atomic mama

The owner and main yoga teacher at the studio at which I practice, Lisa, often reminds us how blessed we are. “We are so blessed to be here,” she says. “So blessed to practice yoga, so blessed to be alive.” And we all agree with her, all of us in our color-coordinated yoga togs, feeling one with the universe after ninety minutes of sweating on our mats in an 85-degree room and now listening to some new-agey music that’s supposed to help us wind down. After class, we all smile serenely to each other as we gather belongings and slip pedicured feet into sheepskin boots. We’re so blessed. I drive home feeling blessed, go to bed feeling blessed. Wake up to the screaming of “UUUUUUUPPPPPPPPAAAAAAA!!!!!!!”

This morning, Lina had three little tantrums within the first fifteen minutes of waking. It affected my entire morning with her. Something in me could not let go of wanting to go back in time, wake up peacefully to a happy child, skip the tantrums, and have a delightful morning. If I had simply forgotten all about the tantrums (as she did), I could have had that delightful morning with her. I screwed it up. I sat in my comfy leather chair, watching her play with her toys, trying to figure out why I was so pissed off. When she asked to be picked up, I put her on my lap. She then proceeded to stick her fingers into my trachea. I put her back down.

It is so easy to practice gratitude in the yoga studio. So easy to feel together, centered, ready for anything. Anything but a one-year-old having a bad day, I guess.

So there I sat this morning, my child at my feet, wondering where in the hell my santosa (Sanskrit for “contentment”) was. Why did her tantrums push me so far off balance? It wasn’t until after I had put her down for her nap that I realized the obvious answer: I had some kind of expectation about how this morning would play out, and it played out differently. And I was so attached to my ideas of how it should have been that I totally missed out on reality. I walked out on it. And I walked out on her, emotionally.

According to the goddess-that-is-our-pediatrician, tantruming should be starting now. “It seems like Lina already knows how to protest!” she cheerfully remarked over the screaming as she was sticking her hand down my child’s throat during our last visit. I wondered what kind of child wouldn’t protest such an invasion, but I didn’t ask, and this woman knows her shit. So anyway, we’re right on track, I guess. Tantruming is developmentally appropriate for a one-year-old. Who knew.

The reality is that when Lina tantrumed this morning, I did too. I lost my way. And this, my friends, is not developmentally appropriate for a 35-year-old. Today was a good day for me to drop Lina off at school, and spend a few hours on my own. I played a Pema Chodron lecture as I was driving around in the car. And while I committed my usual crimes against practicality at the grocery store (this time buying both Vanity Fair AND the Shambhala Sun just to balance things out), I felt more centered before going to pick her up.

And right now, at the end of a long and emotionally rough day, I’m feeling mighty blessed.

PS) I have to add one more thing to this post, because it was such a huge disappointment today. Everyone in Lina’s group of foster sisters received photos of their foster parents today… everyone except us. Lina’s foster parents have moved out of Jiangxi province, and couldn’t make it to the photo session scheduled by the orphanage director. Though not many people receive this kind of link to their child’s past, the fact that we almost did is still painful. I grieve over the fact that Lina will most likely have no record of the loving faces that cared for her before she was placed in our arms.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 14th, 2006 at 16:33 and is filed under stephanie. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.