Posts tagged ‘motherhood’
Happy New Year!
Okay, so as you may have guessed (or perhaps not by my late arrival to 2012), that this blog and you, my readers, make up a big chunk of my resolutions for this year. I need to get my shit together and write more often and more regularly. It’s not that I don’t have things to say, I just struggle to find the time to say them. Sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night with a post in my head but I just can’t leave the warm bed to sit down and write. Especially when I’m sleep deprived as it is. At any rate – bear with me. I’m here and 2012 is going to be a good year.
I’m not usually a big fan of these viral “fill in the blank” thingys, but I found this one at nothingbutbonfires (a favourite of mine if only because I have started to just travel vicariously through its writer. Sigh. Kids and being broke have seriously damaged my travel cred ) so here goes nothing:
1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?
Umm, I gave birth to a boy. I moved to a new little town. I ran 9 miles (all at once!). I watched one of my brothers get married. I would like to say that I got myself into the full splits since this has been on my list of New Year’s resolutions for 6 or 7 years now but alas, 2011 was not the year.
2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Please see above. As far as my other resolutions go, yes, I kept most of the ones I can remember. (Isn’t that convenient?) I tried to get outside every day. I lost the baby weight. I worked to be a better wife and Mom. I tried to get down on the floor at least once a day and play with Paisley. I tried to say “Not right now – I’m busy” as little as possible. I made a bunch of new recipes.We made a huge change in order to improve our quality of life and I feel pretty good about that.
What I did not do was write as much as I had wanted, take as many pictures as I wanted and as previously mentioned, get down into the splits.
I am a resolution junkie. I make them every year and the list is usually exhaustive and unrealistic. It leaves little room for error or the realities of life with kids. Example: I will wake at 5:30 every morning and go for a run before sitting down with a coffee to write. When writing I will devote the first 30 minutes to my blog and the next half hour to the novel that I am sure is lurking deep within me. Yeah. Tthat very quickly turns into me stumbling out of bed at 7:30 after being roused for the third time by an incessantly hungry baby and a preschooler who insists that “my tummy is telling me I’m hungry and it’s YELLING!” and barely managing to have a coherent conversation with my husband before he abandons me head off for work. I don’t care what anyone says, exhaustion does not breed inspiration.
And yet – I’ll do it again. Cuz a girls gotta dream.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
I did. It doesn’t get any closer than that.
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Thankfully, no. I was pretty sad about Hitch but I obviously didn’t know him personally.
5. What countries did you visit?
Oh piss off. I remember when I could actually answer that question with a straight face.
6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
Money, time and energy. Now that we are out of the newborn stage I am pretty sure I will have the latter two. As for money, that remains to be seen. I am thinking of picking up some part time work but I haven’t quite figured out what that looks like yet. Maybe I could combine my life-long goal of getting into the splits with a lucrative internet business?
7. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
April 23 – Declan was born. October 15th – my youngest brother was married. September 13th – we took possession of our new place. In December we went to see “Q” live with Jian Ghomeshi and it rocked my world.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Making the decision to move, pulling the trigger and doing it well (i.e. without killing each other, losing a kid or getting divorced) is the one thing I am most proud of. We were caught in the rat race and knew that we weren’t living our “authentic” lives. So many people live their lives by default and that is one thing that we have always tried to avoid. We made an opportunity and we took it and our lives are so much better for it. Every morning when I wake up in this house, in this cute little town and I have coffee with my husband before he heads down the street to his office I think, “Holy shit do I love it here.” That’s a good feeling.
9. What was your biggest failure?
Probably not writing here as much as I would like. And dare we mention the splits once more?
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
The pregnancy was touch and go for a while and Declan was a twin until we lost one at 6 weeks. Oh, and I had a c-section but other than that, not really.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
A house.
12. Where did most of your money go?
Who knows? Mortgage, bills…the usual. I will say that moving is very expensive and I won’t be doing that again in a hurry.
13. What did you get really excited about?
I got excited about our new family and having a little boy to get to know. I got excited about our new life in a new town. I got excited that Mad Men was coming back. And then it was over again before I knew it and then I got excited about it coming back again. Oh, and let us not forget, jeggings.
14. What song will always remind you of 2011?
I don’t know. I thing “Like a G6″ will definitely remind of this period in my life, if not this year specifically. Paisley loves it and calls it her “dancy song”. I smile every time I hear it.
15. Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder? Thinner or fatter? Richer or poorer?
Happier, much happier. About the same. Poorer.
16. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Write. Travel. Sleep.
17. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Worry. Spend mindless hours on the internet.
18. How did you spend Christmas?
We stayed close to home this year and spent time hanging out with friends and family. I fussed too much and did too much but other than that it was really nice.
19. What was your favorite TV program?
Mad Men. Entourage. Gossip Girl. Pretty Little Liars. And I’m trying to like PanAm…I’m really trying.
20. What were your favorite books of the year?
Oh wow. I read a lot so to be honest I can’t even remember what I read. I know I loved The Colony of Unrequited Dreams (Wayne Johnston) and Freedom by Jonathan Franzen.
21. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I planned a big party and then a few days before, remembered I was pregnant and tired and cancelled it. Instead I went out for a quiet dinner with my husband and celebrated my 33rd birthday as lamely as possible.
22. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Winning the lottery? Eating more seafood. Hiring a personal masseuse.
23. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?
“Wear whatever you find lying around until you lose the baby weight and even then, ensure that any item of clothing purchased is comfortable, stain-resistant and cheap.” Result? New Year’s resolution of “Be a hip mama” left unmet. Again.
24. What kept you sane?
My husband. My kids. Exercise.The few hours I managed to get to myself. Writing. Early nights. Bubble baths.
25. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.
Living an authentic life is the only way to be happy. Don’t check to see if the baby is poopy by slipping your finger into the diaper.
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So, this year? I’m running a half marathon, blogging regularly, making a point of trying to be present and appreciateive of my daily life and I’m going to try to learn to be more assertive. And if I can find time, I’ll take over the world. Oh, and do the splits.
Atheist Mom Gets A New House
While all the other Mothers of the world are lamenting the departure of daylight savings time, I am rejoicing it. Because, here I am! Forced to get up early with the baby while Paisley remains asleep. A teething ring, a spoon and a butterfly on the floor are enough to occupy Declan while I sit near him with my laptop. The fact that I have not been writing (asides from the occasional grocery list, which does not count) has been driving me nuts. Writing has been a part of who I am for as long as I can remember and I always start to feel a sense of cognitive dissonance when I abandon that part of me for too long.
So, here is a long overdue update. Declan is good and growing like a weed. He is 6 months already, can we believe it?
Paisley is funny and clever and never stops talking. Like, ever. She may be part of the reason I can’t seem to grab even 20 minutes during the day to write (and let’s be honest, when I do manage to grab some quiet time I usually try to spend it horizontally. And not in a fun way. In a sleeping way. I am exhausted lately.) but she’s worth every draining second.
When I’m in a mood to allow it, these two bring me pure joy.
The big news for our family is that we moved.! We left the big city to go to a small little town. We’re still close to Calgary (I can make it to Ikea in 25 minutes…whew!) but not immersed in it. The decision to leave all happened very quickly and was a real whirlwind. We had been trying to find a way to get out of the situation we were in (hubby was commuting 1 hour each way downtown and working at a big law firm with a billable hours target and a lot of pressure. In short, it sucked and it was bad for him and our marriage) and then all of a sudden, like life is prone to do, an opportunity arose. We had to decide quickly to take it or leave it and so after a few short meetings and a tearful drive to Calgary we took the plunge.
I was sad at first at the idea of leaving the city and of course, all of my friends. I also knew that my family had to be the priority and that this move would benefit all of us eventually. We listed our house, bought our new house, and made the move all in the span of two months. Considering we had a new baby and it all happened so quickly, the move went pretty well and because we left the city we were able to get more house for our money.
Fast forward to today: my husband works three minutes from the house and as an independent practitioner (no boss! Other than me that is) along with two senior lawyers. We have a bigger house that we love more than the old one and Paisley has started preschool out here. We are starting to make friends (it sure takes some time when you’re all grown up) and feel settled and while we aren’t quite there yet, I just know we are going to love it here. Oh, did I mention my parents live here too? What a bonus that has been – we used to see them once every week or two and now we see them nearly every day. It’s nice to be able to have a quick visit and pop in for a cup of tea. It has changed the dynamics of the relationship and I love that the kids will have their grandparents be such a fixture in their day to day lives.
Now, all I need to do is figure out my schedule enough that I can get back to blogging. Sigh.
Swamped
All my life I have been a very organized person. My husband always laughs about how he used to watch me (this is before he knew me) pull out 8 different coloured pens, two highlighters and a ruler just to take notes in class in University. I remember that too…I also remember leaving a class one day after realizing I hadn’t brought a ruler. The mere idea of an entire day’s worth of notes with crooked lines was too much for me. Okay, so maybe organized is the wrong word. Completely insane?
The point is, that despite my good time-management skills, I am struggling these days to sit down at the computer. I am enjoying having a new baby and my life otherwise is running smoothly but what I still can’t seem to do is find an hour of quiet time to myself during the day. And let’s be honest, if that doesn for some reason present itself, I use it to take a nap. So, my blog is suffering and I know it.
I miss writing and I miss the feeling of community I’ve always felt with this particular project. The only good thing is that a lot of my readers (Hi dear reader!) are Moms too and I’m hoping you’ll cut me some slack? Or at the very least give me some ideas? Baby is up between 6:00 and 6:30am (after eating a couple of times still through the night) and daughter is up at 7:00am which is why I am writing this now. I found a tiny sliver of time this morning and I grabbed a hold of it. Maybe that’s what I’ll have to do until things get a little better.
(Also – this baby loves me. A LOT. A lot more than his sister ever did and if I’m awake, he thinks I should be holding him or at the very least, talking with him. As I sit here writing this he is yelling at me to pick him up. It’s like he thinks I’m his mother or something.)
Hypocrisy is the Greatest Luxury (Raise the Double Standard!)
(The title of this post comes from a band I used to listen to in Junior High when I was pseudo-angry and really cutting edge but still deeply nerdy. They’re actually worth a listen if you can stand academic rap. )
In the past I have called for fellow Atheists to come out of the closet. Richard Dawkins is leading the charge to encourage non-believers to stop hiding behind the term “agnostic” and tell the people they work with, live with and love that they are Atheists. I believe strongly in this principle and know that it is the surest way to gain acceptance and end the ignorance that so often accompanies the “A word”.
And yet (this is where the hypocrisy comes in) I haven’t done the same in my own life. Now don’t get me wrong, everyone who knows me knows I’m an Atheist. My family, all my friends and anyone who ever happens to bring up the subject of religion within a 10 mile radius of me, all know how I feel. (Although I have learned to be a little less psycho militant about it as I’ve gotten older. It doesn’t exactly endear you to people.) On this blog however, I have remained anonymous and it has been nagging at me for ages.
There were several reasons why I chose not to use my name and simply go with Atheist Mom. It provides me with a sense of freedom to write about whatever and whomever I choose without the fear of repercussion. Mostly, I was concerned that my in-laws might be offended by what I have to say about their cult religion. My husband also has a completely irrational fear that I would be endangering our kids by posting their pictures online next to the word “Atheist”. Irrational but not crazy. So, we’ve reached a compromise – I will post our pictures but not our last name. Is that still wimping out? It’s a tough one – I want to introduce you to my family and my life but I also want to protect them and my husband is a pretty private guy. I’m trying to remain true to my ideals without pissing off the man I love.
So, there I am – up in the right-hand corner. Atheist Mom…also known as Caroline.
And here are my adorable babes:
Hiatus
Sheesh, you would think I fell of the planet, or died or had a baby or something. Oh right, I did. Have a baby that is. :) Sorry for my absenteeism folks – been a little busy. So here is the story in a nutshell:
On April 23rd (much later than the doctor had ever thought I would make it) I had a baby boy weighing 6lbs 12oz. (Am I the only one who thinks it’s weird that we announce a baby’s weight. I mean the range is so small really. If the baby is 12 lbs and you pushed it out of your vagina, hey, scream it to the world. But if it’s a normal size baby then it doesn’t really mean anything, does it?) He was born by c-section just before 11am and he is perfect.
Or he was, until he came down with sepsis (a blood infection) and spent the next nest 8 days in the NICU. It was a long, taxing, exhausting and desperate week. I cried every morning because I was leaving my daughter at home and cried every night because I had to leave my son at the hospital. (I know there are parents who do this for much longer than I had to and to be honest I don’t know how they do it. I guess, you just do it. ) My poor daughter, who had been dying to meet her new baby for months and months, developed an infection herself just days after he was born and was barred from visiting the NICU. Poor kid. All in all, it sucked but little guy pulled through and despite many needles, a central line, IV’s, a lumbar puncture and a shaved head (all that cute baby fuzz – gone), he came home and is doing really well.
So, now we are living the normal life of a family with a newborn. I’m tired and a bit frazzled but head over heels in love. I keep thinking of things to post and then I just can’t find the time. I started this post at least three times before it actually got finished and published and the days are quickly turning into weeks. Rest assured, I have not forgotten you and Atheist Mom is still alive and well functioning.
40 Weeks?
From the very beginning of this pregnancy I have been told by doctors that I will go into preterm labour. I have a bicornuate uterus, diabetes and a history of preterm labour (35.5 weeks) with my daughter. Here I am at 33 weeks and so far, nothing. Which is a good thing I know but I really hadn’t prepared mentally for much beyond 36 weeks. Everything is going so smoothly, I feel wonderful, I’ve managed to keep the weight gain to a reasonable amount and baby is as healthy as can be. For some reason I have a horrible feeling I am going to see April and then even mid-April while still sporting a giant belly. Isn’t that just the way?
My daughter who just turned three at the end of January is getting very excited to meet her little brother (did I tell you it was a boy? It’s a boy!) She tells me all the time about all the things she is going to do with him:
“I’m going to teach him how to eat. He can’t eat though because he doesn’t have teeth. I have teeth. That’s why I can talk. I like to talk. I am going to teach my baby brother how to talk. I am going to take him on a walk and show him the park and he can go on the swings with me. He’ll like that. I can hold him and carry him and I’m going to tickle him and make him laugh. Then we can have lunch and we can play airplane. I’m going to teach my brother how to dance and how to run and put your finger in someone’s eyes. People don’t like that. You shouldn’t do that. I will say ‘No baby! Don’t do that!’ I’m going to be a big sister because I’m so big now.” And so on, and so on, and so on.
If I believed in karma I would say I’m being punished for being such a chatterbox as a kid but I’ll just blame it on genetics. :)
Infinite Virginity (What a cool name for a band)…
Familiarity with your own religion (or at the least, the one you were raised in) often immunizes you from recognizing how weird it is. When I first met my husband I recall thinking “Mormons believe some really weird stuff! How can anyone with half a brain believe this!?” Then he asked me if I believed in transubstantiation and the ever-virgin Mary. The answer was that no, I didn’t and that furthermore, I didn’t know that as a Catholic I was even supposed to! The fact that I didn’t believe in half the things the Catholic church taught was actually one of the things that made me start questioning my faith. As soon as I started to see my own religion from the same distance as all the other ones, it ceased to hold any real significance for me. I quite happily threw the baby out with the bath water.
The ever-Virgin Mary was always a strange concept to me and one that I had given a lot of thought to. So, when I heard an author on the radio not too long ago, talking about sex and the bible I was very interested. His point was that in the Catholic church, it is believed that each human is born with original sin. This is why it was necessary for Jesus to have been born of a virgin, so that he was not tainted by this sin. It is also why Mary was forced to remain a virgin, so that she could remain a saint and sinless forever. Except, there is a problem. For Mary to her herself remain sinless, she too must have been born of a virgin. Uh oh. This is where the whole thing starts to unravel. (To be fair, anyone with a heart beat should recognize the absurdity of the ever-virgin claim before we get to this point, but I digress.) So was Mary’s mother also a virgin? And her mother and so on? Nobody ever gets into that because theological muddy waters are best avoided if you want to keep up the ruse.
Poor, poor Mary and Joseph. Born of a virgin-mother and a sexually frustrated father, forced to remain chaste and endure the death of her only (only?! that’s a whole other post) son on a stick in the desert, and wife to a very bitter man who must have been on the receiving end of a lot of jokes. And all for the love of a non-existent God and beatification by a sexually perverted church. Not much of a life is it? Better to have never existed at all. :)
Dancing With Death
One of the things I love most about reading other people’s blogs is that you get the opportunity to enter a whole new world. A completely different life, in another part of the planet, with a different point of view. I have a handful of blogs that I’ve been reading for years and one of them is Girl’s Gone Child. Rebecca isn’t wildly political or a baking savant – she is an intelligent, very hip Mom in the Los Angeles area who I happen to agree with on a lot of things. She is a little more ethereal in her approach to life than I probably am, but I find it refreshing. I love her little family and her little life and her closet full of clothes that I love on her but would never wear. One of the things I love about Rebecca (other than her poetic prose) is the amount of thought and consideration she gives to her parenting. Being a mother is a big, sometimes scary but always important job and too many people take it for granted and do it by default.
This most recent post by GGC got me thinking about death and what we tell our children about it. Death is as much a part of life as living and while I have always been sure I wouldn’t tell my kid some made up story about heaven and seeing their long-lost grandparents in the clouds, I would be lying if I said it was a conversation I am looking forward to. Reading Rebecca’s post however, made me feel a bit differently. Especially the part where she says that most people hold off talking about death to young people until they can understand it. I had never really thought how ridiculous that is. Nobody understands death. Why would kids be less capable than grown ups of wrestling with those very big ideas. If anything, they may have some very valuable insight – they haven’t learned yet to be afraid of death. To avoid thinking about it and dwelling on it until someone close to them dies and it is thrust into their life with fury. That’s no way to be introduced to death.
When it comes time to talk to my daughter about death, I want to treat it with the attention and respect it deserves. I don’t want to lie and I don’t want her to feel confused. She may feel afraid but at the very least, I want her to know that we can talk about it. That like other important subjects (sex, life, our bodies etc.) it is not off the table. I will tell her about heaven and what some people believe and I will tell her what I believe. Ultimately, the choice will be hers.
What conversations have you had with your children about death? What is your philosophy about death, dying and children?
Where Do Babies Come From?
For most people, this is a simple enough question. We know how babies are conceived but if you believe in a soul, then the questions becomes a lot more complicated. This question lies at the root of many pro-life/pro-choice debates as well as the many different religious stances on sexuality, birth control, AIDS, and homosexuality. Your take on this question informs your belief in humanity and the essence which separates us from all other creations.
If you’re Mormon, it’s even more complicated. The Mormons believe in the premortal existence. A place where all the little souls of all the babies to be born are hanging out with God. (In the strictest sense, most religions believe in a pre-existence of the soul before it enters human form but surprise, surprise, nobody has made it as weird and convoluted as the Mormons). They also believe in three composite aspects of the human form; spirit, body and intelligence. Intelligence is a common human essence that is put into a spirit body which is then turned into a physical body. So, souls are not just souls, they are spirit bodies with their own intelligence. Still with me?
Unlike so many other religions that just let non-sensical doctrine stand, Mormons take the bold step of trying to explain this one step further. This is where they lead us into crazy land. So, the Mormons believe that since all these spirit body’s are around, they too must have been created. And how did they get created? Why, the same way physical bodies are conceived. So, now we have the Heavenly Father up in the sky with the Heavenly Mother and their infinite spirit body offspring. This is one of those things that makes non-Mormons go “Whu!?” because it is so against what many other Christian religions teach. The introduction of a heavenly mother who co-created each of us is viewed as blasphemous by many and another example of how the Mormons are not truly Christians.
“Jesus, however, is the firstborn among all the sons of God—the first begotten in the spirit, and the only begotten in the flesh. He is our elder brother, and we, like Him, are in the image of God. All men and women are in the similitude of the universal Father and Mother, and are literally the sons and daughters of Deity.” MFP 4:203.
(As a point of interest, the Mormons also believe that there are spiritual tests and challenges in the pre-mortal existence that will inform your later position in life. These learning opportunities are discussed in “councils in heaven” – a sort of department meeting between uncountable spirit bodies and the big honcho, Daddy God. Up until fairly recently (1978) Mormons believed that people were marked with dark skin for being fence-sitters in the pre-mortal existence, in the War in Heaven. Religion is like the Rabbit Hole in Alice in Wonderland – the deeper you go, the weirder it gets.)
The idea of the Heavenly Mother is part of the doctrine of eternal progression. Ooooh, you’re going to love this one. So, the church basically believes that the Heavenly Mother and Father were themselves once spirit children who received a physical body and were then rewarded for their good behaviour by being given a universe of their own. They were begotten from a Heavenly Mother and Father, who also had their own universe. And so on, and so on. This one (obviously) gets murky and the church has made great efforts to distance themselves from this, at least publicly. This is true for many reasons, the most obvious being because the whole idea is insane. It also goes directly against the teachings of the Bible by implying that there is not one God by many Gods and that each of us (if you are a man of course!) can one day hope to be rewarded with a planet and Godhood. It destroys its own basic principle of the eternal family (hard to all be hanging out together when each male is off being a God to his own universe) and leaves the church out there in the same realm as Scientologists and Raeliens. Even some Mormons seem unaware of this doctrine, despite it being a fundamental plank in their Plan of Salvation.
Deciding how many children you want to have is a personal and sometimes difficult decision. My husband and I talk about it a lot and neither one of us is ure how many we want. There are so many factors to consider – the kind of family you want to have, how much money you have, how easy/hard pregnancy is on your body and how hard baby’s are on your marriage. As a Mormon, a third party enters the debate. God. Yup, you have to pray and reflect on whether there are more babies already destined for your family, hanging out in spirit land just waiting for this one chance to receive a physical body and realize their eternal destiny. No pressure there. My SIL has gone against the direct advice of Doctors and had more babies – all because she had received a revelation that there were more spirit babies waiting for her. (Her pregnancies make her sick, sick, sick for the entire nine months and risk her life every time. She has nearly died with three out of four births and I’m not convinced she’s finished.)
So there you have it in a nutshell. Where babies come from. That is, if you are part of a very weird religion. Everyone else just has sex.
Babes…
Often in the mornings, my husband will bring our daughter into the bed if I am still asleep. Most days she proceeds to poke me, prod me, yell “Wake up Mama!” into my face and generally bug me until I get out of bed. On lucky days, she will lie beside me and cuddle with me for awhile. I wake slowly but happy to have her next to me. We chat, she kisses me and we sing or play little word games. Yesterday, hubby put her on his side of the bed and when I rolled over to look at her sweet angelic face, she said “I need some sex Mama.”
Thinking I might still be half asleep and clearly mishearing her, I said: “What!?”
“I need some sex right now Mama!”
I didn’t even know what to say. I was thinking to myself “How does she know what that is? Where did she hear that? What am I supposed to say to that!?”
Then she clarified. “Mama, my feet are like ice. I need some sex!”
Oh. Socks. No problem.
In Lieu of Prayers Send Doctors…
We have been trying to get pregnant for some time now and it is taking a bit longer than we anticipated. Then, a couple of days ago, I started experiencing awful pain in my lower abdomen and happened to take a pregnancy test. It was positive. Unfortunately, it turned out to be an ectopic pregnancy and after an emergency ultrasound and a rush of phone calls, concerned doctors and a particularly embarrassing tour through my doctor’s waiting room on a stretcher, I found myself in hospital awaiting surgery. My husband called the necessary people and informed them of what was happening and the reaction from the MIL was of course, that she would keep me in her prayers. I always appreciate the sentiment behind those kinds of things and I realize that they are often said out of habit and the uncomfortable feeling of not knowing what else to say. The point was, that she was concerned,thinking of me and hoping for the best.
I had a lot of time to think in the hospital and since that’s what I tend to do anyway, the extra time wasn’t really necessary (or healthy! I was treated by the nicest people and every nurse or doctor who I encountered was kind, friendly, professional and obviously very capable. I watched the machinery around me – from the ultrasound machine that first diagnosed the ectopic pregnancy, the heart monitors, the thermometers that took my temperature with a quick swipe over my forehead, to the little pads on my fingers that read my pulse and oxygen levels. Amazing. Eventually, when I was brought in to the operating room, I was put under with anaesthetic, had my blood sugar monitored continuously and the surgeons were able to inflate my abdominal cavity and perform laparoscopic surgery through three small incisions. That is incredible.
We take so much for granted these days but as a diabetic I am keenly aware of how much we rely on modern-day advances to keep us healthy. I’m glad my MIL prayed for me but I’ll put my money (and my life) on the side of science and technology any day.
What is the world coming to?
This recent article in Time magazine made me so mad and frustrated. A part of me just kept thinking “This can’t really be happening – obviously this judge is insane and it will be struck down at the New Jersey Supreme Court.” I’m hoping that’s what will happen but I’m not convinced.
This is an argument I have heard from believers before, “How could you not allow your children the privilege of religion in their lives?” I usually have two responses to this type of question:
1. The Outloud Response: Well, parents choose religion for their children all the time. Christians raise Christians, Muslims raise Muslims and atheists tend to raise atheists. And while I could argue that in principle they are the same, I think raising a secular child is even less offensive. Indoctrinating a child to believe one story over another versus teaching them to think critically and evaluate each “story” they come across. While it’s true that religion won’t receive much intellectual respect in our household it will be discussed openly with each religion being equally treated. I will not simply teach my kid to listen to me and trust me and believe in something. I want her to learn how to weigh evidence, critically evaluate things and think rationally. These are skills she will need throughout her life and if she applies them to religion, she will come to her own conclusions.
2. The Inside Voice: Well, I plan on keeping her from the “privilege” of experiencing addiction, abuse and pain so why not religion?
you can’t handle the tooth!
If I ever needed another argument agains intelligent design (and believe me, I don’t), teething would be it. Really? The best you could come up with was to slowly and excruciatingly push the tooth through tender flesh? No perforations or pre-made slits so the teeth can pop through effortlessly? My poor little girl is a walking poster child for the haphazard beauty that is evolution.
on motherhood
I was told by my MIL and many others that my approach to the world would shift dramatically when I had my own child. I think my MIL in particular fully expected me to become LDS and lead her wayward son back to the flock. Many mothers cannot imagine having a child and not having religion. I understand that to some degree. I understand how deeply you love that babe in your arms and how desperately you want them to live for all time and be protected while they do it. Unfortunately, wanting something does not make it so.
Having a child did indeed change my perspective, but probably not in the way my MIL would have liked. I remember looking into her newborn eyes and promising her that I would do everything in my power to protect her from religion and all the things it brings with it. I want her to live in a world of reason and truth. Where people’s energies are devoted to one another and to improving our lot in life as opposed to works for some unseen God. I want her to learn that the natural world is amazing and incredible and all that we have. That it must be protected as well as loved and that the answers to the mystery of the universe are ours to discover. When she stumbles I want her to think “What can I do about this?” as opposed to getting down on her knees and handing the job over to someone else.
Religion brings fear, limits, consequences and rigid rules that should not be questioned. For many people that is what parenting is and so having a God to “back you up” makes life easier. They take the “heavenly father” analogy quite literally. We, on the other hand, will treat the whole subject the same as we would treat any other imaginary friend.
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