my girl was a baby and she cried I didn't think "that cry is a indictment of my skills as a
mother". No, I tried to help her. I tried to figure it out. I put myself second and worked for the better of both of us. And that's what I need to do now.
I never thought of myself as one of those moms who saw herself first as her kid's friend. But maybe it slipped that way. Maybe I thought I was protecting her by letting of some things I need her to do ...like chores or listening or being respectful because overall she is a great kid.
But, apparently, according to my mental health professional, she needs something to push against.
That is me.
So here is my job. She pushes, I stay firm. She hurts me and I let it go.
I set a rule and I stick to it.
It is a little trickier because part of this for me is saying no, setting boundaries and making her accountable so she can be an accountable adult. I was really good at setting boundaries for her when she was little. Even when she would push. Because I could see it clearly. Don't touch the stove you will get burned. No matter how much you want to touch the stove the answer is still no.
And now it is the same. The lines are just more involved. But I will figure it out although I could use some suggestions.
And I know, and I should have known all along, we are family and we will work it out. It might be a couple of years, apparently, but it will work out.
Polls don't lie.

1020 days and counting....reluctantly feathering my empty nest

I joke that I have less than three years to emotionally cripple my daughter so she can't leave me and go away to college.

Seriously, it's funny when I say it.

That's because my daughter is an exceptionally grounded little human. My friends know it. She is like that, I promise, because of who she organically is and not because of anything I have done. Most likely, it's in spite of me.

But I do mentally count the days until she will leave and I find it terrifying. My world has been centered on her for a very long time.

I got divorced a little past her second birthday. Her dad, who is at his core a good guy, unfortunately bugged out early and often. He skipped  out on picking her up so I often I stopped making plans. I tried and tried and tried to get him to commit to at least one day a week to keep her. He never could. (Until last year. Seriously. And now he wants to keep her several days a week. I guess he is doing some counting himself.)

So I tried to take pottery classes. Go out with friends. Have a life apart from her but it never worked very well. I had a great baby sitter who she and I both love but didn't like leaving her to do anything but work because I felt guilty. I had to work enough at night and on weekends. (Although now I wonder why I ever did that.) I had awesome family and friends, like my friend and fellow Menopausal Mom, who would keep her. But most of the time it was the two of us.

And, to be perfectly honest, at some point it just got too hard. I was working full time. I was taking care of her, as easy and awesome as a kid that she was, full time. It was all I could do to do that. And I always felt like I was behind.

And so.......it was the two of us. When I did stuff, we did stuff.
And now....she is going to be leaving.

About a year before I got pregnant I started a baby hope chest. I'd buy stuff for a baby, some of it practical like bibs, some of it not so practical like a stuffed bunny wearing bunny slippers. It was my way of getting use to the idea of having a kid.

Now, I am doing that in reverse. I am starting to do things to get use to life without her.

First there is the letting go.
Yes, you can go to that Slipknot concert but you have to stay in your seat.
Yes, you can drive to the wings place with your friend who has a license
Yes, I will not fuss at you about wearing a coat when it is 30 degrees because you are old enough to figure that one out for yourself.

Then there is the doing things for myself.

I danced in the street like a zombie. (See post "You Rock Zombie Grany") I've joined a club. I'm working out. (See post "An exploding hotel) I'm blogging.
I'm making an extra effort to see friends and do things, sometimes on school nights!
I am making a lot of soup from scratch.
I know there is some place in all of this that I should be excited about the prospect. It will be me time all the time.
I'm not that good at me time.

I guess it's good to remind myself I've done this sort reinvention before. Several times. I was a kid. I went to college. I've moved across country three times. I've been married and divorced. I've freelanced. I've volunteered. I've had many incarnations.

This will just be the next one. I realize that worrying about it doesn't
help. It just takes me out of enjoying the moment that is.

But still.....1020 days and counting.