Parenting Is..

Parenting is that first grey hair you notice in your mane and actually wondering what took it so long to get here.

Parenting is getting bit while nursing then crying because you werent ready to stop nursing yet. Rza getting mad because you got mad and trying to decide if nursing is for her anymore. Parenting is also extreme joy when Rza decides that she does want to keep nursing and shes not too grown yet.

Parenting is asking your 7 year old son about the girl that he likes and not flipping out on him because "omg hes into girls already." Actually having conversations about how to treat the little girl that he likes and how to be respectful.

Parenting is looking at your children every day and seeing the changes. Growing as tall as you and accomplishing new milestones and shedding a small tear every single time.

Parenting is my life and i wouldnt change it for the world.

I recently noticed I was in this group on facebook called Empowered Planning and everyone was talking about the planners they've gotten.  My first question was, how did I get put into this group? And whats so special about these planners? So I started paying attention to the posts that were made and what everyone was talking about. Getting the planners is to help get organized, get a timeline of what you want to accomplish, set goals, PLAN.  I remember telling my friend who is also in this group that I didnt think I needed a planner since I use the calendar on my phone to plan everything. What was the point of getting yet another thing to carry around in my already heavy backpack. Reluctantly I still got one and its is nothing fancy compared to the posts Ive seen with stickers, and different sections, binders, the works.
As time goes along, this group plans an outing to a local coffee shop so we can all make vision boards for what we are "planning" to do with ourselves, our goals, dreams etc. The event was nice, it was a room full of beautiful women who are wanting a change and trying to figure out how to do it.
We have been going through our own minor set back at home, and it seems like this group came right on time for me. I've been talking about not wanting to be in corporate anymore and having an idea of the direction I want to go, but havent done anything to get me in motion, as if the opportunity is going to just pay for itself and fall in my lap. So as we are planning our come up as a home, we have also been planning our own come ups as individuals. Of course Sr is working on his music and the different avenues that he is going to take, while Ive decided that I want to be a health coach. Yes health coach, mental health, physical health, spiritual health, nutritional, etc. I want to be able to help people, which I guess is the reason why I always get drawn back to customer service.
Being in this group doing our vision boards, and knowing the strength that I have to manifest has really got me working to make this happen. At our meetup, one of the admins asked what we wanted from this sisterhood and I said "accountability." I wanted to be held accountable for doing what I said I want to do, for making sure Im working on ME. Yes I get support at home, but I also know that we allow each other to slack off as well, and Ive slacked long enough. I want a change so Im going to have to make it happen. Im glad I did get this planner, I literally just wrote to myself for the remaining months about class, and if I have started them yet as I was typing this.
I know that I always tell folks to write down the things that they want because that helps to make them manifest, but somehow I never seem to follow my own guidance. Well, thanks to these wonderful ladies in Empowered Planning, Im writing! I will be a health coach, and I will start my classes by December 2017. If your'e reading this, check in on me, see how its going, make me accountable for the words I put out into the universe.

7 months and counting.

Well almost 7 months,  that my sweet baby Rza has been gracing us with her presence. Almost 7 months that I have been breastfeeding her as well. Im super proud of myself with this because I didnt last more than 3 months with her older brother. When I decided to go down this path, I made my goal a year even though I had no idea what I was going to do when it came to feeding/pumping at work or where to start. I also had no idea that I would go through a period of trying to maintain my supply as well. I reached out to various groups on Facebook to see what others have done to help maintain their supply and had been told things like fenugreek, Gatorade, oatmeal, beer, you name it. I decided that I was going to go the fenugreek route even though I was running the risk of smelling like maple syrup on a regular basis. I will admit, during the week, I did great taking my pills around the same time each day, but on the weekends, you were lucky if I even opened up the medicine cabinet at all. I did notice that I was able to maintain an average of  11oz Monday through Friday since I nursed on demand on the weekends, but I cant help but to wonder if I took the pills on the weekend as well if the results would have been better.  It wasn't until we came back from a music festival in Ohio that I noticed a big drop in production, Im talking a total of 5oz pumped one day and 7oz the next. At that rate, Ill never be able to keep up with sweet baby and her needs since shes eating about 14 oz a day. Oy Vey! Since I am out of the fenugreek and Ive done a little bit more research, Ive decided to start taking Milk Thistle this time around and go hard on the mothers milk tea as well.  I will be more diligent on taking my pills on the weekend, although the tea may suffer if we are in motion and its hot outside. I was also fortunate enough to order a batch of emergency lactation brownies from milky-mama.com and am anxiously awaiting those to come. Stress is a factor that can help deplete milk, and I thought I was doing a good job managing it, so Im not really sure as to why Im seeing such a decrease, but here I am. Its all good though, I set a goal for a year and as of tomorrow (the 5th) I will have successfully breastfed for 7 months, I only have 5 more to go, and as quick as August rolled up on us, Im sure January will do the same.  Ill update this post with results of the milk thistle and the emergency brownies, until then...

Peace

Bop the Barbarian

You may or may not know that Sr calls me Bop and you may or may not know that "the Barbarian" has been added to that name. Heres the reason why:  In our old house, we had a mouse. Pachino (our bluepitt) saw it in the kitchen and went in for the attack with me following behind with the broom. Long story short, I ended up bopping the mouse over the head to kill it and get rid of it. I actually added a few notches to the handle of me vs the mouse in that house. Since Sr doesnt do mice, I was the dubbed killer of all things grey that like cheese. So fast forward to this past week or so and the new adventures of Bop the Barbarian.

Bella (our german shepherd) was barking at 230am, and it wasnt that obnoxious bark she normally does, so i went to go see whats going on. I walk to the window and behold a  possum sitting on the fence looking at Bella as shes sitting there barking. I pull Bella inside since we've recently conquered a rat together (picture the killer whale flinging the sea lion around before eating it) and you have Bella catching the rat the other day. Any who so I bring her inside and she gets to making noise so I'm trying to kick her out again so I can get a couple more minutes of sleep before that 430am alarm. I grab the outside broom thinking the possum is playing dead I can just push him off the fence into the neighbors yard. Its 230, Im half sleep, barefoot and armed with a broom trying to take on a possum. smh  So I walk over there and jab the broom at it a few times, it MAKES EYE CONTACT WITH ME and it gave me that look like "Do it again and see what happens."  After we had a 3 second stare down, I gave up, apologized and kept Bella in the house because all I could picture was this possum coming at me like a rabid flying squirrel. Its 230 in the am, Sr is sleep in the front of the house and no one would have heard me scream if this thing decided to get froggy and jump, so I politely put the broom back and took my tail and Bellas tail to bed asking for forgiveness. Needless to say, there is still a possum running around our neighborhood, who has officially punked Bop the Barbarian. lol 

social media-less

I decided to do a social media fast for a few days and deactivated my facebook on my phone along with removing the icons off my home screen. I felt like it was time to stop and breathe for a moment. Due to one of these groups Im in, I was being bombarded with a lot of information and it seemed like I didnt have time to digest any of it, so a step back was needed. My goal by doing this was to put the phone down and ground myself more. Turns out all the information I was getting was all saved to my phone, all my books, any thing that needed to be transferred to my book, etc. so I still ended up with my phone in my hand a lot. The good thing about doing this was that it forced me to read some of the material that I have and also talk more with people in my life. Yes the communication was still via text, but I feel like I did more conversing with people in these past 3 days than I have in a minute, I was definitely more engaged in the conversation.That first night of not having any fb, twitter or ig to look at truly had me questioning my life, like what did we do before these smart phones? What do I do with myself now that I have nothing to look at?  Do I really spend that much time on social media like that?  Turns out I do. I noticed my battery life lasted a little longer in the result of my phone being so dry. lol Talk about no action. Its all good though, Ill be jumping back on in the car on the way to this music festival tomorrow, but this is something that I think I will be doing more of on a regular basis.  I definitely recommend everyone taking a couple of days from the social state, enjoy the things in front of you and be in the moment.

Lessons

The most important lesson I've learned thus far in life is to trust your intuition, even if you dont agree with it. Another thing that I have learned is that just because something is more challenging than anything Ive ever experienced doesn't mean that I can turn my back on it and quit.  I will also say this, I hate when my husband is right. LOL

Lesson: Trust your intuition. I had 11 days until my house would be a party of 4 plus a dog. Our notice had been given to have Little Buddy removed from our home at his request, he said he no longer wanted to be in our home, so i started the process. Sr and I were in the car yesterday waiting for LB bus to drop him off and were talking about him leaving our house. It was expressed that we are not going to do him any justice by letting him go and everyone that has come in contact with this child thus far has failed him, hence the reason for his actions. Its only 4 months and we were throwing in the towel, well mainly me i guess. Although I was ready to be a party of 4, my intuition is saying the same thing as Sr,  we need to keep LB here. My reason for wanting to do foster care was to make a difference in our youth, even if it's just 1 I know I've helped. How can I make a difference in person in only 4 months? I expect that everything wrong he knows is supposed to be corrected within that 4 months, when Im 31 and I still struggle with correcting some of my wrongs? Sr intuition told him we were making a mistake and hes right.  This journey has been frustrating in many ways, but through those frustrations, progress is being made. With a little more time, effort and patience more progress can be made and hopefully Little Buddy will have that "ah ha" moment and make better choices.


We shall see.

Its happened again. Another child has been murdered at the hands of the police, this time he was 15 and like most, if not all; he was unarmed. He was in the car as the passenger riding away from a party with his brother, when the police said the car "reversed in an aggressive manor towards him" and shot this poor child in the head with the rifle. 15 years old. 15. My god. Jr will be 7 years old in a matter of days and with this homicide, its a reality check for me. I  hate that one of the things that comes to mind as my son gets older is the odds of him having a negative encounter with those who are paid to protect and serve him. Granted 7 isnt 15, but hell Tamir was 12 when he was murdered. The bottom line is he's still a melanated seed in a world that doesnt love him.


A friend of mine posted to facebook that her grandmother prayed and asked to stay alive until she was 18, long enough to make sure she would be able to be on her own. I totally understand why her grandmother asked that, but anymore 18 isnt enough either. You can do everything right as a parent, give your seed all the knowledge in the world and do your best to show them how to apply it. Hell, they can do everything right, only to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I hate to say it, but having a baby girl will change how you look at everything and everyone. Seeing crimes against children and babies always pissed me off, but now that I have my own baby girl, it hurts and angers me more now. I pray that I am here to protect and keep my babies as much as humanly possible. Sigh..

From 1 to 3

Remember how my last post I said I was due any day now, and that I hope I made a difference in little buddys life with that one weekend? Well guess what? The baby has made her entrance and little buddy is now a resident of the house. We went from 1 to 3 in a matter of 2 weeks, talk about change.

This journey that we are on right now, its a bit bumpy, but you know what, it is one with lessons. We are all not only adjusting during this period, but we are also learning, Learning about each other and more importantly ourselves. I knew that when we had Rza life was going to be different, less sleep, more crying, smelly diapers, the works. What I had not planned for was to have a new baby and a new bonus kid at the same time and trying to figure both of them out and how to function with them.

It will be almost 2 months that Rza has blessed us, she is sleeping more, smiling more and even starting to coo at us. Although she tends to be a bit fussy at times, I wouldn't have her any other way. She is the night to Jrs day. Even at 2 months I can tell the difference in them, when he was a baby he was goofy and always smiling. With her, shes very serious and observant. Yes she smiles at you, but you have to work for that smile and even then sometimes its a one sided smile, just enough to show you her one dimple. This is her every day look at you while you sit there and talk baby and make faces at her.

Little buddy has done some good adjustment since being with us as well. He is still getting along with Jr as well as two boys who are the same age can. There is a lot of fussing, name calling and farting that happens in that room but at the end of the day they are "big bro" and "little bro." From what I've observed thus far, I think little buddy feels comfortable and accepted in our house. Hell as much as him and Jr get in trouble, he should know that he belongs here. But I think it's what he needed. He is around a family that looks like him, and treats him like one of their own with no favorites. I am glad that he is with us, he is teaching me about myself and making me have to adjust and adapt. Its a process that's for sure. 

Well here's to another chapter in our book. 

Peace and blessings 

New lessons 2 days in.

Its the 2nd day of the new year and i can say im already learning. This past weekend was the first time our house hosted a foster child, although we have been a foster house for a little under a year now. When the agency initially called me, they were looking to place this young melanated 7 year old boy in a family that resembled him, and was a 2 parent house hold. I was told that he was coming from the sticks of Ky and was getting a lot of racial comments made towards him. Immediately, Sr and I said yes just because of those circumstances alone. A few weeks had gone by and i hadnt heard anything, so i figured the social worker changed their mind. *shrugs shoulders* it is what it is.  A week before christmas, i get a call saying they want to place him with us for the weekend to see how he does, so i set it up to take him  nye weekend not really knowing what to expect.  Now ive been around foster kids before since my mother in law has had them for as long as i can remember, but to actually be the "mom," i had no idea what to expect, especially being pregnant and due any day now. Turns out being a foster mom isn't as scary as i thought it would be especially when you have a good kid who listens.  We got lil buddy home that Friday night and did pizza and movies  to get him comfortable and situated.  It was a relief to see him and jr instantly click and start playing pokemon cards and talk. When it was time to eat, dude ate one piece of pizza when i had made 2 of them expecting for him to be ready to eat. Ok, no big deal, hes still feeling us out not really knowing what to expect, i get it. Next day he said he wanted just 1 egg to eat for breakfast, but quickly realized all was well here and asked for seconds. That was a great moment for me because he was comfortable enough to ask for more to eat. #winning The weekend turned out just fine having dude here, he only had one accident and was proud of himself that it hadnt happened after that first night and even asked for chores. (A child after my heart) lol When it was time to bring him back, my heart hurt. I know youre not supposed to get emotionally attached in situations like this, but how can you not? I like to think that this weekend, dude didn't have to worry about a thing, other than cleaning up toys. I have no clue what his normal day to day life is like, but i hope while he was here he had no worries. This weekend has given me a memory i wont forget. My first experience as a foster mother was conquered, its possible and i feel like we have made a small difference in his life, even if its only a good memory.  I remember talking to someone when we first thought about becoming foster parents and being asked why. My response was that i want to help my people. I cant be out doing activism work, and people are always so quick to either blame the youth or write them off, so with them is where i want to try and make a difference. This weekend, i feel like i did. 💜