This has been a week filled with big emotions for me. Finishing up the school year always seems like a marker of success, like I accomplished the goal of another successful (meaning complete, not necessarily without bumps and areas of growth along the way :)) year of pushing, pulling, and carrying (at times) my boys into manhood.
These days, they often carry most of the load themselves and my role is to keep them between the ditches and walk beside them as they journey. However, these glimmers of household triumph have been overshadowed by recent state, national, and worldwide occurrences of very dark moments.
We don’t watch the news at my house. My parents are often appalled at my seeming disconnect with the news of things going on around me. Maybe it is naive, but I try hard to create a partial bubble around my house where I can serve as a buffer between the world’s harsh realities and the need to be able to discuss openly with my boys the happenings around them.
They are old enough to get information about tragedy and grief and loss and war and hate and evil from the internet, so we can’t hide in the bubble. But, we can work hard to make sure that they are receiving facts and not speculation or polarized and politicized statements that skew facts (or facts as we know them).
We can help them be critical thinkers and consumers of the media that they are exposed to. More importantly, we can remain connected with them as we and they process through these tough times and harsh realities. We cannot hide from the world or step fully away from it. But, have the ability to help our kids sort, process, categorize, and act upon their big emotions in a healthy and productive way.
My personal gut reaction to big emotions is to shut down and often, back away or pull into myself. I prefer to be alone when I am overwhelmed. As a mom, I know that the message of my pulling back can seem like an emotional distance to my husband and children. I don’t want them to experience me as “away” when big stressors are present in our lives.
They don’t know my thoughts and feelings and can only observe these from the outside. I have to work very hard to ensure that they still feel my connection with them as I deal with my own sorrow at times. For me, this means physical touch, like holding hands, hugging, a quick kiss on the back of the neck when I walk up behind them, and choosing to sit beside them rather than across the room or in another room. The process of healing ourselves and helping our children through the inevitable lows and dark places in the world and in their own lives is to remain as effective and connected as possible, even if our own parent response (because we are just people doing very hard work) is to freeze or flee.
If you find yourself pulling back in order to insulate yourself from big, dark feelings at times too, consider how you can “step in” with your loved ones on a consistent basis so that they don’t feel the strain of your distance while you tackle and deal with your own big emotions.
