Who Do You Believe You Are?

It’s the beginning of a new year. I always feel a reset happening with the New Year, because it’s a chance to reflect on the last year of your life and decide how it went for you and think about what you might improve on for the New Year.

I know making New Year’s resolutions is kind of cliché, and there are lots of people don’t like making resolutions because they are unrealistic. I guess they are right, it probably isn’t necessary to make New Year’s resolutions. But, I feel like it is necessary to stop and think about your life periodically, what is working and what is not working, and to make adjustments, and the New Year just seems like a natural time to do it.

So, do you make a list like everyone else? You know, lose weight, eat healthy, and exercise more? I’ve done that before, and sometimes I’ve even accomplished a few of them. They are always things I know I need to do better, but I never seem to want to do them. So I psyche myself up at the beginning of the year, and I quit thinking about it a month later!

I read a quote recently which I think it is attributed to Tony Robbins,

“The strongest force in the human personality

is the need to remain consistent

with who we believe we are.” 

Our personality is how we relate to the world, our styles of thinking, our behavior and our emotional responses, how well we adapt to our circumstances, why we behave differently than others in the same situations as well as our consistency in our reactions. Modern psychology has studied why we react the way we do, they argue nature vs nurture, biology vs circumstances, and all the interplay thereof. It’s interesting to read and learn about, but I think people can change a lot about themselves if they are really motivated to do so.

The reason that quote is so interesting to me is it says we are inclined to do what we do based on our view of ourselves!  So, wouldn’t that also mean that if we can alter what we believe about our self, we could change who we are somehow?

If we believe we are not capable of something, we don’t do it, and therefore who we are is someone who doesn’t or can’t do that.  But if we decide we are capable, and act as though we were, we would believe we are capable, and now that is who we are!  We have improved our selves just by deciding that we can and acting as though we can, and now we are.  It’s like wanting something so much that you keep working on it, even though you don’t always succeed, until you achieve it.

Crystal Peak
Mt. Rainier National Park

One example for me is that I started hiking without planning anything. I did know I would need good shoes and I only knew about one trail, and that’s all!  I just started doing it, and I learned more as I went.  I found the Washington Trails Association website which showed me trails and what I needed to take with me to be safe, and I just kept doing it.  Now I am a hiker! It’s part of my identity, and a part that I am really proud of.

Who do you believe you are, and who do you want to believe you are? It’s just a conscious decision to change who you believe you are. For me, I think I am a person who needs everything to be planned. I want things to go a certain way, and if it doesn’t, I am stressed, and I enjoy it less or not at all. The problem with that is that I ruin a lot of things for myself by thinking that it all has to be a certain way.  I think I want to be a person who is ok with whatever happens, and actually enjoys spontaneity!   So, I am making that decision for myself for 2017. I don’t know how I will change that in myself, but I am making a conscious decision to be easier going, less planned, have less expectation and be more spontaneous!  

Happy New Year everyone!

Retirement Interrupted

 

The possibility of raising a grandchild never occurred to me.  At one point in time, 2 of our three adult kids move back in with us, temporarily (not at the same time). It was a little inconvenient at times, and the stay was longer than anticipated occasionally, but we still could do things we wanted to do.

One of our kids is a single parent and was struggling with their own issues. We tried to help in conventional ways, but it was becoming clear that it wasn’t working, and the help they wanted wasn’t something we were willing to do. When they lost their place to live, we convinced them to let our grandchild live with us until they got back on their feet.

We have had our grandson living with us for 7 months now. We enrolled him in school near us and now I make his lunches, help with homework, and wait for the bus every day with the other moms! (Interesting note: the moms are young enough that I could be their mother! Ha!) He has his own room, and my husband and I are his “parents”.  He really is a great kid, very sweet, does well in school, is making friends, and loves to help around the house.  I feel like I am my grandson’s mom, and I have to remind myself that I am not. My husband still gets to be grandpa, and once in a while I feel bad that I don’t get to be grandma anymore. I have to be the person who guides and directs him, make sure everything gets done, make sure he’s eating well, take care of him when he’s sick, monitor school and homework, and discipline issues are usually my responsibility. The additional twist is we have to deal with the parents, and they don’t like each other, so it can be difficult. So far, we have managed well with only a couple of parental meltdowns.

We had to go through parenting classes at one point when this was starting to become an issue, and I heard a lot of statistics about grandparents raising their grandchildren and why.

·         7.8 million children live in households headed by grandparents or other relatives. These households include those both those where the children's parents may or may not be present.

·         2.7 million children (4%) of all U.S. children are being raised in grandfamilies or kinship care situations.

·         Children placed with relatives make up over a quarter (26%) of all children in the foster care system.

·         For every child being raised in the foster care system, nearly 25 are being raised by grandparents or other relatives outside the system.

·         Of the 65 million grandparents in the United States in 2012, 7 million, or 10 percent, lived with at least one grandchild, according to Coresident Grandparents and Their Grandchildren: 2012, a new report released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.

·         Two percent of grandparents who lived with a grandchild were age 30 to 39, while the highest percentage was for those age 50 to 59 (34 percent). Those age 80 and over made up only 4 percent.

U.S. Census Bureau. “Households and Families 2010: U.S. (April 2012)."

Gregory C. Smith, a Kent State University researcher reported that the need for grandparents to step in is frequently the result of the grandchild's parents' substance abuse, death, mental illness, child neglect, or military deployment

Our time now is not our own as we have him to consider. I have to find babysitters, I don’t go on my husband’s business trips anymore, and I don’t go on hikes as much as I used to.  But, when I look at our grandson, I am certain we are doing the right thing. He deserves a stable and happy life where he can just be a kid and not deal with too many adult issues.

Grieving a Beloved Pet

Why does it hurt so much to lose a pet? It really does! It's happened to me twice, and I am still amazed by the bond with our pets! 

When Rick and I first got married, he and my son Corey got a dog. He was a 4 year old chocolate lab named Molson, and of course, I was the one who had to take care of him. I always said that having Molson was like having a teenager who wouldn’t listen to me! He ran off all the time, and he thought everything was a “keep away” game!  When you called him, he would look at you with his ears perked up, and wait for you to try to come get him!  He loved the water, as most labs do, but he would jump in and swim to wherever someone was playing AND he would not come back until he wanted to!  If you didn't pay enough attention to him, he would start barking until you did! It was exasperating!

After we had him for about 6 years, he got cancer. We removed tumors hoping for the best, but they kept returning, so, we had to put him down.  The day we took him to the clinic, he seemed so happy! He was licking our faces with his tail wagging when we were hugging him and saying goodbye. I asked if I could be with him during the injection but that vet said he didn’t think it was a good idea. I didn’t question it, I assumed he knew best.

It came as a complete surprise to me how sad I was to lose Molson. He was so aggravating sometimes, but also he was such a sweet dog who just wanted to play! I think it was the image of him with his tail wagging, and licking our faces before we put him down that made it hard.

It took about 4 years before I got another dog. She was a 7 year old female shepherd lab mix who I named Abbey (after Abbey Road by the Beatles, of course). She was so great with our new little grandsons, never nipping or barking at them. She let them crawl all over her until she got tired of it and then she just got up and walked away! Too my amazement, she didn’t like to run, so we started hiking together. 

When she was 10 years or so, she started showing signs of arthritis and soon she couldn’t jump into the back of my car, or negotiate a lot of climbing on our hikes. Then, about 6 months ago, she would simply collapse on a walk. I took her to see the vet, and he thought it was a low blood sugar issue. We changed her diet, but it would still happen occasionally. 

In June, she started having seizures. We found her outside lying on the driveway one morning after we had let her out to go to the bathroom. She didn’t seem aware. The next day, I came home to find her laying in her own poop and vomit. She was breathing, and her eyes were open, but she didn’t move. I was home alone, so I called my dad to come help me get her to the vet, and when he got there to help me she had another big seizure. We got her in my car, and I took her to the animal hospital. She started moaning really loud in the car and continued at the hospital. They gave her something to calm her, and told me all the tests she would need to figure out what was wrong, and that still it may be so advanced, it wouldn’t help her anyway. So, I said no, I wouldn’t put her through that. I decided to put her down.

The vet asked if I wanted to be there during the procedure, and I said yes. They brought her in, she was calm with her eyes closed but breathing short fast breaths. I whispered in her ear that I loved her and would miss her, and she moaned a little bit like she heard me. The vet said once she gave the injection it would happen fast, so let her know when I was ready. After a few minutes, I thought I was ok and while the vet administered the euthanasia I was talking to her and petting her until she stopped breathing.

Note: I had to take a 2 hour break after writing that last paragraph, which is the point of this post, why does the death of a beloved pet affect us so profoundly?

I think it affected me so much is because she was with me all day.  I had her at home with me, she was my shadow! I took her with me everywhere, or if I couldn’t, never left her for more than 5 hours. I talked to her all day, I lay on the floor with her often, took her on walks or hikes, we were always together. After she was gone, every time I looked in the corner where she used to lay, I was sad. I still won’t give her things away.

When one of our family or friends pass away, of course it affects us, even more than our pets as it should be, but I think because others come in to comfort and grieve with us, it helps. When you lose a pet there are some, usually those who have lost a pet, who express sympathy, and that does help, but it's a different kind of support than you get with the loss of family. After Abbey died, I spent the day in bed crying. It took me a week to want to do anything, and here 6 months later, I cry like a baby just remembering her last moments.

 

One difference that is unique to our pets is we usually have to decide to end their lives. That is tough. We wonder if it’s the right thing. Even when we know it’s the right thing, it still is a decision we have to make but we don’t want to.

I am definitely a “dog person”, so I love the temperament of dogs. All they want to do is be with you, love you, have you love them. They give their love completely and wholeheartedly! It feels like they are the truest friend you have ever had, and that they understand you and will love you forever!

I miss Abbey every day. I may get another dog someday, but not right now. In the meantime, I will just love on everyone else’s dogs!!

Abbey

Sept 2003 to June 2016

In my heart always.