"Going To Do Something"

When my oldest graduated with her bachelor's degree, we were excited and proud. For one thing, she'd worked hard to get there. For another, my husband, myself, and all four of her grandparents do not have college degrees. All of my children have some kind of secondary diploma or certificate, which makes me happy.

Usually, when we'd tell people she was graduating, the comments were predictable - "How exciting!" "What's her degree in?" "What are her plans?" But one comment just landed a bit wrong. One friend of ours did not actually seem very excited, and said, in an almost scolding tone, "She is going to do something with that degree, isn't she?"

"Of course she is," I replied brightly, ignoring the implied criticism. "She's going to be educated."

This elicited a sigh. "You know what I'm saying, right?" they asked.

"Yes, I do. You know what I'm saying, right?" I asked with a bit more edge in my voice.

They appeared genuinely puzzled. "No."

Oh, for goodness sake.

I didn't try to explain how many things that I found wrong with their query, starting with the fact that good news should be met with congratulations (especially if you're then going to nit pick or gripe). Then there's the fact, as I previously mentioned, that her parents and grandparents do not have degrees. Also, they had chosen to direct this gripe to someone else (me) who has chosen, as their career, to be a stay at home parent.

I was totally clear that my friend was alluding to stay at home parents, despite my being one. I have heard, not just from this friend, but from many people, what a "waste" that is. I experienced frequent verbal bludgeoning, myself, most of it from people who liked or loved me. "But you could do anything!" they'd say, and they were completely unsatisfied by my response of, "I know I could. And I chose." It was annoying and exhausting to deal with people who were sure that no one would choose my life unless they were stupid or trapped.

I've endeavored to teach my children to avoid being job snobs. Sometimes it works. But just recently, I chastized my youngest for saying "Susie Homemaker" in a scathing tone that indicated that the occuption was less desirable than shoveling manure. "You know that I am a 'Susie Homemaker' by choice, right? And besides, do you want me saying (using the same scornful tone of voice) 'people who work retail'?" I asked, since she works in retail. She glared at me, but I'm right about this. Don't denigrate someone else's job. If you do, don't be surprised or angry when they denigrate yours.

Criticism of choosing to be a full time parent (or homemaker without kids) is often leveled at religious people, somehow coupled with the idea that men must have coerced or threatened women into staying home. That may happen occasionally, because humans are infinitely varied. However, most of the stay at home parents that I know are doing it because they really want to be at home. I am also a rarity among us; most stay at home parents that I know not only have degrees, I know a significant number of them with master's degrees. When my kid needed a math tutor, we hired a mom with a master's in math who homeschooled her own kids.

Here's another thing that bothers me when someone tells me what a "waste" it is for bright, educated people to spend their days with children. Do we want only stupid people to spend their time with kids? That's such a bad plan.

Anyway, I knew that was what this person was asking me - "Is she going to spend all that money and time on an education, and then waste it by having kids and staying home?"

At the time, she was headed straight into a job in her chosen field. Her degree is in education, and she wanted a job as a teacher. She worked as a teacher for 10 years, too.

Now, she is not working in her field. (She's not a stay at home parent, either.) I was tremendously proud of her then. I am tremendously proud now. (I would be tremendously proud if she was a stay at home parent.)

Two of my kids are working in their degree field. Two are not. I'm proud of all of them.

I understood why my oldest chose her first career. I also know why she left it. I'm not going to go into all the reasons here. In fact, I'm going to choose just one - money. After 10 years of teaching, she left, and took a job in insurance. Her new job requires only a high school diploma, and she walked into a starting wage that was higher than her wages after 10 years of teaching. It was also fewer hours - no at home preparation or grading time, no parent conferences, no finding and prepping a sub if you're sick. She constantly marveled, "When the work day is over, I just walk away, and I'm done until the next work day!" Her weekends were totally work free.

She's now been there for a few years, and her last bonus almost equalled her annual income for her last year in teaching.

So, even if this was the only consideration - and it's not - I think everyone is totally clear on why she'd choose this job, and not one in her degree field.

In my opinion (and I'm right about this, too), education provides you with two things - knowledge, and choices. She still has all of her knowledge, and all of the experience she gained in areas like time management, setting and achieving goals, "people skills" (how to deal with various kinds of people), and learning how to sift unreliable sources from reliable ones. She has choices, as she can now take many jobs that other people can't. There are many jobs, for instances, that would suit me, but I can't even apply, much less be hired, because of my degree status.

So, Friend, and any other critics, the fact that she is now not working in her degree field does not bother me, or her employer, or her husband or the rest of her family, in the slightest. She is still "doing something with that degree."

As she would be, in my opinion, if she did become a stay at home parent.

Security

"Children need to feel that their parents are all powerful, especially in their early years," says a child development expert whose work I admire. I agree with him, really; I agree on most things he says. I just know that we did not achieve this with our first born.

We did all of the things that are supposed to make a child feel secure. We picked her up when she cried. Frankly, we picked her up when she didn't cry, because crying was rare. She rarely even cried to be fed; I had to watch the clock and say, "Feeding time!" or she'd only eat two or three times in 24 hours, even as a brand new newborn. We talked to her, sang to her, read books to her. I was a stay at home parent, so she was never without me. She was a quiet, easy child, so we took her out on our dates - to restaurants, to the movies. We wore her in a backpack when we couldn't carry her. As soon as she could do things like dress herself and speak, we let her make decisions - what to wear, what to order off the menu at a restaurant.

Everyone assumed she was happy, because she was quiet and self contained, and she probably was. She colored, she sang, she "danced" (she considered walking in a circle while music played to be dancing). 

Even when she wasn't happy, she didn't demonstrate it by fussing. When her little sister was born, and she was 13 months old, I was in the hospital for almost a week. She didn't cry, and she loved the new baby, but she broke out in a head to toe rash.

As nearly as I can tell, she never thought that we were all powerful or all knowing, though. She didn't think that she was - that was our second born - but she didn't think that we, or any adult, was, either.

I mean, it's not as if either of us drank, or traveled for work, or that she ended up pouring herself bowls of cereal because I neglected to prepare dinner. We were there, we were attentive, our home and neighborhood were safe, we had extended family and friends and church members who were there for all of us.

And yet...

When she was 8 months old, we took a road trip to see my sister and her family. The route that is the most fun takes us down the California coast, with stops in San Francisco, Monterey, San Simeon, or other beach spots before heading to Orange County. That's the route we took for that trip. We have photos of her in the backpack on Daddy's back at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and on the beach in Ventura.

We didn't take a trip the next year, when we had a newborn and a toddler, but we did go the year after, when the kids were 2 and 3. Again, we went over the mountains from home, and took 2 or 3 days getting to Auntie's house, stopping at fun places along the way, and talking about how Ariel lived in the ocean.

We'd talked about how we'd see Auntie Lynne and her kids, and stay in their house, but knew that she'd have no memory of having visited before. Still, when we got there, both kids were having fun - who doesn't love the beach, aquariums, and cousins to play with? Plus, we went to Disneyland; it was a great trip.

The night before we left, I told the girls to start gathering their things, because we'd have to pack it all for the ride back home. I let them know that we had one more day at Auntie's, and then we'd drive home. It's about 7 hours in average traffic to get back home, so we wanted to do it in one day, which meant an early start.

"We're not going home," my three year old announced confidently.

"Not today, " I said. "But tomorrow, we are. That's why I want to start packing today."

"No! We're not going home!" she insisted. "You don't know how to find it!"

We reassurred her that, yes, we did know. "Just like we knew what roads to drive on to get to Aunt Lynne's, we know what roads to drive on to get home." We told her that we had done this many times, and that she had actually done it before, but she was a baby, so she wouldn't remember. She looked at us as if we were crazy.

The next day, she got more and more irritated every time we mentioned going home. Her attitude said that she could not believe that we were persisting with this foolishness, insisting that we could do something that was so obviously impossible.

We explained again that we had driven the roads before, and remembered. Then, we brought out our big California map book. (Remember the days of paper maps? I love paper maps.) We told her that these were drawings of where we were, and where we'd go. We showed her that the blue was the ocean, the green was land, and the lines were roads. "Even if we forget, these maps will show us which roads to drive on." 

Still, she insisted, "We can't go home! You can't find it!"

I started to wonder if she understood that we were deliberately visiting family. Did she think that we'd just gotten lost, knocked on a random door, and had strangers take us in?

Of course, we insisted that everything be packed, and we got in the car and drove away. Our second born fell asleep in the car, even on short rides, so she was fine, but our oldest made indistict elephant noises - "EEEEE-eeeee-EEEEEE-eeeeee" - for hours on end. HOURS at a time; I don't know how her throat didn't get sore.

About halfway home, I said to my husband, "The next town we go through, find a park so the kids can run and play, because we all need out of this car." We have cute photos that he took of a smiling me pushing smiling kids on the swings. It looks blissful. It was, in fact, a break necessary in order for all of us to avoid metaphorically exploding.

When we pulled up at home, she was absolutely astonished. "You FOUND it! You FOUND it! How did you find it?"

So we told her, again, about how we knew what roads to drive on because we'd done it before, just like we knew how to drive to her grandparents' houses, about 30 minutes away. We reminded her, again, that if we got confused or lost, we had the map book. She looked confused. "But, how did you find it?" It felt as if we would have had more credibility if we told her that we read it in our tea leaves.

A few days later, I was talking about her astonishment with my brother. "Aren't we supposed to have another ten years or so before she decides that we're brain dead? This just seems way too early for teenage dismissiveness."

He laughed. "Well, she knows that she can't do it, so she figures that you can't, either."

I'm certain that he was correct about this. That's exactly what she was thinking. I just could not - still cannot - figure out how she came to that conclusion after watching us, every day, do things that she could not. We could read, we could drive, we knew how to operate the TV remote and the phone (that hung on the wall, and only made phone calls) and the oven. She knew these things; she watched us, daily, do things that she could not.

So, despite my belief that the psychologist is right - children benefit from a "my dad could beat up Superman!" mentality - I am obviously unclear on how we could have instilled that kind of belief.

Illness Part 9: Breaking Up

 "Can I break up with my endocrinologist?" I asked my primary care doctor, a General Practitioner.

He smiled, and said, "Well, you're the patient. You can do whatever you want."

That's patently false. I spend much of my time getting medical tests and otherwise jumping through hoops, so that my insurance will pay for things. I am not in charge. (But I should be, along with my GP.) In actual fact, my insurance company is in charge.

But, still, I was glad. When I started seeing the endocrinologist, my GP had said, "If anybody can figure out what's going on with you, she can." I looked forward to that. My body chemistry has been just not quite right all of my life. I have developed an aversion to hearing the word "should," as in, "...you should be feeling..." and, "...this should be working...", because often, that is not how I feel, and that is not how my body works.

After my thyroid was removed, my sister wanted to know what had caused it to be enlarged and covered in nodules. I told her, "Nobody seems to know, and they're not particularly interested in finding out." But I wanted to know. Something caused it. Should it be treated? Will it affect other things? So, my family and I were very excited to send me to a specialist, one who would figure it all out.

At my first visit, I went over things going back to my childhood. She seemed interested; she listened, and occasionally asked questions. But it soon became apparent that she was not looking for what caused the gland to need removed. Her entire process revolved around the fact that it was now gone.

Well, OK. It's probably hard to diagnose after the fact. I get that.

Still, any symptoms I had also were disregarded as irrelevant. Every appointment, I'd be handed a sheet asking me about symptoms, and I'd check box after box. Near as I can tell, no one even glanced at those forms. All that was ever discussed were my blood tests. When I'd bring up symptoms, I'd be told, "Don't worry. You're still adjusting. It will all even out eventually."

Ten years later I can say with conviction: it never evened out. Ever. (Illness Part 4: Symptoms) Through different medications, different doses, different protocols, I still have almost every symptom. I had them before the thyroid was removed, too. Obviously, there's something we're not looking at. I have become convinced that we don't yet know even what questions to ask, much less how to check my body. I just hear over and over about what "should" be.

Soon, I rarely saw the actual doctor, and just saw her physician's assistant. Not a deal breaker. I also rarely recieved eye contact from whoever treated me; they spent the entire visit, minus checking my vitals, looking at a screen and typing on a laptop. Years ago, this became standard. I don't know if the directions came from the AMA or the malpractice insurance or the medical board, but every single provider now spends their visit looking not at the patient, but at a laptop. They spend more time filling out forms to "prove" that they're treating a patient than they do actually treating patients. That annoys me tremendously. But, as I said, it's standard; I can't really get away from it.

I have listed the issues that I had even getting an appointment (Illness Part 5: Caring For My Health). It was just so exhausting, and gave me a bit of insight into the fact that the office ran exclusively on PROCEDURE. Again, not terribly unusual and not a surprise, but so aggravating. Every office seems to expect everyone in the outside world to know about and comply with internal procedures as a matter of course. This is a problem, because the layperson doesn't work in your office, so of course they are not going to know How You Do Things.

Now, actually being seen at the office, I had to deal with the office staff too often for anyone's comfort.

For instance, I had to be seen every month. To me, that means "roughly every 4 weeks" or "in 28 to 32 days." Not to the office staff; to them, it meant in 30 days, exactly. If day 30 landed on a weekend, the woman making the appointments would fuss and huff and talk about "getting back on schedule next month."

I once pointed out to her that my monthly blood tests were not 30 days apart. I was sent home with a paper, and I took it to the lab and got tested whenever it was actually convenient. Usually, I did it on day 25 or so, but it might be on day 15 or day 29. She looked at me blankly, like she did not understand the language I was speaking, and then gave me a long explanation of how I had to come in every 30 days EXACTLY "so the records will be accurate." The fact that when my blood was drawn seemed far more critical than when I walked in the door to discuss it with the doctor seemed to just pass her by. Finally I just ignored it and resigned myself.

Then one month, as I was leaving, I was asked to come back in exactly 30 days, and I balked.

"That's the first anniversary of my mother's death. I don't want to even leave the house that day."

"Oh, you'll be fine. Just take yourself out to lunch, or maybe go shopping."

I stood there in disbelief and stared at her. What I wanted to say is, "Oh, of course, a nice restaurant meal will totally distract me from the fact that my mother is dead." But I didn't say that. (In retrospect, I should have.) Instead, I said, "I would really like an appointment on another day. Can I come a day later?"

"No, no, no, it's thirty days. You'll be fine. How's 11:00?"

I wanted to scream, "It is not FINE. She is GONE. Don't you have a mother?" Instead, I got an appointment for 11.

It wasn't too many months later when I ran into an issue that she couldn't bully me through. The only appointment available in 30 days was at 8:00 am. The office is 30 minutes away from my home, and I had to pick up a child, a child who did not yet drive, from a class at 7:30 am. The class was 10 to 15 minutes farther away from my house, so if my child walked out on the very stroke of dismissal, and I had great traffic and luck with lights all the way home, I could potentially leave home at 7:45. The math simply did not work, especially during rush hour traffic.

I explained all of that, and asked for another day. No, of course, I HAD to be seen on that day, and that was THE ONLY appointment available.

"I WILL be late. I can't avoid it," I told her.

"Just get here as soon as you can," she said.

Fast forward exactly 30 days. I browbeat my child, with instructions to come to the car immediately at dismissal, to not stop and say hello or goodbye to anyone, just run out to the car. Eyeroll; "I will, Mom." And he did. I drove like a crazy person home to drop him off, then sped across town. I was, as promised, and guaranteed by the laws of physics, late.

"You're late," the receptionist huffed.

"I know. I told you that I would be. (This was literally the same woman who made appointments.) I had to pick up my son across the valley at 7:30."

"Well, I don't know if we can even see you now."

"When I asked for a different day, because I'd be late, you told me that you couldn't do that."

"The patient after you has already been called in!"

"OK, you gave her my time slot, so give me hers." 

"Her appointment was scheduled after yours!"

"So you said. You have two patients, and two time slots. You gave mine to her, so give hers to me."

"We can't see you if the patient after you has already been called in!"

At this point, I threw out any pretense of being polite. I raised my voice; I'm an actor. I can project. "I told you that today was not convenient for me. I told you that I would be late. I asked for a different day or time. I don't know why I'm here, anyway! I can tell you exactly how this appointment will go. I will walk in and say, 'I feel great.' She'll say, 'But your numbers are terrible,' and I'll walk out of here with a new prescription. I COULD DO THIS OVER THE PHONE."

She stared at me, then out at the semi-full waiting room, and said, "I'll see if we can get you in."

And just like magic, they could. It took all of 15 minutes for the entire thing, from being called in, to being seen, to being dismissed. I walked out of the office with the predicted new prescription.

That was the day I decided that I didn't want to go back.

"I don't ever want to speak to anyone but you about my medication," I told my GP. "If I'm sick, I can see whoever's available. But I don't want to discuss this with anybody else. Ever."

Well, I didn't quite get my wish. I've seen the Physician's Assistant repeatedly. Now, my doctor is going on a church mission out of state. Some day, he will retire. Maybe, by then, I'll be OK with that.

But I have never regretted breaking up with my endocrinologist.