101 Ways to Move Forward After a Midlife Divorce

Sorry I didn't get my blogs done the last two days. On Saturday, my middle son was finishing his family practice residency in Tulsa and we drove to the "graduation" ceremony. It was fantastic as we shared that great, long accomplishment, and there were lots of words of praise for my son! We left after brunch on Sunday, drove 4 hours and I went straight to my oldest son's house to start babysitting their four (wonderful, fun, very active) children. I didn't take a bath or change clothes for two days! I did brush my teeth, but I didn't have a change of clothes with me because I thought I would have a chance to go home before I went to their house. In the two days we had six swim team practices, two baseball practices, two dance classes, four tennis matches and two math camp sessions! Plus the dog escaped twice. I told the kids that I was proud there were no broken bones or black eyes and the dog came back after much bribery and coaxing (but only after she had rolled in some foul-smelling something from a yard down the street!) How do our children do it?!! I was lucky to get three meals on the table at all. I had four children, too and I remember those days of thousands of places to be on my agenda. And I didn't think much about it. But when it was time to go to bed, Monday and Tuesday I was really ready for sleep. On the first morning, the curly headed three year old had had a little accident at about 6:00 a.m.. On the second morning, he called down the steps at 6:15 and asked if it was morning yet. This is the same darling 3-year-old who asked me after I spoke a little loudly and authoritatively to him after a mini-tatrum ... "Are you nice or not?" We all got a good laugh out of that! The last thing I did before coming home was let my 14 year-old granddaughter practice her new driving skills (like-5-times-driving-on-actual-roads new!) She did great, but my foot was tired from all the "breaking" from my side and we only over-judged one turn in into a strip center parking lot and had to go in the out drive. (Luckily no one was coming!) Phew! My daughter brought her little ones (5 & 3) over for lunch yesterday and said, "I'll bet you go home tonight and get a glass of wine and sit out on the deck with your feet up and then she laughed!") I laughed, too, and then thought that she would go home to seeing to her own two non-stop dynamos who also wouldn't slow down until they collapsed into bed. I have a renewed admiration for young parents every time I do this! And I always pray that God will give them an extra measure of strength and endurance for what they do every single day ... and with unbelievable patience and grace and fun!

Okay, back to my relatively quiet, somewhat wonderfully predictable life of R.A.D.I.C.A.L. Women!

Here's your tip #4 for ways to move forward after a midlife divorce:

#4. Find some kids to take care of for a day. Volunteer in the nursery at your place of worship. Take a couple of kids from the neighborhood to a movie or on a field trip of some kind. Being around little ones will give you a fresh, fun, encouraging perspective on life. If you have teenagers, let them help - even though they say they don't want to. Let go of your inhibitions a little! Laugh at dumb things! Listen to a child's way of putting words together. If nothing else, go to a park after work and just watch kids running around. See life from their carefree eyes. At my son's graduation brunch, his five year old daughter thought we were saying egg castle instead of egg casserole (she's very into princesses and castles these days). Children are constantly seeing crazy possibilities and creating wild solutions to problems they encounter. We should be too! Have an energizing (even though maybe exhausting) day!