Inspiration

I am inspired. My friend, over here, is an amazing hostess. I have eaten quite a few fancy meals at her house- A Chinese New Year party, Aidan's first Easter, a Day After Thanksgiving Feast, and many others. I once invited them over for dinner at our house... and I forgot all about it. We left the house. When they came over to eat, they found a dark and empty house instead. They still left us a beautiful plant, and a kind note, "Hmm, we are on today, right?!"

Last night, while I pondered what our family should do for New Year's, I finagled an invitation to her party. Woohoo!

Coincidentally, I had know her husband since 7th grade, theoretically. We were in the same orchestra, but for the life of me, I have no recollection of him, WHATSOEVER. I think I was in the "boys are disgusting and to be hated" phase of life.

Anyway, they are inspiring in their gift of hospitality. They love through the service of comfort, food, and fun.

I want to be like that.

When I was in college, I secretly got myself a college mom. I was this bright-eyed, bushy-tailed 17 year old, eager to get straight A's, excited to be free, and most of all, desperate to find out what I was suppose to be. C gave me a job- playing the piano at the Protestant worship service. It was THE BEST paying gig, EVER. As church going kid since age four weeks, I had played for all kinds of worship services, and never got a dime. Yet C paid me for something I would do anyway, and the best part of the job? I got to talk to her and pray with her, be prayed for by her, for 1/2 hour before every Sunday worship. I don't think she knew I was making her my college mom, but I did! (She also reads this blog! See, she is like my mother.) Anyway, another crazy thing C did for me was to hire me to baby-sit her boys. These angelic boys did not need a sitter, so it was the best kind of baby-sitting job- I got to read her Martha Stewart cookbooks after the boys went to bed. She also hired me to help at her annual Christmas party. Those parties are CRAZY! All these professors (100+ of them) from the colleges floated through, they were wined, dined, and it was so cool to see MY professors having fun! There were these meatballs that she served in a chafing dish, I was very, very, impressed. She also had this amazing collection of mugs and plates. I don't think she ever used paper products at those parties- it was all the real stuff!

I want to be like that.

So I am going to try to have a party at our house. And I think I need to get down to business and send out an evite tonight, before I regret it. This is a good New Year's resolution, don't you think? To serve, to love, and to comfort, and most of all, to have fun!

Leave me a note here or FB or talk to me, if you want to come to this bash.

Getting Ready for 2011

I think, 2010 has been the most whirlwind year of my life.

This past week, has been the most whirlwind week of my year. It has been insane. INSANE. I want to get ready for 2011- but everything/everyone is proving to be resistant to my goal.

I kicked off Christmas week with a cold. The source of the cold was Zoe. I should have known better than to let her kiss me, but those lips! They are so sweet, and how long will my little girl want to kiss me? Not very long. I can already feel some teenage angst in her, and so, I take what I can get. What I got, was devil-incarnate: the rhinovirus. When one is self employed, one keeps working even with a sickness. One does not cancel the day unless one is hooked up to IV fluids AND hospitalized. I offered hand sanitizers to all my patients, I tried to not cough on them, and I advised them to not touch the door knob.

Then we went to Tahoe on Christmas Day, I was congested, coughy, sneezy, and not very pleasant. And probably completely disgusting. But no, such situation was not going to stop me from learning how to ski double black diamond slopes.

We had enrolled A&Z in the Squaw Kids ski school- HELLO! Just take my money, why don't you? I love it when you charge me $290 for 3 hours of GROUP ski instruction. Aidan BETTER be skiing black diamonds soon... Anyway, Hubby and I took lessons from Jason, a very nice young man who has been skiing since he was 9 years old. Then we got a call that Zoe was refusing to actually put on her skis. Alright... My goal of becoming an Olympian was quickly dimming. Jason, however, was quite a trooper. He offered to pick Zoe up and just take her with us. So we did! Zoe loved being on the slopes with Jason- who wouldn't? They guy is a ninja on skis.


The next day, we went back for more instruction with Jason. (Did I mention that I suck at skiing? The first time I went skiing was with Hubby's business school friends- I cried on the slopes, it sucked so badly! The second time was with Bible study friends the year before Aidan was born. I seriously, seriously sucked. I can turn right like an Olympian, but turning left was nearly impossible. Do you know what happens when you keep going to the right? Eventually, you are at the edge of the slope...) Anyway, with Jason, I felt much more comfortable with turning left. Even though my calves were quickly building up lactic acid and were about to quit. Which, actually, were not the muscles that I should have been using... (You understand that things are about to get very, very bad.) We had to leave our lesson early because we needed to pick up the kids from ski school- why do kiddie lessons end before adult lessons is something I do not understand. Instead of taking the cable car down the MOUNTAIN, we thought we would go on Mountain Run. For those of you who are familiar with Squaw, you can see where this is going.

While Jason very cheerfully said we could totally manage, I think, he only said that because he didn't know that my muscles were about to curl up into a ball. Hubby and I stuck together, and we were actually doing quite well. I was doing a phenomenal job pizza-wedging my whole way down. But I was getting tired, time was running out. I fell, and I was tired. The idea of leaving our poor kids stranded at ski school was not appealing, and to demonstrate what a fantastic mother I am, I told Hubby to leave me and go ahead without me. (WHAT?! Was I insane? I blame it on the cold medicines, the lack of proper oxygenation of my frontal lobes, clearly, I wasn't thinking straight.) Hubby found me a woman who was teaching her friend how to ski, and we were moving about the same pace and so Heather agreed to look out for me and help me. You do remember that I suck at skiing, right? Very soon, it became obvious that it was going to take me a loooonnng time to get down, if I would ever get down. Also, I wasn't really thinking anymore, so I also told Heather to go ahead without me.

There I was, in the middle of the slopes, with this beautiful blue sky overhead, and I was on my back, skis on, wondering how on earth was I going to get out of this. The village was no where to be seen, I actually wasn't even sure if it was really there. I was completely stuck. I thought I could take off my skis and just walk down, or up, to catch the cable car. Or I could just stay here until they close and ski patrol can pick me up then. Or I could pray. Obviously, to pray was a far superior option. I prayed for two things: that God would send me an angel, preferably Angel Jason to help me down, that God would send me a snow mobile to give me a lift. Please, God, choose option A or B. Something.

Then I decided to keep going, while I waited for God to do something. So I got back up, skied/rolled/stored ice inside my jacket as I threw myself down the hill. I thought my left anterior cruciate ligament was going to be snapped in half. As painful as it was, I was getting down the mountain pretty fast! Woohoo! Then I had ALL this snow inside my jacket, and I decided to stop and take care of that first.

Then I heard, "M! Is that you? I thought it was you, because of your bright goggles!" Oh MY GOD. God sent me Angel Jason! Of all the slopes out there, God had taken Jason down THIS slope, the easiest of the bunch, even though he had all these options! And that Hubby had bought me this goggle with a bright, floral, yellow/pink band! Jason side stepped up the hill to where I was, and got me back up. We skied for a bit, and I was actually doing ok, although the calves were dead. Then, OH MY GOD! God sent me a snow mobile! The snow mobile went by, and I told Jason, that I think I needed a lift, because I was simply too tired to finish. He chased down the snow mobile, and I got a ride with Rob.

Hubby was ecstatic to see me at the bottom- he had A&Z with him, and they had actually already found a table and ordered lunch. It took me, THAT LONG.

I was, and still am, so incredulously amazed by how much God loves me, how he answers mundane prayers, how he rescues, that indeed, ALL things work together for His purpose. While I was perfectly ok waiting for 4:30, the time when ski patrol starts to look for lost people (I had asked Jason specifically about this the day before), but He didn't want me to wait that long, He didn't want Hubby and A&Z to worry, and He provided exactly what I needed.

It was the most wonderful Christmas lesson ever: That He came, to be one of us, and to love us, with this never ending, all the time, consistent, love. Thank you, Jesus.

With this lesson freshly on my mind, does it matter that I am utterly unprepared for 2011? Does it matter that these little people God has given me to love are constantly in my way of 'self actualization'? I mean, Jesus has already done that for me!

I am going to relax, think of His love for ME, and revel in the joy of that love.

Oh, by the way, this blog is going to be different in 2011. I am going to talk about work less- with all these search engines in place, I am increasingly paranoid that a patient will find this blog and read about him/herself. I am, however, going to talk about things that matter, like A&Z, the Gospel, God's never ending, always, and forever love.

That is NOT what I said

I am sure this is a common problem: People saying you said something, but in reality, why on earth would you ever say that?

Aidan and Zoe do that sometimes, "Mommy, you said we could...etc." Seriously, child, this mother would never say you can play as much iPhone game, watch as much TV, eat as much candy, as you want. This mommy may make you drink until you vomit when you start high school, but that time has not come yet.

For work, sometimes patients say stuff like that, and while I know I never said that, it does still make me feel kind of bad, like I intentionally deceived them or something. There is no point arguing about "I didn't say that. Why would I? That is just not my practice." Nonetheless, I feel like a lame, lame, person.

And now, I probably should go search my ratings on all these physician rating websites. Which, by the way, I think they are WAY lame.

What to know what else is lame? Garbage cans on the street. Our county is switching over to a new system: we are going to have three bins, for recycling (no sorting), garbage, and compost. The cans need to be lined up in a particular way on the street, against the curb. Well, that is fine and dandy, however, can you imagine the traffic by the elementary school on garbage collection days? All the curbs are busy! Full of cans! No where to park! Kids are too young to be dropped off at the circle! Where can we leave the cars?! (Luckily, Hubby drops off on Wednesdays, and that is garbage day, and his car is smaller, so he has better luck, or at least, this isn't really my problem.)

As for the three cans, I have other concerns too. Now that we can mix papers and cans and stuff, which is less work, but do I need to rinse out all the cans? That seems like a big waste of water in our drought prone state. However, if I don't, then the cat food juice will probably get on the papers, and doesn't that ruin paper recyclables? As for the compost, we will be tossing food scrapes and all in it. And I am just waiting for the raccoons to come by, knock over the cans, eat my food, get stronger, and make more babies. I mean, all this food won't be wrapped in plastic, which possibly limits the smell of the food? Or is this really just a theoretical worry of mine?

Possibly, the garbage system I grew up with in Taiwan is the best- because you all know Taiwan is such a clean place... The garbage truck came daily, and it played a very specific song, blasting, really. All the housewives, upon hearing the song, would dash out with their garbage. My working mother usually brought down a grocery bagful of garbage and just leaned it against the front door in the morning. A family of five made just one grocery bagful of garbage a day, really kind of amazing, isn't? We really buy too much and throw away too much here.

Quick Dinner

We enjoyed a very delicious dinner tonight. In case you are interested, here is MY recipe.

Heat up a stockpot, add a bit of olive oil, say 1 tbsp.
Chop up one medium onion, stir it a bit to brown.
Get a package of Italian sausage (I prefer the uncooked kind), cut sausages into bit sized pieces directly into the pot with kitchen scissors. Stir that for a bit.
Then, toss in a box of the precut butternut squash, I use the kind from Costco, so it is one pound of squash. Stir that some more. Add 28 ounces of diced tomatoes. Add about 40 ounces of water. And some chicken stock, enough to cover. Simmer that for about 20 minutes. 8 minutes before dinner time, toss in one bag of egg noodles, I think it is 10 ounces. Cook for 6-8 minutes, per package instruction. Sprinkle some parsley and oregano on top.

Yummers!

I can imagine, for you cheese eaters, that if you have some kind of cheese rind, I think parmasan reggiano, toss that in with your stock and let it simmer will probably add more flavor. Since I don't eat cheese, I really have no idea.

Also, I didn't add salt or pepper. I figured canned tomatoes, sausage...etc, all come with plenty of salt, so I skip that.

Enjoy.

Thanksgiving 2010

I will admit this readily, I am yearning for Thanksgivings of yore. Back to the days when I could spend all day cooking, without interruptions. The days when I shopped in the early hours of Friday and then napped luxuriously. The days without little people interrupting my conversations.

It is true, from time to time, I don't enjoy my kids very much. Ok, ok. I will be honest, a lot of times, I don't enjoy them at all.

The last hour may be one of those times. I don't know what it is, but these kids of ours, really, REALLY, like to be with us. Just go read a book by yourself, please! Go play with all these toys in the house! By. Your. Self!

I just want to complete something, ANYTHING!

Our Thanksgiving was lovely. I baked in peace the night before, and only had to cook a few side dishes in the afternoon as Honey Baked Ham had prepared our ham and turkey. (It was so much better than what I could have done!) The company was lovely, some family, a friend from Bible Study, and four new friends! These new friends had graciously played Monopoly with Aidan, and Aidan and Zoe got to run amok with their cousins. It was good.

There were rough patches on Friday, but we endured. We almost got stranded because Hubby's car key nearly broke in half. (The keys are 14 years old, and one had already broken in half- half of the key is still in the trunk key hole...) We made it home, had more friends over on Friday night, and fun was had by all also. But today, oh today, what happened to today?! While we met up with some college friends of ours, these children made it difficult to converse. Basically, they were being kids, but I was done being a parent.

Seriously, I am done with parenting. This forced volunteerism is over-rated and I have put in over seven years of my youth, and I am peetering out.

Oh yes, these kids are cute. Oh yes, I see that God is working in me, but really, I need Jesus to come soon.

I want to switch shoes with Zoe, I just want to hang upside down for a while.



I know, that the day when they will isolate themselves in their fortresses and I will yearn for the days when they clutched to my legs. However, I am also marveling the beauty of my mother's technique: as far back as I can remember, nearly every time I went to ask her to play with me, or to complain that I am bored, she gave me some kind of work to do. The kind of work that really made me want to just fly under the radar- like practicing Chinese handwriting, copying the multiplication table...etc. She also made me practice the piano and the violin, and all those hours were hours she had time to do stuff for herself, (I think, I can't be sure since well, I was in the piano room by myself.) It is truly a very smart system. I am enrolling Aidan and Zoe for piano lessons as soon as I can arrange it. Not just because it is time for them to jump on the train of music training, but that this mother needs some time to herself.

Trust Me Part II

I am trying to teach the kids to trust me, to know that I really do know more than they do, that I, in fact, want them to be happy. They don't usually believe me when I say so.

When we went to our church retreat, Aidan and Zoe were absolutely ecstatic about the bunk bed in our room. They built a fort, they climbed up and down, they played puppies, it was fun for all. Then, the next morning, Aidan started to beg to return to the room to play on his bunk bed, instead of going to the well-organized-and-very-fun program for kids. He begged, and begged and BEGGED. As I listened to his incessant demands about something that is so lame in comparison to the great fun he will really have with his friends and teachers, I thought about how I really don't trust my Heavenly Father.

"But Jesus, I really, really, really, want to go to an Ivy League medical school. I think it will be so good for me to do that. I really, really, really, want to date this guy, I mean, he is SO cute! I know he doesn't care about knowing you, but c'mon, have you seen how CUTE he is? Jesus, I really want to buy THIS house. Why can't you make that happen?" Meanwhile, Jesus is patiently waiting for me to see that I am wanting to play in the mud when He has an amazing playground for me.

I think, Jesus is always telling me, "My sweet daughter, trust me. I know what is good for you. I love you. I have died for you. I will not withhold anything that is good for you. I will give you what you need, what is good for you."

Similarly, A&Z can now parrot back to me, "Mommy, I trust you to know what is good for me." For now, anyway.

Trust Me Part I

I have lots of ideas for posts. Often, I am chauffering someone, somewhere, and I think, "This would be a fun subject to write about." But alas, by the end of the day, when I am done putting dinner away, bedding the children, returning phone calls, I just want to sit with my sweet Hubby and not be looking at a computer. Maybe Blogger will figure out some kind of voice recognition blogging device.

What are you missing? You must be wondering. For one, you are missing a good story about how I almost ran over the father of one of Aidan's classmates... (In order to get Aidan to school, I slug through traffic of 3 schools: our neighborhood school, the middle school, and finally, Aidan's school. The said father was on his bike, trying to cross a four lane street by the middle school, and I was trying to get Aidan to school on time. I slammed on the brakes at the cross walk, THEN he got on his bike and crossed the street. I didn't actually, almost, ran him over. However, as the whole car continued to move forward with the inertia, and all the bags fell onto the floor, Aidan said, "Hey! That is E's dad!")

What have I been doing, while not blogging, is setting up our our family trust. It is something we have been told to do, for a very, very, long time. When I started my private practice and bought my own life insurance, I was told to do this. Well, we didn't! (We had a will, no trust, from looonnng time ago.) Then our accountant got on our case, and I still procrastinated. It still truly bugs me, that I have to spend money on an attorney, to avoid probate costs, because attorneys made up the rules?! Seriously?! I should have gone to law school! But alas, the idea that A&Z could be in limbo with no milk money was sad enough to make us do it.

For our local friends, if you want a rec, Kimberley is great. She came to our house, for starters. (Although I am sure she charged us for coming to our house, but whatever, she came at NIGHT.)

The road to having a trust is long and arduous and obnoxious and annoying, even with a great estate attorney like Kimberley. We had to pick guardians, and backup guardians. We love these people, but we shudder to think of their complicated lives should we die prematurely. It is problematic, as we all have/will have at least two kids, that if we die, S&A could be parenting FOUR kids. FOUR. And our back up couple could have FIVE kids! Did I say that we love them?

Then there was the need to figure out how to give A&Z money. I tried to set it up so that I could control them from the grave, but Hubby talked me out of it. There was also this weird decision, that if all of us died, what do we want to do with the money? Do we want to give the money to our siblings? What if they died, do we want to give the money to our nieces/nephews? At what age? What if they are still very young? Seriously, too many choices.

There is also the stuff about what to do with my body if I become incapacitated. Everyone, I am game for being an organ donor, but definitely, not to be used for research, academics, or "therapy." Whatever that may be.

The "fun" part of the estate, is that we get to write letters to people to clarify this and that, to help people not to have hurt feelings. However, I think our letters to people will essentially be: "If you don't like this, suck it up. Too bad." I think it is nice that I get to tell people off from the grave.

I am so very, very, happy to say, that our trust is signed. There is just this obnoxiously tedious process of putting stuff in the trust...

By the way, did you know your life insurance policy (if greater than one million) is going to be taxed? I think most parents have a policy of at least that much, and just think, the government wants about 1/2 of it. So that your kids can starve. (Of course, our estate attorney devised some way to reduce such risks, of piling things in different piles...) Kimberley said, "You will always get taxed, whether income, gift, estate, or capital gains." Trust me, you need to get a trust in place.

Can it be true?

I read this fascinating article in The Wall Street Journal- best paper ever- over the weekend. It is an interesting view, certainly. Somewhat simplistic at times, but a very different opinion than the popular opinion of attachment parenting.

A friend of mine send me a message about this article, this is a dear friend of mine, who is thoughtful, smart, and basically, I want to be like her. I am quoting her directly.

"You know, nobody grates on me more than the attachment parenting crowd -- they are zealots and like to make people feel that the "research" shows their way is the best way etc. I am surrounded by them and all I see are exhausted, haggard women, bratty kids that think they are the center of the universe and a deep conviction that they are right. Well, don't they know that I am right? Ha ha....The other thing I thought about the article though is that no woman is being imprisoned. Prison is something that, once you are there, you can't get up and walk out. Each one of us is free to mother however we see fit for the well being of our children and ourselves. Anyone who is smashing their own organic peas and doesn't want to should just STOP! They can and they should exercise their free will and forget about what other people think. Ugh. The article almost victimizes women by not pointing out that we are strong, intelligent and free-- not imprisoned. There....that is what I dare not say on Facebook because I don't want to deal with the thread of conversation."

This is such a divisive topic, isn't it? My smart and thoughtful friend doesn't want to start a war on my facebook page. I love her! But I will start the war here, because I am provocative like that.

I have quite a few patients that come to me for lots of different reasons, but over the course of therapy, these young professional people essentially have to confront this question: "Do I want kids or not?" And they all like to know how I made my decision to have kids. (They assume I have kids, and when they ask, I do tell them I have kids. I mean, I can't deny that and then run into them at Costco with my brood!) This sweet, talented woman told me today about a study showing how single women are healthier than married women, whereas married men are healthier than single men. Her conclusion was that single women have the time/money to take care of themselves, whereas married men have their wives to take care of them. Can this be true? I came home and asked Hubby, he thought there are more ways to interpret it. For instance, married women really let themselves go... (Ha, ha.) Or, married men take good care of themselves because they are motivated to stay healthy to be with their families.

Another patient told me that he thinks parents totally just 'let themselves go, they get fat, they look ugly, and basically, miserable.' (Is that how he sees me?) Very kindly of him, however, he did say that he thought I was an exception. And he wanted to know my tricks.

It is very interesting for me to think about why I chose to have A&Z. They are so incredibly cute, but it is also hard. (For instance, I got a phone call from Aidan's school today that he missed his ride to his Chinese school. I got the voice mail at 7 pm, when we were all home already. Upon my investigation, he had 'missed' his ride because he talked too much at school today and was kept after class! Like I said, it is hard, and at times, troublesome.) Why did I do it? Twice? I believe in a way, I was out of my mind. I got brainwashed by Pottery Barn Kids catalogs. Have you seen how beautiful the catalog is? Chubby, clean, well-behaved children. Happy, glowing mothers reading to their children!

I will admit it, sometimes, when I am herding the turtles home, I daydream a bit. About my life if we were still without kids. I think I would work a lot more, I would be RICH, and I would probably be in really good shape physically. Hubby thinks we will be lonely, "with A&Z shaped holes in our hearts." I think he is right, as much as I don't want to agree with him.

From time to time, I will throw myself a pity party, "Woe is me, I work, I take care of A&Z, I cook, I clean, I do laundry. What does Hubby do? WTF?!" One thing that I love about my husband is that he is not petty. He doesn't keep records like this, he doesn't think about who is working harder. He just loves abundantly, generously, and kindly. You know how I ended up with the responsibilities of cooking, cleaning, laundering? Because I secretly like to take care of him, I like to be in charge of domestic duties. Until I am tired and worn out that is, then I give myself a pity party. If I were sitting with myself in a therapy session, I would tell myself that really doesn't make any logical sense at all.

And I think it is like that with the attachment parenting people. They like to say that they make their own organic compost to grow their organic carrots, which they steam (not microwave, I mean, the microwave kills!), until they are so tired and sick of it. Yet they like it. Like my friend said, they chose to put themselves in that position.

I tell my patients, You have a choice. You can choose to do attachment parenting and then want to die in the process, you can choose to not have kids and have a clean and orderly life. Or, you can choose to have kids, have some mess, feed them store bought organic baby food, let them cry it out, give them lots of kisses, time them out, give consequences. (Like a letter to a teacher, "Dear Ms.Z, I am sorry that I talked too much in class. I am sorry I wasn't listening. I am sorry that I made your job harder. Will you forgive me?")

It is about making choices.

Where is the towel?

Aidan is growing up. He is starting to shed his baby teeth. It is really a crazy idea to think that he is getting his permanent teeth. I didn't really pay attention in med school when they talked about teeth, (and it is highly possible they actually never talked about teeth. Hard to know for sure, but I can't think of which class would have covered teeth... I do remember we decapitated our cadaver on Halloween...) and so I am not sure if they are suppose to lose them in the order they got these baby teeth. Aidan is indeed losing them in the order he grew them. Does that make any sense at all? I am writing this terribly.

Anyway, he is a slightly late bloomer on losing teeth, which is totally fine with us for several reasons. My sister started to lose her teeth when she was still quite little and so when the big teeth came in, her mouth wasn't big enough. They had to pull out four teeth, (or some crazy number like that, I can't remember. Maybe this post is actually about stuff I can't remember.) It was traumatic. We want Aidan's mouth to grow big first, then get big teeth. Secondly, I am not sure if Aidan is really up to taking good care of his permanent teeth yet, therefore, the longer we can wait, the better.

While we want these teeth to stay in as long as possible, in his mind, all his friends have been losing teeth already, for a long time. Therefore, he was SO excited when the first one got loose.

My mother always offered to just yank out loose tooth instead of waiting and waiting until the bitter end. Of course, since I am more and more like my mother these days, I offered to pull Aidan's.

A few weeks ago, while Hubby was in Canada on a business trip, I pulled one.

Tonight, I pulled another one. We are getting our routine down. It goes like this:

Aidan: "Mommy, I think this one is ready."

Me: "Ok, after dinner."

After we finished dinner and ate our share of Halloween candy, (very fitting, don't you think?) we got down to business.

Me: "Aidan, lay down on the kitchen floor." He got down as I found a kitchen towel. I took hold of the tooth, yanked it out, and then, "Ok, bite down on the towel."

Voila, perhaps I should have gone to dental school.

Happy Birthday Hubby!

Hubby is getting old. He doesn't really like it when I say it like that, however, it is a fact. He is getting old. I just can't believe he is getting old.

We met when he was 19. He was a member of the cycling team, and they all wore their cycling clothes to the dining hall after a morning ride for brunch/lunch. Have you seen cycling shorts? They show EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING. When we first met, we were just friends- actually, the entire first year we knew each other, I had prosopagnosia. Selectively for him and his roommate. Mind you, they look NOTHING alike, except they both wore cycling shorts. He was so funny to share a meal with, just so very, very, nice. By my second year, I finally figured out the distinguishing features between he and his roommate: He had big, big, glasses. His roommate had much smaller glasses. (Never mind that he also weighed about 50 pounds more than his roommate.)

I was 19 when we started dating, I used to tell him all the time "You are just SO nice." It drove him nutty. But it is a true fact, he is just so nice!

And cute. I had made a mental note, upon seeing the Claremont Cycling Team during the first week of college, that these guys were cute, and I should definitely try to date one before graduation. Who knew I would marry the cutest one?! =) For the record, I always made sure my eyes stayed above the chest area. Never, ever, below the belt area.

Happy Birthday, my cute cyclist, who is so very, very nice. And to me, you will always be 19.

A Quick Get Away

Because Aidan attends a year round school, he has 3 weeks off in October. Every year, I have grand plans of going to Disneyland during the October Intersession, and every year (ok, only two years thus far) by September, I realize the error of my thinking and change our plans. We have been to Disneyland, and it is fun, but the idea of packing for a longish trip, getting on a plane, blah, blah, blah, for a theme park is just not in me by Labor Day.

Instead, we opted to go to Carmel/Monterey this year. It is a quick trip, and much lower in stress and preparations. For you fine folks who live around this area, this is what I recommend:

Day 1: On your drive down, stop by Los Gatos downtown, walk around, get lunch, relax. (That was the plan, but we decided to get ramen instead, which was delicious.) Throw the kids in the car, and they might just take a nap for the second leg of the trip. Drive past your hotel, either the Embassy Suites or Holiday Inn Express or the Marriott, and continue to Carmel. It takes about another hour- perfect duration for a car nap. By the time you get there, it is mid afternoon, get a snack, walk around town, chide at your kids for touching things in an antique shop. Get dinner at Little Napoli on Dolores Street. Get back to hotel, put the kids to bed. Enjoy the extra couple feet of space in your wheel chair accessible room, because you so cleverly took that room away from the truly handicapped people. (Ok, maybe I should feel bad about this, but I think, first come first serve.) The slightly bigger bathroom is very, very, nice. Especially if you have a baby who sleeps in a porta-crib. You can set it up in there! =)

Day 2: Go to the Aquarium. Park on Wave Street, and if you are lucky, you can park within a block of the Aquarium. Become members, because if you just go back once, you have 'made money.' Besides, it is totally tax deductible- it is not completely clear to me how this can be tax deductible when I am actually getting something out of it? Get lunch at the cafe around 11:30 so you beat the rush. Then, go for a lecture at 1:30, so that you can take a quick nap while the kids listen to the experts talk about whales. Go back to the hotel when you are done with the Aquarium for a swim, then dinner at the Fishwife's in Seaside then throw the kids in bed early and watch TV.

Day 3: On your way back home, swing by Gilroy Gardens. Do the swan ride first, because that gets busy. Then the car ride, because that also gets busy. The healthiest place to eat is the restaurant at the "Mission". They have fruit, roasted chicken, salads...etc. SKIP the Grill and the Mexican joints, trust me. Leave the park about 3, and the children will take another nap, and you are home in time for dinner!

One of the most amusing things for us on vacation is to have TV. The kids are definitely very intrigued by ALL the channels available, and I find some TV shows absolutely fascinating. Like Sisterwives, the reality TV show about this polygamist family. (Frankly, I don't know what people are so up in arms about polygamists anyway, I mean, so they have their own definition of marriage, while not for me, why make it illegal? There are many things that ought to be illegal, or stay illegal, like good old Mary Jane.) There is also this reality TV show about women who didn't know they were pregnant, they thought they were just eating poorly, getting fat, and too stressed, and in menopause. By the time they were in labor, they pretty much all thought they ate something bad, something REALLY bad. I would get cable just to watch these two shows. Seriously. (Actually, the only time I had cable was when I was in med school, and let me tell you, I watched a LOT of TV then- kinda makes me wonder how I passed second year...)

Anyway, book a trip to Carmel/Monterey, watch some TV, and relax!

Sunday School Reverie

I have very mixed feelings about teaching Sunday School. Believe me, I have very, very good reasons.

As a kid who has been going to church as soon as my mother was able to return to church after labor and delivery, then as a teenager who went to church on Friday nights and then Sunday mornings from 9 to 1 pm, then as a college student who did Mark study, and fellowship meeting, and Sunday worship, I feel a little churched out from time to time. After Hubby and I got married, there were times he was so excited about attending Sunday School at Redeemer Presbyterian Church, and I was just completely blasé about it.

To teach Sunday School really challenges me to not be blasé about church. That, is a difficult lesson.

Then there is this desire to look really good while teaching Sunday School. Typically, the teachers meet at 9:45 to pray before the children show up. If I didn't have the family that I do have, you bet I would be there at 9:40, just to be so superior about my timeliness. Alas, God knew that this idol ought to be crushed and gave me a family that perpetually makes me late. This, is another difficult lesson.

Perhaps I learn more while teaching Sunday School than the children are actually learning from me.

Kids...

Hubby and I were talking about how we couldn't not even imagine life without our A and Z over lunch yesterday. I didn't have the heart to tell him that, actually, sometimes, I can imagine my life when they are off to college.

Yes, I realize I will probably come back and eat those words. I will miss them terribly, I will randomly show up on campus, with food.

In this case, a huge pile of French toast.

Last Saturday for breakfast, I made 1 batch of French toast. We barely had enough for everyone. Last night, I wanted to eat French toast, so I made that for dinner. Two batches of it. That was a lot of toast.

Yummers...

Lack of Posts

I was looking through my posts from 2008, and boy, I wrote a lot back then. How much I wrote had a direct correlation to where I was working. Yes, indeed, when I was being paid by your tax dollars, I was pretty much always slackin'. See, the government is too big.

These days, when I am at work. I work! Work, work, work. Sometimes I think I should sing "The Working Song" from Enchanted.

This evening, while putting dishes away, I told Hubby. "Just so your know, tomorrow is my early day. I start at 8. And I don't finish until 5. Boy, I am going to be dead." Hubby replied, "Oh, a 9 hour working day." Yes, I realize it sounds absolutely ridiculous to these hard working people who work in high tech, but really, I dread my marathon days. In 9 hours, I am going to see 14 patients. To primary care docs, or ER docs, that is really a low number. Yes, I realize I am a baby about working hard.

However, I am exhausted at the end. For instance, I gotta counsel someone out of my practice. It is never pleasant, but at some point, it is better for the patient and for me. (Before I let that person go though, I need to convince him to pay me.) Wish me luck.

It is also quite a roller coaster, that in one appointment, I hear about how much better a person is doing. Someone telling me that life is so much better without depression/anxiety. But the very next appointment may be with someone whose depression is just refractory to treatment. I have sent the said person for a second opinion, for hospitalization, for other treatment programs, but I feel like we are marching in place. I don't like it. Not at all. I want this person to be better. To be normal and healthy.

It is sad, actually, to think that there are people who will get better with the first intervention and never struggle with mood disorders again. Then, there are those whose illnesses are just so difficult to treat. Like cancer, some patients improve with one round of chemo, yet another person can't get any better after ten rounds of chemo.

I pray, that God gives me wisdom, all day long. That He gives me patience, to wait for medications to work. For endurance, to sit with patients who will probably never get better. Most of all, I pray for mercy, that everyone gets better.

Just Take It All

I am starting to think that reading the Wall Street Journal may be bad for my health. It is simply frustrating to get the news. To read about the debate of various policies, the nitty gritty details of this awful economy can be so overwhelming. I may have to stop reading it for a while.

But I can't stop reading it because of Aidan and Zoe. Before they came along, I never looked at my taxes all that closely. True, Aidan came along when I was a resident, and as a resident, I made very little anyway. Now that I am responsible for them, I want to be wise, be sensible, to plan for their educational expenses, bar and bat mizvahs, weddings, and well, to set them out to the real world.

When I pay taxes, I feel that I am doing them a dis-service. Not just because then that money won't be saved for them or spent on them, but that the money is not being spent well by the government. With increased taxation, I see that pensions are being funded, but he is now sitting in a class with 24 other kids.

As a side note, I sometimes think we should get a prospectus from the government. When one holds stock in a company, one gets these financial statements. We should get that from the government: of every dollar in collected tax, exactly how is that spent?!

With the debate about estate taxes, I am becoming more and more annoyed. I am sure we won't have an 'estate' to give them- I am going to paying off my medical education well after we pay for Aidan's college- but I do want them give them something! Living where we are, a typical middle class family can easily have an estate of over one million, including real estate, jewelry, 401(k), life insurance, IRAs...etc. Some lawmakers want 55% of that?! I also don't like how the tax is being termed "the super wealthy people tax." Sure, Paris Hilton will quite the estate, but I am just a physician who is trying to be sure that my two kids, who are probably going to be under-educated, to have a jump start.

The idea of jump start is also controversial, isn't it? That the idea of estate tax is to spread things around, so that everyone has the same. What are we, communists? We all want our kids to have a jump start, even parents who are drug dealers want their kids to do well, at school, at drug dealing, or not. Why is it so bad?

Sure, Scripture says to give to Caesar what is due Caesar. That is true, but it sure seems like Caesar is looking for new ways to take stuff. I really hope Jesus comes soon, and very soon. I am ready to go and be with my Maker, along with my Hubby and cute kids, and none of us would have to worry about estate taxes.

Last note, some folks have been telling us that if we form a trust then we can avoid being taxed. I don't think that will be the case. If a foundation is started, then that would be useful to avoid taxes, but that is rather unlikely, don't you think? Does anyone know this for sure? I think the government is looking to tax trusts. What do I know, I am just a mother who wants to take care of kids from the grave.

Lit up like a Christmas Tree

My dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree on Friday morning. I was about 1/4 a mile into my usual 2 mile commute, when the car just stalled. I pulled over and was dismayed, Hubby had just left with the children for school, and my first patient was due to arrive at the office in about 9 minutes. I tried the old trick, turned off the engine and restarted, it drove just fine, and I made it to the office in time. I knew the trick because this had happened last February, and again in the spring. The firs time the car stalled, I freaked. Zoe was with me, and we were about a block from home. I parked the car, and waited for Hubby to pick us up to get to Aidan's Chinese school performance. We took it in to our mechanic, and there were, of course, things to replace and fix. After all that money, it happened again in the spring when my friend Michelle was in the car with me, along with Aidan and Zoe. At that point, we decided to do nothing. I had secretly placed a Do Not Resuscitate order on this Volvo.

The Volvo had been trusty and faithful. We brought home Aidan and Zoe in the Volvo, we mopped up various barf in the backseat, and lots of excrement in the trunk. I was rear ended once in it, and then rear ended someone else a year later. The Volvo had heard lots of screams, Aidan's, Zoe's, mine.

But it was time for it to go.

We had discussed various options for its replacement, and was always dismayed to find that cars had only grown in size since we bought this car in 2002. We wanted something a tad bigger, but not a gigantic bus.

To be honest, I prefer a Mini Cooper. Forget the kids, and their gears, I want a car to drive off, speedily, like Jason Bourne. Actually, I think I want a Mini because when Aidan was 6 weeks old, we took him to a beautiful wedding in North Carolina. One of my best friend from college, my maid of honor, was marrying her best friend. They drove off from the reception in a Mini, while I held a screaming baby who had vomited and pooped on me hours earlier. Yup, the Mini is really about a dream of freedom.

Clearly, not meant to be, at this time.

We had realized that the car we buy will very likely end up being the car Aidan will drive in about 10 1/2 years. And when Hubby's car gets replaced in the next few years, that car will likely end up becoming Zoe's car. Totally crazy to think about it that way! Therefore, the new car needs to be safe, and frankly, a bit dowdy. No need for my flirtatious son to have a flashy car, you know what I mean.

So we decided to buy this:

It was a truly a miracle that we finished the whole process in about 2 1/2 hours. The children did great, I stayed calm, and Hubby was an awesome negotiator. The trade-in value of the Volvo started at $500. FIVE hundred. Hubby convinced them to go 5X of that. Woohoo!

I am looking forward to an unlit dashboard for a looooonnnnng time!

Hoarders

Lots of patients and friends have been talking about these reality shows featuring various hoarders. Intrigued about how hoarders are portrayed in these shows, I sat down with Hubby and watched an episode.

I have been to homes like that. I have had patients who lived like that. As an intern, there was a severely depressed woman who came to the hospital nearly mute. Initially, she only said yes and no. As she improved, more social issues came about. While she was hospitalized, her neighbors called Code Enforcement and her dwelling was pronounced uninhabitable. They found over a dozen cats, and rats, and gerbils, and of course, the usual feces and garbage. My co-intern and I were incredulous. When we asked her, "So, um, how many cats do you own?" She thought she had two. She also thought she had about half a dozen of rats and gerbils in cages. Well, according to the authority, they were DOZENS and these animals roaming. To this day, I have no idea how there were cats and rats running around the same property?! A lot of times, these homes are made aware to authorities because of fire hazards (can you imagine an apartment full of papers burning?) and of course, health hazards.

I also completed this rotation where I went to people's homes to evaluate competency. Basically, is there anyone upstairs to manage the estate/health of the said person, and if there is no one upstairs, and if it is a 'psychiatric reason' (generally, it was all psychiatric reasons,) I then filed paperwork and requested a judge to pronounce the said person to be incompetent. Once that is in place, then a conservator gets involved and theoretically, things will get better. As you can imagine, people really don't want to be conserved. There was a woman in a fancy neighborhood who refused to let us in, we called the cops and she still refused. Without a warrant, one could not go in. (Perhaps she was really with it?!)

There was another lady who lived in this neighborhood that I would love to live in, and apparently, according to the social worker who had been there previously, had no electricity, no water, no heat, and was full of garbage. This elderly woman was never home when we stopped by- we thought she was just sitting in the dark behind the door.

Then there was this family with a very strong psychotic gene, that resided in this very, very, very fancy neighborhood, where a home easily could fetch 5 million bucks. Yet it was so incredibly dilapidated.

Of course, on the other spectrum of the socioeconomic range, a man and his three adult sons lived in this trailer along the coast. It was absolutely disgusting. The toilet had not worked in a very, very, long time and was, well, brown. There was food, of all ages, everywhere. Surprisingly, there was a computer, albeit surrounded by lots of empty boxes from Amazon. The poor elderly man was taking a nap with his CPAP for his sleep apnea, and man, that CPAP was loud! Anyway, turned out, he was competent and he was aware of the mess.

Then things can get freaky at these home visits. Thankfully, a social worker typically already made a connection so I never had to go in 'blind.' There was a lady who 'collected' tarantulas. Her house had floor to ceiling full of stuff: mailings, circulars, letters, newspapers, crap. She did manage to form aisles through it, so one could get from the front of her residence to the back.

It is my opinion that there are two types of hoarders: ego syntonic hoarders and ego dystonic hoarders. Whereas ego syntonic hoarders like it, and must keep up with it, ego dystonic hoarders tend to also suffer from depression, anxiety, psychotic disorders, and do not like how they are hoarding. In general, ego dystonic hoarders are more easily 'treated.'

I was struck by several things for the episode I watched. First of all, these psychologists sound really, well, dumb. They keep saying the obvious. "Let's encourage her. It is ok, I am here to help you." Definitely not a useful portrayal for what a psychologist can do in these situations.

Secondly, some of these people really need to be medically treated for their underlying disorders. Surprisingly, that was not an intervention used in the episode I saw.

Thirdly, I think hoarding really speaks to how isolated people can be in our modern society. So often, people start hoarding behaviors after life circumstances change: after kids move out, after a spouse dies. Sometimes, I think, the prevalence of our psychiatric illnesses would decrease if people lived in more secure communities, where people got in on each others' business, with care and kindness.

Anyway, I think TLC and A&E ought to hire me as an 'expert.'

Kids

I do have two kids, although one may not be able to readily come to that conclusion based on my recent posts.

They are well.

Aidan's reading has improved so tremendously over the summer, and I am thrilled. He is doing well in first grade, making friends, doing homework, being self motivated. While he no longer chews on his finger nails, something we worked on over his year in kindergarten, he now has this weird throat clearing thing going on. I think, it started with his bad allergies, and turned into a bad habit. I have seen no improvement on antihistamines or nasal steroids, perhaps I should try him on Singulair, or send him to see a behavior modification therapist. On one hand, I think he will grow out of it, but on the other hand, man, it is annoying. The old adage in parenting is true, "If it is not one thing than it is the other."

Zoe is becoming quite a young lady. She clearly has an opinion of her own, saying things like, "Good idea!" "I told you so!" It is amusing to see her so determined to 'write.' She is independent, and just loves routine. She is just so eager to grow up and be like her brother. I am, however, not looking forward to her growing up. I can already see the wild hormones that will come our way again, in full force, in about a decade, probably less. She can be so passionate! Why sugar coat it? She can be emotional. I just need to show her how to be emotional appropriately, not an easy task, for sure. (Not that I have mastered it myself...)

Sibling rivalry is also ever present with us. Because they are at different schools, one child always gets picked up first. It does not matter which child I get first, within 2 minutes of the two of them being together, whining and attention grabbing take center stage. Whenever I have just one of them with me, whether we run errands, read a book, hang out quietly at home, it is a breeze. Whenever I have both of them, they bicker over why so and so has two crackers and "I must have the same, or more." Truly. Delightful.

Yet they can also be so sweet together. When they play "I am a dog" game, the dog so docilely follows the owner around, and the owner always so lovingly feeds the dog. Aidan chose to write Zoe a letter for a school project, and he wrote, "I love you" at least five times. (Possibly because he really knows how to spell all those words.) Zoe will save something special for Aidan too.

I hear sibling rivalry continues, forever. Dear God, have mercy on me.

Soliliquy #4

Since I started talking about decreasing health care costs, here are some more ideas.

I don't understand why MediCare and MediCal programs are so expensive and inefficient. Well, I do know why, at least partially.

Part of the problem is that they are government-run programs, and let's face it, people get government jobs for pensions and security. Perhaps this will make me hugely unpopular with my colleagues of yore, but I really think that if physicians who work for the government actually worked, they won't need so many physicians. The problem is that the physicians are salaried, and when people are salaried, in a secure position, with pensions, they are just not motivated to do work. If those doctors actually got paid for the work they do, I would say, they really only need 1/2 to 2/3 of the staff. Seriously.

For instance, when I worked at my old job, we fought tooth and nail to not see more than one new patient a week. These days, I regularly meet 2-3 patients a day. Yup, your tax dollars, hard at work.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, people are more motivated when given the right incentives.

I think, we should do away with county health services. Instead, there should be a loan forgiveness program for people who work exclusively with MediCare and MediCal patients. There are currently programs like that for serving Native Americans on preservations, or with the military. Why not expand it? I would have gladly worked in such a place if my education loans could be forgiven, even partially!

It would also help tremendously if we do away with existing pension programs. I know, it is not a popular thought, but the truth is, we can't fund them anyway, and to go on pretending is really foolish.

I think people should have options, to go into Social Security or to private programs, such as 401(k)s. For those people who just don't want to think about investing, they can opt to go into Social Security, while taking the biggest risk of "It belongs to the government and let's face it, the government is broke." Or, "Let me take this seriously, that the market can fluctuate, and I need to be responsible."

President Obama made a speech about how social security shouldn't be privatized and that Social Security, as a government program, is much safer and people need that kind of safety. I think he made the speech about 2 weeks ago- I saw it while walking on the treadmill on my cruise trip. I mean, does he really think Social Security is secure?!

I have a patient, who retired as a school teacher and saved responsibly during his career. As he neared retirement, he followed the rules and pulled out his money from stocks and bonds, and bought CDs instead. He did this in 2006, when the market was still going up and up. He locked in rates of 6% on CDs! So he is laughing on the golf course while his closest friends, who are still working as physicians slave away fighting for reimbursements.

I do think people should be made to save, just like money is sucked out from each pay check for social security, we should be able to choose where that money goes but no choice in the fact that money has to be saved somewhere.

Perhaps we can learn from China, where entitlement programs don't exist, and people save at a rate of about 40%. Is it surprising that they hold most of our debt?

Soliliquy #3

I think becoming tough can be very good for all of us.

For starters, to be physically tough will decrease the rates of obesity, hypertension, cancer, diabetes, and lots of other diseases. With decreased morbidity, the health care cost will be less, and well, that is good for everybody.

I understand that obesity can be genetic, and of course we shouldn't punish people for what nature has dealt them. On the other hand, people can be rewarded for making changes! Why not have actuaries figure out how much it does cost to insure an person with a BMI of 40 versus a BMI of 30, and each step in between? I am sure actuaries can tell us that, even with more factors thrown in, such as smoking habits and all. Then, based on the facts, we can get money back for making good choices. I really do think people want to change, they just need the right motivation and help.

I can probably count on my fingers the number of obese patients who are not interested in losing weight, that I have encountered thus far. People are very open to discussing meal plans, exercise routines, emotional eating habits...with me. And most of them do lose weight!

I don't know if talking about helping people lose weight and then rewarding them with better insurance rates makes me ultra conservative or what, but that is good for them! Why not?!

Soliliquy #2

People who live in my house are a bunch of softies.

That is my conclusion after reading two books about WWII recently. The first one I read was The Longest Winter about the Battle of Bulge, and the second one was The Ghost Soldiers. It described the POWs held by the Japanese in the Phillipines for over THREE years. (This book has some hilariously awesome writing, such as "The antiquated diseases came out of the latrines for an encore performance.")

It is amazing how these men survived. The constant hunger- having so little to eat, and over time, even less as their captors also had less to eat. The unknown- will the captors be ruthlessly inhumane, or sympathetic? What will the captors do as they face the inevitable defeat? Will they kill all the POWs or let them be? The fear- has the American military forgotten about the POWs, will they ever come back?

I imagine that the toughness of these young men, most of them were in their 20's, stayed with them. There has to be correlation between the greatness of these soldiers who went on to shape the growth of this country, and the world.

In comparison, how did I spend my 20's? I studied, ate whatever I wanted, and became entitled. It is my right to be happy, darn it! I must have my gadgets so that I am constantly distracted! I need to be entertained! What does that mean for my generation? What will we do? How will we help those who are in need?

It is not a secret that I am not President Obama's biggest fan. (Yes, really.) And I think, part of the reason I am not so impressed is because he really hasn't been through tough times.

I think about the presidents we have had since WWII, and most of them have been through something hard. They have been through the Korean War, Vietnam War, and all the financial bubbles in between. Professionally, they governed states, and really made tough choices: If I choose to fund this program, that will have to go. I do think President Clinton was a good president, and I think he picked up a lot of his skills as a governor.

My generation is now encountering something difficult- has the US actually accomplished anything in Iraq? Will we ever have enough jobs to go around? Will our children actually be educated in the schools? I think we need tough people. We need to become tough ourselves!

I don't actually know how to do that. Suggestions?

Soliliquy #1

It seems to me, that somehow, what happens to us very much depends on what kind of judge a case gets in court.

With the case of Prop 8 here in California and how the voters decided one way, and they took the case to the court and a judge decided another way, it just seems to me that it is all so arbitrary. I am not going to focus on the merits of Prop 8 at all, but the process is alarming.

First of all, I don't understand how California has this proposition system for voters to vote in the law. Not that I am saying I want politicians to make laws either (do remember, that I don't actually have any solutions, I am only writing as the peanut gallery.) So people voted. The people have spoken, for better or for worse. And the case goes to a judge? And that one person decides?

Not too long ago, the people in Utah voted against raising taxes. The case got taken through the court system, and the judges there decided that actually, the State really needs more money, whatever, they are going to raise taxes.

Then this week, the case about stem cells went to see a judge, and that judge decided that new grants shall all be frozen.

What?! It seems to me that issues are being decided whether a 'conservative' or a 'liberal' judge hears the case? Is that really how it is going to be?!

I read The Sister Wife: Brides of Gabriel Book One by Diane Noble while on vacation. It is a story about Mary Rose, who converts to Mormonism, marries the love of her life, becomes a missionary to Illinois, and then is informed of plural marriages. The story explores the ambivalence within her, about how her ideas are in conflict with the teachings by the Prophets, yet she is utterly powerless to leave her marriage or to stop her husband from marrying her very best friend. Instead, she chooses to encourage her husband to take on more wives, because if she can't have her husband's love exclusively, she does not want him to love any other woman, definitely not the second wife, not the third...and imagine, all the rest. To find out for sure though, I am going to have to read Book Two.

The story got me thinking about these judges, we disagree with them, yet they alone make the rules, in the end.

Bummer.

Disclaimer: I am not an attorney, and does not understand the judiciary process at all. I am just a mostly-law-abiding, tax-paying citizen, who is paying the salary of the law makers and the judges.

Back from Vacation

Sorry to have been so wordless here- we just came home from a week cruising the inside passage of Alaska. I didn't want to broadcast to all that our house was going to be void of humans, besides, there was no reliable and inexpensive internet connection on the boat.

Precisely because there would be cell phone reception and internet access, it was very restful. I signed out my case load to a dear colleague, I even wrote out sign out notes to her and EVERYTHING, except I left it on our mail box and because I had asked the post office to not deliver mail for a week, the letter sat here for a whole week. Anyway, poor J, she took quite a few calls. I need to figure out a better way to do this next time.

The best part of the vacation was that after the children were in bed, Hubby and I simply sat, read, hung out and went to bed. The other awesome parts included never cleaning anything, no planning meals, no cooking meals... There was, however, a lot of disciplining of children. It was highly probable, that our expectation of behaviors was entirely unrealistic. I think, in retrospect, it is to be expected, that vacation is really behavior boot camp. Whereas on non-vacation days, we are so busy with tasks that A&Z have no time to misbehave. On vacation, we are with them nearly 24-7 (they did go to the kids' camp for a few hours here and there), and thorns became planks and we simply had to act responsibly. Interestingly, Aidan still gave thanks each nigh in his prayer, "Thank you God, for a great day."

Hubby and I had done the same cruise just as Aidan was gestating in me, and boy! 7 years make a huge difference! The glaciers are definitely melting away, the ports are still very, very small, and I am glad we don't live in Alaska.

I read a few books over the week, and because there were few distractions, I had a lot of thoughts about them. Be forewarned, long soliloquies are coming...

Reverie

Hubby runs in this Chase Manhattan race in San Francisco annually, and every year he tells me about it well in advance of the day, and every year, I 'forget' about it until the night before. My side of the conversation goes like this, "What? You won't be home for dinner tomorrow night? Why?" "You never told me!" "Right..."

I make the command decision that if Hubby won't be home for dinner anyway, I will not be making dinner. Instead, we will get food delivered, which is actually a bit of a challenge here in the 'burb, but still less of a challenge them getting the kids in the car and fetching the food myself.

I pick up Aidan and Zoe from their schools and make it home by 5:03. The kids run inside and immediately start a game of "I am a dog and please walk me" with each other. I order our food and decide to take this chance to sit down and play some piano.

I find a very, very, tattered copy of Schubert's piano works. My mother had played from this book in the 70's. There are still markings in it from her teacher. It is truly an antique- kinda miraculous that it still has all its pages. (When I was a kid, if I got REALLY frustrated with a piece, I picked up the pages in my hands and wrinkled the sheets, while the pages are still attached to the book. Yes, there are books with really gnarly looking pages, and yes, I probably had an anger problem.)

I decide to play Impromptus: Op. 90. There are 4 pieces in this set and I learned number 4 when I was 13. I learned No. 2 and 3 a few months ago. I shall rephrase, I didn't learn the pieces, I mainly sight read them and decided to play them on tempo. It is absolutely certain that I am playing some incorrect notes. These Schubertean pieces are very repetitive, which is a suitable character for me. I like pieces that are in ABA formation. You learn A, and you have nearly the entire piece mastered. (Never mind that the B section is usually much more tricky than the A section.)

So I play, as I play, I am wondering if it is a good thing that I am able to play what I played when I was 13. Or is it just sad that I am still playing the same stuff over two decades later. Aidan and Zoe decide to change their game to "Pick up the sword and shield and whack each other silly." They are getting louder, and louder. I wonder, when my mother played the same music in the 70's, did my brother and I act like circus animals too?

As the notes flowed, or staggered and tripped on themselves, I am thinking about Clara Schumann, the wife of Robert Schumann. No wonder her concert pianist career ended when she married Robert and had EIGHT kids. With all that running around, screaming, dirty diapers (no disposables back then!) how did she ever get any practice done? Never mind that her husband also told her that the noise from her practicing was wrecking havoc on his composing. Nice. Clara actually transformed piano performances- prior to her revolutionary act of playing from memory, pianists/harpsichordists used to play with music in front of them. Thanks a lot, Clara, for making it so much harder for piano students everywhere. Then I am convinced that she must have memorized her music before mommy brain set in.

Aidan decides that he needs to do his Kumon, so he grabs his worksheets and settles by me on the floor. I am now playing No. 2 of the set, "Mommy, what's 14 minus 8?" As I play the arpeggiated 16th notes, I yell out, "What is 8 plus 6?" This is making it really hard to concentrate, I think to myself. Then I notice that Zoe is looking bored, I better intervene. "Zoe, go get a book and read next to me," while my fingers stay busy.

I decide, after playing through No. 4, 2, and 3, that I really, really, need to learn No. 1. Looks easy enough, the right hand plays by itself for a while. Aidan finishes his work sheets, they go back to the game of "Let me whack you silly." I am sight reading this baby, and I hear, "BAM!" I nearly jump off the bench! But there is no one crying. Zoe has expertly deflected a life threatening whack using her shield. I go back to sight reading, and they go back to hitting and smacking.

The bell rings, the lady is here with Thai food. Good bye, Schubert, I haven't found out how you end this piece, but I will be back. See you in a few weeks.

Pick Ups

I spend a lot of my life picking up A&Z. It is just the way of life for these two kids, with a working mother. While we live as close to work/school as we possibly can, it is still just a lot of time driving very short distances...

4:29 Pack up my bags, walk to the car.
4:31 Realize I left the cherries in the fridge at work, walk back in to get it.
4:35 In the car, drive the 1.2 mile distance to Zoe's school
4:40 Have Zoe, but she wants to wear the Snow White costume. Put it on her, convince her to keep me company to the bathroom. She twirls down the hall.
4:45 Still twirling, wait for the bathroom, go to the bathroom.
4:53 She is still twirling back to the classroom. Convince her to give up the costume.
4:58 In the car, give her a cracker, call Pizza Hut, order a medium Hawaiian pizza, and another medium of 1/2 cheese, and 1/2 pepperoni. Pizza Hut does not sell water?! Text Hubby to bring water from work. Drive to Aidan's school, which is about 2 miles away.
5:05 Aidan is watching cartoons in Chinese, Zoe wants to watch. I chat with his teachers and practice my Chinese in the process.
5:15 Convince the kids to get in the car, surprisingly, they do. Drive about 2 miles to Pizza Hut. Zoe reports her legs hurt in her knee high boots. Persuade her that she is ok.
5:25 At Pizza Hut, pizzas not ready. Put children on the counter so they can watch gabillions of calories being turned into pizza.
5:45 Have pizza, ask for plates, but apparently, Pizza Hut does not do paper plates. Buckle the children back in the car, drive two blocks to parking lot. Get out of the car, see that I didn't put my reusable groceries bags in the trunk. Aidan holds the picnic blanket and napkins (to use as plates) and water, Zoe holds two jackets. I hold: two pizzas, a container of wet wipes, my purse, bin of cherries, and Zoe's hand.
5:50 See Hubby at the park, find a spot, sit down and realize that I should have brought the children's sunglasses. Oh well.

Sometimes, I simply don't know what to make of my activities.

Back to School Thoughts

I know I have a dissenting voice. Ever since I was little, it annoyed my mother very much that whatever she said, I would disagree. "Eat your meat." "No, Mom, we should eat more vegetables." "Eat your vegetables." "But Mom! I need the protein to grow my muscles." You get the picture, it was painful to raise me.

These days, I have lured Hubby into my Camp of the Dissenting Opinion. I have convinced him to join me, in pointing out the strange ideas that surround us, the inefficiencies of government, of people. And yes, we are the Peanut Gallery.

With Aidan starting 1st grade, I am once again, finding lots of material: the same material as last year, just with the added, "I can't believe I have to do this again."

1. The info packet: At the beginning of the school year, he comes home with about a dozen sheets of paper, things for us to fill out, to sign. Things like emergency contact info and agreeing to the library policy. What I don't understand is why are we signing this again?! I mean, I don't sign the library policy at my city library annually, why are we doing this? Why do I need to fill out my 3 emergency contacts twice? Hello! It ought to be a data base on the web that we can get this done! For crying out loud, there is a poor soul who has to sort all this madness.

2. School supplies: I can't believe the current system is in place. We are given this list of stuff to buy, at 4 pm, the day before school starts. First of all, I imagine the supply is very much the same year to year. Why not send it to us at the end of last year, with the re-enrollment form. Better yet, post it on the website so we can look at it all summer long. Also, I can't believe that all 125 families will need to rush to the local stores to buy the same stuff. The PTA can easily use this as a fund raising opportunity: Here is your bag of supplies, give me your money. I would totally do that! Finally, do we get this supply back, or am I going to buying a new pair of scissors annually for the next 5 years?

3. School funding: I can't believe that our PTA has to fund the music and art and physical education programs. Class size is also going up, to 25. The classrooms were designed for about 18 kids. They are going to run out of space in the classrooms! Politicians should be required to send their children to public schools. Don't make other people do what you don't want to do for your own kids.

On the sunny side, I am very pleased with what Aidan has accomplished over the summer. He only had 5 weeks of summer, since we are in year round school. In 5 weeks, he read over 30 books, on his own. He is now doing subtraction, and even some multiplication, all in his head! I have a chance to get him into an Enrichment Program, where he can learn the Keyboard. He is also back in Chinese school, and I am pleased to say that this mother has finally came to a realistic goal: Aidan's goal in Chinese school is to be able to speak it and understand it. Reading and writing, not our priority. (So freeing to finally be ok with that for myself!) Socially, he is blossoming like those huge dahlias that are blooming right now! He makes friends so easily, and is such a sweetheart. Soccer will be starting soon, and that will be awesome. I am also thinking about doing some swimming lessons with him, so that we can both learn to swim properly!

As for Zoe, I am delighted to find out that I didn't miss the boat on signing up for gymnastics or ballet. (I know, it is ridiculous that one can 'miss the boat' for a 3 year old... but alas, we do live where we live...) I am hesitant about gymnastics because it really can stunt one's growth! On the other hand, I am hesitant about ballet because of its own health risks, like eating disorders... Possibly this mother knows a little too much for her own good. She is growing into a delightful young lady. We love how she will sometimes stop whatever she is doing, run over to us, and whisper, "Mommy, I love you!" She is also making friends easily in her new classroom, learning to obey, and just adores her big brother.

I can't believe how quickly they are growing up. As I picked them up from their schools today, I talked to them about how before I know it, we will be sending them to college! Aidan promised that I can go visit him whenever I want to, and that he will let me take him and his roommate out to dinner, and that it would be ok for me to send him money. =)

Parental Visits and Thoughts

My parents came to help us this past week, and they were indeed very helpful. Aidan participated in a soccer camp last week, and fortunately/unfortunately, for his age group, camp ended at noon. I couldn't play hooky in the afternoons all week long, and neither could Hubby, and thus, parents to the rescue!

Probably already clear to y'all, the simple fact that I chose to be a psychiatrist speaks to the fact that I have an interesting relationship with my parents. When I sat on the couch with my own therapist many moons ago during training, and I went on and on and on about how I wished my parents had done differently in raising me, my therapist looked at me in my eyes, and said, "Exactly what do you want them to do?! They clearly did the best that they could, what do you want?"

That question really stopped me in my track. What did I want them to do? I thought about it for a very long time, and now that I have A&Z, I think I know. I wanted them to spend more time with me. They spent as much time as they had with me, yet I want more! (That is why, I am fully convinced that A&Z will also have something to talk about with their therapists down the road...)

As good of parents as they have always been, they true purpose here is to point me to my Perfect Father, the one in heaven. And that they did. My Heavenly Father always has time for me, His plans are perfect for me, and He will never fail me.

Having said all that, my relationship with my parents have also changed a lot since the arrival of A&Z. I am much more clear about asking them to help me, in the way that I want them to help. Over the last six years, we all have had more practice in this, and dare I say this? I think we are all getting better. I am better at asking my parents to help me in the way that I want them to help, and they are perfecting the art of doing it the way I want them to. For instance, I like my kitchen clean, all the time, even while I am using it to make dinner. My mother, however, does not care about her kitchen. For the week that they were here though, she (or my dad, probably both) diligently kept it clean, which was very lovely.

I am reading Dr. Wes Stafford's Too Small to Ignore. Dr. Stafford is the president and CEO of Compassion International and he is here to comfort the afflicted (the marginalized children, both here and abroad) and afflict the comforted (people like me). As I am thinking about how I can change my life to help children around the world, I am even more mindful of A&Z, and how I am parenting. One of things that I am more convicted to do is to include them in my life more. Yes, they already take up so much my life, but I still exclude them from many things for sure. For instance, my very clean kitchen is evidence that I limit their presence there. Yes, Zoe bakes with me (we made jam filled thumb print cookies yesterday!) but how much did I really let her help? I want to include them in my day to day life more! (Hubby thinks this way, I can also share my chores all around!) And that would be a good thing!

One of the gifts my mother gave me was to teach me how to make a simple dinner when I was 9. She let me chop up vegetables using a huge cleaver, she taught me how to remove fish scales, and how to make soy sauce braised whole fish. At 9. I am sure I made a huge mess! (I have this memory that I was chopping up onions and my eyes burned and burned, and I crawled to the couch and fell asleep...good times.) In exchange, she equipped me for adulthood, and I want the same for A&Z.

In summary, my children are going to be all the more present in my life through participating in my chores!

Schedule Maintenance

I am learning a lot of schedule maintenance on several fronts. How to schedule my free time, how to schedule Aidan and Zoe's activities, and finally, how to manage my practice.

It has been quite a learning curve about all three in the last few years.

For much of my life, I have been on some kind of track. Initially, I was on the track to become a musician for a living. Gradually, it changed to a track for becoming a physician, and this track too a very, very, long time. After Hubby and I got married, we had many conversations about "What does one do with free time?" Hubby has always been very good about finding things to do, things of interest for him, whereas I am very good at doing what I 'need' to do, and not very good at what I 'want' to do.

I am mindful that I want to help Aidan and Zoe to be good at doing things they are interested in doing, to fill their own time, and to be free to try new things for fun. Therefore, I am trying very hard to not put them on a track of my own ideas. It is hard to do! I would love to raise a Julliard caliber cellist, an Olympic swimmer, and a plastic surgeon (all three would actually be the same child.) Because, the other child is busy being a World Cup soccer player, and a Peabody Conservatory pianist, and a cosmetic dentist. You see the importance for me to hold myself back? Because they may not want to play the cello or the piano. They may want to play the viola and the French horn.

As for my schedule maintenance for the practice, it is tricky, to keep it just full enough for me to manage, that leaves me enough time to do errands, make dinners, attend school activities, be a mother and a wife, and do the aforementioned fun activities for myself. On the other side of this coin is to be sure that I line up all the patients back to back, so that when I am away from the children, I am 'billable.' As I look back, it is clear that divine intervention plays a huge role in this. Somehow, I am in network for a good insurance panel, it is all relative, after all. Even when patients cancel, I am often able to fill a time spot, the record stands at about 15 hours. That is rather incredible, that a perfect stranger calls me at the right time, to fill an hour that someone can't make.

Providence is an amazing gift.

My Therapists

As a psychiatrist, I spend all my working hours evaluating how people see their worlds. If they see their worlds through an depressive lens, I try to encourage them to put on a corrective lens, via medications or psychotherapy. Whatever they tell me, I take with a grain of salt, because well, they see the world through the-lens-that-is-at-times-maladaptive.

Not that my lens is always so adaptive at all!

I have my own therapists, they are available to me pretty much all the time! For now, there are two, but I suspect, soon and very soon, I will have three.

There is Aidan, who is actually quite good at cognitive behavioral therapy. The idea of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is that your thoughts, mood, and behaviors are all inter-related. By changing one, you can have effects on the other two. For instance, if your mood is anxious, then your thoughts will be of the anxious kind and your behaviors will reflect such. By teasing apart one's thoughts, one can discover various fallacies in one's thinking and once corrected, the mood and behaviors can have drastic improvements. CBT has been all the rage in recent years, partly because it is a form of therapy that can be done in groups, and therefore, much less expensive than one on one therapy. Also, there is good research data that this works.

Aidan is now on summer break, and so he is going to various camps, and our schedules shift as such. I had thought it would be so much fun to enroll him at a science camp with a friend, in a DIFFERENT TOWN. What was I thinking?! On Thursday, it was our turn to drive his little friend to camp. Of course, it was hard to get Aidan and Zoe up (I don't know why, they are sleeping in until 8 these days.) By the time I drove out of our street, it was 8:38, and the boys need to be at camp at 9:05. I was annoyed, peeved, and irritated. I was becoming increasingly hostile because I actually didn't know how to get to our friend's house! In my agitated state, what did I do? I launched into a discussion about our lateness. "Aidan, why are we always late? You know, so and so's dad said that he always sees us running, because we are always late! WHY!?" To that, Aidan responded in his matter of fact way, "But mom, we are not always late." Ah HA! I was using my overgeneralization fallacy! He is absolutely right. We are hardly late to school. In the 180 days of kindergarten, he was late twice. Once because the car battery died and I had gone to work already, and Hubby had to wait for me to come home to jump the car. The other time was also of a similar situation, something completely unrelated to our efforts. While we have been late to our friends' houses and soccer games, to say 'never' is grossly overgeneralized. Once I realized I was, in fact, thinking incorrectly, I found my mood changed drastically, and behavior was much, much calmer. Thanks Aidan! For helping me to see my lens of overgeneralization!

On Tuesday, it was also hard to get Aidan and Zoe going, it was also hard to get Hubby going that morning. As I rushed out, I hissed at Hubby, "You need to get up earlier!" When we got home that evening and talked about it, it was a very interesting conversation. Whereas I see a hectic morning, and I think that every morning from here on out will be equally hectic and if I don't nip it in the bud, my life will be ruined. That, friends, would be catastrophizing, another thought fallacy. Instead, Hubby sees that such a hectic morning is an outlier: we were coming back from a long weekend, we have not perfected our morning routine to accommodate this science camp, and there is no reason to think that our lives are spinning out of control, forever. We were just having hectic morning. (Of course, it helps Hubby's case that we all got to work/school/camp on time.) In his view, if we were to be sure that no mornings are hectic, we would have to get up at least 1/2 hour earlier, and that, just won't be worth the loss of sleep. Hubby is probably right, he usually is.

I am blessed to have such good CBT therapists who live in my house!

To take it a step further, if we apply psychodynamic formulation to the above situations, it would be clear that one of my neuroses is to be on time. (I know, totally obvious.) This neurosis has worked really well for me, it really helps to be on time for medical training. However, with kids, it can cause a significant amount of stress and friction. I can go on and on about how this neurosis developed, another story, for another time. The most important thing, though, is that despite my neuroses, I am loved, by the One who created me, and loved by Hubby, Aidan, and Zoe. He who created me will continue to work in me, so that I can uses my desire to be on time to serve Him well, but not let my promptness become an idol.

As for Zoe, I am sure, in the next year or so, she is going to be quite the dissector of my thought fallacies.

Independence Day

I had the urge to watch Will Smith's Independence Day today. In my limited movie repertoire, this movie is the closest thing I know to celebrate of this country's independence from the king who insisted on taxation without representation. (Of course, I can go on to talk about the current situation of taxation without representation: the few people who pay for entitlement programs don't necessarily want to continue to pay for it, but the masses who receive entitlements will continue to vote for the politicians who want to expand entitlements. But that is another story for another day.)

Here in our household, we are also celebrating our independence from the rabid creatures who had lived with us for at least five weeks. While not as big and freaky looking as the beasts Will fought off, certainly, we never realized that we needed to fight off the raccoons either.

On Friday evening, I had made the command decision to not make dinner after a very looonnng week. (Any week after Indian Springs would be a long week.) While we waited for the delivery lady, (I found one single place in our town that delivers!) there came a knocking. The raccoon whisperer had arrived! I had left him a few messages with increasing desperation that the babies were crying, but not doing anything to change the situation, and thus, not going to the traps. Steve came, and said that he will go under the house to get them. He asked to be sure that the crying had decreased some, an indication that the babies were growing tired and weary. Indeed, the screaming had decreased in its duration, though not intensity... He donned his coverall, and went underneath.

We heard some thumping, lots of yelling from the babies (like screaming sheep...) and Steve came back with two babies.

After posing for photos, the raccoons got loaded into a container and we pronounced this house independent from the raccoons.

I never thought I would learn so much about raccoons. Not just from the internet, from friends (dear C once had mating raccoons on her rooftop!), and of course, our raccoon whisperer. If you live in our area, and you have a coon problem, let me know! I have the perfect guy for you.

Updates

The raccoon babies are crying.

It is actually really sad.

Since my last post, the mother raccoon went into the trap on Sunday night about 9:30. Hubby and I actually heard the trap close, then we went outside with our flashlights and saw the beast. It was sad, actually, even though the mother caused all kinds of trouble at our house, to see it so scared (it had micturated all over the concrete). The raccoon whisperer came the next day, and upon examining her mammary glands, announced that there are two kids inside the house still.

So we waited. And nothing was in the trap yesterday.

I called Steve again, and he said that we simply have to wait, because the kids need to get really hungry, then they will go and look for mommy, and then we will catch the babies one at a time. Steve then said that we will probably hear them cry. I asked him what that will sound like, and he said, "like the sheep in Silence of the Lambs." I hadn't seen the movie in a loooonnng time and frankly, didn't really see it when I last saw it because I was too scared. Further elaboration followed, "Well, like a banshee." Great.

While tucking A&Z in bed, Hubby and I looked at each other, and we both heard the screaming banshees. Not very loud, but very, very, sad.

I just want this to be over! I can't imagine A&Z wondering around town looking for me while starving, and as much as I wrote callously about catching and euthanizing them, I am sad. At the same time, I can't live with them! I can't let them live with A&Z!

On a happier note, look at these pictures of A&Z on vacation, don't you want to go there?



We swung by St. Helena's Music in the Park event, and Zoe found new friends to dance with! =)