Catholic Guilt and the Ugly Face Phenomenon

As part of the baby preparations, I emptied out my cedar/memory chest so we could move it out of the nursery.  I came across a million scrapbooks and journals.  On the first page of the first journal I opened it seemed like a confession.  I was 11 years old.  Martha threw something at Kathryn, I dropped a bottle of salad dressing into a basket of clean laundry (which I washed again), I had a spelling test and I made a bunch of mistakes.  I thought, "Man, I was hard on myself."

Then later I opened a seminary journal, I was 17 years old.  I expected to find my thoughts on whatever scripture we had been studying but as I opened it to the first page I read, "I forgot to say my prayers this morning."  I always joke with people that I'm half catholic because my mom used to be catholic.  I think this guilt I have displayed all through my life is further proof of that.  Catholic guilt is hereditary despite what Chewy may say.

So I'm 35 weeks pregnant now.  I can tell you that my back hurts no matter what I do, I pee more, I have begun to feel contractions from time to time (apparently normal), but even with all this I'm scared for the baby to actually come.  I'll be fine, I know, everyone has told me I'll do great and not to stress, but how do you not stress about suddenly being responsible for a little life that will be completely dependent on you?  Or for labor pain- yeah, how do you not stress about that?

Anyway, the emotions still run high, I am more cranky than before though my goal this week has been to be better about road rage.  Here's why.  Last Saturday, Chewy and I were at BJs.  It was cold and rainy and so he went to get the car and I stood in the lobby - people watching.  An employee was out there in the cold and rain collecting carts and bringing them inside.  He was coming down a hill in the parking lot with a whole line of carts.  A woman in an SUV starts backing out of her spot.  He waves his arm in the air to get her attention so she will stop.  She does, and then I watch as she turns toward the store watching the guy with the carts go by.  She is talking to her passenger, hands gesturing in anger and indignation and a face all like:

And of course my face went

and I thought, what an ugly face to make. Is that what I look like when I'm cranky on the road?  Therefore, I resolved to be better about my attitude on the road (and to not use my ugly face - especially when judging people for using theirs).  It's been really hard this week but I think I've done alright.  I've hit traffic every morning and I keep telling myself to keep calm and listen to my audiobook.

Of dogs and men

Lately, Chewy has been obsessed with dogs....he stays up later than he should researching the best types of guard dogs, which ones home owner's insurance won't cover, which have the most cases of biting people, the most intelligent, etc.  He's taken quizzes on finding "the right dog for you".  He's talked about dogs incessantly for the last week or so.

My first thought on this? Panic.  I'm about to have a baby, folks, in case you've missed that fact.  I will be a stay-at-home mom with my very first child, trying to sleep and adjust to that lifestyle and my husband keeps talking about adding a large dog to the family (his favorite is Doberman but before that it was a Rhodesian Ridgeback (the Lion Hunter), and he hasn't completely ruled out a Great Dane....a Great Dane!)  I started out by reminding him I would be the one home with the beastie all. Day. Long.  I would have to do the obedience training, I would have to take one of these giants out for walks while also trying to navigate the baby stroller.  As you can imagine this didn't go well.  Spouses don't like being parented, and I'm pretty sure I parented in that moment.  There's a series I really enjoy called, "For All Eternity" - it's a book too, but I haven't read it, I just have the CDs of the guy conducting a four week seminar on the topic of marriage and communication.  Anyway, he says at one point, "Don't be a dream killer, let life kill the dream."  And yet there I was, trying to kill Chewy's dream, but you've got to admit becoming a dog owner has more probability and less road blocks than owning a beach house.

Anyway - so I let him talk and talk and talk about dogs now.  He's decided I am a lot like a Doberman, especially the needy part (I like having my back rubbed...and my arms, and I like cuddling, I can't help it - I require so much attention!)  And I think I've convinced him I would live in constant fear if I had to share the house with a Great Dane, it helped to prove my point that my hand has been in a deaf Great Dane's mouth before - against my will.  Luckily she didn't bite down, but she sent a message I've never forgotten...that if she wanted to, she could have taken my hand off.

So - we shall see.  Fingers crossed I don't end up with a high strung, high energy, 5'9 dog any time soon.

In other news.  We had a doctor's appointment this week.  They did an ultrasound to determine the baby's weight and overall size.  Little guy is already up to 5 lbs 15 oz.  They said that's about two weeks ahead of where he should be and it puts him in the 90-something percentile in weight.  I think Chewy took a lot of pride in baby boy's weight because he mentioned in the waiting room it would be cool if we had an 18 pound baby.  I told him he wouldn't be having one with this wife!

I'm at 33 weeks now but haven't taken a photo this week.

'Twas I, but 'tis not I

This past weekend (Easter weekend) we had an excellent General Conference.

I wanted to write a little on one talk in particular, that of Elder Dale Renlund, entitled Latter Day Saints Keep on Trying.  He began by quoting Nelson Mandela, “I’m no saint – that is, unless you think a saint is a sinner who keeps on trying.”

He then went on to quote from Shakespeare’s play, As You Like It. “’twas I, but ‘tis not I” Meaning, that’s who I was but no longer am. 

This touched me.  When I spoke at New Beginnings in March, our theme ‘we are all under construction’, reminded me how different the 2015 Lildonbro is from 2011 Lildonbro.  A lot of the struggles I went through in 2011 were self inflicted, the pain and sorrow I felt acted like a black hole sucking all the light and goodness from my life and I could not see the end, nor could I feel I deserved better than what I had.  I made a lot of mistakes as I tried to handle life my way instead of the Lord’s way.  I was obstinate to say the least.  I thought I knew what would make me happy, what would make my life more complete and I went for it, despite the still small whisperings that I had chosen incorrectly.  I couldn’t bear the thought of waiting any longer to move my life forward.  So I made things worse for myself.  That’s why it resonated with me when Elder Renlund said, “’Twas I, but ‘tis not I.”

Yes, I made mistakes.  Yes, I thought I had it figured out who I should marry and what I should do with my life.  And when that didn’t happen I let an irrepressible anger take control.  I have since learned to hand things to the Lord, including my anger.  I have learned that he can heal and sooth all the emotional hurts in this life.  The ones caused by others and even (maybe especially) the ones caused by my own decisions and actions. 

Elder Renlund says, “No failure ever need be final,” and I agree with him.  We get up when we fall, we forgive when we’re wronged, we seek forgiveness when we’re wrong, we hand over all the pains and sorrow to the Lord and let Him have them. And then we do it all over again, slowly climbing our way to perfection.  And it's all due to Jesus Christ and his sacrifice for us.  Elder Holland said it best in his talk on Sunday morning when he spoke of Easter and the Atonement, "Today we celebrate the gift of victory over every fall we've ever experienced, every sorrow we have ever known, every discouragement we have ever had, every fear we have ever faced."

So to all my blogger friends, Happy Belated Easter.  May we always remember that it is possible to be better than we are today because of Jesus Christ, our Savior.