middle age – Kimberly Bryant, MA

To Love Being a Mother: Part One of a Short Series

September 24, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

An anchor that is sustaining me as I begin to walk my life in a new path, a solo path, is that I am not really alone. I am blessed to have three children, and the raising of them made me a woman capable of joy, even now that they’re grown and I am living on my own. Let’s share our stories of joy with each other, whether they come from the crucible of motherhood, or from some other place of deep rooted growth.

I used to think of myself as having “given up” my young adulthood to be a mother. It was a sacrifice, almost a burden. I didn’t get the time that so many of my friends did to work for a while, get some money in the bank, maybe get a down payment for a house saved up.

I looked at it as my lost youth. What I know now is that my children saved the joy from my youth, and they helped me carry it with me as they grew.

I have had to make a major shift lately because if I didn’t, I was going to move into this next phase with a lot of angst and resentment, kicking and screaming. The Empty Nest is a monumental transition. I had to shift or suffer, wasting the next 25 (hopefully) years unable to enjoy and appreciate what life was giving me. I enjoyed a Facetime call with three of my best college friends earlier this week; we suffered the travails of sorority rush when we were just eighteen years old, and now we bemoaned the travails of wherever we are in our motherhood journeys: two empty-nesters (though my house is not actually empty), a mom who has just one senior-in-high-school daughter left at home and can see her freedom beckoning like a fluttering will-o’-the-wisp, and a mom who has seen her eldest through a grueling triple organ transplantation and is now fiercely protecting her younger children from a negligent, violent husband whom she is divorcing. We are all happy about our motherhood and struggling with it in equal measure.

I am changing the way I think: I am glad I started motherhood so young! It means I get to enjoy this new phase while I am hip and (relatively) healthy. And, more significantly, I am owning this thing that people keep telling me, but that I have had a hard time believing: I was a pretty good mother.

Ready Like a Mother

When I became a mom, I had to figure it out. I hadn’t had healthy mothering in my childhood, so my tool box was pretty empty. My mom was debilitated by mental illness and addiction, was damaged by faith and desperately lonely in a house with four other equally lonely humans. I looked to relatives and friends’ moms to help me figure it out. My friend Chellie’s mother, Bea, stood across her kitchen counter and offered sage advice while feeding me scratch-made chocolate cake. Carol Brady, Samantha Stephens, and June Cleaver were role models. When I became a mother, I didn’t have peers to emulate; my best friend and I were the first in our college class to get pregnant. She and I had been roommates and pledge sisters, and we had our first babies just six weeks apart. She was just barely ahead of me on the question train: how to get the baby to latch on, when to add cereal, how to manage tummy aches, and such.

A theme of my motherhood was to protect them by being around just enough: not a helicopter, instead maybe a stealth missile. I wanted to keep them safe while instilling courage, so I instructed them, at ages 4 and 6 to “hold onto my pockets” so that I could carry their baby sister into stores. They never did let go, not once. As they grew older, I didn’t spy, I never did read a journal, though I did go through some drawers. On the night of my eldest’s eighth grade dance, I dropped her off and pretended to drive away, then sneaked back into the cafetorium and hid behind a pillar to watch her have fun with her friends in the dress I’d put the finishing touches on just a few minutes before. In my mind, the dress was my back pocket and I was at that dance with her, still protecting from afar.

Now, I am a grandmother, with a nine-month-old grandson and a twenty-one-month-old granddaughter; they, along with their parents, live with us. I was not ready for this new role, this new identity. Because I started my family so young, I was looking forward to the span during which my own kids were grown and independent, so I could be a little selfish with my time and resources. I thought I could pretend to be ten years younger and travel the world, just being indulgent and drinking pomegranate mimosas. Of course, that’s not how it worked. Honestly, when do our plans ever really go like we thought they would?

On the day my daughter and her partner told us about grandbaby number one, we were sitting at brunch at a local restaurant. I knew something was up and asked my daughter to accompany me to the restroom, where she told me she was pregnant and I slid down the wall and plopped gracelessly on the cold tiled floor (it was a nice restaurant, the floor was clean. Thank goodness we weren’t at a truck stop). After the meal, we continued the conversation at our home, and when they left after a long talk about the impending baby, I just leaned over into my husband’s arms and bawled, “I am not ready to be a grandmother.” “I know,” he sighed, “but are you ready to help your daughter be a good mom?” Of course I am.

The Awesome Power of the Grandmother

I remember the awesome influence of my own grandmothers, especially my grandmother June, whose life was a testament to the beauty of resilience and generosity. She never had a mother of her own, and her father was murdered when she was a young woman, and like me, she had to look around her for women to be role models into motherhood. She taught me about the importance of skin care, and that sitting on the porch watching birds was, in fact, a valuable way to spend time.

Her house was imbued with the magic of hospitality, space to be myself, and a place to imagine: an attic room. The stairs were behind a beautiful oak door, and once climbed, revealed a sublime room with an old iron bed, shelves upon shelves of books, boxes of toys and dress up clothes, and a window seat. This room was where I felt more at peace, more myself, than any place I had encountered. In this room, perched on the window seat, I drew pictures and wrote stories, dressed as a lady, danced, and read books. When I read Little Women for the first time, I recognized Jo’s love for her attic. I had my own attic to love. Almost always, when I was there, my mother was in a completely different town, so the pall of her depression was lifted. My introverted little soul could fly free, all under the gentle and generous eye of my beloved Grandma June.

To become a comparable source of joy and a well of confidence for my grand-kids and, more importantly, their mother, to continue to nurture my relationships with my adult kids who remain single, requires that I look backward into my own child-rearing years. I want to remember, from their births to their graduations and beyond, how I explored the idea of being a good parent as well as how I messed up royally but stayed in the game. I want to acknowledge that I was a good mom, which means I need to figure out how I did it. How I still do it. Because I am definitely not finished being a mom. Nowhere near it.

Lessons from transitioning to being a mother, then to grandmother:

If you’re young, look around for role models and don’t be afraid to ask questions.
If you’re older, look around for younger adults who need mentors. We can be a pretty isolated society. You might have a church single or a teen neighbor who could use a friend who’s got a lot of life experience.
Protect, but don’t rescue. Don’t hover. It’s not good for anyone.
Apologize to your kids when you make a mistake. They’ll remember that as they grow. It teaches them that it’s safe to be imperfect.
Write down or otherwise record the moments when you stumbled to goodness. Too often, we focus on the extremes: the picture-perfect happy, glossy moments, or the times when tragedy happens or fierce disagreements cause heartache. I think that lasting joy is found in the middle, those moments when life is just rolling along and you stumble sometimes but you keep going and growing.
Save some toys for your grandkids.

What wisdom do you have about mothering, or empty-nest transitioning? Share, I’d love to learn from you!

Making My Own Magic: The Healing Power of Imaginative Play

September 10, 2020February 1, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

Many who know me believe my life is magical, that the shadows of my childhood have been banished. And in some ways, they’re right. My adult life has been enchanted: a long marriage to my best companion, glasses of wine, beloved friends, grandbaby toes and giggles under my roof, puppy kisses, wonderful books, all that stuff. My life seems pretty charmed.

It’s got some darkness, too. There’s some Maleficent energy to counteract the Aurora sparkle. All authentically lived lives are that way; anyone who tells you otherwise isn’t living in truth. Sometimes, we’re floating above the trees, but other times we’re mired in the muck of life’s sorrow.

Maybe the most fantastically and imaginatively magical part of my span here on this beautiful orb called Earth has been the fairy element; yes, I have been a fairy, the professional kind who gets paid to don wings and glitter and charm the public. Bruises have been suffered from the weight of wings. Tears of “smile fatigue” have been shed. Knees have suffered from kneeling to the level of a four-year-old’s bright face to hear a sweet whisper.

In the early years of my fae life, I embodied the nymph Nimue in a silver dress that was a replica of Drew Barrymore’s in Ever After and a crown so tall it caught on the tree limbs from which I attempted to enter a fog-laced stage. The actor playing Merlin cackled under his breath as he surreptitiously disentangled me as I sang.

I walked the gravel paths of the Renaissance festival where I worked as two queens of literature and myth: Mab of Celtic lore, and Titania of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Every day, I donned wings and glitter, accessorized with a pouch full of glass stones to give as favors to the small children who timidly approached all day for a little dollop of fairy enchantment. Each morning, I danced with abandon, spinning and skipping to the most delicate and playful music played by flute, cello, and harp; as I twirled, the sun glinted off my shimmery wings, the iridescent cobalt blue silk I wore shifting and changing colors. Those moments of abandon reminded me of being a little girl twirling in my front yard until I was so dizzy I lay down to watch the azure sky spinning above me. You only get those kinds of moments in your adulthood when you decide to stop worrying about being respectable and start allowing joy to inhabit you.

In the Quiet Time, that period when my throat was silenced by a vocal cord injury, I created a fairy persona, Hush, a playful sprite who collected found sparkly things, magpie-like, and spoke only with my hands and face or the musical toots from my little pottery ocarina. Being a fairy, as an adult, gave me a voice and the chance to revisit the little girl who had struggled and been so lonely. Hush, Mab, Titania, and Nimue blessed me with an opportunity, undergirded by the security of knowing I was surrounded by family and friends, to play. It’s like that scene in Stephen Spielberg’s movie Hook when the Lost Boys try to get the adult Peter Pan to cut loose with them: they play, and he just takes a ball to the gut. Once he has been in Neverland long enough, though, and remembers the love of his children back home, he can play. And fly.

Dragons and Time Clocks

About five years ago, I stopped playing. Packed away the costumes that represented characters I had inhabited, stopped auditioning for plays and musicals, just settled down. Settled into the organizational tasks of my job without the relieving balance of fun, whether at work or on my off time. Though these days, I play tag and peekaboo with my grandkids, those games, while special because of the giggles and memories of their baby laughter, don’t stimulate brain and activate my body in a challenging, restorative way.

I went looking for information about adult play, not expecting to find much there. Who, after all, believes that playing is an important part of adult life? It turns out: a lot of people, including mental health professionals.

“Play is being joyfully immersed in the moment, and as adults, we rarely do that.In a way, it is an active form of mindfulness, which is widely recommended and advocates being present and in the moment. Mindfulness has been proven to alleviate anxiety and depression. Studies also suggest that it can help you manage stress better and maintain a healthy weight,” says Catherine Tamis-LeMonda, Professor of Developmental Psychology at New York University.

Not so very long ago, our office (which has undergone major turnover that has rendered the following scenario obsolete) staff kept Nerf guns and tiny catapults at our desks. It was not unusual for spontaneous battles to break out, and wild laughter would fill the empty spaces between desks and meetings as we bonded and decompressed. Our staff felt more like a team back then. Playing in our offices as well as in our personal time helps us to feel better. It keeps us sane and healthy and happy. It helps us to connect in an authentic way with others. Imagination and play defeat the dragons of boredom and isolation, at work and at home.

Once Upon A Time…

I was my own Tinkerbell. Nothing more magical than that. I learned to play, and to fly, and to trust my own inner voice; the restored voice that can sing or speak truth, even when intertwined with the snares and branches of the expectations or foibles of others. I developed the strength and power to face down dragons, the real ones: family trauma, addiction, loss. I’ve lost touch with that power, though.

So here’s my magic spell, distilled from all the little tokens ever given to me by children who believed: don the tulle. Swing the wooden sword. Wear the wings. Write the poem. Find friends who will play and make the magic happen with you. Speak the truth. It’s all love, and that’s what we need most to vanquish the sinister shadows.

What do you do to play?

https://www.nbcnews.com/better/health/adults-need-recess-too-here-s-why-you-should-make-ncna887396

Starting at the End: Owning the Remnant of Our Trauma

August 13, 2020April 17, 2021Kimberly Bryant, Communications

I am really glad to share the words and work of mental health professional and fellow blogger, Hannah Siller. She and I share some common life experiences: traumatic childhoods, addicted parents, fractured sibling relationships. Coming from trauma doesn’t sentence us to sitting in pain, though. There is, in everyone’s story, an opportunity for redemption, for repair, for reclaiming who we are in our very deepest souls. I hope you’ll be encouraged by Hannah’s story:

To start at the beginning is too complex. This isn’t a bedtime story that can begin with a “Once upon a time” and end with an “And they lived happily ever after”. Trauma is messy, living in an abusive and toxic environment is messy. Those who have been allowed to glimpse these less pretty parts of my life often say it would make a great movie or book. I guess in some ways they would be right, but it’s not that simple. To know the past I endured doesn’t get anyone any closer in knowing the me that I am now. For a person that has experienced prolonged types of trauma such as childhood abuse, there is this permanent change that happens. We are our past, but at the same time, we are also our journey to heal. This is a process that is continuous and is lifelong. But if that is the case then where would one consider to be the end of their story? Where would I set the last chapter of a book or the final scene of a movie? Searching for this answer kept me from really telling my story. But then it found me. So instead I’m going to start at the end, or at least what I consider to be the end of my trauma story.

The summer of 2018 was kind of a big-time in my life. I had just graduated with my master’s degree in counseling with an emphasis in trauma and crisis and was figuring out what my next steps would be. A lot of defining moments would come from this summer, but for this entry, we will focus on just one, Jess. Jess had been the daughter of my dad’s girlfriend for a good part of my younger years. The four of us lived together, Jess and I were raised as sisters. Our parents’ relationship was problematic, as they were both drug dealers and users. With a relationship like that comes many issues of violence and potential legal problems. It ended in epic fashion with her mother in jail and my father not. Emotions in both families were high, for obvious reasons, and Jess and I were separated and kept apart, forcibly at times.

Given that this was far before the internet was commonplace and social media was yet to exist, there was little I could do to connect. Once I reached adulthood, even with these means, so much time had passed it was near impossible to even know where to look. But it was Jess, and I had to try. Every few months I would spend a late-night scrolling through Facebook for a lead, occasionally messaging someone who looked similar to her mother or who had her name. For years I did this with no luck. Then on August 19th, 2018, I tried one last time. The next morning, I received a response. After almost 30 years I had found Jess and she was once again in my life.

Our relationship wouldn’t be the forever I had wanted, but that is a story for another time. At the moment I had found a missing piece of my life. It’s impossible to completely explain all of the emotions I experienced during this reunion, but what I can say with certainty is that the experience changed me. Suddenly I found a connection between my past and my present that I never had before. Growing up in an abusive environment like I had, there is this question you tend to ask yourself, who would I be if I had never had to endure such pain? Being around Jess answered that for me. There were these times she would comment “oh that’s my Hannah” as if she almost expected me to do or say exactly what I just did. It would take me by surprise that this person who had been so long removed from my life still knew me so well. Somehow through all of the bad stuff I still at my core retained who I really was. Maybe in a different environment, I would have had more opportunities or chosen a different career path, but as far as the root of my being I was always this person.

I gained closure from this relationship. Jess set straight things about myself and my life that no one else could. She had experienced so much of the same things I did in those early years. She could confirm the memories of events I had and allow me to discuss the pain of these events with complete understanding. But most importantly I found that the love I had carried for her was the same she had carried for me. Through everything, I went through there was one person out there that loved me and thought of me and to whom I was important. By finding Jess I was finally able to find an ending of my trauma story. My past will always have a degree of influence over me but the story and the pain from that part of my life is officially over.

the-importance-of-ending

*Names are modified to protect the identity of the individuals discussed. Please respect the privacy of these individuals and refrain from posting additional information.

* I have worked hard to heal from my past through professional therapy and personal growth. Over the years I have become comfortable enough to start using this story in public speaking events and as a major part of my writing. Writing about personal trauma can be very triggering and is not recommended for those still working through trauma unless instructed to do so by a mental health professional.

About the Author

After pursuing a career as a clinical counselor for at-risk youth, I made the important decision to go back to school. I am currently working towards my Doctorate in psychology, which I hope to find better trauma preventions and PTSD treatments. My spare time is devoted to my business Serene Life Consulting, which provides life coaching, public speaking survives, and is home to home to my blog. Like in all areas of my life, the purpose of my writing is to bring mental health education and an inspirational message to others. My dream is to continue this message throughout my life in everything I do. From teaching to publishing a book to research, I just want to make everything I lived through count.

To check out more of Hannah’s work including Life Coaching Services and her current blogging project “Diary of a Trauma Survivor” see her website:

https://sillercounseling.com/

serenelifeconsulting.com

Into The Storm: A Hurricane Hanna Tale

July 29, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

“Phooey,” I replied as I stood in the torrent. And then I laughed. I laughed out loud and I snapped photos and I dug my bare toes into the wet sand. It was no coincidence that the storm had a feminine name this time and I met Hanna head on and ready to be filled with feminine strength. What I didn’t expect was the joy, the sheer joy that her wind-and-water-dance would engender in me.”

Sometimes the big life lessons, the ones that alter your perception, the ones that are like the tiniest shift in the tube of a kaleidoscope leading to the unfolding of a fresh worldview, happen in unexpected places. Maybe it’s a change of scenery that can knock us out of the stupor of automatic living. That happened to me this week, on the south Texas Gulf Coast. In a hurricane.

My husband and I had this trip planned for about a month. By planned, I mean I had simply booked a bungalow for a week and let a friend who lives in the area know we would be in town. There was no agenda, which is unusual for us. When we travel, we typically have each day scheduled with trips to museums, cathedrals, and theatres; our vacations are never restful. But Covid has forced a new kind of getaway for us, that of little plan, lots of naps. We had been looking forward to the trip, we really needed some quiet time, what with two babies (and their parents) living with us, with bonus grandkids visiting as well. There’s been a lot of joyful noise at our house.

A few days before our scheduled departure, a tropical depression popped up in the Gulf; within a day it had been upgraded to a tropical storm. I contacted our hostess to see if we could delay our trip by a couple of days to give the storm time to play itself out. Unfortunately, the bungalow was booked for check in just a few hours after our check-out. So we loaded up the SUV with a beach umbrella, ice chest, a DVD player and our new boxed set of “The Office,” and headed south. Just a few minutes before we crossed the tall bridge over the bay, my phone buzzed with a weather alert: the storm was now expected to hit landfall as a hurricane. We contemplated turning around and going home, but the bungalow was paid for. On the advice of my local friend, we continued to our destination to assess if it felt safe, with an invitation to hunker down at her heavily fortified hurricane-proof place if needed until the storm passed.

When we arrived, we found a cabin that has stood since the 1940s, its deep pink stucco walls surrounded by live oak trees of such girth that the house is ensconced in a sort of protective shell. We unloaded our belongings and settled in, getting a feel for the history of the place as our hostess, Juli, chatted at length about her own life as caretaker of the home. The smooth, timeworn floors are the original pine, tinted in a seafoam green wash that lets the natural patina of the wood peek through, and I slipped off my flip flops to walk on warm wooden floors that simply can’t be replicated by modern materials.

Then I headed outside, where I immediately wrapped my arms around the enormous bent limb of the largest of the great lady trees; I told her hello and asked her to protect us in the storm ahead. I descended the grassy lawn to the water’s edge to snap photos and sit on the wooden picnic tables that are mounted on stilts just where the tide can ruffle one’s dangling toes as it repeats its perpetual dance, advance and retreat, advance again, retreat again. When I went to bed that night, it was a challenge to sleep deeply, I rose several times to look outside and see if the storm was arriving.

Hurricanes travel in large circling bands of wind and rain, there is always a precedent as the outer bands of the system make landfall, and overnight, the waves at the shore splashed higher, the strengthening wind was made evident in the movement of the trees. When morning came, we made a quick trip to the store for rain ponchos, then I put the phone in a waterproof sleeve and headed outside.

I was drawn to the storm, compelled to stand in it. Throughout the day, as the storm made landfall, I continued to run outside, staggering a little in the buffeting wind, getting soaked with rain, sprayed with salty seawater, and feeling utterly alive and completely defiant.

“Stay inside where it’s safe!” I could hear the voices speak to me. “You can’t take a risk- too many people need you (which is patently untrue these days, I have never felt less relevant in my own life, but we’re sort of programmed that way as women- to assume we’re needed to do the laundry or some such chore). What if a tree limb blows and hits you in the head? What if a sheet of rusty tin slices into your gut? What if the water swallows you up?”

“Phooey,” I replied as I stood in the torrent. And then I laughed. I laughed out loud and I snapped photos and I dug my bare toes into the wet sand. As the storm progressed, I stopped taking photos and moved about 15 feet back from the shoreline, far enough from the waves to avoid being blown into the surf (hurricane winds have that power) but close enough to feel, really feel, the force of Hanna. It was no coincidence that the storm had a feminine name this time. Hurricanes alternate between male and female names, and I met this one, a lady, head on and ready to be filled with feminine strength. What I didn’t expect was the joy, the sheer joy that her wind-and-water-dance would engender in me.

I’ve lived an adult life of safety. My family of origin was turbulent. My mother was an abuser. I married very young, intent on creating a new home, a new life that was reliably secure. Its certainty has been challenged a few times, that’s for sure. And under all that, under the suburban idyll, the sweet hubby, the three kids with cute snaggle-toothed smiles and the dogs and the baseball bats and ballet shoes, my spirit ran restless. I made the mistake of confiding it to my mother-in-law once, this desire I had to move our family to a new place, simply for the experience of being somewhere new. “You can’t go somewhere new just for the sake of it, Kim,” she said. “You’re a mom. You owe your children stability. Safety. No, put that dream away,” she said.

Hers was the voice I heard behind me as I turned my face to the rain. I don’t fault her, not at all. She was right in the sense that it was not the right time to go adventuring. We didn’t have a financial safety net that would protect our kids while we gadded about; I had grown up with the spectre of poverty and wouldn’t inflict that on my kids. So I did it. The safety.

But now, I am hungry for something new. Something dangerous. A thunder of the spirit, a wind-shaking of the foundations. I sense it in my friends, too. In so many of the women of my generation whose moms may have marched in the women’s rights movement of the 1960s or who sat at home folding diapers and watching the bra burnings on tiny televisions but ultimately settled for the safer path and encouraged that for their daughters as well.

I think women have too long been denied this restless hunger. We’ve been told to play it safe, to care for our families, our communities, our churches. We’ve ignored the calls of the Feminine Divine to practice radical, risky love in favor of feathering safe little nests. There is a place for those nests, to be sure. But they are not our only calling. We are called to challenge injustice, to heal old wounds, to speak Universal Truth, to form circles of protection and friendship with other women, with bands unfurling and extending into the world to love men and nurture kids. Think of the good that can happen when women stand in the surf and shout their moxie!

If we will but avail ourselves of the wild love of Goddess and each other, if we will learn to listen to the inner voice who teases us into dancing, if we will look around us for the adventures waiting to be had, our lives will grow as powerful as the storm, and as gorgeous as the calm which follows it.

Short and Sweet: So Late, So Soon

July 23, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

“How did it get so late so soon?”
― Dr. Seuss

Not too long ago, I found myself sitting on the sofa, my hand going numb from the weight of my toddler granddaughter who was sleeping in my lap, settling down from the pain of an ear infection.

I was frustrated; I had plans for tasks I had intended to accomplish that morning, though I can’t for the life of me remember what they were. But I knew the clock was ticking, and I felt it like pressing on my spirit like a leaden weight; I wasn’t getting anything done.

But then… I stopped. I listened to Hazel’s sweet inhalation and exhalation, then expanded my awareness beyond just the two of us to hear the birdsong outside my window. I had a sudden realization:

I am simply going to stop counting the years.

It’s not worth it. The angst of aging, the fret of schedules, the tyranny of the clock. I’m weary of agonizing over it. It’s a waste of, well, time, which is too big, too expansive, and too weighty to be carried like a stone shackled to the ankle.

Marcus Aurelius said that time is like a river, it’s become a cliche’ that works: Time is a river everflowing. I choose to stand in that river, letting the cool water lap my calves and its burble tickle my ears. But it’s more.

It’s laughter gurgling. It’s a helium balloon floating. It’s a baseball game played without a clock counting down the seconds of a quarter. It’s the bent clocks of Dali and the poetry of the Psalm where a day is, to the Divine, like a thousand years.

A life without fear of time? Oh, yes.

Certainly, I will keep appointments at their intended times, that’s courtesy and professionalism. It indicates I respect others, and I am all for that. And I’ll be sure to note movie times when we finally get to go back to the theaters.

But quarantine has taught me that time as we have constructed and conformed to it is a cage. Who hasn’t looked at the person sitting next to them on the couch and asked, “What day is it?” at some point since the world paused? We’ve seen what life looks like when not lived with a metaphorical clock hovering overhead like Big Ben in London, clanging to move people along, heads down and destination-bent. I am learning to prefer to meander. To look up. To revel in the time which The Divine One has given me.

Rob Bell, on a recent episode of his podcast, says, “Previously [to Covid], it was, ‘How much can I fit in?’ It was about productivity. But in the future, time will start to mean other things. Like, what can we experience together? The experiences we love most in life are those when we lose track of time. I think in the future we’re going to see people move toward fewer activities, but fuller days.” Days that are less busy, but are richer.

That speaks a truth that resonates with me. It sounds amazing. May your days be blessed with time with those you love, doing what you love, making memories and living a rich tapestry of experiences.

https://robbell.podbean.com/e/a-bit-about-time/

Depleted, I Pause: A Devotional for the Weary

June 25, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

It’s month three of a global pandemic, and I am depleted. Rusty, dark, creaky of soul and bone as a recently diagnosed (but not only recently experienced) autoimmune disorder slows my body while my heart and brain try to process fear of disease, fury at racial injustice not only for black people but for the brown people held in cages at my state’s border, and a tendency toward fatalistic distrust in my government’s leadership in the face of so much turmoil, injustice, and ache.

With my head lying on my arms, sobbing at my desk, I realize I will only survive with spirit intact if I stop relying on my own wisdom to replenish and sustain. That tactic, in isolation, is so much spraying bright paint on a rusty bike, hoping to just coat the battered frame underneath with a sparkle of glossy color.

And so I have been reading, listening, and observing while tucked into my tiny camper in the woods or sitting on my screened-in sunporch (ah, what privilege to even have such places). This week, I am not sharing my own deep thoughts, I am sharing from those whose work is enabling me to stay on the path of a beautiful, rich, magical life, though for the moment I am just plopped down in the dirt of it, not going anywhere. I don’t expect the wisdom of others to shine me up, in fact, I am no longer sure that’s even the goal. No, I hope rather for lubrication of my spiritual frame, a juicy-ness added to my soul. Perhaps part of growing older is accepting that the vehicle is showing signs of wear, but choosing to move forward anyway.

“In God, we live and move and have our being.” Acts 17:28, the New Testament

“We all get shit wrong…The question is: have you built the capacity to care more about others than you care about your own ego?” Austin Channing Brown, author of I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, to Brene Brown on her podcast “Unlocking Us.”

“Despair is the fear that tomorrow will be just like today.” Rob Bell, author of Love Wins

“I tried to imagine a church that did not support its country’s wars as a matter of patriotic course and instead stood against the devastation and suffering they caused in people’s lives.” Sue Monk Kidd, The Dance of the Dissident Daughter

“For the universe is full of radiant suggestion…Over and over in the butterfly we see the idea of transcendence. In the forest we see not the inert but the aspiring. In water that departs forever and forever returns, we experience eternity.” Mary Oliver, Upstream

“I’ve got a dream!” Rapunzel, Tangled

“I’ve got these conditions—anxiety, depression, addiction—and they almost killed me. But they are also my superpowers. The sensitivity that led me to addiction is the same sensitivity that makes me a really good artist. The anxiety that makes it difficult to exist in my own skin also makes it difficult to exist in a world where so many people are in so much pain—and that makes me a relentless activist. The fire that burned me up for the first half of my life is the exact same fire I’m using now to light up the world.” Glennon Doyle, Untamed

“Da! Wow-wow! Thhhhhhh? Woooo!” Hazel Fernandez, 18-month Queen of our Household

And with those words that I am certain are full of the toddler wisdom that so thoroughly lives in the present moment, I say blessings and peace to all who read. May your day, filled with both light and shadow, be lavish in love. Namaste’.

Using My Voice: to Sing, Whisper, or Roar?

May 28, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

I’m standing on a stage in a converted Vaudeville theatre. The house is empty. It’s the final week of dress rehearsal for The Drowsy Chaperone and I am belting out one of my favorite songs I ever got to sing on a stage, “As We Stumble Along.” In my teal flapper dress, black bobbed wig, and feather boa I glide with ridiculously exaggerated fluidity, then I plant my feet to get ready for the next phrase. I take a deep breath, open my mouth, and …nothing. Just a choked wheeze. The director’s face freezes in horror as I cough and gasp, follow spot illuminating my panic in all its weird glory. The stage manager runs toward me with a bottle of water and I drink, but I still cannot squeeze a sound out of my throat. I end the song with tears streaming down my face. There’s no voice singing ridiculously hilarious lyrics, just a pitiful actress with drooping shoulders shuffling off the stage. The vocal cord damage I had labored so hard to overcome, had undergone prosthesis surgery to replace, was my undoing, just two days before opening night.

I’m standing on a stage in a church auditorium. I am flanked on both sides by middle-aged men, and I clasp my husband’s hand tightly as he bares his soul to the congregation, laying down his ministry, our mission, and our livelihood for a crowd of over 1,000 church members. Their eyes are wide and my spirit is shattered; the only sound in the room is my husband’s broken and trembling voice as he confesses his porn addiction for the whole world to see. I have nothing to say, and wouldn’t be permitted to speak anyhow. My church preaches and practices the silencing of women.

I’m standing on a stage in another sanctuary, an earlier one, clad in white satin. It’s a different brand of church that allows my voice to speak not only my wedding vows but also to sing all the love I feel for my new husband that day. We sing “One Hand, One Heart” from West Side Story. We mean it. My voice rings clear and true that afternoon, it is quite beautiful. As I sing, I trust that my uncle and grandfather will keep my mentally ill and drug-addicted mother calm. She has hinted at a scene in my dressing room and again as I hand her a rose during the processional. For a few minutes, I stop worrying about her to bask in my husband’s blue-eyed adoration.

I’m standing on a stage in my senior year of high school, performing the song “Memory” from Cats for the Senior Farewell Talent Show. My accompanist is absent, having not found the sheet music in her bag. I sing a cappella after the speech teacher gives me a pep talk just before the lights turn on my frightened face. I haven’t yet learned that my voice is resonant and strong enough to make a melody without the help of a piano, without the crutch of another person on stage with me. I stand in the spotlight all alone and sing of moonlight and beauty, skipping the final verse when my nerve abandons me. After the talent show, my mother slaps me in front of what feels like the whole school, and I sense the heat of all those curious, sympathetic eyes as I flee to the shared dressing rooms, where my friends form a barricade to protect me from my own mother as she rages.

But my first time on a stage is joyous, though still quiet. My beloved Uncle Steve, who performs at Six Flags Over Texas in the early ’70s, invites me to sing with him at the final rehearsal of the amusement park’s Crazy Horse Saloon. Only six years old, I never utter even a peep. Yet it is so profound a moment that I will always know that I was wearing my white tennis dress that had red and blue edging and looked just like something Billie Jean King would wear. I will always recall the encouraging expressions of the invited audience as I gape and stare. No trauma, just stage fright and an introverted little girl.

So quiet. In so many key moments of my life, I have locked my heart, soul, and voice up tight. Lips compressed. Spirit screaming, though. Screaming, wailing, thrashing, and hurting. No more. No, no more. I am learning to speak my truth, from the small honesty of what I do or don’t want to eat when with my family to calling congressmen to press for justice; from expressing, rather than clutching, hurt feelings to setting a boundary to protect myself from a tyrannical boss. And when the spoken word is not sufficient unto the task, I write my soul’s truth, pouring heart and mind into words that I sometimes share.

I am discovering that being quiet is okay. Quiescence is beautiful, it implies a hush that is grounded in rest. But healthy tranquility is not the same as resentful placidity. Living quietly, in a place of hope, requires muscular work. Diligent mindfulness. Rigorous self-examination. The Divine Creator, She who holds our hearts and minds in such compassion, is present in our quiet; is heard best when we are still. And it is Her voice that can either sing, whisper, or roar through me if I will but avail myself of Her power and courage.

My voice returned in time for opening night, by the way. I belted about bluebirds and “dawn’s blinding sunbeams” as though I’d never known a day of vocal cord paralysis in my life. But underneath my voice was a support network not just of muscle and lung, but of love from family and friends, and the breath of the Creator.

Ouchy Truth From Millennial Daughters

February 11, 2020February 18, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

There I stand, weeping in the dressing room at a higher-end lingerie store. The very accommodating young women there have cheerfully measured my chest without a hint of judgement and helped me to gather various styles; I’ve got some with lace and others with satin, but none quite work. I try a very pretty teal bra that gaps in the front, but more devastating to me in that moment, there are squishy blobs sticking out of the sides of the bra. Now, I had chanted to myself, before I took off my top, “No shame. No shame. No shame.” Literally, I did this out loud. I knew what my mind was capable of.

Bra shopping is just the worst, isn’t it?

I have, all my adult life, had issues with feeling displeased with my body’s appearance. Haven’t so many of us? But that’s not really the rabbit hole I want to plunge down at this moment (I know the mantras: “we are powerful women, no matter our size,” “beauty is as beauty does,” “exercise for health, not for looks.” All true. Every last one).

But you know the phrases that are getting to me these days? That are clanging around in my head like the clappers on the bells of a cathedral? They’re coming from my daughters. And they pinch a little (kind of like one of those ill-fitting bras I was trying on).

While on a visit to my eldest child’s home in Los Angeles last fall, I pressed play on the inner tape that I have been reciting since I was a teen: too fat, too fat, too fat. And my oldest daughter looked at me and said, “I have grown bored with your self doubt.” Ouch. Oh, wow. It struck me so that I even typed the exact quote into my phone within a few minutes of her utterance; I wanted to remember that moment. It was Sept. 2, and my 30-year-old had just abruptly, firmly, but lovingly drawn a boundary. My younger daughter, a fitness trainer by profession, tells me at least once a week to stop worrying about my appearance and exercise for strength and flexibility. The last time I went down a self-critical path for her ears, she actually became angry at me. She told me, “I won’t listen to the negative talk.” She’s raising a daughter of her own now, and she doesn’t want little Hazel to hear the messages that I transmitted, without meaning to, all those years to her.

This post isn’t about body love, though. Here is the learning I want to really contemplate: our Millennial kids, who happen to now be young adults, have wisdom to share with us. They have seen the shortcomings of their elders and they love us anyway. But they don’t want to be burdened with our angst, the self-flagellation and doubt that we have clung to since we watched an insecure-but-gorgeous Molly Ringwald apply lipstick from between her cleavage.

Our children don’t want to lug the baggage of our youth any more than they are willing to cart home the boxes of our discarded belongings. They’re “bored” with our blues. And we, their parents and grandparents, need to listen. My children’s generation has their own hurdles to face: climate change, an unfriendly economy, a sense of destabilization in world governments. Kids to feed. Dogs to care for. Jobs to find. But I have found that they manage to maintain a stubborn optimism in the face of all of it. They are growing into their own youthy wisdom. They have things to say. Good things. Challenging things.

Youth has always had the temerity to speak wisdom to its elders.

When Jesus visited the temple at the age of thirteen, the rabbis were amazed at his teaching. Yes, Jesus is Special, a unique case. And yet, I believe many of the young do have things to teach us. Kids say more than the darndest, cutest things; there can be a clarity to their words and a richness in their observations. When that richness evolves to be seasoned with life experience, it can create young adults capable of amazing perceptiveness and kindness.

There are many young people who have wisdom; granted, it is a different wisdom from that which comes of life experience. If you’ve ever done the laundry of a seven-year-old, you know it’s essential to empty the pockets, for there, treasure is gathered: feathers and pebbles and dice. Marbles and sticks of chewing gum. Silly Putty. Once, our own pockets were full of treasure, too. There is a thought, a whimsical wish, maybe, that when an infant is born, she still knows all the wisdom and beauty of Heaven, from whence she came. Little by little, it is forgotten amid the complexity of living on Earth. Perhaps, our ten-year-olds, twenty-year-olds, and thirty-year-olds are still just close enough to Heaven that they hear whispers of truth from there. By the time we’re fifty, I imagine our heads are too clouded to hear that particular strain of the purely Divine voice. Our ears are attuned to a different aspect of the Divine One: the weighty matters of self and world, nation and clan ring in our ears. I expect that will shift again in another twenty years, when we start to shed all the weighty matters and return to the glittering pocket fortunes of the soul: time appreciated, loved ones kissed, kindnesses both given and received.

Who are these wise youth? Where are they? There are obvious ones. Malala Yousefzai comes to mind. She speaks with a wisdom that is so anchored in truth born of suffering it is hard to imagine her faltering. Samantha Smith wrote a letter to Yuri Andropov that got her invited to the Soviet Union to share her message of peace. But not all of the wisdom coming from youth is of a scale that leads to book deals and international renown. Sometimes, it is revealed in the wisdom of advice given at the right time.

When I left the mall, I posted something on Facebook about my bra-induced tears, and within minutes, my California-dreaming daughter called me. We talked for an hour, she shared her own struggles and fears and listened to mine with compassion, especially when I explained that my dissatisfaction is not so much about appearance these days as it is age and the near-constant literal physical pain of it. She reminded me of my own goals, challenging me on my excuse making; she referred me to a website where workouts are body-positive and inclusive, a far cry from the exercise videos my generation grew into adulthood with.

If you’re blessed to have children, teens, or Millennials in your life, go grab an ice cream or an iced latte with them. Open your ears, your heart, your mind. Let them share some of what they’ve learned from watching us Gen-Xers and Boomers flail around a bit. There’s no shame in a little arm fat dangling over a bra cup. And there’s no shame in listening to whippersnappers in their young adulthood. No shame, no shame, no shame.

Wondering what littles carry in their pockets? Take a look at this joyful photo series!

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sweet-photo-series-reveals-whats-in-a-preschoolers-pockets_n_56fbdde3e4b0a06d58041b04

Loving a Quiet, Ordinary Life

January 28, 2020February 19, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

How did you answer the question, the one single question that every adult asks every kid when they need to start a conversation, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” It’s a tough one, kids only really know the careers they see on TV or in their own small circle of people. They share those big ones, the ones that their families have encouraged: astronaut, football player, doctor, the President. I usually said I wanted to be a famous singer like Marie Osmond or the beautiful ladies called Dawn who sang with Tony Orlando. I loved their pretty clothes, I loved that people clapped for them, and I knew I loved to sing. In my secret heart, I wanted to be a singer all the way through my growing up years. And I could sing, I really could. I don’t mean in the way that we’ve all heard some poor, deluded American Idol candidates, who show up to audition so sure their voices are awesome because their moms always thought so. No, I had a voice that could have played pretty much any Rodgers and Hammerstein lead; if I had chosen to do the work, to study and rehearse and push. I had the instrument.

But I chose a different path. I met a guy my first day at college. I fell in love and got married at nineteen years old. I changed my major from vocal performance to elementary education. I made the conscious, deliberate decision to follow an ordinary life, to settle down and raise a family and have a little house and a conventional, safe career.

I had my first child at twenty-one years old, my second at twenty-four, and my third at twenty-seven. I probably changed thousands of cloth diapers, washed lots of them in an old avocado green washing machine that I bought from my grandpa, made baby food in a food processor, read Watch Your Step, Mr. Rabbit and Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? so often I still feel their rhythms in my bones, graded countless first grade math papers, matched socks, drove to baseball practice and dance lessons, sewed dresses and Halloween costumes, baked birthday cakes, emptied Friday folders, buckled church shoes, made love with my husband, made beds, made lunch, made…a life. An ordinary life.

c1eaddafe90f1180c29c1a7ef7b7b7f9 — Art by Charlie Mackesy

In the quest to instill a spirit of courage and daring in our kids, we encourage them to dream big; and dreaming big seems to mean fame. Perhaps prestige. Most likely hefty cash flow. We tell our kids (both families and teachers do this) that they can be anything they want to, that if they just want it enough and never give up, they will reach their goals. That’s good stuff. We definitely want kids to know that they are smart, that they have talents, that they can do good in this world. They should shoot for the stars!

But that’s not invariably true. Have you ever seen the scene, the incredible moment, in Little Miss Sunshine when Dwayne, the brother character, realizes he cannot be a pilot because he is color blind? To see the realization dawn in his eyes, then inhabit his entire body until his limbs cannot be contained, to see an entire childhood aspiration lost, and so an entire identity erased, is excruciating.

I think a lot of people go through a version of that internally every day. I know I did; not every day, but sometimes. I got lost in the piles of unrelenting dirty dishes, the long rehearsals when I taught my theatre students how to perform instead of working on my own art, or the constantly replenishing pile of bills.

Yet there were so many moments of enchantment- some troubling thorns, but more glittering magical seeds:

Kissing tiny boo-boos and bandaging little knees.

Seeing students hit milestones.

Swimming in a central Texas lake.

Preparing my Aunt Molly’s Thanksgiving dressing recipe.

Loving and losing pets.

Being baptized at age ten, then helping to baptize my own children later.

Giving a daughter away in marriage.

Holding that daughter close when it was time for her to file for divorce.

Being estranged from my adult son for a period.

Seeing the first ultrasound image of my grandchild.

Choosing over and over again to love my husband and to let him love me.

Somewhere along the way I realized that my life was pretty ordinary, and also pretty great.

Laura Ingalls Wilder, the author of the beloved Little House book series, has said, “As the years pass, I am coming more and more to understand that it is the common, everyday blessings of our common everyday lives for which we should be particularly grateful. They are the things that fill our lives with comfort and our hearts with gladness — just the pure air to breathe and the strength to breath it; just warmth and shelter and home folks; just plain food that gives us strength; the bright sunshine on a cold day; and a cool breeze when the day is warm.”

laura-ingalls-wilder-quote-about-the-beauty-of-life-this-really-sums-out-my-goal-in-finding-amazem-best-quotes-life

What would happen if we taught our kids that an ordinary life is beautiful? That having a vocation, whether it’s accounting or bagging groceries is an honor; listening to music is transcendental; noticing the sunlight in the tree leaves is holy; sometimes sandwiches for dinner are perfectly okay? That life does not have to look like a Pinterest board? That children’s birthday parties don’t have to compete with each other or be Instagram worthy? That wedding proposals can be intimate instead of viral?

As I really dig into my sixth decade on this planet, I am choosing to love my ordinary life, to share my ongoing journey to heal from trauma and betrayal (both in childhood and adulthood), and to be okay in alone-ness. I am learning to be as grateful for playtime with my grandchildren as I might ever have been for grand adventures. Restlessness gives way, inch by excruciating inch, to contentment.

May you know that your own ordinary life is also precious. I hope so. Though we’ve all got to walk our own path.

What are the joys you find in your ordinary life? I’d love to know!

If you’re in a quandary how to start conversations with kiddos, this article is great. I wish I had had this information when I was raising kids and teaching school.

https://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/stop-asking-your-kids-what-do-you-want-to-be-when-you-grow-up-ask-this-instead.html

Grandma’s Post-Postpartum Depression.

January 14, 2020February 21, 2023Kimberly Bryant, Communications

A couple of days ago, I found myself picking up, by hand, all the little crumbs and leafy bits scattered on the light beige carpet on our stairs. One by one. This, after stacking toys and reversing the hangers of each piece of clothing in our bedroom closet.

My husband is worried about me.

My daughters are worried about me.

I am a little worried about me.

Plagued by insomnia, heart rate excelling, breath accelerated; for three consecutive weeks I have found myself unable to sit still in my own home, my eyes constantly darting to and fro, seeking messes to straighten or clutter to eliminate. I do not exaggerate, my family pleads with me to stop, to sit down and enjoy a movie or a book or a chat. I fail. Tonight, my spouse stalled me by encircling me with his arms, saying, “Honey, stop. Sit down.” I lay my head on his shoulder for the briefest of moments, then replied, “I can’t,” then trudged upstairs to put dirty laundry in the wash. The garage has been cleaned, the cabinets cleared, the linens assessed and mended. I painted a bedroom on New Year’s Day. Even the slimy produce has been disposed of and the drawers of the fridge washed with hot, soapy water. That’s the worst job, isn’t it? I hate it.

Oh, and just two months after knee surgery I am pushing myself to walk 10,000 steps a day and/or ride my bike. Movement is, at this point, compulsive, though apparently and unfotunately not yet burning enough calories to erase the stocking-stuffer imported English wine-flavored gummy candy from my hips.

Amidst this frenzy of activity, there have been only two things that could stop me in my tracks:

Binge-watching the second season of Fleabag with my older daughter on the day before she returned to Los Angeles; we holed up in my bedroom with wine and chocolate to cram all six episodes of the divine Phoebe Waller-Bridge and her Hot Priest, and I took that break because my girl insisted. It was her one request before going home…

And my two grandchildren. One, a girl, is thirteen months old. She is playful and headstrong. The other, a boy, is only three weeks old. He is angelic and hungry. They and their parents live with my husband and me. It’s a blessing. I love having them. I do. Really, I do.

But I think I may be experiencing a bit of post-postpartum depression. Is that a thing for grandmothers? It should be. I bet it is, and we just don’t talk about it.

Recently, my husband and I met a new couple, lovely folks. As we chatted, we described our living situation: youngest daughter and her domestic partner living with us with their kids while my daughter finishes school and they try to get ahead financially. Incredulous, they said something like, “We told our kids once they finished school (and they paid for their kids’ degrees, a feat we had been unable to accomplish on our pastor/educator salaries) they were on their own, and we meant it. We enjoy our kids and grandkids, sure, but no way would we let them live with us.” Emphatic shakes of their heads emphasized their resolve. Maybe that grandmother doesn’t have any post-postpartum depression. She seems to have it pretty together. But this one? Me? Hell yes. I think I do.

I went looking to see what humorist Erma Bombeck might have to say about being a grandmother, certain that if she could find something funny to say, it would shake me out of the funk of anxiety, and she had nothing but niceness to say, she the pinnacle of rapier wit:

“Grandmas defy description. They really do. They occupy such a unique place in the life of a child. They can shed the yoke of responsibility, relax, and enjoy their grandchildren in a way that was not possible when they were raising their own children. And they can glow in the realization that here is their seed of life that will harvest generations to come.”

Why can I not “shed the yoke… [and] relax?” What’s wrong with me?

It’s a lifetime of perfectionist habits, partnered with a legitimately diagnosed anxiety disorder and a compulsion to be the best, most generous and helpful mom/grandmother/employee/teacher/etc…

Magnified by menopause. That, to quote Fleabag, “horrendous…magnificent” process that shakes us women up, down, and sideways.

Enough about how I have been struggling. We’re all struggling one way or another. What you may wonder, dear reader, is what is she doing about it?

Here’s what:

After a couple of months letting my anxiety prescription gather dust, I got it refilled and I started taking it again. Faithfully, every morning, with my daily 4 ounces of orange juice. At first, I did it because of the look of dismay on my husband’s face when he realized I had not been taking it. But then, I decided to take it for myself. So often, when those of us with a mental illness feel better, we think it’s time to take ourselves off our meds (and of course, we do not consult our physicians because we know what they say. I actually did ask my doctor and she said No and I did it anyway). It’s been a couple of weeks and I am feeling incrementally calmer.

I started letting my family help more. Right now, as a matter of fact, my husband is loading the dishwasher (so…many…baby…bottles…) while I write up here in my cozy bedroom writing space. When I got home from work today, there were dirty dishes in the sink and I left them there! No one in my household expects a constantly clean house. Just me. That’s my hangup, it comes from growing up in sometime squalor. Gotta let that stuff go.

I stuck to my guns with my new boss to get a private workspace. Is it in an old closet? Yes. But it’s my closet. It’s quiet. I can avoid the chaos of an open concept office (which is fun when you’re in an office with Jim, Pam, Dwight, Michael, and the rest of the Dunder Mifflin crew, but not so great in real life). The important part of this situation is that I stuck to my guns and spoke up for something I knew I needed.

I did yoga yesterday.

And I canceled a commitment I’d made to my extended family this week. I’d made it with the best of intentions. And I had tried to honor it. But I simply did not have enough time. They accepted it with silence, then someone else stepped up to do the job. The rest of the family is rallying to help her accomplish it, which is great. I think I disappointed or angered them, but I know that after all these weeks of crying, shaking, and lying awake, my health mattered more. Listening to my inner voice tell me where I had overextended, then doing the humbling work of canceling, was the best self-care I could do at this time.

What I am emphatically not going to do is send my daughter and her family away. They need help, and I remember what it was like to feel bereft and overwhelmed when a young mother. Maybe I am a sucker, but I want to provide a nurturing foundation for my daughter and her family. The best part of “grandma’s post-postpartum depression” is the exquisite beauty of being a grandmother, anyway.

Medication. Boundaries. Saying no. Self-care. Accepting help. Leaving the dishes. Hugs from my husband. Cuddles with two grandbabies. And plenty of the genius of Fleabag. These are tools for coping with the rarely discussed and maybe only case ever of post-postpartum depression.

Okay, Erma, I am ready to glow.