Watering Your Roots

There is this unfortunate thing that happens when you are the proprietor of a bed of lettuce and summer hands you a string of hot, sunny days.

They start to bolt.

This means they grow straight up into the air, with leaves that are tough and bitter, as opposed to growing more tender leaves around the base that are good for eating and harvesting.

The only way to protect them from bolting is to water them faithfully, particularly during hot days. Which I couldn’t do when we were traveling.

Even though this summer has had so much sweetness – babies swimming! Big kids around! Visiting family near Lake Winnepesaukee, and then splashing in the rivers near our condo in the White Mountains near North Conway, NH. Slow lazy mornings and fun evenings at the pool, with lots of fresh fruit and veggies and enough hot dogs and s’mores to make kids happy – I still had to admit that I knew how those lettuce plants felt in the heat of the summer sun.  When we got home and saw that they had bolted, I mourned the loss tender romaine and butter leaves at the ready for salads and sandwiches. But I realized this phenomenon was a great way to describe how moms of kids in the summer might be feeling too. Lots of hot sunny days and not enough time to water our roots can make our leaves tough and bitter, too.

My mantra this first year of having twins is to be aware that my life has fallen into a black hole temporarily, and be gentle on yourself. But I am not good at stagnating. Like, at all. I have to be growing in some area to feel alive. Having new experiences – travel, food, writing, learning – are easy ways to grow. But not easy when you have twin babies.

I was most definitely bolting.

So I quickly took stock. My husband and I decided to cancel our upcoming trip to Pemaquid, Maine. It’s where my novel was set, where we feel very alive with the wild ocean and fresh seafood. Instead we stayed home, cleaned out our attic before our new au pair arrives in a few weeks (hallelujah). It felt so good to throw away bags of things we didn’t need, and I felt my stress falling off of me as stuff got hauled away. It wasn’t traveling and experiencing new things, but instead putting my life in order, that brought me happiness and peace.

Likewise, I trimmed back the overgrowth in our front yard when the babies napped and weeded all of our beds with my kids. When the babies woke up, we set their circles of neglect in the shade, where they watched us bend up and down with so much curiosity they barely made a peep. Somehow all that hard work made me feel…better. Calmer. Less veering out of control-y.

I made plans with my best friend from college to meet at Mass at BC with the babies while the big kids went camping with their dad (who would make an excellent professional nature guide if he wasn’t so good at his current job. If you see Rob, ask him to tell you about the bears). Being on campus connected me to my 20 year old self in unexpected ways and reminded me, even though my current life was heavy and my roots were thirsty, I had lived other lives, had been in rich soil which helped me grow. That there were seasons in life, and a growing season would come again.

I hired a sitter for a day not so I could work or entertain my older kids, but just so my best friend and I could spend the day relaxing and talking and eating, which filled me up in so many ways. I am so thankful for her friendship and her driving out here to water the roots of it.

I started a 30 Day Health Program with Isagenix. It’s worked for me in the past, and I was waiting to stop nursing to start. For the last two weeks, I’ve worked out with my oldest son who is getting ready for football conditioning in a few weeks. Turns out he is the best workout buddy as he motivates me on the days I am not feeling it and vice versa. It feels like next-level parenting to multi-task excercise with him. Our jumping around also elicits much wide-eyed starting from the babies as they sit on the rug next to us.

After my PMDD came roaring back a few months ago, I knew I had to do something, since it made me jittery and snappy with my husband and kids. It is like having depression and anxiety for the ten days before your period, and it made me so sympathetic to those that have it all the time. Stress tends to exacerbate it. I researched the nutrition I needed to battle these hormone issues (read: I watched a lot of YouTube videos made by women who have it). This 5-HTP supplement is ahh-mazing for PMS/PMDD, especially with 1 gram of melatonin during the last two weeks of your cycle, since together they increase your brain’s serotonin levels naturally. And so is this one since it helps to break down the excessive amount of Estrogen that triggers most of the symptoms. If you think you fit the profile for having PMDD or other hormone related issues, these have helped me so much I wanted to share in case they can help someone else. Please research their use if they sound like they could help you. One thing to know is that it is really important to just use the 5-HTP + melatonin for just the last two weeks of your cycle so your body still produces them on its own, and don’t use it if you are on any SSRI’s. I am only one month in, but so thankful for the results. It’s eliminated my PMDD symptoms by almost 90%. In other words, while I used to feel like the Dementors in Harry Pottery were sucking my face, now I feel like myself. (Please be kind to judging this info as it feels very hard to share but I am doing it in case anyone else has those dementors in their life. It sucks.)

I finally mapped out the novel that was knocking on my brain and started to research it. Now it gets chewed on all day while I am rocking babies and folding laundry, and I dive in writing when I have a sitter. I’m thrilled and excited to be writing fiction again.  And I picked up Kristin Lavransdatter again on our trip and can’t put it down. I feel lost and adrift if I am not reading a good book, and consequently feel solid and found when I am. Writing and reading aren’t just watering my roots, they’re adding  nourishment to my soil. (Side note/mildly funny story: Last week I was in front of the row of books at Target with the twins in my 2 (!) carts. A group of older ladies walked by and one of them said, ‘Oh dear, you don’t have time to read with those babies do you?’ I just stared wide-eyed and said, ‘the babies make me need to read more’! I love when people refer to reading as self-care, because its true.)

I tried hard to reach out to others and avoid getting isolated. I texted friends and made plans. Blueberry picking with the kids. Dinner at the pool. Dinner without kids at the new restaurant that just opened. Date nights with Rob. I brought my sister with special needs her favorite dinner at my mom’s house. My other sister met us at the fair with her kids while Rob stayed with the babies for the first time solo. (Now that I think about it, our babies have really rolled with our schedule and done so well with most of our fun outings. So thankful for their flexible natures.) Next up: taking them all to an outdoor concert with friends.

Of course, the quickest way to water our roots is to pray. A few lovely novenas felt like they dumped extra water on my roots and perked my spiritual life right up. This one to St. Anne whose feast day is tomorrow has been beautiful, and I swear it feels like taking mom vitamins since as the mother to Blessed Mother, I think she has a soft spot for mothers. (I’ve also heard great things about this book and am looking forward to reading it.)

These efforts have paid off. Little by little, I feel more like myself. Like my new leaves are more tender and soft. I know it’s a function of the babies getting older and sleeping more, and of seeking help for my health issues, but I also know that trying to proactively carve out ways to do the things that nourish my roots is essential. (Lest you read this and think any part of it says I have my act together – I had to binge a late-to-the-party Game of Thrones addiction to the very last episode just to get it out of my life.)

My time-wasting journey into GOT aside, I know that self-discipline, when you can dig down and find it, is always the best path to growth. And yours no doubt looks different then mine. Maybe it’s Weight Watchers and knitting or Work out classes at the gym and your side business that get you closer to your best self. To water your roots. Either way, finding a way to tend to each part of you – your mind, your soul, and your heart – always pays dividends. Like lettuce gardens and unruly attics and front yards, it’s often about pruning and weeding to get to order and goodness.

So these are the things that are helping me in this season. I’d love to hear about what’s helping you, since I am currently still failing at keeping my house clean and having my five year old reliably wearing matching shoes. So leave a message in the comments and let me know.

p.s. If your lettuce plants do bolt, the gardening rule is to break off the top part of the plant, and wait for cooler temperatures and they’ll start growing tender leaves again. Which as a mom sounds a lot like ‘when school starts you’ll have more time to take care of yourself and you’ll feel more balanced.’ But maybe that’s just me.