To Hell and Back

I felt such a connection to the widowed mom, Deb, portrayed in last night's episode of "Losing It With Jillian." She is in my age group (54), with two kids (a boy and girl, 10 and 12), and her husband has been gone almost six years. At the start of the show she tearfully moans that she is so tired (exhausted really), has nothing left to give (especially to herself), always has to do everything by herself, and feels so alone - all aspects that I cover on a regular basis in this blog. To hear another widowed mom say and relate those same powerful laments reduced my isolation and discontent for a brief period. I didn't feel so alone or so crazy or weak or like I'm a constant complainer. I'm a tired widowed mom struggling to make ends meet just like Deb. I'm not the only one. There is another widowed mom out there who leaves her dishes in the sink too!

There were some differences in our stories. Deb's kids are younger than mine and were only four and six when their dad died compared to my sons being nine and ten. She has a daughter whom she has relied on to fill some of the emotional void. Part of the show dealt with easing this burden off the daughter. I thought about how I have gone the other way in trying to protect my sons' childhoods as much as possible to the extent that I take on too much and just can't do it all by myself. I figure the widowed are doomed no matter what we do. We'll be criticized if we ask the kids to pick up the slack and then we're criticized when we try to let them still be kids. It ends up all being a balance. The kids do need to step up to the plate more than kids living in a two-parent home. Simply based on what has happened to the family - the dad/husband has died. I've tried to protect my sons from having to face more pain. But it has come at a huge cost to me. So in the days ahead I'll work on demanding more of a family input from the guys.

When I worked as a counselor or in social services, I was extremely kind, gentle and empathic. I have always believed that you get more from honey than vinegar. I cringed when viewing Jillian's boot camp tactics. Both last night's and last week's families are dealing with grief issues in their pasts. I say lets tone it down some for people already in deep pain. But that's my opinion. I'd also recommend some therapy or counseling for these families. It is good to change from the outside in, but to change from the inside out doesn't just happen on its own. You have to work at it.

Deb's house was very cluttered with piles of stuff. In fact, I know someone with a bedroom that looks very similar to the one Deb was living in. Although I don't have the piles in our living area, I do have storage sheds filled to the brim. It looks like next week's episode is going to deal with that issue - and again, in the promo, the featured mom says she doesn't want to part with her stuff because she has already lost too much. There it is again - that word - LOSS.

I continue to hope that people watching last night's show felt empathy, compassion and gained some understanding about widowhood. It appears there is an underlying theme connecting these families - loss. Maybe there will be a greater comprehension for the havoc loss can play in our lives. I learned something about myself last night and I felt less alone. That's a pretty good combination.

Jillian told the Deb that she'd been to hell and back already. Now she needs to go on/move forward. While I understand what Jillian meant, I also felt she was just giving lip service. For some of us the hell doesn't cease. Financial worries, working, loneliness are mainstays of my life and Deb's. There was no mention of Deb having a love life and the family even admitted not engaging in many fun activities together as a family. I can totally relate to that. So I saw a bit of that can do, get over it attitude depicted. I'll counter that it's not that easy to just turn your collapsed life around. I think some viewers last night may have had the belief that Deb hadn't tired hard enough, or she'd let herself go. So not true!

Deb - My heart goes out to you as another mom who has walked in your shoes. I get you and I appreciate you. Your courage and strength inspire me to get up off the couch and try and improve my life too. If you can do it so can I!

There is no magic wand for widowed moms unless maybe we win the lottery and even that wouldn't be a total cure. Life is still hard and grueling. Deb losing 32 pounds doesn't take away the pain of not having her beloved husband here to be there for her and the kids. But it makes her physically healthier to face the road ahead. Thanks for sharing your story, Deb. You are amazing.

Teaching the Untouched

I saw the promo ads for the new series "Losing it With Jillian," a knock off of "The Biggest Loser." I've never watched The Biggest Loser but the ads for the new show caught my attention. Jillian goes to the homes of overweight families and moves in with them for a week. She helps them "restore" their unbalanced lives with healthy meals and menu planning, exercise and so on. In the ads, there appeared to be a family coping with the loss of the dad/husband. So I made a note of when the show started.

Tuesday's show did not depict this family but I was still glad I caught the episode. This was a working class family from the East, around Boston I believe. The daughter and dad had already gone through gastric bypass surgery with the daughter successfully keeping the weight off but not so for the dad. The mom was also overweight and the son interested in shaping up, although not as overweight as his parents. The daughter was getting married and the family all made 6-week goals for the wedding.

Having never seen The Biggest Loser, I wasn't prepared for the drill-like, boot camp tactics of Jillian. But even more surprising was the big family secret that came out in the hour. I was really impressed with this family and just fell in love with them because of the great family love and loyalty they shared with one another. It turns out that the first child born of this couple, a son, died only a month after birth. This became a taboo topic between the family but it was clear how the events of some 22 prior years had been literally destroying them.

The unresolved and unspoken grief that persisted over the years was evident and could be detected in the relationships the family members shared with one another as well as their overall family dynamic. There was some initial healing with the simple acknowledgment of the underlying pain. The family went on to make great strides in their overall fitness plans with the dad losing almost 50 pounds and the mom 30 within that short 6-week period. The wedding was absolutely beautiful and a fitting beginning for a new life for all of these truly lovely and courageous individuals.

I am curious what will be exposed on Tuesday's upcoming episode with the widowed mom. It appears that she is holding on to old belongings which I also struggle with (two storage sheds of my husband's and parent's old belongings). I am hoping to be inspired to break with the past and move onward into the future.

But more importantly, I hope one of the benefits of airing last week's show was that it helped those unaffected by grief to gain a little glimpse into the havoc and pain resulting from losses, even years following their occurrence. This family was very brave and did far more than become healthier themselves - they helped educate, they faced their albatross and hopefully inspired others to do the same, and they promoted sympathy toward those stuck by grief. The ramifications of their strength and courage pour out into the Universe.

Ron Howard Saves the Day!

Last night my son wanted to watch the new Ron Howard produced program called "Parenthood." He had heard it was good. I don't watch much t.v. but decided to view it with him and was pleasantly surprised. The storyline centers around a close California family with four adult children, now raising their own kids. The oldest daughter has just moved back home with her parents to get back on her feet after a divorce with her musician, drug using and dealing husband. She has two teenagers, a boy and girl. The daughter is smoking cigarettes and pot. The son wants to go back home to live with his dad. Another son, also with two kids is kicked off his son's little league team as the coach for badgering an umpire who called out his son. The son, age 8 is experiencing learning and social problems - the school suspects he has Asperger's, a high-functioning form of Autism. There is sibling rivalry between the two adult daughters, one of whom is the golden girl high-powered attorney. But it appears that her marriage may not be as strong as she thought it was. The younger brother is portrayed as the commitment phobe. His girlfriend wants to have a baby, NOW, but he is not ready. Then the bomb is dropped at the end of the hour. Turns out he has already fathered a little boy but did not know until now!

Great real stuff. Thank goodness for reality and not hiding the crumbs under the rug! Middle-aged dating after divorce is one of the topics humorously brought up, along with the grandfather being told off with, "I'm not raising my kids the way you raised me." When the teenage daughter asks her mom why they have to move back with the grandparents, the mom replies, "Because we've run out of money." Just gotta love that! Now it would be great if one of the four adult kids had been widowed or maybe widowhood is reflected between the grandparents in some way. But at this point it is a minor criticism because this is such a refreshing and modern take on life today and I felt they did a very good job at it. I guess divorce is simpler to portray because it is more common for mid-lifers and easier to relate to.

So, maybe there is hope for Hollywood after all! Thank you Ron Howard for having the courage to portray a real family with real issues and real lives. I really believed this was an honest-to- good family that could actually exist! I have to admit feeling a tinge of envy while viewing this hour, though. These kids had the support of family to fall back on and that is not something I can rely on. My widowhood has been a very singualr road.

I am grateful:

1. For the springlike weather.
2. For having medical insurance (I'll devote a post to this topic in the near future).
3. For being able to take my sons to doctor appointments.
4. For being able to get my sons Rx acne medication and not pay through the nose.
5. For being offered a job (I'll post on that too).

Partridge Family Revisited

I was a "Brady Bunch" and "Partridge Family" fanatic as a tween and teen. Absolutely loved those t.v. shows and still do. I actually wanted to name one of my sons Brady but my husband refused, although I know of quite a few boys named Brady or Braden.

Both shows were in the news recently. Evidently there is a feud going on between Maureen McCormick and Eve Plumb (Marcia and Jan Brady). And today some of the Partridge Family cast reunited on the Today Morning Show.

This got me to reflect on the programs and I recall that the Partridges lost their father to death, although I'm not sure the details were ever related - just a kind of hazy hint that was the reason why this family was out singing songs to earn a living - the dad had died. The same kind of haziness was in The Brady Bunch. This was a blended family because the prior spouses had died. But again, no details, nothing specific and in all the following shows, nothing mentioned about these characters previous lives.

Now I know that this was a convenient plot line for Hollywood to launch off these programs. Back then divorce was still rather unacceptable. I remember when a couple of women in our subdivision got divorced and moved in together. People used to drive by their house to point and stare. Looking back, what pioneers these poor 1970s housewives became, paving the way for less stigma toward divorced woman forced to start wearing pants and work outside the home. (Girls were not even allowed to wear pants to school in our town until 1974 unless it was terribly cold and snowy!)

So these shows were created from a situation involving the deaths of parents and spouses because that was easier than having the characters be divorced. Convenient but sad. I think that even as a kid I had some interest in the Partridge's old life. What did the dad do? How did he die? Maybe back then such a show could never be envisioned. Maybe it still can't be. Almost 40 years have passed and we still don't feel comfortable talking about or even acknowledging death beyond a nod.

What I find even more extraordinary is that as the feminism movement really started to swell and women were becoming more independent, Hollywood could not portray a widowed mother surviving on her own. They had to add a creepy band manager to the cast to be around for Shirley Partridge to lean on.

Today I propose a new and updated Partridge Family. Based on my own experiences I can provide the pilot story line and even some additional plots for future episodes.

Keith Partridge returns to his childhood home with his five children, all of whom are the same ages as when the original series aired. He has lost his wife to breast cancer (we'll be specific here and not leave the audience guessing). Keith is a physical and emotional mess, overcome with grief. He needs the help of his mother to care for the kids. We see him hiding bottles of Vodka around the house and he starts smoking again. There are days he is incapable of getting up out of bed.

The two older kids in high school start acting out, fighting and skipping school because they didn't want to move from their hometown to live with their grandmother. The younger kids are all experiencing nightmares and miss their mother terribly. In one episode the police have to be called because a fight breaks out between a drunken Keith and the two teens. In another episode, Shirley goes to the younger kids' school to meet with teachers and staff. We can go two ways here - either have grandmother be sympathetic or not able to handle her son's grief - the "get over it" mentality which causes friction between mother and son.

As the shows continue, Kelsey Grammer will join the cast as the family therapist. Each week's episode will open with a counseling session involving some conflict or issue involving the family which will be elaborated on during the hour (too much stuff going on for a 30-minute show). At the end of each episode, the family will meet with Kelsey and discuss their progress, or lack of progress if we want to be honest.

I see a lot of potential for this Partridge Family Reunion. But hey, there would have been a lot of potential 36 years ago if someone had written a Brady Bunch episode where the Brady boys and Brady girls each end up in a showdown between the parents, shouting "You can't tell me what to do because you're not my real mom/dad!" And then when the parents respond,"But your parents are dead and now we all have to get along and move forward," the kids all break down, unleashing all the emotions they've had to hide. Alice will come in with cookies and lemonade and lead the family in an impromptu healing session where order will be restored without missing a beat. See, it could have been done, even in that wimpy example. Even some acknowledgment would have been better than nothing.

I am grateful:

1. For blasts from the past that allow me to remember my wacky 1970s.
2. That next month is April.
3. For the Easter wreath I saw on a house today, the first one of the season.
4. For the promise of spring.
5. That short, shag haircuts for women have never come back in style.