parenting

August 26, 2018 By HallieZ 1 Comment

I WILL DO IT!!!!

When she’s waking up next to me… burrowing into my body, nuzzling and smiling and she thinks that since I was in her dream it wasn’t a dream because here I am next to her…

“OK! I WILL do it, Mama!!!”

She declares into the folds of my tummy.

What? What will you do?

She turns her face up and gives me a glare of impatience at my stupidity.

“I will make the BIGGEST PARTY”

duh, mom

The biggest party? Where will it be?

(I know I’m slow, child, but seconds ago I was in a completely different universe)

“ALL THE WAY TO CHINA!!!”

she dives under the covers again and comes up between my pillows and I can’t breath because I’m almost suffocated from the snot that is trying to kill me.

China!

I’m only slightly surprised.

“no, DISNEYLAND!! The party will be ALL THE WAY TO DISNEYLAND!!!”

Like an eel she’s under my arm and over my leg and the sheets are twisted and good heavens child.

“I need to watch Daniel Tiger now!!!!!”

She yodels

I readily agree, because she is my 4th child and I’m over freaking out about screen time and I need a half hour to recover from waking up with this wildcat.

June 25, 2018 By HallieZ 1 Comment

Dear Son, A Gift You Could Miss

Dear Son,

You were at your daddy’s all week, and I missed you SO MUCH!

You’re little still, and this won’t be for you to read for some time, but it was pounding in my heart today, and I thought I would write it down for you, and maybe you won’t ever need to read it, because it will be in our every day and it will be who you are… but still. Here I am, son-of-my-heart. All the love in the world for you, and, you know your mama, SO MANY WORDS!!!

Last night I went to a comedy show with some friends, downtown, and it went late. I never find myself walking through the nightlife of Salem Oregon past 10pm! But there I was.

Headed toward my car, I was. Minding my own business, skirt swishing, heels tapping, when a car full of men drove by.

(I know, gross, I’m your mom, but still… its my story, dude)

“Girl! HOT DAMN, YOU GOT AN ASS”

and then the things you can imagine that followed that.

Mama don’t mess. As you know. No, I didn’t flip them (because, I save my energy for shit that matters) and I didn’t feel ashamed (because, well, we all know I DO have an ass on me)

It took me a couple days to figure out what was simmering in my soul, after that night.

You’ve heard a lot of it, son.

“ treat women with respect, that’s someone’s wife/mom/sister/daughter”.

Its all true and good, my boy.

But here’s what my mama heart is saying.

When you treat women like that?

YOU ARE THE ONE LOSING

When you drive by, and all you see is an ass?

You miss the power in her soul.

When you declare over a woman a thing?

You miss her truth and you get stuck in your perception.

Every woman, all over the world, is holding a gift inside her heart, a gift more beautiful than you can probably even imagine.

Son.

It might be her friendship, steady and true.

It might be her voice, powerful in tenderness.

Her gift might be her body, wrapping you in comfort.

It might be the heat of her passion, shaking you to your core.

Her gift might be a truth, typed out on a paper, or etched in stone.

And son, you may hold a gift for her.

You can show up,

you can stand still,

you can drive by,

you can SEE.

You can look past that ass. And find her.

And my son.

It could break your heart, and it may break hers,

and son,

It will make you a real man.

Always, your mama

June 20, 2018 By HallieZ 5 Comments

Father’s Day, huh?

So. It was Father’s day a few days ago.

I did what I have always done, helped my kids prep and wrap their gifts for their daddy.

I sent him a text message that said Happy Father’s Day, hope you all have a good day.

I cried, because this isn’t how I ever thought our Father’s Days would be.

Once I got my heart through all that sorrow/mess, it was time to think about MY father.

That sucked even worse. So I cried more.

My father sent me an email when I filed for divorce that said I wasn’t allowed at his home on special events or holidays.

I mean. I did stop by on mother’s day and give my mom flowers, I told myself, so maybe I OUGHT to stop by on Father’s day anyway. And give him, uh. I don’t know. Like. Jerky or something?

But I didn’t WANT to do anything. I didn’t want to call him. Or drop of jerky. Or anything.

Not just because he said I couldn’t, but because he broke my heart.

I had scheduled cleaning job that day, to help keep me busy, and I cried as I ran the vacuum, and raged as I scrubbed the toilet. I had flashbacks, all day, of things that had happened that were not ok.

I remembered conversations and I remembered the agony of finally realizing my dad was only going to empower and embolden my abuser, not protect me.

I asked the Spirit what the gift was.

I asked the Spirit what was being asked of me.

– HOLD THE PAIN WITH THE BEAUTY –

Pain with the beauty?

What the hell.

There is only pain.

Images started coming to mind.

Reveling, the first born.

The love, the bond.

How well I remember holding my first daughter for the first time.

Small. Warm.

Nothing I wouldn’t do for you, my daughter.

A diaper change.

A first bike ride.

All this and more, a world awaiting.

So thank you, Papa, for the gift of attachment.

Thank you for holding me against your skin and letting me know your scent.

Thank you for carrying me on your body.

Thank you for changing my diaper.

For letting me feel the grass against my skin.

Thank you for letting me explore the world and know the feeling of dirt.

Thank you for letting me witness the birth of my siblings.

Bringing me into a place of connection with them.

Thank you for telling me stories of the natural world.

A teacher by destiny.

Thank you for being gentle with animals.

For teaching me to hold the plants with respect.

Those first 5 years cemented a character that I give thanks for. Every. Single. Day.

I don’t know how to hold the beauty and the pain in the same place and not explode.

But I am trying.

It’s right here, beating in my chest.

March 26, 2018 By HallieZ 2 Comments

Happy Birthday to My Son

This day. A sacred day.

The day my son came from his mother’s womb.

I know well the opening, the blood, the sweat, and the tears that brought him into the world. His sisters came with the same rush. The same yells and the same power.

I like to imagine him, the wrinkles, the snot. I wonder if my silent boy cried, or if he just stared, unblinking, into his mother’s eyes.

Words fail me.

This day, my son began a slow march of loss and grief that no child should ever be forced to travel.

When I look back at the things I do know, the day he was found in the street next to an orphanage, the day my friends saw him for the first time, and thought of me. When I think about the phone call, and my return call saying YES…

I can’t tell you it was all worth it. Because that seems to shallow of a thing to say in the face of his loss.

However. He is mine and I am his. He is beloved and belongs.

On this day of his birth, we celebrate with legos and streamers. We plan nerf gun wars and we are about to go pick out the birthday donuts.

On this day of his birth, we honor his family of origin. We honor their lineage, their courage. We honor their tears. We honor the travail in which his mother brought him forth.

I have a million things I want to say about this boy.

He is 6 years old today!!

A million things I want to tell you, I want the whole world to know.

And yet, I feel a shift has come.

6 years old, and I feel his story becoming his own in a way that is different from before. I feel the sharing of his story now, today, is more private. His coming into our family was a loud bang, an event, a great to-do.

Part of this year, is him stepping into the quiet. The unknown. The world of his own choosing.

My son.

My only son.

You did not smell of me. You didn’t want me. I was afraid of you, and wanted you more than life itself. Very few things in the world have forced me to confront the darkest and lightest places in my soul the way your life has.

My son.

A miracle. A treasure. I love you forever.

Mama

December 18, 2017 By HallieZ 9 Comments

christmas ramblings on shunning

Sometimes I think about what it is like to be shunned. I really don’t like thinking about it. Even as I write the word “shunning”, I wonder if that’s the best word to use. The people who are shunning me keep saying they’re not shunning me.

As if saying that they are not, makes it not so.

If, however, it looks like shunning, and smells like it, and meets the definition… I suspect it is, indeed, shunning.

Sometimes, I’d like to know what they’re doing. Are they practicing “church discipline”? I’m not even sure what that means. Especially since they’re not my church, they’re my family. Are they “protecting” their family? I can’t imagine what they’re protecting them from since I’m dangerous only in the sense that I believe every person is a human with their own brain with which to make decisions.

Maybe that is, in fact, the most dangerous thing, maybe that’s what we all need to be protected from, people who think for themselves. Maybe we all need to be protected from seeing the joy in life, the hope and freedom that comes when you take responsibility for your own life, for your own thoughts, for your own beliefs.

This is my second Christmas being shunned by my family.

My mother, my father, and my seven younger siblings.

This is my second Christmas missing out on all the memories, the moments that I longed for the many years I was overseas.

I wonder to myself will they even think about me on that day?

Do they remember their big sister, the first year she had a camera and took pictures of everyone? There were not a lot of pictures being taken for a while, maybe our family didn’t have a camera, maybe my parents were too busy with other things to think about taking pictures. Maybe they were too tired. I don’t know. But there weren’t many pictures of holidays for a long time, and then they were a lot, because I got a camera, and loved capturing all those memories.

I wonder if my siblings know how much they were in every beat of my heart, all those years. Do they know about the gifts I would plan ahead for each of them? How I thought about what cookies everyone would like to eat, and tried to talk my mom into buying more sugar and more butter, so we could make extra of the best ones, to store in big gallon jars under the butcher block.

I wonder if they remember the year I was in China, and didn’t have the money to send them gifts, so I wrote them each a letter, and asked my dad to print it for them. I was such a young mom… with two little babies… in a cold, new country. My littlest sisters were 10 and 12 by the, I think.

I wonder if they have turned me into a devil, or just someone who doesn’t exist.

They have joined forces to make me fear I don’t exist.

Unanswered text messages and un-return phone calls. Vacant looks when I run into them out in public. Did anyone ever really know me at all? Is the person I was for 35 years suddenly gone? How did they sleep at night? I can’t imagine the pain I would feel if I kicked my child out of my life. I can’t imagine removing my child from a family photo, from our family existance. I can’t imagine anything horrible enough that I wouldn’t answer my child’s phone call.

At night sometimes, one of my children will get scared, or worried, or just wake up for no reason. They will come to my bed and climb in. One of them in particular steals my pillow, she wants a warm one, that I’ve been sleeping on, instead of the cold one next to me, waiting for a kid to climb in bed.

I think about the authority that this child has, to come get in my bed.

Never imagining for a second that would send her away. Never imagining for a second that would say “you may not ever again climb in bed with me, no matter how scared or alone you are”.

I think about how that’s the way I approach God, kind of barging in to the space God occupies. Sort of expecting that when God said “I will always be with you, even to the ends of the earth”, They meant it with all Their heart. I just take it for granted that when They said “to the heights, the depths, nothing can separate you from my love”, They meant it.

If ever the love of God was to be found in the world, don’t you think we would find it first in the love of a parent?

Every time one of my kids climbs in bed with me, I imagine myself being parented like that, even now, a grown ass woman. I think about how I am worthy of being loved like that, worthy of being safe like that.

I’m so safe inside of love, so warm, so secure. And no divorce, no opinion, no fear, will ever be able to separate me from this love.

I often try to understand why I’m being shunned. I tried to understand why anyone thinks it’s OK to treat me like this. I don’t. I never well. I actually understand less every day that I’m further away from that kind of spiritual abuse. I was talking to my counselor about this, and the word mystery was used. Accepting mystery. It’s OK if I never understand. It’s OK if they kick me out forever. Its ok if they never actually see me. I will be a better parent to my own children.

The pain I’ve experienced in being rejected, is a motivation for me, an urge to push through pain, and to try to show up every day, in love, to be with my children.

I hate Christmas for the reminder that I have been rejected. I hate Christmas for the sorrow of identifying so much with Mary and Joseph. I hate Christmas for knowing what it’s like to be turned away from a warm cozy inn, full of life and laughter and warmth. I hate Christmas for that idea I’m supposed to be grateful they sent me to sleep in a stable full of shit

I love Christmas for the pain of identifying with Mary and Joseph. I love Christmas for knowing that my house will be full of light and love, and that no one will ever be sent to sleep in the shed. I love Christmas for knowing that love and light and joy comes from the homeless… the humble.

I love Christmas for the opportunity to embrace the pain and to push on toward healing. I love Christmas for the joy of embracing the sorrow, along with the good memories. I love knowing that it’s OK for me to miss them, it’s OK to hope they miss me, it’s OK to love them, and it’s OK to be inexplicably and wildly angry they put me out of my family.

I take a lot of comfort in the stories of people who live through similar experiences. I take even more comfort in the lives of the ones for victoriously move through these experiences. I take comfort from the people who put their arms around me, and acknowledge that the pain will never go away. And tell me I will be happy, and find joy again. They tell me to love my kids, and that will help to heal my heart.

I wish I had a moral. Or a solution with which to end this post.

It’s just what it is. I don’t like it. I don’t have a nice happy ending, because I’m still right inside of this moment.

There are far too many of us, kids of fundamentalist evangelical families, who have been put out of our families of origin. For them, who have comforted me in this season, I am thankful.

What I’m Writing