This afternoon I pulled a lounge chair onto our pool's baja shelf and sat with my feet in the water as Roo swam back and forth in front of me. She was ecstatic to have me there, having just ditched the arm floaties for total swim independence. And since she knew that my parental duties required that I stay present and alert as long as she was in the water, she decided to take full advantage of the situation by demanding "Mama, WATCH!' every time she swam to a new location.
You all know how that goes. "Mama Watch" is the most boring game in the world, and it became exponentially more difficult to act impressed every time she wanted approval. It crossed my mind to go mean girl on her and say something like "Oh good, honey. Tell me, the next 50 times you swim to that rock are you going to expect me to cheer? Because if you are, mommy is going to run inside and grab a red cup with something special inside to help with that, mmmkay?"
But I didn't. It was partially my fault that she was so excited. In the last three years, her dad and I have probably spent over $300 in swim lessons for her. Girl KNOWS how to swim, trust me. But Roo, being our most timid and least self-assured child, hadn't ever really gotten the confidence that she needed to believe that she could swim. So that, combined with the fact that she's our third baby and we were just.... I don't know- tired, is how she ended up relying on her arm floats for three years. It was just easier.
Matt decided last Monday that it was time to conquer the beast. He's better than me with this stuff. While I would have just thrown her in the water and said "Swim!", he talked to her gently and encouragingly. Funny how that can be effective. Fifteen minutes later she was floatie free, so it felt only fair that on this afternoon I pay the piper by listening to her joyful pride as she swam around without the assistance of inflatable devices.
Thankfully the water was relaxing. As I watched her, I started thinking about how taking off the floaties has really been a metaphor for the mental push and pull that parenting has been lately. I've felt like every week, sometimes every day, I've been having to ask myself "Are they ready for this yet, or do they need me a little longer?" It's exhausting. I've never felt like I have parenting under control, but you know.... when the kids were younger, the issues were more along the lines of "Are they ready for solid food? Should I move them out of the crib? Can I switch them to a forward facing car seat?" All these things I could look up on the internet. Nowadays it's not as easy.
J has been struggling with fitting in. When we take him to parties, he refuses to interact with the other kids. He'll go off and play by himself somewhere, or worse, cling near us. It's maddening. I want to say "Go! GO! Stop hanging on me. Take off the floaties and SWIM for God's sake!' (Actually, I do say that. Not the swim part, cuz that's a metaphor. Unless it's a pool party, in which case, yes, I do literally want him to swim). However, he's inherited Matt's shyness and my social awkwardness, which is just about the worse mix of DNA he could have been born with where parties are concerned. So he clings. He refuses to take off the floaties and swim independently.
On the other hand, we have PG who announced to me a few weeks ago that she wanted to watch The Hunger Games. I hadn't let her seen it because it's basically a story about kids being forced to kill other kids for the entertainment of adults. Dark stuff. But that's my Gracie. She's dark like that. I have to acknowledge that side of her, so I told her that if she read the book and still wanted to see the movie that we'd rent it. So she did. She read it in two days. She was kind of obsessed with it. So we let her watch the movie and she loved that too. In fact, my Mother's Day card from her stated that I was "as strong as Katniss Everdeen."
Wow. Thanks PG. That's pretty strong.
I thought I had done a pretty good job of judging when it was okay to take off the floaties and let her enter the land of young adult books with more mature themes. But then she started having nightmares about mutant monkeys with sharp teeth, so now I'm back to square one. Did I have misjudge and take the floaties off too soon?
Then there's 9, who we had to force to get his driver's permit last July. His 17th birthday is coming up and he's finally decided that he wants to get his license. Yay! I'm pretty sure that some of this decision was made partly due to the fact that he's going to the Prom this weekend and there is a very real possibility that, unless he figures something out in the next 24 hours, I will be driving he and his date to the prom in the back of my minivan, with all three of his siblings in tow. Nothing like the threat of a little parental humiliation to motivate a teen to take his own floaties off.
All this was passing through my mind while sitting on the pool shelf, nodding vacantly to Roo and throwing an occasional thumbs up. To break up the monotony, I called to J: '"Hey! Why don't you teach Roo to float?" And J, my middle child who never passes up an opportunity to be an authority on anything, turned to her and then said something very wise and relevant. For all my pondering about when it's okay to push your child or keep them close, I forgot that sometimes it’s helpful to stop worrying and just be still for a moment. It’s okay to just sit and let things be where they are. J summed it up for me in his instructions to Roo:
You all know how that goes. "Mama Watch" is the most boring game in the world, and it became exponentially more difficult to act impressed every time she wanted approval. It crossed my mind to go mean girl on her and say something like "Oh good, honey. Tell me, the next 50 times you swim to that rock are you going to expect me to cheer? Because if you are, mommy is going to run inside and grab a red cup with something special inside to help with that, mmmkay?"
But I didn't. It was partially my fault that she was so excited. In the last three years, her dad and I have probably spent over $300 in swim lessons for her. Girl KNOWS how to swim, trust me. But Roo, being our most timid and least self-assured child, hadn't ever really gotten the confidence that she needed to believe that she could swim. So that, combined with the fact that she's our third baby and we were just.... I don't know- tired, is how she ended up relying on her arm floats for three years. It was just easier.
Matt decided last Monday that it was time to conquer the beast. He's better than me with this stuff. While I would have just thrown her in the water and said "Swim!", he talked to her gently and encouragingly. Funny how that can be effective. Fifteen minutes later she was floatie free, so it felt only fair that on this afternoon I pay the piper by listening to her joyful pride as she swam around without the assistance of inflatable devices.
Thankfully the water was relaxing. As I watched her, I started thinking about how taking off the floaties has really been a metaphor for the mental push and pull that parenting has been lately. I've felt like every week, sometimes every day, I've been having to ask myself "Are they ready for this yet, or do they need me a little longer?" It's exhausting. I've never felt like I have parenting under control, but you know.... when the kids were younger, the issues were more along the lines of "Are they ready for solid food? Should I move them out of the crib? Can I switch them to a forward facing car seat?" All these things I could look up on the internet. Nowadays it's not as easy.
J has been struggling with fitting in. When we take him to parties, he refuses to interact with the other kids. He'll go off and play by himself somewhere, or worse, cling near us. It's maddening. I want to say "Go! GO! Stop hanging on me. Take off the floaties and SWIM for God's sake!' (Actually, I do say that. Not the swim part, cuz that's a metaphor. Unless it's a pool party, in which case, yes, I do literally want him to swim). However, he's inherited Matt's shyness and my social awkwardness, which is just about the worse mix of DNA he could have been born with where parties are concerned. So he clings. He refuses to take off the floaties and swim independently.
On the other hand, we have PG who announced to me a few weeks ago that she wanted to watch The Hunger Games. I hadn't let her seen it because it's basically a story about kids being forced to kill other kids for the entertainment of adults. Dark stuff. But that's my Gracie. She's dark like that. I have to acknowledge that side of her, so I told her that if she read the book and still wanted to see the movie that we'd rent it. So she did. She read it in two days. She was kind of obsessed with it. So we let her watch the movie and she loved that too. In fact, my Mother's Day card from her stated that I was "as strong as Katniss Everdeen."
Wow. Thanks PG. That's pretty strong.
I thought I had done a pretty good job of judging when it was okay to take off the floaties and let her enter the land of young adult books with more mature themes. But then she started having nightmares about mutant monkeys with sharp teeth, so now I'm back to square one. Did I have misjudge and take the floaties off too soon?
Then there's 9, who we had to force to get his driver's permit last July. His 17th birthday is coming up and he's finally decided that he wants to get his license. Yay! I'm pretty sure that some of this decision was made partly due to the fact that he's going to the Prom this weekend and there is a very real possibility that, unless he figures something out in the next 24 hours, I will be driving he and his date to the prom in the back of my minivan, with all three of his siblings in tow. Nothing like the threat of a little parental humiliation to motivate a teen to take his own floaties off.
All this was passing through my mind while sitting on the pool shelf, nodding vacantly to Roo and throwing an occasional thumbs up. To break up the monotony, I called to J: '"Hey! Why don't you teach Roo to float?" And J, my middle child who never passes up an opportunity to be an authority on anything, turned to her and then said something very wise and relevant. For all my pondering about when it's okay to push your child or keep them close, I forgot that sometimes it’s helpful to stop worrying and just be still for a moment. It’s okay to just sit and let things be where they are. J summed it up for me in his instructions to Roo:
“Just take a deep breath and lean your head back. Then peace! Harmony!
You just float."
This one kinda gave me chills, because I feel this way every single flipping day! Thanks Tacy!
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