Connection with Our Co-Parents

Finding time to connect in a big way is challenging. Especially when connection has been lacking for a while. 

My husband and I didn’t have much connection for a long time. And it was rough. Trust and cooperation are scarce when we aren’t connected. 

So now, my husband and I have a daily connection plan: after the kids are asleep, we spend five minutes together. 

Just five minutes.

Some nights it turns into longer, but there is no pressure for it to.

On the late nights…the extra challenging nights…those nights where we just want to fall onto bed… five minutes together won’t hurt our “schedule”. But those five minutes will be wonderful for our connection, our relationship, our family, and our lives. 

☮️🧡

Interesting Characters

by Dena Birmingham

Public transportation. There is always at least one interesting character when one rides public transportation.

A homeless person lying across a row of seats riding the bus aimlessly just for the warmth.

A young man in black clothes muttering to himself angrily and punctuating his comments with a fist to the seatback in front of him.

A plump, older lady wearing pink lipstick and a hat the queen could wear to tea.

As I looked around the bus, I noticed there were no interesting characters riding today. Everyone looked pretty bland. Bored, tired faces heading home from work. Some reading or listening to an MP3 player. No oddballs or quirky folks. Weird.

My stop was coming. I put my book into my backpack and slid my arms into the straps. My stop arrived. I bent down and heaved up my computer monitor. The place a worked was throwing it away. I was so lucky to snag it.

As I waddled off the bus with my 25 pounds of cathode ray computer monitor, I again found myself wondering where the interesting character was.

 

A Clean Kitchen

Last week, I cleaned the kitchen. I cleaned it in anger. My rage powering each swipe of the sponge.

My daughter was mad at me. She had shouted at me blame after blame. Everything that makes her unhappy is my fault.

I couldn’t hear her. Ego was screaming and running up and down the aisle of my Brain Bus. My inner child, the one that was forced to wear dresses with itchy lace, feels threatened and rages at the accusations. Her screams trigger Ego to a higher pitch and he gets louder and louder.

My daughter was struggling.
My daughter was having a hard time.

My baby needed me.

But the bitch inside my head, the scared, lonely, inner child was driving my bus and I shouted back. I defended myself!

I couldn’t hear my daughter’s message. “I need you. My feelings are too big and I need you, mommy”. The message was clear, but I still missed it.

So I shouted back at her until she stormed off and then I angry-cleaned the kitchen. Because that’s what kids really need from their momma: a clean kitchen.