Life With Mother

Ruthie's Dolly

2006-01-04T06:13:00.000-08:00

It was a cold January morning and little Ruthie hated to climb out from under the warm quilts made so carefully by her mother. Ruthie slept in a bed in a little room in the family home on Flat Top Mountain West Virginia. The warmth she recieved from her grandmother was more soothing then the colorful patchwork that her mother had painstakingly made from scraps of material from old clothes. Often the clothes were made from bleached flour sacks from the little country store.

Breakfast would soon be ready and on a cold morning like this the thought of hot biscuits with home churned butter and honey from that old oak tree that her dad had harvested. She quickly popped out of her bed and jumped when her little bare feet hit the cold wooden boards in the room that had no heat. Quickly she dressed and ran to the little breeze way between Granny's room and the kitchen. A pail sat on a hand made wooden table her father had hewn from a fallen tree. She broke the ice on the water in the pail and splashed the icy water on her face to clear her eyes. She ran quickly to the kitchen door and slammed to door behind as she entered.

Her mother, Avis, gave her a sharp look and Ruthie grinned in that special way she had that would last all her almost hundred years and said: "I'm sorry Mommy."

She quickly went around during her chores to help Avis with preparing the morning fare. Even at four, she was expected to help anyway that she could. She wanted to play with her dolly that she had received at Christmas. She had never had a real china dolly before and it was so beautiful and with a hand painted face like an angel with a special smile. But that would have to wait as there was kindling to bring in, dishes to set on the table, and, of course, she had to get the butter from the window box that kept things cold along with the pitcher of milk that Dad had already milked from Old Blue before she even thought of waking from her dreams.

It was going to be a special day. Avis's sister was coming to visit and there would be cousins to play with and special cornbread and green beans for dinner. About mid-morning the house was filled the laughing of cousins running and teasing each other. Then trajedy.

As Ruthie and her cousin Gracy were playing with this wonderful and precious new china dolly, counsin Rufus grabbed the doll and as Ruthie ran after him, he threw it across the room to his brother Tom. Tom missed. The dolly crashed into the wall and was shattered into what seemed like a thousand pieces.

Ruthie broke into tears. She cried every night cuddled up to Granny for weeks.

Two weeks before she died my Mom, now called Miss Ruth, the former little Ruthie, told me of this morning. She never had another beautiful doll until she was about eighty when my sister Glenna bought her a china doll. Every year on Christmas from that year on, we would buy Mommy a doll. My favorite now sits in my office. It is a Granny dolly that sits in a rocking chair that is automated and it plays Christmas music. But none of these dollies would ever take away the sadness that little Ruthie felt on that cold January morning when her dollie was lost.

If you would like to see more about My Mom go to http://lifewithmother.com for my story about love, death, and rebirth.

Myriam

The New Age Grandparent

2006-01-01T08:51:00.000-08:00

When I was a young mother, my mother was my resource for information on raising my children. The values that she taught me were important. However, much of the information that she taught me has lost its value in the New Age that we now live.

Divorce was fairly uncommon at the time. Two parent families were still the norm. The biggest problem we had in dealing with our grandparents was negotiating whose house we would go to for the various holidays without hurting anyone's feelings.

Today, the two-parent family is slowly becoming less and less significant. The average marriage is now 8.2 years, compared to 13.4 years in 1970. In two parent households, it is considered the norm that co-parenting is the rule and not the exception. While my children's father probably changed a diaper once in his lifetime, fathers today are expected to help with the majority of tasks involving the household. And, in the single-parent household, there is a growing agreement to shared custody. When I was a young mother, the very idea that a Father would have equal rights when it came to divorce and custody usually indicated a woman with a "shady reputation".

Reality has changed.

Women are opting to have children without being in a marriage or a committed relationship. Single men are choosing to adopt children.

We, the parents of today's parents have to readjust our attitudes toward the evolving family unit. Where do we fit in? What is our role? Are our values valid in today's family?

Big questions with important impact face us as we evolve into new roles of grandparenting.

The most important question is how do we create and maintain a trust-filled, loving relationship with our grandchildren's parents? -- Not only with our child but also with our child's ex-spouse. How do we negotiate through the anger and hurt of divorce and maintain focus in order to help our grandchildren have a better life?

This is a big order, one that requires some new skills on the part of grandparents. These skills include:

1. Not taking sides. While we might want to rage and rant and try to protect our child when he or she is hurting because of divorce, unless there is evidence of spousal abuse, our grandchildren will be hurt if we show animosity toward either parent.

2. Listening to all sides. Now, while it is important not to take sides, it is also important to take on the role of sounding board and listening with an open mind and heart to the issues that our child and spouse (or ex-spouse) are facing. To listen without judgment or the need to solve the problem empowers you as a trustworthy friend and grandparent.

3. Trusting our children to make good decisions. Trust is a two-way street. Most children are not going to be harmed by a few parenting mistakes (We certainly made our share.) so trust your children to make good decisions and don't offer advice unless it is asked for and give specific advice but always add that the decision as to how to handle the problem ultimately lies with the parents and not the grandparent.

4. Define your role in the family dynamic. It is important to know what your role is as a grandparent and to set your own boundaries as to what you will and will not do as a grandparent. You do not have to be a free baby sitter available on call. You do not have to be an interest free bank for emergency loans. You do not have to have all the answers to life's questions. You do not have to take sides with one parent or the other but it might be nice to choose to place your grandchildren first in all discussions about parenting and grandparenting.

5. Be a good example. Unconditional love is the greatest gift that we can give our children and our grandchildren. Everyone needs to know that someone in this world loves him or her without reservation. That is the ultimate role of a grandparent. However, don't get caught in the trap that unconditional love and accepting negative behavior are the same thing.

6. Be a spiritual force. Work daily to develop your spiritual side. As you come to a deeper understanding of your connection with the divine, and it does not matter which religion is your choice, you will become a greater example of the ultimate goal in life which is to live in contentment and harmony with others and with the world.

Trust will result as we choose to manifest the above behaviors. Our children and our children's children will be blessed by having us in their lives. We will be blessed by maintaining a sense of family and connection.

The New Age Grandparent can help to solve many of today's problems through direct self-improvement and growth emotionally, spiritually, mentally and physically.

Gingerbread House

2005-11-28T04:58:00.000-08:00

The Gingerbread House

I don’t know why but there is something inherently sad to me about thinking about gingerbread houses. I don’t know if it is because the look god-awful tacky or I can’t imagine putting that much work into something that should be delicious but gets so dirty that it is basically inedible.

I think maybe it is because that my mother had a gingerbread house that someone had made for her and each year she would get out this box where she preserved her little decorated house with plastic wrap and place it on her TV in a place of pride to celebrate the holiday season. After a few years the icing really was smashed and the gumdrops looked like they had fallen from the sky in an attack of the sugar plum faeries and just went splat. I don’t know what crazy relative made this house for her but Mom saved it.

But Mom saved everything. She would wash off aluminum foil and dry it and use it again. She would wash out zip-lock bags and turn them upside down on a bottle and save them to use again. She would wash out plastic tubs that were filled with everything from butter to cottage cheese to sour cream and carefully clean the lids and let them dry so she would be able to use them again. Clothes that were to worn to wear were cut up and used as dust rags. She had a ball made of rubber bands that she had carefully constructed over the years. She did not buy paper towels but dutifully scrubbed and cleaned with old rags that were bleached to a thinness that made them as soft as a baby’s blanket. My Mom didn’t believe in a disposable world but that gingerbread house definitely should have been tossed in the trash or gone to compost heap. Oh, Mom never threw out food either. It was either reheated to mush, frozen and saved for a hungry day or put on the compost heap.

In many ways I admire the world that my mother was trying to save. A world that did not waste and throw away whether it was a piece of tin foil or a person. Maybe we need to rethink our world of throw away everything from plates where we serve our food or a shoe that has a run down heal that you can’t even find someone to repair.

Mom used to say: A woman can throw out more with a teaspoon than a man can bring in with a shovel. In many ways I think she was so correct, we do not destroy our world, our planet, our finances with the big stuff. We do it as we nickle and dime ourselves into poverty and insecurity.

Well I guess I better go put that soup that was left over from supper in those plastic butter tubs and put them in the freezer. They will be delicious when the winter snows keep me from sending Mark out to the grocery.

You think I should put Mom’s Gingerbread House out on the compost pile?

Life after Death

2005-11-22T08:11:00.000-08:00

It seems that one never recovers from the loss of a parent. But does a parent recover from loosing us?

I decided to talk to a psychic medium and discover if Mother was trying to communicate with me.

I was amazed at the results.

I felt so alone when Mother died. It was like she didn't exist anymore. No one can explain a hole in one's heart that comes with death unless one experiences it. While I couldn't feel my mother around me anymore, I wondered if she still felt me.

When I talked to the medium at http://asknow.com I was led to pay more attention to my dreams. It seems that my mother was truly trying to communicate with me.

Now the title of my book makes more sense: Life with Mother: A journey of love, death and rebirth. I was reborn knowing that my mother was watching over me.

If you feel the loss of a loved one, go to http://asknow.com and talk to one of the wonderful people who truly can see dead people. It gives one renewed hope.

2005-09-04T04:10:00.000-07:00

A review by Connie Anderson

2005-08-11T09:45:00.000-07:00

Self-help

Life With Mother: A Journey of Love, Death and Rebirth

By Myrian Maytorena

PageFree Publishing, Inc.

Reviewed by Connie Anderson

Myriam's mother was almost 100 years old when she brought mother home for her end-of-life journey.

This is an important personal story because:
- The fastest growing segment of our aging population is the old-old (over 85).
- By 2015, there will be more that 350,000 people over age 85 in America.
- More than 7 million Americans over 65 will need some help with their day-to-day lives.
- The average age of the caretaker is 57; the professional caregiver is 42.
- 72% of caregivers to the elderly are women who also have outside jobs and many still have children at home.

When you bring an aging and ailing parent into your home, the rules … and the roles change as do the expectations. The author said, "It's a hard lesson to learn to be a caretaker, and also to take care of yourself." She walks us through ways to take care of ourselves during this new 24/7/365 challenge.

The section on getting the elderly (and usually the dying) to eat was revealing. The author explains that "It had become a power struggle between us and death – that the body shuts down and the need for food diminishes. But that we are afraid for our parent if they don't eat so we do everything to get them to eat."

When our parents lose control of their body, they lose their dignity, and as "their child," this is also hard on us. We grieve a little every day. She reveals that when there is no hope of improvement, many of the services are no longer paid for.

The resource chapter is invaluable. My favorite line was: We don't always need to be nice with health care workers and sometimes need to be assertive to make sure our parents received maximum care.

Armchair Interviews says: She advocated for her mother to her dying breath, a task not many of us are willing to take on. Her insights are invaluable and we'd recommend anyone contemplating such a loving gesture read this and other books – so you know!

Life After Life

2005-07-12T10:58:00.000-07:00

It seems that my life is continuing to heal from the grief of losing Mom. It takes time to heal and I wonder how she would have dealt with it if the roles were reversed.

Mother always dealt well with adversity. She had a strength of spirit that I really admire. The ability to continue when life seems to be in nothing but a downward spiral is an amazing trait for a person to have.

It took me a long time to recover from not having a schedule that required me to care for my mother. I am just now starting to redevelop some sort of discipline so that I accomplish more and more everyday.

I am pleased that my book Life with Mother has now been published. I am thrilled that I was able to carry through mother's desires and complete this. I hope that she is the angel watching over this project to plant little ideas in people's minds to have them find the book and find the help that they need.

I am again overwhelmed with Life. But this time it is the challenge of learning to market my book and having enough energy and discipline to achieve this goal. I am lucky for the people who come along to help me make this a reality.

If you would like a copy of Life with Mother for you or to give to a friend who is dealing with loss please go to http://lifewithmother.com

Life with Mother in the Kitchen

2005-07-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

My mother (who died last year at age 98) always wanted us to cook Lob Lollie for her. Lob Lollie was a recipe from my grandmother who would always use fresh vegetables to feed the family.

Lob Lollie
6 squash (mix and match)
cubed or sliced thick
1 onion diced
2 or 3 cups of tomatoes - you can use fresh tomatoes, canned tomatoes or tomato juice.
a couple tablespoons of olive oil or butter (my grandmother didn't have olive oil and would use what ever fat was available)
salt and pepper to taste

(our addition is a couple of spoonfuls of chopped garlic and you can add fresh herbs of choice. I like cilantro really well.)

sauteÃ© squash, onions and garlic till translucent.
Add the tomatoes
Cook until all is hot and ready.

You can can this or freeze it very easily. Just increase your ingredients proportionally for larger amounts.

SquashParmesann

Any yellow or green squash can be made into a casserole.

Slice your squash in faily thick slices.
Dip in egg and then inParmesann cheese mixed with a little flour or bread crumbs.
Brown in olive oil.

Cheese slices -- may bemozzarellaa or any mild white cheese.

Cup ofParmesann cheese

Tomato sauce -- may be jarredspaghettii sauce or your own homemade tomato sauce.

Layer the squash, cheese slices and tomato sauce in a greased casserole. Sprinkle top withParmesann cheese.

Bake for 1 hour or until the cheese melts in apre-heatedr 350 degree oven.

Serve with pasta or garlic bread.

Additions to the recipe can be fresh herbs like basil, parsley, and so forth, garlic, mushrooms and such.

If you are going to prepare this for freezing do not bake and use a freezer safe to oven casserole. Or as an alternative, you can put in a plastic container for individual servings and freeze and then put in microwave to cook and have your ownTVv dinners. I buy freezer containers that are divided likeTVv dinners and will put in some cooked pasta in one section, a green veggie in another and either the lob lollie or the squashParmesann.

Mother was always a lover of fresh foods or home cooked foods. She did not want anything to do with TV dinners from the grocery. She started when she was about 70 to make her own TV dinners so she always had a balanced meal waiting to go into the microwave.

Mother loved breads and roles and anything sweet. One great alternative waszucchinii bread.

Breads.

You can use any squash to make breads likezucchinii bread.

ZUCCHINI BREAD
1 pkg. Pillsbury nut bread

1 c.Shreddedd zucchini

1 egg

1/2 tsp.Cinnamonn

1/4 tsp.Clovess

2/3 c.Milkk

2 tbsp. Wesson oil

Mix all ingredients but the zucchini until well blended. Fold in zucchini. Pour into bread pans that have been greased on the bottoms only. Bake at 350 degrees for 45-55 minutes.

My Mother My Friend

2005-07-01T04:55:00.000-07:00

There are three types of friends: those like food, without which you can't live; those like medicine, which you need occasionally; and those like an illness, which you never want.

There is not a day that goes by that I am not thankful for the friends in my life. I wish that I could fully let them know how important they are to me. Yet, it seems that real friends don't have to be reassured that you love and need them. They just seem to know. My mother, Miss Ruth, always said: If you want to have a friend, you have a be a friend. I guess that she was my best friend for all my life.

When did we become friends? When did our relationship change from me being the child to me being a woman and an equal? I think that it was about the age of 28. It was at the age of 28 that my perceptions of self changed from being a girl to being a woman and a mother. I had always just thought of Mom as mother - A supportive and authorative person on whom I could rely. But when I became a woman and a mother, my understanding of my mother changed. I could see my faults in her. I could see my strengths in her. I could see all that I liked and disliked about me in her. And that is when she became my friend.

All of my friends that have lasted longer than a minute, usually had these qualities of reflection of who I am, and perhaps more importantly, who I want to be. More and more as I work to expand my possibilities and potentialities I see shifts in the new friends that are coming into my life. Some enter to show me how I need to change some negative behaviors into positive behaviors. Some enter to teach me tolerance and acceptance. Some enter to teach me to say NO. Some enter to teach me to say YES. And the really cool ones that I am meeting now are of an age that many would call the golden years. They are teaching me that possibilities do not end at 50 or 60 or 70 but possibilities constantly keep expanding if we are willing to continue to grow. I am meeting men and women who are more willing to take risks in order to make their dreams a reality. The dreams vary from wanting to enter a new career to creating a life of contentment and quiet joy.

These are my dreams at this time in my life and my friends, both old and new, are helping me learn this lesson. But my first friend and undying friend is my mother. She does not live in this physical reality anymore but she lives in my heart. And the heart is where all friends reside.

Life Begins Again

2005-06-28T05:20:00.000-07:00

My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.

Mark Twain

Yesterday was a good day. My book Life with Mother was published and is now available for sale on my website. I want to thank all of you who wrote me notes of congratulation and support. I want to especially thank my sister Glenna for her support which made it possible for me to complete the book. Today my morning muse is dedicated to Glenna.

Mother used to always call Glenna sunshine. And from when I can first remember Mother always loved the song You are my sunshine. Her last year, I could always cheer her up by singing it. Sometimes my brother Lee or sisters would be on the phone and they would all sing this song together. And Mother always wanted Sunflowers around her. She and Glenna have been sunflowers in my life.

One of the major things that I learned from my mother was that in spite of adversity - or maybe because of it - we can grow and we can thrive. We can become the spiritual flower that we are destined to be when that seed of our soul is planted when we are born. It is the role of our mothers to nourish that early development so that we can evolve into the spiritual beings that we are to become.

I was lucky in that my mother was a very good gardener of her own life. She knew how to pluck out the weeds of fear and distrust. She knew how to water and refresh her life with faith and hope and belief. She knew how to perservere in the worst of storms. She taught me these skills. Some folks were never fortunate enough to have a mother like mine. Some were orphaned at an early age rather than at sixty like I was. Some had mothers that were ill, either mentally or physically, and did not receive the nurturing they needed.

However, I have learned we have lots of mothers in our lives. One of mine was Naomi Hail. Naomi married my brother John and was always special to me. Many times when I was growing up the adversities in life challenged Mom and me, and I would go and live with Naomi. She taught me other skills that I did not get from Mom. She taught me to be involved in life. She taught me how to put on make-up and be a girly-girl. She taught me how to hang in there also. It is amazing how our female friends share with us different roles. Sometimes they are like sisters, sometimes like mothers, and sometimes they are our daughters. Male friends do the same. Sometimes they are like brothers, sometimes they are like fathers, and sometimes they are our sons. Always, they are the flowers manifest in our garden of life.

Today I am going to hang garlands of Sunflowers in my office as I remember my life with mother. http://lifewithmother.com

The Long Goodbye that Comes to Soon

2005-06-24T09:59:00.000-07:00

As an end-of-life caregiver you are playing a waiting game. You are waiting on death but you also fear its arrival. It may seem that the days and hours seem to just go on and on and there is no end in sight for your suffering or for the suffering of your beloved charge.

As we live our lives and finally come to the stage where we are placed into the role of caregiver by circumstances that are normal, we feel like our lives have moved to quickly. Where is the mother or father that you used to turn to for comfort and advice? They are gone and before you is a bed ridden old person that sometimes may appear to be totally out of his or her mind because of diminished capacity or illness. Sometimes it makes you wonder why humans choose to love when leaving can bring such pain.

Death wounds those who survive the passing of a loved one. A hole is created in the heart that not even the passing of time will take away. How do we fill the hole so that our wounds do not consume our attention night and day?

They, and I don’t know who they are, say that time heals all wounds. When one is in a state of grief either before, after or during the dying process, this does not seem like a possibility. We all have individual ways to handle this process that is unique to us alone. Oh, we all have some similarities and that is why support groups work because we talk to people who have been there and done that. But support groups are only a way to be able to make it through the days and weeks and maybe years of healing. We will still be scarred by the loss that death brings to our psyche.

Anniversaries will come along and cause us to re-feel our loss .A movie that we once watched together with our loved one will come on TV.A smell will remind us of our Mother’s kitchen. Always reminders are there and at first they will be reminders of the pain.

We can change our reaction to these reminders by stopping ourselves and reframing our thinking. We can control what we think if we make the effort. When a tear comes to your eye remember a smile and the warm love of the past. Do not focus on what you have lost but instead focus upon what good that you did have.

Let a picture bring a smile to your heart. Let the times of suffering fade into the back of your mind and the memories of joy, fun, pleasure and just living life move in and take up the front of your mind when you remember a beloved who has passed over.

Until you heal from the wound in your heart, take a few moments every day to write in your journal a thank you note to your parent for some special thing that they did for you while you were growing up. And, then, take a moment to write a note or make a phone call to some one that you love who is still in your life to thank them for something special they have done for you now.

The past and the present can walk in harmony. It is up to you to write your own memory songs and sing them like a gentle lullaby to your inner child that will always miss a parent who has gone away.

Today, won’t you share with us a beautiful memory of the love and the wonder that made you who you are because of a special parent’s gift to you? You were the miracle of your mother and father – share it with the world in kindness to self and others. Define you with a state of grace and love.