Photo replay: Standing guard

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Luke and Kameliah stand guard while their mama, Andrea, recuperates from her tonsillectomy.

February 24, 2012

 

Shameless self-promotion: If you liked this post—or Grandma's Briefs in general—please vote for Grandma's Briefs in the About.com Favorite Grandparent Blog poll. Vote once per day per email address through March 21. Thank you!

Today's (unrelated) question:

What's the highlight of your upcoming week?

The healing power of positive thinking...and puppies

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Those of you who follow Grandma's Briefs on Facebook and Twitter know that I've been on nurse duty for my youngest daughter, Andrea, who had her tonsils out this week. At 26 years old. Which had her mama—that would be me—pretty concerned.

The surgery went well, and I think much of that can be attributed to Andrea's positive attitude going in.

I've heard distressing stats on how long it takes adults to recover from tonsillectomies, ranging from two weeks of intense pain (and hunger) to it taking three full months to get back on one's feet. Again, I think (and hope) Andrea's positive attitude will make for the best possible outcome.

Despite moments of debilitating pain and frustration immediately following the surgery, Andrea's sense of humor continues to carry her through. To wit: When the nurse summoned Andie's roommate and me from the waiting area to see Andrea in the recovery room, the nurse said Andrea's first words were, "No grape popsicles!" All Andie and a reference to her concerns medical staff would immediately provide purple pops afterward. Seems purple popsicles and the vomiting that accompanied them is Andrea's only memory from her only other surgery, getting tubes in her ears, more than 20 years ago. Her roommate and I couldn't help but laugh (yes, out loud!) as we followed the nurse to Andrea's bedside.

Another example of Andrea's goofiness and how it's helping her deal with the pain is her novel approach to communicating in the first excruciating hours after surgery when talking was virtually impossible. She started off with pen and paper to relay her requests—and, at times, distress—but that soon proved too cumbersome and Andrea turned to her iPhone, typing all she wanted to say into the Notes application then having her text read by the computerized voice...which involved not only a monotone voice—except when a typed question mark meant text was read with a lilting tone at the end of requests—but numerous awkward and incorrect pronunciations of words. Which got Andrea giggling despite the pain. Which made her repeat the humorous text again and again. Typing song lyrics got her roommate and me giggling as well.

That's not to say it's been easy on Andrea. At all. She's in pain, she's hungry, she's worried about coughing and choking and vomiting, and concerned the recuperation might not go as quickly and smoothly as we all hope. When mustering her own comic relief doesn't come easy, though, puppy love steps in, courtesy of Luke (Andrea's dog) and Lennox (her roommate's dog).

With a cute quotient so high, how could these adorable kiddos not make her feel better?

I head home today, leaving Andrea under the care of her roommate—and the pain relieving power of puppies.

I have no doubt she'll be better in no time.

Shameless self-promotion: If you liked this post—or Grandma's Briefs in general—please vote for Grandma's Briefs in the About.com Favorite Grandparent Blog poll. Vote once per day per email address through March 21. Thank you!

Today's question:

When you don't feel well, what one thing never fails to help you feel better?

Love manners and matters

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When I was a child, I rated my affection for something based on one question: Did I love it more than I loved my mom? To me, love was a hierarchy, and Mom was firmly and forever at the top.

Sure, I loved macaroni and cheese, I loved mashed potatoes, I loved listening to the Bay City Rollers and wearing my ever so stylish elephant pants. But did I love those things more than Mom? Not even close.

I soon started applying the same question to people. I loved my sixth-grade teacher, but not more than Mom. I loved my BFF, but not more than Mom. I even thought I loved a boy or two, but certainly not more than Mom. (Their failing the test, I now see, was truly a blessing for me.)

Then came Jim. I soon learned a very important lesson: My love test was silly, my love test was naive. Love isn't a matter of degree, I realized, it's a matter of manner, and I loved Jim in a far different manner than I loved my mom. Not more, not less, just different.

Yes, I loved my mom, but I sure didn't want to spend the rest of my life with her. I did, though, want to spend the rest of my life with Jim. Fortunately he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me, too. So we married. And had kids.

When the first baby was born, there was the struggle of coming to terms with the fact—for Jim and for me—that the manner of baby love was such that it required more attention, more nurturing, more time than anything else in our world. It wasn't a matter of loving the baby more than Jim, though it took a while to convince him of that.

When the second baby was set to arrive, I had to convince myself that I wouldn't love my first more than the second. I had yet to learn how much the heart expands with each child. The lesson was confirmed when that second baby arrived. And again when the third baby arrived.

Again and again I've learned—and did my best to teach—that each and every one of those loves of my life were loved the very most I could possibly love, just all in a different manner. I've never loved one child more than another; they're loved in manners befitting them. Sure, there were—and continue to be—days when one drives me more batty than another, but that has nothing to do with love. I love them all fully, love them all completely. I just love my oldest daughter in a manner far different than the second, which is far different than the third. I like to think, and continue to hope, that the manner in which I love them is the manner in which they need, deserve, love in return.

If you're a mother, you get that.

When I learned I'd be a grandmother, though, I clearly didn't get it. Not fully. I wasn't sure I could love my grandchild as much as I loved my children. How, how, how could I, I wondered, when I loved my girls so fully and completely?

Again the matter of manners came into play. The manner in which I love my first grandson is so very different than the manner in which I love his mom...and his aunts. No one more, no one less, all of them different.

Which made it easier when my second grandson came along. I now fully and completely love him, too, yet in a manner so different from how I love his brother.

It's been more than thirty years since I first learned the lesson that love isn't a hierarchy or a matter of degrees, that it's a matter of manners. My love has grown to encompass so many in that time. I love my grandsons. I love my daughters. And I love my cats, my dogs, my house, my home. I do still love macaroni and cheese, too, and do still love potatoes. The Bay City Rollers? Well, not so much anymore.

Through all the additions, though, I still love my mom.

And I still truly and deeply love Jim.

And despite all that we've been through in our decades together, all the other manners—and the oft-heartbreaking matters—that have been thrown into the mix, I do still want to spend the rest of my life with him.

All of my manners of love matter, but today, that is the manner that matters the most.

Happy Valentines Day!

photo: stock.xchng

Today's question:

What love manners and matters are on your mind today?

The curse takes effect — let the gloating begin

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For centuries, or so I hear, mothers have placed upon the heads of their daughters The Curse. I'm talking about the doom and damnation of sorts that mothers pass along to their daughters, swearing that once they have children of their own, they will surely get their due for all the drama, trauma and heartache they once put their mothers through.

The Curse is such a cliché.

Well shiver me timbers and consider me cliché, for I've uttered The Curse many a time—and I now gloat about seeing it in action.

When my girls were young, we had a trampoline. A big, round, bouncy gateway to injury and potential paralysis. My family had a trampoline when I was a kid and it was such fun that my youngest sister tried to convince me I simply had to provide similar fun for my daughters, despite the dangers. In 1992, I succumbed to her peer pressure. We got a trampoline. Despite the dangers.

As the dangers of a trampoline were many and my imagination expounded upon all of them, always and in all ways, I spent a lot of my time cringing and wringing my hands while my daughters jumped with joy. They did seats, stomachs, knees, seat and stomach wars, and—ohmyohmy!—front flips, back flips, and swan dives. I trembled with fear and anxiety each time they climbed up on the frame, removed their shoes, and proceeded to jump.

My fear and anxiety multiplied each time the girls invited friends over to jump. It was assuaged a bit—at least the fear Jim and I would be sued by parents of kiddos who had jumped right over the edge and onto their necks, leaving them paralyzed for life—by my requirement that every single child who did not belong to me have a permission slip signed by a parent before they even considered stepping foot on the mat. My daughters often whined and complained about having to hand out the slips to friends they invited over, to which I recited the dangers of the <cuss> thing and how kind and awesome of me it was to even allow such a death trap on my property and that they darn well better appreciate that and abide by my one simple rule regarding permission slips if they want to ever jump again themselves, much less with friends.

Yes, I was a paranoid parent. Allowing my daughters—and their friends—to jump on the trampoline took every ounce of restraint I had as well as never-ending lectures to myself on the importance of letting kids be kids. But I did it. I survived it. And so did they—despite my fears, my worries, my visions of daughters in wheelchairs or worse simply because I allowed my kids to be kids.

Fast forward to this past weekend.

Megan, Preston, and my grandsons moved into a new house over the weekend. They originally considered finding a rental that included a swimming pool (a pretty common commodity in their part of the desert) which worried me like mad thinking of all the ways such a feature could be fatal for Bubby and Baby Mac. Luckily Megan and Preston settled on a place that had no pool. Instead, the back yard features a full-size trampoline built into the ground.

Naturally the idea of the trampoline worries me nearly as much as a swimming pool. At this point I'm not too concerned about whether Megan requires permission slips for Bubby's friends, I'm concerned about Bubby himself. (Thankfully Baby Mac is not yet old enough to be on the trampoline. Or he sure as heck better not be allowed on it yet. Note to self: Ask Megan about that.)

Turns out I don't need to be all that concerned about Bubby's safety. Because despite all the times Megan, as a pre-teen and teen, complained—in unison with her sisters, of course—and told me to "calm down" or "stop freaking out" when my trampoline paranoia reached fever pitch, she finally gets it. How do I know? Because Saturday, just after she and Preston first introduced Bubby to the trampoline (and attempted a few tricks of their own as examples), Megan called me to say: "I can't believe you let us do the things we did on the trampoline, Mom."

In her voice and between the lines, the worry, fear, concern, trepidation, and unspoken WTF did we get ourselves into? was unmistakable. Call me mean but it was music to my ears.

The Curse had finally gone into effect.

And I'm not one bit ashamed to admit that so has the gloating.

I suppose tempering the gloating would be the proper tack at this point, though, so as to not tempt fate. For I'm headed to the desert later this week to babysit Bubby and Baby Mac while Megan and Preston attend a conference, and the request has been made that I help Bubby learn a thing or two on the trampoline while Mom and Dad are away.

I'm thinking I might need to write up a permission slip for Megan and Preston to sign before they hit the road and leave me in charge of Bubby's trampoline use. Just in case. I've never heard of any guarantee that, once enacted, The Curse won't backfire.

Today's question:

Describe ways you've seen The Curse in effect—whether it was placed by you or upon you.

Photo replay: Run, Andie, run

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My youngest daughter, Andrea, set a personal record in her most recent five-mile run, yesterday's Frosty's Frozen 5 & 10 in Denver. With a final time of 42.32, she broke the 9-minute-mile barrier and averaged 8.5-minute miles. Woo-hoo!

Congratulations to Andie, not only for the PR but for finishing 171st out of 714 overall and 17 out of 82 in her division. (Plus, major props for picture-perfect posing for mom mere moments after crossing the finish line!)

Today's question:

If you could set a personal record in anything—sports-related or not—what would you like your record to be?