If I could ask my mother one question, I would have to make out a list and whittle it down to the question that most encompasses all the answers I seek. I am amazed at how respondents are quite clear of what they would ask their mothers if allowed but one question.
Their questions are extremely well-thought out. Perhaps they
Of Self-Revelation, Philosophical Reflection and Sweetness … Read More »
Like the teacher in my psychology program who said that the hardest thing about parenting was the time required, I find that I never have enough.
Mothering three daughters, seeing to my husband, or rather attending our marriage, along with my work as a psychotherapist, and writing novels proves daunting.
I count minutes in much the same way that I count calories.
Frustration continually arises as I reprimand myself for lack of efficiency.
“I’m working as hard as I can,” I say to myself.
But am I working smarter?
I do not know.
Personal experience has
Of Riding Ellipticals, Counting Minutes, and The Challenge of Parenting … Read More »
Not a day has passed during the three weeks since posting my last blog that I have not felt guilty for failing to hold to my schedule of blogging.
It is a promise I give to myself, and a responsibility I maintain as a published writer.
The nagging feeling that has haunted me now abates as I write this post.
But what occurs when life happens and disrupts our goals and the tasks we have set our energies to?
What do we do when
Of Life, Revelations, and Our Differences That Bind … Read More »
Now a mother of three daughters, a licensed psychotherapist and an author, I still lean back in awe at how much emphasis individuals of certain cultures, African-American included, place upon the success of our children.
Some weekends ago I attended the Senior Recognition Ceremony held each year by hundreds of Jack-n-Jill Chapters across the country, honoring the children of mother-members who having and preparing to graduate high school will in less than three months, leave for college.
Conversations during the meal, as usual, included
Of Hopes, Dreams, and Cheetah Mamas … Read More »
During the past year I have noticed an increasing number of Internet stories/articles reporting the murders and /or more often murder-suicides wherein a parent has killed the spouse and their children.
Men and fathers are usually the assailants for cases involving a murdered spouse.
Children are usually the victims when mothers commit homicide on members of their immediate families.
The act of any parent or adult killing a child is horrendous.
And yet, as the mother of three daughters, I am most taken when a mother kills her daughter (s).
As a psychotherapist I a to ask, “What
Of Mothers, Daughters and a Nation Crying for Help… Read More »
“[D]aughters can model a great deal from a mother who is self-aware herself,” says Juanita Johnson in, Know Thyself First (Part 6 of Our Mothers, Ourselves: Mother-Daughter Relationships)
A storyteller and psychotherapist, who, along with her 27-year-old-daughter gives talks and workshops on the mother-daughter relationship, Johnson adds, “…I observe quite frequently that [a] mother knows so very little about her own self…[and instead] plac[es] way too much emphasis on how her daughter turns out rather than examining, ‘What [what she, the mother] do I know[s] about [her] self and how [she] feel[s] about [her]self…”
After reading this I immediately realized why I have felt such
Of Daughters, Actions and Self-Awareness… Read More »
When two years ago, our eldest daughter asked to moved back home I was thrilled.
Having just earned a graduate degree and about to begin law school she expressed the desire to return to a more laid back lifestyle than she had experienced when a coed and then graduate student living in the city.
My excitement at having our first born home came not simply from 0ur enjoyment of having her around to share and do activities with, but with the additional idea that she truly liked being with her father and most specifically me, her mother.
The relationship I shared with my mother, now nearly 16 years deceased,
Of Eldest Daughters, Mothers and Healing… Read More »