Mother Son Bonding?

As a single parent I struggle with spending enough "quality time" with my son. I work full time; I have a home to take care of; I volunteer in my community; I'm involved in my church; I attempt to be a girlfriend and actually socialize with other women every now and then; and, of course, there's laundry, dishes, cleaning, grocery shopping, errands, doctor and dentist appointments, and all of Nick's activities. I end each day absolutely exhausted and wondering what I actually accomplished that day.

Do you feel me? Does this sound like your life? Seriously... there are days when I look at my son and wonder, "who is that young man on my sofa and how long has he been sitting there?!"

Before I had a child I worked on a cross-stitch piece to hang on my wall. (It was the last piece I ever worked on and I never completed it.) It was the saying,

Cleaning and dusting can wait 'till tomorrow
for children grow up, we've learned to our sorrow.

So quiet down cobwebs - dust go to sleep
I'm rocking my baby, and babies don't keep.

It was a nice thought. Then reality kicked in... along with dirty diapers, late-night feedings, and LOTS of laundry! I suppose I could have sat in the squalor and rocked my baby and somehow learned to live with the smell but that just didn't make sense. Somehow I found a way to balance quality time with my sweet baby with the daily responsibilities of running a household and being a wife. I loved my husband and my child and I wanted to spend time with them. But, laundry doesn't do itself. I had to juggle my time and learn to prioritize. Like most women - I had to do it all! (Isn't that what it says under "woman" in the dictionary?)

Ron died 11 years ago so, for 11 years, I have not had a husband to help me raise my child or to help with any household chores. Some days are harder than others. Of course I would prefer to spend all of my time with Nick but the reality is that the bills need to be paid and the house will start to smell if the dishes pile up in the sink! (I know this from experience!)

Last weekend my "to-do" list was WAAAAY longer than time would make possible to complete. "Mommy guilt" kicked in right away as I realized that the only communication with my son would occur when he called out that it was feeding time! I do NOT want to be a parent who misses the important things. I do NOT want to be a parent whose child doesn't remember any "fun" times with mom. I do NOT want to be a parent who wakes up one day to realize that my son has graduated from college and I have no idea who his friends are, what he thinks about, and what matters to him. So... what do I do? How can I spend quality time with Nick and still get at least most of the things on my "to-do" list completed?

First of all, Nick is 14 now and there are basic household chores that are his responsibility. He takes out the garbage, sorts his dirty clothes, vacuums, etc. I'm talking about the extra stuff that comes up like cleaning out the closets and putting together furniture before company shows up, which is what happened last weekend. I found an answer to my dilemma through laughter. What I thought would end up being the lost weekend, turned into one of the best mother-son bonding weekends ever!

I included Nick in the planning, cleaning out the closets, and putting the furniture together (we can only afford furniture that comes in a box). Instead of looking at each item on my list as a "task," I looked at each one as an opportunity. I found ways to make jokes about the stuff we pulled out of the closets, and the silly differences in men and women as we put the furniture together. There was his way (the manly, man way) and my way (the follow directions girly way). We switched roles more than once (his idea) and laughed our way through every "task" on the list. We laughed so hard that tears were running down our faces. We had SO MUCH FUN that it didn't seem like work at all. And... best of all... I didn't miss another weekend with my kid because I was taking care of the chores. I didn't put the chores before Nick. I just found a creative way to get it all done. Uh huh... I am woman- hear me roar!

Being a parent is probably the hardest job in the world. So much of it is a guessing game and I know I make lots of mistakes. My priority is that Nick feels loved and that he never feels like he comes in second to my responsibilities, even though these things are necessary parts of life. I want him to look back at his childhood and remember the silly stuff as well as the significant stuff. I don't want him to look back and remember that his mom was always too busy to spend time with him.

I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to hear from you if you have ideas for spending quality time with your kids while still getting everything done. I know how hard it is to try to accomplish everything without your life-mate. It's rough! We need all the help we can get so maybe we can help each other!

Blessings!
LeAnn

Busy Life

Hi Friends,

I'm sorry that I haven't posted anything new on A Widow's Might in the last few weeks. Along with many of you, we are in the middle of the crazy summer (no school) schedule. I've been working on some home repairs and now my mom is visiting so Nick and I are hanging out with her. I have written a couple of new posts on my personal blog, In the Shadow of His Wings" so, if you really want to see what's going through my little mind these days, I invite you to visit.

I'll talk with you soon!

Blessings,
LeAnn

More Letting Go

I just wrote about my thoughts on holding onto "stuff" on my personal blog, In the Shadow of His Wings but I feel like my mind is still as cluttered as my attic so this post is kind of a continuation. Besides, with three blogs to keep track of... I'm thinking that starting a post on one blog and continuing on another is a good idea - at least every now and then (smile)! So... here are more of my thoughts about letting go of "stuff."

Letting Go... Part 2

OK - I'll just come right out and say it... Ron was a pack rat! He came upon it naturally as his father is a pack rat (sorry, Dad) and his grandfather was a pack rat. Now, they are not nearly as bad as the families I have seen on Clean House but, they do tend to hold onto things... just in case they might need them one day.

Ron's grandfather died not long after Ron and I were married. We hit the road and drove across the state to the town where his grandfather had lived for many years. At first glance the house didn't seem to be the home of a pack rat. Ron's grandmother was in the kitchen baking pies. Everyone loved her pies and, since all of the family was arriving for the funeral, she was baking as fast as her fingers could peel apples. This was a sweet, old home, filled with the fragrance of cinnamon! But... everything was not as "Leave it to Beaver" as it appeared on the surface.

With several members of the family in town for the funeral, it was decided that we should take advantage of the extra hands and get some things taken care of around the house for Gramma. A few of us were assigned to the clean out the basement. The basement was his grandfather's domain. It was scary! We found about a gazillion empty baby food jars and margarine containers. We found stacks of old furniture that was piled from floor to ceiling which, over the years, had become critter condominiums. We found old canned foods that looked like those jars on the shelves in biology class. We found so much scrap wood that I'm pretty sure was enough to build a small house. We even found a dead cat! There is no telling how long it was in there because it was hard to see with all the clutter. Grandpa just didn't get rid of anything!

Over the next few days I listed to stories about Grandpa's "collections" and how he was brought up poor so he held onto things - just in case he might need them one day. The stories were told with love, the way only families can. This was the first time I had met several members of this wonderful family that I had just married into. Over the years I would discover that Grandpa's children and grandchildren shared his tendency to keep everything, including my new husband.

Ron held onto everything and I don't like clutter. We moved a few times during our marriage and I remember having to move several boxes of his from house to house. These boxes were never unpacked. They were just stored. I asked Ron why he kept them if he never opened them and he just said that it was stuff that he might need one day. I, on the other hand, used each move as an excuse to get rid of more stuff. Moving was a great opportunity to clean out all the closets and drawers! Ron just liked to pick up the drawers and carry the entire mess to the new house.

Not long after Ron died I decided to go through those boxes that were stacked in the garage - the boxes that had been moved from house to house but never unpacked. Each time I opened a box I started to laugh. One was filled with old notes from school that went back to the THIRD GRADE! One had boy scout stuff. One had old techy stuff that was obsolete. (Knowing him as I did, I'm sure he thought he might use the parts one day.) One was actually filled with dirty ROCKS! I think the only thing I ended up keeping were Ron's old Hot Wheel tracks and cars. I thought Nick might want to have them one day as they didn't make the old orange tracks anymore. He might like to have a collectible from his dad's childhood to one day pass to his own children.

In addition to Ron's boxes, I also got rid of many things that were "ours." Friends did not think this was a good idea and tried to talk me out of it. But, what looked like a perfectly good bowl to them was, to me, a bowl that I hand-fed my husband out of when he was too weak to hold a spoon. What looked like a great couch, was a piece of furniture that Ron laid on for weeks before we realized that we needed to bring in a hospital bed.

There are things that we hold onto because they hold wonderful memories. But, there are also things that we hold onto simply because they belonged to someone we loved and it seems wrong somehow to get rid of them. It was very easy for me to get rid of items that held memories of Ron during the last few months of his life. These aren't memories that I necessarily want to hold onto. I want to remember him the way he was before the cancer moved in. But, watching Clean House is making me think about this in a new way as well. Perhaps some of the things I have been holding onto are things that I have kept only because I would feel guilty parting with them. I don't know if the actual item really holds a great memory or if I'm just afraid to let one more piece of Ron go. If there are no more signs of him or anything that belonged to him in my home, does that make Ron any more gone?

I have so many wonderful photos and wonderful memories of Ron and the life we shared together. I don't think any of the "stuff" that belonged to him, or to us, makes those memories more real. I treasure the memories and they will be with me forever. A day doesn't go by that I don't think of Ron or mention something about him in a conversation. But, I want to rethink whether or not I want to treasure "stuff." This weekend I am going to take a good hard look at every item that I have held onto simply because it belonged to Ron, and I am going to pray about whether the item truly holds some significance to me or to Nick or whether the item and Ron's memory would be better served by passing the item along to someone who could truly use it. I don't expect this to be an easy task, but I do expect it to be a positive one. I'll let you know how I did!

Don't Waste a Moment

A friend of mine just asked how Ron died so I figured many of you may also be wondering. Ron died of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Ron was very healthy! He rarely took a drink. He never smoked. He ate right (most of the time). He exercised regularly. In fact, he was a member of the Mountaineers, a mountain climbing group in the Seattle, Washington area. Because he climbed mountains and slept in caves that he carved in the ice on the side of a mountain, we dismissed some of his symptoms thinking they were a result of no sleep and harsh conditions. He had been complaining of night sweats, itchy skin, and a racing heart. We thought the itchy skin might be an allergy so I kept changing laundry detergents. Then he lost his voice. After a week went by and his voice didn't improve, he went to see a doctor. Initial X-Rays showed a growth on his thymus gland. A biopsy confirmed cancer.

The next step was the staging process where they look at your entire body to see if and where cancer might be. The doctor did not order a bone scan, which I later learned should have been standard procedure, so they did not find the cancer that was in his hip. Ron was treated with six rounds of chemotherapy followed by radiation for the tumor on the thymus gland. The tumor responded so well that after two rounds of chemo, it was almost completely gone and we celebrated a miracle. It was during the radiation treatments that he started to experience the pain in his hip. Evidently the chemotherapy was keeping the cancer in his hip from growing but it wasn't killing it.

After a few failed biopsies and a second opinion, we learned that the cancer had been in his hip from the beginning and that, if the doctor had been aware of this, Ron's treatment would have been very different. By the time it was discovered, the cancer had started to spread. It was in several of his organs and he was no longer a candidate for the treatment that could have saved him.

We rode the up and down emotional roller coaster for a year and a half before Ron took his last breath. I don't know what would have happened if the doctor had ordered a bone scan in the very beginning and I don't want to look back and say "what if." I had doctors telling me that I had an open and shut case against the doctor who made this error. I even began ordering copies of all of Ron's medical records so that I could sue. But, somewhere inside of me, I felt that I would be getting paid for his death and this didn't seem right. Now... maybe I should have. This would have paid for Nick's college. But, at the time, I just didn't feel like I could do it. I was told that I would have to relive everything and I didn't think I could go through it again.

Instead of suing, I went to the doctor's office and asked to speak with him. He came out of his office and, in front of his nurse, the office staff, and the people in his waiting room, I balled my eyes out. I told him that I would not sue him but that I wanted him to remember Ron every time a new patient came in. He listened to every word as I poured my heart out. I gave him a picture of Ron with our sweet three-year-old son on his lap so he could see exactly what was taken away. With tears in his eyes, he gave me his word that he would never forget. I don't believe that he could. He knew that he had made a mistake. I tried very hard to remind myself that everyone makes mistakes. None of us are perfect. His mistake may very well have cost a life. But, this man will remember Ron every time a new patient comes to him for staging. He will never make this mistake again.

OK - why did I take the time to share such a clinical (and painful) chapter of my life as a result of one simple question? Well, for a couple of reasons. First, I was surprised when we found out that itchy skin, night sweats, and a racing heartbeat were very typical of lymphoma. Had we known, we would have been on the doctor's doorstep on day one! So, consider part of this post a quick medical lesson. If you know or hear about anyone with one or more of these symptoms... make sure they see a doctor immediately. Early detection... etc.

But, most importantly... I learned first hand that life is precious. Only God knows when you will take your last breath. Because Ron's death wasn't sudden, I was able to tell him everything that I wanted to say. He knew how much he was loved and this comforts me. I don't have regrets. His family was able to say goodbye. Not everyone has the opportunity. A sudden tragic accident can change your life forever. I know it sounds corny and I'm sorry if I sound like a Hallmark card but... tell the people you love how much they mean to you. Don't waste a single moment.