Running a Family is like Running a Business

March 4, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Group Of Friends. 3d Rendered Illustration by cooldesign

I have many clients who are involved in family businesses or who are consultants for family businesses. One question that is raised often is how do you create harmony when dealing with so many different personalities? I would like to address this issue today for all families, not just those in family business. Let’s face it; the “business” of running a family is not much different than the business of running a company.

First of all there needs to be clear leadership. A boss if you will. In my family growing up, that was my Father. That is not to say that my Mom wasn’t in charge most days. She absolutely was but when the buck needed to stop when the “you know what” hit the fan, my Dad was the top dog. It doesn’t matter who the leader is, Mom or Dad, but the family needs to know the hierarchy. Parents can and should be in cahoots about the rules of the house. There should be no confusion about what is allowed. Children will play you like a fiddle if they smell dissension in the ranks.

Many divorced couples have this problem when it comes to their kids. As in business, when the leadership crumbles so does the foundation of the values and the structure of the family. When this happens children start to push their boundaries. Everything from what they will eat to when they come in at night will be in question. When each parent creates their own set of rules, so starts the uphill battle of trying to please everyone. It is really valuable for divorced parents to agree to, and uphold, common rules they have formed for their children.

What is your family “code”? Corporations appreciate the value of a mission statement. It can keep people focused on the mandate of the business at its core. You can create one for your family. My family is from Scottish decent so we have a crest with a mission statement on it that goes back many generations. It simply states “Mean Well, Speak Well, Do Well.” That is the statement I grew up trying my best to live by. It helped me understand right out of the gate what was expected of me.

Understanding what makes each person tick is valuable information when trying to create harmony in one’s family. A fun exercise is to have everyone in the family design a dream board. This allows each participant to feel free to express their dreams, desires and goals independently and then share them later. At that point, you will see what the other members of the family want and can talk about how you can create a plan to incorporate and/or strive for each other’s dreams. There may be things that your children and or your spouse can’t voice that are really important to them. They can use their dream board as a non-judgemental playground for their thoughts. Anyone who can cut and paste pictures or words can participate in this.

Find out what the values of each member of your family are. If your children’s aren’t the same as yours, and they most likely won’t be, that’s ok.  They are thinking independently. Understanding what their values are will help you to understand what is important to them. It will become clearer why your son loves playing the piano instead of hockey. Perhaps his top values are creativity and expression.

Pay attention to the continuous evolution of your family. If you hold on too tightly to the “way it was”, you will choke the life out of future growth and miss all the good stuff that wants to happen.

Just like in business, the family has to change to succeed.

Caird Urquhart

 

Caird Urquhart is Founder and President of Newroad Coaching, a boutique coaching firm providing one-on-one personal and business coaching services. She is also author of 30 Ways To Better Days: How to Rally After You’ve Been Dumped. Find Newroad Coaching on their blog and on Twitter and YouTube.

 

 

 

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Letting Everyone Shine

May 29, 2012 by 1 Comment

A couple of weeks ago Caity announced that she had ‘auditioned’ for the school talent show. “Oh, I said. “What did you do?” Apparently she danced. Apparently she did the coffee grind dance move for about 30 seconds and that was it.

A worried teacher caught up to me the other day and in a panicked voice told me she wasn’t ‘er um, ready.’ The teacher said that she could have another chance if she wanted too, to prepare something more….structured. EEEEEH.

I give points to my daughter for having the guts to just charge up there and do ‘something’ THAT is awesome. However, my daughter has a tendency to not want to remotely understand that any ‘talent’ takes practice. I earnestly explained all this and that she and I would have to work on a routine, a whole dance that she could do. She steadfastly refused.

Later on a bit more came out. She had HEARD a teacher say she was terrible. Probably not quite in the context SHE assumed, but it broke her little heart. She refused to do anything to the point that she was going to skip school the day of the talent show because she feared being forced to get up and perform.

Oh dear.

We were watching the new season of You Think You Can Dance, a show we have all enjoyed as a family. Caity suddenly burst out with a wail of “I CAN’T DO ANYTHING.’ The realization was devastating to her. I hurredly placated her with the idea that perhaps she just hadn’t found HER talent yet or perhaps her talent just wasn’t the type you could put in a show. Awkward I know. The truth is, as much as I love my daughter to pieces – the things she likes to do most – singing and dancing – are two things she just does not have a talent for. Her brave Hip Hop solo a while ago at school – in front of the ENTIRE school – was alarming to say the least. God bless her.

Throughout her short life, I have gamely let her try anything she wanted to, she is a pretty good artist, but only when she truly focuses on her work. She is so like me. When I was a kid, I expected to just ‘do’ things. I didn’t want to learn musical theory, I just wanted to play the violin. I didn’t want to make pigs out of clay, I attempted porcelain figurines like I had seen on the Antiques Road Show. I couldn’t understand why mine weren’t the same. I quit everything I tried.

Caity is a magical being. She shines with energy and enthusiasm. She is loud and creative and it shows. She stands out from the crowd. But standing out is a hard path and I sure hope she has the strength to handle it. I hope she can find her own true talent and I will do my best to make sure her enthusiasm never wains……balanced with a teeny tiny bit of ‘perhaps you could try something else’ for good measure.

Thanks to the kind people at the Vancouver International Children’s Festival, we are spending Saturday down at Granville Island to take in couple of the featured shows. We are going to check out ‘Journey Through Sound,‘ being that the kids love street dance and hip hop. We are also going to see ‘Pete the Cat.’ Pete the Cat never stops moving and grooving and singing his song and hopefully that will reinspire my daughter into remembering that she can try and do everything she wants to do and nothing can slow her down.

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Worn Down – Push Through

April 14, 2012 by 2 Comments

Some times there is just too much stuff going on.  Sometimes I have to learn to say no and to learn  that magical concept of time management.   I need to talk to all the clever life and business coaches and get help creating a life and editorial schedule.  I feel terrible when I forget emails and commitments to people.

Oh well.

This blog needs to be more interesting, and I do have ideas, however, apart from the cool stuff happening with Women in Biz Network, the family stuff has been a tad chaotic and a bit depressing, and I have been loathe to discuss it more publicly.

I am finding parenting school age kids to be a bit of a trial.  If one isn’t angry and fighting the other is.  It is like tag team misery.  We seem to be only allowed  a few hours of peace at a time.

My elder son and daughter cannot take no as an answer in any shape or form. Their answer is to wear us down by argument.  Every discussion feels like it takes place across a boardroom with an army of legal advisor’s.  Nothing is simple.   Adam wears us down by counter argument.  Caitlyn fights by high pitched screaming….much like Black Canary if any of you know your super heroes.   What boggles me is that they  think this works to their advantage when the usual result is myself, husband or both of us completely losing our shit and things going from stupid to insane.

Nobody comes out of these episodes well.

Case in point Thursday morning.   The morning started out with my son telling me that he couldn’t go to school because he hadn’t done his homework.  Homework he had been given on Tuesday that he only hinted at and refused to show me or go into detail about.  Instead of babying him and getting his work set up for him, I thought..fine….let’s see where this goes.  Well it went straight to hell.  Lippy talk and us not being able to take the high road.  It was not pretty.  Husband was late for work, the kids were late for school, everyone was upset.

My only thought was  to quit everything.  That blogging and my career ‘aspirations’ were just getting in the way of my parenting, which was obviously sucking to have created such angry and rude children.  I was going to phone poor Leigh of the Women in Biz Network and not show up for the event that night.  I was going to delete my blog and walk away if that was what it took.

It was that bad. It is still bad.  We are so fed up with the ‘IT’S SO UNFAIR’ crap.  We hate ourselves for raising ungrateful and spoiled brats.

I have said it before and will stick by it….this is not a parenting blog…this is a how NOT to parent blog.  I love my kids and I love their minds and their creativity….but the negative end of the spectrum of the things we have  taught and encouraged is making life really really suck.

Later Thursday morning when my mom walked into the house with a white face and asked me to come outside stating that she ‘had done something really stupid,’ I could only imagine.   I envisioned bodies in the trunk of the car when she had me walk around her parked car.  There was a dent in her bumper.   There was no blood on it.  Phew…but she had had a fender bender in the Extra Foods Parking Lot – a ring of hell – and was really shaken up.

The day however was going from bad to getting stupid.

After a tearful ‘I can’t do this without help’  cry to my mom about it all, I staggered away to meet Leigh and pretend to be all competent about business.

Our event was fantastic.  But it really does take ‘help’ to do anything.  I couldn’t have done the day without mom and my husband helping out.  Leigh had her amazing sister step up to the plate again.  As Nicole of Entrepreneur Mom Now Vancouver said, Networking is about helping and friendship.  It certainly is.

Settling down to listen to Danielle LaPorte speak that evening was perfect though.  It isn’t even what she says, but how she says it.  She has an electrifying voice.  She speaks with forceful quiet.  You sit up and you listen…not just with your ears and brain but with your whole body.  She makes you pay attention.  I could feel all the tension flowing from my neck and shoulders the more she tackled our fears and woes about being entrepreneurs.

Danielle and all the women attending our event made it all worthwhile.

I won’t sacrifice my kids for my dreams…but it is all about balance and doing what feels right even when it makes others uncomfortable.  Change is tough.  Evolution is difficult…..my family has to adjust to it.  I can only work at making it easier for them….but not at the cost of my own soul.

 

 

 

 

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Slacker Mom’s Unite!

August 9, 2011 by 1 Comment

So in the summer the parenting blogs are FILLED with ideas for activities, camp suggestions, vacation suggestions, etc. An endless list of things to keep your ankle biters engaged and occupied all summer long.

And yes. We have done SOME things and we have plans to cram in a few more day trips and so on (testing out the new Ford Explorer next week!), but someday’s I either:

a) don’t have the money
b) don’t have a car
c) am horrified by taking 3 kids on public transit
d) have other things to do
e) or just don’t feel like it.

Today was a perfect storm of that……perfect in that the children were in perfect agreement and in fact led me in the decision to happily lay around in their pajama’s for most of the day. I am dressed if you count yoga pants as dressed. Tara WAS dressed but then wanted a second bath and then I couldn’t be bothered again. Before that is was naked pee on anything I want time and I was okay with that.

Today, we have chatted, laughed, played Angry Birds together, watched shows together, lay on the bed together. We have been together in our slackerdom and enjoyed every minute of it.

Last summer we hardly saw Adam as he was always away with the neighbour’s at some pool or another. This year there seems to be NO kids around. It is a ghost town around here till after supper. So yes, it has been up to me to make sure they are active and burning up their energy and having fun. Now that we are on the road to the end of Summer, we seem to be all in sync with our ebb and flow of energy and today….was a fun day.

This was one of the few days that I haven’t felt anxiety about ‘doing stuff’ with the kids. I always feel that I am not fulfilling my parental role or screw them up if they are not stimulated by something new every day. And yes I totally agree that sitting inside is not good for anyway….but sometimes it is just fine. Especially when we are stimulating each other by TALKING to each other. Engaging. Being excited by what each other has to say.

I like my kids. They drive me batshit crazy. But I really like them. I feed of their energy and enthusiasm.

We have totally gone feral this summer, which is unsettling for my husband who is still trying to work and still trying to deal with his routine and is surrounded by people who are eating and sleeping at odd times.

His dinners have been odd to say the least.

Hey…at least I have managed the laundry.

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Head Against Brick Wall

January 3, 2011 by 3 Comments

So my son has taken up ‘cussing’ lately….which isn’t surprising since I have a terrible potty mouth and it gets worse the more frustrated I get…and my son tends to frustrate me.

He tends not to say anything TOO bad…but there is a lot of DAM this and DAM that….and is somewhat more forgivable than the surreptitious middle fingers my DAUGHTER is flicking at him behind my back.

Anyway….he is usually raging with the big D word because I have asked him for like the five MILLIONTH time to please pick up that piece of FUCKING LEGO that I asked you to pick up 6 hours ago.

And thus many of our conversations seem to play out these days.

I have tried everything with this boy when it comes to things like eating and cleaning up mess.  I have read about how large portions of food will overwhelm a child…so he gets TEENY tiny portions of each food group…….it still turns into bargaining on how many bites will be required to gain ice cream later….and this also takes HOURS.

I understand that “clean your room” is a large and nebulous statement…..so I break it down.  ” Can you make your bed please.”

“Great….can we work on the lego that is under your tv table?”

This doesn’t work…so then it is….”I have found this great box here that you can put the loose lego into….we can sort it all together later!”

If I step away….nothing is done.  If I start doing it myself…..nothing is done.   If I stand over him fuming…..nothing is done.

He will find ANYTHING to distract him…..Tara, the weather, his emotional well being….I swear this boy is looking for a doctors note stating that he is too fragile for us to ask him to clean up after himself.

EVERY SINGLE REQUEST requires a verbal dance and time wasted……I don’t know how my blood pressure stays the same.

EVERY SINGLE REQUEST turns into him raging at the injustice of it all…..

I have tried many tactics.    Hubs and I have done good cop bad cop.  We have done reasonable discussions about families working together…how it all takes a team effort….we have done the bit about responsibility…..we have done the THIS IS MY HOUSE DAMMIT….we have done the if you do this then we can discuss THIS reward….he then fixates on the reward and not the path TO the reward.

And it is always someone else’s fault.

Always…when we follow through with the no swim date, no play date, no video games till this ONE task is completed, he prefers to waste energy raging at me, his dad, his sister, life, his room…..anyone and anything except himself and just shutting up for a minute AND DOING IT!!!!

What is that?

What have we done wrong???

It just all seems like pretty basic stuff and this is basic stuff that we have stuck with since he was old enough to understand…..it’s not like this has been sprung upon him recently.

Also…teeth brushing…..this seems to come to him as a total surprise EVERY SINGLE  DAY!!

Bed time is also a bit of a shock as is dinner and homework.

Like it hasn’t happened BEFORE!!!!

I would just like one day when I say time to getupgotobedmakebedtimefordinnertime etc, that he would say….awww okay…and DO IT!

I keep waiting to see if he will figure it out one of these days…the light bulb moment…like he gets with math or reading….but so far, NOTHING…except more gray hair for me.

I would LOVE any ideas from the more calm and experienced moms out there.

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Strange Days At The House Crunch

December 13, 2010 by 8 Comments

I am sitting here wondering if I need to be terrified, worried or just bemused.

Caitlyn offered to have a bath with Tara since Tara was currently covered in sticky rice from “eating” sushi.

While Tara was in the bath, I decided to tackle her bangs as they were starting to bother her.    I managed to cut her hair without it turning out TOTALLY dorky and they played for a bit in the bath.

Caity wanted to stay in for a bit and was playing around with the comb I had used and the makeup mirror……you can hear the ominous music now can’t you.

I went downstairs with Tara and soon after Caity joined us all in her PJ’s and hair brushed.

I went upstairs to make sure the tub wasn’t full of Tara’s hair and hmmmm there in the garbage can was locks of long hair.  Locks on long hair with PINK IN IT.

I came back downstairs and just said to her…”Caity, if you are going to sneak cut your own hair, you need to flush the evidence.”

And sure enough…..BIG chunk of BANGS gone.   Sigh…..why do we do these things?? I did the same….what I did not do however….was so vehemently DENY that I had done such a thing.

Denied to the point that we were starting to wonder if someone really HAD done it….I mean really really convinced that SHE DID NOT CUT HER OWN HAIR AND WHY WOULD YOU SAY SUCH A THING MOMMY!!!!

It started to give us chills…..so we all backed off and let things lie.

Later, when we thought the dust had settled….after all, there was no point in arguing..the deed had been done and could not be reversed.

I was sitting at the computer when Caity casually asked me…”Mom, do you really think I cut my own hair?”

…..

???

Ladies and Gents….my daughter.

Face Painting

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Me n U

November 10, 2010 by 1 Comment

As Tara and I sat down to watch an episode of Dinosaur Train (her new thing is dinos), I realized that Tara is probably the first kid o’mine that I have spent a lot of time with all alone.

Now that the other two are in school all day, Tara and I get to hang for six hours together…just the two of us and just one nap to break it up.

We usually don’t get to far afield these days.  I putter and she plays and climbs all over me and we go outside for a bit if it sunny and that is our day.

Nap time is for work (bloggy/writey stuff) or housework, or phone calls or heck even a nap for mommy.   Because if she is up..it is all her all the attention and nothing else can get in between.

When Adam and Caity were little, their father-figure worked from home.  Now granted, a lot of time he was in his office or asleep as he tended to work on a night shift pattern instead of days, BUT he was there.    And we were both free to run errands together or tag team baby watching and so on.

And I was never alone with a baby.

This is the first time  I have been like many many other moms out there and ALONE with a small active non verbal creature.

And it is fine.   I am enjoying it.   She is cute and funny and lovely and I can’t stop hugging her and just enjoying her.

Cept when she is wrecking things, drinking the dogs water, spilling cat food, smashing my keyboard, opening cupboards…..well you know how it is.

Everything about having Tara has been different than the other two.

Adam is a product of being first.  We were nervous, antsy parents and everything freaked us out.  But we did all the ‘right’ stuff too.  Music Classes, Gymboree, Infant Drop In’s, and so on.

Caity had more confident and more relaxed parents.   We had done it once and could do it again.  Even when she was being a total pill, we felt we could manage just fine…..together.

A few factors have destroyed my ‘rhythm’ with my child rearing…..the five year gap between Caity and Tara was more than we had planned on to begin with.  I appear to have forgotten more than I ever learned about the baby and toddler part.

Losing a baby in there certainly destroyed our feelings of parental confidence.

Pregnancy was once again an anxious time for all involved.

And Patrick went to work outside the home a couple of months after Tara arrived.

This was a bit of a shock to the kids who were used to their dad being around.  Starting school and adjusting to dads work hours was quite tough.   I found it rough too.  Mainly in that I had to adjust to a whole new routine for the ENTIRE family WITH a new addition in the mix.

I got a bit wacky.

I was in fear of Tara ‘getting in the way.’   I worried about her disturbing the rest of the family.   I took on all the feedings, diaperings, everything….I felt I had to do it all.

The fact that her sleep patterns have SUCKED for the now almost 16 months is due to my rushing to silence her every time she stirred.

Now I wake every two hours regardless if she does.  Yawn.

I don’t know where my anxiety around Tara arose from.  It is not like she was not welcomed or not wanted.   We all waited anxiously for her arrival.

But for some reason I have acted like she is ‘my’ baby and mine alone…..which has been hard on the rest of the family.

I have managed to let go many of these feelings now and have struggled to let OTHERS deal with her more and more…and love how she seems to adore her siblings and call out ‘Dadeeeee’ when she sees him.   She is a happy loving child that rarely ‘makes strange’ with anyone or any circumstances.

But I wonder….will she feel ‘closer’ to me than Adam and Caity because of all this one on one time?   Is our bond different?  I love Adam and Caity just as much…they are all special and wonderful.    But Tara will always be our little baby….no matter how old she gets.

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We Are All Babies

September 19, 2010 by 2 Comments

I finally managed to watch the lovely documentary ‘Babies’ last night. I highly recommend it if you haven’t yet seen it.

It is so much fun. Babies are fun. Babies are fun no matter WHERE in the world they come from. And that is the great lesson….a great lesson for peace, respect, and understanding.

No matter where we come from, what our religion is, or colour of our skin…we all start out as babies. We are all the same. We all learn to say ‘mama’ and how to put one leg in front of the other in exactly the same way.

We are all born needing the same things from those around us. We want love and protection.

We are all the same.

And we all love our babies in the same way.

However, I did have to giggle at the crunch family from San Fransisco. In one scene the dad is attending some sort of ‘Sing About the Earth Mother Parent and Baby’ thing and the baby is clearly not impressed and thinks they are all mental. She gets up and heads for the door…pushing and straining to open it.

She also was not impressed with the reading her mom tried to do and HIT HER MOM and then picked a new book about hitting. HEH.

Anyway……All the families were amazing…I found the sedate grace of the Namibians entrancing.

And for all the people in the world who cringe at breast feeding….get over it. The scene when the Namibian mother calmly bends down to let her toddler have a quick suckle to ease her tired fussiness during their walk was beautiful. That is what mothers do. That is what breasts do.

Babies shows that no matter how hard a life can be or how harsh the environment, letting babies be babies and have the safety and freedom to explore their worlds is vital and wonderful.

It is a great documentary to remind us to see the joy in the simple things..and the miracle of life.

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A Pain in the Back

September 12, 2010 by 5 Comments

Thursday morning had me filled with anxiety and upset as we stared at the boards posted outside the kids school. On it were the class listings…every grade split. Every single one.

I realize that some think this is a fine way to do it…..I am not so sure.

I had gone with Patrick to take the kids to school, so I would specifically be able to take the time to make sure Adam and Caity were going to be okay.

I was upset to see that Adam wasn’t with some of the people I knew he considered friends, but seemed to have others, so in the confusion of trying to find the right classrooms for both, I was just stuck with muttering and Patrick told me to basically take a chill pill as there wasn’t much I could do anyway.

This did not make me feel better as I vehemently disagree with this. Yes, there isn’t much choice. The other class and that is it…and not much you can do without disrupting your child and other kids, etc., etc. However, I do still believe that a parent SHOULD be passionate about who is teaching their child and with what kids.

I firmly believe that there should be far more communication between parents and schools. I firmly believe that a PAC should be more than fundraising. Parental participation in school should be more than just volunteering in their classes and so on, though that is a good start. I firmly believe that the education of our children should be team effort between schools and parents.

I have been quite vocal about this in the past and I am sure the teachers cringe, when they see me coming.

Needless to say Patrick and I parted grouchily. I was going to wait to see how the kids were when they finished that day. I was also then starting to doubt myself and my beliefs about caring about my children’s school lives and so on.

Am I making too much of it? Should I not worry so? Should I not just sit back and let them deal and see how the report cards roll out? Do other parents not feel the urge to ‘rock the boat’ on behalf of their children?

Perhaps it was because of this that my back went out when I went to take Tara out of the stroller. Hmmmmm

I find it hard to not reflect my own school memories upon my children.    Unfortunately my elementary school memories are of a place far far away, and that seemed to be TOTALLY different from the school system here, past and present.

My memories of school are good.  I had a super school and super friends and great teachers.  I was very lucky.

I suppose I want my children to have good memories of their school too.  Industrial Education Factory or no….good education or no, it still should be fun right?  It still should help produce functioning adults for our beleaguered society right?  And I think friendships in school create a solid basis for any sort of education.  After all, how can you do well in your studies if you are miserable?

Anyway…that is how I feel about school.  My husband has slightly different views and that is fine…..we just need to work around them for some sort of balance….I get that.

So I waited to see how my kids felt about the situation.

I was relived to see that many parents from all grades seemed equally perturbed by the situation, and the area around the school was filled with parents talking about where their kids were and with who and if they should or could change that if needed.  My relief was that not all parents were going to just roll with it…that many seemed concerned.

I hope the school had many discussions with parents if they weren’t happy.   I have not.  Yet.

Both children have told me that they are happy with their set up and who they have in their classes.   We shall now just have to see how they adjust and how they roll with the new school year.

I am sure Patrick is happy to have a wife who is NOT railing at the system for the moment……we have both been frequent visitors to the school in the past.  We have not been happy with how things have been handled…but will just see for now.

I am sure he is less happy about having a wife doubled over in pain with ice packs shoved down her pants and stinking of muscle rubs….oh and Wheat Germ Oil.

That is to help with my C-section scar,  which my chiropractor is convinced is the root of all and any back troubles I am having.    I love my chiropractor.  I love the deep tissue pummeling he is giving me just now to help work this out.  My back and left thigh are KILLING ME.

I missed my second PAID boot camp class because of the back pain and had to cancel an important lunch on Friday too.

Once again..despite commenter’s telling me to get a grip….if this isn’t karma or some sort of cosmic message kicking me in the face, I don’t know what is.

My attempts of trying to live ‘outside the mom box’ seem to be continually thwarted.  I think I need to start paying attention to what is going on here.  To listen to the ‘signals’ that are being sent to me.

I think I need to reevaluate how I am living.   It could fix the rut of permanent frustration I seem to be stuck in.

It would probably make life easier for all around me…including the teachers.

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Sharing the Purple Crying

August 11, 2010 by 4 Comments

When you think nobody else understands how you feel, the world of the internet and blogger opens your eyes to a myriad of people who have walked in your shoes.

Hence why mothers and fathers have loved the community that blogging has built for them.   People on the internet share what they have experienced, gone through, suffered, enjoyed and so on….there is someone out there that understands you and that alone can help a person who is in need of nodding heads and warm calm thoughts.

That is the good side of blogging.

There is a negative side too, but I am here to focus on the power of good that blogging can do.

Hence I was very interested when I was asked to spread the word and share stories for the people behind ‘The Period of Purple Crying.”

Purple crying describes the crying that you can’t seem to stop in a new born.  The crying that can send people completely over the edge…’shaken baby syndrome,’ in worst cases.  For the rest of us it means the unfun part of being a new parent that people tend to skim over.

The letters in the word PURPLE describe the properties of normal infant crying that are frustrating:

P for Peak of Crying — Crying peaks at around 2 months, then decreases at around 3 to 5 months;
U for Unexpected — Crying comes and goes unexpectedly, for no apparent reason;
R for Resists Soothing — Crying continues despite all soothing efforts by caregivers;
P for Pain-like Face — Infants look like they are in pain, even when they are not;
L for Long Lasting — Crying can last as much as 5 hours a day, or more;
E for Evening — Crying occurs more in the late afternoon and evening.

Tara did this.   We had the DVD.  I didn’t think we needed the DVD and had tossed it under the tv.   After all…THIS was our THIRD CHILD. WE knew what to expect….ha ha ha ha.

When the crying started up and we were walking and pacing and shoo shooing I just gritted my teeth.    What  I didn’t realize was that the crying was really affecting Patrick.  It was almost personal this time.  ANOTHER baby that had issues with sleep and settling?  What on earth were we doing wrong!??

He watched the DVD.    He then came and told me to watch it.  It helped him knowing that it wasn’t us.  That there wasn’t something wrong with our parenting OR with Tara and this was just something babies did AND stopped doing too.

Knowing there was an end made all the difference for him.  He was then able to help me struggle through this painful time of no rest no peace…etc.  And I knew I could cry and let go and have people who understood not only take care of the baby but take care of me.

I have spoken before about how the first few months of Adam’s life is really a dark blur.  That I was really suffering from PPD and just getting by.

And that on top of the shock of being a new parent.  Because lets get real here….you can read all the books.  You can talk to all ready parents and you can plan all you like…but you don’t know.

NOT how hard it can be…you don’t know YOU.  You don’t know how YOU will deal.  You don’t know how you and your partner will deal.

Shock, health issues, fear, lack of sleep all play silly buggers with your mind and your ability to even cope with the smallest things.

Add to that the extended family, friends, work, money…..well again…for some it is no problem.  Easy transition and easy babies…..everyone is different.

And that is where the silence comes in.

EVERYONE is afraid of looking bad.   Being judged as a lousy parent.  What do you mean you can’t hack it?   What do you mean you can’t breast feed? What do you mean you aren’t happy and glowing?

So some of us fake it.  Some of us grit teeth and suffer.

The Purple Program wants that to change.

The Purple Program is doing a knitting project for November 15th to help prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome.     All the knitters out there can work on little baby hats in PURPLE to be given out on Canada’ National Child Day.

PURPLE caps must be received no later than by November 5, 2010.

If you have any questions, please contact Melissa Pelto: melissa@limelitepr.com or call 778.786.1495

Please knit and mail your PURPLE caps to
BC Children’s Hospital:
c/o Claire Yambao
Provincial Program Coordinator, Prevent SBS BC
BC Children’s Hospital
4480 Oak Street, K1-209
Vancouver, BC V6H 3V4

It is all about breaking the silence.  It is all about support and understanding.  It is all about letting new parents know that it can be hard and we are all there to help.   It is all about making parenting part of a community again.

Amber Strocel wants to do that…..Amber feels a book inside her and she wants it to be something that can be helpful to all future parents to be.   She wants us all to share our stories.    She wants us who have been there  to share the good the bad and the ugly.  The medical, the technical, the fun and the horrors of being a parent.

If you can and would like to help …please share YOUR journey with Amber.

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