If you know me in real life, you will know that I am usually very active. I like to work out, I like to play with my kids, I keep a clean house, I love to cook, and bake and I have hobbies. I write. I never stop talking.
I'm pregnant right now, and I have been sick, sick, sick. Part of it is nausea (blech), hyper-smell which makes the nausea worse, and a large helping of dizziness and exhaustion. Apparently these are all normal, because my body is drastically increasing its blood supply for the new baby, but it all comes together to make me feel like garbage. I haven't been super chipper about it.
In fact, I've been downright depressed at times.
I take showers sitting down. I spend almost all day in bed. I'm sick before I eat, and after I eat, and sometimes I get to taste things a second time. All in all, my days drag into weeks, and into months, and since I don't really know when it will be over, I get a little down about it.
Today, after another depressing sit-down shower, something struck me very clearly. I have been richly blessed with a body that functions properly. Every time we've wanted to get pregnant and have a baby, we've been blessed with one immediately. (Most times the very first month.) All but one of my pregnancies have gone very well, sickness aside. I know the sickness means my body is making progesterone, a hormone that's important to a baby's growth. All in all, I have been richly blessed, in every single aspect of my life.
It got me thinking about all the things I'm thankful for this Thanksgiving season. I'm well known among my family members for not loving Halloween (yes, I'm a Halloween scrooge. I do decorate my house, for the record, and I let my kids get dressed and go out, too. It's just, I don't love the greediness that I feel permeates the whole holiday!) But anyway, as much as I get annoyed by Halloween, I ADORE Thanksgiving! I love the idea of counting all your blessings and being happy for the things you have. So here is a list of things that, this Thanksgiving, I am grateful for.
1. I love my husband. I know this is where I'm supposed to list God first. I love God, I really do, and I know all my blessings come from him, but He gives me those blessings, in large part, through my husband. I have the best husband I have ever seen or heard of, and I don't mean that as hyperbole. He puts me first, always. He is patient. He is kind. He is considerate, and caring. He is funny and smart and responsible. He never gets upset at my shortcomings and he loves me with all my flaws.
He swore when we started dating that he would take care of me, and at the time, I thought it was sweet, but un-necessary. I mean, I was a smart, responsible, independent lady. I didn't need someone to care for me.
Except I have needed that every single day of our marriage, and he has always been there to honor his promise.
Some days he's been the only thing that kept me going. I've been sick, I've struggled with pregnancy, with babies, with job difficulties, with friend or family drama. I've made mistakes and struggled with them. Every single step of the way, for every single difficult thing I've surmounted, my husband has been there, lifting me up, carrying me over, supporting me without judgement and with unfailing love. I have trouble expressing the vast emotion I feel for him in the medium of language, but I will tell you it is overwhelming, it is unending. I love this man. He is my greatest blessing.
2. I love my God, the gospel, and the Holy Ghost. I have truly felt my Father in Heaven's love for me, and the love of his Son, my Savior. I've felt these things from the Spirit of God, which each of us can experience. I have received inspiration and revelation for the course of my life and that of my family. I have had concerns resolved, problems solved, pains salved, and inspiration to direct my words and actions. I have felt the light of forgiveness and the warmth of loving guidance from a brother and father who care. I am so grateful for the peace and joy the gospel of Jesus Christ and its restoration have brought to my life.
3. I am grateful for my children. They are exhausting. They are irritating. They are time consuming and often tedious. They can make me doubt my own worth and sanity. But they are also beautiful little spirits I have been given the responsibility to watch over and protect, to rear and train, here on earth. I'm grateful for that stewardship and the joy they bring to me. I don't believe babies naturally know how to love, or what it is. I have been truly blessed to help teach my children what it means to serve, to love, to care, and to grow.
I am constantly amazed by their capacity to understand, to strengthen our family in ways I never expected. Their little personalities shine out, each one different, each one divine. I can't wait to meet this last little addition, and to round out our family. You sacrifice a lot when you have children: your time, your belongings, your peace, and your sanity most of the time.
You don't realize when you get started that it is the sacrifices you make that are the richest blessing of having children. The children are their own people, but in being who they are, they transform you into something better: a parent. You grow as a person while you help them grow. I am so grateful for the opportunity I have to be a mother.
4. I cherish my extended family, and dearest friends. I have been blessed with an angelic mother, a devoted father, and wonderful in-laws. I have a brother and sister here on earth that I am so lucky to have, and to live near. I have another brother who is no longer with us here on earth, and I have a brother whom I've sort of adopted to fill that hole. I am so grateful for the sealing power that allows us to remain sealed to our parents and to our spouse after this life. I'm grateful for the power of resurrection, that one day we will be reunited with our loved ones who have passed. I'm grateful each and every day for the time I can spend with my family and my dear friends, and the joy and fullness they bring to my life. I am grateful for the joy it has brought me to see each of my siblings with an eternal companion, as happy with that companion as I am with mine.
It's funny how sometimes bad things help you appreciate the good. My mom (and mother in law) couldn't have been such an amazing support to me if I hadn't gotten quite so sick. It's my difficulty in pregnancy that allowed my gratitude for their unfaltering service. I might never have been as close to my "adoptive" brother Brian if Jesse hadn't died. I might never have developed such a close relationship with a sister who is five years my junior if she hadn't been my rock during a painful and difficult divorce. I might never have had a cheerful, beloved Linsey for a sister in law, if we hadn't both endured law school. (Ok, not as bad as a death or divorce, but if you've been through law school, you'll know it's a special kind of misery.)
This list could go on and on and on, and in my mind, it will. But I want to leave you with this thought today. If you are going through a dark time, a painful time, or a difficult loss, pray for God to let you see the joy, the beauty, and the blessing that will develop from that. I have a firm belief in God's principle of compensation. We lose things and we suffer so that we can grow, so that we can improve, so that we can comprehend. God will always bless us richly during and after these dark times if we will open our eyes to see it. Open your eyes and look for the blessings around you. I promise you they are there, or they will be if you will exercise a little faith. This Thanksgiving season, it is my hope that all my friends and family will be surrounded with their blessings, filled with their love and gratitude for them, and comforted with the joy that comes from the light and love of God in their lives.
Sunday, November 22, 2015
Thursday, November 12, 2015
They Stare at Each Other
One of my favorite lines in The Little Mermaid is when Scuttle the seagull is explaining to Ariel that humans used to "Stare at each other all day. Got very boring." I sometimes wonder what it looks like to outsiders when we are all staring at screens all day. Pretty boring, I imagine.
Today, Emmy has been staring at an iPad screen for over an hour. She is absolutely taken with this game called Monster Petshop. Emmy is only four. She has almost no concept of time. When she asks me how long something is, I tell her, "It's five spongebob shows." Or something like that. Otherwise my answer means almost nothing to her. Well, on this monster petshop game, you have a shop that sells various monsters. In order to get them, you buy or make eggs, and then to go select an egg to incubate. Emmy doesn't know how to get an egg started, so she will ask me or her dad to do it. Then she will sit and stare at it until it starts to "wiggle" so she knows to hatch it. The egg has a timer above it that tells you how long it has. Some eggs only incubate for an hour. Others for four hours, or even twelve.
She sat and stared (despite my repeated suggestions that she turn it off and come back) at the game for an hour while her egg incubated, asking me at intervals how much longer it would be. Finally, the hour long incubation ended and the anticipated egg hatched! She was giddy, and didn't complain a bit. Of course, the second egg I incubated for her has a 4 hour incubation period. She is still staring at it, lovingly, and asking me how much longer it will be every five minutes or so. It's a little annoying, but she's so patient and happy about it. (I won't address how much the music from this game is beginning to annoy me. Ha!)
It has come to my attention that we are much like a child with a game we don't understand, but on a slightly larger scale. A few weeks ago, I was only a month and a half pregnant. I was feeling fine and working out every day. Then one day, I started bleeding. The time I had bled before, I lost the baby. So I panicked. I had a baby shower to go to that day, and after sobbing in a fetal position about the bleeding and what I figured was a miscarriage for a few hours, I got myself together and went to a baby shower to coo about the upcoming children my cousin would have. That entire time, the bleeding continued, and I felt so much sadness for this little baby I hadn't even known I'd have for very long.
I fretted, I worried, I panicked, I sorrowed. I could not look away from the egg that was incubating. I just sat, staring at it. Then I arrived home from the shower. I said a little prayer before going back inside, and sitting in my car, I felt the Spirit of God so strongly I began to cry, but this time with joy instead of fear. The Holy Ghost told me that it would be okay. The baby would be alright. Everything was fine. A great peace took hold of my heart that day, and to this day, weeks and weeks later, I can still feel that peace. I knew then that a loving Heavenly Father would tell us, "It's okay to look away from the screen. All will be well."
I also know that sometimes, all is not well. Sometimes a bleed means a miscarriage. Sometimes we really are sick and God won't take away our pain, but He will still be there to give us peace and speak to our souls. It must be annoying to have us incessantly asking how much longer, when He knows we can't understand His full answer, but He will still tell us we can look away from the screen. He will remind us to go on living our lives, and not let this one thing take over. Currently I'm in the middle of being sick from the pregnancy, the baby that was in fact fine. I have been sick for a long time now, and I don't know how long it will last. My inclination is again, to stare at that egg. To obsess over it. To fret, and worry, and sorrow about my life right now. A loving Heavenly Father is there to remind me, to look away from the screen.
I guess my inspiration today was that we all need to look away from the things that we can't change right now. Try to live your life with peace and joy, and if you ask, God will help you with that. He will tend to the things you can't change, the things that take an inexplicable amount of time, if you will let Him. He can see and make sense of that little timer, the one we don't yet comprehend. If you place your faith in Him, He will help you gain perspective and find the joy in the things around you that are ready and that can fulfill you now, instead of worrying over things you can't change.
Today, Emmy has been staring at an iPad screen for over an hour. She is absolutely taken with this game called Monster Petshop. Emmy is only four. She has almost no concept of time. When she asks me how long something is, I tell her, "It's five spongebob shows." Or something like that. Otherwise my answer means almost nothing to her. Well, on this monster petshop game, you have a shop that sells various monsters. In order to get them, you buy or make eggs, and then to go select an egg to incubate. Emmy doesn't know how to get an egg started, so she will ask me or her dad to do it. Then she will sit and stare at it until it starts to "wiggle" so she knows to hatch it. The egg has a timer above it that tells you how long it has. Some eggs only incubate for an hour. Others for four hours, or even twelve.
She sat and stared (despite my repeated suggestions that she turn it off and come back) at the game for an hour while her egg incubated, asking me at intervals how much longer it would be. Finally, the hour long incubation ended and the anticipated egg hatched! She was giddy, and didn't complain a bit. Of course, the second egg I incubated for her has a 4 hour incubation period. She is still staring at it, lovingly, and asking me how much longer it will be every five minutes or so. It's a little annoying, but she's so patient and happy about it. (I won't address how much the music from this game is beginning to annoy me. Ha!)
It has come to my attention that we are much like a child with a game we don't understand, but on a slightly larger scale. A few weeks ago, I was only a month and a half pregnant. I was feeling fine and working out every day. Then one day, I started bleeding. The time I had bled before, I lost the baby. So I panicked. I had a baby shower to go to that day, and after sobbing in a fetal position about the bleeding and what I figured was a miscarriage for a few hours, I got myself together and went to a baby shower to coo about the upcoming children my cousin would have. That entire time, the bleeding continued, and I felt so much sadness for this little baby I hadn't even known I'd have for very long.
I fretted, I worried, I panicked, I sorrowed. I could not look away from the egg that was incubating. I just sat, staring at it. Then I arrived home from the shower. I said a little prayer before going back inside, and sitting in my car, I felt the Spirit of God so strongly I began to cry, but this time with joy instead of fear. The Holy Ghost told me that it would be okay. The baby would be alright. Everything was fine. A great peace took hold of my heart that day, and to this day, weeks and weeks later, I can still feel that peace. I knew then that a loving Heavenly Father would tell us, "It's okay to look away from the screen. All will be well."
I also know that sometimes, all is not well. Sometimes a bleed means a miscarriage. Sometimes we really are sick and God won't take away our pain, but He will still be there to give us peace and speak to our souls. It must be annoying to have us incessantly asking how much longer, when He knows we can't understand His full answer, but He will still tell us we can look away from the screen. He will remind us to go on living our lives, and not let this one thing take over. Currently I'm in the middle of being sick from the pregnancy, the baby that was in fact fine. I have been sick for a long time now, and I don't know how long it will last. My inclination is again, to stare at that egg. To obsess over it. To fret, and worry, and sorrow about my life right now. A loving Heavenly Father is there to remind me, to look away from the screen.
I guess my inspiration today was that we all need to look away from the things that we can't change right now. Try to live your life with peace and joy, and if you ask, God will help you with that. He will tend to the things you can't change, the things that take an inexplicable amount of time, if you will let Him. He can see and make sense of that little timer, the one we don't yet comprehend. If you place your faith in Him, He will help you gain perspective and find the joy in the things around you that are ready and that can fulfill you now, instead of worrying over things you can't change.
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