Kids Don't Learn to Love Themselves In a Vacuum -- Contributor Post

With Monday's news, a lot of us on the team are trying to deal with our grief in our own ways. Today, Jerry Kennedy from Choosing the Truth looks to the future.


...

I had plans to write a different post today but, like many folks in my age bracket, the passing of Robin Williams on Monday rattled my cage. His death follows pretty closely on the heels of the suicides of three folks in my immediate circle of friends over the past year and a half, so maybe it’s hitting a little close to home. Whatever the reason, I’m a little sideways from all the reflection and thinking. Chances are pretty good that you are too. As evidence of exactly where my head is at, this post has already gone through three title revisions and I haven’t even finished the first paragraph.

I started out with “What I Want My Kids to Know.” It was going to be an inspirational list of life lessons that I plan on passing on to The Monkey and to any offspring of our own making that might one day happen on the scene. It was going to be a list of things for them to remember when the darkness seeped into their souls that would maybe, just maybe, cause them to reach for the phone instead of for a belt. Or a gun. Or a bottle of pills.

Then I expanded the title to “What I Want *All* Kids to Know,” because only a selfish prick would be concerned about just his own kids. The fact of the matter is that far too many kids have very little in the way of positive influences in their lives. Moms and dads who ignore them, or don’t have time for them, or who learned how to be dicks at the hands of their own parents and are just passing it along to the next generation. I wanted those kids to have the list, too.

And then I realized that my list really only had one thing on it. Only one item that I want all kids to know, no matter who they are or where they were born or what they grow up to be. Only one message:

Love yourself.

Some of you will be protesting at this point. “That’s so selfish!!” you say. “I want my children to love other people, not just themselves.” To you I say this: if you teach your kids to truly, deeply love themselves and that they are worthy of loving themselves by the very act of being born, you won’t have to worry about them demonstrating love for others. It will be second nature to them, and words and acts of love will flow from them like water from a bottomless well. They’ll be a blessing to everyone they meet.

Still others will be screaming that I’ve been drinking the Kool-Aid of the “self-esteem” movement and that I’m enabling the “pussification of America’s kids.” To you I say this: go fuck yourselves. You seriously want to bitch that a bunch of five-year-olds got medals for playing soccer, even though they didn’t win, as if feeling good about playing is some kind of mortal sin if you didn’t earn it by winning the game? Yeah, you might be exactly what’s wrong with “kids these days.”

If you ask me, the “self-esteem” movement doesn’t go far enough, mostly because they focus on things that are external to the child (medals, awards, grades, etc.), instead of on teaching kids that they’re worthy just because they are. No need for external validation because, while it’s sometimes nice to have, it’s always temporary. Loving yourself should be a forever relationship, 24/7/365 until the day you die.

It’s no mystery why most people don’t feel that way about themselves. From the second we came into the world, most of us were were greeted by a family that did everything in their power to get us to conform. They weren’t being malicious; they were doing what they believed to be in our best interest: teaching us to comply, to not make waves, to fit in so that we would be acceptable to the people around us.

How can you learn to love yourself when you’re taught from the very beginning that you need to change who you are in order to be acceptable?   

Before you think I’m advocating a “no-discipline” policy, please understand me: I’m not talking here about your child’s behavior. Children absolutely need to know acceptable from unacceptable behavior. They need to learn about when certain behaviors are approriate and when they’re not (check out the article “We Don’t Play With Our Vulvas at the Table” for some great tips on that subject - http://www.scarymommy.com/dont-play-vulvas-table/).

But they also need to learn that they are not their behaviors, that even when they do something unacceptable or socially inappropriate, they are still worthy of loving themselves. And that’s your job, mom and dad. That’s your job, stepparents. That’s your job, grandma and grandpa and aunt and uncle and teacher and neighbor and family friend. Don’t fuck it up.

I know it’s hard for a lot of us because we haven’t figured out how to love ourselves yet, let alone how to teach our kids to do it. But does the fact that you don’t know how to play the piano mean that you shouldn’t encourage your kids to pursue playing the piano if they have a knack for it? Or does the fact that you’re not good at math mean that you should tell your kids that math is stupid, even if they have a talent for it?

Most kids come into the world with a leaning towards self-love. It’s their natural state, a seed planted in each of them. All the seed needs is a little coaxing, a little encouragement, a little tending and watering. Before long, it will grow into a beautiful, strong tree at the core of their being, a tree that will bear fruit in the form of loving words and deeds.

In loving memory of Mork from Ork, the guy who taught me that it was okay to be a weirdo. Na-Nu Na-Nu.

 

Black Dog -- Guest Post

A brave and important post today by Aubrey Harmon from World Split Open as we all process the events of this past week.

...

You are in the middle of training for your new job, when the trainer needs to take a break for a few minutes.  You pull out your phone to check for news about your son, who has been sick.  Instead you discover that Robin Williams has died of an apparent suicide.  You share the news with the trainer when he comes back and you share a moment of shock and sadness.  Then you get back to work.  But the knowledge hangs in the back of your brain, nibbling.  It’s there when you drive home with music turned up loud to drown it out.  It’s there when you get home and eat dinner and drink wine and keep eating and drinking to drown it out.  Because nothing drowns it out.  Not petting your dogs.  Not thinking of your kids.  Not trashy television or equally trashy novels.  You know depression, that black dog, is stalking and it can take you down.  Even with money and fame and everything that goes along with that, even knowing the pain suicide would cause those you leave behind, it can take you down.  You aren’t in that bad place now.  You believe in better living through chemistry.  But sometimes, even with the meds and the therapy and the writing and art and music and eating and drinking, even with friends and family, the black dog whimpers and growls at the edges of your mind.

I have lived with, and struggled against, depression and anxiety for as long as I can remember.   Even before I can remember.  There are stories about the horrible attempts at taking me to preschool, where I would cling to my mom’s legs and sob and sob.  I wasn’t one of those kids who would cry for a minute until my parent left, then get sidetracked by other things.  No, I was determined.  I cried the whole time I was there.  The teachers finally told my mom that I probably wasn’t ready yet. 

As I got older, I learned how to cope better.  I was able to go to school, to overnights with friends, and finally to sleep-away camps.  It was at one of these camps, during the summer before I started high school, that I met one of my best friends.  She came up and started talking to me and we just stuck together.  Later, she told me she’d approached me because I looked confident, and like I knew what was going on.  I busted up laughing – I’d barely been holding it together.  Stumbling along, trying to find my way around a huge new college campus, across the country from my family,  telling myself not to cry.  Finding her helped me immeasurably.  Not only did I stop crying, but I found someone to laugh with, and to commiserate with when I started failing a class for the first time in my life.

In high school I found more friends, and I met Tom.  I kept it together, mostly.  I transferred some of my separation anxiety stuff onto him.  As long as he was with me, I was okay. 

It wasn’t until late in college that I learned from internet friends that my anxiety had a name – emetophobia.  It’s the fear of vomiting, and when I was a kid it affected me so strongly that I often couldn’t eat much if I were around lots of other people or if I were away from home for fear that I would throw up.  When one of the kids in my second grade classroom threw up in class I had such a severe panic attack that I ran out of the room and refused to go back.  Eventually I was reassigned to the other second grade classroom. I circumscribed my life into a tiny little circle to keep from being afraid.  My mom pushed me to widen my circle, though I hadn’t been able to tell her exactly why I was afraid.  It wasn’t all doom and gloom – I had fun with friends.  I traveled some.  I went on a cross-country trip with Tom.  I moved to San Francisco and found where I belong.  But in the back of my mind, always, the anxiety and depression lurked.

It wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I discovered that medications could help.  I found a good psychiatrist and found a medication that drove my anxiety into a small enough corner that I could ignore it.  At one point, figuring that maybe I was fixed, I went off the meds, with the assistance of my psychiatrist.  It took a couple of months, but pretty soon I was crying on my back stairs, for no reason, barely able to eat, nearly unable to leave the house.  Needless to say, I went back on the meds.

There have been some dark times. Times when I was so anxious and lost that I thought I would try anything to make it stop.  Times when I thought about killing myself, and the only thing that stopped me was being more afraid of death than I was about never feeling better.  Times I thought I could never have kids, because how could I deal when they threw up?  Times I worried about passing my anxiety on to my kids. 

One of the worst times was after my daughter was born.  Her birth was physically hard on me, and I needed surgery unexpectedly right after she was born.  I ended up with a catheter for several weeks, housebound and mostly bed-bound for a week, and the pain combined with post-partum hormones kicked my ass.   I thought I ruined Tai’s life by having Miriam.  I thought I was ruining Miriam’s life by being so mentally absent.  There were times when I thought that maybe having no mom would be better for them than having a crazy mom.

I have been beyond lucky that those times pass, for me.  I keep walking, putting one foot in front of the other, and gradually I break out of the isolation I tend to withdraw into when I’m hurting most.  I reconnect to friends and the world.  I remember that music sounds good, the sun is bright, and life can be sweet.  I try to remember to reach out to people who love me when I’m hurting, even though the idea of being vulnerable like that is horrifying.

I’ve seen lots of reminders to seek help if you’re in that dark place.  Call a hot-line, call a friend.  Know you are loved and not alone.  Don’t feel ashamed of taking medication for your brain, as you would for any other body part.  Those reminders are true and spot on.  But I’d add one more thing:

If you know someone who struggles with anxiety and or depression, ask them how they’re doing – and ask for the truth.  Tell them that you are there.  If they have withdrawn, give them a poke in whatever way works for you both (email, text, phone, smoke signals).  Just sit with them.  Because sometimes we can’t reach out ourselves, but if someone comes in after us, it helps.  And as someone else on my facebook feed said, know that suicide isn’t an act of selfishness, it’s an act of desperation.  I believe it’s an action taken when you get too exhausted to keep fighting it, when the black dog catches you too many times.

Today I’m feeling okay.  I’m going through some difficult stuff, but I’m still moving forward.  My heart hurts for Robin Williams and his family.  And I hope that wherever he is, he has found some peace.

 

The Week I Don't Remember -- Guest Post

Katrina Leno's inaugural book is coming out early next month through HarperCollins, and if you like thrillers, I cannot recommend it enough. The book is suitable for those over 13 which places it YA, but the twists, turns and dilemmas within can be fully appreciated by an adult audience. You will not want to put it down.

Today, I am lucky enough to have the author herself give a glimpse of some of the inner workings of The Half Life of Molly Pierce. And, you know, some of it? The important bits? Not made up.

Seriously, check her out, you will not regret it.

...

You take it for granted. Waking up. Going to school, talking to your friends. Watching a show on television or reading a book or going out to lunch.
You take for granted going to sleep at night, getting up the next day, and remembering everything that happened to you before you closed your eyes.
You live and you remember.
Me, I live and I forget.
But now—now I am remembering. 
For all of her seventeen years, Molly feels like she’s missed bits and pieces of her life. Now, she’s figuring out why. Now, she’s remembering her own secrets. And in doing so, Molly uncovers the separate life she seems to have led…and the love that she can’t let go.
The Half Life of Molly Pierce is a suspenseful, evocative psychological mystery about uncovering the secrets of our pasts, facing the unknowns of our futures, and accepting our whole selves.

...

The Week I Don't Remember - Katrina Leno

This is how I remember it.

Everything got very dark, very quickly.

Sometimes I imagine my depression like a window. Just a plain window. A little older, maybe, so that sometimes it sticks when you try and open it. A single brass lock. A panel of clean, clear glass. White paint on the frame that’s been built up a little too thick over the years, so now it’s clammy and slick to the touch.

White curtains, but surprisingly thick. When closed, the sunlight is fully extinguished from the room. The window disappears entirely. It might as well be solid wall.

This is my depression.

When I was twelve, the window shut. No more breeze. No more air. And not long after that, the curtains shut. They shut a little bit at a time over the course of several months. It was hard to tell they were even moving. Just one day they were open and the next day I couldn’t see anything. It was all dark.

I went to the doctor for headaches. I said, before, this is how I remember it, because in truth—everything is faded. The doctor’s visit is like a story someone told me. It’s like it wasn’t even me.

The doctor referred me to a psychologist, who then referred me to a psychiatrist, who then diagnosed me with a smattering of illnesses—none of which I had. I had depression, fully. The rest were misdiagnoses.

I was swiftly medicated. This was the right decision, but it unfortunately led to THE WEEK I DON’T REMEMBER. That’s what I call it now, when I talk about it. THE WEEK I DON’T REMEMBER. I had an adverse reaction to the medication, had what might aptly be called a mental breakdown (at thirteen! I was a fast learner), and blacked out for the majority of a week.

It’s weird, when I look back. These holes in my memory stick out. What did I do? What can’t I remember?

Memory has always fascinated me because my own is so tenuous and unreliable. Because even when I finally managed to open the curtains, to crack the window, to raise it even higher—even now, when I am arguably better, able at least to control my depression so much better than the twelve- and thirteen-year-old version of myself, I still find it so hard to remember. To commit things to memory. I’ve just never learned how.

I knew, when I wrote my first book, it would be almost autobiographical in the way it dealt with depression and mental illness. It is also a wholly fictionalized story. Nothing that happens to Molly Pierce happened to me. It’s just the feelings that are identical. What she feels is what I felt. Her words are taken from my journals, from my experiences, from my life. It is the truest account of my struggle with depression that I will ever be able to write. And it’s also made up. It’s the best balance I could find.

I wrote THE HALF LIFE OF MOLLY PIERCE in three weeks—ten-hour days of writing that bled into each other and lost their borders and turned into one long, fuzzy day. I wrote a chronicle of my depression and gave it a plot, made up characters, inserted suspense.

I wanted to get it all down correctly. It felt important to record it. It felt important to show people—see? Do you feel like this, too? Do you sometimes have trouble even brushing your teeth, because the curtains are shut and there is no light and you are, essentially, blind?

Well you’re not alone. I’ve felt that way too. I’ve spent years feeling around in the dark for a window I know is there, but cannot see.

To normalize depression, to normalize mental illness—to identify and treat and erase the stigma so inherent in this process—that is what I want. That is why I talk about my depression. That is why I write about it. To make it okay. To open the window. To try and remember.

 *

THE HALF LIFE OF MOLLY PIERCE will be released July 8, 2014, by HarperTeen. It is Katrina’s first novel, and it is suitable for ages 13+. You can find her in the following places:

Website// katrinaleno.com

Blog// thesevagaries.com

Twitter// @katrinaleno

Facebook// facebook.com/katrinalenobooks

 

What They Don't Tell You About Anxiety

When "demons" are depicted in scripts or drawings, they tend to follow the same trope. You've got your protagonist, seemingly fine, walking along, and following her, there are these entities. Sometimes these are actually drawn beings to personalize the "demons", sometimes they are simply words trailing the protagonist. Things that sometimes don't reach the ears, but sometimes catch up, and take hold.

This image is incorrect (for me). Anxiety can be far trickier than this. While I understand the benefits of drawing it like this, since it indicates the anxiety is not you but instead something that hinders you,  in reality it's not a physical entity (even an imaginary one.) It's not even a voice. It's not words. God, that it were words. I can beat the shit out of words. I do words. But no. For me, anyway, it's not messages following me around only to jump onto my back from behind a tree at random points.

It is inside of me. It is feelings. It has no drawable, relatable comparison. Which is  interesting because you cannot conquer something like that. Which leads to anxiety about anxiety. Awesome.

It's taken me a very long time to even accept that I have anxiety. Since it doesn't seem to me like a voice or demon following me around, but instead seems like, well, me, I've been very strict my whole life about kicking its ass. About kicking my own ass. When I feel like this, I don't shut down. I run harder. Because I hate weakness, and this is weak.  (Keep in mind, this is before I knew what it was.) To me, it didn't seem like something affecting me, like something paralyzing me. It felt like me doing that to myself. And fuck that, I am stronger than that. I ignore my stupid-ass self, because, no. I just will not give in to this fucking nonsense. So that I never look like this:

...because I just tell myself to shut up. And if you can just tell yourself to shut up and continue to function normally, even though (and the bottom panel is pretty spot on) there is some shit literally vomiting on your head, then you can't have anxiety, right? I mean, look at how much I do in a day? I do so much. There is a reason. If I'm still moving, I won't stop. If I stop, those feelings, that me, myself, those nerves welling up in my chest like a volcano of I-don't-even-know-what-the-fuck-it-is because I'm too afraid to stop and listen to it, well, they'll all get bigger, and harder, and seem important. To me, the only thing to do is to continue to tell yourself these feelings are bullshit and not important.

And that works for a little while. Until you throw up. Until you get migraines so unbearable strong that even you, the girl who stops for nothing, cannot move. Until you lose who you are entirely, and are just surrounded by dark.

So, perhaps, then, not the best solution...

And sometimes, in a twist so unfair it can make you cry, your children inherit this bullshit you've never given any thought to, and never tried to straighten out because you're just so strong, guys. Look. No problem here.

I have a daughter who is pretty anxious. And I'm giving her my coping mechanisms. My shitty-beyond-belief, non-working, coping mechanisms. And I'm angry. And I'm scared. I'm angry at myself for giving this to her, even though I had no control over it. I feel like it is my fault. I'm so angry, it's hard to explain. It's just like one more hugely important way I failed. And this time, I didn't fail me. I failed my child. Just by having a genetic code. How's that one for you? I'm scared because I don't know how to handle it. I want to make it go away, but I don't want to be cruel to my child the way I'm cruel to myself. I don't want to teach her to be cruel to herself, either. And yet, it's already started.

It's already started because I do not know what else to do. These things just fall out of my mouth because it is the way of the world, the way of me, and my kid is only five, and Jesus, what am I going to do?

In this comic, I am the squirrel. She is the bird.

"We don't have time for this. Suck it up for right now, and deal with your wall later."

That's fine when I'm talking to myself. I either take a bulldozer to the damn wall, or push it aside "for later" then never come back to it, until it comes up my esophagus in a fit of physical rage over not being dealt with. No biggie. It is what it is.

But, I mean, just this morning, my daughter was having trouble leaving the house for our walk to school. She'd either imagined or actually seen a spider blocking her path, and couldn't move. She tried to tell me about the spider. My response? "We don't have time for this. There is no spider, and if there is, it's not going to bother us. LET'S GO, ALREADY." And I pushed her along out the door, and she cried for the first part of our walk.

So, way to go, mom. Awesome job. We got to school on time (barely), but at what cost? And how often do I tell her to ignore her anxieties or that her thoughts are not important? Do I realize them all? Probably not. I'm basically ruining my own child every minute of the day.

Do you see those "demons" in the above paragraphs? They're not voices following me around. They are feelings without names, worries without cause. And they're not vocal. I can't hear them as if they are talking to me. They are me. It just is what it is what it is. This is reality, not something from which you could run, You can't detach it, or stop it. Because if you stopped it, you would stop life. This is life.

Another wonderful part of this is that I am on high alert all the time. You know how when something really intense is happening and your fight-or-flight kicks in? That's me from the second I wake up to the second I fall asleep. This made me a great fit for the newsroom. Do you have any idea how nervous news producers are? I looked like a beacon of calm. Or at the very least, I looked normal. And since there was ostensibly a reason for this stress (you're live in five minutes, your show is 2.5 minutes over, half your video isn't cut and your sat shot isn't up yet). In the newsroom, you don't have to explain why you're so intense. And even in real life, people seem to understand that deadline work requires a certain ethic and they respect your quirks due to that. In essence, the way you are is validated. Not so much as a stay at home mom. Without the reason to be nervous, you lose your base. It becomes something you need to think about because it doesn't fit your lifestyle.

And being constantly on high alert frays your nerves and patience. My reactions are too strong for real life. So that when I interact with my children, I come on too strong. And the anxious one? She is so sensitive and perceptive, she can pick up on cues I don't even know I'm giving off. It's a horrid cycle.

I combat this by controlling everything I do, packing everything in, being as efficient as possible. I keep thinking maybe if I could succeed at something, anything, maybe then I could calm down, get off my own back. But, unfortunately, I'm learning that's not how this works.

Very dishearteningly, I came across this:

If that's true, I'm in a lot of trouble. Controlling the world had been one of my main coping mechanisms.

One final thing, thinking about this, trying to fix it, makes it worse (hopefully in the short term?!). I'm only allowing this analysis because of my child. I want better for her.


 

Down in a Hole - Guest Post

Today Sarah from A Place That Does Not Exist was kind enough to share some really important and personal thoughts in a post about something millions struggle through each day. Something that for some, writing can help with.

 ...

Depression sucks.

I could try all day to explain why, and I'd never do it half as well as Allie Brosh already has. So all I'm only going to say a little bit about the "why" part today. I recommend clicking here to read Allie's explanation, if you're one of the few who hasn't seen it already.

The biggest why, for me, is the isolation. There's a reason my work in progress is set in a desert. At its core, it's an exploration of what my therapist loves to call my "trauma" issues (doesn't that sound so dramatic?), and it gets a little ugly in places. It's going to be a series, if I ever quit rewriting the first book to death, and somewhere in there I expect there will be redemption and hope.

In real life, those things exist--even with depression.

The problem is, it's hard to believe in them when you're already dead inside. If you're lucky enough to have people who care about you (or unlucky enough to have people who just want things from you), you'll hear a whole lot about hope. How if you have enough of it for long enough, you'll pull through, and probably all the reasons you should have it.

Ever repeat a word so many times it lost all meaning and melted into random babble? That was "hope" for me, after a while.

I grew up privileged, and I was raised to believe you had to work to stay that way. Talking about your problems was whining and only results mattered. So I worked hard for what I wanted and mostly got it, except I guess a lot of it wasn't what I really wanted. I didn't know what I really wanted, and complaining about what I had felt idiotic. Nice house, nice husband. A good salary and a beautiful son. I was counting my blessings and coming up short.

People told me to buck up and fake it 'til I made it, and it didn't help. I'd been telling myself to do those same things for far too long, and I didn't know why I couldn't anymore. Explaining it to someone else would've been too much effort, anyway.

It was much easier to be alone. Scratch that--it was much easier to create a world where I wasn't. A world populated by people as screwed up as I was. I didn't do it intentionally, but its people spoke to me and wouldn't shut up until I wrote them into existence. And thus, Cliffton was born, and apart from my one-year-old son who couldn't talk enough to get bootstrappy, it was all I cared about.

Eventually, it was my way out of the dark. Sort of.

It was the only way I could feel, but it didn't feel good. It was raw and scary far too real. My characters were, too, in my head, and hurting them hurt me. I wondered constantly what kind of person would give life (even fictional life) only to destroy it, but I couldn't stop, because the stories needed to be written.

I wrote the first draft of my book in about three months. During that time, a lot of things happened in my "real" life (the one that wasn't inside my head), and I decided to go to therapy. If it weren't for my son and my characters, I don't think I would have. I'd probably still be alive right now, but I'd also probably still be stuck in the same hole I was then.

Digging my way out has been hard, but it's been worth it. There's only one problem. Sometimes I miss that hole, and my desperation to claw my way out of it. That desperation fueled my writing, and now that it's gone? It's not that I can't write anymore. My writing's been better since I've been better... when I can make myself do it. But I don't need it to survive now, or at least it doesn't feel like I do. You need oxygen to live, but you don't notice that in any given moment unless you're actively suffocating.

For every step I take toward rejoining the "real" world, for every commitment I make out there, that other world slips away a little more. It's still right here, and so are the people in it--revealing themselves to me in new ways all the time. But stepping out of my reality and into theirs? That gets harder every day, and I hate it.

My writing process used to go like this. I sat down in my chair, put on some music, and got sucked in. Whoosh. At my peak, I was churning out a chapter every day or two--even though they were crappy first-draft chapters. Now, I produce a chapter a week, and that's if I'm really pushing myself, the wind is blowing in the exact right direction, and all the stars are perfectly aligned. I outline and I rewrite and I second-guess.

I'm on antidepressants now, and my therapist warned me that they might affect the way I connected with my characters. She said it was most likely something I could work through in the long run, but I'd have to re-learn how to do it. I'm trying, and succeeding in some ways. But damn, does it ever suck sometimes.

My book is in first person, from five different characters' POVs (stop laughing). When my depression was at its worst, I could only connect with one of them on a deep and reliable basis--the one I often refer to as [Problem Character]. He'd hijack my brain whenever he felt like it, and at those times, the words would flow effortlessly.

For the non-writers here, let's pretend this is a normal thing. Okay?

This was good for my book, in a way, because he drives a lot of the plot. It was also bad for my book, because when I wanted to hear my other four protagonists, he'd shout over them. Besides that, he's mentally unbalanced and an Unreliable Narrator. He may drive my plot, but it's the other characters' perspectives that make it all make sense.

Since I started the antidepressants, I've developed the ability to hear two of my other mains really well. I'm still working on the other two, but I know I'll get there. [Problem Character] doesn't hijack my brain anymore when I'm in the middle of making cookies or trying to sleep, which is for the best because that got a little scary after a while.

It's just that have to work so hard for all of it now. I get so frustrated that I want to quit. It feels like it'll never get any easier and whatever magic I had before, it's gone now. I've tried everything I can think of to get it back, that perfect certainty that the story I'm writing needs to be told. I've written character sketches, done an outline, taken a break to read lots of other authors' work, forced myself to write every day even if it's awful.

No matter what I do, that drive--that craving--just isn't there anymore. I'm starting to wonder if it's gone for good. If I've already quit, and I haven't admitted it to myself.



And that? That's kind of depressing, isn't it?

 

Are Parents Ruining Their Children?

Are parents ruining their children?

This expansive article by Psychology Today, first released in 2004, says yes.

It says that from infancy on, helicopter parents cushion their children's failures while pushing them ever harder for success, and if that success doesn't come naturally, well, the parents help the children along. Anything for a successful child. It concludes that the obsession with perfection from a young age prevents children from growing up. It sites increased depression and anxiety diagnoses and a slowed rate of adults actually being adults (which they define as completing school, holding down a job and starting a family) to back this theory up.

And it's not that I don't agree, necessarily. I think the five-page article brings up many valid points and that parents need to re-look at their dealings with their kids.

But I think those studying this need to take our society into consideration. Remember, if your studies start in 1988 and end in 2004, or continue to the present, you are using the same subjects as both the children and the parents. That's important. For if this child-adults you speak of actually are the parents, then it's no wonder why they coddle their kids the way they do. They don't know any different. You cannot in one breath complain at the immaturity of adults today, then turn around and say those adults should know better while rearing their own kids. Of course they don't.

This is a long-term problem that has been getting worse very very gradually, not just in the last 20, 30 or even 50 years.

As we become more technologically advanced, we are coming up with solutions to problems prevalent in the 1980s. In twenty years from now, the technology will be focused on eradicating the new problems brought into existence by our current solutions to our old problems. This is a pattern that's gone on from the beginning of human existence. It can hardly be blamed solely on "hothouse" parenting.

This is an incredibly long piece, so I'm just going to highlight the select areas I had issues with.

In the very beginning, the study uses an example of a highly competent girl whose parents wrote in to her school, explaining that she had "difficulty with Gestalt thinking." The authors put forward that there was nothing wrong with this girl, that her parents had prematurely set her up for an advantage while taking her SATs.

Now, that could very likely be the case. Or, alternately, the girl could have actually had problems with Gestalt thinking. A close friend of mine in school was very smart, worked very hard on her grades and pulled in good ones. She was social, academically inclined and good at sports. She got a 500 on her SATs. She took the tests three or four times, each with the same dismal results. She'd probably have a lot to say about the smarmy conclusion of this article. Some kids, believe it or not, actually do have the problems they present with, regardless of their competence in other areas. Had my friend been given the unlimited time for the test that trouble with Gestalt thinking allows, she'd have done just fine. Her issue was that she could not skip questions, an imperative piece to doing well on the test. I don't know why she couldn't, but I believe her when she says she couldn't. She's now an elementary school teacher with a master's degree and two children. Wimpy? I think not.

This broadens to the next point of the article which is increases diagnoses of depression and anxiety in college students, supposedly brought on by parental involvement. The article purports that students are pushed to be perfect while at the same time their parents are doing their work for them, blocking them from the natural cycle of failure and disappointment, the result being that students feel they cannot do anything by themselves, and the prospect of having to (in college) folds them into a box of insecurity, anxiety and depression.

Could be. This could definitely be part of it. But we cannot ignore the advanced techniques we now have for diagnosis these conditions and regulating the brain chemicals to help those truly in need. Fifty years ago, these conditions may not have seemed as prevalent, but that doesn't mean they weren't. It simply the ways for treating it (or ignoring it) were different. Those who were not suffering to the point of incapacitation were considered slow, or odd, or slightly off. They had trouble making it in society and often stayed with their parents forever, never even attempting this growing up that the article is so fond of referencing. Those who suffered from advanced symptoms were locked away and shoved under society's rug.

Are people these days using depression and anxiety as a crutch in what should be very normal lives? They could be, I can't talk to that. But I do know that you cannot use such a statistic as evidence of poor parenting practices. It's not logical without taking societal history into account.

The article says parents are no longer teaching their children the essential skills they need to survive. Instead, it says "showing kids how to work the system for their own benefit."

I would say for the sake of argument that learning how to work the system in which you live to your benefit is a valuable life skill.

It attacks cell phones, saying the devices extend the umbilical cord indefinitely. That students and young adults no longer reason for themselves, but simply call mom and dad to get out of trouble.

I would argue that the point of cell phones is to help young people out of trouble. Real trouble. I would say the safety benefits of cell phones outweighs the potential for stunted growth into adulthood. I have a cell phone. An., yeah, I called my mom up until my early twenties if I was scared or sick. Childish? It probably was. But it didn't harm me. And I felt loved and safe. And I'm now 29 with my own family, and I no longer call my mommy when I have the stomach flu or when my car gets towed. Not that this disproves their theory, which I agree with in essence, but I do think cell phones are an advantage, not a disadvantage. Remember, 50 years ago, people stayed a lot closer to home and had their entire extended family network to lean on, in person.

The article boldly states that parental hovering is the cause of failure in young adults. It says the "no man's land" of 20-30 is continuing to extend because children don't know how to be adults themselves, and so they revert to being the children they were never allowed to be in youth.

"Using the classic benchmarks of adulthood, 65 percent of males had reached adulthood by the age of 30 in 1960. By contrast, in 2000, only 31 percent had. Among women, 77 percent met the benchmarks of adulthood by age 30 in 1960. By 2000, the number had fallen to 46 percent."

Remember, the benchmarks are finishing school, getting a job and having a family. Excuse me, but why would we use the classic benchmarks of adulthood here? We're not in 1960. We cannot compare to that without comparing all other factors as well. What about the increasing number of students getting their master's degrees and doing post-doctoral work? What about the economic downturn that is stopping millions of previously employable, competent people from getting jobs? What about women becoming more confident in pursuing careers, so that perhaps their family lives come later? My sister is well on her way to a Ph.D in biomedical engineering. According to this article, I'm the adult, and she's the kid. I'm the success and she's the coddled young adult unable to forge her way.

I don't think so. If you look at my specific family, you'll see it's my siblings that are successful. You cannot define success and adulthood by job and family anymore. It's not fair and it leads to false conclusions.

I think this article is great, don't get me wrong. It certainly gave me a lot to think about as I continue to rear my children. Many of the points are spot on, or at least make enough sense for me to be able to glean the information I need from them for use in my own life.

I do want my kids to be independent. I do want them to play. I do want my life to be easier. I think this article has a lot of tips to help parents who may be faltering on their way. But I also think that they've omitted important study in order to drive home their objectives. And I don't think that's necessary. The world is scary enough, as those writing the article well know.  We need to take things at their face value in the way they currently fit into our society without conflating them without making faulty comparisons and placing extensive blame. Of course parents are at fault for some of their children's problems. Are they responsible for the weakening of the fabric of society? I think that's stretching it.

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Beating Depression

Postpartum depression - a serious condition that is finally getting the attention it deserves from both doctors and sufferers.  Because of newfound understanding in the medical field, countless mothers have been safeguarded - have been saved - from harming themselves or their children.  Because of newfound understanding in the public eye, mothers need not be afraid of the stigmatism that formerly went along with such a diagnosis, if such a diagnosis was even given.  While this understanding does not lessen the pain or still the symptoms, mothers no longer need feel so alone - bearing their cross, wondering what is wrong with them, feeling like failures.

But what about fathers?

A new study published Monday says in the first year of a baby's life, as many as one-fifth of fathers can suffer from depression.  I think these results could go a long way in helping both mothers and fathers understand the feelings rushing in on them as they struggle to stay afloat during the first few months of their child's existence.

As adults, particularly as parents, we all seem to go just a little hard on ourselves.  Responsibilities continually rush in, finances rise and drop, relationships between spouses, coworkers, and immediate family are close then strained then close again.  Because all of these things are happening to us, we assume they're happening because of us.  We sometimes think we can change all of those variables using only our strong characters and stronger wills.  When we can't, well, we've added more to our pile of stressors.  Now add a baby.

Financially, a baby is, at best, a burden.  Everybody knows that.  During these past few years, however, job stability has spiraled downward, leaving many parents unsure if they'll be employed tomorrow - forcing many more out of the job market entirely.

A baby requires a lot of attention.  Many parents think they're ready for this kind of mind-numbing call-and-response, but even the most well-read, prepared adult can be thrown for a loop if their child has colic or is high-needs.  Even easy babies like mine take all that I have each day - and have been doing so for two years now.  Parents are setting themselves up for failure if they try to live up to the standards they set for themselves before the baby was born.  It's impossible.

The attention that a baby needs not only saps energy from every adult within cry-hearing distance, it also changes the dynamic between partners and between older children.  While this sometimes leads to jealousy or hurt feelings in those to which a new parent is closest, more often it results in just one more thing for that new parent to feel bad about.  They sometimes feel that they're letting the new baby down, letting their other kids down, and letting their spouse down all in one fell swoop.

Change is always hard.  It's harder when you don't take each facet of that change into consideration.  Depression isn't just hormones, it isn't just genetics.  Depression can hit anyone, and many times the triggers occur outside the body.

What I'm trying to say is it's okay to have a bad day.  It's not your fault.  And if you have several bad days, bad weeks, bad months, go to your doctor.  There may be help out there for you.  No one will look down on you, and you might end up feeling a lot better.  New parents, you have a lot on your shoulders - it's okay to get off your back.



**CNN article linked above: http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/09/06/dads-get-baby-blues-too/

** For more information: 
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/postpartum-depression/DS00546
http://www.postpartummen.com/