A Sense of Humor

Haha. Did I say "return to health"? Haha. That's a good one!

Okay, Naomi came down with an ear infection this week that meant that she had to have antibiotics. And she hates getting them. And she had several 20-minute screaming episodes that scared the dickens out of her mom. This is all besides the temperature of 104.6 that got the whole thing started. Okay, enough details. It's been a rough week.

But strangely enough, either I'm getting worn down or I'm learning something, because I handled everything much better this week -- especially towards the end of the week, when I'd gotten some practice with the screaming episodes. I even was caught up on the laundry by Thursday afternoon, switched from winter to summer clothes for the girls and I, and made a trip to the store to get a few summer essentials for Hannah, who doesn't have hand-me-downs to grow into.

So thank God for adversity, I suppose, since it's the only way to learn to deal with adversity. And I did better. Not a perfect job, of course -- far from that. But I remembered to pray, and I rested, and I enjoyed the little things.

I took the girls to a new park yesterday and helped Naomi slide down the slide over and over as she giggled aloud. I watched Hannah as she climbed and balanced and jumped and played. I remembered to bring a snack. It was fun.

Naomi is much better, and I'm very grateful for that. And we're not doing the planned activity with several other families this afternoon, since two of those families have colds. I mean, adversity is one thing, and sheer idiocy is another.

Gratitude

There is really nothing like illness to make me grateful for returned health. And isn't that true in most areas of life? I wonder how much I wander around, unaware of the rich blessings that God is showering upon me. When things get taken away, I miss them, and when they come back, I am very grateful, but I realize that I should try to be grateful more often without having to suffer the loss first.

So I will try for at least a week to come up with something new each day that I'm grateful for -- that hasn't been taken away recently. Something that's a fixed part of my life -- or as fixed as things in a passing world ever are.

For today, I'm grateful for Hannah's swimming lessons. She's got an amazing teacher, she's learning a ton and is not afraid of going under water any more, and she's having a great time. Thank you, God, for Hannah's swimming lessons.

(Incidentally, Naomi is grateful for Hannah's swimming lessons, too...although she would be more grateful for her own swimming lessons! When she turns two...)

Enjoying the little things

This morning I was sitting in the living room with my children, when Hannah decided she had to go potty.

"Mama, please keep an eye on Naomi while I go potty."

"Okay, Hannah."

How sweet.

Holding lightly

Well, what do you get when you have a 13-month-old with a nasty cold and 8 teeth coming in at once? Tired. Also, you get to not speak on the panel discussion because you have some compassion for your husband and a fear of getting a plugged duct, since your baby hasn't been nursing very well these days, either.

So I didn't speak on the panel after all. And I need to remind myself that God is in charge, He certainly knew that I was planning to speak on that panel, etc. There must have been a reason for me to be home instead of speaking.

One reason might be that I got the chance to spend a relatively quiet evening with my husband, doing some meal planning, talking, and enjoying the fact that our little one was sleeping more than 15 or 30 minutes at a time. That was nice.

I am a planner. I like to plan out fun stuff to do, meals, days, weeks, chores, vacations, etc. I don't know why, but it is just fun for me to plan. And I enjoy doing the things I've planned, too, most of the time. Now that I've had a bit of practice with planning things with children, I am much better at not overplanning where the kids are concerned. I planned too much on our trip to Houston and the kids both objected violently -- in their own ways. So I'm learning.

But the thing that's somewhat difficult is to give up the plans. Like the panel. And although I'm even getting better at giving up the plans -- although not terribly great at it yet! -- I still like to plan things. And sometimes even that has to go. My husband, my children, and I all need quiet times when we don't have plans. Not just that we cancel plans, but that we don't have plans. Or have vague plans, like: if it's a nice day, we'll go outside. If not, we'll play indoors.

It is so difficult to hold things lightly, and it seems that, right now at least, it is hardest for me to hold my time lightly, to be ready to give it up to what is necessary, and especially to realize in the first place that it's not really mine at all. And I need to remember that, and not spend it all before I get it.

A well-formed conscience

I'm going to be on a panel discussion next Wednesday about decision-making for Catholics. I have 7 minutes to present on "pro-creation issues" -- most especially contraception -- and then I will take questions. 7 minutes. What to say in 7 minutes.

The tricky part of this discussion is that on most pro-creation issues (sex before marriage, contraception, abortion, IVF), Catholic teaching is quite clear. It's not hard to find the teaching, it's not hard to understand what the Church is saying, and it's not hard to tell whether it applies to your situation. The tricky parts come in once you've accepted the basic teaching and are trying to live it out -- how to date in a secular world with Catholic ideas about these things, how to decide if now is a good time or not to have a baby, etc. However, I think that most people are still at the phase wherein they're trying to decide about whether to follow Church teaching on these issues -- or trying to talk to others about them -- so that's what I'd like to primarily address. And 7 minutes isn't going to be long enough to cover much more.

The beauty of the teaching is what I'd like to get across. I could open up with saying that it's not a terribly moral dilemma because Church teaching is clear, so let's move on to more exciting moral dilemmae, such as how to decide if you should have another baby at this point. But I don't think that will win friends, and I also don't think that it will get at what most people need to hear.

So I'm going to try to come up with a 7-minute talk that doesn't make me sound like too much of a cheerleader but in which Church teaching comes across as the sane and beautiful message that it is. Please pray for me.

The benefits of lack of sleep

This isn't a post you're going to find in a health magazine, because I will freely admit that physical health isn't really one of the benefits of lack of sleep. There you will find out why you must get at least 8 hours a night. Little do the authors know that I would love 8 hours straight of sleep. Given the option, I'd go for 9 or 10, even -- this sounds like a recipe for paradisical living!

However, there are some benefits of lack of sleep that bear mentioning. Especially to those who aren't getting 8 hours straight. The main benefits, should one choose to take advantage of them, are spiritual.

First, one gets the chance to make a large sacrifice for one's family: getting up with the alarm. I believe that there needs to be no more said on that point.

Second, one needs to pray most fervently that today go okay. Because one realizes on this day, even if this has never occured to one before, that one cannot do this alone. Especially since one is not a caffeine drinker and one will be fighting heavy eyelids and slower thinking all day.

Third, one has many occasions for humility throughout the day: one cannot finish housework as one would like; one cannot remember a darn thing that one promised oneself to remember for today; one barks at one's children for minor offences and then realizes that one is completely out -of-line...The list could go on.

Once one has faced the humility lessons for the day, one gets more motivated to practice other virtues: patience, kindness, goodness, self-control, etc, in an effort not to be too overloaded with humility.

So as the day progresses, one is brought to thankfulness for the lack of sleep, as there are so many obvious spiritual blessings emanating from it. But one also prays for better sleep tonight. Because even though God can bring good out of anything, it's not easy to be chronically tired. And one might even remember to get Motrin at the store in an attempt to help the teething baby facilitate one's sleep.

Conformity with the will of God

Michael: It's hard to believe that someday our girls will be teenagers.

Hannah: I'm not going to be a teenager, Dada, I'm going to be whatever God calls me to be.

(Her parents sit quietly, bemused at their sweet daughter.)

Hannah: Maybe a garbage woman. Where do you buy a garbage truck?