Stop Screaming at the Microwave: How to Connect Your Disconnected Life - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Mary LoVerde, who spreads her message of life balance through connection as a professional speaker, is the president of Life Balance, Inc. Formerly a member of the faculty of the University of Colorado School of Medicine for fifteen years, she lives with her husband and three children in Colorado.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter One: When You Can't Keep Up

Hurried and worried until we are buried, and there's no curtain call, Life is a very funny proposition, after all.

-- George M. Cohan

I got home from work and flopped into my easy chair, totally exhausted. I turned on the answering machine and heard the baby-sitter for my (then) five-year-old son Nicholas. She explained how she had driven him to preschool that morning, walked into the classroom and saw before her nineteen little boys and girls, all sitting in a circle, wiggling with excitement, and...she noticed, each one of them was wearing a Halloween costume.

All of them except Nicholas.

She went on to describe (in brutal detail) how he had burst into tears, clung to her leg, and begged to go home.

OK. So Mother of the Year I wasn't. In fact, I felt like the worst parent on the planet. Despite my best efforts to keep all those plates spinning, I had let one fall. I had humiliated my child in front of his friends. I felt overwhelmed and exhausted, and I vowed then and there I would never let my life get so out of balance again.

But how? I had tried the superperson route and had failed. Yes, there were some days I could pull it off, sometimes even for days in a row. I just couldn't keep it up. I needed something a little more realistic. Surely there was a better way. (There is.)

We're All in the Same Boat

You might see yourself in this story. Whether it is failing to meet the needs of your family or failing to get it all done at work, many of us feel like we are doing just that: failing. No matter how hard we plan or work, it never seems to be enough.

We aren't alone. According to the National Study on the Changing Workforce, Americans are overwhelmed, exhausted, and constantly under stress from trying to accomplish more than we can handle. If you feel that you have too much to do and not enough time to do it, well, you are not imagining it. Actually, you are not in this predicament because you are failing in some way. There really is too much to do. We know we can't keep up. We are going 90 miles an hour and the faster we go, the farther behind we get.

Do you remember the Leave It to Beaver show? To many of us baby boomers who grew up with the show, the Cleavers were the perfect family. Part of our current frustration stems from the fact that we still cling to the "Cleaver ideal." Don't get me wrong: I have a lot of June Cleaver in me. I believe in the values we associate with that model. However, I discovered I was trying to run my life according to Cleaver Principles. I believed things like:

• I can solve all problems in thirty minutes.
  
  
• The division of labor between men and women is equal and agreed upon.
  
  
• I can always "be there."
  
  
• My idea of a juvenile delinquent was Eddie Haskell!
  

We live in a very different world than June and Ward experienced. In America, women now make up more than 50 percent of the workforce. One in two marriages ends in divorce. We have biological, open adoptive, single, joint-custody, step, foster, and surrogate mothers. We have in vitro, latchkey, and boomerang kids. And a dozen flavors of deadbeat, Disneyland, and dedicated dads. The Cleavers we're not. That doesn't mean family life has gone to hell in a handbasket. It means that we can believe in the values of days gone by -- with the understanding that our lives probably won't look like June and Ward's.

We Disconnect in the Name of Balance

I once listened to a man proudly announce that he was "going at breakneck speed to meet his deadline." I had a gut-wretching response to his words. I prayed his body would not obey his vicious command. I started listening carefully to how we describe our lives. I was flabbergasted at the language! Ask someone, "How are you?" and she might respond:

• "I'm hanging in there." Is she saying she needs a lifeline, not a noose?
  
  
• "I'm torn in a million directions." Would she rather be centered in one direction?
  
  
• "I am coming apart at the seams." Does she want her connections intact?
  
  
• "I am pulled in a dozen ways." Could she really be pleading to have her life together in one "peace"?
  

I was astonished to hear how we felt hung, torn, and pulled apart. Such pain! It sounded like I was on the set of the popular nineties television drama ER!

I could hear the cry for unity. We hurt and we attempt to relieve our psychic pain by disconnecting.

We Disconnect from Ourselves

First, we separate from our bodies. This is like ignoring the advice of a loyal devoted friend. Our bodies tell us when things are out of kilter. Initially, it informs us nicely; we get tired, thirsty, hungry, achy, short of breath, forgetful, or irritable -- and our pants get tight. Then, if we take no action, it talks louder and more urgently; we get ulcers, insomnia, headaches, chest pains, rashes, panic attacks -- and our pants get tighter. As a last resort, our bodies make final attempts to get our attention; we get heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, cancer, emphysema -- and our pants no longer fit at all. As the former director of the Hypertension Research Center at the University of Colorado, I saw patients regularly who insisted they had no symptoms before their heart attack, stroke, or bout with gout. In fact, we called hypertension the "silent killer" because people did not know anything was wrong.

How ridiculous! Of course our bodies talk to us -- over and over again. We have taught ourselves to override the early detection system that protects us. We rob ourselves of a healthy diet, adequate exercise, enough sleep, and good medical care because "we don't have time." We ignore our bodies in the name of balance and end up with a butt-related depression. Even our Wonder Bras have a limit to the miracles they can perform. We can't fool Mother Nature.

We Disconnect from Our Families

I will never forget the day I was at the computer, feeling pestered by the kids, when I shouted, "Leave me alone! Can't you see I am writing a book about connection?" Immediately thereafter, I developed a case of guilty writer's block. Who could blame me? Once again, in my zeal to get it all done, I disengaged from who I was and how I wanted to be. And I am not the only one who acts this way. My audience members tell me how they stay up late completing all the chores and end up too tired to hear about the delights of the day. They confess that their conversations deteriorate into "Who's picking up the kids?" "Can you get the shirts from the laundry?" "Your mother called -- again." They describe how they work hard to buy things that will make them look sexy and attractive, and then are too tired for romance. We disengage from what feels good. (And we still don't get it all done.)

We Disconnect from Others

Many of us could sit down right now and make a list of fifteen friends who we genuinely enjoy but haven't contacted in months, maybe even years. When we get overwhelmed we often cut out the very people who could help us the most: the ones who encourage, stimulate, and challenge us; the ones who know us warts and all and like us anyway; and especially those fun, zany friends who always make us laugh. God knows we could all use a good laugh. But we decide we are too busy right now and so we put our noses to the grindstone and try to solve our problems in a vacuum.

We Disconnect with the Big Picture

Feeling this disjointed, we can't find our way in the world. We doubt ourselves and our God. It is unsettling to be so out of touch. We want sublime balance and end up with confusion and uneasiness....