On jumping into the fray...

So... I have thoughts about stuff.  Perspectives about issues of the day -- personal issues, faith issues, etc. -- that I think some person or other out there might find valuable.  That's why I started this blog to begin with.  But while I have words and sentences and 2/3-of-potential-blog-posts swirling around in my brain constantly, I hardly ever sit down and type them out and I even more rarely push the "publish" button.

Why?

I think there are a few reasons.  #1 -- The difficulty of putting all these swirling thoughts into coherent essays.  It's daunting.  There is always more I wish I had said, or that I had said it differently.  How do I express all of this so that no one will misunderstand?  #2 -- Time.  I am a busy mom with kids who have homework and practices and all sorts of goings-on, just like pretty much everyone else.  And apparently playing Candy Crush on my phone while watching The Voice is a higher-priority use of my post-bedtime hours than putting the work into writing would be.  Because that's mostly what I've been doing lately.

#3 -- (And this is the big one) I hate contention.  I hate "getting into it" with people, especially people that I care about.  Some of the things that I want to write about address topics that people get really heated and just plain mean about.  And I don't want to jump into the fray.

But here's the problem I see with that: there will always be people on both sides of any issue who love to argue and fight and yell and scream about stuff.  And boy, do they make themselves heard.  I think so much of what is broken about our culture and our government and the world in general comes from only the people on the extremes of the divides being willing to make themselves heard.  So the issues become more and more divisive because those are the options we are presented with.  But those of us with perspectives that might help to unify get drowned out, or we never put our thoughts out there in the first place.

I also really don't want to open myself up to the personal attacks that are so easy to attract online.  I've watched my brother Dan of Single Dad Laughing go through a lot of crap as he's become a really big blogger.  No matter what he posts, someone wants to tell him he is the devil incarnate.  He's had to develop a really thick skin when it comes to that.  I don't know if I have it in me.  Not that I have any aspiration to blog at the level he does, but it seems like it doesn't take much to bring out the animosity in people.

Then I saw Malala Yousafzi on the Daily Show -- the 16-year-old girl who was shot in the head by the Taliban for advocating for girls' right to education in Pakistan.  This teenage girl has shown incredible bravery in the face of real attacks, so much more than just the threat of a few mean words on a computer screen.  It made me feel ashamed of myself for being such a coward.  And hopeful that I can follow her example in a small way by being brave enough to share my feelings and perspectives without fear for peoples' animosity.  Here is the full interview -- so completely inspirational:


She combats hatred and fear with love and courage.  I am committing to do the same myself, to try and put a small voice of love out into the sea of craziness in the world, and hope it makes a difference to someone.

I don't expect anyone to read this -- it's been so long since I posted on this blog I doubt anyone is listening -- but really I'm just thinking out loud to myself right now.  And posting it here to make a commitment to myself to start getting the words and thoughts out of my head and out into the world, where someday, something might make a difference to someone.

The End.

One for the moms -- ALL the moms...

I just finished reading the blog post Friendly Fire, by Glennon over at Momastery, and I had to share it here. It's an inspired post about the ongoing conflict about working moms and stay-at-home moms.  My favorite part was this, where she's talking about what our daughters learn by watching all of us women:

"I’d like her to learn that a woman’s value is determined less by her career choices and more by how she treats other women, in particular, women who are different than she is."

Which I think is true for what we teach our children about how they treat everyone.  And that's just one of the great points.  It's not a long post, so take a couple of minutes right now to read it!

It's the thought that counts... but no pressure or anything.

Last weekend the hubs and I were out on a date and he told me he needed a Christmas list from me.  I said, "Oh, I don't need anything.  I just got the new computer -- that's plenty!"  He said, "Well, I need a list of little things, then." I said, "Oh, I really don't need anything.  But, ya know, if you found some little thing that just seemed like it would be perfect for me, then that would be cool.  But no pressure, I really don't need anything." (Oh, my goodness -- I sound crazy just typing it out, but it gets worse...) Then I said, "You know, part of the happiness of getting a gift is knowing that the person took the time to think about you, that they appreciate what you like and what makes you you." You know, some small gift that communicates everything that makes a person who they are.

But no pressure or anything.

Fast forward a few days, and my son Josh (just turned 7) and I were in the car, jamming out to the Phineas & Ferb Christmas CD.  A song came on in which Candice (neurotic teenage girl) is agonizing over what to get her boyfriend for Christmas.  When it ended, Josh asked "Why doesn't she just ask him what he wants?"

I said, "Well, Josh, sometimes what makes a gift special is knowing that someone took the time to figure out what you would like more than anything else, because they know you and care about you!"

Glancing in the rearview mirror, I could see his look of utmost befuddlement.  I'm pretty sure it was the same look Dan would have given me if he wasn't so nice to me.

I laughed and said, "Sounds too complicated, huh?"

Maybe I'm trying to put a leetle too much meaning into what we find under the tree 19 days from now...

What he's doing right.

Today marks three months since That Night.  As I have contemplated the awesomeness of my husband lately, I have been so grateful for the way he has approached this huge upheaval in our life.  After all, there is no guide for how to tell your spouse you lost your faith, or that you've been hiding something so life-altering for years.  And I know (especially as I've had a lot of opportunities to talk to people since my last post) that many people face the same kind of situation.  It may not be a loss of faith, but there are a lot of times when a person might need to reveal something potentially devastating to someone they care about deeply.  Dan could not have done a better job, and I thought I would share a few key things he's done that have helped me and our marriage and family enormously.

1.  He told me the truth.  As difficult as coming to grips with all this has been, I am so grateful that he had the courage to tell me the truth.  That was not always his plan -- he had planned to keep up his facade of faith until our kids were out of the house.  Let me tell you right now, that would have been a disaster.  It was hard enough dealing with the fact that he had been concealing this struggle for five years.  Add another 15 on to that, and the damage might have been irreparable, both to me and to the kids.  Plus, I don't think he could have done it.  I knew something was wrong, even though I didn't know what.  His secret-keeping was suffocating to him, and it was weighing down our whole family.  We didn't recognize that at the time, and thought we were pretty dang happy, but the difference as we have truly worked together and fought for each other has been incredible.  If that weight had remained on our relationship, it would have done more damage every day.  Tell the truth -- there is no good alternative.

2.  He talked.  Like many men, Dan would not put "let's sit down and talk about our feelings" at the top of his "fun evenings" list.  But he recognized that I needed to talk, to know what he was thinking and feeling, to be able to express to him all the overwhelming crazingess in my brain.  In the days and weeks since "the big talk," we have spent hours and hours and hours talking.  Dan has let me get to know him at a deeper level than I ever have before, and that was crucial in helping me get over that initial "do I even know you at all?!" feeling.  And now I know that he really will talk to me about whatever comes up, as we continue to work through all of this in the future.  There are going to be lots of issues dealing with this, but I know we will be able to talk and work through it.

3.  He let me grieve.  Dan knew me well enough to know that his loss of faith would break my heart -- that's why he kept it hidden for so long in the first place.  And it did.  I went through all the classic stages of grief: denial, bargaining, anger, depression, and finally acceptance.  There probably needs to be a "feeling like you're going to have a nervous breakdown" stage in there, too.  None of that could have been easy for him.  But he didn't get defensive or demand that I "get over it." He respected that it was going to be a process for me, and stayed right by my side throughout, completely supportive.  Even when I have been fine for a while and then suddenly have a little breakdown, he has been completely patient with me.  His patience and support and absoutely continuous love are what have made it possible for me to regain complete confidence and faith in him.

4.  He has stayed positive.  He has not looked to blame others for his loss of faith, or tear anyone or their faith down.  He is living in a way that is true to what he feels is right, without bitterness or anger.  He supports me in my own faith in a positive way, and is truly striving to build instead of destroying.  That is the measure of a good man.

5.  He loves me completely.  The #1 most wonderful thing that Dan has done throughout all of this is to show, both by word and action, that he loves me, that our marriage is his top priority, and that nothing will change that.  In the midst of so much change in our family and our lives, knowing that nothing can change that.  Not because we just know we're strong and take it for granted, but because we are both willing to work every day to protect the love that we have for each other.

What it all comes down to, I think, is unselfishness.  This doesn't surprise me -- ever since I've known Dan, which has been 15 years now, he has always put the needs and feelings of others ahead of his own.  And in all of this, a time when he could have been selfish and defensive, he has continued to try to make this as positive a situation as possible for all of us.

I love Dan with every part of me.  I am so grateful for the courage, positivity, and love with which he is facing this change in his life.  He never set out to lose his faith or to hurt anyone, and throughout this transition he has worked -- really worked -- to proactively be the man he wants to be.  That is what has made the difference between "potentially devastating" and the beginning of a beautiful future for our family, whatever that future might hold.

Less and More.

Believing in God has always been as natural as breathing to me, and as vital.  It has been the foundation for my life, and the framework upon which we have built our family.  And like breathing, you take it for granted until your ability to do it is threatened.

One month ago, my husband Dan came to me after all the kids were in bed and said we needed to talk.  I could tell by his ultra-serious expression that this was going to be a life-changer, but I was unprepared for the words that followed: "I am an atheist."

I felt that I had been suddenly plunged into a cold, stormy ocean, and every word he said was another heavy stone around my neck.  He had come to this realization 3 1/2 years ago after a year and a half of struggling with his faith, he told me, but had felt that hiding it was better for our family.  He couldn't live with himself anymore, though, and needed to come clean.

Sinking and sinking, I thought about every prayer we had said as a family, everything we had taught our kids together, every time we had knelt in prayer together at the end of the day, and the million other ways in which our life was so entwined with our beliefs -- all lies.  3 1/2 years?  Three and one half years?!  Every moment of every day.  WHY?

I can't even begin to express all the thoughts that were churning through my head, thoughts of past, present, and future.  What would happen now?  How was our life going to change?  How would this affect our children?  How could he just give up on the promise of being together forever?  Could he truly believe that this life is all there is, that we were really only married "until death do us part?"  Dan tried to pull me back, assuring me over and over of his love for me and our children, his dedication to supporting me in my own faith and helping me raise the kids in the gospel, and the kind of man he always intends to be.  But I felt like I was hearing him from underwater -- all I could really hear was the fear pounding away in my own heart.  I thought that I knew Dan.  I thought that I knew who we were, together.  Now I was terribly afraid that I was losing him, and myself and everything else important to me along with him.

I floundered in the depths for what felt like a long, long time.  We talked for hours, and when we finally went to bed I did not sleep.  I felt like we had lost something so important, and that I had never had a chance to save it, to fight for it.  I prayed and prayed but found no peace.  The next day I went through the motions, keeping it together as best I could for the kids, but there was no relief.  We had returned only two days earlier from an incredible just-the-two-of-us vacation to celebrate our tenth anniversary, and the suitcases full of memories were still in the middle of the living room floor.  I couldn't bear to look at them.  I couldn't bear to download the pictures I had taken on the trip.  For me, the trip had been magical -- two weeks of just us, laughing and talking and having all sorts of funny adventures, growing closer and just being so... together.  But now it was all muddled together with the fact that I felt like I had been living in a fantasy world of my own creation.  Had I imagined every good thing about our relationship?  Because obviously Dan was living in a very different world than I knew.  The trip had become the ultimate example of the facade of our lives, a sham of happiness that I had been blinded by.

I talked to Dan about it that night, and he was visibly upset that his timing in telling me the truth had ruined my memory of the trip.  He told me what the trip had meant for him, and the way he described it sounded just the way I would have before everything got smooshed together in my mind.  It was like the first shaft of light for me -- the realization that, while it was true that I had not known or understood what was really happening with Dan, our life and our love was not a figment of my imagination.  And then he said something that I will never forget.  I asked him why he had chosen now to tell me -- if he felt I was ready for it, or if he just felt so much pressure from living a lie that he had decided that it was time to sink or swim.  He said, "Never for more than a moment did I think we would sink, because I knew that I would swim."  I realized then that I had underestimated his love for and commitment to me.  He was just as fiercely committed to us as I was, and he would do whatever it took to protect that.

I had been clutching fear so tightly that I was paralyzed.  As I began to let it go, there was room in my mind and heart for other emotions: understanding of what Dan had been going through for the past five years and the pain of bearing that burden all alone for so long; gratitude for his determination to live as an honest, loving, moral husband and father; trust that he really meant it; and, finally, peace.  When I stopped shouting so loudly inside my head, God was able to send me the peace that I needed.  I began to have specific, undeniable experiences that let me know God is aware of our little family at this moment of upheaval, and that He has not let go of Dan.  He is there, and He loves us.  I don't know what is coming in the future, but I do know that.

I began to hold on to peace and love with both hands, instead of fear and resentment.  As Dan and I have worked together through the inevitable issues this has brought forward, we have grown so much closer and more united.  And I have felt God's love stronger than at any time in my life.  I feel so grateful for Dan, for our family that has shown so much love and understanding, for a kind and thoughtful bishop who gave me a blessing that was literally a godsend, for a friend who took me to the temple and let me cry it all out to her, for a hundred moments of guidance and peace that I have felt in the past month.

How is it possibly that through losing so much, I feel like I have been given so much more?  How can having the foundation of our marriage and family swept away lead me to a stronger relationship with Dan and with God?  My only answer is the grace of God.  To me there is no other explanation for being able to overcome the overwhelmingly negative emotions with which I reacted, so quickly and completely. Dan doesn't explain it that way, of course.  And that hurts my heart, but I know that he is working so hard to be the kind of man he wants to be.  He is positive and supportive and so full of love.  And I am grateful for that.

It has been a two-steps-forward-one-step-back process -- sometimes a rogue wave of sadness pushes me back under for a while.  But instead of feeling like I'm drowning, I am trying to let my faith in Dan and in God pull me out again.  Dan and I are sailing our ship together. (Do you think I've beaten this metaphor to death yet?  Because I could go on...)




P.S.  Why am I putting something so personal out into the blogosphere?  First, I needed a way to let as many people as possible know about the change in our family.  The last month has left me emotionally and physically exhausted, and having to explain this to people over and over again just makes it harder.  This was the best solution for me, short of renting a billboard that says "Dan is leaving the church.  I'm okay.  Our marriage is not in danger.  Go back to your lives, citizens."  I don't mind talking about it, but having to break the news again and again is just too much for me right now.

Second, I guess I hope that this experience will help someone else.  I do not think I have suffered in some uniquely difficult way -- on the contrary, I think everyone goes through utterly heart-wrenching experiences at some point(s) in their lives.  But after this storm hit, when I went online, I couldn't find any experiences like mine.  Or like Dan's, that might help me to get some perspective.  This blog post is entirely my story, I realize.  Dan is going to write his own experience -- why he hid the truth for so long and what he wishes he'd done differently, as well as his experience with finally telling the truth -- and post it here as well.  People need to be able to talk about things and know they are not alone, whichever side of this kind of situation they're on.

P.P.S.  A note about commenting.  I think nearly everyone who reads this blog is made up of our family and friends, so I'm not that worried.  Please leave comments if you'd like -- nothing is worse than radio silence after putting something like this out there.  But I've seen too many mean, bitter, snarky, contentious comments on blogs not to be afraid of that one random person who, protected by the anonymity of the internet, decides to take in on themselves to inflict pain.  Please know that this is coming from an intensely personal and painful place in our very real lives.  If you don't have something nice to say, please just keep it to yourself and click to the next blog...

And if everyone else was doing the macarena, would YOU?!

My son Sam is in Spanish Immersion at his elementary school, and last night they held their year-end program, called "La Fiesta."  As part of the grand finale, all the student did the macarena. A few seconds into it we noticed Sam was not even close to the same moves as the other kids. At first we thought he just didn't get how to do the dance -- he is my son, after all -- but then we realized he was totally doing his own thing -- one kid doing a very serious robot dance in a sea of macarena. I asked him afterward why, and he said the macarena was weird and stupid.

That had to take guts.  8 years old, first year in Spanish Immersion, surrounded by his friends, classmates, teachers, and tons of older kids he looks up to, to say nothing of the thousand plus people in the audience, and he was brave enough to decide the macarena was going to be his line in the sand.  I can tell you right now that when I was 8... or 18... or probably even now, I would not have had the guts.  In fact, I can point to a lot of situations in my life where I felt uncomfortable with something, but I kind of went along so I wouldn't stand out from the crowd, or look as weird as I always felt.  Who knew a second grader doing the robot could teach me a profound lesson on being true to yourself no matter what?

Sam is on the second row up, third from the right of kids who are in the light. I wish this video was better -- I just pulled out my iphone as soon as I realized what he was doing. You'll also have to excuse Dan and I giggling like crazy in the background, but it was pretty much the funniest thing I've ever seen.

The King Mushroom (extended version...)

I pride myself on not being easily offended, but now I have been defamed on the Internet for all to see, and I will not put up with it!  My famous blogger brother Dan of Single Dad Laughing just posted about The King Mushroom, a story that lives in infamy in our sibling history.

The basic story is this:  My mom always added raisins and canned mushrooms to the spaghetti sauce.  Don't knock the raisins till you've tried 'em, people!  Dan is totally fronting that he didn't like that part -- we all gobbled up those little bits of sweetness.  But the mushrooms?  Oh, what we wouldn't do to escape the slippery, rubbery bites of death.  One night we discovered the most enormous canned mushroom in the history of the earth in the spaghetti sauce.  I'm pretty sure it was the size of my hand.  It may have covered the entire plate.

DANIEL is saying that I was the unlucky recipient of the flying-saucer-sized fungus, and that after my attempt to hide it on the floor under the table was discovered, I blamed him then gleefully watched as he was forced to eat it.

Lies, I tell you!

I know this, because I would never, ever have done such a thing.  I was the oldest, and therefore had a responsibility to set an example of perfect integrity and compassion for my younger siblings.  And I was perfect at it -- just ask me...

I'm pretty sure the original recipient of The King Mushroom was our poor little brother Eric, who at seven years old could hardly have been expected to eat a mushroom the size of his head.  He did chuck it on the floor, where it was in fact discovered by our parents.  Dan probably did get the blame, because he was definitely the pickiest eater.  You should have seen him gag pathetically when forced to eat peas.  But Dan, you missed the best part of the story!  When none of us would 'fess up to the crime, my parents decreed that no one would get to leave the table until that mushroom was eaten.  They didn't care who ate it as long as someone did.  So the four of us "big kids" sat at the table, long after our parents had left, eyeing each other and The King Mushroom.  Dan stabbed it with his fork and dropped it onto Eric's plate.  Eric picked it up and threw it at Dan, who picked it up and threw it at me.  Pretty soon we were laughing hysterically as we threw it back and forth at each other.  It may or may not have escalated into throwing other food items -- my memory gets fuzzy at that point.  But it did not go unnoticed by our parents, and the four of us spent some significant time with our noses on the wall that night.

But not all night -- that's a sibling story for another time...


P.S.  I mentioned this story to my mom the other night and she had zero recollection of these events.  I'm very interested to hear if Amy and Eric (our two younger siblings involved in this particular episode) remember this at all, and their versions of the events!

P.P.S.  Raisins in spaghetti sauce are delicious!  Just check out this yummy recipe for Sicilian spaghetti sauce:

http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Sicilian-Spaghetti-Sauce

On a lighter note... (Why does everything turn to tears?!)

Yesterday's post was a pretty heavy one in which a lot of crying happened.  One of my friends, as we were discussing it on FaceBook, said that she always ends up in tears, too, and wondered why that is.  Why is that our outlet?  Would it be healthier to scream into a pillow?!

Everything seems to turn to tears for me -- happy, sad, weddings, funerals, babies, public speaking, my son's pre-kindergarten evaluation.  Seriously, I stood out in the hallway with tears streaming down my face watching him count with his new teacher.  Me when I'm pregnant?  Crazy town.  I sobbed for about an hour when detective Bobby Simone on NYPD Blue died.  I cried for four hours when my dear sweet sister gave me a hideous haircut (that was my poor husband Dan's first introduction to crazy Tomi).  On the flipside, my family's favorite sport was to see who could get me laughing, because it would inevitably lead to me crying uncontrollably.  Yeah, glad I could entertain you guys...

You may have already seen this -- it's all over FB and the morning TV shows -- but Kristen Bell was on Ellen yesterday talking about her emotional meltdown over getting to interact with a sloth for her birthday (the fulfillment of a lifelong dream).  It's pretty darn hilarious:



Ah, another member of the crying club.  I love how she described her crying zone as anything outside 3-7 on the emotional scale.  I'm with you, Kristen.  (Except when I'm pregnant, which I would say is anything outside the 4-5 range.)

Crying is not a negative thing -- I think it's just one way to release emotional stress.  Dan (my husband) prefers to "criticize invisible liberals" while "yelling at the windshield like a moron" on his drive home.  That's his outlet.  Yelling always makes me feel worse instead of better, so that wouldn't work for me.  Some people have physical outlets (Dan also likes to lift a lot of weight at the gym when he's frustrated).  Some people have a hobby that lets them escape.  For me, that's arts and crafts and DIY projects.  Hmm, I haven't made a lot of time for that lately -- maybe that's a contributing factor to my recent trip into yuckville.

At any rate, I think we should give ourselves a break if we're criers.  It just means our hearts are full to overflowing, right?  Overflowing right out of our eyeballs.

P.S.
I also really love these two graphics I found via Pinterest.





(A very kind commenter named Gretchen also left that last thought in the comments yesterday.  Thank you!)

Bloodletting...

A couple of weeks ago I turned 33.  I have never been one to be bothered by getting older, but this one was a doozy.  For the first time in years, I felt terrible about myself, like I was going nowhere and just getting worse and worse as a person.  The one big area where I seemed to be offending humanity?  My weight.

I have always struggled with weight.  About five years ago I started making a real effort to get healthy and lose weight, and I lost about 70 lbs.  Yay!  Then I got pregnant and gained every single ounce back.  Boo.  Then over the following two years I got back down again.  Yay!  Then my sister revealed that she had been struggling with an eating disorder for ten years, and in supporting her through her treatment process I realized that my own obsession with my weight was not only harmful to her but to me and also potentially to my kids.  So I made a commitment to her and to myself that I would not weigh myself again and started working to reevaluate my goals for my health and life without being obsessed with the number on the scale, or tracking calories, or crushing myself with guilt about food choices.

It is a thousand times harder than I expected it to be.  Over the past year, though I don't know how much because I'm still committed to not weighing myself, I've slowly gotten bigger and bigger.  I'm still exercising and eating sensibly, but apparently if I don't obsess and restrict and go crazy, my body doesn't want to be that smaller size.  It is incredibly frustrating to feel the pounds come back on and have to buy bigger clothes.  I have paid a lot of lip service to not valuing myself by my weight, size, or physical appearance, but saying it is a heck of a lot easier than really believing it.

So back to my birthday.  For the last five years I've felt every year like I was making progress, going forward, getting more and more awesome.  But this year I just felt like crap.  And I was walking around for weeks beforehand with all these negative thoughts and feelings swirling around in my brain, feeding on themselves and growing bigger and bigger until it was all I could think about.  I couldn't see my many other great qualities, or the fact that my appearance is just one small part of my identity and life. It was a dark cloud from which I felt like there was no escape.

I started thinking about writing this post, but realized that I hadn't even talked about it to another human being.  And that maybe that would be helpful.  And that, just maybe, I should talk about it to my husband, who I know without a doubt loves me.  Duh.

So, the night after my birthday, I spilled my guts and cried on his shoulder (literally) for an hour.  And since I had been holding all this in pretty effectively, I'm sure it was kind of blindsiding for him.  And guess what: he didn't have any miraculous fixes for me.  He just let me talk it all out and tried to reassure me.

And when I woke up in the morning, I felt much better.  I don't mean to say that I was suddenly okay with everything about my body image and my self worth, but things were more proportionate with the rest of my life.  I was able to see that yes, I was unhappy with that one area, but I was also growing in many other areas of my life that I was very proud of.  I was able to stop obsessing -- instead of could see taking things one step, one choice at a time.  The dark cloud lifted.

While we were talking about it, my dear husband was sorry that he didn't have any answers for me.  He joked, "I could suggest leeches..." I replied, "Well, as a lover of the Jane Austen time period I should be all over those old-fashioned methods."  Which made me think of bloodletting (stick with me here), where doctors would open up a vein or artery and drain some blood out of a patient in the hopes of getting rid of the bad blood making them sick.  When I finally opened up and poured out all the poison that had been swirling around in my head and heart for so long, it worked just that way.  I let it all out and that allowed healthier thoughts to come in.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is that keeping negative thoughts and feelings bottled up is only going to make them stronger until they poison everything in your life.  I am grateful to have a loving and understanding husband I could talk to and I really wish I had done it sooner.  For you it might be a husband, friend, mom, sister, or just a journal where you write everything down.  This blog post is helpful for me, too.  I kept it in because I didn't want to admit that I was struggling with the changes I've made.  I didn't want to burden anyone else with my negative emotions.  But the truth is, my husband knew I was unhappy about something.  My mom knew.  My kids knew, because by the time I finally let it out I was not a particularly cheerful person to be around.  So I wasn't fooling anyone anyway.

I realize that many people upon reading this would think, "Duh."  But for those who are like me, and have a difficult time talking about hard things, I hope this will empower you to open up your heart to someone you trust.

And now, for something funny...

Not from me, though -- I wanted to share with you a blog that I just stumbled upon. It's by a blogger named Serene, and the blog is titled "Serene is my name, Not my life!" She blogs about her imperfect parenting adventures and the posts I've read so far literally have tears running down my cheeks because I'm laughing so hard -- the situations are just so what we find ourselves in the middle of every day. I have officially wasted invested all my free time this morning into reading her posts and I can't wait to read more. My current fave is "A Man and His Business." If you're looking for a mommy blog that will help you shake off the "I have to be perfect at this" feeling for a little bit, check it out!

See past what it seems -- a must-read!

A Facebook friend posted a link to this blog post today with the comment "You will be really glad you read this." Boy, was she right. It's from the Brave Girls Club blog, called "We must see past what it seems," and it tells a very powerful story about how we judge the people around us and why we must be gentle with others.  Please take a few minutes to read it today -- I know I will be a little bit closer to my best self today because I did.  Have a blessed Sunday!

P.S. This is my first introduction to the Brave Girls Club, but I am excited to explore it more. It looks like a great resource for women trying to live an imperfect-but-beautiful life.  

Setting up roadblocks to intimacy...

I'm not talking about that kind of intimacy.  I'm talking about the kind where you open your self up, the very core of your being, to another person.  It's scary, because it's a very vulnerable position.  How much easier is it to put up a false front and keep others at a safe distance?  I recently saw this segment on our local lifestyle show and thought it was definitely worth sharing. Family therapist Julie Hanks talks about the things that prevent us from letting other "step in our shoes."

Or you can read the written article as well.  Just some food for thought!

Perfect is nice, but imperfect makes better memories...

The other night we had a joint birthday party for my little Eliza and my niece Amelia, who both just turned 3.  This is the first birthday they've really been old enough to "get" what was going on, and I wanted to make it big.  My sister Amy is an awesome cake decorator, and I asked her to please help me make a super fantastic girly cake, and she was with me all the way.

But, as so often happens, our plans got derailed.  With 40,000 other things happening, I didn't get the cakes made early enough to freeze (which would have made them much easier to decorate).  Then I was late getting to my mom's house to do the actual decorating.  Then, as my sister was hurrying over to teach me how to do the decorating, her tire blew out and she was stranded.  My brother went to rescue her, and by the time she got to the house there was almost no time left before the party was meant to start.  I said, "Maybe we should just forget the cake.  There's no way we can do it in time."  I was thinking we could just cover it with canned frosting and call it good, or steal the cupcakes my mom had bought for another occasion.  But Amy was adamant -- the cute girly cake was going to happen!  Moving at lightning speed, she leveled cakes, rolled out fondant, and did a bunch of other stuff that I didn't even see because I was trying to put up balloons and streamers.  I have never seen someone work so hard, so fast.

She was apologetic about the final product -- it was lumpy and bumpy and did not have the perfect finish that her other cakes have had.  But the little girls loved it.  I loved it.  Everyone at the party loved it.  It was really the centerpiece of the whole party!  

Do you think they're excited about the cake?

As I thought about it later, I realized how much more memorable that cake is now.  If everything had gone according to plan and we had come up with a perfect cake, when we looked at the pictures of the party in the future we would have said, "Oh, there's the cute cake Mom and Amy made."  Instead, we have this crazy cake that every time I see it, it will remind me of that crazy day and how much my sister loves me and Eliza and Amelia, and how hard we all worked to make that party a fun one for our little people.  It reminds me that my sister is willing to drop everything and do anything for me and my family.  It reminds me how much I love her.  It might sound silly, but now that cake stands for something.  Kerry Vincent probably wouldn't give it high marks, but that's okay -- it's about so much more than the decoration now.

The difference between "owning it" and "you're on your own."

The other day I posted this quote from Albert Ellis:  "The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own.  You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president.  You realize that you control your own destiny."  


Then I received this comment from a reader named Genevieve:  "I agree that it's up to us, but I also think sometimes we need help. I went to a funeral today for a woman who apparently didn't have help, and her "demons" got the best of her. So tragic."


It struck me that there is a disconnect here between what I read in that quote and what she got from it.  After  reading both the quote and her comment a few times, I could see her point and felt that I needed to address it.


To me, this thought is all about the blame game.  There are so many times that we want to shift the blame for our problems to other people or to circumstances beyond our control.  "I wouldn't be so fat if my parents had taught me better habits." "My kid would do better in school if the teacher would just pay more attention to him." That may seem easier, but in reality it takes away our power to change our lives.  Taking responsibility for our lives can be scary, but it also means that we can make changes and decisions that will be true happiness and peace.    Other people and circumstances do affect our lives, but we cannot allow them to control us.  We "own" who we are, imperfections and all, in order to become who we want to be.


I think the danger in this thought, and what Genevieve was observant enough to pick up on, is if you just focus on the phrase "your problems are your own."  Believing that our problems are entirely our own affair can wall us off from the people around us, as I wrote about in a previous post "I thought I was the only one..."  We must be willing to let our guard down and let people in so that we can get help when we need it.  And everyone needs help once in a while.  Admitting that we need help empowers other to ask for help as well.  Sometimes we need a strong shoulder to lean on (or cry on), and sometimes we can be that person for someone else.  But if we keep up a facade of perfection, we are cut off from both roles.  We can't ask for help, and others don't feel comfortable asking it of us.


Taking control of your life should not mean that you are on your own.  It means that you face yourself and your choices with honesty, changing what you can and allowing yourself to ask for help where you need it.


Now, I'm going to go quit blaming the over-flowing closets on a mutant outgrown-clothes breeding phenomenon and do some de-cluttering.  Feel free to come over and help if you want... :)

You Control Your Own Destiny -- a "Perfect" Thought for Today

Who do YOU let in? -- a great link to check out.

I follow approximately a gazillion craft and DIY blogs, and one of my faves is Kimba's a Soft Place to Land.  Today she posted about the difference between "Upstairs Friends" and "Downstairs Friends."  It's really not about home decor at all -- it's about whether or not you let others see your imperfections, and about how doing so opens the door to real friendship and understanding.  Check it out!  It's a short little post, but it gave me a lot to think about today!  Click HERE to head over.

Have a great day!

Life is Too Short.

Last week a girl that I had known since junior high passed away without warning. One moment everything was fine, and the next moment she was gone, leaving behind a husband and three kids. I didn't know her very well, just enough to smile and say hello when I saw her in the hall at church, but the sudden devastation of her death has forced me to think about the fragility of life. To quote a line from one of my favorite cheesy chick flicks (Where the Heart Is): "Our lives can change with every breath we take." 

The overriding feeling I was left with is that life is too short. 

Life is too short to hold a grudge.  You never know when it will be too late to forgive, or to ask for forgiveness.

Life is too short to judge others, to deprive ourselves and them of what we could share with one another.


Life is too short to waste time on what matters least.


Life is too short to limit your own potential.  How much time do we spend telling ourselves we can't do it, we're not good enough, we shouldn't even try?


Life is too short to stay in your comfort zone.  We need to push ourselves, to take risks, to have adventures!


Life is too short to only see the darkness around you.  Yes, there is always darkness in this world, always hurt and hunger and injustice.  But there is also so much beauty and love.  Embracing the light gives us power to combat the darkness.


Life is too short to withhold love -- from our children, our family, strangers, any human being.


Life is too short to live in regret.  We can't go backwards, only forwards.  We have to be honest with ourselves about what we regret, do what we can to fix it, and live in peace with what we can't. (See #1 about asking forgiveness...)


And finally, life is too short to live in fear, waiting for the other shoe to drop.  This is a big one for me.  I am so paranoid that something catastrophic is going to hit our family, like losing a child or my husband.  It's as though I feel we are so blessed that something must be lurking around the corner, just waiting to broadside us when we least expect it.  And the truth is, it's probably true.  Every family is faced with loss or hardship.  That is part of our journey through this life as human beings, and none are immune.  But we can't live in fear of the unknown.


Yes, life is too short.  It's true whether we have another 5 minutes or another 50 years to live.  If we live with purpose, whatever time we are given will be exactly the right amount for us to create a beautiful, happy life.  If we don't -- if we let life pull us along without choosing to be what we want to be -- 1000 years wouldn't be enough.




P.S.  I just watched a video on TED by a man who survived that plane crash into the Hudson River, and what he learned from being faced with death.  It's worth a watch.

Motherhood Matters

Happy Mother's Day to all you beautiful women out there, both those who are mothers in the traditional sense and also to those who bless the lives of everyone around them with their mothering influence.

This past week I have been participating in a challenge created by our local lifestyle show Studio 5 called Motherhood Matters, which they describe as "a campaign to inspire, encourage, and remind ourselves why motherhood matters." I can always use a reminder to find the joy in motherhood rather than getting sucked into the mundane, and I have really been enjoying completing the challenge each day.

The other day the challenge was to make a list of the skills and attributes that you bring to the role of mother, and for some reason I found that very challenging. What strengths do I bring to motherhood? At first, all I could come up with were my weaknesses. I get mad a really really lot more than I should be, I'm ridiculously disorganized and forgetful, I let them watch too much tv... the list could go on and on. So before I got too bogged down in berating myself, I decided that I would commit to posting here about my positive strengths and attributes so that I have it in black and white. I haven't really started coming up with anything yet, so we'll see how it goes:

1. I am willing to admit when I'm wrong and ask my kids' forgiveness. I try really hard to own up to my part when things go amuck.
2. I tell them I love them a gazillion times a day. So far they are not old enough to be embarrassed by this.
3. I try to tell them specific reasons why I think they're great and why I'm proud of them.
4. I try to give them lots of opportunities for creativity (both in the artsy-crafty way and also just in their thinking).
5. I believe in God and Jesus Christ, and I am working hard to create an environment where their Spirit can be felt.
6. I am not "too cool" to run around and play and be silly with them. (Of course, if you knew me you'd probably say that I'm not in grave danger of being "too cool" for anything...)
7. I will never, never stop trying to be a better mom for them.

I am not trying to toot my own horn here. I know that for every one thing I get right, I probably make two giant mothering mistakes. Or miss some huge opportunity to love and nurture the way I should. I'm sure we all feel that way. And Mother's Day, for some perverse reason, frequently just makes moms feel more guilty, like we somehow don't measure up to all the praise. But this Mother's Day, please stop berating yourself for all your mothering imperfections and take a moment to appreciate your mothering strengths.  You have them, I guarantee -- otherwise, God would never have entrusted His precious children to your care.  Give yourself the gift of actually thinking about it and writing it down.  I'll bet you'll find you're a pretty awesome mom after all. :)

Happy Mother's Day!



Oh, and if you need a little encouragement, please watch this beautiful video about our true value as mothers:

The Civility Experiment -- a video

This video really touched me today -- it demonstrates so well the power that comes from getting to know someone instead of judging them by their outward appearance or what you think you know about them. I believe that if more of us (myself included) took the opportunity to really get to know the people we are judgmental about (whether it's an individual or a whole group), we'd learn that underneath the surface we are all just human beings. Imperfect, yes, but all of us having something to give and share with each other. Worth the watch!

He makes it possible...

None of us, as human beings, are perfect.  That's kinda the whole point of this blog.  But today, as we celebrate the life, Atonement, and resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ, I want to share my faith that Jesus WAS perfect, and that it is because of Him that it's okay for us not to be.  It's okay that we make mistakes and wrong choices and everything else that comes with being a human being.  HE paid the price for us, to give us the chance to learn and grow and take two steps forward and one step back.  He loves us more than we can ever understand, and He will always help us become our best selves if we choose to come to Him.  Through His power we can be forgiven for all those wrong choices and become who HE sees in us.

This Easter message touched my heart today, and I wanted to share it with you:

I wish you a blessed and joyful Easter!

Thanks for stopping by!