A Honey Hijacking

I can’t stand it any longer! I was just going to make a little comment on Brooke’s latest blog entry but after reading 11 of some of your priceless comments and suggestions I hope Brooke will allow me to hijack her blog one more time with a little grandmotherly editorial.

First of all...”Bad Habits” might have been titled “Little Phases” and boy did Brooke and her brother, Brent put me through their fair share, but then what mother doesn’t have these woes to tell (thus the 11+ blog comments).


Let me name just a few “Little Phases” that I can vividly remember throughout sweet Brooke’s 30+ years of life. I took Brooke for her 1 year check-up. She still wasn’t walking. Expressing some concern to our pediatrician, he nonchalantly stated that she was “too young to check for Down’s Syndrome”. Needless to say I freaked out, called our good psychologist friend, David Koch who calmly and wisely told me that there was nothing in the world wrong with Brooke other than she was too fat to walk. He assured me she would be up and walking in no time. I wasn’t completely convinced until one day while I was filling her bottle with Similac. I need to hit the pause button here and explain that at the time, I had Brent who was 2 years, Brooke just turned 1 year and life was cuckoo. So, back to my story, I cracked open that can of thick, creamy formula and as I was pouring it straight into her bottle when I just happened to notice the large letters that read CONCENTRATE. Oops, the light bulb on! No wonder my darling little roly poly wasn’t walking I had been feeding her non-diluted formula for 1/2 of her little life. She quickly changed to regular milk and was indeed walking in no time. Crisis over.



Skip to middle school, 7th grade cheerleader tryouts. Brooke was the only one of all of her friends that didn’t make cheerleader. Oh a heartbreaking and certainly life-scarring event. Every Friday all the cheerleaders wore their cheerleading outfits to school, you know...school spirit, getting the student body all fired up for the big game on Saturday, the important stuff in life. During football season every Friday, around 11:00 I would get a call from the school nurse (who happened to be a friend of mine) telling me Brooke was feeling a little “under-the-weather”. So every Friday I would go pick her up and we would spend the rest of the day together. Brooke would lie listlessly on the sofa, and we would have heart-to-heart talks about how she would need to let this be a character building time and the next Friday finish out the school day--among all the cheerleader uniforms. Yet, each Friday I continued to get calls and each Friday we continued to spend together. Fortunately, 8th & 9th grade try-outs proved more successful and Brooke ended up among the chosen elected and the Friday puniness was no longer an issue. In fact by the time 9th grade ended Brooke decided she wasn’t really cut out for the whole cheerleader thing and that was the end of that career and that crisis as well!



Fast forward to high school. Steve and I were going out of town and leaving the kids unattended for the first time. Strict instructions and promises were made by all parties. There were to be no people/parties of any kind in our house while we were gone. Brooke got busted, big time! Grounded for 6 weeks for breaking the rules and I was certain I had not one but two juvenile delinquent teens on our hands and spent countless hours talking with other parents about how to reign in our terrifying teens. Well, it took both kids getting out of college for that little “phase” to end, but indeed it too passed. Whew! We made it through parenthood! Nothing to it...

Oh not so fast. Just when you have finished raising your children, realizing they have become wonderful adults, that make you proud and grateful and you think you are coasting...you get a call from your precious daughter. You can tell immediately from the tone of her voice that something is not quite right and the hair on the back of your neck goes up, those mothering instincts come alive.

It was about this time last year when Brooke and Jared discovered there would be a problem with the little baby she was carrying. Each month the concerns with the Omphalocele seemed to grow larger and more serious. I watched my little girl be so strong, so courageous, so determined to fight to do everything in her might to allow their little one the best life possible. While Brooke was tough I, on the other hand was falling apart, in a heap of tears, in fear not only for my grandchild, but perhaps even more for my daughter, yet her resolve was steadfast. Then came Harper! Once again this “phase” of life thankfully passed.



So you see, I can have a chuckle at Brooke’s little worries over pacifiers and napping habits because I know that these are simply little phases and there will be so so many more to come. All of you young mothers reading this blog will face struggles with your children, some stages will be more difficult, more challenging, more concerning than others but there will never be anything more rewarding, more worthwhile or more priceless than the years you spend raising your children. I read once that motherhood was “going through life with your heart outside your body" no words have ever rung so true.

For what it’s worth and with all my love to all of you sweet mommies,
Janet