One is ten. Two is fifteen. Three is seventeen. Four is BOOM.

Four months into to life with four ex utero, and my days are a mix of peace, fulfillment, meaning. Oh, and nine parts anger, stress, and denial that this--this noise and chaos and bodily-fluid-and-rambunktion cocktail--is our relatively-newish normal.

In the last five and half years, Papa and I have weathered the new parent experience (an insanely high learning curve), the two-under-two juggle, the three-easing-in gig. Pearly Girl's arrival was smooth, and within three weeks I was thinking, "This is easy. Cool!" Deluded, I thought I was proving to be just the kind of mega-awesome mom I always knew I was.

But the last few months have exploded my self-satisfied smugness. No, I can't point to crime-worthy messes or even particular instances so much as my general feeling of physical and emotional exhaustion. And I began realizing a few months ago that this wasn't depression; it was life. And if this was what my life was like, then my understanding of myself was being blasted to smithereens.

I had a breakthrough last month when I struck up a conversation with another mom of four whose kids are roughly a year ahead of each of ours. "So, does it get easier?" I asked hesitatingly, half-giggling, hoping that she could hear, and yet hoping she would miss, the barely-disguised hysteria behind my generic question.

"Yeah, it does," she said. Then she gazed down at her one-year-old and helped me to some perspective. "But four is hard. Everybody said, 'If you can do three, you can do four, five six.' And three for us was cake. But four was..." her voice trailed off. She looked at me. "I had a hard time. I had postpartum depression, which I'd never had with the other three kids. But my sisters-in-law helped. [They have four kids each, too.] They told me four was tough for them, too, but that it would get better." She paused, steadying the barely-walking brave soul hanging on to her pant leg. "Now the baby wants to go off on his own, and I'm like, 'He's not my baby anymore!' and at the same time I'm like, 'Go! Go!'"

Empathy comes in many forms, and sometimes it trickles into our lives almost unconsciously, emerging as in-the-trenches shared experience. Mom-of-four Amy put into words what I had been struggling to admit even to myself--that four kids is somehow astronomically harder to manage, but in subtle ways, that makes the very difficulty in care somehow negligible. I had felt like I was slowly drowning--and in truth, I still do, many days--but I felt like I couldn't acknowledge it because, well, three kids had been easy, and so many people told me that "if you could manage three, then you can manage four fine." Maybe someday I'll start second-guessing gross generalizations about parenting and spare myself the unrealistic expectations and inevitable guilty fallout.

I also felt like I couldn't acknowledge what our life is like because to do so prompts many people to jump to an illogical, if tenaciously popular, way of thinking. It goes something like this: if I, a mother of four, say that being a stay-at-home mother is hard, then I'm admitting failure. If I admit failure, then I 1) should really look into doing something more productive with my time, like working at something away from my children that tangibly and reliably rewards my efforts (unlike my current routine, which swings from high highs and low lows, like a bipolar monkey. Yep, pretty much like that), and 2) should stop embracing life and being open to more children. Because who in her right mind wants more of what causes her stress, sleeplessness, and six days straight of no showers? (Okay, it's usually not that bad. I had to pick a number that started with 's.' And 'seventeen' would have just scared people away.) In the midst of this juggle, I didn't know how to begin to respond to these arguments. In fact, I wasn't sure that I could personally categorically reject them, though logically I knew they were flawed.

A few years ago, Glennon Melton, a blogger at Momastery, wrote a great post entitled "Don't Carpe Diem," which went viral. In it, she discusses this very conundrum.

Parenting is hard. Just like lots of important jobs are hard. Why is it that the second a mother admits that it's hard, people feel the need to suggest that maybe she's not doing it right? Or that she certainly shouldn't add more to her load. Maybe the fact that it's so hard means she IS doing it right...in her own way...and she happens to be honest.

I disagree with some points here: I'm not doing it right, and I can't judge motherhood by my own standard (more on that in a bit). But the honesty part is what struck me, both when Amy talked to me and I read what Glennon wrote to the blogosphere. What is this life but hardships? And why was I stressing so much about the sheer hardness of life with small children? When I spend more than two seconds listening to myself, I realize how often the wambulance wails in my head and how I really do need to kick the wimpiness to the curb. In Lutheran-speak, I need to confess and repent the real culprit behind my stress: my own pride. I need to banish the Pharisee of Superwoman who, in a different but related vein, tries to keep me enslaved to the belief that I can control my life the way I want--and show the world how I really can live the perfect parent-magazine-spread life and put all those other moms to shame. That I can, in fact, do motherhood right, and do it right all the time, perfectly.

I realize that I am staggering from one ditch of self-pity and naval-gazing to another ditch of self-glorifying Mommydom. Both ways leave me with zero comfort and plenty of pent-up anxiety. Worse yet, I am leaving the One who can actually steer the ship, right the course, calm my heart, and lead me and mine to the Way Everlasting when I insist on thinking all of these gifts are entitlements and rewards. And I end up buried. As hard as I pity myself or congratulate myself, the law written on my heart whispers the truth: I fail at this mommy thing. I sin against my children daily, hourly. And real pity doesn't apply to evil. The meek were truly helpless and deserving of pity; I'm a sinner worthy of death. And I dwell on myself to the exclusion of every real good gift, like a massive quantity of explosives simmering before a lighted fuse. As Chad Bird put it in this blogpost among many other fine ones, "Behold, the sin of the world, that takes away the Lamb of God!"

Struggling is not abnormal. Struggling is what we do in this life. But struggling should not excuse the sins that hide behind it. I am angry many times because I think God is unfair to make my life something other than an Emommy awards show, that my service to my children goes unnoticed by most of the world, usually including my children; that my efforts don't merit a paycheck or an impressive job title or an awesome alumni magazine write-up. And my anger is so incredibly sinful, so immeasurably petty and juvenile, because God Himself did for me what I so dimly, blunderingly do for my own children. He loves me first and puts Himself aside. And He did this in His earthly life with the ultimate humility and grace and endless love. And remarkably, He still does love me, the merit-less and worthless, and gives Himself to me still.

And for this I am eternally grateful. And I am reminded, however fleetingly in this frenzied life, that He carries my sorrows, even the silly ones; He was cursed for my transgressions, even from my most terrible hatred down to my most childish anger. Upon Him was laid the chastisement that brings me ultimate peace, and by His stripes, I--with the messy remnants of my pride and sins raining in and on and through me--am healed and cleansed.

Because explosions can be beautiful.

Newsworthy Rats

So Papa and I decided a few months ago to begin a subscription to The Wall Street Journal. We've done so in the past, but stopped them due to major, major delivery problems (like the paper not coming three days out of six) and budget issues. We love the paper; we just like getting it when it's not too much of a budget crunch or when we, you know, actually get it. We'll determine in the next few weeks if the current delivery practice of our unknown paper carrier continues (he or she lies to drive onto our front lawn to leave the paper on our porch. And in Minnesota midwinter, the tire tracks on the front lawn are a little, um, obvious and presumptuous. In other words, WHO DOES THAT?! We've tried to report him or her, but still the tracks remain. So it goes in rural America, at least here, with us, with this newspaper saga).

Now that this post has included so many parentheticals that you're wondering what the point it, it's this. One of the reasons we love getting a physical newspaper is because we can share it with the kids. Yes, they're young, and most of them can't read. But they like looking at the pictures and discussing them, and it's far more enjoyable to hold a paper newspaper than to read it online (or at least Papa and I think). So last week, when I read this article about rat-throwing at a local festival in Spain, I knew we had a winner. The boys loved the article, Little Professor so much so that he proceeded to read it out loud several times several days later. There's innocent glee when a five-year-old snickers as he reads, "Despite animal-rights activists' objections to the practice, locals last year once again threw caution to the wind—along with rodents." If this encourages my children to read and learn about the world, then I just might be able to tolerate the tire-tracks on the lawn--for a little while, at least.

Queen of the Bowl

Pearly girl is moving toward independence by leaps and bounds. By independence I don't mean driving motorized vehicles, paying her own rent, and generally assuming the responsibilities of adults--though I suppose her progress is a start. 

I We officially began the great procession known as the weaning of diapers on Saturday, January 4. With the boys, our system--if you can even call it that--was less official and more gradual (diapers to pull-ups or the much-preferable training pants, with rubber pants, then without, and finally moving into actual dandified underwear as the ultimate prize. Or exhausted finish. Whatever.). People had always told me that girls were easier to potty-train than boys. I thought Little Professor and Superman were pretty easy, if messy. Superman moved into underwear on his second birthday, so I figured an older brother role-model really helped him.

Well. Pearly Girl has put them both to shame. Granted, she's one and a half months past her second birthday, but I can't remember the last time I put a diaper on her. Last week? Anyway, after one day of full court press of the training pants, she was telling us when she had to go. A few accidents later, she's into the girlie underwear I figured was at least a month away. I am relieved the way runners are when they get to the last lap. And we got here much faster than I anticipated.

I know more accidents will happen, because they just do. But in the meantime, I am crowning Pearly Girl Queen of the Bowl and loving washing the prettiest little undergarments that mark her transition to Big(ger) Kid. 

So much cuter than cars and Ninja Turtles pants! Say it with me: ooooh!

One Thousand--Ahem--Boons

No, really, Sister--thank YOU. Nice hat, too.

Maybe you've heard of or read Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts. It's a beautifully written read--thought-provoking, lyrical, laughter-inducing and certainly tear-inducing. It also, from my obviously Lutheran perspective, ultimately ends up heaping law upon law on Voskamp herself and her readers by concluding that we have to give thanks in all circumstances. Period. So DO IT, good Christians! Always! No excuses! What I began reading with so much hope and delight ended with me slinking back to the library dropbox, wondering what went wrong.

And what went wrong, of course, is that we can't actually give thanks in all circumstances all the time or even act like doing so is some act of penance or some act of works-righteousness contributing to some partnership-with-Jesus contract deal. And since we can't, because we're poor miserable sinners and we generally know it (thanks for this, Adriane!), this book that tries to emphasize the good ends up shackling us with more impossible expectations rather than giving us the Great Thanks-giver Himself. Because ultimately I need to know that Jesus could give thanks all the time because He was God, and Jesus loved me even unto death, and His vicarious atonement isn't conditional on any merit on my part, like giving thanks always. Otherwise His work wouldn't be, well, a something-for-nothing gift. I realize the hyphenated adjective there is superfluous, but it's amazing how many people think of "gift" as more like the beginning of a bartering deal. "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine. By the way, I've got an ingrown hair problem, but you're cool with that, right?" Thanks, but no. I'll take my birthdays and Christmases and back-scratching and Jesus without the sides of conditions. 

All that being said. Here I give you One Thousand Boons, my list of decidedly less--no, significantly less--than one thousand benefits that I* never, ever list when I'm coming up with things I'm thankful for. Enjoy, and go about your blessed life with all of its gifts and boons.

(*or anyone else, unless she's--or he's--crazy or warped. Join, please!)  

• The Friends of Meinders Community Library Annual Book Sale.  
• A room in which to lock myself into for five minutes of privacy. 
• That my belly button isn't in the middle of my head (that would be awkward).
• Angelika, who came up with those last two while 1) yelling at her kids through the locked bathroom door to give her some peace for five minutes and 2) explaining how truly awkward a belly button on the noggin would be. Yes, she's joined. She's actually probably a charter member.
• Accidentally dropped M & Ms under the kitchen table. That I find days later. (Surprise chocolate!)
• Bath salts and a sleep aid. Not used simultaneously but in tandem.
• And a glass of Riesling.
• The flip-down mirror by the passenger seat for mascara-application, hair-fluff-checking, and last-minute blotting of baby-stained clothing. Better than a personal stylist, IMPO.
• Bedtimes. For small children.
• Natch that. Sleeping children. 
• Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, and Sister Carrie. To remind me that my life is actually pretty s-ah-w-eeeeeeeeeet.
• Ear plugs.
• Ice packs.
• Three-packs of kid underwear.
• My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less Than Jesus' Blood and Righteousness. And that's a for-real boon.

Three years is long, fast time

Just about three years ago...

 

Now, our little boys are our "big" boys!

Deep Freeze

Who knew Minnesota deep freeze winters could be so lovely? From the warm indoors, at least.

Small Dude at Three Months

Our Small Dude has already reached three months of age. Truly, the time is whizzing by so quickly, I'm afraid the years are going to pass before I've realized it. Since the beginning of 2013, this year has sure been...what? It's a new year?! Sheesh.

Small Dude still does plenty of sleeping, eating, and all the requisite things that go along with digestion, but he's also starting to really watch us, hold his head up, and generally insist on seeing what's going on. Here he is from a few months ago:

Because dreaming of a Packer win is always a good dream. Hey, it's a new year!

Now you can see how alert he's getting, despite our horrific cold stretch (you know when you can count on one hand in the last thirty the number of days that have gone above zero degrees Fahrenheit, it's been a long cold stretch, even for Minnesota), his perennial hat-wearing, and his imprisonment in various small-child seats. And what a little sweetheart he can be! Even when he insists on sleeping during daylight and cooing wide-awake at 3 a.m. 

Mesmerized by the mobile...

Okay, Ma, just pick me up already!

Unwrapping all those gifts really takes it out of ya.

Able to snag a smile, if a blurry one!

Ahh... sleeping.

Far as the curse is found

Every year on Christmas Eve night, our church's Sunday School presents a pageant. The pageant includes lessons and carols, with some shepherds' robes, microphone feedback, candlelight, and the usual-yet-unexpected poignancy whenever children are involved in public confessions of faith. This year, the Sunday School teachers did an exceptional job preparing our youngsters to read and sing of Christ's coming. And despite a last-minute rash of kids getting the flu and a snowy, blowy Eve, Our Saviour's Sunday School did a wonderful job. Here they are right before the service.

Our small group is blessed to include Ali, a lovely, energetic girl who is developmentally disabled. She cannot walk without help and she cannot speak with words that we understand. But she smiles often, participates vigorously, and shows us how God makes beauty out of brokenness.

Ali's mother is one of our Sunday School teachers, and one of the ways Ali participated in the pageant was to light candles during one of the readings. Her mother helped her walk up to the Advent wreath. Then, she carefully wrapped Ali's fingers around the acolyte's brass lighter and lifted the flickering end bravely toward the candles. It took some doing, for it was difficult for Ali and her mother to get the lighter wick lined up just so against each candle wick. But as we watched Ali's rapt face glow in the soft light she lit and listened to the Old Testament prophecies and New Testament narratives of Christ's coming, we saw exactly why Christ came: to give light to darkness and to give hope to the weak. Later, while Pastor read of joyful noises and praise for God's good gifts, Ali lifted her voice to share her excitement. Her timing was perfect. She literally made a joyful noise as we heard about all of creation rejoicing in God's greatest gift.

One of my favorite Christmastime readings is Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. In the story, Bob Cratchit tells his wife about taking their son, the saintly Tiny Tim, to church. "He told me, coming home," Bob says, "that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see." 

Parents of disabled children, including Ali's mom and dad, will tell you that their children are not perfect. They know, just as parents of able-bodied children know, that despite glimpses of sweet innocence and selflessness, children act in savage, selfish, sinful ways, ways that belie their angelic appearances. That's one reason why Lutherans baptize babies--we know our months-, days-, or even hours-old children have been infected with the sin of Adam. Their behavior shows this, but their bodies show it, too. Children scrape knees, break limbs, get infections, battle cancer. Some of the scars heal, but none of them disappear forever. And even the most saintly kid can't fix himself. Tiny Tim recognized this. Even at young ages, we see our children marked for death.

Papa and I witnessed this firsthand in our own home this week. Superman developed a low-grade fever a few days after Christmas. I kept him home, snuggled him, gave him lots of 7-Up and regular doses of bubble-gum Tylenol. But he still felt badly, and his body suddenly reacted to its illness by triggering a seizure. We took him to the Emergency Room within ten minutes of his seizure, and he revived, especially when the nurses prepared his hand for an IV. (Oh, the great patience of pediatric nurses!) He spent the night at Sanford Children's in Sioux Falls, at what we call the Castle (it looks like the Cinderella castle at Disney World). And we were relieved when his temperature disappeared after a night and the doctors concluded that Superman is one of about five percent of kids who experience febrile seizures, or seizures causes by a fever. He might have another one, but he might not. It's most likely that he will grow out of them. And we are very thankful that he is well now, asking for candy at every meal, and asking us, "Do you remember when I got to spend the night at the children's doctor?" Yes, Superman. We remember. And we always will.

In a feeling-apple-eatin'-good moment.

Few things are as terrifying to parents, I think, than when their children become physically unresponsive. Right after his seizure, Papa scooped up Superman and held him like a baby. Our son was helpless, and so were we. All we could physically do was to rock him and place him in the care of people who know how little bodies work and what they need. The experience with Superman was a mighty, visceral shock to remember that our son is not ours, that we did not make him, and that we cannot keep him well, or even keep him at all. His days on this earth are numbered. And this knowledge can cripple us with fear and anger.

Too often, I think the world manipulates the weakest among us. Many are manipulated because they are small or voiceless. Many are exploited as powerful political or religious examples that we thoughtlessly or knowingly parade in a voyeuristic show of pity to achieve other ends--our own selfish ends. But Christ came as a weak Babe precisely to show us that He loves each little one unto death. Because that's where Ali and Sam and every child, from the red-faced newborn to strongest Olympian to the frailest centenarian, is headed. And the Child gifted with myrrh, the embalming spice and funeral incense, reached for Death and struck it away, for us, forever.

On Christmas Day, we sing joy. We sing, "Joy to the world, the Lord is come." But even more, we sing healing. "He comes to make His blessings flow/ far as the curse is found." In the Christmas season, and for the rest of this year and every year, we need joy. But we also need to know that His blessings flow even into the very crevices of our sinful lives, into every dark and putrid corner, into every broken heart and annihilated hope that we suffer due to our terrible physical and emotional and spiritual frailty and that of those we love. We need to know that He, the mightiest and the greatest, made Himself the smallest and weakest and most nothing of men to save us, the ones who so desperately need Him. As this Christmas season closes, I pray you know and remember that He comes to defeat every curse that haunts and plagues you. He comes as the lowliest to lift you lowly ones up, to hold you like babies, to heal your brokenness. And he comes still to make His blessings flow.

Quasi-Resolution: Let's Ditch the Wimpiness

Otherwise known as "Tough It Out, Wimps."

I've realized that, aside from my typical blogging chagrin, I'm not a big fan of New Year's resolutions. They bespeak a kind of subtle laziness: "Now that the calendar's changed, I resolve to take charge of my health, my finances, and my life!" In other words, I couldn't act like an adult, i.e. make hard decisions and actually do the hard work to carry those decisions to fruition, without an arbitrary time marker to kick my rear into gear. My issue isn't with resolutions, you see; my issue is with resolutions time-stamped, as though the other 364 days of the year aren't fit enough opportunities to act decisively about healthy eating habits or exercise or actual penny-pinching budgeting or resolving differences with a friend or setting boundaries with family or whatever things there are that we can reasonably change in our lives.

Now that I've had that little rant, let's get on to this recent Wall Street Journal interview with Julian Fellowes, the creator of the period drama "Downton Abbey." Fellowes makes a point of criticizing "our lack of personal discipline" and how it begets vulnerability and weakness. Unlike early-twentieth century Britishers, like the characters on the show, we lack a certain toughness. "Some pain was the lot of every human being alive," he says. "It didn't matter if you were the King of France. We don't have that." Then the interviewer asks these intriguing questions, which prompt Fellowes to really open up about modern society:

So we've become a bunch of wimps?

We think we can go from cradle to grave without any pain at all. As a generation, we can be rather feeble about toughing it out. Even the people who were working in those households, I don't think they were all miserable. It was a tough job but if you had a good employer, like anything else, there were worse places to be. It was a hard life—you had to get up early, work very hard. They had a more realistic expectation of life.

Do you think people's expectations these days are unrealistic?

With marriage, our generation thinks that we should all be incredibly happy all the time. The moment we are not incredibly happy, something's wrong with the marriage. Well, nothing's wrong with the marriage! You've signed up to live with someone for a half a century, and as long as you still have stuff in common and are still close, it's fine. But you see people getting divorced and you think "What do you think is waiting out there?" I kind of liked that [the generation that grew up in the interwar period] would have laughed at this idea.

I really appreciate Fellowes' analysis of us because, ultimately, I think most of us are wimps. I include myself in this. Most of us have had pretty easy lives, and when hardship has come along, we react as though it's an anomaly to life. Like Fellowes implicitly points out, expecting painlessness all the time isn't merely unrealistic; it sets us up to think we can be "incredibly happy all the time." Both expectations are laughably infantile. And who wants to go through life with an infantile view of life?

Aside from the huge number of people who actually do want to cling to this way of thinking and living, I think many people want to ditch the wimpiness embedded in our coddled culture. And I'm one of them. With Fellowes' words in mind, I'm resolving to approach the problems and struggles and crosses that will inevitably occur in my life with at least a modicum of perspective; that is, that while pain is hard, sometimes terribly hard, it is temporary. True Christians will understand this. In fact, they're still celebrating the end of waiting for the ultimate Defeater of pain, suffering, and loss (that's "Merry Christmas!" in vernacular-speak). And billions of people have weathered far worse tragedies than mine and still managed to be thankful for the good things that come. If they can do it, and God Himself took on the worst of it, then I at least can strive to keep a stiff upper lip, come high water and whatever else comes--for Hell isn't coming for me.