The ups and downs of caring for a sick child can be dizzying. I picked up a paperback recently from Reese Witherspoon's book club - HAPPINESS: A MEMOIR: THE CROOKED LITTLE ROAD TO SEMI-EVER AFTER.
I'm only a few chapters in and frequently have to put down the book to clutch my chest. The relatableness of her experience birthing a baby and suddenly being whisked away in Intensive Care gives me flashbacks.
I've consumed a number of books over the last two years. Mostly audiobooks to pass the time as I rock Maeve to sleep. Here are some of my favorites...
This audiobook had me in stitches. The narrator has an extensive range of British, Irish and Scottish accents. Anything by Neil Gaiman gets my thumbs up.
Another comedic audiobook - who wouldn't want to listen to Trevor Noah's lilting South African accent? I'd listen to this on my walk to yoga and just have a smile stretched on my face the whole time. Trevor also talks about South Africa's rich history most of which was new to me.
I bought the paperback AND audiobook for this novel. Esther has a beautiful french accent which I loved listening to. This book is combination of relationship therapy, sex therapy and everything about practicing effective communication in any relationship. Dana introduced me to Esther after hearing her interview with Tim Ferriss. She also hosts a podcast where she records live therapy sessions - Where Should We Begin. Esther flipped my mindset on modern love, outdated relationship expectation, fantasies and monogamy. I could write a separate blog post just on the things that Esther taught me (and maybe I will next time).
This audiobook I listened with my kids on our drive up to Toronto last summer. We arrived after 4 hours and debated whether to continue driving JUST to see how the chapter ended. TBH, both Dana and I listened to the audiobook when our kids were in bed - we couldn't help it!
I was introduced to Dr. Shefali on Oprah's Super Soul podcast. She approaches parenting from the perspective that your children can be your biggest self development teachers if you let them. By reflecting on your parenting approach, values, decision - you will quickly uncover all these subconscious layers of belief sets you didn't realize you had. Caveat: your discovery will be quick. Then it'll take years to unravel its meaning, decide whether you still believe in those ideals AND THEN figure out how the hell that meshes with your children's completely different value sets. Here's a small example of what Dr. Shefali challenged me with.
Her prompt: What conditions, beliefs & fears do we impose on our children? After some thinking, I jotted down...
While these beliefs are commonplace, what I actually realized was these beliefs stem from fears I held throughout my teenage years. In those days, all I wanted to be was independant, interesting and part of the cool kids. The more difficult follow up question I had to ask myself was what will I do if my children don't have these fears. What if they're totally comfortable being dependant on their support network? Shouldn't I think it's wonderful that they have such high trust and a strong familial base that they don't feel the need to be in control? How can I value their beliefs without superimposing my past fears? Super cool stuff from Dr. Shefali if you ready for deep introspection.