Lizards are part of good family life, would you say?
And it’s that time of year again.
- Summertime;
- Fireworks;
- Gardening;
- Beaches;
- Road trips;
- Summer camp; and
- Lizard babysitting
Yes, that’s right…lizard babysitting. Spending some quality time with my son’s lizards is one of the things that summer means to me.
You see, my kids have gone to overnight camp about 5 hours away since 4th grade. The two week session became a four week session, and the finally, camp for the whole summer.
My youngest son (who is 16 yrs old) has two Crested Geckos as pets. They are in his room. These two lizards, Daphne and Rocky, become my responsibility for eight weeks in the summer. Yay.
Oh sorry, YAY!
It’s not a super onerous responsibility, but…it means that I get to mist them with water, turn off and on the tank light, and of course, mix up the mushy food every day.
Rocky is a calm, creamy colored little guy. Daphne is darker in color and not calm at all…you have to make sure she’s not near the door when you put the food in. She freaks me out a little bit. You don’t want her to jump out because she could get hurt and drop her tail. That would freak me out a lot.
The last time we had a lizard drop its tail was also when the kids went to camp.
We were packing up the house to move and were thrilled to have the kids gone for a few weeks so we could get more work done. We had House Geckos at that time.
How did you come to have House Geckos, you might be asking? Well, we unintentionally brought one back with us after a trip to Florida. And who knew House Geckos can reproduce without a mate? Parthenogenesis is just so fascinating! Anyway, one of the five geckos got out and dropped its tail with all of the stress of us trying to catch it (and not leave it in the house for the new owners to find – the tail or the lizard without his tail).
What do good parents do with a tail and a lizard body that aren’t attached?
Keep it in the freezer to show your kids when they come home from camp of course!The five House Geckos lived for nine years, way longer than expected. They all finally died last year. Babysitting two lizards is way easier than seven.
So you see, I’ve been on lizard babysitting duty for a decade.
Why am I telling you all of this in a blog about life coaching?
As a midlife coach, my practice is all about helping older and wiser women rock at doing their midlife thing. I’m not advocating extreme lizard love is necessary to be happy at 50. But for me, babysitting lizards is all about my kids’ gradually transitioning into more independence. And that is a key part of midlife for moms.
How do we react to kids having and wanting more independence? It really depends on what we think about it. Their age is a fact. It’s our thoughts about that fact that create the drama in our minds. And these thoughts lead directly to feelings.
Some of my clients are more ready for the natural transition than others.
Does wanting more independence mean that they need us less? And is needing us less a good thing or a bad thing? What does all of this mean for us, the parents of older children?
I can help you sort all of this out…the good, the bad and the ugly. Check out my FREE download with the top tips to help you regret-proof your life! www.suzyrosenstein.com/dreamigniter.
