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I Am Doing Today
Last week was brutal. And there was no warning. In fact, I thought that with my birthday, things would be great. I LOVE my birthday. But it somehow set off something in me that sent me on a downward spiral. Maybe it was the realization that I was entering a new decade, and I was doing it without Shawn. Maybe it was being overwhelmed with the many demands of childcare and work that somehow really piled up at that moment. Maybe it was the fact that late at night, I started to feel really, really lonely. Regardless, I hit a bottom like I haven’t hit in a number of months.…
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The Fans in the Stands
“Nice shot Claire!” yelled the man sitting next to me. I barely knew him, but he was a parent of another girl on the basketball team. The shot had actually bounced off the rim of the basketball hoop, but this random father was still yelling encouragement to Claire. She looked in our direction. I gave her a thumbs-up. As I’ve written about before, sports are not my thing. I don’t know the first thing about whether my kid is off-sides or needs to go back and tag first base before running to second. I don’t watch sports and apart from a brief stint as a cheerleader, I don’t play them…
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Who Has a Better Life Than Us?
A few months ago, I remember thinking something like, “I think I’m in such a different place, because I’m not walking around the neighborhood crying anymore.” Well, strike that. Because that’s exactly what I did last weekend. There wasn’t a specific reason why I started walking about the neighborhood. I was overwhelmed by my kids and one of my friends kindly volunteered to take all three of them and I thought, “I gotta get out of my house.” The sun was shining and I decided to take a walk. As I started walking, I thought about my life. I thought about all of the walks I’d taken in my neighborhood…
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40
The first party Shawn threw for me was for my 24th birthday. We’d been dating since the previous fall and it had only taken him a few months to understand the importance I placed on my birthday. As a kid, my mom had always gone all out on our birthdays and I continued to want lots of fun and attention on my birthday. For my birthdays in college I had danced until the wee hours of the morning and really, turning 24 felt like another college birthday. I hadn’t quite yet grown up, even if I did know that I was likely to spend the rest of my life with…
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Tommy’s Birthday
Five years ago, I had a baby in my living room. Oh yes I did. Before you hear the story, I have to tell you this: it was not on purpose. I grew up in Oregon and I enjoy lots of all-natural products but I definitely didn’t want a home birth. But Tommy had other plans. The day started out like any other weekend day with Shawn and I getting two kids fed, dressed and eventually off to the playground. I was so pregnant that I couldn’t tie my own shoes very easily anymore, and we laughed about that. The day continued, and by the early evening when we had…
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Our Trip to the Waterpark
For some reason, my kids’ school decided that this year there would be a mid-winter break in addition to all of the other breaks. Of course, I did basically no planning for it because I am barely managing to keep our regular life going, much less organize some big trip. A little over a week ago, I realized that I had no plans for the kids – not even a day trip. So I went online and looked for something fun for us to do. I found an indoor waterpark with an attached hotel. Lots of my kids’ friends were going somewhere much more exciting – to grandma’s house or…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
