Juggling Life

Seeking Recruits for the Menopausal Hen Twitter Army

Life: She is naught but crazy at times.

The Yahoo article led to a TV Interview (hoping for more to come, I am doing a radio show for a station in North Carolina on Tuesday). I am certainly making contacts with some phenomenal journalists who care about telling a story ethically and that is nothing but good. I am hoping that #NEDAW next year will give me a chance to EDucate more people and spread awareness.

San Diego, California News Station - KFMB Channel 8 - cbs8.com 

A hilarious offshoot of all of this was that an insult in a comment on the Yahoo page (can't unsee some of it, though it's since been deleted. I am fairly sure that if what you got from that story is that my daughter and I are both "bang-able," you've been in your parent's basement for too long) has led to my Twitter Army having a name . . .

Introducing: THE MENOPAUSAL HENS TWITTER ARMY (Activism-ing on a Twitter feed near you)!

(I am still tweeting from @jugglingjenn, but I had to change my Twitter handle to Menopausal Hen Jenn 'cause that just has too fun a ring to it to pass up. If you're going to turn 50 anyway, why not embrace it fully?!)

Stay tuned for more craziness!

 

Thanks so much to reader and FB friend, Amy, for this. You know how sometimes you REALLY wish someone lived next door because you would get on together like a house on fire? That's how I feel about her!

Also, the Menopausal Hen Twitter Army takes those men brave enough to Warrior with us--and the first man to sign on the dotted line is the same dad I first met on a plane to Dallas (we were both en route to the F.E.A.S.T. Conference) when he recognized me from my FB profile pic and then graciously let me hitch a ride to the hotel in his rental car. Again, life is deliciously full of kismet and craziness sometimes!

In Which I Shamelessly Use My Impending 50th Birthday to Beg for Something

As you may know, I am in countdown mode to my 50th birthday. T-8 days to be precise. I was pretty angsty about the whole thing for about nine months and then I just sort of realized that it was happening regardless (God willing and the creek don't rise) and the internal whinging was not going to make a damn bit of difference so I ought to just move on. And I did. 

But . . .

50 IS a big birthday and it would be a shame to let it pass without some sort of bloggy celebration; after all I've been doing this since I was but a young woman of 42. (Good. Grief.) 

(Insert smooth transition that is just not happening for me writing-wise right now.)

A pretty amazing thing happened today; this piece was published on Yahoo. If you remember, the beginning of all of this was just last week, so it's been quite a whirlwind. The thing I'm most pleased about is all the new recruits to my long-dreamed of Twitter Army of Eating Disorder Awareness Advocates and Activists. People are beginning to believe!

What does this have to do with my birthday?

This journalist, Beth Greenfield, did a fantastic job with the piece; she asked insightful questions and her story reflects what we talked about--that's not always a given. I would love for her editor to see that a story like this--one that raises awareness and highlights advocacy--can generate traffic. 

To that end . . .

For my birthday, I would like all of you--regular commenters, intermittent readers and lurkers alike--to leave a comment on the Yahoo piece. If you would like to put icing on that birthday cake of mine, you could also retweet me--@jugglingjenn--as I am looking to take this story even further; national coverage would be a dream come true.

To get the message out that eating disorders are deadly diseases with a strong neurobiological component and deserve the evidence-based treatment and insurance coverage that is a given for other medical conditions is what I REALLY want for my birthday. 

Will you help a sister out? 

P.S. YES, you do have to have a Yahoo account to comment. It takes less than 30 seconds to sign up. I love you!

 

 

 

It was 21 years ago today . . .

Danger Boy already opened his Amazon-shipped gifts of a good beard trimmer and a Magic Bullet, so I'm not giving anything away by sharing. When he called to say thanks, he said "Remember how you were always cooking brown rice and broccoli and stuff like that and I hated it?" (Why, yes, I do happen to remember--I used to joke that his preferred meal was a funnel and a bag of sugar.) "That's the kind of food I cook now" (this is his first year with a kitchen). If that's not a sign of adulthood, I don't what what is.

Happy 21st Birthday, Danger Boy . . . life with you has never been dull! Love you much, my Achy Breaky Jakey!

Here's the post I wrote for his 15 birthday--this blog has been a wonderful way to memorialize our lives.

Danger Boy--going straight to the top without bothering with the trail since 1993.

 

 

Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink . . .

I am posting my words all over the place, just not here. 

It's hard out there for a pimp eating disorder activist. Who knew there was so much misinformation out there that I would have to launch a one-woman crusade to personally read and comment on every article linked to every tweet hashtagged #NEDAW (National Eating Disorder Awareness Week)?

The thing that makes it really hard (and slightly less fun) is that I am told that snark is not the most effective method of opening minds. I am having to use wording like "While your intent is good . . . I am concerned with . . ."  rather than phrases that roll more trippingly off my tongue like "Have you actually read a scientific journal published since 1983, fer f**k's sake?!"

It takes energy and restraint, people!

Even with all the tilting at windmills I do, I now have enough free time to exercise every day, cook an ocassional meal for hubs, watch cool stuff on Netflix (House of Cards. Oh. My.) and get to the movies--I actually saw three in the five days before the Academy Awards and ended up seeing all the best picture nominees. Loved them all, but it would have gone to Wolf of Wall Street if it was my choice.

I am relishing catching up with all the friends that were mostly sidelined from my life during The Road to Rosewood mania.

Last Wednesday night, I started back up with my weekly visit to hang and have dinner with my friend, Michele--a former student--and her totes adorbs kidlets.

I have a bil ol' smile on my face for many reasons, not the least because when we set off on a late afternoon hike, the kids didn't for one minute doubt that I was going to the top--and not on any roundabout way either, but straight up after them.

True story: This was formed by a volcano and is pretty much right in Michele's back yard.

When you are 49 years and 345 days old, that's a big compliment. So much so that I'll post that picture even if it does make thoughts of Botox dance in my head. Not really. Maybe a little. (Actually, I think seeing Kim Novak on Oscar night sealed the deal on sticking with the natural aging process--give or take a few facial peels).

Danger Boy turns 21 on Monday. As Mr. Fix-it says, "What the hell?!" and "No way!"

Dr. Who--okay, I am finally in. After Buzzfeed told me I was the strong female heroine River Song, I had to see what that was all about; apparently I am not just starting a series, but embarking on a lifestyle.

Daylight Savings Time starts tomorrow . . . I am thrilled. I will gladly give you that hour of sleep for the chance to walk around the lake after work and still have time to eat dinner on the patio.

Random . . . every now and again it has its appeal; what random things have you been doing?

 

 

Houston, We Have a Problem, Part 2

As we settled in together on Friday, our minds were solely on Jenny, just a few hours away in Houston.   Houston was only 4 hours by car!  Oh how we wanted to finally meet our Jenny in person! Friday night our mission to Houston began! Car rental . . . check!  Directions . . . check. Three road warriors . . .check!   (Due to her responsibilities, Becky couldn't join us). Jenny hasn't a clue we are coming!  Mum's the word!

We got a late start on Saturday morning . . . afternoon rather!  At the helm was our pilot, Alyson, first stop, Starbucks. Supposedly a few blocks from the car rental place, however, all roads do not lead to Starbucks, even when they are supposed to. But Texas gold was calling so Starbucks had to be found. After many U turns and directionally challenged all-seat drivers, voila! We arrived! That only took 15 minutes to find.

Time to get on the road for real  At some point between Dallas and Houston, Denise gets fixated on finding a new tablet for Jenny, hers being broken.  Of course, this had to be found before we got to Jenny.  We also decided on flowers and perhaps a cuddly bear...and how hard can it be to find a Walmart in Texas!?  I mean, we were in Walmart country, by golly! And by golly, we found one!  Right thar off the highway!   Seemed like all of Texas was headed to that same Walmart off the highway, 'cause getting to it wasn't easy!   Traffic lined up, cars mid intersection, left turn lane jammed, Faith insisting we just ride the lane next to it to the front, and sweetly ask to butt in!   Maybe that works in Pennsylvania, but Alyson and Denise weren't about to risk their lives letting me try that act in Texas! (editor's note: Denise is actually ethically and morally opposed this maneuver).  Finally, the Walmart parking lot!   And all that walks in it! Including us.  Who stood out boldly from them!  (I'm sure they felt the same about us!)

We all split up in the store to grab one of our gifts, and converged in electronics to see what tablet Denise found!   I will never truly be able to convey here what that moment was for us, but I will try.  Three of us watching the salesman guy amble over to us, sucking the bits of lunch out of his teeth and eating time on the clock getting to us . . . does he really work here or did he just morph out of Duck Dynasty? Denise is frantically pointing to the exact tablet we want, and the sales man has to convey to us in Texan twang and speed . . ."We ain't got no tablets, we was robbed, took everything outta them shelves (we look down at the locked cabinets to see nada, zilch, zippo) in broad daylight.  Can't sell ya no tablets. Won't have em 'til next week.   Can't sell that display either."  

We're outta there!!   Racing thru Walmart, 'cause by now, it's getting late and we need to reach Jenny!  But NOT without that Tablet, declares Denise!  And when Denise declares . . . well, let's just say we were hell bent to find another Walmart!   Or Staples. Or Target. Or any darn place selling tablets"  And oh . . . we saw them all!  Yes, we found it!  We see it from the highway! There it is, get off here!  Here?  Where? Wait...where'd that exit go?   We discovered that you need to exit in Texas way before you actually SEE your store of choice off the highway! And it was here that we realized....
HOUSTON, we have a problem.

As we exited off yet another random ramp, Denise reached her spiritual breaking point by declaring,"if I see a Walmart or Staples at the end of this ramp, I'm going to believe in God."  Alyson and I were praying like crazy.   Guess it wasn't Denise's time!

Back on the highway, and Faith is ready to ditch the whole tablet thing already!   Let's just get to Jenny! Uh, wait, is that really...could it be?  A Target!!!  Accessible, yay...go,, go, go...poor Alyson was a wreck by this time, in one breath screaming for quiet and in the other, telling us she loved us dearly.  Denise was in hyper-energizer mode (oh, wait...that's her normal mode, so how else could I describe it? You get the picture!) ready to dash into that Target and find her bounty!   No tablets there!  

While Alyson and I turned in circles wondering where Denise disappeared to, Denise calls and tells us she hightailed it first to Radio Shack next door then to Staples across the parking lot!  On foot. We never saw her actually leave Target, she was going so fast!   At least Target has cuddly bears.  One mission accomplished between Dallas and Houston!  And Pizza! A and I, well, that Pizza Hut pizza was too much to turn down.  We needed fuel and I immediately.   Off we ran, pizzas in hand . . . or in my case, in mouth...to Staples to find Denise, praying to God she found that tablet!   And she did!  However, getting a distracted salesman to ring her up was another story.   Time was running out and 4 hours had past!  And we hadn't reached our destination yet!   Finally, Tablet and gifts in hand, we were off!   So close now, arriving in the city and blocks from Jenny . . . GPS is a bit confused and so are we.   This hospital is a mega- structure.  Finding the parking garage was a feat in itself and having to make the turn into it using a lane shared by a train.  well . . . that almost put us all over the edge (editor's note: It was actually Denise, who happens to have personally known someone killed by sitting in a car on train tracks).  Green light couldn't come fast enough!

Houston, we have arrived!

And Jenny, here we come!

We really (and I do mean really as you can tell by my facial expression) just want to get there at this point! Also, there's a tablet in that there purse.

Stop back for the final installment--in which we meet Jenny in person for the very first time.

Meet the PITAs . . . Faith (subtitle: Houston We Have a Problem, Part 1)

My friend, Faith--she hails from Pennsylvania; I swiped this picture from her FB 'cause it's pure Faith! Faith brought acting talent to the PITA Group--which is how we learned Jenny is a talented actress.

I really wanted to edit this post down to blog size, but I couldn't find a single place to cut (except the gratuitous exclamation points; Faith understands that I post multiple exclamation points for no man or woman), so I am posting it in installments.

It all started during a usual PITA Mom FB chat one evening. On which Facebook chat thread I couldn't begin to tell you!  With many going on simultaneously, like MAED moms,Jenny in hospital, bah bah meals, Jenny legal, it's impossible to know which I was in that evening.   Something was mentioned about the FEAST conference, about Becky and Alyson and Denise sharing a room, and an invite to join them in Dallas!   Yeah, right!  Like I could just drop everything, jump on a plane from Philadelphia to Dallas and go to a conference!   Could I?   For a chance to actually meet a few of my fellow PITAs I'd been with on FB every day? Started to sound like something I wanted to make happen!  With a generous scholarship from the conference administration and a credit I could use on Southwwest air, and a hotel room split four ways...heck YES, I'm going to Dallas!

One by one, the four of us arrived, meeting in person for the first time!  We had already shared so many moments together on FB and Skype that sharing a hotel room turned out to be like a girlfriend reunion!  No ice to break, no awkwardness, just four crazy PITAs having a grand time.  Oh, we learned a few things about each other, for sure!  Denise needs ample hair time in the bathroom, and carries an array of combs, brushes, gels and goo to create her sassy doo!  Faith, that's me, can't seem to find anything she just had in her hand, or around her neck!  Where did that name tag go? I KNOW I just had it! (Looks down, in a blonde moment...one of many...and sees it hanging around her neck!)  Alyson, sweet Alyson, likes some quiet and down time....but the chatter in our room rarely stops, and Denise loves to converse at a speed faster than the human ear can detect!  And on many topics at once! How does she do that?   And how can Alyson find the quiet she needs? There are some positives to needing a hearing aid! Becky is our sweet, gentle, love, peace, joy girl.  We learn that zen can also be zany and she fit right in, although zen can only bear one late night of zany!  With many responsibilities at the conference, poor Becky was not going to get the sleep she needed with us in the room; she found a spare bed across the hall!

Tomorrow, we head to Houston!

Denise (aka Jenn @ Juggling Life), Alyson, Faith and Becky. Boy were the snowbirds eager to spend time outside!

 

When One Sprints a Marathon . . .

 

PITA Moms Alyson, Denise (aka Jenn @ Juggling Life) and Cherie

If it could have been arranged, there really should have been a piece of tape for us to break as we walked through the doors of Rosewood Ranch. 

This weekend was about rest and relaxation, but I must confess that by Sunday, the PITAs were back to conferencing and plotting next moves. We've got the fire.

Just so it's on record here, though, NEVER AGAIN will we do what we just did. NEVER AGAIN. What I mean by that is  . . .  NEVER AGAIN.

Once-in-a-lifetimes experiences need to remain just that sometimes.

I love this photo for the "Mission Accomplished" message I see when I look at it. 

(Okay, I also love it because I think my fellow half-centurians and I look pretty darn cute and since we've mostly looked exhausted to the verge of collapse, it's good to know we can rebound!)

Regular life . . . it's pretty sweet. 

Meet the PITAs . . . Jen

I asked my fellow PITAs to contribute written snippets of this incredible, exhausting, magical happening of which I have been part (plus it will help with the book :)). Thank goodness, Mama Jen took me up on it and picked just the right snippet. 

Please leave her some comment love!

Jen: She lives in the U.K., we share a love of shoes and bubbly and a devotion to our children. She's finally going to be in my timezone Sunday when the PITAs do a Sunday Skype-with each other instead of Jenny. Clealy, she's fab.

Moma Jen's contribution for Denise's 'Juggling Life' blog 

It was D-Day. Or maybe I should say R-Day – Recovery Day. But we'd been here before – so many times Jenny had been in medical hospital with the vague 'promise' that she would be transferred direct from there to Rosewood Ranch, the eating disorder treatment center that had been pinpointed as ideal for Jenny's complex needs. So I was trying to tell myself not to get too excited.

But actually, it felt different this time. Far more positive. Firstly, Jenny was in a different medical hospital that actually seemed to care! All the nurses were doting and caring in Memorial Hermann Hospital where Jenny had been for a couple of days. The doctors seemed to not only care far more for Jenny than previous hospitals, but they were keen to learn about how to treat someone with an eating disorder, rather than getting her only just medically stable and then discharging, often late at night.

So here I am, sitting almost five thousand miles away, in a teeny tiny, quiet village in Oxfordshire, UK, alternately huddled over my laptop on my round glass table or pacing around the room, thinking:

“WHAT'S GOING ON?!!!?”

I know that Cherie is on the plane from Florida to Houston. I'm opening up real time views of Cherie's flights to see where she is. Nearly there.

I'm watching all the threads, seeing the discussions, heart in mouth, waiting to see when Cherie arrives at the hospital, and seeing Jenny talking to the rest of us PITA Moms who are all doing the same as me. Watching and waiting, impatiently. Jenny's telling us that she's not stable enough to fly. But we know full well that she's just scared, despite wanting to recover so much. The discussions on all our different threads (they all have names, one quite rude where we can vent!) are chaotic at times and all over the place as we're all chatting to one another, guessing at what will transpire and how. All of us are waiting with baited breath.

Then we see a picture pop up on a thread of Cherie with Jenny! She's there, sitting on Jenny's hospital bed, scooping her up to safety. But I'm still not ready to celebrate quite yet – there's still a flight to Phoenix to go, and then meeting up with Denise and Alyson, aka Thelma and Louise, who were driving from San Diego to Phoenix to meet Cherie and Jenny at the airport. The plan was to then eat out, all together for the first time, and then drive Jenny the 90 minutes to Rosewood.

We see that Cherie is helping Jenny to sort all her stuff out. She has a LOT of stuff! Eventually we hear that they're at Houston airport, on their way to Phoenix. Another photo is posted by Cherie of the two of them on the plane, later followed up with a picture of Jenny sleeping. Bless. One of the mom's – Lisa I believe – commented that that will be a picture to show together with baby pics at her wedding, or some other big celebration that we ALL intend to take part in... :-)

Jenny is not planning on returning home, so she had stuff. Oy, did she have stuff!

More waiting. More chatting. I'm trying to focus on doing things around the house. Write a blog. Prepare dinner. But always with half an eye on the laptop, our chat threads. Our lifeline threads. 

Suddenly there's lots of chat as we see that they've landed, met up with Denise and Alyson and are finally on their way to Rosewood! By now it's around midnight my time and I have to get to bed. So first thing next morning I'm up, logging on quickly to see what's happened and see the chat threads have hundreds of comments on them! 

Part of this extraordinary journey of helping Jenny throughout her illness is the morning ritual, for me, of reading through the threads from the day/night before because of the 6-8 hour time difference. The threads can take an hour or more to read sometimes! Frequently I would have to scan read them – look out for pertinent comments from people and scan over the 'chat' (which can get quite personal and fruity, I can tell you! Well, we're sisters now, what would you expect?!). Certainly this particular morning there was more than enough to read through, but early on I quickly noticed a beautiful picture of Jenny with Cherie, Denise, Alyson and Shannon at Rosewood. She's there! She's safe.

Denise (aka Jenn @ Juggling Life), Alyson, Jenny, Cherie, Shannon

Now we can breathe. Relax, take stock of ourselves, learn to self care again and live our lives. Because this journey has been so all consuming that even our own husbands and partners have been neglected. So now it's time to show them the love they all deserve, and adjust to our 'normal' lives again. But always with Jenny in our minds, just waiting to see her again when she's finished treatment. Or even during, if it's possible, for some of us.

We PITA Moms are sisters now. We will always be there for one another, and, especially, for Jenny.

State of the State

I am starting to come out of the head-down, mission-oriented, adrenaline and righteous indignation-fueled, somewhat necessarily-manic state of being that has characterized the last few months of my life. 

There are still "i"s to be dotted and "t"s to be crossed, so I must keep mum about exactly where we are (advice of counsel and all that biz) with Jenny's situation, but things are positive right now. 

I am delighted to be flying to Dallas on Thursday--my first time in Texas-- for the F.E.A.S.T.  conference. If the hour wasn't so late, I would ask about presenting a breakout session on the use of social media and hope to do so next year.I will be traveling with my good friend Alyson and rooming with two PITAs, one of whom I've not yet met in person. I feel a little bit, "squeee!" about the whole thing. 

The intense work of getting Jenny into treatment and keeping her healthy enough to go is winding down, but the PITA Moms know that our work is just beginning. What we are doing and have done is reproducible and though our entire group is speaking with one voice when we say "never again!" on doing direct meal support AND fighting insurance at the same time. You have my permission to come to my home and slap me if I ever seem to be heading down this road again.

That said, living the wise words of Margaret Mead is not a bad way to approach life. "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."

Social Butterfly got her Escape delivered to her this weekend--life is just so much better with a car to get to the slopes in and wheels to find some babysitting jobs (she's signed up at Care.Com--we've heard good things about it) so if you happen to be in Flagstaff and need a sitter . . . Mr. Fix-it was once again husband/father of the ear as he drove to meet her at the Phoenix airport and they got to visit and have some dinner before he boarded a plane to Salt Lake City and she drove back to NAU.

Grownup Girl and Grownup Guy have moved from thinking about thinking about househunting to thinking about househunting. I'm excited.

I got to induldge my passion for politics and catch up with an old friend this Sunday and that was a good thing indeed. I would love San Diego to go boldly where we've never gone before and elect a homegrown American success story who really reflects our community, David Alvarez.

Sometimes you don't realize how long you've been holding your breath until you come up for air. That said, I wouldn't change a thing about this recent, and magical, experience.

And I can't wait to tell you the whole story. Cannot wait.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Starfish Throwers Wanted

When the PITA moms started (here's some background on my blog and on FB if you need it; Laura Collins, co-author with Charlotte Bevan of Charlotte's Helix fame, of the fabulous eating disorder primer, Throwing Starfish Across the Sea, has some nice things to say about us) we, along with Jenny, always knew it was the beginning of a magical happening destined to help not just Jenny, but others who struggle with eating disorders and woefully inadequate access to services.

As I wrote the above paragraph and was doing the linking, I came across the news that Charlotte is in the last days of her fight against cancer. It seems almost kismet that on this day I should be asking YOU to consider become starfish thrower in Charlotte's mold.

Doing re-feeding and meal support for a person with an eating disorder is a teachable, coachable skill. If you have successfuly re-fed, using FBT/Maudsley methods, you have worked damn hard to aquire that skill. It's like you've been through the SEAL program of parenting. The knowledge and skill you have gained is a gift--a gift that can help save someone's life as surely as donating an organ would.

You know when people say "If my tragedy can help even one other family . . .?" This is a chance to give that help. Or maybe there was a time when you made some promises to God about helping others if you could just get through this. You can keep that promise. Maybe you got great treatment (as was our case) and you feel like you need to pay it forward.

Where am I going with all this flattery and gentle coercion?

The PITA moms need help throwing a starfish. Gretchen is a 21-year old young woman in Canada who struggles with anorexia. Due to an administrative error, a bed that was supposed to open for her at a treatment center in Toronto won't happen until the spring. She is very sick, but also very much wants recovery and has checked herself into a psychiatric hospital. The problem is that this hospital, as is true of most psych hospitals, doesn't know how to handle eating disorders. She's getting worse by the day.

Gretchen's mother, Janet, mother reached out to Lisa, one of the PITA moms, and because we are clearly both passionate, compassionate, and occassionally a wee bit nuts, we almost immediately came up with an idea of how to help.

Provide Skype meal support for her (in the hospital and then at home), using volunteer moms just like us (we'd do it, but Jenny and fighting Amerigroup have us pretty busy right now). The time committment (if we get 12 moms which is our ideal number) would be 30-60 minutes once a day, every other day. Mom Janet will get the food piece into place on-the-ground. Lisa would administrate, organize and train the group (so much easier than you would think thanks to Facebook). We'd love to have moms from around the globe as that helps cover all times without disrupting lives. Our timeline for continuuing this (at home once she is out of hospital) is the two to three months until she gets into a program.

I know this sounds crazy--and it is--but it is also amazing and magical and a gift of love and wouldn't you want someone to help your child like this?

All that is left is to ask you to email if you are interested at [email protected] or friend me on FB (Jennifer Denise Taunton Ouellette) and message me.

Time committment: 1 hour every other day for a few months . . . Reward? Helping save a life . . . Value? Priceless.

 

P.S. If your excuse is you don't Skype, neither did I! If it's because you don't use FB, that's easy to solve! If it's because you're worried you will fall in love with Gretchen as we did Jenny, I say, it's worth it!

 

 P.P.S. A commenter asked me to explain refeeding and this was my response: 

Thank you for your interest. Refeeding is using meal support that enables/requires (with gentleness, patience and compassion) a sufferer to begin eating again and to start to regain weight. Because an eating disorder is somewhat like a psychosis in that an internal voice or thoughts are actively discouraging eating. having an outside force prepare the meals (so essential fats and calories that would be impossible the eating disordered person to prepare are on board) and then support the person through eating the meal  relieves the guilt that prevents them from feeding themselves. It works!