Beautiful custom art from KR Custom Art. This was based on our chRISTMAS as card photo this year!

Hi, My name is Katie and I’m a worrier. My favorite things to worry about are things I cannot control, like time. I’ve been like this as long as I can remember. Tests, trips, life changes, really anything that throws a wrench in my routine fills me with worry. I’m not a doomsday worrier - I’m not hoarding food for the end of the world or building a bunker to hide from zombies. I’m more of a, “oh gosh this big new thing that will cause change is coming up and how is it going to be and what will I do and how will I react and am I prepared and do I know enough?” sort of worrier.

You know what fretting about change and time does to you once you become a parent? It compounds it by one hundred million bajillion (those are scientific numbers based on a personal study of one). Think about it - the whole parenting experience is a ride of wanting and worry. Trying to conceive, being pregnant, having a newborn, negotiating with a toddler, and raising children into respectable, self sufficient human beings is…ALOT. For me personally, I tend to bounce between a looping track in my head that wonders if I’m doing any of it right, with interjections of pure ache that my kids are changing just as I got comfortable in their stage. It’s a real mind F, isn’t it - parenting? Just as you finally feel confident, they go and grow and make you hit play on the worry track once again.

For the past 15 years or so, I have been a next-stage kind of gal. When I was dating my now husband, all I could focus on was when we would get engaged. When I was engaged all I could focus on was starting our life and having kids. When I had a newborn, all I could think about was the day they would sleep through the night or crawl or walk or eat solids. But now, as I just rounded the corner of my mid thirties, I am becoming a last-stage person. Now all I want is to go backwards. To go back to when I had a toddler and a baby. To go back to when life seemed simpler. Hindsight is always twenty twenty, because when I was in the thick of it I so badly longed for the day when I would have kids in school and could write again. And here I am finally with time to write and I write about how I want to have babies at home. What a kerfuffle I have created in my mind.

Word of The Year

All of this is a very long introduction to my word of the year. Now that it’s February, it felt like I should finally declare my word. Because writing it down makes it real, right? If you’re new, I’ve written about my words of the year previously here and here. I use my word of the year to remind me of my intention and overarching goal for the year. I somehow work in into passwords I use frequently, tape the definition to my bathroom mirror, and sometimes even put the word on a bracelet.

As I feel all of the aforementioned feelings of worry and wanting for time to slow down, I was trying to find a word that was the antithesis of worry. My therapist* reminds me a lot when I get into these worry spirals about the future to just, “be where my feet are,” meaning just stay present. I literally stop and press each of my toes into the floor as a physical way to re-root to the moment. I nearly settled on gratitude for my word because another technique I’ve learned from therapy is to stop the train of thought at the positive. Rather than thinking, “Oh wow, this moment with my kids is so special, but oh no they are growing and it won’t be this way again,” I just stop the thought and end it with gratitude. Instead I think, “oh wow this time with my kids is so special. I am so thankful for this moment.”

*A quick note on therapy: I started therapy again (did it a bit in my early twenties) a year ago and it has made such an impact on my life. You don’t have to be in deep despair to benefit from therapy. I am a firm believer that it could improve every single person’s life as a way to enhance the positives and better understand the negatives of our personalities and tendencies.

“Gratitude”. Felt like a real winner of a word. I even had this bracelet made after this kind company contacted me (go check out their stuff! Beautiful pieces. Make great gifts). But I just didn’t feel in my gut that that word was “the one”. I felt like I needed something more visceral. Because the deep sorrow (really that’s how it feels - that my babies are growing and time is moving on and I can’t stop it or change it) is so overpowering at times that I completely miss the moments that I’m worried are fleeting.

“Because the deep sorrow (really that’s how it feels - that my babies are growing and time is moving on and I can’t stop it or change it) is so overpowering at times that I completely miss the moments that I’m worried are fleeting.”

I need to stop and savor these times. I need to throw up a shield at that voice in my head (enneagram 1 here, hi hello from the voice in my head) that tells me all of this good will go away and just SAVOR it all. Our friend Merriam-Webster defines Savor as “to delight in: enjoy” (this of course is after the first definition that relates to tasting food which also feels on brand for me).

I LOVE this article by my pretend fairy godmother, Brené Brown about dress rehearsing tragedy. Which is exactly what I do. She writes, “When we're overwhelmed by love, we feel vulnerable—so we dress-rehearse tragedy.” I don’t really imagine terrible things happening to my kids like she alludes to in the article, but moreover just fret about the fact that they have the be molded and guided to live up to their full potential and that responsibility is mine and each day that they grow, I have less and less time to help and be with them.

So many tools of Brené Brown’s that I’ve learned over the years help stop this fear of the next shoe dropping, the first being “Name It To Tame It”. Just stating that “I feel sad that time is changing the way things are” helps me connect with myself and my husband and pause to relish in these moments of good. Phrases like, “this is so great,” or, “this is everything we prayed for,” or “I’m having real fun!” allow me to savor this season.

My husband and I both are trying harder to start a practice of gratitude. We have had a lot come at us in the past two years, and through the grief our biggest take away is that life is short and every day counts. I received this this Five Year Journal for Christmas. Each evening, we reflect and I write down the good parts of the day. Little things the kids did or said, how I was feeling, even things that do worry me are written out for commemoration. Each page is a day with a spot for five years so over time you can go back and see how your days compare. It’s neat and I hope some day my kids enjoy reading it.

As I write this, my kids are destroying the playroom as snow (ice) falls outside. We are all still in our pajamas and I plan to serve granola bars and apple sauce for lunch. This disorderliness at one time would have driven me mad or made me feel like I wasn’t doing it right, but instead I’m just sitting in it. I’m savoring this season of messy playrooms, packing lunches, and tremendous growth. I am so thankful that each day I fall asleep with the luxury that the life we have is the life I always wanted. Yes, the heartache still looms near - that this season is in fact “the good old days” and it too will sail away soon, but I am choosing to savor it as long as I can.

Cheers to 11 more months of 2022. It’s not too late to pick a word and hone in your desires for the year. If you need help, some of my words from previous years have been “steady” (2021), “cultivate” (2020), “slow” (2019), “presence” (2018), “accept” (2017), “love and hope” (2016), and “new” (2015). Also, click here for a playlist I created that really captivates these times I want to hold so close. It’s called “Core Memories” (if you’ve seen Disney Pixar’s Inside Out you’ll get that reference).