Enjoying the Moments

One day I will not wake up to the crying of children.  I will wake up, and it will be after 6am, and nobody will have disturbed me all night long.  I will drink an entire cup of coffee while it is still hot.

One day no one will reach out arms for rescue from the crib-prison and spin circles around the room in a celebration of freedom.  No one will wake up overflowing with dreams and ambitions (what she has decided for her next birthday cake and when she can change her name to Elsa).  I will no longer cling to my coffee as the sweet nectar which sustains all life.

One day I will lie down on the couch and read a book.  Just uninterrupted reading, for more than thirty seconds.  No one will try to sit on my Kindle or suddenly discover a DIRE band-aid situation (can't you see the teeny, tiny cut I got last week??)  that needs immediate attention.  There will be no screaming.

One day no one will bring in a pile of slightly-chewed books saying, “Read! Read!.”  No one will climb on my belly and demand 20 games of "ride the horsey" which end with everyone in helpless giggles.  The chubby laughing face will have become too busy for silly games.

One day I will eat an entire meal in peace.  I will sit down, eat leisurely, and not get up until I'm done. There will be no screaming.  No one will steal the best parts of my food.  My husband and I will hold entire conversations not broken by a single "mama-mama-mama-MAMAAAAAA!"

One day no one will climb into my lap with a mischievous grin while slyly reaching for my bread.  No one will give an animated account of what happened at kindergarten.  No one will say incredibly funny things and then get mad at us for laughing.

One day no one will wipe boogers on my shirt or pee on the couch or talk about poop at the dinner table.  No one will shriek with frustration because the Stupid Puzzle Piece Won’t Go IN!!!

One day no one will dance wildly to "Pop Goes the Weasel," no one will beam with pride over a wobbling tower creation or laugh with joy when it falls down two seconds later.  No one will nuzzle a soft cheek against my chin.

One day we will get out the door without hunting for socks and shoes and waterbottles and toys.  There will be no sunscreening squirmy faces or last minute trips to the potty or how-is-your-face-still-covered-in-breakfast-oatmeal-at-4pm.  There will be no juggling of bags and strollers and babies up and down flights of stairs.

One day we will decide to go somewhere and we will just...walk out the door. We will go out to dinner and then say, "Hey, let's see a movie.  Why don't we walk around the lake?"  And then we will just do it.

One day we will go to concerts and coffee shops and whatever places adults go to.  We won't plan our vacation around the hotel with the good playground and the amount of insanity required to get there.  We will get on an airplane and just watch a movie or read a book.  Maybe we'll even fall asleep.

One day we will stop to point out the playground or the cows or the really big dump truck and no one will care.  One day no one will beg for hide and seek, or plant twig trees in the ground, or ask where the worm lives.  We will get on an airplane and nobody will be wildly excited about the little buttons and the window shades and the teeny tiny bag of pretzels.

One day we will not hurry back from dinners or forgo evening plans because little ones are melting down.  No one will take 30 minutes to put on a pair of pajamas or demand the door cracked at a perfect 13% angle and the right light on and the covers straightened out again and the waterbottle placed just so...   And there will be no screaming.

 One day no one will make a last minute pajama escape, running giggling through the living room exulting in nakedness.  One day no one will cuddle in laps for another reading of Goodnight Moon. There will be no "Jesus Loves Me" and prayers and sweet kisses through crib bars.

So I won't enjoy the 2am wake ups or the 3am throw ups or the 4am attempts at morning.  I probably won't enjoy most of the happenings between 1-5am, because seriously, I'm not crazy.

But I will enjoy the thousand other tiny, sticky, loving, learning, out-of-control-silly moments that fill the day.  Because one day is sooner than I can ever imagine.

[Linking up with Velvet Ashes: Enjoy]

Tips for the First Year Overseas...Single, Married, and With Children

Ten years ago I moved overseas for the first time.  Single, barely 22, with no earthly clue what I was doing.  That first year was rough.  Quite rough.  But I survived – and not only that, I learned some really important lessons. 

A few years later I returned from leave as a newly married woman – so grateful for my new companion and relatively unprepared for the pressures overseas living would put on our newlywed life.

And a few years later I transitioned from full-time teacher to full-time mom.  Talk about a big learning curve on absolutely no sleep!

I grew a lot through each of these transitions.  I’d like to share a few tips, particularly from all the things I didn't do well, but you know...that's how you learn.

Tips for the First Year 

…As a single woman

Be prepared to need your teammates more than they need you.  Maybe they are experienced and have a wealth of established relationships, maybe they are a family who is up to their ears in interpersonal interaction. Their fondest dream is of “alone time” when 90% of your life is just that (and not so rosy as they’d imagine).  Help them to understand your needs and work to understand their perspective as well.  Figure out what your team can do to help meet your needs and figure out how your gifts and abilities can benefit your teammates.  You may be new at everything, but you still have unique offerings!

Be prepared to feel helpless and useless and confused…fun, huh?  Get ready to be humble and glean others’ experience about culture, about your new roles, about how to buy fruit.  A trip to the store will be exhausting, and it’s not because you are weak – it’s because your mind is trying to process 50000 new stimuli and you are getting smarter by the minute.  You may feel like you have never been dumber, but actually you are learning more than ever before.

Take care of yourself.  Sleep. Eat. Exercise. Rest.  Pretty basic, but let’s be more specific.  You will need more sleep than you used to because you are working really hard just at daily life.  Eating well does not mean heating up a tiny package of tomato soup in the dark and calling it dinner (obviously I have never done that). Exercise may look different when running past five thousand gaping strangers who are trying to figure out what is wrong with the crazy foreigner.  Talk to your teammates for ideas, and experiment to see what works for you (say, running after dark!)  Don’t feel guilty about watching TV or reading a book or doing a puzzle.  You need breaks, and if you don’t take them you will not last.   We all know that 5 hours on Facebook is not helpful, but it’s easy to feel guilty about any “indulgence.” Rest is not selfish; it’s healthy.

…As a married woman

You and your husband will handle the transition differently.  It’s bound to happen.  Maybe one of you is super adaptable and seems unruffled by all the transition, while the other is feeling the effects of everything (I’ll let you guess which one is me).  Maybe one of you is gifted in language while the other is struggling.  Maybe one is in your element and the other is feeling totally out of place.  These things can cause a lot of tension that can easily lead to resentment.  Talk about how the transition and your new roles are affecting each of you.  Then keep talking about it, because this is not a one-time thing!  Work really hard to understand the other person and to make yourself understood.

It’s easy to blame culture stress on your spouse.  Culture is vague and hard to yell at, while your spouse is right there, such a visible target.  Try to think carefully, “Am I really mad at my husband or have I just had it with bargaining?  Is he frustrated with me, or did he just have a frustrating morning at the bank?”  Try to become allies instead of enemies as you work through cultural frustrations.

Your relationship is going to change.  You might be spending more time than ever with your husband in shared work.  You might be adjusting to long hours or days apart.  McDonalds might be the hot new date night location.  It will take some time to adjust, but you’ll work out a new normal.  You’ll likely depend on each other more than ever before, and hopefully you’ll realize that in all the crazy changes, you have someone who sticks with you and “gets” your life – past, present, and future - like no one else.

…As a mother

You are strong.  You went through the trials of pregnancy and the “I can’t do this!!” moments of childbirth, and you did it anyway.  Or you agonized over paperwork and more paperwork and waiting and setbacks and uncertainty until your child could finally come home with you.  You have made it through sleepless nights and the days when your children seemed to be testing out new torture methods. You have survived parenthood thus far, and that’s how you’ll survive this difficult first year.

Think basics.  When I first became a mother, I quasi-joked that my goal for the first year was for us all to be alive at the end of it.  This is a pretty good goal for your first year in a new country.  Everybody ate.  Everyone has bathed sometime in recent memory.  Everyone is alive.  You win!!  Keep your expectations low and give yourself a lot of grace.

Whatever your long-term goals are, your first year will probably be a lot about your home and family.  Maybe you are learning how to home school for the first time. Maybe you are trying to figure out how to buy diapers and milk or how to carry three bags of groceries and two clinging children around the block and up 5 flights of stairs.  You will be helping your kids through their own adjustments, and that’s huge.  The wellbeing of your whole family is an important factor in being able to stay.  You may feel like you aren’t doing anything useful, you aren’t doing anything you couldn’t do in your home country, but don’t believe it.  This is make-it-or-break-it stuff you are dealing with.  You are vital.

Get out of the house.  You may need to put a lot of focus on what’s happening inside your family, but you also need to get out.  You need breaks from your children and their ever constant needs (who doesn’t?).  You need to feel connected to the culture and the reason you are there, even if it’s not as much of your life right now as you imagined.  You need to connect with people who are not related to you.  Talk to your husband and your team about how to make this a reality.  For the good of everyone, make it happen.

You will get through this.  With support, reasonable expectations, and a lot of grace, you will thrive.  And if you’re like me, you’ll be blessed to look back 10 years later and wonder where time has gone.

[Linking up with Velvet Ashes: Tips for the First Year]