My ex

I have an ex that still haunts me now and then but it isn’t an ex-boyfriend or an ex-husband (though I do have one of those too). This ex is my addiction to smoking.

I still remember my first puff of a cigarette given to me by an older cousin when I was about 13 or 14 years old. I didn’t start right after that but by the time I was 15 I was smoking on a fairly regular basis…bumming a smoke while waiting for the bus, sneaking into the girl’s bathroom or other spots during school for a few drags. The fact is I was a smoker at the young age of 15. You might wonder how I got my cigarettes but the fact is that was a time when ID’s were rarely, if ever, checked and I had older friends who could purchase them for me when needed. It also helped that I looked a few years older than I really was. I quit when I got pregnant with my older children but the inability to deal with the stress in my life drew me back to my old friend…or enemy depending on how you look at it.

I finally quit just over 3 years ago when I decided to get pregnant with my youngest. After she was born I just couldn’t imagine smoking with her around so I never picked it back up but that isn’t to say I don’t ever think about it….I do. The crave, though very mild, is still there even 3 years later. It isn’t often and is usually only when I either see someone smoking or get a whiff of cigarette smoke in the air. Then, only for a moment, I drift off and long to have one….just one…drag. I don’t though because as a former smoker who has quit two other times in the past, I know it would NEVER be just ONE drag. That one drag would leave to bumming a smoke which would then lead to picking up just one pack for an occasional cigarette to just smoking a few a day to becoming a full time smoker again and I can’t do that.

I am healthier now, my car smells better and I smell better. I have no doubt I will always battle my ex but there is a strength in me that I didn’t have before and I know that I won’t ever smoke again.

And honestly, have you seen the price of those things lately. I can’t understand how ANYONE can afford them!

Not Me Monday

I have always loved reading the Not Me Monday’s on other blogs so I figured I would give it a whirl.

We certainly did not eat most meals out this weekend even though the fridge and pantry are filled with plenty of food. I always cook my family well balanced meals and never rely on pizza and hamburgers to feed my family.

I definitely did not let my two year old run around Sear’s barefoot while I purchased my new washer and dryer and she definitely did not scream at the top of her lungs on more than one occasion and then laugh hysterically about it when I asked her to be quiet. I have much better control over my children and would never stand for such behavior especially out in public.

I also did not get almost all the way to work (45 minute commute) one morning last week before realizing that Tinker Bell was still playing on the DVD player in the minivan. I always pay much closer attention to what is coming through the speakers. And even if I did, I certainly didn’t enjoy it.

So what did you not do last week?

Sometimes kids just know

As my mind continued to drift to the little girl and her family this morning while getting ready for work, a part of me longed to just crawl back in bed with my own daughter and hold her tight all morning long. But work awaited and the roads were not going to be fun so I needed to go. I was being quiet so not to wake both her and Daddy as I try to every morning that they are home which also meant that I was not going to disturb her with a kiss goodbye but sneak out in the dark. This was a morning though that I needed that kiss and hug and needed to hold her tight once more before I left and I guess she knew that.

As I opened the door to the hall I heard a little voice in the dark say “Goodbye Mommy” and I quickly turned around and gave my dear daughter a huge hug and a kiss goodbye. I never knew she was awake until that moment and it is almost like she knew that I needed that moment this morning.

Kids grow up so fast (my oldest is 16 and I can’t figure out how that happened) and sometimes parents lose their children all too soon so cherish every moment that comes your way for that kiss and hug. They really are too few and too precious.

I miss my bubble

As much as I love technology and blogs and facebook and the internet as a whole, there is a part of me that misses the days before all of this. Not because it complicates my life or because half the time things just don’t work right but for a deeper, more emotional reason. I miss my bubble. Prior to the internet (and getting older and more aware) I lived in a little bubble, not always a happy bubble and not one that was never touched by the cruelness and pain of the world but one that didn’t know as much as I know now. Yes, with age and experience comes knowledge but that knowledge can bring pain and heartbreak and knowledge that yes….some women can’t get pregnant and yes…babies and children die.

The blog world is filled with these stories and as much as I try to look away and not read I feel myself drawn to these stories like a mosquito is drawn to a bug zapper. I know before I even read them that I will cry and I will feel sorrow and hurt and pain for these children and their parents but I read. Then the realization hits me that while I am sitting here at work and my older children are at school and my toddler is enjoying a day with her Daddy, there is a family sitting at the bedside of a child the same age as my precious daughter watching their child take what are most likely her last breathes on this earth. I find myself flooded with emotions and tears that I fight to hold back but they escape here and there. I find myself longing to be with my daughter and hold her tight and tell my teens how much I really do love them even though they might not always believe me. I find myself looking at my daughter’s picture and wondering how I got lucky to have a healthy child and could my luck run out tomorrow. These parents aren’t bad people, honestly they are probably much better parents and people then I could ever be but it happened to them. It is their daughter who is dying as we go about our normal day.

I used to not understand how much death really affects a person until I lost my Grandma Betty. Losing her hurt and it hurt a lot but she had lived a long (albeit not as long as we would have liked) life and had children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It makes it easier to grasp and understand. But when a baby or child dies either from disease or a tragedy or at the hands of a monster I can’t comprehend it. It doesn’t make sense, it isn’t right, it isn’t fair. These stories that I read on blogs and the news stay with me and I carry these children with me, like the little twin boy who was thrown down by a daycare worker and crawled to his favorite bouncy seat to die or the high school girl who was hit while crossing the street to get on her bus by a careless woman driving an SUV or the little girl who is losing her battle with cancer as I sit her writing this. I will carry these children and they will cross my mind as I see my children prepare for the bus in the morning or watch my daughter dance around the living room in her tutu or kiss her goodbye in the morning while dropping her off at daycare.

So why do I continue to click on the links that people send or post telling of the stories of these precious children whose lives are cut short? Maybe because I need a reminder from time to time just how lucky I really am. Maybe I need to be reminded that even though raising two teens and a toddler is tough, the alternative is something I NEVER want to experience. And maybe it is because these children need to be remembered. Their lives, albeit short, were precious.

So tonight when I go home, I will be a little less stressed with the teens and take a little more time with the toddler. I will remind them just how much I love them all and just how precious their lives are to me. And after everyone goes to bed and the lights are out and the house is quiet, during those moments before sleep takes over, I will probably shed a tear for these little ones whose short lives have touched my heart and soul.