Parenting: SOCK THERAPY

My son came home late one day during his first year in high school, paced around the kitchen and started to rant. 

“The Principal really ticked me off! He is so unfair! “ When he sat down in a chair and toed off his shoes he saw his toe poking out of a hole in his sock. He first pulled the hole to cover his toe, but as his rant continued, he began picking and pulling at the hole. 

“I was trying to break up a fight (rip goes the sock) and got sent to the office (rip, riip) with the guys who were fighting (rip) and I got blamed (rip, rip, rip) and we weren’t allowed to explain (two-handed RIIIIP) and I had to apologize (rip, RIIIIIIP) and serve detention (rip, rip, rip, rip), and I’m so mad I want to break something! (RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIPPPP)”

Gitalongs: ANGST REFINED

He came in the front door with a cheery “Hello!” looking spiffy in his business suit. His kids, wife, and I responded in kind. He set his brief case on a chair in the hall and came into the kitchen. In the space of one minute, he crossed the kitchen to his wife at the stove, gave her a noisy kiss, raised the cover on a simmering pot (“Ummm that smells wonderful!”), crossed the kitchen again to kiss me, said “Stay for supper. Be back soon,” and went upstairs.

When he came down 20 minutes later, he was dressed in casuals. We called the kids to dinner and had random conversation with them about the kids’ day at school and my friend's and my work in our gardens. After dinner, the kids were excused to do their homework. My friend said, “Abby and I were talking about all of us taking a trip to the Eastern Shore tomorrow.”

Oh, I'm sorry,” came his response, “but we have other commitments.”

“We do?” she asked, puzzled.

Bread Crumbs: GRIEVING THE LIVING

Christmas, a season that emphasizes family gatherings, may be especially difficult for those who are grieving the living.

My friend, a spiritually grounded apostate, got a letter from her born-again daughter disowning their relationship and forbidding my friend any contact with her or her family of two beloved teenaged grandchildren and her son-in-law.

Another friend lost her son to drugs and yet another grieves loss of contact with highly successful children who have moved far away, make no effort to stay in touch, and chat only briefly when she calls them.

A couple I’ve known since we started raising our kids together nurtures their two adult sons who are marginally making it because of mental health issues.

I myself grieved the end of a marriage – the triple loss of a parenting partner, a once friendly and intimate relationship, and a social role. As in my first friend’s case, divorcees too may lose beloved family members and friends - people who “don’t want to take sides” or don’t know how to handle a “third wheel” in their social scene.

Gitalongs: THE WANTS/NEEDS GAME

We become adults when we finally get it that, once we pubesce, there is no one on the planet whose job it is to meet our “emotional needs” except ourselves. In the first place, there are no such things as emotional “needs”--- “wants”  a-plenty, but no needs. A need is something we cannot remain alive without. The needs list is short: food, water, shelter from prolonged exposure to hostile elements, and sufficient warmth to maintain functional body temperature. We can live without any emotional interactions at all - as hermits and recluses demonstrate - and still enjoy emotions. The only emotion we actually need in order to survive is fear which, in appropriate doses, warns us of real or imagined danger.

It’s okay to have emotional wants. Emotional experience enriches our lives. And it’s okay to ask for help from a friend if we're feeling stymied, lonely, or vulnerable, and want to connect on some emotional level. But when we try to control (expect, demand, and/or manipulate) others to meet our wants by insisting that our wants are needs we are being dishonest and childish - refusing, or somehow unable, to grow up. That is a recipe for frustration because, aside from the protective/instructive aspects of raising kids safely,  the only person one is entitled to control is oneself.  And that effort is challenge enough!

The Wants/Needs Game by Abby Freeborn is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. For permission to use contact randmxcentric@gmail.com

Gitalongs: THE GUNNYSACK AND THE HANG-UP TREE

Some days when we arrive home from work at the same moment, I see my neighbor stop and admire a dogwood tree along the pathway from his car to his door. Some days he just eyes it as he passes, perhaps nods and smiles at it. Other days he appears to examine it for quite a while. On one such day, curiosity got the better of me and I hailed my friend as he was gazing at the tree. My friend half waved and continued to look at the tree. I approached quietly and looked at the tree to see what was so interesting. When my friend finally turned to me, I asked, "What are you seeing that I don't?"

Gitalongs: THE SIX PRIMITIVE EMOTIONS

Let's use use your hand, palm up, to explain the six survival emotions of our primitive brain.


Let your palm represent LOVE –- acceptance, attraction, protectiveness, nurture are a few manifestations of love:
Let your pinkie represent JOY –- confidence, peace, happiness, contentment are manifestations of joy; 
Let your ring finger represent GRIEF –- sadness, loss, emptiness, heartfelt angst, vulnerability;
Let your middle finger represent PAIN –- physical and/or emotional discomfort, feeling vulnerable;
Let your pointer represent FEAR –-  uncertainty, lack of control, vulnerability, fight or flight;
And let your thumb represent ANGER –- hot rage or cold fury, a protective/defensive response to Grief, Pain, or Fear.

Now make a hard fist.