So, Hope and I are in Montreal, Quebec for a few days on spring break.  I had several revelations that I figured I better chronicle before I keeled over from a new level of exhaustion.

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I think I’m becoming my mother.  OMG, on the escalator yesterday morning I realized that some of my reactions over the last 24 hours resemble things my mom would say/do/feel or some such thing.

So, this trip would appear to be thrown together despite planning it for more than a month.  I *thought* I booked a trip to Quebec City and only 4 days ago realized that I had booked a trip to Montreal.  So much for the haphazard loose itinerary I had put together.  I have been so busy the last few weeks that I hadn’t paid close enough attention.  Additionally I didn’t put my whole name on my plane ticket and had to spend nearly 2 hours on the phone getting it straightened out (always get travel insurance).

Anyways, I was anxious and fretful and spastic about taking care of EVERYTHING necessary to get us out the door, on a plane and through immigration.  Somewhere along the way, it dawned on me that I am fully aware of moments when my mom seemed to feel that way when we were traveling as kids.  Further I remember my grandmother being anxious and fretful when I was a kid as well.

I am becoming them.  I love them both madly, but hmmmm.  Am I really going to have to carry these anxiety meds around in my purse forever?  And more importantly, should I just put a few of them in some foil, old school style???  #nopillboxes #nervepills #justneedstartlightmintsontheside

Is it bad to be happy that Hope might not assume these behavioral traits because of our lack of biological ties??  Maybe these traits are hereditary and not just learned behavior? Does she stand a change of sliding into middle age not being anxious? Maybe?

Just going to let that marinate for a while.

Vacations with kids are some BS. I am exhausted.  Exhausted like when I first went back to grad school at 37ish.  I just always was tired.  The last month of work has been draining.  So I was looking forward to my vacation until a few days ago I realized that I was not going to be getting any rest on this trip.

I still have to do Hope’s hair. I am her personal, walking Google with all of the GD questions she asks.  I swear the questions alone stump me–seriously, the stuff she asks is so effing random and then she gets offended when I tell her to go look it up.  Yeah, I know it’s sweet that she asks and apparently thinks I’m all knowing, but this is supposed to be my vacation! #nomorequestions #nomoretalking #shhhhhhhhh

I just want throw a bit of cash to her and run from this hotel room for like 12 3 hours.  I don’t even want to sightsee; I just want to check in two doors down the hall and take a much needed nap.

When people don’t take time to breathe, they are mean.  I have never asked someone to move on a plane; I never needed to before yesterday. Somehow the airline put Hope and I on the same row but window seats on opposite ends.  I asked the lady next to Hope would she mind taking my window seat so I could sit next to Hope.  She rudely said NO and went on to say she hates window seats and she wasn’t giving up her aisle seat.  I was stunned but just smiled and told Hope it was a short flight and we would be ok.

I took my seat, twiddled my thumbs and sighed.

Then as we rolled down the runway, the tears started.

Hope didn’t cry.  I did.

I cried.  I did it silently while I leaned forward and watched to make sure Hope was ok.

I got out my hanky and mopped my slow, silent tears.

Despite wanting a respite; I didn’t want to be separated  from Hope. And I was desperate about that ish.

I tried not to make a big deal, but I was soooo sad.

After we took off and leveled off, the woman breathed, softened and gave up her seat so I could sit near Hope.

Seriously, I was singing “And I will always love you,” Whitney Houston-style like I hadn’t seen my kid in weeks. I think everyone around us appreciated the need to just take a moment before we react to things. It was a good lesson for me too to try to just practice kindness more and to remember just how much I love my daughter.

The world is a better place because of jacuzzi tubs.  We are staying in a very nice hotel.  As one of my good pals would say, “FANCY!”  Hope just can’t stop saying how much she loves our room.

Lawd, I’m raising her to be so bougie!

Anyhoo, the room has a jacuzzi tub.

Hallelujah.

Now I don’t know about you or what you believe, but listen, the Holy Homeboy is alright with me.  Jumping Jehovah. when I opened the bathroom door and saw the tub I silently said, “Praise Him!”

Yasssssss!

So last night I loaded that puppy up and soaked in the hot water.

Ahhhh.

I’d put something on Netflix for Hope to watch (never travel without an HDMI cord!) since despite telling everyone that she speaks French she is frustrated that nearly everything here is IN French including local TV.  I digress, she was set up with something to keep her occupied and I soaked until my toes pruned.  i also contorted myself so that every achy joint got dedicated jet time.

What a delightfully, decadent thing to do, and I so enjoyed it!  It almost makes up for my fatigue. Almost.

Thirteen is such a hard age. Ok, so Hope is a teenager, but 13 is like make-believe teenager.  She still can be entertained for hours and hours watching Nickelodeon and Disney.  Despite being shuttled around so much and having been exposed to so much in her short life, she is blissfully naive about so very much.

Hope is still very much a little kid trying to blossom into a young woman.

I’m aware that our adoption has given her the freedom to settle back into childlike moments that she missed.  We’ve done an enormous amount of kiddie do-overs in the last year trying to create childhood memories that she can better use to scaffold teen stuff on to.

I’m not that much of a fan of Iyanla Vanzant, but I remember years ago seeing her on Oprah talking about how you can skip any developmental phases; you just get stuck.  You keep doing stuff, but you do it from the mindset/framework of that phase.

So, Hope and I have been working on nudging her development along so she can catch up, yet she’s still a “young” 13.  In some ways it’s charming; in others it feels really, really hard.

Add to that the fact that Hope’s body looks like a 16-17 year old—tall and developed–and it’s hard to remember and sit with the fact that she’s 13 sometimes. I know I’m guilty of unrealistic expectations sometimes, and that does neither of us any favors.

I find myself periodically having to stop and think that if it is hard for me to deal with her at 13; what must it be like to be her at 13.  I am clear that you couldn’t pay me to go back to middle school; those years are awful and I swear I want to go up to her school and take some kids over my knee on the regular. #badarses

In short, this in between phase of not a little kid and not a full on teen is some BS.  Necessary evil and all that, but it sucks.

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Today Hope and I will do some more wandering of the city.  I’m trying to decide if we will go to Quebec City tomorrow.  There’s really more than enough to do here in Montreal.  The way she’s still throwing up zzzz’s at 8:07am lets me know she’s still sleepy, so I’m going to hit the gym and contemplate my need to…ugh…change my eating habits.  #40sarehardtoo

So, after the epic showdown from New Year’s Day I swore I wouldn’t read another dang parenting book this year.

Nope.  Nope. Nope.

The last parenting book–which I refuse to name here–at least helped me figure out where a couple of my non-negotiables are. ( A clean room is a non-negotiable at Casa d’ABM.)  But beyond that, that book was a set up for failure and fail I did.

So no more parenting books for a minute.

So, recently I turned to podcasts on parenting.  Hey, I do a podcast with Complicated Melodi’s Mimi every two weeks (Add Water and Stir — #shamelessplug for tonight’s episode!), and Mimi often mentions her love of podcasts during her daily commute.  So, I figured why not; it seemed a bit more passive than the whole book thing.

So, as luck would have it, @MomCasts starting following me on Twitter. I clicked follow, downloaded a new podcast app and started searching for something to listen to.  I chose a couple of podcasts for subscription and started listening this morning.

For reals, I’m going to quit taking in information at all at this rate. So in my feels…sigh.

So I tuned into Power Your Parenting this morning…episode 008 to be exact.  I listened to a snippets of others before settling into this one. The episode is about hormones.  (In defense of the podcast, it was really interesting.  I will keep listening)

Oh yeah, I was all settled to into hear about Hope’s brain chemistry and how that has made my kid bat schnit cray.

Whomp! Whomp!

The episode is about how mom’s are often experiencing perimenopause as their daughters slide into adolescence.

Peri-who?  Pause-what?

Ahhh hells naw.

By the time I got to my office parking garage,I was coming undone.  I started to think about our last podcast, during which Mimi raised the issue of Advanced Maternal Age, at which I sniffed my “all kinds of in denial” nose.

So this morning, I couldn’t help having the following revelations:

1. There is a deep part of me that still mourns not having biological children.  Man, it’s deep and this perimenopause thing got right up in that space, quick. It’s funny, because I don’t even think I would ever want to try to have a child at this point, but the notion that the choice to do so is clearly, unequivocally slipping away is hard to swallow. Jeesch this cuts right to the core of my womanhood, and I did not take that ish well at all.
2. We might turn into WWE at Casa d’ABM.  Hope and I have serious tempers, and the few times it’s really, really, really gone down between us it’s like we are spitting hot grease in hell.  It is sooo not pretty. You mean to tell me that it’s not just my temper, but hormonally I can’t keep my ish together?  Oh, sweet hey-zeus…I cannot. Oh we work on lots of strategies for positive conflict resolution and anger management, but it’s almost like a valve has to be released ever so often.  #messy
3. I started really thinking about my own mortality and being….old.  Ugh.  Now, I usually tell folks that I like being my age because the alternative of being my age is to not exist.  I am usually unbothered by the notion of growing older.  I gave up dying my hair; Elihu affectionately calls me his silver fox.  I think myself still pretty hip and fly.  And even though I intellectually know that I’m getting older and that perimenopause isn’t that big of a deal, um, well, it kinda is.  Me no likey.

So this knowledge is something else for me to consider and ruminate on as I try to figure out how to navigate this teen thing. It’s easy to think that problems are extrinsic and need external solutions.  I guess I need to look even more inward…of course I think I’ll be doing that on the homeopathic remedy aisle of the local Whole Paycheck.

Thursday @9:30pm EST!

On the next episode of Add Water and Stir, Mimi and ABM chat about parenting topics in the news.  Adoption related topics like the disparity in family leave availability and the intersection of same-sex marriage and the adoptee’s amended birth certificate are hot topics.  Parenting style choices are also up for debate in the news:  Parents in a suburb of DC are in the news because of their choice to practice “free range parenting.”  On Thursday night, the Add Water hosts will dish on all latest parenting debates.

Of course we’ll chat and chew Being Mary Jane, Empire and maybe a dash of Scandal during The Wine Down!

So pour yourself a little something to sip, and join us live at 9:30pm EST/8:30pm CST on Google+ or later on YouTube, Stitcher and Itunes!