Imposter

In my head, I am never good enough.

One recent Thursday, I got home from work around 5pm. Alyssa and Tom had been there all day, just hanging out. Olivia was with my mom and wouldn’t be home until at least 7pm.

I’d planned to put on my new roller skates as soon as I got home and work on breaking them in.

Instead, I plopped down on the couch next to Alyssa for an hour.

Tom mentioned pizza for dinner.

He and Alyssa bickered over who was going to make it. He ended up going in to the kitchen and I heard him chopping onions. At that point, I assumed he was getting ready to put the pizza in the oven.

At 7:00, Alyssa went into the kitchen and exclaimed, “Dad! I thought you were making the pizza!”

He declared that no, he wasn’t making it. He’d chopped the onions but it was her job to put the pizzas together and get them in the oven.

I felt so defeated by this whole thing. By the time the stupid oven heated and the pizza cooked, it wouldn’t be done until at least 7:30. I decided then and there I was NOT eating that late.

I know. I’m only punishing myself. But it was so frustrating. If I’d known he was doing some kind of power play with Alyssa, I’d have gone out and put the stupid pizzas in the oven myself.

I went up and laid in my bed with a fan blowing on me. It would have been lovely if only I hadn’t been feeling sorry for myself. I was hungry and yet…I knew I wasn’t going to eat.

Olivia called me from town to let me know she and Gram had just dropped the boys off at their house and they’d be home in about a half hour.

I went back downstairs and put a can of soup in my bag for lunch at work the next day. I couldn’t bring myself to cut up a cucumber or make a salad. It frustrates me so much that I am so self-defeating.

Olivia got home, we all welcomed her as if she’d been gone for weeks instead of 36 hours.

The pizza got done just as she was getting home so she was just in time to eat a couple of pieces even though she’d had McD’s an hour before.

While I sat at the table with the girls as they ate their pizza, Tom brought three pieces of pizza to the table for me.

I glared at the pizza and asked him, “Where’s yours?”

See, let’s back up a bit. He’s been eating salad for dinner every night for a week. NO WAY IN HELL was I going to sit there and eat THREE pieces of pizza while he stuffed lettuce in his face. Nope.

I let the pizza sit there while O finished eating her own. Tom did end up getting one piece of pizza for himself. While he ate it, I got up and put the leftover pizza away, including the three pieces he’d set out for me. Full disclosure: I ate several mushrooms off one of the pieces he’d give me. So I didn’t completely abstain from dinner that night.

As I was putting everything away, he came over and started washing the dishes.

I could tell he was pissed. When I asked him why he was mad he said, “You didn’t eat, there’s no need for you to have to do the dishes.”

And okay, that’s very nice. But…damn it, it made me feel terrible.

Why?

Why does it matter to him if I eat pizza or not? I’m FAT. I’m gross. I can skip a meal or twenty and not be anywhere near starvation.

I often feel like nothing I do is good enough. I can’t skip enough meals to be thin enough. I can’t be gentle enough to be a good mother.

I don’t exercise enough. I don’t model good choices for my girls. I don’t keep our house clean enough.

Let’s be clear that this is all me. No one in my house says anything to make me feel this way. It’s all my own issues and my own sense of not being nearly good enough. Everyone THINKS I’m good enough but that’s because I’m faking it just enough to make it in their eyes.

When I tucked O into bed that night she said, “Was it better while I was gone?”

Oh. Oh no, not even close. I told her I didn’t sleep well the night before because she wasn’t there. I told her life is NEVER better when she’s not there.

Now, let me be clear, I do not think that my husband’s and children’s lives would be better without me. As bitchy as I sometimes get, as awful as I often am, I never imagine that they’d be better off without me.

They love me. They love me despite that fact that I can’t seem to love myself. So Imma stick around even though I often don’t feel like I deserve any of them.

Literally Olivia

Remember that exercise where you have to describe how to do something and the person following the directions is really obnoxious about it?

We did it during RA training back at IU a hundred and twelve years ago. We, the RA trainees, had to tell our trainers (the ACs – aka Assistant Coordinators) how to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

But we had to be REALLY detailed because they acted like they didn’t know how to open a stupid jar of jelly or what to use to spread the peanut butter.

Yeah.

So.

That’s kind of what it’s like to raise a child like Olivia.

She can be so sweet and so funny and these days she’s REALLY loving.

And yet…she is so literal. You have to watch every single word that comes out of your mouth because if you misspeak even one word in a sentence of eleventy hundred, she’ll latch on to that one word you messed up and won’t let it go.

And sometimes, I swear to Rob Thomas, she deliberately mishears something just so she can argue with you.

It’s beyond frustrating and into infuriating.

There have been times when I have to step out of the room before I lose my freaking mind.

Yes, I am mother of the century over here.

I know. I know. I AM grateful that she speaks so well and often so eloquently. I am grateful that she can be so deep as to pick up on nuances and inflection.

But the literal stance she takes on your word choices is insane.

She also had to make sure everyone hears and acknowledges everything she says. She has a lot of good ideas. I love that she’s so imaginative. She’s clever and smart and is always thinking.

But she often thinks out loud and she wants EVERYONE to hear her thoughts.

Even if we’re all in the same room, she’ll say something and if I’m the only one to reply to her comment, she’ll go stand in front of Tom and repeat herself and then she’ll go stand beside Alyssa and repeat it AGAIN, just to be sure everyone in the room can appreciate her brilliance.

And wait, one more bit of… grievance? Is that what this is, a bitch session about O’s idiosyncracies? Maybe. Maybe I’m just documenting her personality at 13. Yes. Let’s go with that. I’m not complaining so much as I’m documenting.

Except this next one is a complaint and I’ve told her more times than I can count that it irritates me.

We can be in the middle of a conversation. We’ve had several exchanges where she talks, I talk and then she talks some more but then, all of a sudden, she’ll have to start her next statement with, “Mom?”

And then she waits until I say, “What?” before continuing.

Guys, we were talking…to each other! She doesn’t need to ‘get my attention’ because she already had it. She doesn’t need to make sure I’m still listening because we were conversing. That’s how conversations work, for the love of Meatloaf!

Ahem.

And that’s a little bit of life with 13 year old Liv.

Venturing Out

At this time this was written, I am in the middle of my third week back to work.

How’s it going?

Olivia’s stress level has dropped a little, which is a HUGE relief.

Work is fine. The stress level is fairly low. There are no outside visitors to deal with.

Olivia had an orthodontist appointment, which was non-eventful. The tech who worked on her wore an N-95 mask under a paper mask and all of that was under a face shield. She was well protected as well as protecting Liv. That was nice.

I was able to go into the orthodontist’s office with Olivia. They took our temperature and pointed us in the direction of their wall-mounted hand sanitizer. We were the only two in the waiting room and all the receptionists worse masks.

Back in the room where they do the work, I sat in a chair that was all by itself against a well across from where Liv reclined to have the work done on her teeth. We continued to be the only people in the building other than those who were working there. The orthodontist himself also wore an N-95 mask, a paper mask and a face shield. Everyone also wore gloves.

So…that’s one place in our area that is doing the very best they can to keep us all safe.

Olivia and I both wore masks as well, though, obviously, she had to take hers off during the work on her braces.

We went to Meijer to buy groceries over the weekend. About half the customers work masks. All the workers did.

Our local Walmart has six confirmed cases of Covid-19 among their employees. We’re not going in there any time soon.

Is this our new normal or are we marking time until things get back to the old normal?

Who even knows?

America's Roast Beef, Yes Sir!

I’ve learned a few things from having a teenage daughter who works at a fast food restaurant.

While I did once work at KFC a hundred years ago, I only worked there for six weeks because I HATED it. It was just so seriously awful. I admire Lyss so, so much for sticking it out at Arby’s for as long as she has. Maybe it helps that her first job, in the kitchen at a boy scout camp, was so much worse than what she’s doing now that Arby’s doesn’t seem so bad. Maybe it also helps that she works with several friends and she likes most of her other co-workers as well.

Or maybe, and this is just a shot in the dark, she’s just a better person than I am. I am absolutely not discounting that possibility.

So in her time at Arby’s she’s shared the biggest pet peeves that people working in fast food have.

1. When you’re in the drive-thru and the voice comes over the intercom asking you if they can take your order, don’t chortle and say, “Heheheh, it’s gonna be a big one.” Seriously. Don’t do that. It’s an asshole move and it just serves to irritate every single person listening in on the order.

2. Do order just a beverage through the drive-thru. Everyone is always SO HAPPY when someone comes to the drive-thru and orders just a drink. Even just a shake makes their lives that much easier.

3. Don’t call the young lady handing your food anything that might be an endearment. It’s not charming, it’s not polite; it’s creepy and gross. And yes, saying, “Thanks, Super Model”c ounts as creepy and gross. Yuck.

4. This should probably e 3a. But don’t try and flirt with the person taking your order. OR the person making your order, or the person around the corner trying to cut beef. Leave these kids (and their mom-supervisors) alone. They’re just trying to get through their day. Isn’t it enough that they leave that place smelling like curly fries? Do they also have to pretend to be deaf so they can avoid your obnoxious comments? They are NOT interested in having a flirtatious conversation with someone old enough to be their parent or, God forbid, their GRANDPARENT. Stop. Just…don’t.

5. If you are going to be ordering a lot of food, prefacing it with an apology actually does kind of help. It lets the employees know that you know you’re kind of being a jerk and you’re actually sorry for it. But then again, this might just be me. I mean, I apologize for taking up space so…take #5 with a grain of salt, or maybe a side of ranch.

6. If the place you’re ordering from says their water isn’t working so you can’t order beverages, don’t ask for coffee, then tea and finally a Coke. The WATER WAS CUT BY THE CONSTRUCTIONS WORKERS. Here, have a shake!

7. If you’re pissed off when the poor teenager manning the register tells you that CORPORATE discontinued onion rings, please know that this wasn’t done AT you. And the kid making $11/hour isn’t to blame. Decisions like that are above their pay grade.

We’ve all had crappy jobs, right? It’s too bad we can’t all remember that when we’re out in public treating service workers like crap when things don’t go our way.

What I’m saying is maybe we could all not be dicks to each other when we’re out and about.

And damn it, if you’re in a place where the employees are wearing masks, the least you can do is wear one too! I mean, DAMN!

What I Learned from Celery

I did actually learn a thing or two during the celery challenge.

Well, wait. I think I knew most of the things I ‘learned’ but I was reminded of them while I crunched my way through The Week of Celery.

One – I can do anything for a week. When I know there’s an end in sight, I can do just about anything.

Two – I definitely wouldn’t want to do it for any longer than a week, though. I hate diets. I hate being hungry. I hate feeling sorry for myself.

Three – Eating a stalk of celery a day is not smart. I was so tired that week. SO TIRED. Not enough calories wears me right out.

Four – I sleep better when I’m not consuming caffeine. For what it’s worth, I haven’t taken up the Coke habit in the days following the end of The Week of Celery.

Bread

So the whole celery challenge is over. With its completion, Tom decided he’d give up bread for the time being.

I only mention this so that in case anyone hears of a woman being arrested for murder, you all know that there were extenuating circumstances.

Because, see, if he loses ten pounds in a week from giving up FREAKING BREAD, I will murder him.

Wait, does that seem extreme? Really? Ever so sorry but no.

I ate CELERY for a week. Let’s remember, too, that this was not unlimited celery. I ate a single freaking stalk of celery each day and I did NOT lose ten pounds during that week.

So, if that man is able to eat normally except for the omission of BREAD from his diet and loses weight like I expect he will, I will not be responsible for my actions.

I will be found not guilty for reasons of insanity because damn it, men and weight-loss make me crazy.

Are You There God?

The few days that Olivia was super sad, I started praying with her, asking God to touch her heart and help her find peace.

She latched on to the idea of peace and God like a drowning girl hugging the neck of a life guard.

We found a book for her at Ollie’s about children’s prayers and bible verses that are child-friendly.

She had read it from cover to cover several times.

She asks if Nell is at peace since she’s in heaven. She wonders aloud if God is watching us and how he can keep track of every person on earth.

She asks questions and listens to the answers. She wants to know and she’s actively seeking peace.

I’m learning from my sad thirteen year-old and I’m so grateful for that.

In the past couple of days, she’s been markedly better.

She’s asked about depression and how it differs from mere sadness. I’m trying to answer her with age-appropriate information.

I don’t have all the answers and I admit that to her.

We hug a lot. We pray. We are trying to get outside more and eat better. We go to bed earlier and we’re washing our faces and feet before bed because it relaxes us.

We talk and we listen, with our ears and our hearts.

And we know that God is listening. Jesus is listening. The angels are listening. Our loved ones in heaven are listening. We are not alone and that right there gives us all a lot of comfort.

Congrats Trey!!!

The school year went to shit in March, as everyone knows. Everything that is usually done in person at the school was suddenly posted on social media.

Alyssa and several of her classmates (including Trey) were announced to be the section leads for band for the coming year. The ones with FB accounts were tagged in the post, which makes sense because it would show on their friends feeds.

We’re all proud of our kids. They all work hard.

One the FB page for the school’s band, the director posted the listing announcing the leads.

Alyssa is the woodwinds section lead. She’s every excited about this.

The other leads are Norah, who’s the section lead for percussion. Tessa is the low brass section lead. Trey is the leading the sax section and Gil is the section lead for high brass.

As one does, people commented under the post. The first comment was Trey’s mom, who posted, “Congrats Trey!!”

Which, yes, she’s happy for her son. And to give her credit, she almost immediately posted another comment saying, “Congrats everyone!”

But then one after another the comments rolled in, all saying, “Congrats Trey!”

Now, let’s be real. I totally understand that all of these people are ‘friends’ with Trey on FB. I get that they were notified that he’d been tagged in a post and they came to see what it was all about. But I also find it funny that every single one of them singled him out to say congratulations. And let’s be honest here, Trey is probably totally embarrassed by all the people congratulating only him.

However, I did not go on and congratulate Alyssa. I mean, I live with the dear heart, I was able to hug her and tell her how proud I am of her in person.

So the on-going joke in our house is to say “Congrats Trey!” if a group does something great or several people are mentioned for doing something good.

I know I’m petty. I don’t care, it’s funny.

Peace for Liv

We’re struggling over here.

Three days in a row I’ve arrived home to find Olivia in tears.

She’s obsessed with death and her fears of my death and her dad’s death and her Gram’s death and Alyssa’s death. She wishes God would let us see heaven without having to die.

She asked me if some people choose to die.

I try to answer all her questions honestly but I also want to answer them in ways that are appropriate for her age and maturity.

It breaks my heart that she’s so sad.

She asked me if crying is the best/only way for a person to release pain in their heart.

Yes.

I told her that crying is absolutely the best way to release pain in your heart. I am not going to tell her that there are people who cut themselves because they say it releases emotional pain. OMG. Can you imagine? I mean, I already put nine Band-Aids on her fingers every single night so that she doesn’t lay in her bed and pick at her cuticles until they bleed. And some nights, she takes the Band-Aids off after I’m asleep and picks anyway. So…yeah.

I’m so glad she’s talking to us. I’m glad she can verbalize her pain and share with us what triggers her. She says she misses Auntie Nell. Nell is the only person she’s been even remotely close to who has died. She was so sad for Nell to have died and left everyone here. I told her that it’s okay to be sad for herself that she misses Auntie Nell but Nell is as peace. She’s no longer suffering and she’s happy in heaven with her daughter and her brothers and sister.

When I tucked in her into bed on that third night of jagged crying and near hysterics, I prayed over her. I prayed aloud for God to heal her heart and for the angels to come and give her peace.

I also ended up upping her dose of Lexapro in hopes of calming her anxiety.

We went to bed early that night in hopes that a decent night’s sleep would help too.

If you’re the praying kind, please add my girl to your list.

Heaven (Another Livie Talk)

The day after the death talk with Olivia, she decided she wants to know about heaven.

She said that she wishes Jesus and the angels would let us visit heaven without having to be dead to do so.

She worked herself into sobs again thinking about all the people she loves, has ever loved, will love in the future being in heaven where she can’t see them all the time.

She even thought about her dad’s parents, who have been dead since way before she was ever born.

When she’s like this, I let her talk and cry and I hug her and try to say the right things. But I also try to listen. I try to figure out what the base of her angst is. Where is it really coming from?

I still haven’t figured it out, though.

Alyssa suggested that O is PMSing. Hmm, it’s possible. I mean, sometimes we all just have big feelings bottled up in side and we need an outlet.

She told me recently that she prays for God to let her have a peaceful day and for me and her sister and her dad to stay safe. I told her that’s a beautiful prayer.

I don’t know.

If I thought she’d talk to a stranger, I’d take her to a therapist. But I’m pretty sure that if you to actually SPEAK to someone for them to help you. So I’m her sounding board.

And that’s okay too, at least with me. I hope she’s okay with it too.

Please pray for us.

I’ve been back at work for less than two weeks and we’ve had two evenings of near-non-stop tears. Things are rough over here, is what I’m saying.

Talking to Olivia about Death

During dinner one recent evening, Olivia told me she’d been thinking about something.

She said, “I don’t know why I thought of this but…”

She struggled to find the right words for what she wanted to say.

Finally, she continued, “If Lyssie dies before her girlfriend and I’m living with them, will I be able to stay living with N?”

Wait.

What?

It took me a minute, but I caught up to her train of thought. Then I grabbed the caboose rail and hauled myself right onto the train even though I didn’t even have a ticket.

I replied, “Of course N would let you stay with her if you were already living with her and Lyssie and Lyss died.”

Then O asked, “But what if Lyss and N die at the same time? Who would take care of me then?”

By this point, she was in tears at the thought of her sister being dead and her, Olivia, being alone without anyone to take care of her.

I hugged her, obviously and then I told her that if A and N were old enough to be dying, they’d probably have kids and O would be Auntie Livie and those kids would take care of her.

Olivia choked on a sob and said that she was just imagining being at Alyssa’s funeral.

I tried to lighten her mood and said that her nieces and nephews would probably come up and hug her and ask if she was okay and if she wanted some tea.

She gave me a teary smile.

She tried to eat a little more dinner as she dried her sniffles but then another thought occurred to her. “Can a person come home from another person’s funeral and then lay down in the person’s bed who died?”

I asked her if she wanted to know if when I die, can she come home from my funeral and lay in my bed.

She gave a great heaving sob and nodded, throwing herself into my arms.

I think this quarantine is getting to her. All this talk of death and dying and not being able to go anywhere or do the things she enjoys are taking a toll.

Later that night she asked about heaven. We talked about God and how much He loves us all.

She wondered how, when you die, you know how to get to heaven. I told her that I think that everyone we ever loved who died before us meets us and helps us find our way to heaven.

She seemed to take comfort in that.

She also took comfort in her dad shouting from his couch earlier that evening, “Livie, your mom’s grandma is 94 years old. You’re going to my age before your mom croaks.”

He’s always a lot of help.

Celery

Preface: It’s been well established that I’m an idiot.

While I was off work, Tom and the girls and I ate horribly. I mean, seriously, it was awful.

We had fast food at least once week, often twice. I swear, it seemed like as we were finishing one meal, we were already talking about what we’d have for our next snack.

As one last hurrah (OMG, that’s so stupid) I picked up some appetizers from Applebee’s on the Friday of my first week at work.

Olivia had been asking about Applebee’s for a while. She loves the garlic mashed potatoes and the spinach artichoke dip.

So yes, on that Friday afternoon, we all gorged on deliciously fattening, nutritionally-void fried foods. It was glorious.

After she’d had honey bbq wings, her own spinach artichoke dip and one of my mozzarella sticks, Alyssa leaned back in her chair and said, “Oh, I’m so full. My stomach is poking out this far!”

And here’s where my stupidity steps in.

I raised an eyebrow at her and said, “Please. I could eat a single celery stick for three days and then have you eat what you just ate and we could compare stomachs.”

Then, because I’m JUST THAT STUPID, I said, “No, actually, I could eat a single celery stick for a WEEK and still my stomach would be bigger than yours.”

Hello. I’m Mrs. Ordinary and I’m an idiot.

I’m almost 50 years old. I’m not active. I eat horribly.

And I’m sitting here comparing my NON-ACTIVE body to my seventeen year old daughter’s. She, who is active, who works out every single days, who eats well and takes care of herself.

What the actually hell? Why would I do that? Why do I bring these body issues up at all? I do not want to make thinness a thing for my girls. I want them to feel good in the skin they’re in and to know that all bodies are beautiful.

Except…I don’t actually believe that.

I do not think my body is beautiful. I hate my body. I hate the skin that I am in.

So. Yes. Because I opened my stupid mouth and issued that stupid challenge, the next morning, I started my week of celery.

Or, you know, week of hell, tomayto/tomahto.

I know how stupid this is. I do.

I also know how stupid is that once I’d issued the challenge, I felt like I couldn’t back down. It’s my own challenge. Hello, stupid, you can stop anytime you want!

Except I won’t.

Instead, I’ll sit over here with my daily stalk of celery cut into eight pieces and I’ll feel sorry for myself.

Because yes, of course I do that too.

I sit at the kitchen table while the girls are eating their noodles and their chicken strips and their mashed potatoes and I choke that damned celery down because I HAVE TO. And I sit there feeling sorry for myself because that’s just how it is. I don’t WANT to this but my brain tells me that I’m a total loser if I don’t complete this ridiculous task that I set for myself. I am the only one who insists that there are RULES in place and that I MUST follow them.

And because I’m perfectly aware of how dumb this endeavor is, I say it out loud to Alyssa. I tell her not to internalize this little experiment because it’s stupid. Do NOT do what I’m doing.

What the hell, MOM! This is some brilliant parenting right here. Sign up for my webinar and I’ll teach my ways. The small print at the bottom of my webinar contract will alieve me of all responsibility when your child has to reparent themselves or pay exorbitant amounts for therapy.

But I explained to Tom, it’s only a week. Big deal. People do cleanses and fasts and it’s only seven stupid days. And let’s face it, I am absolutely big enough to go a week eating a stalk of celery a day.

So what if I’m so tired I can barely stay away when I get home from work. So what if gnawing hunger makes it hard to sleep even with the blinding tiredness.

It’s only a week.

But please remember: do as I say, not as I do. YOU are beautiful. You are perfect just the way you are.

And for your own mental health, don’t watch several (4) episodes of My 600 Pound Life right around the time you start contemplating your own enormousness.