THE AWKWARD MOM

because uncomfortable conversations are the ones worth having

Tag: anxiety (page 2 of 2)

Freebie Fridays [INFOGRAPHIC]: Helping Kids Deal with Their Fears

April 6, 2018 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: 2 minutes

We were on our way to the local aquatic center with friends in my trusty, dented little Subaru. We passed a few yard signs for our small town’s upcoming election. I was listening to my 10-year-old chat with her friends about how excited they were about summer’s approach. Of course, right? But get this. “Yeah, I can’t wait for summer, with all this election stuff and the school shootings.”

Well. Is that how you know that your daughter is growing up in a different world?

I eventually talked with her about the local election: That despite she and her siblings’ wide-eyed ingestion of the scrolling newsfeed in 2016, elections are not usually scary things in our country. (This was less so in Africa, where she grew up, so I get that, too.) read more

Guest Post: When Parenting Means…Fear

July 18, 2017 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: < 1 minute

I didn’t know what a turquoise-painted pumpkin was—until my nephew, the one with the chocolatey eyes and the wide grin, was allergic to peanuts. Now I know that a teal pumpkin outside a house on Halloween means they have non-food treats for kids with food allergies. When I was a young youth intern, it felt extreme of one mom to walk through the mission-trip bus and ask all the kids to surrender snacks with peanuts. Now, having known at least three moms who grappled with this life-or-death allergy on a daily basis—I get it.

My sister-in-law have had some heart-rending conversations over the last year about the fear she deals with around this allergy—which could take her son in ten minutes’ time. One wrong snack, one EpiPen too far away.

But my heart balled up with a single text last week from the same sister-in-law: Her daughter, who’s not yet one, had an anaphylactic reaction. …To eggs. read more

A Mountain of [Surprising] Reasons to Get Our Kids Outdoors this Summer (…and Maybe Follow Them)

June 30, 2017 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: 5 minutes

In all honesty, with my house still lined with cardboard moving boxes, camping was not at the top of my priority. When my dad burst into a rendition of a song entitled (I kid you not) “We’re Going Camping Now!”, I admit to replying with a chipper, “Whether we like it or not!” I could barely find underwear for everyone. I’d been in some form of transitional housing for the last year. Let’s go sleep in a tent without a shower!

But as we wove through the mountains, I had to admit that maybe it was good this was blacked out on the calendar. How long had it been since I’d been able to tell everyday life “Stop. For right now, just stop”?

My sheepishness reached its hilt the next day when my kids’ skin was glittering and shivering as they picked their way through the river, counting rainbow trout and daring each other to duck beneath the current. Their courage and confidence mounted before my eyes. The spikes of pine behind them were stunning; the rock formations solid and timeless.

Worry: It’s What’s Eating You

April 18, 2017 / / 2 Comments
Reading Time: 3 minutes

A question. What are you…afraid of?

Fear has this way of flaying us open, I think. Of laying bare what we see as bigger than us.

Worry manifests itself in vastly different ways. Some of us, for example, seek to staunch this bleeding of our hearts with intense control or safety. That is to alternatively say, some of us who struggle most with control actually are waging an inner battle with fear. As counselor and neuropsychologist Ed Welch writes, “One message is obvious: ‘If I imagine the worst, I will be prepared for it.’ Worry is looking for control….Worry has become your talisman to ward off future catastrophe.”

Under pressure: Militant mommy convictions vs. authentic friendship

September 12, 2016 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: 4 minutes

Okay, moms: Who’s the best mom you know? And what makes her, y’know, stellar?

I wonder what the highest standard for motherhood is in your group of friends. Is it clear where you should be sending your kids to school, or what educational concepts they should have mastered? Whether you should vaccinate? Whether you use essential oils or antibiotics? Which programs your kids are enrolled in, how your daughter’s room is decorated, or what cute ideas you found on Pinterest for her birthday party?

I’ve only been back in the States for a month, so maybe I’m picking up on the wrong vibes. But—I am picking up on some significant pressure that we both give and receive from each other as mommas. Maybe you’re insecure like I was as a young mom, and sometimes still am. So much is imploding in front of you, despite your utter exhaustion. I admit to a wee bit of wicked consolation when another friend has a pile of dirty dishes that’s kind of erupted all over the rest of the kitchen, or when her kid also has a head-turning meltdown in the housewares aisle.

Friday quotables #4/Freebie Fridays: FREE printable chalkboard art!

July 1, 2016 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: < 1 minute

Philippians 4 6-7 chalkboard-page-001

I wish that writing about my anxiety actually meant I didn’t wrestle with it anymore… I find the need to meditate on the words you, too seemed to resonate with in The Scribbled Heart: Fear-parenting vs. Faith-parenting.

So today’s quotable is from The Message–with a free chalkboard printable of these sweet words about worry: Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns…It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life. (Philippians 4:6-7)

The Scribbled Heart: Fear-parenting vs. Faith-parenting

June 15, 2016 / / 0 Comments
Reading Time: 4 minutes

Around the world, so many of us are grieving this senseless tragedy in Orlando, trying to make evil fit into a narrative that would make sense. Beginning on Monday morning, I’ve felt myself pushing against that gray, shapeless mass that is anxiety–for a number of personal reasons, not the least of which are these heart-rending events in my home country. Though I don’t feel my voice would add something unique to the reaction, after talking with our kids on Monday evening and praying together as a family, I found my friend Kristen’s post, Dear Kids: It’s a Sad Day in America, to be a good word.

My anxiety doesn’t compare to what many are mourning right now, and I continue to pray for Orlando families and churches. But perhaps you can identify with some of these thoughts as we confront fears of all dimensions.  -Janel

Parenting is…overwhelming sometimes pretty much all the time. Last night I recognized a sensation creeping over me with shadowy fingers, as my thoughts slammed into my kids’ schooling and implementing solutions for my son’s ADHD and appalling, heart-rending current events: anxiety. If I were to have drawn my heart, it may have looked like this:

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