The cancer club may be the first club I've ever really belonged to. Back in 5th grade, my classmates and I would form clubs, but they were more about excluding the kids we hated than they were about loving each other. Most of the time, I'm introspective and socially awkward (ie. Terrified of people and their possible rejection). I'm not a joiner. My shy kids are not joiners.
But here we are, in a club so tightly wound around the lives of the other members, so intimately familiar with each other's most painful thoughts and experiences, that we are committed to a lifelong membership.
We are the Cancer Club. Specifically, it's the My Child Has/Had Cancer Club. I like to believe we're an elite breed, specifically chosen for our strength, resilience, and grace under pressure...Though we often feel clumsy and weak and sad...But we're good at propping each other up during those dark moments, and collectively, we stand strong as the oak in the meadow you visit every Spring...year, after year, after year...
Just like that, we will be here in the club, fighting for our kids, fighting for each other's kids, fighting for kids that don't know yet that they're headed our way. In more ways than we're cursed, we've been blessed. We've seen the worst work the devil can perform on little bodies and the brightest lights of heaven shine through our children, those who help us, and through each other.
While I would jump at the chance to throw my membership key out the window if it could erase Nick's cancer, I would miss the tender club friends I would leave behind, fighting on for their kids and each other....
Sent from my iPhone
Sunday, June 14, 2015
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Teens v. Parents
As the school year winds down, summer plans are being made, and finals have tensions high, I've been talking to some parent friends who are worried about their teens' activities, fought with my own teens over messy rooms and attitude problems, and begun giving this whole teenage angst issue a lot of consideration.
If I could say one thing to the teens of this world and really have it stick with them, I would say "Understand that everything your parents say or do for you or to you comes from both a place of love and a place of fear. Parents love you so much that they want the absolute best for you...your happiest happy, your greatest love, your fondest dreams. Mostly though, parents want you to be able to survive and thrive on your own, without them. Parents greatest fear is that you won't have the tools and skills required to build an independent life on your own or worse, that you will throw your gifts away with dangerous behavior that compromises your quality of life or ends your life completely. When your parent nags, instructs, seems frustrated, and lectures you, it's not because they want to be mean or damage your relationship or ruin all your fun. It's because they are afraid your current path of behavior will ruin your chance of living your best life now and when they've passed, leaving you to make your own choices. Grant your parent the same grace and patience you beg for, and take responsibility for making your life ."
If I had understood the role of parents better as a child, I would have been a better child. I would have shown my parents a better me, so they could relax in the confidence that I would "be fine."
Good luck parents! Good luck teens!
Sent from my iPhone
If I could say one thing to the teens of this world and really have it stick with them, I would say "Understand that everything your parents say or do for you or to you comes from both a place of love and a place of fear. Parents love you so much that they want the absolute best for you...your happiest happy, your greatest love, your fondest dreams. Mostly though, parents want you to be able to survive and thrive on your own, without them. Parents greatest fear is that you won't have the tools and skills required to build an independent life on your own or worse, that you will throw your gifts away with dangerous behavior that compromises your quality of life or ends your life completely. When your parent nags, instructs, seems frustrated, and lectures you, it's not because they want to be mean or damage your relationship or ruin all your fun. It's because they are afraid your current path of behavior will ruin your chance of living your best life now and when they've passed, leaving you to make your own choices. Grant your parent the same grace and patience you beg for, and take responsibility for making your life ."
If I had understood the role of parents better as a child, I would have been a better child. I would have shown my parents a better me, so they could relax in the confidence that I would "be fine."
Good luck parents! Good luck teens!
Sent from my iPhone
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