advice

Support outside of family gives strength in challenging times

How do you say Thank You to people you may never meet? How can you convey the choked up, holding back the tears feeling after reading a blog comment and realize that people get you, feel you, are with you? Well, to the best blog readers in all of the land, the two simple words that truly mean what they say: Thank You. I’ve gotten emails, scriptures, jokes, straight up “Hey Girl” messages from all of you and I…I just don’t know what to say, except for Thank You.

See as many of you, I am the Go To Gal, the Make It Happen chick…I make it do it what it do, baby! And when I’ve done what I can do in my strength, my faith has always seen me through, but this time, this shattering of my confidence, came quickly and fierce. And it came from every side, but the tricky part is it’s come mostly from the inside. That’s where the stronghold lies. I put in greatness, possibilities, but I didn’t dejunk, reprogram, so when I needed solutions, answers I pulled out some junk, some deep junk. And only through intervention, professional intervention, have I had to sort out what I was taught and what I believe.

I won’t bore you with my results-oriented, conditionally loving upbringing. I’ve tried to steer away from the discussion on parents trying to live vicariously through their children, but I will turn this into a couple of parenting notes and make it more about how I parent, than about how I was parented (love my parents/don’t want to open the can/mother hasn’t made this choice easy though).

As a parent, you make choices and you want your children to learn from your mistakes, but how you convey your mistakes is so important to the overall emotional health of your children. For example, if you got involved with the “wrong” man (I put wrong in quotes for reasons I’ll explain later), then you don’t have to punish every young man who looks like him and is dating your daughter. Don’t make prejudicial statements like “Oh, he’s from that side of town. You know he knows good.” “He’s an only boy. Oh, he will never leave his mother for you.” See we, as women, are prone to wear our mistakes, our issues on our sleeves like badges. Stop it! Raise your child to think for themselves and let them think through their choices.

And

Be there for them without judgment. Man, I pray that I will NEVER tell my children…”I told you so.” “I knew I was right all along.” No matter how right you were, petty vindication or any form of public vindication just ain’t sexy, it’s not welcoming. I heard my Pastor say that people who criticize you, do it because they don’t understand you. Wow! I’m pretty un-understandable. I am not even a “kid” person per se, but I will go to bat for my children. I’ve nurtured, some may say smothered my children and to think that in just a few short weeks, their lives are going to be like something that even us as parents have never seen…2 working parent household.

WHOA!

I haven’t been doing a lot of praying as much as I have been just reflecting. Give yourself credit for what you’ve done in your life no matter how small or insignificant you think it is. We are our worse enemy. The one thing I’ve learned in this process is that I forgive others easily (for the most part  :lol: ), but I don’t forgive myself. I beat up on myself so tough, my girl Ce’ says It’s worse than those 6o’s Batman episode: BAM! SLAP! URRGGH! You guys know what I’m talking about. Please forgive yourself. You can turn it around, whatever you’re facing just by saying I wish my mistakes didn’t hurt so bad/cost me so much, but I am grateful for another day to make things better, to turn it around and the challenges only strengthen my testimony.

We were asked to encourage one another in His word (1 Thes. 3:2, 4:18) and you all came through for me. I got a call from my old friend Stephanie in Ann Arbor and she’s been listening to my show (I LOVE my show, but I have considered quitting because…I’m not going to be Dahgurl like yall know her and I don’t want to…it’s silly but this is the kinda stuff that plays in my head all of the time) and she talked about how this is my season and how she can just hear the shift to being more like the me before children/household management/homeschooling. Talked to Candace at church and she was telling me how she listens on her iPod every week while she’s at the gym. Oh and Marnita stopped me at the church picnic telling me how she’s so proud of me and loves hearing me do my thing. And then you guys…Yolanda, Michele, others of you…I just say Thank You for doing what we’re all called to do, so lastly, if you feel like you’re at the end of a short rope, encourage someone else, give them a kind word, a song, a scripture, a referral to a good massage therapist.

It can get lonely, confusing, daunting…even for the Can Do sistahs. I’ve had to learn to breathe through the panic and to write down the anxiety triggers. I know that once the major deals are closed, specifically the relocation to a better school district and the full-time employment at an above-entry level position is going to help tremendously. Life happens. Don’t let it knock you off your feet, but if it does, dust yourself off and hope you got a nice pedicure when everyone’s trying to figure out how to stand you back up and help you out (i.e. take care of you).

Us Mamas have to stay on top of our personal emotional, mental and physical health and appearance.  Thanks…I’m getting back on track/keep you posted…appreciate all of the love.

© 2007 DahGurl.