It's Official

Throughout the years as a mom, I have heard the phrase "it's official" for many different reasons.  From being chosen for the part in the school play to graduating with top honors and everything in between.  The only time that phrase tears at my heart and makes me worry for days on end is when my beautiful daughters say "it's official, I have a boyfriend".  Now, my youngest has never said this, even though she is 17, because she doesn't give her heart away very easily.  My oldest, however, has...more than once...and this time she is away at college living in an apartment and has made it official with the boy man downstairs.

I tried, I really tried to sound enthusiastic, but she heard it in my voice.  She heard the worry and the not so sure feeling of mom in a panic.  So she texted me and asked if I was happy for her.  Well, that hit me where it hurts because I am happy, of course I relish in the happiness of my children.  I assured her that I was happy and then went on the mom rant of be safe, school and work come first, make sure he respects your decisions, etc. etc. etc.  When what I really wanted to say was "DO NOT HAVE SEX".  Yes that is the gist of it, I can't even fathom, nor do I want to.

I know you understand, I know you feel my pain.  I want my 3 year old ballerina back, now.  Long gone are the days of worrying about scraped knees and mean girls.  Worrying about sex and all the crap that comes along with it, I'm not ready.  If I'm not ready, is she?








Grandma, Can You Hear Me?

Old. 3 letters, big impact.  I use to think people my age were old and now I know better, 44 is not old.  My grandma is 92, that's old.  My mother is 68, slightly old.  (Oh, they would be pissed if they knew I posted their ages for all to see, lol).  

My grandma is fading away, she won't admit it, but we can see it.  Her day to day is not what it use to be, she just sits and waits.  In my heart of hearts I know what she is waiting for, but we don't discuss it.  She is still the woman full of pride and would never admit defeat.  She is so filled with pride that she refuses to get a hearing aid, so we have to talk scream loudly when we need to tell her something.  This ends up in an argument because she gets mad when we yell.  If we use our indoor voices, she says what, what, WHAT??? By that time, what we needed to say has lost all meaning, so we make something else up just to make her think we didn't lose interest in talking to her.  We laugh a lot, not at her, just at the situation.  She gets mad, thinking we are making fun of her.  We talk about the hearing aid again, she pounds her fists and yells telling us she can hear.  Ok, grandma, whatever you say... She says, "what?".

This past week paramedics visited grandma who was dangerously close to a diabetic coma, she thinks she is fine.  We know she isn't.  My mother thinks she is getting better everyday, we know she is not.  The rest of us are watching the two matriarchs of our family live in a world that doesn't exist.  The world where everyone else is wrong.  We fight, a lot.  My sister fights more than I do, we feel guilty for not helping.  They won't let us.  They win the fights, so we don't call and we don't visit.

Old.  Something we will become one day.  Don't stop your family from loving you, don't keep them away, and accept help when you can no longer help yourself.  Are you listening?  Can you hear me?

Grandma's 91st Birthday July 2011 (she wouldn't let us take pictures this year).