DC Metro Moms

Confessions of a Recovering Germaphobe

I’ve always been a bit of a neat freak, trying to keep the house organized, things properly filed in the filing cabinet, the kitchen scrubbed down with spotless floors, bathrooms without a stray hair or spots on the mirror. I’m far from a perfect housekeeper as evidenced by the lack of dusting, but general neatness and cleanliness is important to me. When I was in the nesting phase of my first pregnancy, I had a few moments when I was convinced the house would never be clean enough. Fortunately for my loving husband he was off on business trips when I would go off on a cleaning jag.

My neat freak backslide started after the birth. I had complications during labor and delivery and was physically weak for a couple weeks after. Thankfully we had family to help, but I clearly remember thinking, “If I don’t mop the floor every few days, it won’t be such a big deal.” That was my downfall.

This Isn't What I Planned

I’m a type A planner and organizer—a girlfriend once told me I was Type A++—and I’ve always had a plan for what I wanted to do even though it hasn’t always worked out as anticipated. At an early age I decided I wanted to be a teacher, probably because I enjoyed school so much, and I became a teacher. From the time I first thought of having my own children, I knew I would stay home with them until they were all in school full-time, and back when I was in the classroom I thought my teaching career would sync perfectly with the family since we would be roughly on the same schedules. I decided to be a teacher when I was a young girl and thought I would be a teacher forever.

My career focus changed 12 years ago when I transitioned into training and instructional design, and feel like I really found my calling in designing learning materials. But we also began having children in my mid 30s, right about the time when I wanted to be working hard on my career. Fortunately my then employer had flexible work opportunities and I was able to work from home for three years. After that I did some other work and have pursued other instructional design opportunities with flexible work options, but in the last few years our lives have changed dramatically and I find myself shifting towards yet another path, one I never planned or prepared for.

Keeping On

My summer resolution to get back in shape and lose some weight is slowly showing results. I started a boot camp back in May and have been getting myself out of bed on Saturday mornings to (hopefully) work my butt off. My weekday workouts have become more regular with my husband’s help with the boys and in July I started spinning at home at 5 am five times a week. The spinning workouts have really helped my endurance and I like that I don’t have to drive anywhere at the crack of dawn to get some exercise. And along with increasing endurance and strength, I’ve finally started dropping weight and not gaining it back the next week, a total of 10 pounds so far. Not nearly as much as I would like but every little bit counts.

Even after all these weeks of boot camp plus the spinning, the boot camp still kicks my butt every time. Most days I get to the 30 minute mark thinking I’ve made it through pretty well, then our instructor Kelly throws in some twist that leaves me gasping for air or groaning in pain, usually some tough cardio burst or ab routine.

During our most recent boot camp workout, the killer was the 50 pushups followed by the tricep pushups, all towards the end of our 60 minute workout.

How Free Public Healthcare in Australia Saved Me

In the summer of 1992 I took a 10-week trip through Australia and New Zealand. One of the many things I eagerly anticipated was the opportunity for horseback riding, something I had enjoyed in my childhood and sorely missed as an adult. I signed up for two rides, one on the beach at Magnetic Island which is off the coast of Queensland near Townsville, and the other at Ross River in the Northern Territory east of Alice Springs. The group ride at Magnetic Island was magnificent, even though the horse they assigned me was a Clydesdale with the name…get this…Clyde. He was truly a gentle giant and I had a wonderful time though I earned a few saddle sores that day and my rear end hasn’t been the same since. Clydesdale aren’t exactly known for their smooth gait. We took a ride to the beach and ran the horses up and down the sand for a while, and then for a treat rode them bareback into the water. Clyde loved that part and thankfully he didn’t roll in the water like a couple of the others.

I should have stopped after that ride because no rides in my memory could ever top that one, but I wanted to ride in the Outback as well. The morning I got up for the group ride at Ross River I should have changed me mind. Let’s just say my horse didn’t want to go for a ride that day and tossed me after only a few minutes. We were already out in a rocky area and I was really fortunate not to land on or hit my head on any of the rocks. I landed on my back in a hard spot, rolled into a really prickly bush, and just laid there face down, unable to move. A few minutes later the others riders came looking for me after my horse streaked past them, riderless. Two of them rolled me over (bad idea) and I threw up. A couple of the riders went back to the cabins and got help. A dusty truck drove up and they carefully lifted me in and drove me back to my cabin. Though I felt a lot of pain in my upper back I couldn’t feel anything below my waist.

It's Not a Video Game Ban, Just A Deferral

This spring we bought our two older sons, ages 5 and 6, kid-tough digital cameras. It seemed like a good idea because Builder Guy (6) constantly asks me to make videos of him and his brothers, and Top Gun (5) likes to sneak off with my camera and hide under the dining room table while snapping all sorts of pictures of the table legs, chairs, curtains, carpet, dust bunnies, and wine bottles. He’d practically filled a 2 gigabyte compact flash card, which I didn’t realize until I got the friendly “CF card is full” message after snapping just five photos during our recent trip to Germany. Of course I had left the hotel without a spare card, so I had to plop myself down on the curb while I impatiently deleted zillions of blurry photos of my dining room.

The boys were very excited when we gave them the cameras and they laughed and chased each other around as they took pictures, mostly of their feet and furniture, and tried to make videos with the familiar low-budget shake-and-make-me-vomit camera style. After the excitement of that wore off, they started playing with the buttons to see what else the camera could do, and that’s when some very uncamera-like noises got my attention.

Summer Boot Camp Kicks My Butt, But Not as Fast As I Want

Now that I’ve done boot camp for seven weeks, I can honestly say it hasn’t been as hard as I thought it would be to get up on Saturday morning and work my butt off. Yes, the workout is tough and at the end I feel like I can barely drag my bag of weights back to the car, but all the effort is paying off. I feel very motivated to get out of bed and get to it because I’m seeing results and can tell that I’m reshaping my body. I’m getting stronger and have more endurance than when I started, and for the first time in my life I can actually do full pushups (aka toe pushups). At the beginning I could only one full pushup, and at my last assessment I did 17 before falling onto my face with pain streaking through my arms. Of course I did that assessment before doing the workout, because after one of these workouts I’m pretty pleased if I can do five full pushups.

The hardest part has been ensuring I get in the weekly homework, which amounts to two more workouts plus some light cardio and stretching on other days. My husband and I worked out a schedule where he makes an effort to get home at a reasonable time, then he watches the boys while I get in my workout, which is the only way I can do this. Summer vacation has just started and already the boys are climbing all over me. During the day I can’t even go to the bathroom without an entourage, never mind spend 45 minutes with weights and aerobics.

Where's My Vacation Mental Reset Button?

When my husband had to go to a recent conference in Germany, I jumped at the opportunity to tag along. I had a wonderful time, and though I missed my boys I also enjoyed a much needed break for myself. I could wake up on my own schedule, have a leisurely breakfast with a little pot of tea, and go sight-seeing all over Stuttgart and nearby towns without worrying about losing one or all of my three little guys.

After husband’s daily meetings we even had meals at nice restaurants without kids crawling under the table, standing in the chairs, smearing food on the table or in hair, annoying each other, yelling about something they see across the room, or announcing to everyone in the restaurant that they had pooped on the potty. We took strolls after dinner and had real conversations with other adults, including one fun evening in which we shared a table with a German couple and passed the time trying out our German while they tried out their English.

The best part of the trip was that I allowed myself to relax and not worry about the boys; they were in good hands with the grandparents, after all. We called home each day to check in, but otherwise I just had fun. My vacation brain was not ready to come back to reality

Losing a Friend

When I picked up our 6 year old son from school on Friday afternoon, he told me that two of his classmates, twin brother and sister, were leaving. I asked him how he felt about that and he said he was sad as he hugged me in front of school. On the surface it may not seem like a big deal as the DC area is notoriously transient, but in our home it was a major breakthrough for our son who has an autism spectrum disorder and doesn’t form attachments easily.

Until this year he has never formed a bond with any of his classmates, and the majority of his interactions are still in parallel. He rarely mentioned anyone except his teachers, and even that was only peripherally. Occasionally he would make a book with the name of all of his classmates, but that was as far as it went, so we knew this particular boy was someone important when our son began to mention this boy in conversation earlier in the school year.

Summer Boot Camp

It’s May and my plan to train my three young boys in proper behavior while Mommy gets some exercise is not working out as I had hoped. I haven’t given up, but I’ve taken to getting in quick bits of exercise here and there. The Twittercize guy keeps me on my toes for at least a few minutes each hour, and when the weather cooperates I do a stroller jog/walk to pick up the kids from school. I sneak in some Pilates or yoga when I’m not out in the garden on the days Monkey Boy takes a nap, a habit he is fighting and I’m coaxing him to continue. I count my gardening activities as some form of exercise, even if my heart rate doesn’t get up there quite like a good aerobics and weights session with The Firm. I tried the 30 Day Shred but just couldn’t get into it for some reason. In other words, I still don’t have a regular exercise routine and it’s getting on my nerves.

Some of my neighborhood girl friends told me about a boot camp they’ve been doing on Saturday mornings and invited me to join them for the summer 16-week session. It’s held outdoors, rain or shine, and I had visions of a large 65-pound pack on my back while running through rain and crawling through mud with R. Lee Ermey (Full Metal Jacket) or Eileen Brennan (Private Benjamin) in my face telling me I’ll never make it as a Marine or a soldier, both of which would be true. At the very least I knew I wouldn’t be relaxing into downward-facing dog while listening to some of my favorite meditation and yoga music during this workout. Well, crazy me, I signed up for the boot camp anyway and started this past weekend.

Hope for a Cure, or At Least Hope for Insurance

Ever since our oldest son was identified as having an autism spectrum disorder, our family has focused on getting him as much assistance as possible in school and at home. We’ve never had hope for a cure, just hope that all the therapy will help him to learn the social skills he needs to function well in life. He’s had speech therapy and attended a six week summer camp that focused on communication skills, and we were very encouraged after that program. With the assistance he received via his IEP, he was able to successfully transition from preschool to kindergarten and adapt to his new environment and routine. He communicates about his school day with the help of a visual daily journal that outlines the activities he participates in and helps him express his feelings about the day, a huge improvement from previous years when he could only state his teacher’s name and couldn’t describe the activities. All of this is helpful, but it’s not a cure.