What's So Funny About Peace, Love and Understanding

I have two friends who became Catholics this past Easter at our parish. They were graduate students at our local University who also graduated this past spring and are engaged to be married next summer.

They were lucky enough to both get teaching positions at the same school in another part of the country. As soon as they were settled, they made plans to marry at their new parish.
With one being a former Southern Baptist and the other an Evangelical and their families still practicing these faiths they have proceeded cautiously but assured in their goal to have their wedding as part of a mass. Because both of their parents are divorced and remarried, this wedding has also been a balancing act in respect to parental feelings as well.

It was in keeping with thinking of the parents that the decision was made that the bride would walk down the aisle solo and that the unity candle would be eliminated from the mass as all of the parents and step-parents had made it clear they wanted part in that ceremony. The priest at their new church was fine with the bride "giving herself away" but still believed the unity candle should be included. Quite frankly, I had never heard of this "requirement" so when the emailed me asking about it because I am a cradle Catholic, I had no idea of the answer.

Enter: Faith and Family Live! where I asked the ladies during the weekly Coffee Talk session. There are many women in the community who know much more than I in regards to this matter. But, I was doubly lucky because Danielle picked up this thread and asked a priest who assured her that the Unity Candle was not an integral part of the wedding mass!

While we were collecting the answers, a very funny thing happened though, instead of just answering, many women decided they would pose their own "solutions" to this problem. One said that the biological mothers should do it because the bride's biological father would give her away (which was not going to happen) while another suggested that all eight adults should come to the altar and light a candle each so that the bride and groom could somehow combine all these flames, and then there was the lady who suggested that they should do "unity sand." What is so interesting about this was that the question posed to these women wasn't "how do you include all these people" but "is it okay to exclude this ceremony." In fact, the best man in the wedding, the best childhood friend of the groom, happens to be Jewish and when he read the response about all eight adults lighting a candle, he jokingly suggested donating his family's menorah.

Because the original priest at the new parish was so adamant, in desperation, the bride contacted our priest back here who had an opening that weekend and is allowing the couple to not use the unity candle.

Nothing was wrong with their decision to remove the ceremony from the church's stance and the bride and groom had decided to do this to respect the feelings of all of their parents. The stance of many of the women who responded who obviously thought the ceremony should still be included, was a stance taken that did not respect the unusual (at least in the Catholic church) family situation or the feelings of the bride, groom, and other family members. In fact, there were other women who responded that a priest had not allowed them to have a unity candle and some who said that priests in their parishes no longer allowed them at weddings because they detracted from the actual vows and are actually a Protestant tradition "borrowed" for the symbolism.

The decision that was made by this couple is one that will still allow their love to be center stage as they take these important vows, and will keep the peace among an already fractured family.

Happy New Year!

2009 is here! We can't wait to see what God has in store!

Wishing You the Healthiest and Happiest of Holidays

And I do mean holidays, as in St Nicholas and Lucia's feast days, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Immaculate Conception, Christmas, New Years and the Epiphany!

Do You Know Who Lives in a Pineapple Under the Sea? Do your kids?

Mine do.
His name is Spongebob Squarepants.
Danielle recently hosted a little forum on her blog about families allowing his sponginess' presence in their homes. (Danielle allows him.)
There were a lot of moms who said no. Some had objections to content. Some to tv in general. But a few confessed they (and their kids) watched and liked him.

One mom states they were an anti-Spongebob house for a variety of reasons. Then they had an autistic child who responded to the yellow kitchen sponge who lives in a pineapple, has a pet snail and works as a fry cook. They found they could engage their child in ways they were never able to previously through Spongebob. And they became an SB household. In recent months, in speaking with several specialists (speech therapists, play therapists, OTs, psychologists, etc) who work with autistic children I have found that Spongebob is a rare character that seems to engage many autistic children. I learned that there is even a study as to what about this one particular character seems to reach kids that so often will respond to nothing else.

The objections were many, and a lot of moms said they didn't like the "ickiness" of the characters. I have a co-worker who disliked the cartoon for the same reason and told her kids that Spongebob was too "repulsive looking" for them to watch. A few weeks ago, she came to work VERY upset. As it turns out she has a new neighbor who has a daughter her daughter's age. The neighbor's child has severe facial deformities. After a few meetings between the families, the neighbors invited my co-worker's daughter for a play date. When the co-worker asked her daughter if she would like to go, the little girl said, "No. She is too repulsive looking, just like Spongebob." My co-worker was mortified, even more so because two other neighbors were over at the time and heard the exchange. I understood what upset my co-worker most is that she greatly underestimated her four-year-olds ability to translate her mom's dislike of a character into a dislike of real people. In a way I understood her, but I also felt like it was all to easy to make an assumption that kids wouldn't understand what she "really" meant.

Kids are pretty savvy. They understand a lot more subtleties than we truly give them credit for. We act shocked when a child repeats profanity, but what do we really expect. If they hear it being used, they assume it is okay for use. Especially if the person saying it is a parent, older sibling, grandparent or other trusted adult. And we make it worse when we pass it off as, well, they don't really know what they are saying. They may not be sophisticated thinkers, but small kids can make inferences. In fact, that's how they learn about a lot in their world.

You can ban Spongebob, you can allow him. Same with any other cartoon. One does not make you a better parent than another. And while we should be honest with our children in our decisions, we should also be clear. Had my co-worker explained to her child ahead of time that this is a cartoon character, not a real person, perhaps the child would not have turned the rationale on another human. But, then again, children crave consistency and it gets sticky with the world of make-believe.

A mother at daycare recently told me she did not allow her children to watch a locally produced show that included martial arts because of the violence. The show actually is about empowering kids and shows how kids should use discipline. In fact, most people don't put their kids into martial arts programs to exercise a violent outlet, but for the discipline these eastern arts teach. But I digress. I could understand this woman's initial resistance until she added this statement, "I only allow my kids to watch Boomerang, and Looney Tunes." I hope she did notice the look I gave her when she mentioned Looney Tunes. I love Bugs Bunny too, but if violence was her objection, what about "Duck Season, Rabbit Season," Wile E. Coyote and Roadrunner, or the endless anvil dropping. I mean, is it okay for a duck and a rabbit to suggest that Elmer Fudd shoot one over the other? This violence is acceptable because it's animated creatures, or because it wasn't a big deal when mom was a little girl and her parents allowed her to watch it? I have only caught the local martial arts program a few times and it mostly includes kids breaking boards and bricks, talking about how the "program" helps them to focus in school, and even has included a few segments about students being bullied and finding a non-violent way to stop it. Yes, there are some scenes of sparring with pads on under the tutelage of an instructor, but we aren't witnessing kids "jumping" each other on the playground. It struck me that unless this mom's kids pointed guns at each other yelling, "duck season! Fire!" she probably wouldn't realize the violent nature of the animated creatures.

There are no hard and fast rules for allowing one program over another with most children's progamming. And while we should all be aware what our children are watching and the lessons they are learning, there has, in recent years, developed a generation of "super-hyper-vigilant" parents who reject much of the programming they see that is new while allowing much older programming that often extols the same "values." It doesn't help to harbor under the delusion that older is always better.

And there is the temptation to get rid of the television altogether. I understand this sentiment as well. We very often feel we will build a better, smarter, more skilled, more Catholic child with no television.

The bottom line is, good parenting is good parenting, tv or no tv, Spongebob or no Spongebob. Good children will come out of homes that don't own a television and those that do. Productive citizens will have grown up watching Nickelodeon and just not. Good Catholics will be made from kids who only watched EWTN kids and those that might not have.

The Best and The Worst

As the year comes to an end, we see many "lists" come out. One of my favorites this year is over at Celebrity Baby Blog where they are debating the ten best and ten worst celebrity baby names of 2008. I agree with some of them and not so much with others. So I came up with my own:
Worst:

1) Zuma Nesta Rock Rossdale (son of Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale)...I mean really, this kid is going to be in therapy for a LONG while.

2) Knox Leon Jolie-Pitt (son of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt)...I'll admit, could be worse, but this one makes me think of Knox gelatin.

3) Bronx Mowgli Wentz (son of Ashlee Simpson-Wentz and Pete Wentz)...this name is just awful. I really wanted Ashlee Simpson to be a good mom who proved people wrong about her. This name does the exact opposite.

4) Jagger Joseph Blue Goldberg (daughter, yes DAUGHTER, of Soleil Moon Frye and Jason Goldberg) Okay, so Soleil Moon Frye has the excuse when it comes to odd names, but Jagger and Joseph for a GIRL? Come on sweetie, you're not doing anything to help the cause that Hollywood kids can grow up normal.

5) Ignatius Martin Upton (son of Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton)... I will admit I feel guilty about adding this one because I love that Cate Blanchett is so open about naming her son after a Catholic saint (she openly admits he is named after Ignatius of Loyola) but his nick-name, Iggy, as in Pop, ugh!!!

6)Viggo Moriah Hanson (son of Taylor and Natalie Hanson)...can anyone say Lord of the Rings? And Moriah, I mean, I understand it's a Biblical mountain, but is this kid gonna get teased or what?

7) Buster Miller (son of Jonny Lee Miller and Michele Hicks) ok, Jonny Lee Miller is Angelina Jolie's first husband. That is no excuse for giving your son a dog's name!

8) Peanut Rademacher (son of Ingo Rademacher and Ehiku) The name came, wait for it, from the picture of the little guy on his first ultrasound. My kids looked like peanuts too. It's a nickname, not something to scar your kid with in high school!

9)Kadence Clover Hawk (daughter of Tony Hawk and Lohtse Hawk) so Tony Hawk finally has a baby girl, and we have the lovely alliteration gone bad. Personally Clover makes me think of a cow chewing cud. And I have a friend who named her daugther Cadence. Cadence Ann. I think it should be a law, unusual first name must be paired with a normal middle name.

10) Rain Amethist Ryan (son of Lee Ryan and Samantha Miller) how is this a boy name?

Best:

1) Honor Marie Warren (daugther of Jessica Alba and Cash Warren) a virtue name that is not overused and Marie is a well suited middle name.

2) Harlow Winter Kate Madden (daughter of Nichole Richie and Joel Madden) Harlow is a look back at old Hollywood and while Winter is not conventional, it has been used in the early part of the 20th century and Kate puts a nice normal spin on it. And who would have thought Nicole Richie would be the type of mom to insist on breastfeeding and making her own baby food.

3) Vivienne Marcheline (daughter of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt) in honor of Angie's late mom Marcheline Bertrand and her French-Canadian heritage. It also has an elegance not often found in baby names these days.

4) Stella Doreen McDermott (daughter of Tori Spelling and Dean McDermott) in following Tori's heritage and naming your child after a loved one who has passed, little Stella's middle name Doreen was the name of Dean's late mother.

5) Olive Cohen (daughter of Sasha Baron Cohen and Isla Fisher) something simple and classic from two over the top actors.

6) Samuel Kai Schreiber (son of Liev Schrieber and Naomi Watts) the simplicity of the first name and the exotic middle name (beautiful in Hawaiian) make this little guy a winner!

7) Alexander (Sasha) Pete Schreiber (son of Liev Schrieber and Naomi Watts) don't know about how I feel abot Sasha as a boy's nickname, but this little guy has a solid name to fall back on if and when he out grows it.

8) Thomas Boone Quaid (son of Dennis and Kimberly Quaid) his name means twin and he is one. The poor little guy fought for his life at ten days old, and proved maybe a strong biblical name doesn't guarantee strength but seeing is believing.

9) Zev Isaac Miller (son of Marisa Jaret Winour) the hairspray star chose a name that honors her Jewish heritage without sounding so outrageously ethnic as some others.

10) Levi Alves McConaughey (son of Matthew McConaughey and Camille Alves) simple, biblical, mom's maiden name as a middle name. Unique but not so far out.

So what about you? Any baby names that riled you up or made you say "Yes! Someone normal in Hollywood!"

Revisiting this topic...family size and how they come about

Over at Inside Catholic, Danielle Bean has a great column about large families in mass culture. In it, she describes how, despite their not being married, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, are promoting a family culture. A LARGE family culture. This broke down in the comboxes as "yes, by and large in the secular world, large families are an oddity and a curiousity at most, but they are the norm in the Catholic faith." But this was followed up by a great conversation about how many in the church show prejudice and judgment of those families in the pews whose ranks are not sporting a baseball team.

I try to live my life by, judge not, lest thou be judged. I find it's a pretty good policy because we never know another's circumstances just from appearances. But some of the harshest judgments I have ever heard were by Catholic women, in church, about other families. A woman in my church has only two children. Her two girls are her source of joy. She would have loved to have a platoon of kids, but that wasn't to be. I was sitting by myself one Sunday and saw her come in with her girls and husband, genuflect and sit down. She smiled and waved to me (we are acquainted) and I returned the gesture. Behind me, I heard a growl. I didn't turn around as I knew the couple sitting behind me. Not well, and I don't plan on getting to know them that well, but, I have met them. I heard the woman behind me's voice to her husband, "I can't believe they can go up and receive communion when they are so blatantly using birth control!" I prayed for God to give me strength. I prayed for God to give me self-control. I prayed this woman would stop the sin of gossip. I prayed she would realize she was wrong about this. The woman with the two children does not use birth control. She doesn't need to. Like a member of my family, she nearly died during a vbac birth when her uterus ruptured and she almost bled out. A hysterectomy was performed to save her life. I was part of a prayer chain the prayed for her when it was uncertain if she would survive. And in talking to her after her second daugther was born, I found out she didn't want the vbac. She wanted a repeat c-section, but her SAHM Catholic mothers playgroup convinced her she had not experienced birth because of her c-section with her first daughter, a transverse postioned baby. I was aghast that these women in her group had treated her that way. Even moreso because, okay, now she had a "natural birth" and almost a "natural death."

"Had I listened to my own heart and not worried about the judgment of others, I could have had more children," she said woefully to me at the time. I wished this woman sitting behind me could have heard that.

One commenter to the article about the Jolie-Pitts stated that Catholics are now becoming "contraception-minded" and part of the culture of death. Her reasoning made perfect sense to me. Because of their "openness to life" many in our pews feel it is their duty to be the inquisition where the reproductive lives of others are concerned. Now, I am not talking about abortion here. That is wrong, we all know it. But as this commenter stated a common and prevailing them from many moms (and sometimes dads) of large families: "If you WEREN'T contracepting, then clearly God would give you as many kids as he gave us!" Sadly, I've seen and heard it all.

And it is precisely this attitude that brings me to the second item I discovered recently. Over at Crunchy Con, Rod Dreher is taking a break and Erin Manning is filling in for him. She posted recently about an NYT review of a new book chronicling an infertile couple's quest to have a child by surrogacy. She went on to mention how many poor women are deciding to become surrogates to help supplement their income and the moral and ethical implications of surrogacy.
(A warning, I LOVE this blog, but some of the commenters are a bit "colorful" so, know the sensitivity of your constitution before wandering the comboxes.) The commenters blew up, Rod, taking a break from his break, turns this into a "liberals v conservatives" debate again and there is a lot of space, waste--er devoted--to this by some of the commenters, but there are also some who just question the overall morality and the ethical question. One male commenter points out that having biological children is not a right. Several commenters point out that they know people who were unable to conceive naturally and went to adoption only to have the door slammed in their faces. But, very quietly, a few posters remind that having one's own biological children is a standard among which many are judged in our culture.

And so it is. While the culture at large does put a price on carrying on your family name, as Catholics we often wrongly put real pressure on people to conceive and carry their own children.

We are, after all, the denomination that adores Mary (we do not worship her) for being the woman that carried Christ. Just yesterday, we celebrated the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe and Monday, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. We revere the family unit. We ask pregnant women to come forward for a "special" blessing on Mother's Day. We pray that "blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus."

I don't disagree with any of this. But all of this allows some members of our church to justify judging others. When a woman is unable to conceive, there is a deep and profound sense of loss that cannot fully be understood by someone who has not gone through it. Before having my own children, my husband and I went through a period of infertility due to an anatomical abnormality of mine that had to be surgically corrected. As I watched friends become pregnant while we were trying and month after month went by, I kept thinking, something is wrong with me. What are they doing that I'm not? What have I done to anger God so much that this we can't have a baby? I would pray at my church's chapel to Our Lady of Guadalupe for forgiveness, I would ask God what I should do to repent. No one I knew personally was going through this, and my husband and I felt very alone. I would see large families at mass. I would watch baptisms. I would think, will this ever be me? I knew the church was against IVF and IUI. I knew surrogacy was out of the question even if the church allowed it because of money. I was from a large family, no one else in recent history had fertility problems as a young person in their 20's, I just didn't get it.

I look back on that now and see that although no one said anything to my face, seeing so many with their own babies and large families, did play into my psyche that something was wrong with me. It makes me wish the Catholic church would promote blessings on Mother's and Father's days of people unable to become parents (not one where you get called out to the altar, but a general one). After all, I had looked into adoption too, and that was very prohibitive and almost more difficult than fertility treaments. The general lack of support I have written about before from many Catholics for adoption (by adopting themselves) also discouraged me.

I can very easily see where many couples would be tempted by judgment of others as well as a lack of support for adoption and a feeling of inadequacy due to culture within the church to seek out fertility treatments. While biological children are certainly not a right, there are many out there who see them as a responsibility and if you can't do it on your own, well, then are you really a responsible Catholic in good standing? And the Bible is a bit murky on this for us. After all, Sarah, desparate for a child, gives Hagar to Abraham and we have our earliest known surrogate. And Hannah prays for a son while we are told her husband's other wife is fruitful and multiplying.

We must stop judging one another. We must realize that there are pains for families both large and small. As much as it galled me when a friend said she didn't think she would have more than two children because she and her husband would be outnumbered (forgetting she was a third child evidentally), I find it every bit as wrong for someone with eight to say that the mom of one must be contracepting.

Instead, we should all be praying for one another. We should be loving each other. We should stop thinking of "our family" v "their family" and think of ourselves as the ONE body of Christ. We should realize that all families have their unique struggles and respect those. We must promote adoption as a way to increase the body of Christ. Adoption of the disabled as well as the healthy, the babies that look like us vs those who do not. If we take on these challenges, we will be true promoters of life.

Symbol

There is a symbol that has been a part of all my Christmases. And this year, I'm not sure if it will be part of the festivities.

O Tannenbaum! Your branches are beautiful and your scent divine but you are a danger to my toddlers and dogs alike!

Late Night Mothering

My children have a virus. Croup is part of this virus. Last night I had to waken a feverish toddler to force Motrin in her. After an hour that fever broke and I had a sweaty, uncomfortable toddler on my hands. We established a pallet on the floor in the living room. Eventually, the toddler woke up again. At 2 am we were having a nasty croup attack. And so into a steamy bathroom we went. Of course at this point the toddler was wide awake and Mommy was dead tired. So we gave into TV to let the toddler have some amusement and Mommy got sleep.

Late night mothering gives us the rare opportunity to be selfless in ways we don't expect. And at a time when no one can laud us for the "heroic sacrifices" of motherhood. It makes muscles ache and heads spin with exhaustion. And not so a voice can say, "Thanks Mom" but so we can see a smiling face just eating breakfast and find a child tearing apart his or her room with so much energy it just can't be possible.

I am happy to report that said toddler is fully recovered now!

Shouldn't It Be Thanksgiving Every Day?

There is a song about it being Christmas in our hearts all year long. The idea of goodwill to our fellow man and Christian charity lasting everyday is a wonderful idea.

And so should be the idea of Thanksgiving. Thanking God for the gifts in our life should be an action of our everyday lives. We should be celebrating the abundance God gives at each family meal and gathering. And we should be using our talents in ways pleasing to God on all occasions.

This post is the result of my enduring much grousing by others regarding not getting to spend a traditional meal on a particular day with certain people. I understand well the emotional pull of family and cultural traditions. But I feel sadness that these people cannot see past the the disappointment to celebrate the bounty of their life's harvest.

Baby It's Cold Outside!

We live in an area where very cold temps are common in winter. But snow never comes. Occasionally we get ice (which means, black ice). So when the few flurries dance in the breeze, it's a big deal.

I love the cold weather. It makes snuggling under blankets and cups of hot cocoa and hot cider all the more cozy. Apparently I am raising babies who feel the same way. The other night, we were preparing for bed. The two-year-old was jumping on her mini-trampoline. And the baby was crawling around. He was looking for a place to crash. He crawled over to his sister's toddler bed and pulled down her pillows and made himself a small palate. Then he squealed with delight as I wrapped him up in a blanket. His sister, stopped jumping and joined in, wanting Mommy to wrap her up too! We looked like a burrito family, wrapped up tight in our warmth and love.

It Does a Mother's Heart Good....

Here is an exerpt from a letter that I received from Michael who is a recruit in basic training for the US Marine Corps at Parris Island, SC.

"I go to church on Sundays. Church here is awesome.The priest is a Navy Chaplain. He starts by greeting each company in a very enthusiastic manner and the music is Catholic hymns sung in a gospel type manner. His homilies relate the gospel to us as marine recruits. Mass is so cool that the people who are not catholic choose to go."

The first sentance alone gave me joy.
It gives my heart peace to know that his faith is a companion for him on this journey.

Forever a mother am I.

Losses

We all deal with loss differently. Oh, I know all about those stages and steps, but there are still differences.

This morning, a body was found at a local elementary school. It was an adult and the death was determined to have been from natural causes, but classes were cancelled at the school and the children were taken to a nearby middle school to have their parents pick them up. My husband text messaged me that he hoped that none of the children had seen the body. I told him I hoped so as well, but I was sure counselors would be on hand tomorrow just in case.

He then text messaged me that only liberals would want counselors and his solution was to take the kids the funeral home and the baby hospital (the mother-baby floor in a local hospital) to show death and life as natural things.

Now this really boiled my blood here are the three follow- up texts I sent to him:
1) Having counselors is not a liberal vs conservative thing. And I don't suggest that taking children to a funeral home is a good thing for kids because those people don't "look" dead.

2) Both birth and death are traumatic experiences for those who witness them. Counselors help facilitate for children that it is okay for them to have mixed emotions or happy or sad ones at such an event and how to express those emotions. (In short, we have to learn to grieve and work through our grief. Children often need the assistance of a counselor to walk them through this process.)

3) I agree that birth and death are natural processes and should be treated as such but that should not negate that they are emotional processes as well.

His response was a message saying I was right. What was that? I was right?

A recent thread I was reading on a blog was about loss, specifically miscarriage.

Having suffered a miscarriage, I knew greatly the sadness of losing a child one loved so much but had not met. The woman who started the thread had just suffered her second miscarriage in less than six months. Many women responded to her fears that she was too old (39) to have children. Many more responded to her sense of loss. I suffered a miscarriage at 24. Most women don't get a reason. I got one. I was born with a defect in my uterus which prevented the baby growing. The doctor also suspected I had had several other miscarriages that were early and for that reason not detected. The only thing I could do was undergo surgery. Surgery we couldn't afford until I switched jobs and got better insurance. I was then blessed with two children. I hope, someday, I may be blessed with more.

One woman very insightfully noted that the original woman who posted should take adequate time to grieve each of her children. It was a sentiment that struck me. After our loss, I sought out guidance from my priest. A wonderful man, he asked me how I felt about attending a "Mass of the Angels." I had never heard of this, but it is a beautiful mass the church created especially for this type of loss. I was touched by the number and range of women I saw at the mass. The church was crowded. Instead of a homily, our priest asked a woman to come forward and speak about her loss. The woman who spoke was in her early seventies and lost her first child as a twenty-year-old. She talked about how not a day in her life goes by that she doesn't think of that child. How, with each child she gave birth to, the whole in her heart became smaller, but never fully went away. She talked about teaching her children of their brother or sister in heaven who was looking out for them, and helping their guardian angels watch over them. In her voice, I could hear the strength God had given her to overcome this loss. And I also heard the sadness of a child she never knew, but would one day meet in heaven.

She also talked about how unrealistic the views of healing from this type of loss were fifty-odd some years before. How her family expected her to, "snap out of it." How friends didn't know how to react. She spoke of how, when speaking to her niece recently who had also suffered a miscarriage, her niece asked for guidance when people would say things to her such as, "Well, at least you know you can get pregnant," or "you can always have another one." Comments that were well intented, but well off the mark. Every woman seemed to nod, we had all heard them. It made me think to one of the few comments that had comforted me early on, a male co-worker, hearing of my loss, said, "I want to tell you how sorry I am, but I really believe God has something else planned for you and that baby. I know that's probably not what you want to hear and doesn't make the pain any easier, but I had to tell you and I know I wouldn't be your first choice to talk to, but I'm always here, and you'll be in my prayers." It was a clumsy attempt, but it was genuine. He wasn't searching for the "right thing to say," he was just saying it.

The woman giving the "homily" was giving the advice to pray for the person saying these things, that they were just trying in their imperfect, human way to acknowledge your loss.

In her book, A Catholic Woman's Book of Days, Amy Welborn relates a similar lesson, when after the loss of a pregnancy a friend said to her, "It's too bad, but I guess it's better than getting a broken doll, isn't it?" Welborn doesn't relate her response, but offers this prayer, Lord, forgive me for the times I have hurt others with my words, even unintentionally.

These are lessons we could all apply regardless of the type of loss.
1) Give yourself time to grieve.
2) Do not put a time table on healing. God works on His time, not yours.
3) People's human responses are just that, human, and therefore, imperfect.
4) Don't expect to never feel sadness, that whole in your heart may grow smaller, but it will never disappear.
5) Sadness is an emotion, God gave us these emotions and they are good.
6) Loss is natural, it is also emotional.
7) You cannot prepare for a loss, the finality is only real when you've experienced it.
8) Trust that God will have different plans for you although you cannot understand it.
9) We must respect the pain that others go through in their losses.
10) No loss is small to someone experiencing it. Don't roll your eyes at the neighbor whose cat has died. That cat may have been all they had.

"For I know the plans I have for you says the Lord..."
~Jeremiah 29:11a

There Are Some Days

When I feel sublime.

Today is not one of those days. This is one of those days that I wish God did not trust me so much.

Right now God is trusting me to not lose my cool when customers cuss me out. He's trusting me not to quit my job because of a hostile work environment (see the customers cussing me out above), fatigue, and missing my kids.

I am praying for strength. I am praying for sanity. I am praying that at least one of my customers will realize I am a human being and that I deserve to be treated like one. (I'm not counting on God answering that last one the way I would like.)

The day will be over soon and I hope I will get a good nights sleep. After all tomorrow will be its own gift.

Milestone

Shelby Clare made a major breakthrough. She peed on the potty last night! Now for various reasons we are taking a fairly laissez-faire approach to potty training with her. So far, we have placed her potty in her room and allowed both her and Joey to play with it and be comfortable with it. At the advice of her therapists we are not having a "big potty training talk," and we have an Elmo video about potty training which it turns out Shelby, despite loving Elmo, loathes. So, after her bath, I dried Shelby off, and walked her to her room. I decided to wait a minute on her diaper, and sat her on the potty. I sang her some songs and had no expectations other than to make Shelby happy and have her sit on the potty for a few minutes. When she was ready to get up something caught my eye. Whether she realized it, Shelby used the potty the way it was meant to be used! Her Daddy and I praised her and I cleaned the potty. We realize this doesn't mean Shelby will be trained any time in the near future and that this early victory may be accompanied by setbacks and possibly no further developments for sometime, but, for the moment, we are basking in the proud parental glow!

What are Little Boys Made Of....

What are little boys made of?
Snips and snails, and puppy-dogs' tails,
That's what little boys are made of.
What are little girls made of?
Sugar and spice, and everything nice,
That's what little girls are made of.
~Robert Southey

I've come to realize over the last couple of months that boys are very different than girls.

Well, duh. And you think I would know that being the only girl with three brothers growing up, but I guess, I forgot. And I hadn't seen this from a mother's perspective before.

Joseph Patrick, my wonderful son who I named after the father of our Lord and the saint who drove the snakes out of Ireland, some days has horns growing out of his halo. He is angelic in appearance with blond hair, and big, innocent looking blue eyes. He smiles and is sooo cute. Then he pulls his sister's hair.

There are some things that Shelby did not do, that her brother is teaching us all about. First there is the hitting. Joey can't give a kiss without following up by hitting you in the face. I'm not kidding. Last weekend, at my parents' home, my mother came over to me holding Joey and exclaimed happily, "He gave me a kiss!"

"Did he hit you in the face right after?" I asked.

"Yeah, pretty much." This woman gave birth to three boys. Some days I wonder how she has any semblance of sanity.

Shelby did bite for a very short period of time (and this was restricted to me, with the exception of my mother one time). Joseph has been biting for 3 months. Everyone. Luckily, at daycare, they have been able to stop him before another child was the victim.

And here we come to something that Shelby could not have done if she wanted. On my birthday, while he was supposed to be napping, I heard a squeal of delight come from Joseph's room. This, I knew, could not be good. Previous squeals of this sort revealed a dog having his ears pulled or a newspaper being shredded and eaten. He was in his crib though, what could he be doing? I opened the door. He had removed his diaper and was standing up peeing through the slats on the crib onto the floor. On, the upside, a friend with two boys said, he might potty train more easily since he has the standing thing down. On the downside, he knows how to take his diaper off and peed on my floor! He was ever so proud of himself and continued to squeal even when I told him, "It's not very nice to make Mommy clean up pee-pee on her birthday!"

My brother Michael (Joseph's uncle and Godfather) informed me that, of course Joey had to be delighted. Being able to stand up and pee was the greatest thing since sliced bread. I didn't know what I had been missing.

Now for those who think I must capitalize on this development...we have encountered another problem. The potty we were given for Shelby to start training is being used by Joseph, to put in whatever he wants to discard. His socks, an empty sippy cup, a toy he is done with, have all be retrieved.

Now, I did learn something important from that...our bathroom door remains closed. If there is one thing I know about children in general and boys in particular is that if you hear a toilet flush and then hear "uh-oh" it's already too late.