by Rachel Toalson | General Blog
Dear Dr. Brougher,
I miss you when I’m not pregnant.
I know it sounds a little crazy. You, the doctor whom ever woman dreads that one time a year, because there are stirrups and cold metal and paper-thin sheets to cover everything and nothing at all, but I mean it. I really do.
This last time around, when I learned there would be another baby, part of my excitement was that I would be able to see you again, that you would share, once more, in the most joyous, scary, beautiful moment that can happen in the lives of a man and a woman.
I wonder if you know just what you have done.
The first time I met you, I was three months married, coming on the recommendation of a friend. You sat me down in your office and told me you’d been a former journalist, because I was one, too. It was the beginning of a friendship.
I asked you all sorts of questions about sex, the ones I’d never been able to ask my mother, and you answered them all in that direct, no-nonsense way of yours.
And then you sent me off with a “See you next year,” and you did see me the next year and also four months after that, when I took my first pregnancy test and it said yes. You may not know it, but I drove 115 miles to see you for that first prenatal appointment, because even though we’d moved to another town, I couldn’t imagine anyone else delivering my first.
And it’s a good thing, too, because there I was in the hospital, three hours pushing and no baby, and when my eyeballs felt like they might explode from the brutal strain, you told me you needed to use a vacuum to get him out.
I went crazy. I cried about how a friend who was a nurse in neonatal intensive care had seen so many cases of brain damage because of the vacuum. “Just don’t let them use a vacuum,” she’d said just two days before I lay on a bed in labor.
You did not laugh at my fear. You took it and held it gently. “That has not been my experience,” you said. “But it’s entirely up to you.”
Those contractions kept coming so I had to scream out, “Whatever you need to do, just get him out,” and you did, and he was fine, and you slipped out of that birthing room quietly, because a new mama and daddy were having the moment you’ve seen a thousand times, and the last thing you wanted to do was intrude. We didn’t even have a chance to thank you.
We would have more chances, though.
You would be my rock that this-is-the-safe-day when you ran the wand across my belly and there was no heartbeat, the same day you would deliver a baby and instead of placing her in my arms you would place her in a lab jar.
You would walk us through a twin pregnancy, a high-risk, share-the-placenta case that has more pages of what could go wrong than what could go right.
You would carry me through this last one, and maybe this is the most significant of all.
You see, I didn’t know if he would make it. There was that pregnancy condition, when I itched all over day and night. The condition that made me want to scratch my eyes out. The condition that could end in stillbirth.
And, God, I couldn’t do that again. I couldn’t lose another one.
I cried after every appointment near the end. I had anxiety attacks when he stopped moving for a minute or two. I dreamed about a baby whose face I would not kiss alive.
I sent you notes. I begged you to deliver early, since I’d read all about those stillbirth chances and how they increased the longer babies lived in a womb. I became the patient no obstetrician wants.
And then, the day before my birthday you gave me a gift. A baby, and he was ALIVE.
I love you for that.
I just had my last post-pregnancy appointment with you, because this boy was always going to be our last, and you don’t know it, but I felt all torn up inside.
Because the truth is I will miss you.
I will miss your humor. I will miss our talks. I will miss sharing in this new life experience with you.
I don’t even know that words can express how grateful I am to and for you, but I will try.
Thank you for all you have done.
You saw the fear in my eyes for that first one, and you spoke courage and peace and wisdom. You felt the sorrow of that lost one, and you spoke comfort and hope and healing. You knew the fear and worry that can consume a mama when stillbirth looms, and you spoke calm and understanding and love.
This cannot be underestimated.
Maybe it’s not what typical doctors do, this caring enough about a patient to ask about the lost job and the writing pursuit and the husband at home, whose name you remember, but you were never typical.
You were exceptional.
Not only did you deliver new life into the world, but you delivered new life into the heart of this mama, who did not know if she could really do it, any of it.
I will not be the same because of you. My family will not be the same. We are forever changed.
So thank you. Thank you for your gift of life. Thank you for sacrificing weekends so you could deliver every one of my half-dozen boys. Thank you for your love and care and constant concern.
You are a healer in every sense of the word.
Thank you for being you.
by Rachel Toalson | General Blog
My husband and I used to sit down to a quiet dinner, just the two of us. We used to be able to eat the same thing every week. We used to be able to hold hands when we wanted and pack up leftovers for the next day’s lunch.
Kids changed all that.
Now we sit down to a dinner with more words than you’ll read in a George R.R. Martin novel. We have to have something different every night of the month. We use our hands to dish out food, and there are never any leftovers.
Over the years of eating dinners together, which, in spite of the mayhem six boys can rouse, we still find important, my boys have emerged with very different eating personalities.
There is The Picky Eater.
This is the kid who asks what’s for dinner, and, before you even get “chicken noodle soup out,” he’s already looking in the pot and saying, “I want something else.”
“If you can cook it,” I say. (He can’t. He’s 4.)
“But I HATE that.”
“Do you even know what it is?” I say, because I’m a cook, not a chef, kid.
“No.”
I have to give him credit. He gives it a chance. In fact, he gives it three chances, in three separate helpings, all the while saying how much he wishes he could have something else for dinner.
We also have The Player.
This is the kid who will take a string of spaghetti and swing it around like a rope. He’ll set up a forest with his broccoli. He will wear his pizza like a triangle hat.
“Stop playing with your food,” I’ll say.
“I not playing,” he’ll say. “I eating. See?” He puts the broccoli in his mouth, shouting, “I eat tree! Oh no!”
Well, at least he’s eating broccoli.
And we have his twin brother, The Wanderer.
This is the kid who cannot put one bite in his mouth without moving from the table to pick up the book he wanted to show his brothers. He’ll take another bite and remember he forgot to show Mama the toy he found under the couch today. It was gone for so long. Another bite, and he’s up again, using the bathroom or putting his shoes where they go or remembering he left his Thermos in the refrigerator.
“The rule is you stay at the table and ask to be excused,” I say.
“I am staying at the table,” he’ll say.
“You’re not.”
“I AM!”
“No. That’s not staying. See? You just got up from the table.”
“No! I staying.”
Ever argue with a 2-year-old? Not only does it not make sense, YOU WILL NOT WIN.
So we strapped him into a booster seat. The Wanderer wanders no more.
One of our boys is The Talker.
This is the kid who will take so excruciatingly long to eat his dinner he’s the last one at the table and we’ve all fallen asleep.
It’s not that he isn’t hungry, because he’ll always ask for more, even if dinner has already been cleaned up.
It’s just that he has to tell us every single second of his day, and he forgets that there is food to eat. The loud rumbling in his belly will not make him shovel that food any faster.
“You should eat,” I’ll say, after he’s told me in finite detail what went on today in his Sage class.
“But I want to tell you about my day.”
Twenty-five minutes of every person he came across at school today and what he did in math class and who he played with at recess and I’m getting a nervous tick in my leg, because dinner is almost over and he’s only taken two bites.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad he talks. It’s just…Eat.
Then there is The Inhaler.
This kid is the opposite of The Talker. He will start eating at the exact same time as everyone else but will finish when everyone else is on their second bite.
“May I have some more please?” he’ll say.
“You’re already done?” I’ll say.
“I’m really hungry,” he’ll say.
Obviously.
These are the only words The Inhaler will say during dinner, except for a quick one-word answer when asked what his thankful is for the day. He’s too busy shoveling to talk.
“Chew your food,” I’ll say. “Take your time.”
He’ll shoot me that you-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about look.
“My stomach hurts,” he’ll say after dinner.
“Do you think it’s because you ate too much?” I’ll say. “Too fast?”
“No. I think it’s just gas.”
I’ll wait a while before I tell him that eating too fast causes gas.
All I know is mealtime sure has gotten interesting.
And, if I’m being honest, a whole lot better.
by Rachel Toalson | Crash Test featured, General Blog
I don’t know if I’ve ever faced a harder challenge in my parenting years than raising twins.
Maybe it’s because our twins came near the end of the line of boys and they see all their older brothers do, and they expect that life will be exactly like that for them.
Except there are two of them.
Oh, you want to drink out of a big-boy cup because your older brother did it when he was 2? I’m sorry. There are two of you.
Oh, you want to sit free at the table instead of strapped into your chairs because all your brothers did it when they were almost 3? I’m sorry. There are two of you.
What? You want me to leave the baby gate on your door open because you haven’t yet figured out how to climb over it (it’s coming)? I’m sorry. In case you haven’t noticed, THERE ARE TWO OF YOU.
Out twins are identical, two sides of the same egg. Nature’s gift, doctors say. One is left-handed, one is right-handed. They complete each other.
That’s part of the problem. What one doesn’t think of, the other does. What one is afraid to do, the other will try.
It’s like having four toddler wrecking balls walking around the house, scheming about what they can destroy next. I imagine their conversations go a little something like this:
Twin 1: Hey. Hey, bro. Mama’s not watching. Remember how she told us not to touch this computer? She’ll never know. Where is she?
Twin 2: She’s in the bathroom. Remember what we did last time she was in the bathroom?
Twin 1: Oh, man. That was fun. But this computer. She’ll never know. I just can’t figure out how to open it.
Twin 2: Like this. But how do you turn it on?
Twin 1: Easy. I’ve seen Daddy press this button right here.
Twin 2: There it is.
(Mama comes back into the room with the baby she just changed.)
Twin 1: Close it, close it, close it!
Twin 2: Walk away. Not too fast, not too slow. Just enough to look like we weren’t doing anything.
I love my twins. Of course I do. It’s just that they were unexpected.
If I could have read a primer two years ago, this is what it might have said:
Every parent of twins needs…
1. An extra dose of patience.
You will need this for many things. You will need it for the stranger at the store who asks to see your amazing bundles of joy and, after looking at their angelic sleeping faces, declares she “always wanted twins” and you want to say, “Oh, really? Then take mine,” because one was up screaming at 3 a.m. and as soon as you got him calmed down two hours later the other one woke up screaming, and as soon as you got that one calmed down an hour later all the other boys were up asking for breakfast. Which woke up the twins, who were also hungry. Again.
You will need it for when they learn to talk and there are so.many.words and so.many.whys and so many demands for everything under the sun. You will need it for the potty training and the big-boy-bed transitions and the constant fighting from dawn until dusk.
You will need it for the times you were helping one out of his pajamas and into his day clothes and you return back downstairs to find all the jackets removed from your poetry books and spread across the living room floor like a special carpet for toddler feet, for the six thousandth time (You should probably just put those books away, Mama. Far, far away.).
I’m an angel. That’s what this face says. Keep this picture close. You’ll need it for the times you wonder if he really is the devil.
2. Good decision-making skills.
These will come into play those times they both wake up at 3 a.m. because they’re hungry. Which one do you feed first? (Answer: You’ll figure out a way to feed both.)
You’ll need these skills when one twin is in the downstairs bathroom playing with a plunger in a potty you specifically remember your older boy didn’t flush five minutes ago when he stunk it up and the other is in his bathroom upstairs finger painting the mirror with a whole tube of eco-friendly toothpaste. Which do you get first? (Answer: The toilet one. Toothpaste is much easier to clean than the mess an overzealous plunger can make.)
You’ll need them when the one who’s known for wandering does exactly that, moves from his nap time place while you take a minute or five for a shower, because it’s been four days since the last one, and you walk out to find him playing with the computer he’s been told 50 billion times to leave alone and, in his panic to close it, he deletes the 1,500 words you wrote this morning before kids got up. What do you do? (Answer: Cry.)
3. A rigorous workout regime.
When one is running down the street because someone forgot to lock the deadbolt he can’t reach and another is going out back without shoes in 26-degree rain, you’ll want to be in shape for that. I recommend interval training. That way when they stop and change directions, you’ll be ready. You’ve done this a thousand times. Ski jumps. Football runs. All-out sprints.
When they slip, unnoticed (because they’re like ninjas), into the playroom while you’re wiping down the table after a ridiculously messy lunch, and both of them come out with their scooters, you’ll want to be able to wrestle those “cooters” from screaming, flailing bodies without hurting anyone.
And when one collapses in the middle of the park because it’s time to go and he’s not ready yet and the other thinks that just might work, you’ll need strong arms to carry 32 pounds of kicking and screaming twins back to the car, one tucked under each armpit.
4. Containment measures.
This would be things like strollers until they’re 3 and booster seats until they’re 4 and a baby gate on their door until they’re…15. Okay, maybe 13.
It also means leashes at the city zoo on a packed day, even though you said you’d never use them and you can feel the disapproval of other people and you want to say, “Come talk to me when you have 2-year-old twins. These things have saved their lives 17 billion times, and that was before we even got out of the parking lot.”
Containment saves lives. And sanity.
Twins are great. And hard. And maddening. And great. And so hard.
They can disassemble an 8-year-old’s room of LEGO Star Wars ships in 3.1 seconds. They can disassemble a heart with one identical smile and a valiant try at saying “Uptown funk you up” that sounds like it should have come with a bleep.
There’s just nothing like them in the world. You’ll be so glad you get to be their mama.
Especially after they fall asleep.
by Rachel Toalson | General Blog
That’s not true, really. My kids have friends. They play with them at recess and collaborate with them in their classrooms and talk to them during PE when they’re supposed to be doing six hundred jumping jacks.
We have avoided play dates for eight years, but no longer.
On a recent day, a note came home from school with my 5-year-old, from the parents of a boy named Aaron* (*name has been changed for privacy). My son had talked about this Aaron, so I knew they were good friends.
“Aaron would like to arrange a play date with Asa,” the note said.
I had no idea how to go about this.
The note, fortunately, listed telephone numbers and e-mail addresses for Aaron’s mom and dad, asking me to “get in touch.” Being the introverted person I am, I chose to text the numbers given. Surely that would be the easiest, and definitely much less awkward than trying to fumble through a conversation on the phone with people I don’t know.
Two days passed, and I heard nothing. That’s when I assumed maybe the numbers given weren’t cell phone numbers and didn’t have text capacity. So I did the next best thing.
I e-mailed.
Meanwhile, I mentioned to my oldest son, who is 8, that his little brother was going to have a play date with a classmate and did he have anyone he would want to invite over for a play date, too?
He had to think about this.
My 5-year-old had his friend over, and it went well, and I was preoccupied wondering about the after-play date etiquette—thank you note for letting him come over? Follow up of some kind? Reciprocated play date?—when my 8-year-old, one day after school, grabbed my hand and pulled me over to a woman I had never met, but clearly needed to, right this minute.
He didn’t say a word of introduction.
We stared awkwardly at one another for a minute-that-felt-like-an-hour, before she held out her hand and said her name, which I didn’t hear because my heart was roaring in my ears.
Awkward, awkward, awkward, it beat.
“I’m Christopher’s* mom,” she said. “He wanted to schedule a play date with Jadon.”
Oh no, oh no, oh no, not like this, not here, not in person. I wasn’t expecting this. I wasn’t prepared. I DON’T KNOW HOW TO DO THIS!
“Okay,” I said, and then I realized I had no idea what to do next. I panicked a little and then started babbling words that probably sounded something like this: “I don’t have my phone or a piece of paper or a pen or anything at all to write with or record your number but do you have a phone or a piece of paper or a pen or anything at all to write with or record because if you do I could give you my number and then you could text me so I have yours and then we could figure out this play date thing like when and where and how.”
Oh, crap, I thought. My mouth and its word vomit just lost my boy a friend.
“Oh. Oh, okay,” she said, and I knew then, for sure, that I was doing this exactly wrong and weird and much more complicated than it needed to be done. Most people just pick a day, I’m sure. They set a time. It’s easy. Except I was totally unprepared and didn’t have my calendar with me and needed to talk to my husband…
She fumbled around in her pocket for her phone, trying to maintain her grip on the arm of her 2-year-old, who was trying to escape exactly like my 2-year-olds would have tried to escape, and I thought about how I would have felt the teensiest bit annoyed that the person talking to me couldn’t see the struggle I was having, and couldn’t we do this later?
Fail.
I started working on an apology to my son, because I knew his friend would never be allowed over to our house.
Christopher’s mom took down my number, and my boys and I went home, and two days passed. Two days.
Then she texted, instead of calling, and invited my boy over.
He and his friend played LEGOS for three hours, and when they were done, I walked to pick him up, and Christopher’s mom invited me in, and we sat in clumsy conversation on her couch while our boys kept playing some more.
And that’s when I realized she was just like me.
Awkward. Weird. Unpracticed at this whole play date thing. (She was just like me!)
Her boy and mine have had another play date since.
And I might have made a new friend, too.
by Rachel Toalson | General Blog
A few weeks ago I published a column on Huff Post Parents about how I chose my large family and none of my children were “accidents,” and here came all the “environmentalists” calling names (breeder, selfish narcissist, hoe—for sleeping with my husband, no less) and whining about overpopulation (it’s actually over-consumption that’s the real problem) and bemoaning the state of the earth and its far too many people.
It was all really ironic, because I’m actually an environmentalist myself and spent months as a reporter raising awareness about my city’s disappearing trees and developers’ standard tree-razing practice to build the most houses in the least amount of space.
Before I even had kids, I did years of research on how to live frugally, earth-consciously and intentionally so I could raise my family with those values that were so important to me.
But this article is not a defense, because the haters don’t really deserve that. This article is about the (largely unexpected) ways my half dozen boys have made me green.
So, without further ado…
1. If it’s yellow, let it mellow. They don’t flush the toilet. Like hardly ever. If I want to go to the bathroom, I better be using my own, because theirs has been mellowing for days. And it smells.
Saves on: Water and wastewater.
2. Bath water can be consumed. That’s right. Bath time is not only wash time. It’s also hydration time, because they’ll fill up the bath cup that’s supposed to be used to wash off the eco-friendly soap in their hair, and they’ll drink that nastiness instead, no matter how many times we’ve told them it’s gross. Also, if one brother has already finished his bath and left the water in the tub, another brother will get in and wash anyway (and still drink the water). And while we’re on the subject, I’ll admit that their daddy and I only have time for showers every two or three days, so. Winning. (Don’t worry. We make our own deodorant. No, really. All you need is organic corn starch, baking soda, coconut oil, an essential oil of choice.)
Saves on: Water, wastewater, energy.
3. They’ll wear the same Iron Man costume with nothing else underneath for four days straight. Or the same pair of pajamas. Or the same sweat pants. They’re not picky at all. They just want to wear what’s comfortable. For a week. This saves us the most in the summer, when it’s too hot in Texas to wear clothes. They just run around in their underwear swim trunks instead.
Saves on: Water, wastewater, energy.
4. Paper of any kind is good for drawing. This means their brother’s class list for Valentine’s Day is a good place to draw that 2-year-old version of a spider. So is that flier for math camp registration and the thousand other pieces of paper that come home in school folders and clutter up our counter.
Saves on: Paper waste.
5. Sharing is caring. If one pulls out an organic apple and puts it down, another will find it and finish it. No food is wasted around here. And when they’re finished, someone will find that apple core and take it outside to plant seeds and feed birds. (We’re still waiting for those apple trees to start sprouting, but I hear Texas isn’t so great for growing apples because it’s ten thousand degrees here.)
Saves on: Food waste.
6. They prefer unpackaged foods. Actually, that’s not true. Give them a choice between a chocolate bar and a piece of organic fruit, and they’ll take the chocolate bar (unless they ask their parents… in which case they’ll take the fruit). But their daddy and I stick to the peripheries of the store, so they don’t really know what they’re missing until they see what’s packed in all the other kids’ school lunches. They’ll thank us later. So will the environment.
Saves on: Energy required to package foods, chemicals buried in food and released in air.
7. What’s TV? It’s been years since we got rid of cable and threw out the television. Our boys spend their days outside making movies with an old camera or pretending fallen tree branches are light sabers or creating hole-in the-yard art masterpieces their daddy and I will trip in later.
Saves on: Electricity, consumption messages spread through commericals.
8. Weeds are just another word for flowers. Our boys gather them into a bouquet for Mama. They give them to the neighbor girls. They pick the dandelions and make their wishes. We have no use for herbicides, and guess what? We have the greenest yard on the block. Weird.
Saves on: Chemicals leaching into groundwater.
9. Fertilization is free. Boys like releasing bodily fluids outside. No, we don’t have a dog. That’s probably just the waste of our two 2-year-olds. It’s OK, though. Just watch your step on your way to admiring the prettiest peach and pear trees in the city.
Saves on: Synthetic fertilizers, chemicals leaching into groundwater.
10. Energy is free (and plenty). We live half a mile from our boys’ school. So we walk or ride bikes or race on scooters. A little more than half a mile down the road is the neighborhood park. A mile down the road is a frozen yogurt shop and a pizza place, perfect for the monthly family night out. After all that, our boys will still have energy left over. One of these days we’ll find a way to bottle it up and patent it for selling. Or just drink it ourselves.
Saves on: gas, emissions from a car.
There are many intentional ways we teach our boys about environmentalism and social justice—because environmentalism always boils down to social justice.
But I did not expect our boys to help us along the journey.
So I can only say to these six wonderful little people: Thank you. You have made the world a better place in so many ways.
I’m so glad you’re here.
by Rachel Toalson | General Blog
It’s quiet, and it’s dark, and it’s only you and me.
All day long your brothers have pulled and demanded and captured my time while you have slept and dreamed and grown, little by little by little.
But right now is our time, because brothers are sleeping and Daddy is snoring beside me and the whole world is silently breathing its way toward morning.
And it doesn’t matter that I’m so exhausted or that I will wake again in three hours to start the morning whirlwind of a school day. It only matters that you are here with me, that you are looking at me with those eyes that just might stay blue this time, that I can kiss a tiny face back into sleep once a belly is full.
It doesn’t matter that all day I have poured milk for your brothers and cooked breakfasts and lunches and cleaned up after dinner. It only matters that there is this quiet, still moment when I get to hold you and only you, when I get to talk softly to you and only you, when I get to stare at you and only you.
Your brothers, they used to be you once, and I know exactly how this will go, because they used to enjoy the holding and the talking and the kissing and the staring, and now they are too big for laps and too busy for talking and too old for staring.
This will go fast and sharp and bittersweet.
So I will have you to myself, for this one moment in time.
I bend to kiss you, and it is overwhelming, the love that cracks a whole heart wide open, again, because you are tiny, and you are last, and you are just thirteen days old. I bend to kiss you again, and it is overwhelming, the sadness, because you are tiny, and you are last, and I know your peaceful sleep in my arms won’t last forever. Not even close.
So I will take time where I can.
And here it is, in the dark of early morning, when everyone else sleeps and you meet me, for the thirteenth time.
I hold you close, longer that I would if I was concerned about sleep, longer than I would if I were thinking of the day ahead and all the challenges it will likely hold.
Because this is our time, you and me.
So what the clock tells me makes no difference whatsoever, because we are together, and this time belongs to you. Only you. This time is frozen. Sacred. Beautiful. It widens the heart of a mama so another little boy can take his seat inside.
I drink every moment of this time, every breath, every flicker of a smile, every stretch. I watch you feed, touching the soft skin of your cheek, feeling the weight of you in the crook of my arm, memorizing the curve of that nose and the flutter of an eye that blinks open and shut again beneath the soft glow of a lamp.
I gaze and soak and adore, oblivious to time’s ticking, because some things transcend time.
Like a 2 a.m. feeding.
And when you are done, when I am done, I kiss your face once more and wrap my arms just a little tighter, and then I fold the blanket around your still-tiny-for-today body and put you back to sleep, whispering the words I always whisper when our time has met its end.
See you at 2 a.m., my love.
