Things That Are True - Ruminations Upon Turning Forty

Warning: cringe-inducing earnestness ahead. If you're looking for cynicism, click away. You'll not find it here.

My 40th birthday party - photo by HWSNBN

A month ago today, I turned 40.

I had a half a dozen half-written posts in my head at the time, which have grown to a dozen since. Things I've wanted to say: an update on my Fit by Forty mission, discussions of celebrations, birthday cake for the non-dairy set, clever quips about passing life's milestones, and some Significant Ponderings Upon Reaching Adulthood. It's taken a month for all of that to simmer on the back burner of my mental landscape and bubble over into this:

I'm 40. And I don't care anymore.


Let me clarify: this is not "I don't care anymore, nothing matters and what if it did." I have not been tsunami'd by a rogue wave of apathy. The exact opposite, in fact. I am as passionate, as engaged, and possibly more driven than I've ever been. This is "I know what I know, I love what I love, and I no longer give a damn what other people think."

This, friends and relations, is what freedom feels like.

This is a huge deal for someone like me. I have expended a lot of energy - enough kW hours to make a serious dent in the global energy crisis - being consumed with anxiety about not fitting in, worrying about what to wear, what to say, how to act. I have, more than once, allowed my fear to sink me into utter paralysis. I've not done things I desperately, achingly wanted to do - talk to that guy, write that song, go to that event, try that new scary thing - because of my fear of Getting It Wrong. Sheer will pushed me forward on occasion, but more often than not, I feigned aloofness and pretended what I really wanted didn't matter. I opted out.

No more.

An actual photo I took today just before the scribbling began

As I write this, I'm sitting in a cafe that is much cooler than I am. I put my pen down periodically (yes, I still write with pen and paper occasionally - I like the tactile nature of it) and dip in and out of the stream of conversation around me, capturing vignettes of people's public and private lives. I'm surrounded by 20-something hipsters. I admire their easy confidence, their languid coolness, their uninhibited friendships. And I wonder what I looked like at their age to a 40 year old woman sitting scribbling in a notebook nearby. Did I seem so easy and comfortable in my own skin? Or could she tell I was afraid of looking foolish every waking moment of every day? And are these beautiful younger-than-me men and women plagued by the angst (existential and otherwise) that plagued me at their age?

It feels sudden, this I-don't-give-a-damn liberation, but I'm sure, like everything else, that it's not that simple, that it's been creeping up on me far longer than I've been aware. It's just the introspection of watching a major milestone approach and go past that's made it front-and-centre.

I spent my twenties figuring out who I was in the wake of a disastrous and abusive relationship. What other people thought of me was always top of mind. In my thirties, I had a better poker face, but I was still consumed with how I appeared to others. The things that made me happy - designer clothes, extravagant vacations, expensive restaurants - were still tied up in how other people saw me. If I deconstructed every choice I made in the ten years between 27 and 37, what other people thought was the single most important factor every time.

Motherhood - ah motherhood: paradoxically crisis-of-confidence inducing and magnificently empowering all at once. While the mere act of living my life, examining my mistakes, and choosing better the next time has contributed to this new, giddy sense of freedom, it's motherhood that has triggered a quiet revolution in the way I look at the world. I've always been someone who had to know how to do something perfectly before I would even try it - as a result I didn't try a lot of new things. But becoming a parent isn't something I could know how to do before I actually did it. No matter how many books I read or friends I talk to, every person's experience of parenthood is different, and I can't do anything but figure it out as I go.

And Get It Wrong. Boy, do I get it wrong. I angst. I worry. I fret. It's a struggle, and a challenge, and a different game every day - which would have stopped me in my tracks ten years ago. Even five years ago.

But I keep doing it anyway. Aloofness isn't possible. Opting out simply isn't an option.

The getting it wrong and doing it anyway is a monumental change for me. Learning to be a parent has given me the permission to fail, and the courage to try to fail better next time. To just get over myself, to challenge my own assumptions, to reach out, to share my hopes and dreams in this space, and most importantly to believe that my hopes and dreams do matter. Pretty heady stuff.

Web cam photo taken right this minute

Hi. I'm Alexis.

My hair gets frizzy. My teeth are crooked. I make mistakes. I know what I know, I love what I love, and I stand up for what I believe in. I'm 40. And I don't give a damn.

Can I get a booyah?

Things I'm Learning - Milk Allergies

The Imp was a pretty mellow baby. He cried when his diaper needed changing, when he was gassy, when he was overtired. But he was happy to be handed around to willing arms, grinned his toothless grin to any friendly face that came within range, and slept through the night at six months of age.

Then he became a toddler. From about 14 months on, there were temper tantrums. His willful independence started to assert itself. His stubborn temperament began to make itself known.

I can't imagine where he gets any of these traits.

Ahem.

A natural stage of childhood, I assumed. And it was. All part of the transition from dependent infant to independent little person, I thought. And it was. The lead up to the dreaded "Terrible Twos", I reassured myself. And it was. It was all those things - but turned up to eleven. Everyday simple things would cause extreme reactions. Aggression. Anger. Total lack of impulse control. My kid (that gentle, happy, cooing baby) had become that kid. The one that would. not. sleep. ever. The one that Did Not Play Well With Others. The one that bit other kids, that pushed the littler kids over at daycare. The brat that erupted into screaming, shrieking tantrums that would last an hour and a half, six or seven times a day, over nothing. The one that, when told not to do something, looked at us, oozing defiance, and did it anyway. And did it again and again, no matter what reasoning, cajoling, or expert-sanctioned behaviour modification strategies we threw in his direction. The child that bit, hit, kicked, head butted, and actually spit at us when we tried to change his diaper, or put his shoes on, or give him breakfast. We had THAT kid.

One of the really little guys at daycare actually cringed whenever The Imp went near him.

I was horrified. And mortified. And pretty sure that I must be the worst parent who ever lived to have spawned this awful, impossible to control child. I was pretty near the hairy edge of what I could deal with, so stressed that my stomach was literally tied in knots, causing me such pain that I spent big chunks of entire days curled into a ball on the floor. I was so frustrated, I wept daily.

It was awful. But it was our normal, and I didn't know what we were doing wrong.

Then my dad came to stay with us for a few days.

And he gently pointed out that the behaviour we were dealing with was very reminiscent of what he had experienced with my sister when she was about the same age. She'd also had uncontrollable anger and behaviour issues, which through trial and error (and terror that she would have to be medicated or institutionalized) they learned was caused by an allergy to milk. Dad said that within six hours of eliminating milk from her diet, she was an entirely different child.

The clouds parted. The angels sang.

Even though I was aware of my sister's milk allergy, even though HWSNBN and I had discussed, way back when I was pregnant, the possibility of different things being handed down from either of our families, it never occurred to me to associate The Imp's behaviour with his food. And I never wanted to be that mom. You know the one - the one who makes excuses for her "perfect" child's gawdawful behaviour.

Hearing my dad describe the uncanny similarities between The Imp's rage and my sister's childhood, it was like getting permission to explore whether his terrifying behaviour maybe, just maybe, wasn't our fault.

photo credit: luvi on flickr

The next morning, The Imp was a very different little boy. It literally was like day and night. Diaper change? No problem. Getting dressed in the morning? Easy peasy. Drop off time at daycare, which had become a half hour ordeal of screaming every day? "Bye bye Mummy. See you later!" as he ran off to play with the other kids.

And he stayed that way for the several days we managed to keep milk out of his diet. He slept better. The aggression towards the other kids at daycare melted away overnight. Small upsets could be addressed with words, and hugs, and kisses. The difference was gobsmacking.

Then he had some cheese at lunch one day through an oversight on my part.

The onslaught of his towering rage that evening was mind. numbing. Right back to hitting, spitting, biting, head butting fury.

Clear cause and effect.

It's been about a month now. There's been accidental ingestion of milk products a handful of times. Every single time has resulted in the same off the charts uncontrollable behaviour.

The takeaway:

1) Lactose intolerance and milk allergies are not the same thing. Lactose is the sugar in milk, and intolerance usually leads to gastro-intestinal distress of varying degrees. Milk products can often still be used, as long as something like Lactaid is taken with, or lactose is removed from the finished product. A milk allergy, on the other hand, is usually a reaction to proteins in milk, like casein or whey. Reactions run the gamut from skin rash and hives to anaphylactic shock. Behaviour issues are less common, but do exist, at least anecdotally.

2) Milk ingredients are in everyfuckingthing. Read labels some time; look for whey or casein. Almost all processed food, even that labeled "lactose-free" has some kind of milk ingredient in it. Hot dogs. Hot dog buns. Most margarines contain milk ingredients. Crackers, bread & other baked goods: the ones that don't say "milk ingredients" outright on the label usually contain whey powder, and if the label says "enriched flour", it's likely milk ingredients that do the "enriching" even if no milk ingredients are listed on the label. Caramel colour, found in many processed foods, including Coca-Cola, (incidentally, do you know how hard it is to find ingredient lists or nutrition information on Coca Cola's own website?) is often derived from casein. If you don't make it from scratch, odds are good it's got some kind of milk in it.

3) Can't substitute goat's milk, or sheep milk, or any other mammal's milk. (Except human, apparently, as The Imp seemed to have no problem with my own supply.)

4) You don't "grow out" of a milk allergy. Symptoms may change over time, but the immune system's response does not magically disappear. My sister, now in her 30's, still struggles with it.

5) I cannot possibly express the depth of my gratitude for my father's perceptive observations and his gentle approach in sharing them with us. Had he not come to visit at that moment, noticed the similarities 30-odd years apart, and spoken up about them, it's difficult to imagine what our life would be like now. It really was becoming more than I could bear. I didn't realize how much it was affecting me until it went away. Don't get me wrong, The Imp is still a two year old. There are still tantrums of the stomping feet and being obstinate when thwarted variety, but words can be used to address them, they're over quickly, and they happen a few times a week instead of all day long every day.

6) I'm no doctor. I don't even play one on TV. I am far from qualified to offer any kind of medical, psychological, or psychiatric advice. Even my parenting advice, well, take it with a grain of salt, I'm figuring it out on the fly, just like everyone else. But for the love of all things holy, and possibly your own sanity, if you have a child with behaviour issues, at least be open to the idea of exploring food allergies as a contributing factor. I'm not saying every child on Ritalin just needs to stop consuming milk. But if there's a chance that behaviour issues are exacerbated by food allergies, isn't that worth at least investigating? We didn't do our homework a few evenings ago and accidentally gave The Imp milk - his behaviour until we finally managed to get him to sleep? A couple hundred years ago would've merited an exorcism. It was agony watching him go through that - he was literally howling and writhing in his fury - and knowing we had unwittingly caused it by giving him a chock full o'milk ingredients hot dog for dinner at the beach really made me feel like the worst mom ever. Perhaps with some justification this time.


So in answer to the question "Got Milk?" in our house the answer is now a resounding "Hell, no!" and I'm on the hunt for truly dairy free products. I've had some luck with kosher and vegan stuff, and I've been adapting recipes I know and love by substituting rice- or soymilk for regular milk, and vegetable or olive oil for butter, but I'm wondering if anyone can steer me in the direction of some great, absolutely 100% dairy free resources. Websites (preferably not of the hysterical-omg-you-guys-milk-causes-autism variety), books, organizations... Help?

Things I've Read - Sleep Is for the Weak

In the last few weeks, I’ve been reading a series of books that have made me angry. So it was a pleasure to tuck into this lovely little book one afternoon as The Boy was napping.

When I first started this blog, I had no illusions that I was unique in my struggles and questions and daily triumphs as a new mom. I’ve lived long enough to know that if I’m thinking something, a whole bunch of other people are thinking it too. Advertisers count on this, it’s called demographics. What I did not know, however, was just how many women have taken to their keyboards and written exquisitely and unapologetically about their lives.

The thing about being a mom, especially a new, first-time mom, is it’s easy to feel alone. Despite caring friends and family, when it’s 3:30 in the morning and your beloved is sleeping and you’re trying to feed the baby and dammit breastfeeding hurts, you’re on your own. The Groundhog Day-like sameness to your days has you striving to be a better mom and person, without even the fun of a car chase. (Seriously, the chase scene in that movie is one of my favourites. Ever.) And conversations with your still-childless friends can leave you feeling pretty isolated. Not because of anything they’ve done or not done, just because they can’t possibly understand why it's such a personal triumph to get to the coffee shop, on time, with baby, both of you recently bathed and in clean clothes. No matter how supportive your partner, and even if you’re lucky enough to have friends with kids the same age, there are so many moments when you feel alone; when the enormity of the decisions you have to make every minute weighs on you almost unbearably.

So many of the child care books I’ve read are emotionally disappointing, discussing developmental milestones and common questions in a detached and impersonal, generic way. This book, however, is a quick read that is the cure for what ails you; the literary equivalent of hot chocolate or chicken noodle soup. (Or, you know, a gin and tonic. Whatever.) Comforting.

In this book you’ll find, as Stacy Morrison says in the Foreword, “…a story from someone just like you, or not at all like you, that will shine a light on something true you didn’t even know you needed to know until you found it.” These are fragments of the lives of women who have written honestly and unflinchingly about their parenthood experience, recognizing the joys of the process, but not glossing over the bits that hurt, that terrify, and that ultimately unite us. I was so moved as I read through the pages. Compassion for Jennifer Satterwhite, struggling to stay clean as she raises her kids, recognition as I read Amy Corbett Storch’s description of her visceral love for her son: “I feel like someone scraped off the top layer of my skin and created an entirely new little person with it,” and tears of solidarity as I read Kelli Oliver George’s advice for a new mom.

Get your hands on this book, or visit the websites of its contributors. I'll be adding them to the blogroll in the next few days and weeks.

Things That Are True - Crying

The Boy crying at 9 days old

If you are anything like me, in the first weeks of your baby’s life, you will find the following to be true:

Your baby’s crying will turn you instantly into a deranged lunatic.

Blame the DNA: millions of years of evolution have fine tuned the new mother to respond immediately to the sound of her baby crying. And that’s a good thing – for the survival of the species. For your ability to deal rationally with your disconcerted precarious emotional situation (thank you Tom Waits), not so much. In the first few weeks of The Boy’s life, I became completely irrational every time he cried. If his crying went on for more than 15 seconds, I went completely around the bend. My need to make it stop was buried deep down in Lizard Brain territory; intellect played no part in my decisions. The sound of it put me so on edge that I simply could not deal with anything else until I made. the. crying. STOP. I became frantic – by the time he’d been crying for 30 seconds I was seriously unhinged. Nothing else mattered.

My husband started to quietly worry about my long term sanity.

When The Boy wasn’t crying, I was able to recognize, on an intellectual level, that my behaviour didn’t make sense; that no harm would come to The Boy, and I wasn't the worst mother in the world, if he cried for a minute or two. But the very second I heard that little sound (and when they’re newborns, it is, mercifully, a little sound) Lizard Brain took over again.

So I went in search of expert help: I asked my friend Sarah, who had two kids already, if she had experienced anything similar. She told me of a time when her firstborn was just a couple of weeks old, and she was driving on the freeway, husband in the passenger seat, baby safely ensconced in his car seat in the back. All was well until he started to cry. Sarah became so frantic that only her husband’s firm hand gripping her own prevented her from undoing her seatbelt and leaping into the back seat to comfort her son. While traveling in the driver’s seat down the freeway at 100 kilometres an hour…

The Takeaway:

1. This is normal behaviour, as outlandish as it may seem. Show your partner this part, so he or she knows not to have you committed immediately.
2. You are not alone. Every woman I’ve asked about this, regardless of their pre-pregnancy career and competency, has behaved in the same way.
3. This too shall pass. You eventually learn what crying sound means hunger, which means gas pain, which is the result of overstimulation or tiredness. Your confidence as a new mom grows, and you begin the long trek back to sanity - which from what I'm told, doesn't end until your child has their first child...