CLARAFIED BUTTER

As I ponder over these past few weeks of motherhood, since both babies have been in school I can't help but feel so many things. It's weird not being with them all day every day. I enjoy the 'freedom' or lack thereof, since all my thoughts are with them, wondering if they ate breakfast, will they eat their lunch, what are they retaining, are they behaving. What will their teacher notice that I didn't about their appearance, before sending them to school. These things and more consume my mind in those hours they are out of my sight. With my daughter in particular it's been challenging. Sometimes she's so much like me it's scary other times I find myself looking at her wondering, 'who is this child?' She's starting to have these moments of distress. I think they are more significant than tantrums. They can last anywhere from five to thirty minutes. In those minutes she is incomprehensible and inconsolable. She is usually screaming and crying,...

"It's been too hard living but I'm afraid to die, cause I don't know what's up there beyond the sky." (c) Sam Cooke  Earlier this month, marked four years since my Mama passed. Her funeral was held on this very day in 2013. It's been a tough four years, adjusting to her physical absence. That change has been the hardest to accept, but it's the little things that get me through it. Like how my heart still skips a beat whenever I see her car on the road, a 2002 silver Subaru Forester. Or whenever I hear 'Teddy's Jam' on the radio in the car while I'm driving, some of the best car dancing moments I can recall because of that song. I know if I can adapt to this change, nothing else is insurmountable. But recently the changes have just been coming so fast, it's almost hard to catch my breath! My first baby, my cousin Chip went away to school in Arizona a few weeks ago. He was the first person I saw grow and develop before my eyes, ...

I'm not sleeping well tonight. I am worried about my son. In the dream that woke me up, I'm in the back seat of the car, my uncle Darryl is driving and my aunt LaJuanda is sitting beside him. I was telling them about the stories Ma would regale me with starring my uncle Darryl as the smart little kid she adored. As I was finishing up, we parked next to a preschool. The children were lined up on the stairs. I notice my son is one of the kids. I observe that he is well-behaved and following directions, just like the other kids. His teachers call him down out of line and he comes down smiling, though he hasn't spotted me yet. He stops at the first teacher and shares his snack with her. Then he goes to the next teacher, and does the same. That teacher brings him to me, he offers me a square of his Chex mix, I accept and it was like suddenly, I was watching a play. The two teachers Izzy had greeted, were sitting at a picnic table directly in front of us. They were saying to eac...

Disclaimer: This is the most difficult post I have written. Revealing details about my Mama's death will be disclosed. Also I am not a professional therapist or counselor, anything remotely close to a helpful fact is just my opinion. August 10, 2013 the world stopped. At least it felt like it did. One moment I was fussing at my Mama. With her fading breath, she was professing her love to me and I wouldn't accept it as our finale. I actually said to her, "Shut up, I know that already, I love you too." Those were not what I thought my last words to her would be. I told her to fight to stay here, fight to be with me. And the next moment the medical staff was telling me she had passed. She fought as best she could to stay. But, I fought her passing by giving up. I wanted to be with her, the way we had always been. But I had yet to accept things were different.  The first four years, since her death, I have focused on the physical adjustment to my loss, like not get...

Mama and I were avid Gilmore Girls fanatics. The show was about the close relationship between a single mother and her daughter. To this day I don't know her true reasons for loving the show but I can guess she saw similarities in our relationship. My reasons for liking it were simple:  I liked the theme song and Ma really liked it. Any reason for us to have a weekly topic of discussion, I could never resist. Ma and I talked all the time, mostly about our day and current events but on Gilmore Girls days, I got to hear her speak enthusiastically about a show she loved. She loved it so much that we couldn't even be on the phone together while it was on television, she didn't want to be 'distracted' and potentially miss anything. We would speak before and after the show. Some of my fondest memories are of us singing the theme song together. We would belt it out to each other whenever we got the chance. "Where you lead, I will follow Any and everywhere that ...

Life for me has always been about addition. Being open, adding more and appreciating all the blessings that are introduced to me. From adding siblings to adding aunties, adding cousins, adding friends and eventually adding a husband. I love addition so much the only choice that made sense for me when I got married was adding his last name to mine, Brewer-Craig. When you get married the inevitable question you dread to hear as a couple is, 'When are you going to have a new addition?'. Apparently, I married a man who likes to add too, since  India Ellise was born a few weeks before our first anniversary. Israel Zion aka Izzy followed three years later, during a time of transition and grief. When he appeared in May I was deeply in mourning over my Mom. Most of that time I was focused on making it through the day, each 24 hour period had it's own challenges but focusing on India and Izzy got me through. Regretfully, to this day Izzy's milestones and accomplishments hav...

Much has been brought to my attention in the weeks since my last post. Mainly pertaining to the depressive tone my posts continue to take, even months into starting this blog. After some pause, an impromptu 'therapy' session with a close family member, and some much needed introspection I believe I see my reality a bit clearer. Yes grieving sucks! The process is draining and ongoing, but over time life should regain some semblance of normality. For me it was being able to notice the little things that my kids like to do. Both my daughter and son like to play with my arm fat! My daughter has an obsession with my breasts and upper arms. Some say it is because I breast fed her too long (23 months exactly), which I know to be bull because there is no such thing! But even when I'm sleep and she wakes before me, the first thing she goes for is my arm fat. She obsessively likes rubbing it like it's a lucky rabbit's foot or the Genie's lamp from Aladdin. The irony is...