the march post

It's March 31st, and if I want to have any post in this month I gotta do it now.

Thing is, nothing springs to mind that is bloggable. Nothing has sprung to mind since the beginning of February really. Proof is in the post dates.

Oh, there've been Random Musings over the last seven weeks, but nothing 'worthy' of sitting down and creating with. I've been creative in other ways: noodling around with iMovie, slopping Modge Podge on some things, loving all my new photography apps on my iPhone, baking polymer clay into wee cupcakes... and trying to stay in touch with my One Little Word: [clean].

I'll be able to access April's prompt for the One Little Word workshop starting tomorrow, and I'm hoping that I can do better in April cuz March was a bust. March was Action: find something to Do that has meaning with your word. I decided to find or develop or create a yummy gluten-free bread so I can have toast with peanut butter on it. One of the definitions of [clean] for me is Eat Clean and I do a lot better off gluten, so I thought this Action would be great. (and easy)

Pftt. Shudda known better. How many loaves of bread did I make? One. And a blechy one at that.

I looked around online, and I have some recipes myself and I figured out what I wanted in my loaf compared to others and last week I finally got around to hauling out the bread machine to create a wonderful loaf of gluten-free bread and then I'd be able to fill out all my lovely scrapebookey printouts JUST in the nick of time. Nope. Not gonna happen.

But you know, part of this workshop for me is to embrace the imperfection. Somehow it's tied into my One Little Word. I finished January's task and immediately wanted to pitch the sheet of paper. It wasn't Perfect. But I didn't, and it is still in my binder and now it doesn't look so bad. But I was really uncomfortable walking away from a Job Not Perfect. And then I had unexpected palpitations just showing my creation to my husband; what if he just shrugged and walked away or laughed or something? Better off to keep it to myself... but I didn't. And he was kinda impressed!

So come on April... what's it gonna be??

LOL

paraphrase of The Current's The Voice from this morning:

"an elementary school in the polygamous community of Bountiful BC has made the Fraser Institute's top list; a topic sure to come up at the next Parent Parent Parent Parent Teacher interview"

feeling purple

Today in this part of the world we remembered a very sad occasion and my kids wore purple in honour. Daron Richardson would've been 15 yrs old today, but she didn't get to celebrate this milestone. Unfortunately her parents have started marking a whole new milestone now.

My son is only one-and-a-half years younger than Daron was. The news last November, and remembering it today kinda hits home. I just cannot imagine coming home to find your child in the basement like that. It's unthinkable, unspeakable.

So I'd like to write an open letter so all the teens out there who may be relating particularly well to this topic.

You... Are Not Alone. You aren't. I swear sometimes we should just dump antidepressants into the public water supply*. This depression monster likes to make you think you're alone, but you are not. (*not my original thought: a very smart, depressed friend came up with that one)

Talk. To someone, somewhere, about this. When things were really bad for me I remember thinking I can't talk about this: if I open my mouth I'll start crying and I'll never stop and I'll drown and go crazy. Now granted the first couple of times I started talking about it I did become dehydrated from loss of fluids and ended up hiccupping through most of my sentences, but that calms down. I didn't go crazy, and no one told me I was crazy. People sat and listened, handing me tissues as I needed them and helping me.

It Gets Better. It does. It really, really does. Once your body figures out which hormone goes where and does what and you, your body and your life settle into a rhythm... it gets better. Please don't give up yet.

Start collecting tools (figuratively speaking), things you find helpful to fight this Demon. I realized much much later in life that depression and creativity live hand-in-hand. Being creative soothes that Beast better than any antidepressant does for me. If I'm not able to be creative for a while, guarenteed I will go squirrly. Music is a great tool for me. I truly believe that our brains are hard-wired to respond positively to music. Find a kind that makes your brain happy and strong to combat this Demon and load up your iPod with it.

Exercise. It feels like just about the last thing in the world that you'd like to do but getting some nice fresh blood up to those hardworking neurotransmitters helps.

Sleep. Wow, it's exhausting being depressed or anxious! When you need to, sleep. Of course the human teen's circadian rhythm is changing so there's that to contend with... but don't be surprised if your absolutely wiped (aka knackered: a much better term I think) sometimes. (especially if you've just Talked to someone... I'm always surprised that I'm physically tired from sitting and blabbing. yeah, yeah; and crying)

Basically just hang on; you're not alone and it gets better.

And if you're a parent: listen. Listen first, act second. And get help if you need support too. Let your child know through your behaviour that you can be trusted to take on some of this burden... and then celebrate when things do indeed get better.

Thank you for your time.

sideview

This whole food theme seems to be cropping up over and over! That post by dooce, the book that I rec'd for xmas ('s OK it was on my wish list), me and my one little word work... and now this aha! moment I had recently...

I was talking with Eleanor about raclette; explaining it to her and talking about how even my kids eat it, albeit modified. On New Year's Eve we fed all six kids first so they could reach the raclette set in the middle of the table and then us Growned Ups would eat after. Nutella was placed on the table with an explanation that "Drew doesn't eat raclette, he doesn't like melted cheese" or something like that.

I thought nothing of it at the time really. I understand totally, having picky eaters living with me every day... but I realized during my conversation with my friend that Drew's food issue was totally accomodated! I hadn't even realized this up until then. None of the "this is what's for dinner, eat it or else" or "you must try a mouthful of each" or even the cousins "oh, come on... just eat it!". He doesn't eat melted cheese and so he could have a grilled Nutella sandwich. Which he made himself.

Maeve of course asked if she could have one too, and I said sure. She ate some raclette though, didn't even have to tell her to.

I'm not passing judgement. I understand, and it's not a problem with me if my sister-in-law and her husband allow their son to make a food substitution at dinner. It does however illuminate on our food issues from another angle...

I started following Brene Brown on Twitter, and have now registered for an online course that she mentioned. What will my word be...?

I've narrowed down my word choices, and that in itself has been illuminating. Illuminating ruminating... henh.

One thing I've realized is that this is my first home, this house is the first one I've chosen. We've only ever owned two houses, and the first one we moved into and rented from the InLaws and then just cuz it was easier to stay put than move, and the neighbourhood was well located and the school was great... well, it was Good Enough.

But then we moved last summer, and in that process figured out what we did and didn't want in a home. So this is the first place I've Chosen from Scratch so to speak. And it's great. Don't get me wrong, the first place was great too and I was able to renovate it to my liking... but this house is somehow different.

It's not perfect; the backyard is a bit too close to our back neighbours, it sits sideways on the lot so I don't feel as connected to the street as I like and therefore has poor curb appeal. But there's something about it. It's solid, calm, nourished to completion.

Geez, that's so weird-sounding. Sometimes words make concepts difficult to convey. Which is why I'm looking forward to starting that workshop!

consumed

Boy, how do I put this... I know, I'll blurt it out:

onceuponatime I was afraid to eat in public.

Weird, huh? I was paralyzed by the thought of having to sit and let people see me eat. Afraid that someone, anyone would see me eating and tell me off. That I wasn't allowed to eat. The thought of being out in public, potentially at a hungry time could make me hyperventilate. Seriously, just ask Joe.

I can remember giving myself an assignment during therapy; I had to go to the mall, get a cup of coffee and sit in the food court and drink it. By myself. I think I made it through half a small cup the first time.

Don't worry, things got better. I got better.

Jump forward to present day. I was stuck in the mall across the street from our car dealership whilst they poked and prodded and cleaned and refilled the car for almost five hours. At some point I had a hungry time. Most of the time was spending shopping, blissfully alone. (I'm almost finished my xmas shopping!)

So I headed to the obligatory (rhymes with pergatory) food court, got myself something and found a table. I was comfortably engaged in reading when all of the sudden it hit me just how far I'd come. And yes, the therapy helped... but surprisingly it was the Trip that we'all went on last year that has made the difference. It's been about a year-and-a-half since we took the Family Trip (one that is still talked about fondly at least once a week) and I still feel the confidence I gained from doing that travelling.

A proud little moment, an epiphany of sorts, sitting in that food court... sometimes I'm proud of me.

I belong to a freecycle network, and was briefly perusing the listed items a couple of days ago: "offer: two jars of instant coffee, opened".

Really?! No... really? Seriously... come on...

I mean, I'm all for redirecting stuff away from the landfill 'n all... but you mean to tell me that you're that on top of your foodstuff inventory? And you have time in your life to give to making sure two jars of instant coffee don't get composted & recycled but instead go to a new home??

Impressive.