Tag Archives: menopause

my modern fresco

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fresco noun
1. a painting done rapidly (not so rapidly actually) in watercolor (interior latex & acrylic) on wet (old) plaster on a wall or ceiling, so that the colors penetrate the plaster and become fixed as it dries.
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My twin girls are graduating soon and I’m feeling nostalgic.
I’m not surprised I had a little trouble prioritizing things this week.
I focused on this instead, the other stuff will get done somehow.
Getting up at 4:15 to paint with the birds chirping was pure joy.
Below is the evolution & some details of the painting.
I haven’t felt “painterly” for a long time.
I do now.

Lisa Lillibridge's modern fresco

 

 

Thank you Ruby, Lena & BHS YES (year end studies) program.

I was very inspired talking about art and process.

Please Note:  I’m off FACEBOOK, please contact me through e-mail, not messenger.

fledge, far more than just a verb.

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My twin girls are graduating from high school in a few weeks.

We noted when they were born that they would be the Class of 2018.

 Lucy is on the left & Willa on the right—one hour old.

FLEDGE verb (Merriam Webster)

1: to rear until ready for flight or independent activity

This definition of fledge, makes the process sound so simple, so animal.  I’m finding that this process is not so simple and requires some emotional skills far beyond natural animal instincts.  A few questions keep coming up for me.

What do I need to let go of now?

What’s at stake by holding on to my girls too tightly?  Too loosely?

What relationships do I desire moving forward?

Who am I when I no longer have kids at home?

I’m allowing myself to grieve the end of this stage of family life.

I know I won’t hang out in this emotional space forever.

If I stuff these feelings, they’ll leak out in remarkably weird ways.

Perhaps even weirder than usual lately.

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Congratulations to fledglings throughout the land.

Happy Graduation 2018!

 

 

top rack only

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On this Mother’s Day, I really wanted to be honest with myself about it all. Mothering my kids has been heart-shatteringly beautiful and sometimes just plain heart-shattering, without the beauty part to soften the daily blows. 

I can’t change anything and regret is a waste of energy anyway.  If I try to tamp the regrets down, I know they will leak out in uncomfortable ways at inconvenient times. 

Recently I noticed the TOP RACK ONLY button on the dishwasher.  “Jeff and I will be a top rack only couple probably a few nights a week when the girls leave for college.”  When I said this to myself, it made me cry inconsolably.  Damn, that’s bleak.  

These episodes are getting more frequent now as our nest nears it’s emptying…clearly a time for a little extra grace. 

When Ellis, Lucy and Willa were growing up, I often did a quick review at the end of the day, asking myself one simple question: Did I love them more than I was pissed off at them?  I don’t remember ever answering, NO.  It was all the encouragement I needed to wake up and mother them another day.

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Happy Mother’s Day 2018!

what we pay attention to matters & grows.

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I’ve wasted some time not understanding (or maybe believing) this simple concept.  Every day we wake up with a choice to be made, even when it doesn’t feel like a choice.

choices and attention lisa lillibridgeWho wants to wake up in the morning highly attuned to the things that make them feel like crap?  I honestly don’t, and yet, sometimes I do that to myself.

I want my anger and resentment some days.  I really want to hang out in the house of pain and suffering on occasion.  In the last few years though, I’ve increasingly become aware of the toll those days take on me and everyone in my orbit. My dark days will obviously never go away completely, but thankfully, by noticing where my attention is directed, those days are finally getting to be fewer and far between.

Once I noticed my habits and patterns I couldn’t possibly un-notice them. 

Damnit, I tried pretty hard.  Trust me, I gave it a really good shot.

I love that knowledge can be brilliantly sneaky that way.

Good luck noticing, folks.

A NOTE OF COMPASSION:  Many people suffer with devastating, lasting sadness that requires way more than just noticing habits and patterns.  I don’t mean to diminish anyone’s experience.  I’m only sharing what’s been helpful to me.  I struggle with the blues, not prolonged clinical depression.

elusive sleep & alien identity theft

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Sometimes I’m unable to sleep because I’m so jazzed about something I’m working on that sleep seems like a waste of time.  However, this time it’s something else.  Lisa Lillibridge alien inside myselfI’m pretty sure it has to do with closing in on fifty-one, hormones, grief, puzzling rage, extraordinary joy, occasional alien identity theft and letting go.

Sometimes it all actually feels this alien to me and I barely recognize myself.  I know that non middle-aged women tend to believe (at least from my experience) that menopause is an excuse to explain away shitty behavior, lack of energy or out of the blue tears.  It’s really not an excuse and it’s often as confusing to me as it is to my poor family.

A generation ago, it was less frequent that Moms would be going through menopause with teenagers still in the house.  Not that it didn’t happen, but it was less common.  I feel sort of sorry for my twin daughters right now.   My relationship was different with their brother.  He was not twins.  He was never a 17-year-old girl.  He’s not living at home right now.  He was not a mirror to me the way my girls are.

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My girls are living with the Many Faces of Mom during their stressful last year of high school.  Sometimes I freak out thinking that I haven’t taught them what they need to know before they head off to college in a year. I have to trust that I have and allow them to learn the rest on their own.  It’s time to let go a little bit more.

However, I feel like after going through pregnancies, nursing and giving up my sense of self to care for these little monsters (that I heart breakingly love) that I’m due a little break now.  Is that so wrong?  Isn’t that what menopause is?  Transition from one stage to another.

Nothing in my life has been as dramatic of a shift as becoming a Mom…and now in some weird way, when my girls are a year away from leaving home, my body is making me feel like I’m in the first trimester of my pregnancy.

Fatigue. Uncertainty.  Cravings.  More fatigue.  Headaches and more even uncertainty.

Nature’s cruel joke or a reminder of how tied to them I am on a cellular level?

 

It’s the last day of school…

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here in Burlington, Vermont.  My twin girls will be seniors next year so I’m heading into my last year of parenting kids in high school.  I’m finding myself feeling uniquely nostalgic.  I’m not sad about the inevitable transition, but I am mindful.

Last Day of School Lucy and Willa

I have friends whose oldest or only children are graduating on Friday.  It’s big.  When my son graduated from high school in 2014, I was sort of a mess.  I believe there’s just something about transitions that requires us to take stock of our emotions.

The summer between my junior year and senior year of high school was rough for me.  I had a lot of friends in the class above me and they were all leaving for college and other adventures.  Every time during their senior year when we played a ball game, sang in a concert or went to the drive-in movie theater it felt like we were saying goodbye to our childhoods.

Last weekend in South Dakota I got to spend time with some of those friends who graduated a year ahead of me.  It was great!  I simply cannot believe how much time has passed…1983 and 1984 just don’t seem all that long ago in some ways.  I’m very aware of how my daughters are feeling this last summer before they graduate from high school…perhaps even a little too aware.

I guess to honor life’s transitions, we need to slow down a little and try to understand what it is we’re feeling…the good, the bad and the slightly confusing.

Happy Graduation Class of 2017!

 

VIDA added a photograph…

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to my collection.  I haven’t seen this scarf printed yet.  I’ve placed an order though.  It’s one of my favorite photographs that I’ve ever taken.  I shot this one week after my 50th birthday.  I didn’t intend for the title—fading beauty to sound like a lament of any kind.  I truly find beauty when things are “fading” and changing.  Although I miss a few things about being younger, I was fine saying goodbye to my forties.  I like my fifties…so far anyway.

I wanted to share the image.  Here’s the link to my site.

https://shopvida.com/collections/lisa-lillibridge