Bits of Wisdom and Gratitude

I detest a stagnant blog, so here is a new post. Our lives are definitely filled with unusual material to blog about, but in my post-op state (To answer the inevitable questions: laminectomy, discectomy, related spinal headache and possible spinal fluid leak) I am unable to even lie on my back to make use of a laptop. So picture me manually punching in the letters of this post on my iPod touch. Side note: I highly recommend these fun gadgets to both the bedridden and not. Thank you, dear husband, for so unselfishly giving me yours so you had no choice but to buy a newer version for yourself. What sacrifice! :)

Motherhood- when can I get back to it?! It's been nearly three months since my back gave out and I was rendered unfit to pick up my baby. I miss being a mommy. Everyday I pray, "I promise I won't complain of another poopy diaper, just help me be well enough to be a mother to my kids." I am an emotional basketcase these days, but found some good laughs and inspiration in Kerry Blair's Counting Blessings. Here's some keepers:

"If you believe that feeling bad or worrying long enough will change a past or future event, then you are residing on another planet with a different reality system." - William James

"Worry not about the possible troubles of the future; for if they come, you are but anticipating and adding to their weight; and if they do not come, your worry is useless; and in either case it is weak and vain, and a distrust of God's providence." - Hugh Blair

I also crave to publicly express gratitude to the dozens of friends and family that have made dinners, cared for the girls, sent encouraging cards and balloon bouquets, lost hours of sleep to help, prayed for our welfare, or done us another act of service. Yet everytime my mind settles on the issue, I am paralyzed by tears of gratitude. Thank you, everyone.

With fear of jinxing myself, it looks like things may be taking a turn for the better. With some luck our family may be able to spend at least a week all under the same roof before Janson's upcoming rotation. In our case distance does make the heart grow fonder!

Dear John: Book Review (Murmur, Murmur)

Today I read Nicholas Sparks' Dear John. I needed a light, happy, lovey read and figured Sparks would hit the spot.

It didn't. Maybe I should have taken more warning from the title. He set up a fairly depressing start, included abouted 20 pages of happiness, and then let it just roll on downhill. The literature, morals, and basic ideas are inspiring, but the story line is depressing. Here are some "highlights:" [Spoiler alert!]

• Boy finds Girl on a short two-week break, the best two weeks of his life


• Girl says she will wait for Boy while he fights in Iraq


• Boy and Girl spend most of book separated, teary and sad


• Girl marries someone else


• Boy comes back to Girl, finds her married to Dying Man


• Dying Man tells Boy, "Marry Girl when I am dead"


• Instead, Boy secretly gives up his inheritance and savings to cure Dying Man


• End: Boy still loves Girl, but walks away supposedly happy that Girl is happily married to No-Longer-Dying-Man

Sorry, now you know the end. Perhaps Sparks got enough complaints that his books were too unrealistic with their happily-ever-after-endings, and decided to throw us a dark one. Personally, I like depending on Nicholas Sparks for an occassional happy, lovely story when I need one. Darn.

P.S. If you have any good suggestions of nice, light-hearted reads (preferably fiction) please, please leave me a comment. Obviously, I could use some help picking books.

Humbly Waiting

I have been humbled. I cannot diaper, clothe, bathe, or feed my own children. Why, oh why does this happen to mothers? So here I am sitting at my parents house, watching them change the stinky diapers, shovel in the baby food and perform bathtime. Did I ever think I would be envious of changing poopy diapers? Well, I am. I am so grateful for the many, many friends and my loyal family who care for my girls.

I am being taught patience. Every medical professional aware of my symptoms has declared my situation fairly emergent. And yet I am then directed to wait... wait for an urgent care visit, or an appointment later in the day, or an MRI report to come in a few days, or an insurance counselor, or another MRI test days away.

While a medical professional declares "see you in a day" to be immediate service, waiting one more day for treatment equals a lot to a mother. That one more day of waiting equals...

• a dozen diaper changes,
• 3-4 messy, intensive meals,
• a bedtime routine,
• 6-8 filled sippy cups,
• 6-8 bottle feedings,
• 2-3 naptimes
• 2-10 toddler tantrums
• and a possibly sleep-deprived night.

A mother on bedrest cannot perform very many of these tasks. In the defense of the medical professionals, I am not the usual patient to be suffering from these disk problems. They are not as well-acquainted to the toll these ailments place on the family life of a young mother. Maybe one or two future medical professionals can gain some tips from this read.

Hopefully the days of waiting are coming to an end, and I can begin the journey of recovery so I can once again.... change gloriously poopy diapers!

Update: I jinxed myself. Twelve hours after finishing this post, I listened to the doctor say, "See you in ten days." So take the above list, times it by ten, and the result equals my parents work load (in addition to their own work schedules, health concerns and other children). Luckily the doctor combined that phrase with some new drugs, so there is still hope I can soon change poopy diapers.

Book Review: Project Mulberry

I love Linda Sue Parks, and she did not let me down with this book. I read it two months ago, but it's still on my mind, so I figure it's worthy of a quick review. Here's what I loved: in between each chapter is dialogue between the fictional main character and the author. Intriguing? The main character complains to the author about her annoying brother and the way she wants the plot to go. Absolute genius. Who says young adult books aren't great literature?

BPA

Since herniating a disk in my back I have tried hard to avoid the subject on my blog. Unfortunately, the event is causing dramatic changes in my life. My mind goes blank when I try to think of a blog post topic unrelated to my pain. So I'm just going to face it head on and address the issue. Hopefully my thoughts can be helpful to others, rather than meaningless complaints.

I feel like I should be in a circle of people sitting on folding chairs as I introduce myself: "Hi, my name is Lynn and I have chronic back pain." Once a week I'll slip out of the house disguised with hat and sunglasses as I attend my BPA (Back Pain Anonymous) meetings. Ok, so the BPA thing is completely fictional, but it probably exists somewhere.

When I first herniated my disk I kept thinking, "I'm not going to let this rule my life. I'm going to get my life back." Well, I'm learning. Such as... I dropped by mayoclinic.com (a fav site of mine) to help Janson out with canker sore home remedies. Afterwards I searched "herniated disk." As I was reading information I already knew, I noticed an unusual subtopic: Coping and Support. Why, oh why?! The word "cope" was not something I wanted to link to my pain. I wanted words like "cure," "healed," or even better, "miracle."

As we all know (and as Mayo Clinic so kindly reminded me), the first step of coping is acceptance. Hence my previously stated introduction. I am slowly accepting chronic pain as a part of my life, and trying to adjust my life so that I can rule my pain, rather than it rule me.

I have a profound, new respect for others who suffer from chronic pain. That includes one of my favorite TV characters, House, MD. Stay tuned for more on that thought...

Book Review: Saving the World

We are not alone. We are here together.

Julia Alvarez repeats that phrase throughout Saving the World. Recommended by my dad, I read this book while recovering from my herniated disk. Masterfully piecing her words, Alvarez writes parallel stories of two women, two centuries apart.

A personal message I received from the book dealt with the title. Alvarez shows that we, especially women, can "save the world" through our nurturing and loyalty to relationships. While the male characters take flamboyant and obvious actions to save their world, the women at their side do so in a more subtle yet powerful manner.

It's a long book, full of beautiful language and scenes. There are very few books that have played with my emotions, but this one had me choked up at the end. Partly because it was over. My favorite passage:

I suppose only an almighty God can see all of our differing stories. Only He can love each narrow, aggrieved, and petty self and applaud each time one of us, inflamed by love or enlarged by loss, manages to see briefly beyond the confines of our own self-interest into another's being. I see you. You are not alone. We are here together.

Extended Post Adolescence

Our BYU Magazine arrived in the mail yesterday and, as always, I devoured it within a few hours. I was drawn to this article in their Family Focus section, "In-Between-Ness: How to help your emerging adult through an extended post-adolescence."

Do you know anyone between 18 and 25 years old experiencing an "extended post-adolescence?" I do, and according to the article, this is becoming common. I think this article especially attracted me because I am just barely still in their target age. Being the mother of two children makes me feel that I am certainly an adult.  I didn't feel like an adult at age 18, but sometime when I got married and became more financially responsible I took on that heavy, burdensome title of "adult."  

I got a kick out of this article. Some statements I gave my full-fledged agreement, other parts left me wondering. Their main argument behind the slow emergence to adulthood were two-fold:

1. It takes longer to receive enough training and education to land a well-paying job.  Especially one that could raise a family, thus the tendency to wait later for marriage.
2. "Children are getting a message that adulthood is onerous." a.ka.  They see their parents going through divorces and hating their jobs, so they think, "I'll take my time and do it right."

Since it's a long article, and the HTML version not nearly as fun looking as the glossy magazine page, I'll put out a few interesting quotes:

"Most men and women ages 18 to 25 do not consider themselves adults, and neither do their parents."

"About a decade ago researchers identified the emerging-adult idea and found that this age group no longer believes traditional milestones mark entrance into adulthood, such as marriage, parenthood, and home ownership. Rather, says Nelson, they believe that adulthood is reached with 'internal markers—developing greater concern for others, accepting responsibility for the consequences of your actions, gaining financial independence.'"

"[...] Cutting a child loose at age 18 would be like letting a 13-year-old fend for himself in the 1950s. The realities of life are simply different, and most emerging adults need more time to search out their beliefs, explore careers, and learn about relationships."

I know several twenty-somethings that show no interest in "growing up." I have no idea what support will help them or hurt them. I picked out some of my own useful tidbits of advice from this article. Do you agree with these ideas?