Lined up in the garage as if they are expecting us still are the dining room chairs of my youth. In all there are five. Yet now, as if in a dream, I see eight.
You need to first accept, completely and fully, that this is how your daughter is. Acceptance can be life changing. Then, you can see your possible paths more clearly. Family counseling is one option. Another is just taking the high road and loving your daughter as much as you can.
This year, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) put out a revolutionary report about improving quality of care at end of life for all Americans, including children. Despite these important advances, we still have a long way to go in ensuring that palliative care becomes a human right for all.
I brought my beautiful girl, Arayla (10.5) with me to Ecstatic Dance in Oakland today, for the first time in a couple of years, as it's often one of...
We can help counterbalance the pain and the sense of chaos for the griever by being with them and supporting them throughout their grief journey and well afterward as they navigate the complexities of 'growing up' well past childhood.
Being a single mom with five kiddos at home means that I have to be incredibly budget-conscious. It also means that, while we find fun in lots of ways, they're not generally the same ways others find fun.
The first day back to school was a study in spacing. It was the first time that Avery would ride the bigger kid bus with Briar, leaving Finley home for another hour and then off to ride the younger kid bus alone.
They call it the "Makeup Tax." The average woman spends $15,000 over her lifetime on makeup. And then there is the time, about 20 minutes a day -- or two weeks each year -- spent smoothing and blending and smearing. All this primping and preparing is worth it, we are told.
Just like love, grief is an experience that evolves and changes with time; but one thing is for sure, it is not forgettable, because it never goes away.
This slight tension between me and my daughter has been present for a few weeks now. She's growing up, not a little girl anymore, but not quite big one yet either. She needs and wants me, and I need and want her, and yet something is new. Something is different.
The realization hit like an epidural. I felt a joyous ache, both comforted and terrified in the knowing our relationship had and would continue to forever change. As I held you once more, I was reminded of the poem, "On Children", by ultimate truth-teller Kahlil Gibran.
I have discovered that parenting is not a one-size-fits-all concept. It's a fluid dance full of give and take. For me, parenting requires humility, honesty and a willingness to admit when I am wrong and say I'm sorry.
The wise, old, spiritual teacher Ram Dass says, "We're all just walking each other home." That's how I feel about my role as a caregiver. I'm just walking my mother home.
A writing mentor once told me, "To be a writer [of memoir] is to be a very good detective." Like a detective, the memoir writer finds the tension points, the contradictions, and the core story.
My daughter is a smart, sweet, boundary-testing control freak -- like every other toddler I know. My marital status plays no role in her life. We are committed to her, and our relationship, in all the ways that really matter.
Babies love flesh. My daughter searches for the softest parts of me when she's sick or she needs a hug or reassurance. I love her cheek on my breast, her head pressed against my tummy on the couch. The way she gets cold in her bed at night and begs for me to come in so that she can put her little feet in the folds of my legs to warm her toes.
I am noticing a pattern with my mid-life friends. They are afraid of their adult children. Not in a way where they think they are in danger, or threatened. No, these women are afraid of offending their adult children and then, well, who knows what might happen?
Irish photographer Samantha Conlon explores the close-knit relationship between girls and their moms in an intimate series she calls "Daughters."...
Mother ceaselessly sought to mentally destroy me as a prepubescent, because I was the outlet most handy and available to absorb the pain of her losses and dereliction.
My little eight year old has figured out, in her young age, in her own words, that she is a people pleaser. Sitting at the breakfast table, unassuming in our pajamas, we have struck life-lesson gold.
Beth, 22, claims she grew up in a "house of horrors" filled with unbelievable acts of abuse and neglect, allegedly at the hands of her mothe...
Marriage, like any relationship, is hard. Being true to ourselves is even harder. My daughter is my hero because even as she enters the cruel world of tweendom, she stays the course.
Original illustration by Jake Reeves. October 28, 2012 at approximately 10:30 am. Tess Senay Raynovich died in a car accident on her way to wo...
One day soon, she will seriously doubt her ability to do anything. It is your job to remind her of the truth.
We bucked up and packed our stuff, confused by the strange folk in this unreal world who seemed not to operate like folks in Real-land. Our stay in Wonderland had taken a surreal turn, indeed.
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