Smash Your Fears

Posted on February 20, 2014 by jessiepbraun

I recently received an email from Cameron Von St. James, asking me to help share his story. Cameron’s wife, Heather, was diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma -a form of cancer caused by asbestos – when the couple’s daughter Lily was only a few months old. Heather was 36, and was given 15 months to live.

With the help of the Mesothelioma Cancer Alliance, Heather was able to find the right doctors, and eight years ago on February 2, had her lung removed. In order to cope with their fears, Cameron and Heather named this date Lung Leavin’ Day and celebrate it every year. Heather explains,

Lung Leavin’ Day is about overcoming your fears. I get together with my family and friends and we write our fears on plates, and then smash them into a fire.

The timing of Cameron’s email – just days before our move from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania – was compelling. Moving is not cancer – note even close. But it is scary in it’s own way, sometimes I think more for the parents than the kids. In the last few weeks, anytime Phil would start to voice his fears about moving, I would shut it down by saying, “Look, we can’t give into that,” or “Let’s just focus on the positive.” In my delusional Mommy Guilt-gripped mind, I thought I was protecting Emma and Phoebe from our fears. Basically – for anyone who has seen The Lego Movie – I had morphed into Unikitty from Cloud Cuckoo Land: “Stay Positive! Stay Positive!”

If my therapist is reading this right now, he is shaking his head and massaging his temples.

Stuffing my fears is never an effective strategy, yet I continue to find excuses to do it. I say things like, “We just need to keep it together right now,” or “The kids need us to stay upbeat!” And yes, if the girls saw me crying into my coffee every morning, they may question my leadership abilities. But even Unikitty from Cloud Cuckoo Land knows that resisting “negative” emotions will eventually catch up with you:

What I love about Heather’s story is how she chooses to live in a place of hope by facing her fears, not denying them. Inspired by Lung Leavin’ Day, Phil and I decided to follow Heather and Cameron’s lead and write down our fears about moving, and then conduct our own plate breaking ritual. My initial list looked something like this:

Fear of the girls not liking new school
Fear of Phil not feeling fulfilled at work
Fear of us losing a sense of adventure as a family
Fear of losing current level of closeness in marriage
Fear of losing Phil to his “fans.”

The first thing I noticed about this list is my fears are more about other people than myself, which I am sure in its own way is a form of hiding from the real feelings. The second thing I noticed is that apparently I think I am married to Tom Cruise. Or maybe David Hasselhoff.

By fans, I mean his “people.” Phil is from a large family and has had a beer with pretty much everyone in the Philadelphia area. He calls it “The Long Arms of Braun.” Philly is his hometown. When I was 25, I moved there to be closer to him, because I am from New Jersey, where we are bred to be resilient and adaptable with a slight inferiority complex. When I married him, I often felt like an appendage – an accessory to his former life. Moving to Massachusetts, while sad and challenging at times, was the first thing we had ever done as a couple that was truly ours. It brought equality to our our marriage.

Love and fear are in this constant tug of war. I love Philly, and moving back there feels like going home. We have a wonderfully supportive family and amazing friends. But I also love the independent person I have become, and fear that moving back into our comfort zone will make that person disappear.

So I guess my real fear was not about losing Phil, but losing myself. Which seems silly when I say it. But not scary.

After sharing our fears, we wrote them on plates. Well, paper plates. Our plates were already packed.

An while paper plates don’t break, they definitely burn.

The whole experience made me feel lighter. When I look back at our lists, some of our fears are real – usually the things out of our control. Other fears are real but manageable; fears that require planning and taking action.

But some fears are just not real. My fear of losing myself is not real because I am right here. I can feel my feet on the ground and the computer keys under my fingertips. The fear of losing myself is an old fear…that I am not brave or smart or independent enough to do something scary, or be my own person.

But I have. And I am.

But I guess I had to write it down to realize that.

Setting it on fire also helped.

Please support Cameron and Heather in their commitment to raising awareness for mesolthelioma by spreading the word about Lung Leavin’ Day. You can learn more about Heather’s story here.

Then, go smash some plates.

Scituate, A Love Story

Posted on February 13, 2014 by jessiepbraun

Dear Scituate,

It was love at first sight.

For days we had been driving, looking for the perfect town to move our family, up and down the coast from Portsmouth to Plymouth. Newburyport, Marblehead, Hingham, Cohasset – all beautiful in their own way. Lots of harbors.

“What the hell are we going to do in a harbor?” I asked Phil. “We’re from Philly.”

“There’s one place we didn’t hit. It’s off the beaten path a bit – Scitu-ate? I’m probably saying that wrong.” (He was.)

“Ok, sure, we’re here, might as well.”

That ain’t no harbor. I turned to Phil: “This is it.” He smiled. He knows I don’t mess around.

Things moved fast, as they tend to do when you know what you want. Our courtship was complicated. Sacrifices had to be made before we could make it official. Like the temporary lodgings we found online – in a house that happened to be on a marsh.

But we did it willingly, because love is blind, and you were worth it. I braved the late night marsh sounds of a coyote mauling an egret because I knew we could do this, we could make this work. And then, serendipity stepped in. We met the right agent who happened to know of a winter rental in a neighborhood overlooking the ocean called Third Cliff.

Phil looked at me and shook his head. After a decade of living in a landlocked state, he knew I was a goner. I think I was weeping. “We’ll take it,” he said to our realtor.

Of course, no relationship is perfect. We had some bumps in the road, like a hurricane

and a blizzard.

But somehow these challenges seemed more like adventures. They made us feel tough and resilient, like we could roll with anything life threw our way. And for the times when our energy flagged, the right people always seemed to come to our aid.

When I discovered that the big blue house across the street was for sale, I imagined myself living in it. I saw Phil and I with cocktails on the wrap-around porch after rolling back from the beach, sandy and starving. I imagined the girls dozing in a hammock, being lulled to sleep by the clang of the ocean buoy. I actually printed a picture of the house and carried it in my wallet – my own little secret fantasy.

I didn’t think it would actually come true.

But it did – all of it.

The sandy walks home from the beach…

the cocktails

the hammock.

While I hoped it would last forever, I fought back feelings of impermanence. It all felt too magical to last. I blamed my fears on my pessimistic set-point, on my leanings toward fatalism – that everything good is just one heartbeat from being taken away. But in my gut I think I always knew that we wouldn’t last forever.

And that made me pay attention. For the first time in my life, I was present. For every sunrise and sunset, for every run on the cliff or walk on the beach, I was there. I didn’t want to miss a thing. When I look back at my photos from this experience, I notice that I am always walking behind.

As a mom, I often find myself behind things: a swing, a stroller, a wobbly kid on a two-wheeler. Phil likes to lead the charge, but I love to walk behind. It’s where I can see everyone, where all are accounted for. I can read their body language – if they are happy or tired or holding something in. I think mothers prefer the panoramic view. The big picture.

And in the big picture, our move back to Philadelphia is the right decision. My instinct was probably right all along – this was a passionate fling, a summer romance, not a long-haul kind of commitment. But for a blissful 18 months, we found ourselves on your rocky shores. Why? What did we come here to learn?

You taught us awe. To have our breath taken away daily by nature. To truly comprehend the vastness of the ocean and how small we are in comparison. Hopping from rock to rock on the cliffs became a meditation for me.

Especially when I stumbled upon messages I felt destined to discover:

You taught us that people are good, welcoming, and kind. I have yet to meet a Masshole. Ok, there was that one. Our neighbors – loyal like family – kept us from feeling orphaned. They even attempted to make sailors out of a bunch of Philly landlubbers.

You taught us to be brave.

To try new things.

To take care of each other.

To feel alive.

But mostly, you taught us how to be together. Just us. And have that be enough.

Better than enough.

It was here that Phil, Emma, Phoebe and I learned how to depend on each other. And while we may not always get along, we are all we’ve got. Moving someplace new is like a Family Immersion Program. It is exciting and terrifying, and at times, really fucking lonely. But we road that roller coaster together. We learned by trial and error when to make someone laugh…

Or give them a hug

Or just leave them the hell alone.

You taught us how to be a family.

And for that, a piece of my heart will always belong to you.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

xoxoxo

Insomnia: Gettin’ Dumbah Everyday

Posted on February 5, 2014 by jessiepbraun

We are moving in 17 days. And while our previous move was only 18 months ago, I seemed to have forgotten one of the side effects of moving: Insomnia. Of which a side effect is forgetfulness. It’s a vicious cycle.

When I was paralyzed by sleeplessness with our move from Philly to Boston, I sought medical intervention. I was given a prescription for Ambien…and then blogged about it here. And, to be honest, I wrote the PG version. Ambien had other side effects that I will not discuss ~~because my mother-in-law is reading this,~~ but let’s just say Phil really misses the ~~crazy slut~~ alter ego that was Ambien Jessie. He misses her a lot.

But no matter how tired I am, I refuse to go the Ambien route. I can’t take the chance that I will answer an Evite with a 500 word run-on sentence that includes an in-depth analysis of a Scooby-Do episode and my social security number. Again.

That being said, I have to do something, because I am tired – to the point where I feel like I am losing brain cells. When I was 21, I went out on a date with a NYC transit cop, who was adorable but not my type. When I asked him to describe his typical work day, he said in a thick NY accent, “Basically, I just get dumbah. I get dumbah everyday.”

That’s me. Gettin’ dumbah everyday. The evidence:

Emma’s 2nd grade math homework has become too challenging. (17-8=…..wait…wait…I got this….).
When my mom calls and asks if I received the book she sent me, my response is: “No. Wait…maybe. That sounds familiar. Yes, I did.” The truth? No idea.
Any thing that crosses my path goes in the washer and dryer, including cash, tissues, my iPod, and this wool sweater that is now keeping Phoebe’s American Girl Doll nice and toasty.

While I have never been the most organized mom on the block, my current inability to retain basic info has forced me to rely on responsible (and nonjudgmental) friends. I’m the one in blue:

So when drugs are not an option, the only thing left is to examine one’s habits, which is annoying, because I have a lot of bad habits. But for the sake of this blog, let’s stick with two: Bedtime Ritual and Racing Thoughts.

Bedtime Ritual Every parenting book has a section on the importance for bedtime rituals for children: no screens, calming activities, limit sugar, keep the actual “time” consistent, etc. It dawned on me that while I am the Sleep Warden with my kids, I am a rebellious teen with my own sleep hygiene.

The biggest offender is late night computer use. The kids will be in bed, I will be cleaning up the kitchen and feeling exhausted. Ok good, I think to myself, I am on the right track. Just finish loading the dishwasher and then I’m getting in bed. But then….something happens. Suddenly there is a piece of information I simply must have before I can possibly go to sleep, some ridiculous, non-essential tidbit that will then open the Pandora’s Box of nonlinear Google searches.

For example: “How EXACTLY did Yolanda from Real Housewives of Beverly Hills get Lyme’s Disease” leads to…..

Research on the 47 species of ticks in California
Real estate listings in Malibu
The distance from Malibu to Joshua Tree
The inspiration behind the U2 album Joshua Tree
Is Bono’s real name Bono? (it’s Paul).

When I am satisfied with my groundbreaking findings, I’m all revved up by the evil blue light of the computer and I start vacuuming. One night Emma had gotten up to go the bathroom, and came downstairs: “Mom? Do normal mothers vacuum at midnight?”

I gave her a look that said, what makes you think I know anything about normal? Then I took her back to bed. As I was leaving her room, I saw this book sitting on her dresser.

It’s a journal Emma and I write in together a few nights a week as part of her bedtime routine. I grabbed it before closing the door, and sat on the stairs reading our entries. This one hit me….

….which brings us to

Racing Thoughts Little kids resist bedtime because they are scared of: monsters under the bed, the dark, bad dreams. I resist bedtime because I am scared of: moving, leaving our friends, the ocean, this house that I love, of the kids adjusting to a new school, are they going to need therapy, should we buy them a dog, should we join the Y, I forgot to order Emma’s uniforms…blah blah blah.

So, if my issues are not all that different from a kid’s issues, why not treat it the same way? This week I created my own firmly enforced bedtime ritual:

No computer after 8:30 PM
In bed by 10 PM
Read a novel. (No self-help)
Create a mantra: It’s going to be ok. None of this is happening right now. It’s going to be ok.
And the most important piece of changing one’s habits: Accountability.

That’s right. 14 days of good bedtime behavior and mama gets a new pair of jeans.

If none of this works, there’s always the Ambien my mother-in-law slipped in my hand during our last visit, you know, “just in case.”

Just in case I want to go streaking while riding a purple unicorn that smokes cigars.

Time will tell.

The Selfie Experiment: #BeautyIs

Posted on January 30, 2014 by jessiepbraun

A few days ago, I saw this video posted on the Facebook page of a friend and Philly photographer. Watch it. It is 7 minutes well spent.

Selfie, directed by Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker Cynthia Wade, reveals how we have the power to redefine what is beautiful in all of us. The video is part of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty.

To say it made me think is an understatement.

Ironically, before watching it I had been giving Phil the hard sell as to why I needed eyelash extensions: to distract from my “accordion eyes and Grinch-like face.” Emma and Phoebe were not in the room, but we all know that doesn’t matter. They hear everything.

Typically, I try to be vigilant about this kind of negative self talk around my daughters, because I know it sticks. Phil and I consider “fat” and “diet” dirty words. My sister and I still tease my mom for saying repeatedly: “My sisters were very petite but I was born a size ___.” A size (for what it’s worth) that she has yet to reach.

I remember what happened the first time I watched one of the Dove commercials:

It was 2006, and I was sitting on my couch watching the Super Bowl. When that commercial aired, I cried. Not misty-eyed, not weepy – I am talking full on sobbing. Emma was 9 months old at the time, and the thought of her believing she was anything less than exquisite just destroyed me.

But that’s not why I was crying.

I was crying because, at age 29, thoughts of self-loathing ran through my mind 24/7. I starved myself to get that baby weight off. Starved. And still, It was never enough. I was never enough. How am I going to teach Emma to love herself? I don’t even know what that means!

Well, I had to learn. And I’ve come a long way, Baby.

But, maybe not far enough.

Perhaps it’s because it’s the dead of winter, or because I haven’t been going to yoga, or getting enough sleep. Maybe it’s my new uniform of a grocery store sweatshirt and snowflake-reindeer leggings that has taken a toll on my self-esteem. Whatever the case, there has been a whole lot of negative self talk rattling around in my head:

My butt jiggles when I walk. If my left boob hung any lower I would trip over it. How is it possible to have zits and wrinkles simultaneously?

I asked Phil, “Do I put myself down…out loud?”

He paused. “Well… it’s not like you come out and say, I’m a hideous beast! But you do tend to make these odd comparisons that are not exactly self-affirming.”

“I do? Like what?”

“When we are going out, you will say something bizarre like:

Do I look like the last clown in a clown car?

Do I look like a bell boy?

Do I look like a greeter at Walmart?

Do I look like a Wookie?

Do I look like a hostile transvestite?

“Huh. Yeah, I guess I do say those things.”

When I “poke fun at myself,” I tell myself that I am being funny. But even seemingly harmless self-deprecation carries the unmistakable tinge of truth. The truth that I am not good enough, exactly as I am. Even in reindeer leggings.

A teenage girl in Selfie says:

I think my mom’s insecurities affect me a lot. When you hear her talk about her insecurities, you start to think about your own.

I asked Emma why she stopped smiling with her lips apart.

“Because I hate my teeth. So I stand in front of the mirror and practice smiling with my mouth closed.”

Crap.

She’s 7.

So, we watched Selfie together. As the credits rolled Emma said, “Wow, that made me kind of sad at first, but then the end made me smile. That’s a cool experiment.”

“Do you want to try it?”

She raised one eyebrow. “What, like just you and me? Take selfies?”

“Yeah, why not?”

“Uhh, because you hate getting your picture taken. Do you even know how to take a selfie?”

“I think I can figure it out.”

She didn’t look convinced. “Ok…”

She wasn’t wrong to be skeptical. Let’s just say I don’t love being photographed. When I go to take a picture with my phone and accidentally press that reverse-selfie button, I scream like I am being stabbed. Every. Single. Time.

In Selfie, the photographer says:

Your mom can redefine beauty, just like you can.

Redefining beauty through selfies? I wasn’t convinced. But, hey, I also compare myself to Chewbacca, so…..yeah.

Taking a selfie did not feel natural nor intuitive. It made me feel like Justin Bieber. But printing and actually looking at the selfie – now that was an eye-opener.

How often do you really look at your own face? And no, I don’t mean in that special makeup mirror that magnifies your pores 5,000 times. I mean, really look. Like the way you look at your child’s face when she is asleep, and think, Really? How perfect is that little face?

Once I got over that initial GADZOOKS! response of seeing my own reflection, I started to really see. Not beyond my usual list of imperfections, but beneath them, like the way I look at a painting in a museum. Instead of noticing flaws and labeling them as “wrong”, I just….noticed. I asked:

Who is this person? What is her story? What is going on behind those eyes?

I wasn’t a total purist – we had fun with filters and photo apps.

Why not? Just like fake eyelashes, hair color or smokey eye makeup, it’s fun to play dress up…to explore…to try on different disguises. When I was a teenager, we did it with Manic Panic and black eyeliner. Now they have an app for that. Blue hair that you don’t have to grow out! Genius. In fact, we got so caught up in the possibilities that Emma forgot to hide her teeth.

Really? How perfect is that little face?

But despite all the options for brightening or blurring or bronzing, it was this makeup-less, filterless, early morning selfie that changed how I see myself:

When I look at this photo, I see a mom, a wife, a friend, a daughter, a sister, an artist, a seeker. I see a good person who is earnest and kind and loving. I see lines that come from laughing and worrying…and from a few years of maybe not taking the best care of myself. I see eyes that have seen a few ~~thousand~~ sleepless nights nursing a baby or changing pukey sheets. I see a face that is grateful to be needed, to be loved, to have finally found a place to belong in this world, and that place is right here, right now. I see sweetness in this face. I see peace. I see someone who does her best everyday to become a little bit more of who she truly is.

And that, dare I say it, is beautiful.

That’s a cop out, right?

Ok…

I am beautiful.

Now you try.

You Don’t Know Until You Know

Posted on January 23, 2014 by jessiepbraun

Last week I waxed philosophical about creating an attitude of abundance. Abundance is what I was after, and abundance is what I got. And then some.

After I posted last week’s blog, a tsunami of emotions came flooding in. I felt too full: of feelings, of information, and to-do lists. I felt like Knuffle Bunny on the spin cycle.

Emma was ~~getting pummeled by~~ riding the same emotional wave. When she came downstairs in the morning, I had to guess the Mystery Mood: excited, sad, annoyed, bitchy, sweet, angry-cat-that-hisses….it was a real mixed bag.

Over the weekend, our friend Todd, (aka. Todd-the-Bod for his muscular physique) came for a visit. Todd is one of our closest friends from Philly and he is about as lovable as they come. Picture a giant teddy bear with enormous biceps and expensive hair product who laughs at all your jokes and calls you “sweetie” and basically makes you feel amazing and beautiful. That’s Todd-the-Bod.

Oh, and he plays with your kids like the Super Nanny on meth. He is every kid’s dream visitor. Emma loves Todd-the-Bod.

I did not tell Emma that Todd was visiting because he recently separated from his wife. Because, she’s 7……right?

Despite Todd’s piggy back rides and scavenger hunt, Emma, in her current state of Knuffle-Bunny-on-the-spin-cycle, was unhappy with the amount of “adult talk” going on in the kitchen that was taking up her quality time with Mr. Todd-the-Bod.

She protested by not going to bed. Up, down, up, down, up down. “MOOOOMM!” Rub my back. I need water. My shirt is making me hot. My pajama tag is itchy. I am ready just to strip her naked and call it a night when she says: “Is there something going on you’re not telling me?”

My heart dropped. “What do you mean?”

Her blue eyes met mine in such a penetrating stare I almost stopped breathing. “Where’s Mrs. Todd-the-Bod?”

Oye.

“Well, you know how _____’s parents aren’t together anymore?”

“You mean….Mr. and Mrs. Todd-the-Bod are getting….a DIVORCE?”

“Yes. But he’s doing ok. He’s just a little sad. Being with Dad is helping him, I think.”

Then, the tears. She wailed, “Why didn’t you TELL ME!? Now I feel like such a JERK!”

“Huh? Why??”

“Because I would have been so much NICER to him! I wouldn’t have STALKED him to PLAY like a HONEYBADGER!”

“Oh Em,” I sighed. Then a quote from Maya Angelou popped into my head:

Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.

“Hey, Em, you didn’t know. But now you do know, ok?”

She sniffled. “Ok. Leave the light on – I might draw a picture for Mr. Todd the Bod, ok?”

Hours later I went up to check on her. Emma was sprawled across the bed, lights still on, and there were drops of green liquid on the floor. Is this paint? What the hell?

Then I saw this on her desk:

If I thought I had an abundance of emotion before…holy shit. Wow. Empathy. Compassion. She gets it. They should put this in the baby book: First Tooth, First Step, First Undirected Act of Empathy. I was a proud momma.

I snuck it down to show Todd and his eyes got misty: “How did she know?”

“Know what?”

“That Sunflowers is my favorite painting. I stood in the Van Gogh museum for hours looking at it.”

That gave me goosebumps.

Many St. Germaine cocktails later, the weekend came to a close, Todd-the-Bod returned to Philly, and my steady state of feeling overwhelmed returned. As I drove to Phoebe’s parent-teacher conference, I jotted things down on the back of a Starbucks napkin at red lights: Call pediatrician/find new pediatrician. Cancel paper. Call the vet to pick up Ellie’s ashes. Then I started crying. I can’t believe Ellie is ashes. Oh no, God, please don’t let me cry in a conference ~~again.~~ Help me not be a hot mess. Everything is hitting me at once and I am starting to unravel.

The teachers were running behind, so I sat down at a kiddie desk. Another mom -we did not know each other – was also waiting and we started to chat. We did the basic mom intro: Who’s your kid, do you work, yada yada yada. I mentioned that we were moving to PA in a few weeks.

“Oh wow!” she said. “You have a lot going on.”

“Yeah….it’s good….but kind of overwhelming. My mind just keeps running like a ticker tape, you know ticker-ticker-ticker all day long.”

Stop talking, Jessie. Find your filter.

I reeled myself in and we kept chatting. We had some things in common: I freelance write, she is an editor. She has worked for a non-profit, I once volunteered at a grief center.

She paused, then said: “What made you get involved in the grief world?”

“I don’t know, I was just drawn to it.”

“It’s just interesting you bring it up,” she said. “because I had a son that died of a brain tumor eight years ago. He was 3.”

“Oh my God. I am so sorry.”

And I’m telling this women how overwhelmed I am. I’m such an asshole.

“Thanks. People ask me all the time how I got through, and I don’t know, I just did. I mean, what choice to you have?”

I just nodded, tears for this nameless woman pooling behind my eyes.

“But you do the best you can, right? Life is crazy. And now we are in the process of adopting a baby boy, so it just gets crazier!”

And I’m the one who is overwhelmed. I’m such an asshole.

The door to the classroom opened. It was time for her conference. We finally exchanged names, and clasped hands for a moment before she turned to go.

“Hey, best of luck with everything,” I said. She winked and closed the door.

I sat there alone for a moment, stunned but her story and horrified by my own self-centeredness. God, why am I such an asshole?

Then I thought about Emma’s sunflowers…about her lambasting herself and the advice I gave her, and now here I was, wedged into a child sized-chair doing the same exact thing. Anne Lamott wrote:

I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox, full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools – friendships, prayers, conscience, honesty – and said, Do the best you can with these, they will have to do. And mostly, against all odds, they’re enough.

I believe that God had me cross paths with this woman, but not so I could scream “ASSHOLE!” while I jab my eyes out with a pencil. I think His intention was to open my eyes a little wider, to see a littler farther, beyond myself and my own stresses. I think He says what any loving parent would say: “Hey, relax. You didn’t know. Now you know. And now you can do better.”

Some of my stresses are still real and significant. But when I open my eyes a little wider, I see that they are not that significant. And some are not actually real at all. And then I can breathe again.

Eyes wide open.

My Dog Is Dead and We’re Moving: How to Choose an Attitude of Abundance

Posted on January 16, 2014 by jessiepbraun

“My dog is dead and we’re moving.”

This was how Emma greeted her bus stop pals on the first day back to school in 2014. Happy New Year!

But that’s my firstborn. In all of her 7.5 years, she has never been one to sugar coat things, and she tells the truth. The whole truth and nothing but, whether you’ve had your coffee yet or not. So put on your helmet.

Our dog is dead, as you already know, and yes – we are moving. AGAIN. When I told my friend Kathy she said, “You move more than an army wife.” Yes, except we are not nobly sacrificing ourselves for the good of this country, nor is Phil out in the trenches fighting for freedom and justice for all. He is fighting to make “validation sexy.”

But hey, if he didn’t, who would?

Alas, it is a position within his current company that sends us back to our beloved Philadelphia – 18 months, 2 rentals, and 1 house purchase later.

This was a bit shocking at first. We have only been in this house for six months.

I’m still unpacking from the last move. It was only a month ago that I got one of those silverware drawer organizers at Bed Bath and Beyond. Opening that drawer gave me such pride in my attempt at organization. But now, as I reach for a fork – destined to be thrown back in a moving box – I think, I can’t believe I actually used a tape measure for this shit.

I am not going to lie, I spent a day ~~or three~~ in my snowman pajamas. I wondered if Phil had unconsciously manifested this re-re-location by never changing our license plates.

I just felt so…..torn. Sure, there are many benefits to moving back to Philadelphia: family, old friends, the Phillies, WaWa….

God I do miss WaWa.

But, even a 24 hour store that has everything from Midol to mac-n-cheese cannot compare to this:

Yet compare is what I continued to do.

In high school, I had a friend who was trying to decide between two colleges: Tulane and JMU. They were both great schools and she was having a hard time choosing, so she made a comparison chart. I only remember the first bullet point:

Tulane: Smelly

JMU: Not Smelly

She went to JMU.

I began to notice that both Phil and I were taking the Smelly-Not Smelly approach in order to feel better about our decision. For example:

Boston: Crazy Cold

Philly: Normal Cold

Boston: Lobster Rolls (no thanks)

Philly: Soft Pretzels (yes please)

One night over a ~~bottle~~ glass of wine, a rapid-fire compare and contrast ensued: Boston doesn’t have a Liberty Bell! The ocean is too cold in the winter! It’s a 30 minute drive to Target! I hate clam chowder!

Our Bash Boston list became increasingly more shallow and sophomoric, yet the negative energy ~~and booze~~ continued to fuel our bad behavior. We finally hit bottom when Phil said, “The women at Lululemon in Philly are hotter than the women at Lululemon in Boston.”

Oh, Phil. That’s just weird. Way to ruin the game.

With the Bashing Phase over, I moved into the Avoidance Stage. I stopped going for runs along the rocky cliffs. I drove circuitously in order to avoid the scenic route through the harbor, where, on a clear day, the sun reflects off the water and the lighthouse stands proud in the distance.

The Avoidance Stage came to a reluctant end when I ran out of episodes of The Real Housewives of Anywhere. I had no where left to hide. Now I had to actually let myself think and feel again (dammit!) and ask myself, Ok, what is going on, here?

I was scared. Scared of feeling sad. Scared of missing this truly magical place and the people in it. Scared of never being as happy as we have been here.

Then I read this line in a daily reflection book by Julia Cameron:

Life is what you make it.

Our life here in Scituate has been awesome and abundant because we decided it was going to be awesome and abundant. When Phil’s work brought us to New England, we literally picked a town off the map of MA and said, “This feels right -let’s try here.” This was huge for us, having always lived near family and in familiar places. Sure, there was some lonely moments, but we dedicated ourselves to believing our own bullshit: “This is going to be GREAT. This is going to be the best thing we’ve done YET. We are going to meet some amazing people.”

And you know what? It was. And we did.

But this move back home to Pennsylvania holds the same possibility of abundance and awesomeness – if we choose to invite it in.

Emma said at bedtime, “What if I don’t make any friends?”

“That’s impossible,” I said.

“How is it impossible?”

“Everywhere you have ever gone, you have made friends. You made friends in the sandbox, at the playground, on the beach, in school. You make friends because you love people. So all evidence supports you making friends again in Pennsylvania.”

She seemed to accept this as plausible. I think because I used the word evidence.

Acknowledging the good you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. -Eckhart Tolle

Life is so good right now. And there was a time where I might have said, “Well, this is as good as it’s gonna get. I’ve filled my happiness quota. It’s all downhill from here.”

But this line of thinking made me a miserable f***k.

So I’m adopting an attitude of abundance. Instead of assuming every blessing will be my last, I will assume there are an infinite amount still waiting for me…for us.

I am still sad to leave.

But I am even happier to have been here.

What We Can Learn From Newlyweds

Posted on January 9, 2014 by jessiepbraun

Last weekend my niece Nora got married.

When I first thought about writing about her wedding, my working title was something like “Advice to Nora on Her Wedding Day.”

But then I looked at her face in this photo, and decided: Yeah, looks like she’s doing ok. Pretty sure she doesn’t need any advice from me.

In fact….I have a sneaking suspicion it might be the other way around.

Any marital advice I would give – while perhaps true and hard-earned – would be a real buzz kill. I remember when my dad used to wax philosophical on marriage to my sister and I at the dinner table.

“Girls,” he would begin, in-between bites of Shake n’ Bake chicken, “the key to a lasting marriage is COMMITMENT. CO-MMIT-MENT.” Because sounding out words to teenagers really brings your point home.

Phil and I are married 10 years this July.

We are definitely committed. In fact, at one point I actually was committed. (Well, not exactly committed – it was self elected – but still. It was a facility.)

Phil and I work hard at our marriage, because we like to work, and we like things to be hard. I blame our collective German, Irish, and Catholic lineage for the fact that we feel the need to suffer for happiness. If we are not digging deep into our “shame barriers” or “upper limit problems,” we are clearly being complacent, and need to spice things up by throwing in some conflict. Gotta keep all the tools in our therapeutic tool box nice and sharp.

And, in fairness to us, I believe there is value in this level of dedication. We have seen a marriage counselor – we will call him George – on and off for years. Frankly I am in awe of how couples make it without a George. He has given us a whole new language with which to communicate. With frightening regularity, we say things like: “Is this really about me, or is this actually about a primal unmet intimacy need?”

Because healing your childhood wounds is hot. Hot like a hemorrhoid.

At the wedding cocktail hour, I gave Nora and big hug, and said, “Wow. You look beautiful….and really happy.”

“Oh my gosh,” she said, her face flushed with excitement. “I AM SO happy. Dan is such a great guy. I just feel so lucky.”

As she moved through the crowd to greet her guests, I thought about the perfect simplicity of Nora’s words.

In her book Marriage Rules, Harriet Lerner describes young love as the Velcro Stage:

In the Velcro Stage, we automatically focus on the positive. We know how to make our partner feel loved and valued and chosen. We may find our differences interesting and exciting, and overlook the negative.

Life is hard. There will always be reasons to have conflict, whether it be illness, death, financial ruin, or a spray of pee on the flipped-up toilet seat. There will always be something wrong with our spouse (and us), because we are not perfect people. If it’s the flaws we are looking for, it’s the flaws we will find.

But Nora reminded me that if I look for reasons to feel lucky, I will find those, too.

So in the spirit of feeling lucky in love in 2014, Phil and I each composed a list entitled “Top 10 Things I Love About You.”

Reading the list made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, and Phil of course sobbed like a schoolboy (see #2). I highly recommend writing a list for your spouse/significant other. Don’t even tell him/her that you’re doing it. Just write it in an email, on a post-it note, on your hand, wherever. Just get started. It will put some pep in your step, and in your partner’s as well.

Life is difficult enough without looking for more reasons to be pissed off. Instead of trying to fix what is wrong (which makes you feel heavy) young love reminds us to see what is right (which makes you feel light).

In 2014, choose to feel light.

Faith

Posted on January 2, 2014 by jessiepbraun

I feel like I am torturing you guys with my tear-jerker dog stories. But, every story has an ending. I feel I owe it to you – and Ellie – to share the end of her story.

After a few days of watching Ellie decline, Phil and I decided it was time to end our dog’s life. We called the vet and made “the appointment” for the Friday after Christmas. Phil and I took turns being the one that freaks out and the one who says, “We just need to have faith that we are doing the right thing.”

But what does even mean?

Anne Lamott says that the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. I find this comforting, because the older I get, the less certain I am about anything.

On that Friday morning, I stood in the shower until the water ran cold. I prayed, Please tell me this is the right thing. Please tell me this is the right thing. This is the right thing….right? Can you send me a sign?

I have a deep but amnestic faith in God. My signature prayer, the one I say every morning, is one of the ADD variety: Good morning G-Money. Please help me find you today, and then please remind me to look, or that I even asked you in the first place. Amen.

We declared Friday a “lump day,” a day spent lying on the couch like a lump. Ellie, who in 9 years was never allowed on the furniture, got the best spot.

Phil and I picked Ellie out together, and we needed to say goodbye to her together. Me, Phil, and our friend Jameson.

The walk into the animal hospital was surreal, Ellie still half-heartedly sniffing the grass as she stopped for a final pit stop. Despite the vet’s reassurances, my silent prayer for help played on a continuous loop in my mind: Please tell me this is the right thing. Give me a sign that we are doing the right thing.

And then something weird happened.

Ellie was really Phil’s dog. He is the master, the alpha-male. As females, there was always a low level of competition between Ellie and I….a desire for Phil’s attention, I guess. When Phil would travel for work, Ellie would get pissed, and let me know by eating garbage, specifically tampons. There has to be some symbolism to the tampons, right?

Anyway.

But as we sat down next to her on the floor of the vet’s office, she rested her head in my lap. Not Phil’s, mine. She looked up at me with those big, pooly brown eyes and with them said to me, “I need you right now. Not as a substitute for Phil; you. I need you here right now, holding my face. And please don’t look away. I need you to not look away.”

Maybe it was the whiskey talking, but I was pretty certain that was my sign.

The doctor talked us through the process as she injected the medication. I held Ellie’s face and she stared into my eyes with a look of pure trust – so intimate that it almost became too much for me, and I was tempted to look away. But I willed myself to hang in there. Within what was probably a split-second – but seemed so much longer, as if in slow motion – I went from looking deep into her brown eyes to suddenly seeing my own face reflected in them. And I knew that was it. She wasn’t seeing me anymore. She wasn’t there. As the deluge of tears ran down my face, I tried to picture her soul rising up and running….running like she used to, chasing a skunk like a bat out of hell.

Why did she come to me? In The Art of Racing in the Rain, the protagonist -a dog named Enzo – says: “There are things that only dogs and women understand because we tap into pain directly from its source.” Maybe that was why.

Or maybe she chose me because she knew I needed it. I needed her to forgive me for flipping out about the tampons. I needed her to know that I loved her. I needed her to tell me that she was going to be ok. And she did.

The next morning, after reading the book Dog Heaven with the girls for the 58th time, we decided to draw our own versions of Dog Heaven.

When we asked Phoebe to describe her picture, she explained: “Well, that’s me and Ellie surfing, and over there is Nannie and Aunt Terry having cocktails.” Of course.

Emma’s spoke for itself:

Much of the research I found says you should be 100% honest with your kids about death; that any watered down version is to rob them of the death experience. Maybe. But my gut feeling was that to describe euthanasia and cremation to my young children would be to rob them of something…of their sense of wonder, of their version of faith and God. Maybe I will regret that decision one day, but right now I have to have faith that it was the right one for us.

John Lennon said: “I believe in everything until it is disproved. So I believe in fairies, myths, and dragons. It all exists, even if it’s in your mind.”

So if my kids want to put their faith in a dog heaven where cocktails are served and doggie treats fall from the sky into the peanut butter river, who am I to say that it doesn’t exist?

Five days later, I am still seeing Ellie out of the corner of my eye. When I walk on the beach, I think every dog is her. When I slice an apple, I wait for her to come running for her share. Then I remember. And the sadness is crushing.

But then I think about her running through grassy fields to the peanut butter river, and I smile.

Waiting

Posted on December 19, 2013 by jessiepbraun

In this season of Advent, I have been thinking a lot about waiting.

I am not a huge fan.

In fact, I hate to wait. I am impulsive and impatient. I make hasty decisions, especially when I am tired and my brain is too full.

I can be ungenerous with those who do not seem to be keeping a proper pace, a quality for which Phil is certain I will burn in Hell. I told him to go grocery shopping at the same exact time as every senior citizen in town, and then we can talk about Hell.

I hate to be late yet I always am – maybe because I fight time rather than move with it.

My impatience – along with my big ears and fear of clowns – has been passed down to Emma. She came into the world exactly on her due date, waiting to be born. Ready to get on with it. Ready to crawl, to walk, to talk, to run.

Ready to go to school: “No kisses at the door, Mom.”

Ready to walk to the bus stop alone: “Stop lurking in the driveway, Mom.”

She wants to know when: When can I get my ears pierced? When can I ride my bike alone? When are we leaving? When will we get there? She is fully dressed – hat, boots, and backpack – by 7:43. The bus comes at 8:35.

Phil and Phoebe don’t mind waiting. In fact, if they wait long enough, they might forget what they are waiting for and move on to something else. Emma and I call it PST: Phil & Phoebe Standard Time. I spend a lot of time waiting at the door with Phil’s keys, his phone, his wallet. Emma spends a lot of time waiting in the car. She hides books between the seats.

But out of all of us, our dog Ellie waits the most. She waits to be fed, to be walked, to have her belly rubbed. She waits by the door when she hears Phil’s car in the driveway; she waits under the dinner table for Phoebe’s first fish stick to drop. She lets everyone else go first while she patiently waits.

And now, she is waiting to die.

In a theology class, I remember learning about the two types of time: chronos and kairos. Chronos is clock time, the time we live in. It is chronological, measurable, predictable. It makes sense. Bus comes at 8:35. Karate is on Tuesdays. Sun rises at 7:07.

The Greek word kairos means “God’s time” or “the right moment.” It is elusive and mysterious. You can’t predict or control it – you have to feel it. Nine years ago, Phil planned to propose to me on the beach at sunset. Instead he dropped to one knee in my parents’ garage as I reached into the fridge for a Coors Light. Why? “It just felt right.” Oh, Phil. You just wanted that Coors Light.

Henri Nouwen writes, “Fearful people have a hard time waiting.”

That sounds about right. I am terrified. I am afraid that Ellie is suffering. I am afraid she is going to fall down the steps or slip on the ice. But really…I am afraid of what’s to come. Of how bad it’s going to get. “Anywhere from a few weeks to a few months,” is what the vet said. It is one month today. 30 days. Chronos.

But right now there are still moments when I can forget. I scratch her ears, she thumps her tail, and I forget that her bones are being eaten away. I forget that her shoulders are disintegrating as we sit by the fire, with Phoebe deejaying on Pandora like any other day. Kairos.

But when will it become impossible to forget? We had to put baby gates by the stairs. Last week she cried when she tried to scratch her ears. Yesterday she had a hard time breathing. What’s next? Will she stop walking? Pee in the house? Stop eating? When? Tomorrow, next week, next month? How will I know when it’s time to let her go?

“You will just know,” they say. “She will tell you when it’s time.”

Huh? What does that mean? How will she tell me? And I never “just know” anything, ever. My sister-in-law had to tell me to go to the hospital when I was in labor because I thought I just needed to poop.

My friend Priya, who has known me and my specific brand of crazy for 30+ years, broke it down for me: “If you are questioning it, you’re not there yet.”

Ok. That, I get.

I want a chronos answer to a kairos question. But we are not waiting for the bus, here. I am being called to a deeper waiting. Nouwen calls it “active waiting.”

Active waiting means to be present fully to the moment, in the conviction that something is happening where you are and that you want to be present to it. Our waiting is always shaped by alertness to the world.

Waiting actively changes what I see, what I notice. When I wait fearfully, I hear Ellie’s labored breathing and think, Should I call the vet tomorrow? When I wait actively, I notice how she lays her paw on my wrist, and I think, We are holding hands.

Chronos vs. Kairos. There is nothing the vet can tell me that I don’t already know. All there is to do is wait. Do I wait in fear or do I wait in love?

John Grogan writes: “Such short lives our pets have to spend with us, and they spend most of it waiting for us to come home each day.”

Ellie has spent most of her life waiting patiently. But this time she is the one who will go first. And while she waits, we will wait with her. Lovingly, reverently, gratefully, until she tells us it is time. Kairos.

Olaf and the Quest for True Love

Posted on December 12, 2013 by jessiepbraun

I will do almost anything for my kids. But I won’t do The Elf on the Shelf.

Disclaimer: To all the Elf-hiding moms out there, don’t freak out. I am not making a political statement or embarking on an anti-Elf crusade.

I am scared of the Elf. I trace it back to the only Twilight Zone episode I ever watched involving a ventriloquist and a sadistic dummy that comes to life.

I’ve never fully recovered.

Among other commonalities, Emma shares my fear of the Elf. We also take issue with:

Clowns…

…mimes…

…porcelin dolls…

…and claymation. Don’t even get me started on claymation.

Basically anything fitting one or more of these descriptions is off limits:

Anything that looks fake but at the same time freakishly real
Anything that is smiling at you but in a way that says “I want to kill you.”
Anything that wears sad/angry makeup but is intended to make you happy
Anything that pretends to be voiceless and trapped in an imaginary box.

All of these things just seem to be invented with the sole purpose of fucking with your emotions and making you feel slightly schizophrenic. And I don’t need any help in that area. I am all set.

Anyway.

We recently took the girls to see the new Disney flick Frozen.

In the movie is an adorable snowman character named Olaf. As I sat in the darkened theater, listening to the girls belly laugh at his sweet antics, I thought I love this little snowman. I want to put him in a snowglobe and put him on my shelf.

Eureka!

On the drive home, I turned to the girls and said, “I have an awesome idea. Instead of the Elf, we should have…”

“…an Olaf on the Shelf,” finished Emma. Our telepathic connection is both fascinating and frightening.

Olaf’s role in the movie is the funny, lovable sidekick. He “likes warm hugs,” and defines true love as “putting someone’s needs before your own.” So, our Olaf on the Shelf is on the lookout for Acts of True Love.

When I think of the words “true love,” I think of my two girls.

I will do pretty much anything for them: Get intimate with their poop, puke, and boogers, paint daisies on their microscopic fingernails, and subject myself to a quiz entitled “What Color Are Your Feelings Today?” on the American Girl Doll website. I will make sure the peas don’t touch the chicken nuggets on their compartmentalized plates, I will play in the snow even though I hate the cold, and I will listen to the Annie soundtrack for the 3,000,000th time without singing a word because it pisses Phoebe off.

Stage-hog.

But that’s a mother’s love, a love that is in large part a sacrificial love – to give freely without reservation or expectation.

But what about “true love” in the marital sense – does the same definition apply? Maybe I am still working through my Catholic issues of sin and sacrifice, but…that definition makes me cringe a bit.

For the past eight years, I have been a stay at home mom. I don’t view this as a sacrifice, but as a decision Phil and I made for a variety of reasons. I don’t regret it, but with Phoebe getting ready to go off to kindergarten next year, I feel…uneasy with the role I have created for myself. I wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of my own teeth grinding together. Then I wonder if our dental insurance covers a mouth guard.

I worked before I had kids, but I never had a career. My career has become supporting Phil’s career. And I don’t just mean in the you-make-money-I-clean-bathrooms kind of way. Phil confides in me about his work, and asks me to weigh in. We discuss books likeThe Big Leap by Gay Hendricks, and how Phil can achieve his “Zone of Genius:” that which you are truly called to do.

I thought this dynamic worked for us, until I realized that helping Phil discover his Zone of Genius had become my Zone of Genius…which kind of seems like a waste of a graduate degree.

A close friend asked me, “Let’s say, hypothetically, that Phil never finds his Zone of Genius. Can you still be happy?”

The answer flew out of my mouth before my brain could catch up: “No. I can’t.”

What? Who said that? Is June Cleaver in the house? What the hell?

The Sufi poet Hafiz writes, Both our hearts are meant to sing. Taking care of the people I love does make my heart sing, but I am realizing it can’t be the only thing that makes it sing. Sacrifice is a huge part of any marriage, and of course there will be periods of inequality, the scales tipping one way or another. There will be moments when the other person has a deep need, and in the spirit of true love, you run to meet that need. But a lifetime of sacrificing – without pausing to ask, what do I want? What do I need? – doesn’t make the heart sing. It strangles it.

There’s a reason Meatloaf sang, “I will do anything for love, but I won’t do that.” Because everyone has a “that.” Having a “that” doesn’t make you less of a person, it makes you a person. A whole person. A person with needs and dreams and a Zone of Genius all your own. And as I see it, to entrust these vulnerable parts of yourself to another person is an act of true love. Because while it is wonderful to give, it is just as important to receive. We all deserve the opportunity to do both.

Give someone a chance meet your needs.

Because while I agree with Olaf that it feels great to give a warm hug….

…it feels even better when the other person hugs you back.

No Cigarettes, No Bologna

Because marriage is all about compromise and throwing stuff