Look Mama, I have grown another inch today!

We have the ability to measure tangible things, such as one’s height or weight,  the mileage one has run in a week, or how much more weight can be lifted at the gym, but we have no tool that we can hold in our hands that can measure our growth.  Well, tool or no tool, I can say with certainty that I have definitely grown at least an inch or maybe even two, conceptually speaking of course, in the life department. It is a great feeling indeed!

Now what brought on this weigh-in so to speak?  A Ted Talk, two actually. One by Stacey Kramer and the other by Jane McGonigal.  Stacey talks about how a rare tumour became the greatest gift she ever received.   Given that she couldn’t change what happened to her, she recognized she could change how she reacted to it and saw it as an opportunity to create a new and meaningful life. One that involved recalibrating what is important, developing a new understanding and trust in her body, expanding her vocabulary in directions that were never even imagined, developing closer relationships with family and friends, as well as, meeting new people. Her medical crisis ultimately challenged, inspired and humbled her all at the same time which allowed her to further develop her life with new meaning.  Her message to anyone experiencing adversity in any form, that when you face something unexpected, unwanted or uncertain view it as a gift.  One can argue that having a child with severe disabilities falls within this domain and although it has been tough at times, I can share Stacey’s experiences and sentiments that the best way to view this adversity is in the positive. Again admittedly I sometimes need to be reminded of this, hence the Ted Talk.

Stacey’s attitude and approach in dealing with her ‘gift’ is a perfect example of how we are evolving in the emotional intelligence department to not just survive adversity but thrive on it.  In the psychology world, they have even come up with a new term called Post Traumatic Growth to illustrate “how adversity can often be a springboard to a new and meaningful life in which people re-evaluate their priorities, deepen their relationships and find new understandings of who they are.” (2013, Huffington Post, Joseph, Stephen).

Like Stacey, Jane also turned her medical situation into an opportunity for personal growth.  Her experience in overcoming the adversity that faced her led her to identify 4 areas of strength that everyone should foster to allow them to more effectively deal with a challenge should it present itself.  The 4 strengths include (1) physical –  exercise,  mental – learning, problem solving, game playing, reading, etc., emotional – positive interactions, goal setting, etc.,  and social – practice of gratitude, healthy touch, trust of oneself, etc.

Many people wrongly assume that resiliency is a trait of an individual, something you are born with or not, or can learn by doing a series of exercises.  Instead of it being a specific skill or a trait, resiliency is rather a process, albeit, a dynamic set of on-going processes that must be actively nurtured and pursued to give an individual the means to not only manage adversity but overcome it. I will define overcoming it to mean that someone can live a positive and meaningful life despite an adverse situation/event.

As a parent, one of many, whose world has been rocked and continues to be rocked by the challenges that come with raising a child with severe special needs, I can honestly say with open arms and heart that I have been given an incredible gift to cherish and grow.  Truthfully if I don’t embrace this way of thinking into every fibre of my own existence then the alternate way of living is dark, depressing, and rather shallow in opportunities.

My advice to anyone who sometimes finds themselves retreating back onto the darker path of a given trauma, illness, accident, grief, etc. to muster up the strength to remind themselves of the good that has come out of whatever has been experienced – what new and valuable relationships have been strengthened or developed as a result, what new skills have been developed, what new opportunities have you experienced that you wouldn’t have been exposed to or even considered before, and what else can you do to make the best of your situation.    Unfortunately life isn’t fair and once something bad has happened you can’t turn back the clock and I don’t think many people have had much luck with retribution, so really there is only one way to succeed going forward, and that is to cherish what lies ahead, knowing that you have the personal power to not only survive a negative experience but thrive.  To do so it is key to build on those 4 areas of strength – essentially these are the 4 pillars of life that will allow you to leap to a new level of growth.

How to break ties with the TV

Before actually having children I often played with the idea of being able to raise children without a tv or very, very limited engagement with one.   When I became pregnant with Reilly, naturally I thought more and more about the type of environment I/we would like to create for our children and again the idea of minimizing tv use was part of our vision.

Then came Reilly.   I don’t remember exactly when she got her tv but I am guessing she was around 2.  Any parent who has a child with severe issues would most likely not even question this decision but I know it is hard for a parent of a normal child to comprehend how bad could it get to warrant such a crutch.  Well let me tell you, we have seen hell first hand and made it back to tell the story that getting a tv to help with the issues at the time was a life saver on so many fronts.

The acquisition of the tv was prompted by Reilly not being a great sleeper. Let me be more specific.  I can’t remember when it started but by the time she was 2 she was expressing severe bouts of frustration and irritation particularly at night where she would wake up screaming and be up for hours.  Nothing medical related seemed to be the issue.  And if she wasn’t screaming, she would wake up cackling (laughing) and although this seems innocent it wasn’t and instead marked a psychotic side of what would be Rett Syndrome.  As a result of many sleepless nights of despair, we chose to accept a gift from my parents – a Winnie the Pooh television for her bedroom to hopefully distract her from whatever was going on.  This television didn’t solve all our problems but it gave us enough relief to see another day.

In the last couple of years I can’t remember when we last used it in the middle of the night.  Her night-time screaming and laughing are no more but she still wakes up several times a night but this has nothing to do with the physical presence of the tv and we are able to get her back to bed through other means.  During the day though, her want for the tv is another story, as she is completely addicted to watching  “television” whether it be on a tv, computer or ipad.  Part of her addiction has to do with it being one activity she can really enjoy without any effort. She has lost ALL fine motor skills, in other words, she does not have the ability to use her fingers to pick up or grab any toy/food/anything.  To top it off she no longer can walk on her own and consequently does a lot more sitting than all of us would like.   Without saying we do our best to off-set tv watching with other activities – reading, listening to music, socialization with others, etc. but at the end of the day the television is her best friend, and our greatest ally.

Of course we try to limit Reilly’s watching of tv but another challenge stems with London and her concept of fairness around the use of the tv.  I think she has officially given up thinking that she too will acquire a tv in her room but that hasn’t stopped her in getting in her fair share of tv watching. Due to all the challenges we have had in prior years, London has been exposed to way more tv than any of us would have liked. It also doesn’t help that the only way Reilly would travel peacefully in a car is if she is watching tv (music doesn’t cut it) and so London would also be exposed to screen time.   Although we lead a very active life and keep pushing and/or exploring the special needs boundaries with getting out there and trying different things as a family it still leaves lots of time where it makes sense to have Reilly watch tv but how can you tell London to do something different.  You might just say ‘You do!’  which we do and boy do we get resistance.   Of course that is part of parenting but there is parenting and parenting within a special needs household.

So going forward here is trying to keep television/ipad/Netflix/etc watching to one hour MAX per day per child and two hours per day on a non-school day/weekend.  Oh boy, wish all of us luck.

Last day of vacation

Today is Labour Day and although our world as we knew it changed significantly with the move to Calgary at the beginning of August, the real change starts tomorrow as the girls go back to school <Insert happy dance here>.

For the last month the weather has been amazing, every time we looked at the forecast it said Sunny. We learned quite quickly that when it did say there is a chance of thunderstorms, it really was just a small chance. Whereas back in our home town, when it said it was going to rain or storm, it did 99.9% of the time.  We can certainly attest that Calgary does boast consistent sunshine and endless blue skies.  We also love the fact how it dips down overnight, last night it was to dip down to 8 degrees C, and then it is go up to 30 degrees C.

As a result of the great weather, it has been hard to worry about completely organizing the house and instead have been enjoying the outdoors whenever we can.  We are taking full advantage of the Glenmore Reservoir and Bow River path system, either going to each location at least once a week for either a run, walk or bike ride.  And we haven’t even scratched the surface with all the hiking we can do in the area and other trail systems. We definitely feel like we have won the lottery on this front.

For some reason though we both feel up to this point we are just vacationing and any day we will be reunited with all our friends and the old schedule we are familiar and comfortable with but obviously that is not true. The real change of what we have done will sink in tomorrow as the girls go off to school.

Although I will gladly give up my Entertainment Director hat there are some things I will miss about our time together, such as the days we could lazily sleep in without any regard for the time, THIS NEVER HAPPENED BACK HOME – EVER, the trips to the park, morning hot tub soaks,  watching London connect with the little boy from next door, recent outings with my sister and her two little ones, and not worrying about the state of the house to the extent I did before. In some ways it was a very good experience in letting go and being in the present but it was certainly not without its challenges, unfortunately the Rett Syndrome Factor reared its ugly head often.

So once the girls get settled this week, I will switch gears and focus on creating the least stressful routine in the morning for all, start booking new appointments for Reilly to deal with the many issues we are facing, finish up organizing the house, and trying desperately to set realistic expectations for me each week.

This is the happy dance song I will be dancing to today:

Describing the Big Change

 

I apologize if this image offends anyone but I think it is perfect given that numerous people have used the exact words that ‘we must have big balls for doing what we are doing’ (i.e. moving to Calgary and essentially starting over).  Given that I am female, this pink ball image seem to be appropriate.  At first I was a little offended that this male anatomy term was being used to describe our adventure but I guess when you get down to medical science, I believe testosterone is what drives adventurous behaviour, right?  Either way I am cool with it.

There is no question that some people think we are crazy for giving up what we do have here and yes we are taking a risk.  I am confident that although there are going to have some moments down the road where we say to ourselves, what the hell did we do,  I know in the long run we will be glad we made the change.

Then there are people who are cool with what we are dong or indifferent but get absolutely stumped that we are making these bold changes without any jobs lined up.  Sure cash inflows are very important but we have planned for this and have socked away a healthy emergency fund to bridge us at least several months if needed.  Sure we could have waited for A job to be lined up first but truthfully that would have been even more stressful if we have to split up (i.e. one of us go ahead to work).  I would need another post to explain this more thoroughly.  Sometimes I secretly enjoy saying we don’t have jobs lined up only to see the look that we must be crazy or the stupid comments many have actually made that this probably wasn’t the best approach to take. I translate these negative comments as the people expressing their own fear of change.

Then we have the camp of people that  have used the big ball reference, and those are the ones we find completely envious that we are taking life by the reins, as they would love to do something similar as they too are longing for a change but feel the chains of responsibility and stability are wound too tight to even think about it.  And of course we also have a lot of people are completely supportive, similar to unconditional love, have no desire to make any bold changes but truly happy for us.

Since we have made our big decision, one of my good friends also took life by the reins and decided they needed a little adventure. Before we all knew it, her husband took a job in the US and she is busily planning their big move.  Although the new company will look after most of the moving details, it will be nice to have someone in my network that will be going through some similar adjustments.

Not everyone has to uproot their family or do something big like this to deserve the big ball award :-), I think everyone deserves it if you are being true to yourself, your desire and dreams. Now this doesn’t mean you give up or forgo responsibilities but you pursue your dreams in a responsible way. Anything can be done when you set your mind to it, just think one step at a time.

Judging your life

“What if a life was judged not by its monetary worth or possible economic benefit to society, but as a series of complex and rewarding relationships?” Globe and Mail.

I have reread this quote over and over again to myself for it has so much meaning,  application and implications to my own life.  I know that I wouldn’t have given this quote the time of day if it wasn’t for raising a child with severe handicaps for I am part of the economic philosophy and generation of my time that your worth is defined by more external measures.

For me it dates back to my first job at 10 years of age, where I had a serious babysitting gig earning $2/hr and saved over $500 in 2 years. At 13, I was working for my dad selling hockey programs and tickets at the local Jr. A hockey arena during game night and at 14, I was employed by St. Cinnamon, making cinnamon buns at the local mall.  I don’t even think I was legal to work back then but somehow I made it happen.  At 16 I worked at Canadian Tire and continued with various other jobs right through University. The fact that I graduated from a top school in Canada with a Commerce degree is no coincidence.

My goal was to work downtown Toronto in one of the high rises, wearing a power suit,  making the big bucks and living the grand life travelling the world.   At school we were practically conditioned for such pursuits and made to believe that this was THE path to follow.  I didn’t end up pursuing this path upon graduation, another post is needed to address the reasons around that,  but what stuck with me over these years is that those that are deemed successful are the ones that have climbed the corporate ladder and are making tons of money and have the materialistic products to prove it -nice cars, big houses, vacations, etc.  And those that don’t have such demonstrations of success must not be as talented or skilled as opposed the possibility that these individuals have actually chosen to redefine what it means to be successful, and potentially these people might actually rate higher in life satisfaction scores.

Now the fact that I sometimes get frustrated with our circumstances as we are forced to make compromises that other families don’t have to make and get very little support from the community, only highlights further the paradigm shift that really needs to take place in our society.  We talk about companies needing to become more socially responsible what about in our own communities? For instance, recently our family attended a BBQ with 4 other families and out of the 8 children there, only 1 child attempted a little interaction with Reilly. This child was 3 whereas all the other children were 6 or older. Although the adults said hello to Reilly upon us arriving, not one asked to help feed, entertain, walk or do anything to engage Reilly.  I know it is challenging and I am not innocent myself but together we all need to do better when it comes to supporting and accepting differences.

Can you imagine how our communities would be different if we raised our children to place greater value on developing rich relationships  instead of monetary success and material belongings?  Sure money is important and I am not suggesting we take it away but it should be one piece of the pie and not the entire pie.  Here are some of the things I think might be different:

• Schools would have active partnerships with Senior Citizen retirement homes
• Children with special needs would be more highly integrated with regular classrooms
• My daughter with RS would have greater access to the same basic benefits as other children without the parents having to pay extra dollars
• Other children would do more than just stare and whisper about Reilly being different. Instead their curiousity would blossom into rich and wonderful interactions and relationships
• There would be funding for all necessary equipment for individuals like my daughter to function with dignity
• People wouldn’t look at families like ours with pity or gratitude that they don’t have such a ‘burden’ but rather just another example of what a family might look like
• More accessible housing would be built to allow seniors and those with special needs to stay in their own homes (longer)
• Children would have more options with career choices that match their strengths without getting caught up in today’s definition of what a cool job is about (money!)
• Employers would offer more flexible working arrangements for parent’s

Given that my own self-worth is very tightly interwoven into how society views Reilly’s worth or value it is discouraging but yet I am determined to do everything within my power to help influence our network of interactions, not just with our family but also my role to others.  Thoughts lead to actions, here is mine….

A must read book if you have kids

I was at the library recently to pick out some books for the girls and as I was passing by rows and rows of books, this one particular book jumped into my view. I hesitated for I already have a dozen or so books on the go but I thought it got my attention for a reason. I am only 1/3 of the way through and want to spread the word that this book should be read by anyone who has a family.

Given my career background as a Business Analyst, Change Agent, process improvement, etc.  this book totally appealed to me for it talks about taking these business skills, approaches, methodologies into the family environment. Why not? It makes perfect sense.  Families face the same things as businesses do with respect to needing to be adaptable and agile to the constant changes that we face in this high tech global world.  Just think of the other important skills in today’s workforce, such as excellent communication and negotiation skills, continual process improvement, quality control, etc. How many of us really spend time teaching these skills within the context of the family???

One concept/exercise that has been introduced early in the book which is totally not new in parenting literature is the value of having a weekly family meeting.   When I was a manager I had regular department meetings with my team to discuss our successes, challenges, and the plan for either the next day/week/month or quarter depending on the situation. So why wouldn’t we do this as a family? So this past Sunday we had our first Harris family meeting just after dinner.  So I borrowed the questions from the book to use at our first meeting; which were:

1) What worked well in our family this week?

2) What didn’t work well in our family this week?

3) What will we work on this coming week?

I had no idea how this would go, especially since I didn’t prep my husband, one child is non-verbal and can’t participate at all and in fact can sabotage such an attempt if she is bored, and a 6 year old who might need some prodding and coaching.  To my surprise and delight we had a successful meeting.  Aside from Reilly, the three of us all gave input as well as listened to each and shared in some good laughter.  I wrote out the main points that we talked about for each question to serve as reference guide as we move forward with this exercise.  And even though Reilly couldn’t contribute in the traditional way, she was at the table and I believe enjoyed being part of this family affair.

One of the issues that Mike and I struggle with is how grumpy London is in the morning and this was certainly one issue we put out on the table in our discussions. We were very good though in trying not to make it an issue specific to London but rather a family issue that we need to work together to solve.   She didn’t get defensive when we brought up and even said “I know, it is just the way I am”.  We talked about how we can help each other in the morning and came up with several different suggestions and ideas. In the end we settled on a couple and moved on.  Well two days later and we have had two much better mornings.

I am looking forward to our next meeting!

Teaching the next generation

This picture of London was taken last Easter weekend and it just melts my heart.  Given how young she is (6 years now), as  her parent I have a tremendous opportunity to shape her life in a way where  it is ingrained in her that she has complete control over the design of her life.   To know that it is within our power to teach London that the only way of living is one where you are actively following a passion and purpose filled life is tremendously exciting.

So how do we get our children to embody this way of thinking and thus living? It is not enough to simply read her books about following your dreams, being true to who you are, and building self-esteem through words. Instead the power of influencing her thinking and behavior will be predominantly based on our ability to actively demonstrate in our own lives what it looks, feels, and sounds like.   Part of this involves each of us being in a job that we really enjoy and be careful with the words we express in front of her when things are going well or we have had a rough day.  This is an exercise that will not only benefit her but us as well in handling stress in general.

 It also involves actively participating in various hobbies and interests that get us excited individually and as a family.  I believe it is very healthy that all of us have our own interests and give each other time to enjoy them but also have family time as well.  I know a lot of moms who literally give up their lives for their children and forgo doing anything for themselves. On the surface this might look commendable but what message is this really teaching your children? That you have to lose your own identity when you want to have children? Another component to effective role modelling is by including her in age-appropriate family goal setting sessions and then working with her to visualize her own goals/dreams or desires.

A Leadership “not to do”

I know this is old news about how Marissa Mayer has issued a ban on telecommuting within her company effective June 1st of this year but late or not I would like to provide my commentary.  Without question this new company policy has thrown many of her employees within Yahoo into an understandable quandary, especially since many employees chose to work at Yahoo on this provided flexibility. Her decision has also spawned quite a bit of conversation outside the walls of this organization much of it not in favour of Mayer’s decision.

So let’s look at some information:

• The telecommuting ban was made public by someone within Yahoo leaking a memo about the directive  (smart move by the employee who did this)
• The objective of the telecommuting ban is to foster greater collaboration to ultimately come up with better strategies to improve Yahoo’s declining position within the marketplace
• Marissa has no problems in complying with her policy for she built a nursery for her 2 month old beside her office, albeit, at her own expense
• Marissa earns a gazillion dollars annually – actual figure is about $115 million over 5 years.
• Productivity research has shown that flexible work arrangements increases productivity, reduces traffic congestion and also environmental impact, increases personnel retention, and in many situations employees express greater satisfaction, motivation and engagement scores which ultimately translates into high performing work places.

I have a few issues with Marissa Mayer but for this post I will focus on one and one only and that is this telecommuting ban.  I personally feel that if Mayer holds true to this new work in-house policy that in the end she will not realize her objectives or they will be short lived for the following reasons. First, this announcement alone will most likely affect current productivity levels of her organization as they take time to process the news – internal “coffee-time” discussions, plus the possible need for additional meetings to review the change and to discuss the impact as well as other internal communication to try to bring the employees on board. Second, this change might cause some valuable employees to start looking for alternate employment. Third, actual turnover of employees that might be instrumental to Yahoo’s future success. Fourth, for those employees that don’t find alternate employment but would like to will fall in line with this policy but under great resentment and/or resistance which most likely will affect their engagement levels and possibly those of others.

Can Marissa really think by doing this she will create an engaged workforce that will produce the ideas that are needed to move them forward and upward?   S.Mipham from Ruling Your World puts forward the notion that “power that depends on bombarding others with our ambition or terrorizing them into submission does not last, because it requires constant maintenance” are quite appropriate to describe Mayer’s leadership style. The one great thing about Mayer’s decision is that it is going to be written up in many business text books in years to come on what not to do to create high performing and engaged work environments.

 

Opportunities increase as they are taken – Sun Tzu

David Cameron Gikandi’s book A Happy Pocket Full of Money is as his subtitle suggests about how to generate infinite wealth and abundance in the Here and Now using the laws of the Universe.   I am not finished the book yet but one chapter totally caught my attention and in some ways I wish the author would have started with it first and then worked backwards.

Most of  Gikandi’s earlier chapters cover familiar principles that I have heard from many other authors covering Law of Attraction concepts until I hit the chapter titled Acting: That which Receives and that is when a light bulb went off – I finally get all this stuff.  Now what I am going to say next will most likely only make sense to those that already understand the general concept of Thoughts become Things.  In this chapter, Gikandi makes it clear that actions are the last component of the creation (thought) processes.  He begins to outline a hierarchy based on our relationship with the Universe that starts with the Self, then the Spirit, your Being, your Thoughts/Mind/Words and then Actions. Actions are very necessary and important but they come at the end as a result of putting out what you want to Receive.

Right now I am doing a lot of work in Change Management and I use this model called ADKAR developed by Prosci that describes 5 elements that define the building blocks for successful change.   ADKAR represents Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability and Reinforcement.  In my mind these last two elements equate to Action and in order to produce successful change you need all the earlier elements in place; otherwise, the change will either miss the full objectives or even fail. Similarly if you don’t fully understand and thus leverage your Being, your Thoughts and Words, you will not be as successful as you can be for you will ultimately be at the mercy of how the Universe interprets your created messages, whether they were intended or not.

There is no question that most of us have been living in a state of ignorance (focusing on the visible and physical world) or not truly understanding the interrelationship between thoughts, things and actions. Either way it really comes down to not knowing that there was even a different way to approach life. It baffles me why this information is so readily available but minimally embraces by the masses.  The ripples have started though.

As stated Action is very important and necessary but the role of Action is very different than what what most of us believes it does.   Essentially Action’s role is to Receive what you have already created through your Thoughts and not the other way around.  For example happy conditions arise because you are happy, not the other way around.  This concept is not new but walking through the connection within this greater framework makes it sink in on how things really work.  The author further states that action just helps your mind do the thing your mind has already decided – how you are going to experience the action, whether positively, negatively, fearfully, joyfully, etc.  The biggest a’ha moment for me is truly understanding that everything vibrates including our thoughts and it is through this vibration that we harmonize with others and attract the appropriate experiences to ourselves, good, bad or indifferent. This information is powerful!

Difficulties adjusting to change

Rett Syndrome has introduced us to a lot of people that we wouldn’t normally have met, including multiple Occupational Therapists, Physiotherapists, 3 neurologists to date, a Geneticist and his team, an Endrocronologist, an Orthapeodic (specialist), 6 different teaching aids, several Speech Therapists, an Early Interventionist, a couple of Community Access Care case workers, numerous teaching doctors, nurses, EEG, MRI specialists, and the list goes on and on. When you stop and list all the different people that have been involved in Reilly’s 7 years of life so far it is staggering.  Especially for a little girl who can’t communicate with us to express her fears of ‘another’ visit or to hear all sorts of information be discussed in front of her without her being able to contribute to the conversations.

On Monday, the first day back from the Christmas holidays, Reilly had a new bus driver in the am. I asked the new guy ‘Alex’ whether he was just subbing or was there a change in the guards so to speak. He said the previous bus driver resigned over the holidays and he is ‘it’ until they find a replacement. This will be Reilly’s third new morning bus driver this year. The first one was fantastic but wanted more hours so the bus company had to switch the route to accommodate. The second bus driver was very good too and always made a point to first acknowledge Reilly and then me, even though I am the one that said good morning first.

When I saw the new bus driver my heart sank for it was just another change we all would have to get used to. It is funny that it affected me so much and although on the surface I will claim my angst is really for Reilly and wanting limited change in her life, I think it is more to do with my feelings and ability to handle change these days. Earlier in the fall, our Personal Support Worker, lost track of what # she was, phoned into her agency claiming she hurt her back supporting Reilly so they ceased all support to us until they can assess the lifting situation with Reilly. We really liked this PSW and was taken aback by the sudden issue when she gave us no indication she was suffering. In the end we had no support for Reilly for 4 weeks, it took quite a toll on our work schedules and overall family schedule.  Of course add this to the lack of sleeping and you have a perfect cocktail for insanity.

A few weeks ago we finally were given the clearance for a new Personal Support Worker. We said we would still welcome the one from that ‘quit’ as she got along quite well with Reilly and vice versa but she didn’t want to come back. Confused about the PSW’s decision and worried we would not get a decent PSW we were guarded when the new lady showed up. Almost instantly I fell in love with her though (as Reilly’s support worker of course) and made a comment that the Universe can be cruel at times putting us through a month of agony and then giving us a resource that is proving to be the best Personal Support Worker on record. The only negative is that she has now set one high benchmark for all others to come.

It will be interesting to see what affect the revolving door of therapists, doctors, and support workers will have on London later in life. Although it doesn’t affect London directly there is no question she is exposed at a level that is leaving an imprint on who she is and will be over time.  So far both girls are proving to take everything in stride and thank goodness neither one of them has issues with the constant change in their life. I guess as hard as these changes are on me as the parent,  my job is not to let it show that it bothers me and to paint the picture that every new person that walks into our life is a wonderful opportunity to learn something new. Oh boy.