Manifesting an Attitude of Gratitude

I don’t remember who first introduced me to the gratitude journal.  The concept is simple: record three things for which you are grateful each day.  I’ve started and stopped dozens of gratitude journals over the past twenty years.  Though the habit of writing the gratitude journal may not have stuck with me, the general idea has.

Today was the third day of a long weekend.  My college-age daughter had been home since Thursday, and my high-school age son had no school Monday. In addition, my son had a friend over for the long weekend.  Xbox on the big screen in the living room, late nights of teenagers laughing and eating (and eating and eating, as teenage boys do).  Each morning was a treasure hunt of glasses, plates, and wrappers to figure out what we had run out of, and needed to restock from the grocery store.

Socks on the floor, soda bottles and glasses on the coffee table, and for some reason, a grenade of lollipop sticks and wrappers had exploded throughout the living room.  A recipe for Mom’s crankiness.

I think I drew blood from biting my tongue. It was time to drive my daughter back to college, with a laundry basket full of freshly-washed clothes.  Returning from that 2-hour round trip drive, it was time to take the friend home.  The son remains, prepping for one more teacher-workshop-day-off before beginning finals week and returning to his Dad’s house by going into his own room to play video games.

Quiet.  No chaos.  No “get your feet OFF of me!”  No video game frustration. No “where’s my cell phone” tearing apart the couch.

Peaceful.  Messy, but peaceful.

And it struck me then.  I have a beautiful, intelligent, funny daughter who chooses to come home from college frequently because she still enjoys being at home.  I have a clever, handsome, determined son who is willing to share his interests with me, and is still comfortable having a friend come for several days into our home and family. That my kids bug me because they want me to be involved in their lives.  That my kids have been and are continuing to make very different choices than I made when I was a teenager.  They don’t party.  They don’t break curfew.  They know what their goals are, and they work hard to make them happen. They are willing to share who they are with me.

I am reminded to be grateful.

Rolling the boulder uphill

Life sometimes is unmanageable, no matter how simple it may seem to others.  A daughter in college, struggling through first semester with an anxiety disorder as well as developing mononucleosis, doubles the strain on her as well as challenging Mom to keep her healthy, motivated and keeping her scholarships active.  A son in high school, also diagnosed bipolar, whose half-time father tells him to ‘man up’ and outgrow his need for meds so that he can go into the military and not waste money by failing out of college.  A relationship between a man and woman, challenged by a combined total of five divorces and a mutual unwillingness to put the teens through the stress of yet another step-parent. The death of a parent with Alzheimers, and the mutual assurances that it is for the best, yet painful.  The economic challenges of surviving on disability income without making the family feel deprivation and uncertainty.

And yet, somehow, it works.  There is compassion, and mutual understanding, and joy.  There is laughter and love, challenges and successes.  But the existence, the day-to-day struggle, the never-ending appointments with therapists and psychiatrists, the unending medication refills; no matter how well this day has been accomplished, the ongoing burden of bipolar will be there in the morning.  And sometimes, it feels like the battle will never end.