Abigail's Alcove

I Am Wonderfully and Fearfully Made

2012-02-02T22:26:00.001-05:00

Everyone has a cross that is perfectly fitted to her back. Mine is multiple c-sections. I've got Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) which means that common worries such as breaking down on D.C's Outer-Loop or over-drawing my checking account can sometimes cause me to experience panic attacks. But nothing, nothing causes the blood to freeze in my veins like surgery.

So what does our great God do, He hands me a body that can only eject my pretty, happy babies through C-sections. Multiple, multiple c-sections.

Oh, and for good measure, He throws me into an intense anti-life time in America where most secular MDs are completely freaked out by multiple child-birth, much less multiple c-sections, and casually throw out helpful comments like "don't you know the maternal death statistics for women with your c-section history?" without bothering to review my medical chart.

Those type of random, shot from the hip, comments from visiting obs who have no formal connection to my life are just guaranteed to set off all the panic buttons in my mind. And I always seem to run into these "helpful" second guessing doctors at the weakest times of my psyche.

This time (at number 5!) I was determined to be strong. Thanks to Baby Tessy's dramatic experience in the NICU, I found out how surgeons really talk when "death is one the line." The talk about my newborn's risk of death during her necessary, life-saving surgery was calm, and smooth, and intense, and sweet. Nothing like the "Girl, you are so STUPID for using your uterus again" rant that I got from the "I've got fake concern for your health" obs that I sometimes run into on the multiple c-section question.

All the same, when my OB referred me to a specialist to take an extra hard look my unborn Baby Clare's placenta, I found myself getting some butterflies. The referral talk had some scary parts to it. I got a little scared. I prayed. I asked my husband to come to the appointment with me. I tried to steel myself to experience the worse.

Instead, this amazing doctor walked into our sonogram appointment.

"I'm sorry for wasting your time today," he said right away as he shook my husband's hand and then my own. Wasting our time?

Together the three of us marveled over these beautiful images. We could see Baby Clare's big head and a dark expanse of empty space above her. The was no sign of the worrisome placenta. Instead, the doctor flipped to another image. At the very top of my uterus, as far as possible away from my c-section scar, was the placenta. It looked clean and well-divided, as firm as a line in the sand. There was no sign that it was dangerously creeping past the uterine wall into trouble inside my body.

Then this amazingly kind, competent doctor showed me my c-section scar. It didn't looked hacked up or mutilated. It didn't look like there had been four previous surgeries on that same site. It was a tiny, single line--as thin as a small crack in a robin's egg.

It was as if God knew when he kick-started my little girl's life that her placenta needed to be planted as far as possible from my c-section scar. And when He created my uterus, back when I was as small as a pin in my own Mama's womb, He'd given that organ an extra measure of His healing grace.

I'm used to cooing over God's wonderful creative powers as reflected in each of my newborn's amazing bodies. This was the first time, however, I could see firsthand His healing grace reflected in my own.

Why I Love My Husband, Part IX

2012-02-02T21:51:00.000-05:00

I'm used to thinking of my husband as my best friend, my red hot lover, and my hero who walks in the front door at 7 PM every night and convinces our four rowdy kids to go to bed. I'm not used to thinking of him as "my spiritual helpmate." Yet that is exactly what he is to me. Sometimes I'm amazing how his insights are "spot-on" for clearing out whatever knots I've currently tied my spiritual life into. "Wow, he's good!" I often say. Then I remember the Holy Spirit is always helping him, help me.

There are many beautiful words that can describe my sacramental marriage to Jon Benjamin, but "a spiritual friendship" is one of the sweetest!

Just for Today, Please Stop the Obama Bashing on Facebook

2012-02-02T15:04:00.001-05:00

Let me tell you a story.When I was three months old, my maternal grandmother carried me to her Methodist Church to get baptized over the objections of my hippie, "God is everywhere, we don't need to go to Church to find him" parents. My other grandmother sent the antique family baptismal gown for me to wear during my ceremony. No matter what the fads were during the early 1970s, my two grandmothers were united in one firm conviction. Their beloved granddaughter was going to get an old fashioned head dunking in a "real" church as soon as possible.

I have done an absolutely miserable job of keeping my baptismal garment spot-less until my death (praise God for the restorative powers of Confession). Yet even if I was more pure of heart from the get-go, I would NEVER, ever be able to repay those two women for the priceless gift they gave me.Just like the baby Jesus, a woman carried me up to my Father's Temple when I was a mere infant and dedicated me to God. I lived the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in real life, as did many of my readers.

Now contrast my story with President Obama. From all appearances his Kansas Mom and his Kansas Grandma did an awesome job raising him. The guy ended up as the first African-American head of the Harvard Law Review. He's in a solid marriage, has two wonderful girls, and he's currently President of the United States of America.From what I've been able to piece together, however, it appears that there is one thing they omitted. He didn't get baptized as a kid.

We have a strong fight with the Obama administration's recent ruling that Catholic institutions must pay for birth control pills, abortions and sterilizations. While we must support our Bishops, write our outraged letters to Congress, and pray fervent prayers to Saint Micheal the Archangel, we also need to remember one crucial fact.Our fight is not with President Obama.Our fight is with the Devil.That tricky, mean-spirited Devil who often paints black as white and can easily mislead boatloads of people away from God's glorious Truth.

So during all our intense activity let us remember the virtue of humility. Most of us got graced with infant baptism. We didn't become Christians because of our own efforts. We were carried to Christ in a faithful woman's arms. Let us have compassion on those who didn't get that favor. On this Feast of the Presentation, let us truly pray for our enemies. Let us pray that the Illumination of Christ comes to enlighten all minds, our own minds and President Obama's mind too.

Mother Mary, pray for us. Pray for President Obama to become one of your beloved sons, fashioned in the image and likeness of your dear Jesus.

Better Than I Used to Be -- Tim McGraw (Lyrics on Screen+Download)

2012-01-27T17:09:00.000-05:00

A rough week for me. But I thought this song is inspiring and pretty reflective of where I am in my spiritual journey right now.

March for Life

2012-01-22T21:56:00.001-05:00

God bless everyone who is marching tomorrow. This pregnant Carmelite will be holding you, and our whole nation, up in prayer.

Great Reads

2012-01-19T06:06:00.003-05:00

Still climbing out of eight days of the stomach flu in our house. Surprisingly, by NOT reading the internet very much this week I stumbled upon some truly excellent reads. (What is this, a sign of "less is more?" my Jesus?)

Here is a totally inspiring conversion story from Secularism to the Catholic faith. (My dear Carmelites even provided a setting for a stranger to meet face to face with our Jesus.) This line made me cry:

"These days, when I pray the Rosary, I find myself wondering which woman was the last in my line to do so, and how easily she gave it up."

(h/t Father Dan Gallaugher)

Here is an inspiring piece from the Desert Nuns on sanctity that got me kick started this morning.

Your Husband Might Be a Carmelite If....

2012-01-14T11:10:00.008-05:00

his compassionate response to your puking sessions from a stomach bug while being 29 weeks pregnant with his child include saying deep St. John of the Cross quotes on the joy of suffering for Jesus.

I'd like to say its a mark of my own increased Carmelite formation that I didn't slug him in return for giving me all of this uplifting spiritual advice while I hugged the toilet bowl. I just kept muttering "I know I'm supposed to feel this way, but I don't!"

What Is On My Plate This Week--Update

2012-01-10T08:01:00.005-05:00

This kid, so cute.....

...so much trouble!

I had a stupid idea that the more kids you had, the easier it was to be a parent. I would have all this "experience" right?

Yeah, right.

Then came dear Miss Tess.

So my kiddo flunked her hearing exam in her right ear last week. Because Tess was on such strong drugs during her stay in the NICU there is an ongoing concern that she might be deaf. We're off to see a hearing specialist for more tests on Thursday. I specifically promised Jesus that I would NOT freak about about this. My mantra has been "no need to panic until we have a specific problem identified."

Then this morning, my darling starts throwing up.

For most kids, just a stomach bug.

For my post-surgery kid, vomiting when no one else in the family shows signs of the stomach flu could mean intussusception or "telescoping of the gut." According to her surgeon anytime she throws up I'm supposed to race to the ER to have an x-ray to confirm that her little small intestine hasn't folded in on itself.

It's 6 AM. My husband has already left for his long commute to work, I'm alone with three sleeping children and one sick toddler. My usual Carmelite prayer time was spent asking Mary "What am I supposed to do here?"

I didn't end up going to the ER.

So far, Miss Tess seems like she's back to her old self. I'm assuming that "intussusception" comes with a few more symptoms than messy sheets at 3 AM and 6 AM.

So that is what we are up to this week. Taking down the Christmas Tree. Teaching a reluctant reader how to enjoy Judy Moody. And waiting to see if my darling toddler is deaf or needs additional small intestine surgery.

At least my life as a housewife is never, ever dull!

Update: Tess passed her hearing test. Thanks for your prayers. When we started the test Tess was having the same odd response difference between her right and left ears. Suddenly, my extra shy girl pulled it together and started to actually cooperate with the audiologist. So her final, clear hearing test result was ranked "excellent." Praise God!

We also ended up having the stomach flu in our house, not intussusception. Of course my four year old confirmed Tessy's alternative diagnosis by throwing up on the way home from the audiologist while our new mini-van was stuck in the middle of the HOV lane on I-270. But hey, your minivan doesn't legally belong to you until it absorbs some puke stains, right? :-)

What the Poor Need More than Money

2012-01-09T10:44:00.011-05:00

One of my Sunday School students stopped coming to class this winter. When I called to check in on her, I heard a rough story. Her Mom is a widow with five children. My student and her siblings had been out of school for more than two weeks with "walking pneumonia" and her Mom was having trouble finding contract work with so many needy, sick kids to care for at home.

I called our Church to see if we could give this family some help and first person I talked to was not so helpful. (It's hard to explain but in very poor parishes, versus more wealthy ones--there is this strict line between the "deserving and undeserving" poor. Charity doesn't just go to whoever scores low on an income-asset test. When an entire parish is poor the poor box money often goes out to the "good" poor and not the "bad" poor. The "good poor" are widows who show up reliably at Mass, serve on the Social Concerns Committee and are poor through "no fault of their own." The bad poor are the ones who show up irregularly at Mass and Sunday School, have children far behind the neat sacramental schedule and constantly "need charity instead of give charity.")

I'm a horrible, messy, distracted, barely able to stand on my own two feet Catholic myself. I'm the one in Mass with a pregnant belly, a toddler with mismatched shoes, and a naughty seven year old who sometimes KICKS his sister's dropped bottle all the way down the pew instead of handing it gently to his mother when asked.

As a result, I have soft spot for the "undeserving" poor of my parish. I wasn't about to let this needy family go unaided. At this point, I could either "fight" with the parish, or just handle the situation myself. I asked Jon and we decided to send a good gift card from Target in case they needed Christmas presents, clothes or food.

The actual gift card purchase was so fun. My kids picked out the "scratch and sniff" Merry Christmas Card. I wrote a nice note saying "God see the work that you are doing for your family" and attempted to disguise my handwriting. Then I put our Catholic Church on as the return address and popped it into the mail.

On Christmas Eve the Mom called me.

I freaked out when Jon handed me the phone. I thought that she had figured out that it was our family who sent the gift card. I felt all squeamish inside. "It was supposed to be a secret" I complained mentally to Jesus.

The Mom never mentioned the gift card. Instead she was calling all apologetic that her family couldn't come over for Christmas dinner. (Honestly dear readers, I forgot I had mentioned that as a possibility three weeks earlier). She couldn't come because her 15 year old son who suffered from Depression was committed into a Adolescent Psych Ward over the weekend. My Sunday School Student was going to be spending Christmas Day visiting with her brother in a mental hospital in another state.

I was stunned.

I was stunned because of the glory of the Holy Spirit. Here I was concerned that this family was unemployed and recovering from pneumonia, when the cross they were really struggling with was so much harder.

And I was stunned that my "almsgiving" task, for which I was busy patting myself on the back-- was the least important thing I was giving to this family.

This woman was in tears on Christmas Eve because I had invited her family into my home. I wanted them to visit.

I took a deep breath. I do not know this Mother well at all and there seemed to be all sorts of hidden minefields in a conversation about a child's commitment to a psych ward. But I just asked the same caring questions that I ask if one of my friends was going to Children's National Hospital with a physical illness. I asked if she trusted the doctors. I asked if she was scared to bring him home. And that was the right questions to ask.

I'm so freakin' grateful to be a Catholic. To be a Secular Carmelite like Mary. I keep wanting to do something "big" to fight poverty in Appalachia. I want to join a committee, or volunteer at a legal clinic or sew sleeping bags for the homeless. God keeps reminding me about the virtue of Humility. He brings me people to serve--I don't need to go out in search of them. The tasks he asks me to do for them are always simple and light. Invite a stranger to Christmas dinner. Listen to a Mom talk as she drives back from the hospital where she just left her sick son.

St. Bernadette, please pray for Family "X" to heal. Please help my fourth grade student make her First Communion this Spring despite all the health challenges that her family faces. This is a cause so close to your own heart!

My First Advent as a Carmelite

2012-01-09T10:11:00.005-05:00

This Christmas was my first as an official Carmelite. I found myself making some daring changes.

First, I bought the gifts for the grouchy people on my list first. I stretched myself and bought "nice gifts." I didn't buy cool gifts made by nuns this year. I didn't try to make myself look "hip" or "holy". I didn't buy things that were irresponsibly expensive with the hidden hope of getting "liked" this season, but I put myself out there. I spent the more money on gifts and postage than I was normally comfortable spending and I (the girl who HATES shopping) spend some uncomfortable time hunting extra hard in fro-fro stores. I spent the money on others and didn't fret about what was going to be left to buy stuff for my own children. And then I stood in long lines with a pregnant belly and four grumpy kids to get those gifts shipped out at the Post Office by Dec 6th. Ahh! Advent got easier with that hard task off of my plate.

Then it was on to sharing love with the neighbors.

I live in a kennel. Seriously. The neighbors on each side of my leave their very large, very noisy dogs outside for hours and hours at a time. The poor dogs never stop pleading to be let back inside. Did you know that a Great Dane's bark can be heard inside a brick house even when all the doors and windows are shut? For the past five months, this constant barking has been driving me insane. (Don't even ask me if I've talked to the neighbors because the answer is yes and obviously it's just a mark of my "city ways" that I walk my dog on a leash around the neighborhood myself instead of "tossing him out into the back yard for hours to poop.")

So here is the thing, I needed to get a gift for the neighbors for Christmas. So I prayed to St. Francis of Assisi and I got all the neighbors cute organic dog treats for Christmas. I wrapped them up in pretty Christmas bows. I wrote nice notes. I dropped them off at all the houses secretly in the middle of the night. Amazing reaction!

I didn't realize that since none of these neighbors have kids, they feel like their dogs "are their kids". Sending treats to the dogs was received with such appreciation.
The best part was that it made me feel so better. Now when the Great Dane starts going I have affection in my heart for him.

This Advent I spent most of it very sick. I think pregnant ladies have a lower immune system, right? Anyway, I caught a bad cough on Dec 8th and I was like the walking wounded for all of Advent and Christmas. It was sort of relaxing because I didn't stress out about making this Advent "prayerful." I didn't worry about "making memories."

I knew in my weak state, I had to peacefully take whatever I could or could not get done that day. (I couldn't even really have a plan because this virus came with a nasty habit of starting a coughing fit so bad that I'd suddenly have to throw up. I never knew when I was going to have to retreat into my bedroom for a few hours.)

Becoming a Carmelite has made me more peaceful about Advent. I don't feel like I have to "try hard" to be holy, or force my family to "connect with Christ." I'm more trusting. I know that He's looking for me far more than I'm looking for Him! I've just got to relax and open my heart to the grace He's already poured out into my life.

The "no plan/not trying to hard Advent" ended up being so beautiful. I hope I get the grace to repeat it again next year.

War Horse--The Moviegoer

2011-12-31T22:31:00.006-05:00

My parents dropped by on their way home from spending Christmas visiting my sister tonight. We lucked into free babysitting for two hours and took in the movie "War Horse." I thought the plot a more saccharin (and simultaneously less believable) rip off of "Black Beauty." I'd save your precious movie dollars and wait to rent this film at Blockbuster.

The funniest critique came from my husband in the parking lot. "My Faith has sort of ruined historical fiction for me right now. Modern writers make such horrible mistakes when they try to depict the past when people were better Catholics. Way was the Irish Catholic mother knitting during a time of great stress, instead of praying? Why did the grandfather talk about the spiritual significant of passenger pigeons to his sick and sad granddaughter? He was a good French Catholic farmer, he would have said something about Jesus in that moment. And where were all the siblings?? Everyone in 1914 rural Ireland was not an only child!"

He makes me laugh, that man!

Update: Wow, totally disagree with the New York Times flattering review of War Horse.

Happy 37th Birthday To Me!

2011-12-31T22:23:00.008-05:00

Two of my pregnant, Catholic friends drove over an hour to hang out with me at my Birthday Tea! Can life get any sweeter?

Oh it can, since my sick husband stayed up late painting my dining room pink in time for my Birthday Party. I love you, Jon!

The Hidden Power of a Carmelite!

2011-12-27T11:40:00.001-05:00

A dear reader brought this great blog post to my attention today about a reflection from last years March for Life.

"During the speeches, my eyes fell on a Carmelite brother in a very rough and worn brown habit. He bore a beard and appeared recollected the entire time. I looked down and saw that he wore simple thong sandals and no socks. It was below freezing outside and there were his toes. Let me tell you, my toes were cold and I was wearing two pairs of socks. He had to have been suffering.

I understood in that moment that we can't win this fight with just speeches, t-shirts, and banners. That thin, bearded Carmelite brother was secretly and quietly overcoming the demonic principalities in our nation's capital. He was doing it through recollected silence and penance. He was the the true sign of contradiction against the culture of sex, the culture of excess, and the culture of death.

May God richly reward him, hear our prayers, and bring this national scourge to and end."

Happy Birthday Jesus!

2011-12-25T09:05:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T08:54:00.000-05:00

Today Everyone Is a Carmelite!

2011-12-24T09:12:00.002-05:00

There was a special "buzz" in the air yesterday when I went shopping at Target. Maybe it's just because I just moved to a small town in the Bible Belt, but everyone was patient and smiling and the clerks actually still said "Merry Christmas!"

It was so cool because I realize that today--everyone is a Carmelite! Everyone is more conscious that they are doing their work "for Him" which is what "praying always" means.

When I was a kid, I had that thought "Why can't Christmas last all year!" And today, as a Carmelite, I just feel so happy for everyone. It's like "Hey, today you get a chance to taste that same exciting spiritual "buzz" in your daily life that my Johnny and I get to lap up all year!"

Happy Christmas everyone!!!!

The Maccabeats - Purim Song

2011-12-22T10:49:00.000-05:00

Taking the Bible Stories--Literally

2011-12-22T10:18:00.006-05:00

I know we Catholics aren't involved in the debate "is the Bible literally true", yet the deeper I grow in Faith, the more I drink in Holy Scripture, the more I start to see these fantastic "tales" I grew up with as a Protestant start to factually happen in my own life.

Hammond & Queen Ester

If you haven't yet read the book of Ester yet, take a few minutes soon to check it out. After the Jews got kicked out of Jerusalem, some were taken to the Mesopotamia. A beautiful Jewish girl was kidnapped by the King and forced to endure a year long "beauty pageant" to win the heart of the king. Ester is so NOT into this early version of the Bachelor but guess who ends up being chosen to become Queen?

One of the king's henchmen, named Hammond, hates the Jews and comes up with a tricky plot to make sure that all the Jewish people are massacred on the same day. Ester's uncle comes to her and tells her that she must act to save her people. "God has placed you on the throne for this purpose," he says.

Queen Ester risks death to save the Jewish people. The Jews are saved and in a very specific "tables are turned" event, Hammond is hung on the same gallows he built to kill Queen Ester's uncle.

Fast forward thousand and thousands of years to September 2009. My husband and I are sitting in his childhood living room in Upstate New York waiting to bury his father.

Jon's father had cancer, and died very suddenly 12 weeks after his first diagnosis. We got the unexpected news on a Saturday, left a hurried message on voice mail at Jon's work and frantically drove 12 hours to reach his hometown. On Monday, my husband spoke to his immediate superior (hereafter "Hammond") and was told "don't worry about missing work for your father's funeral. Take all week to stay there and help take care of your mother."

On Wednesday, Jon called to check in at work and got horrifying news. The main boss and all of his co-workers had no idea where he'd been for the past 48 hours. "Hammond" had refused to pass on any messages from Jon and had "allegedly" walked around the office saying "Where is Jon? This is so not like him to just disappear on us!"

My husband was horrified. We knew "Hammond" had been gunning for a replacement for Jon for sometime, but how could we have predicted this? It felt so awful to be both dressed in black, grieving the sudden death of a Father, and now have the possibility that Jon might be fired from his job solely because he tried to attend his father's funeral.

My husband's face was totally white. "What do we do?" he asked me. "Should we run home today?"

In this rare moment of clarity, I thought of the Bible Story of Queen Ester. "No", I said. "We're here. We are going to bury your father tomorrow. We're going to trust God to protect your job."

We got through that horrible week and Jon still had a job when we came home to Washington D.C.

One year later, Jon came home and told me that "Hammond" had been fired as a result of a really crazy situation. Hammond had tried to keep her firing secret from Jon for almost 3 months, but it all came out into to light. We were just stunned. It was such an obvious work of God.

Jon now has a new supervisor. While his workplace is not perfect, it's many, many times better.

Our God is trustworthy. Even when it seems like Evil has the upper hand, God will never ever abandon his people. I watched that video of the Maccabeats sing "the Purim" song (which is the traditional festival celebrating Queen Ester) with tears in my eyes this week. That story means so much to my heart.

Happy Hanukkah!

2011-12-21T10:20:00.001-05:00

Time to DELIGHT in all those great Maccabeats videos.

(Umm, where o where is our great Catholic acapella groups?)

The Maccabeats - Candlelight - Hanukkah

2011-12-21T10:19:00.001-05:00

The Maccabeats - Miracle - Matisyahu - Hanukkah

2011-12-21T10:19:00.000-05:00

The Maccabeats - Book of Good Life

2011-12-21T10:18:00.000-05:00

Cheap Christmas Party Ideas

2011-12-16T09:24:00.002-05:00

Anyone have fun, easy, and cheap Christmas party ideas?

I'm hosting a Caroling Party for 10 people tomorrow night. I picked up a ham for dinner. I think I'm going to bake 2 pies and possibly some cookies. I need ideas for easy side dishes, appetizers, decorations, etc.

Thinks for letting me borrow your creativity!

Trials of Post-NICU Motherhood

2011-12-16T00:46:00.021-05:00

Just a follow-up on my previous sonogram post.

So it was not that bad. They didn't get all the pictures they needed because the little squirt was in an odd position, but at this point I'm cheerfully thinking "the more the merrier" with non-invasive tests for Miss Clare Bear.

Here's the ironic part.

I got yelled at.

Yes, the ultra-sound technician was totally freaked out that they didn't catch Tessy's duodenal atresia during her 20 week ultrasound. Now, I did not think that it was totally weird to miss a speck of trouble in a tiny unborn baby's small intestine. But evidently there is some unstated rule that sonograms are 100% reliable in picking up potential birth defects. So the tech was mad and kept commenting on it through out our very long sonogram appointment.

Then she made a big conclusion that clearly I was at fault for the missed diagnosis. Obviously, it was awful that I brought all my distracting young kids into the previous ultrasound and disrupted the prior tech's concentration. That was the only reasonable explanation for why Tessy's condition went undiscovered.

a) Meanwhile, the tech is lecturing me while she and are are ALONE in the room, which is exactly how it went for 28 1/2 minutes during the last ultrasound with Tess. (I only bring my kids and my husband in at the end of a sonogram to see the youngest baby.)

b) Where does someone get off yelling at the Mom? Especially the Mom of a disabled kid?

c) (which I didn't realize until my husband noted it during our car ride home) this was the EXACT same tech who did Tessy's ultrasound!

Ahh! This conversation made me so mad! (Plus the tech's disclosure that there has been a perinatologist in the same building that I could have easily gotten a referral to see on week one of my pregnancy, instead suffering through weeks of nervousness to week 25).

During our ride home I was channeling my buddies St. James and St. John of Zebedee. "Can't Jesus just burn up that whole building with fire from heaven?" I asked my husband only half in jest. "Our HMO has been so mean to me for four straight pregnancies now AND they do abortions there."

My dear, Carmelite husband looks at me and says seriously "Abby, they ARE going to all end up on Fire. It's called Hell. And it lasts forever. If you don't have Jesus, it's impossible to be nice to a pregnant woman. Impossible! That's where our prayers for God's mercy are supposed to come in."

(I'm telling you, if I end up in heaven after all my "hair trigger temper tantrums" it's going to be solely because I've got the cheat sheet to Jesus' heart itself in my spouse!)

So in the end, I'm working on forgiving everyone in advance of this sweet daughter's birth, because chances are that not a lot of doctors, nurses and ultra sound techs are going to be super excited about kid number five entering into the world.

But that's fine. Because her Daddy, me and Jesus are firmly in her fan club. Our love counts more!

It's a GIRL!

2011-12-15T18:50:00.001-05:00

Pleased as punch to announce that

Miss Clare Jean Benjamin

is expected on March 22, 2012!

The Joys of Catholic Motherhood

2011-12-14T21:47:00.004-05:00

It's pretty crazy being the mother of the Benjamins at the indoor soccer field.

For the first hour of soccer practice on Wednesday all I hear is "ALEX! ALEX!!!" because my 7 year old son has his head in the clouds and is the only kid on his intense team NOT watching the ball.

For the second hour of soccer practice all I hear is the coach yelling "Hannah, Hannah! Way to go HANNAH!" because my 8 year old daughter is a killer defender and has her foot on literally every scoring attempt from the other side.

It's kinda nice to have both parenting experiences side by side.

Thrown Back Into the Pile

2011-12-13T16:57:00.010-05:00

(A follow-up post from a Post-NICU Mama)

In a gushing burst of love for little "mystery" Benjamin (my kid's nickname for their youngest sib) I scheduled a sonogram for this Thursday. I did it solely to let my husband see an early outline of his little one's face. This was a huge deal for me. I tried to explain to my husband all my conflicting emotions with my first pregnancy after a NICU baby. They are mostly not good.

I mean, I love this new kid. I prayed for him (or her). I'm okay with doing general routine maintenance during OB appointments--testing my sugar, etc.

But I'm so NOT cool with doing a sonogram.

It's like, the bloom is off of the rose.

Not only did I have a kid with a fatal birth defect who passed her sonogram--I had a kid who PASSED all her physicals with flying colors for the first SIX DAYS of life. I think I truly passed the 10 mark of pediatricians who all said that my Tess had simple reflux or simple jaundice, all while she was actually dying! (The worse thing for me was that she was under 48 hours of hospital observation from day 4 to day 6 and no one caught it.)

So this whole "sonogram" thing doesn't mean anything to me. I'm not going to believe it if we get an "all clear"--but the worse part, I don't think I'm going to believe it if we get the "all clear" during the next baby's first week of life, either.

The good news is that they don't think that my daughter's birth defect is genetic, which means we have no higher risk of having it again.

The bad news is that they are throwing me back into the pile! Seriously, I have no special tests or monitoring done with this next pregnancy. Which is hard because the technical odds of something going wrong might be the same as pre-Tess, but I'm not the same!

I am not the same Mom.

So, I don't know. Yesterday, I call the hospital where I gave birth to Tess and where I'm scheduled to give birth with baby mystery. I was hoping to get some insight into what screening tests after my new baby's birth to rule out any intestinal or heart trouble. The Pediatric Floor remembered me! Tess left a memorable impression. The bad news is they are not going to do anything. In fact, the perky nurse said "don't worry after any neo-natal testing because if there is a problem they'll catch it in the sonogram."

I said "But they didn't catch Tessy's problem in the sonogram!"

Dead silence on the other end of phone.

Yeah, no help or understanding from the medical establishment. There's no standard protocol As my husband said with forgiveness "Tessy's troubles weren't serious enough to go into automatic high alert status with the next baby, but we also can't go back into in easy, totally healthy baby section either. We're in the gray zone where no one knows what to do with us."

So it looks like it's just Jesus, Mary, and the Archangel Raphael who will be the ones keeping an extra sharp lookout on mystery Benjamin's pregnancy and his emotionally fragile Mama. Which worked perfectly for Baby Tessy's birth.

On the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, I didn't celebrate with any cute teaching moments with my kids. Instead, I tried to more deeply inhale our Mommy's dear promise:

"Do not let anything afflict you, and do not be afraid of any illness or accident or pain. Am I not here who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Is there anything else that you need?"

How to Tell If You're A Really Great Sunday School Teacher

2011-12-11T13:49:00.011-05:00

After a rough lesson on the Third Commandment---where my students were in open rebellion about the requirement to got to Mass every Sunday and one kid defiantly said, "I'm not even going to Mass on Christmas!", I started a game of "telephone" to lighten the mood.

I'm so glad one of the first messages to pass along in a whisper was "Going to Mass stinks!" Clearly, my lesson on the importance of "Honoring the Sabbath" made a wonderful impression! :-)

Why I Love My Husband, Part VIII

2011-12-11T13:36:00.005-05:00

This past Friday we had the following conversation while Jon was on the commuter train.

Him: "So you picked up paint today and we'll be painting the living room tonight?"

Me: "No. I fled from the Lowe's in a panic. There were so many color options. I just didn't feel like I could commit to one."

Him: "I know it's really hard to choose. That's why I was secretly hoping you'd take the pressure off."

Me: "Really?"

Him: You can just pick one, and if it looks bad, we'll just paint over it with another color. Anything is going to better than the all white walls we currently have in the living room."

Me: "Well, there was this one shade that I was thinking about, but I'm still not sure what it's going to look like at night....."

Him: "As long as its not black, it can't be wrong!"

Me: "Okay, you've inspired me! I'll go back to Lowe's right now with the kids. We'll get the paint for you to work on tonight!"

(Why was that conversation so lovely? Because it wasn't until AFTER I hung up the phone that I remembered my husband is the one with the Masters of Fine Arts degree! Jon is so endlessly encouraging. Like Jesus, my husband is very meek and humble of heart!)

How to Paint a Living Room with Small Children

2011-12-10T21:29:00.002-05:00

So I asked all my friends on facebook for advice on how to paint a living room in small patches while having lots of young children in the house...

No one came up with my husband's suggestion--put them to work!

Daddy did the high parts

Finished result!

Why I Love My Husband Part VII

2011-12-08T22:27:00.003-05:00

Because he scores his children's miniature golf game as seriously as if he were on a real putting green!

Go Say Congratulations

2011-12-07T17:25:00.005-05:00

Two of my favorite Catholic bloggers are celebrating new life today.

Lauren from Magnify the Lord with Me just adopted a newborn daughter. Yeah!

Nicole from Sew Hormonal just found out she's pregnant again. Yahoo!

St Hannah, in heaven, pray for all of us infertile women to bear an excess "good fruit" in the form of finding many spiritual children to raise up in the knowledge of the Lord.

A Beautiful Post About Having Hope

2011-12-07T17:22:00.004-05:00

All You Who Hope hit the nail on the head with this luminous post. Sometimes our worse suffering occurs just as God is granting a giant yes to our deepest prayers.

Don't ever think Jesus isn't listening to you!

Sister Love

2011-12-06T21:59:00.002-05:00

For all the hostile forces who think that there are already "to many people in the world" so no one should have more than two "replacement" kids per family

I'd like to say NO WAY!

My number 3 and number 4 are too precious for words! :-)

Does Your Monday Currently Suck?

2011-12-05T12:07:00.008-05:00

Does your Monday currently suck? Are your kids sick and crabby with winter colds? Are there expensive plumbers currently visiting your house or are you trying to teach unmotivated children to learn how to read?

Yet did you get the Eucharist last Sunday? Do you know who is waiting to enter into your heart on Christmas Day?

If so, the world needs you. The world needs you to decorate your face with a beautiful smile to match the holy love lodged deep in your heart--despite all the agitation and turmoil around you.

Here's some proof. As I was researching acappella groups on You Tube I found a clip from my alma mater, Smith College (a college of all women). They are singing this depressing song about lost love INSIDE my old Protestant Church, Helen Hills Hills* Chapel.

The place where I went to pray and feel close to Jesus all of the time in the late 90s is now hosting the words in 2010:

"This is the way you left me,
I'm not pretending.
No hope, no love, no glory,
No Happy Ending.
This is the way that we love,
Like it's forever.
Then live the rest of our life,
But not together."

The college dating scene without a concept of true love and sacramental marriage --truly SUCKS!

Lets cover all the petty grievances we have this Advent with out imperfect lives, children, spouses and ourselves this season with a smile. In the "big picture" we have it all! We know the One who truly, truly loves us.

There are a lot of people looking for Hope this Season. Lets give them a reason to come home to the Catholic Church for Christmas.

Smiffenpoofs - "Happy Ending" (Mika) - 2010

(No the double Hills Hills is not a typo. Turns out Helen Hills, Married a boy also named Hills, but when she left the money for the Smith College chapel she wanted it clear that her maiden name was included in the official chapel name. I always that this needless "double name" for my beloved chapel was a bit of a sign that feminism got a little carried away at my dear old college)

One of the joys of moving to a small town

2011-12-04T21:56:00.000-05:00

Free Horse-Drawn Carriage Rides at Christmas Time

O Eve... do not grieve

2011-12-04T21:33:00.001-05:00

"O Eve!
My mother, my daughter, life-giving Eve,
Do not be ashamed, do not grieve.
The former things have passed away,
Our God has brought us to a New Day.
See, I am with Child,
Through whom all will be reconciled.
O Eve! My sister, my friend,
We will rejoice together
Forever
Life without end."
— Sr. Columba Guare copyright© 2005 Sisters of the Mississippi Abbey

(ht The Anchoress)

Nice Plug for the Servants of the Lord and of the Virgin Matara,

2011-11-29T11:48:00.001-05:00

The Anchoress has a nice plug for the Servants of the Lord and of the Virgin Matara. I love the picture above!

I Feel Like I Have Never Ever Done This Before...

2011-11-28T02:14:00.006-05:00

Pregnancy.

I feel like I have never, ever done this before.

Which is crazy, right?

My youngest is 15 months old. My house is filled with four biological children, who clearly didn't drop in from outer space or hatch from eggs.

Yet this fifth pregnancy, in the 22nd week, still feels so alien to me, so strange.

I still don't have "my pregnant Mama groove" on yet.

It's like I've never been pregnant and tired and had to go to the grocery store before, or had to teach school while I feel distracted, or changed a diaper while my pregnant stomach was feeling extra nauseous, or searched for a maternity dress that was both modest and pretty....

Instead of feeling like I'm on well-traveled ground, I'm constantly shocked that this process of "co-creating a new soul with God" isn't easy.

Mommy Mary, pray for me! This Advent, give me your generous heart!

Christmas Tree Shopping

2011-11-26T19:19:00.001-05:00

We went "local" this year, getting our tree from a local Christmas Tree farm. A fun switch from artifical trees in a small City apartment. One of the many benefits of moving to the country!

Freedom From Want

2011-11-25T22:03:00.012-05:00

This morning Tess stole the breakfast of her three older siblings

and actually demanded more donuts!

Hard to believe that in September 2010

this same baby almost died after a birth defect left her unable to eat for four weeks..

God answered this Mother's prayer for healing--in abundance!

Prayer Is A Battle

2011-11-21T12:20:00.007-05:00

(This post is also entitled "What I wish someone had told me three years ago when I started Carmel because I have spent a long time banging up my shins wandering around in the dark, totally confused as to why praying is so hard for me.)

Gentle readers, did you know that our dear Catechism defines prayer as a battle?

It's a fight!
It's a bloody, no gloved, unfair bar room brawl.
The fight goes back to Genesis, when our ancestor Jacob fought all night with an unseen force and "refused to give up until he had been blessed."

It's important to remember that Jacob, walked away from that successful fight --LIMPING because his thigh socket had gotten thrust out of joint. (Did it ever heal, I ask?)

Here are the elegant, inspiring words of our Catechism:

"THE BATTLE OF PRAYER

2725 Prayer is both a gift of grace and a determined response on our part. It always presupposes effort. The great figures of prayer of the Old Covenant before Christ, as well as the Mother of God, the saints, and he himself, all teach us this: prayer is a battle. Against whom? Against ourselves and against the wiles of the tempter who does all he can to turn man away from prayer, away from union with God. We pray as we live, because we live as we pray. If we do not want to act habitually according to the Spirit of Christ, neither can we pray habitually in his name. The "spiritual battle" of the Christian's new life is inseparable from the battle of prayer."

(Read the whole glorious section on Prayer is a battle here.)

When we pray, we need to battle distractions. We need to battle discouragement. We need to battle our inherent selfishness. We need to overcome obstacles both internal and external in order to seek union with God.

Indeed, the whole thing is so impossible for mere stupid mortals, the Holy Spirit has to come down to be our Advocate.

Prayer is not something easy and relaxing to do in your spare time--something like scrap-booking or crochet, my darlings. Prayer is hard work that makes us fit Marines for Jesus!

Jon and I are Carmelites!!!!!

2011-11-20T23:01:00.002-05:00

November Profession Mass in Frederick, MD

My Temporary Promise

“I, Abigail Benjamin, inspired by the Holy Spirit in response to
God’s call, sincerely promise to the Superiors of the Order
of the Teresian Carmel and to you, my brothers and sisters,
to tend toward evangelical perfection in the spirit of the
evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty, obedience, and
of the Beatitudes, according to the Rule of St. Albert
and the Constitutions of the Secular Order of Discalced
Carmelites, for three years.

I confidently entrust this, my Promise, to the Virgin Mary,
Mother and Queen of Carmel.”

(PS I'm wearing the cross I got in the first grade for singing in the Methodist Youth Choir. I can't believe this "non-crucifix" Protestant cross was actually a perfect replica of the special crosses that hang inside the Carmelite convents!)

Are You Gonna Kiss Me Or Not - Lyrics-

2011-11-18T12:48:00.003-05:00

I heard this song today in a special place after Daily Mass. I could just picture Jesus singing this to me in jest after all the dithering I've done the past two months about joining Carmel on Sunday. The Lyrics are so perfect!

"Are you gonna kiss me or not" (i.e. make my temporary Carmelite vows to Him)
Are we gonna do this or what?
I think you know I love you a lot
I think we've got a real good shot
Are you gonna kiss me or not?"

He makes me laugh, that Jesus. He loves me with such special affection!

Here's to all of my Carmelite friends and all of the dear readers who follow the Lamb of God wherever He leads us!

Prayer Request

2011-11-17T21:45:00.004-05:00

My favorite former premie is getting cochlear implant surgery tomorrow at Children's Hospital. Please pray for Miss Sky and her Mom, Tharen. Thanks!

5 Days to Go

2011-11-15T23:05:00.003-05:00

Five days to go before my temporary vows (for three years) to become a Carmelite.

Monday night the phrase "evangelical perfection" gave me pause. Can I really promise to "continue to strive for evangelical perfection" for the next three years? I mean, it sounds so hoity toity, at the same time, COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE.

Then my sweet husband came home from work and straightened me out.

"Are we really going to give up on trying to get better? I mean, are we ever going to go back to thinking that we were fine and be content with keeping our spiritual life on a straight plane."

No.

So I'm back in.

Emergency Prayer Request--Update

2011-11-11T09:00:00.002-05:00

Please say a prayer for my bridesmaid's little boy, Raphael Balint-Smith. He just got diagnosed with a brain tumor at age 3 and has to undergo surgery today. Poor Baby! Poor parents!

Glorious Archangel St. Raphael, great prince of the heavenly court, you are illustrious for your gifts of wisdom and grace. You are a guide of those who journey by land or sea or air, consoler of the afflicted, and refuge of sinners.

I beg you, assist me in all my needs and in all the sufferings of this life, as once you helped the young Tobias on his travels. Because you are the "medicine of God" I humbly pray you to heal the many infirmities of my soul and the ills that afflict my body. I especially ask of you the favor (here mention your special intention), and the great grace of purity to prepare me to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Update from my friend Christine:

Thank you so much. It means such a lot to us that there is a community of wonderful people praying for our little boy on the other side of the world. I wanted you all to know that he had the best possible outcome for the actual surgery yesterday. The surgeon is hopeful that he was able to remove the whole tumor, or very close to it. He came out of the anaesthetic beautifully (he mumbled: "I'm ready to go home, now.") and was able to move all his limbs. Through all of this he has been so patient and cooperative. The night before his operation he was worried about the other children he could hear crying on the ward. We are blessed to have such a special little boy. Test results in the next few days will determine further treatment. In gratitude, Christine and Rupert

Why I Love My Husband- Part V

2011-11-08T18:20:00.004-05:00

Because, today I emailed him a 500 word essay on how a November budget hiccup was going to cause our family all sorts of dire problems in the next three weeks. He emailed me back a three word message

Jesus, loves us!

(He is the ONLY man who could get me to better embrace our Carmelite vow of poverty!)

Jon's Soccer Cake

2011-11-06T00:39:00.000-04:00

He designed this entire concept. I was super doubtful, but it ending up looking good and tasting great!

Taking the Road Less Traveled

2011-11-05T19:46:00.018-04:00

On Thursday, I grabbed this book from the library.

The first couple chapters are a really hilarious read on a bad motherhood day. Some ex-Advertising gurus interviewed a bunch of mothers about their lives. For the first twenty minutes they got all sunshine and roses. At the twenty-two mark limit, moms let down their hair and started telling the truth about the cracks in the facade. My favorite quote was "I love being a Mother. I just hate doing it!"

It was a great read. Super fun. I thought it hit some of the emotional problems I face in my conception of motherhood right on the mark.

However, reading it left a bad taste in my mouth.

The problem is that the author's conclusions are things that are either unethical, or basically impossible to do as a practicing Catholic. Their cure for the "insane" expectations of modern motherhood were to "just drop a few things.

Here are some actual quotes with my reactions.

"My husband and I initially wanted to have three kids, but we decided after a long honest talk that we could really only handle two." (Ah, contraception is not really an option for me).

Or "if family dinner is too hard, why not aim for family togetherness at a nightly back-yard soccer game instead." (Sorry, much as I hate it, my crew needs to eat.)

Or "just say no to doing hosting a kid's birthday party." (Hmmm, tempting...)

This 'just drop all the unnecessary things" really ate me up.

But here is the thing, on Wednesday night, my kid's soccer coach put out an APB begging a parent to host a post-soccer season celebration party. After talking to my husband, I unenthusiastically agreed.

On Friday, I started throwing up at 8 AM and didn't stop until 2 PM. (Hello, morning sickness. Did you get the 'we are now firmly in the second trimester memo?) The house is a mess. I practically crawled through the Target birthday aisle on all four picking up party supplies with 4 kids in tow.

The whole time I thought "this is so stupid! Why is the only pregnant girl on the team hosting a party? And I'm the poorest one who has to give up her HEATING OIL money to host a party that no one has RSVP'd for? This is exactly the sort of 'crazy mothering thing' the book says to avoid!!!"

But in my heart of hearts I knew the truth. No one else had volunteered. Zip. And I knew why. No one else was going to clean their house for a bunch of total strangers except me, this silly Catholic girl who sometimes takes random stabs at extending "charity" and "hospitality."

Then my son's team won a ticket to semi-finals unexpectedly on Friday. That put me in a better mood. But I mean, I was still cooking a soccer cake at 10 PM (because of course, I had forgotten to buy vegetable oil and toilet paper, so my hubby had to make at 9:30 PM grocery store run).

Then this morning, an impossible thing happened.

We WON SEMI-finals.

You guys have to understand. We beat the team that hadn't had a single goal scored on them all season! My team, the guys that just believe that soccer should be fun, and use all the players on the team in every single game. We beat the intense coach who hand picks all of his players each year. And we didn't just beat them, we shut them out! The final score was 3 to 0.

(I sort of credit massive prayers made to Blessed Pope John Paul II. He was a soccer player in his youth, remember).

Then, almost as an anti-climax, we won the championship game 5 to 1.

So after this major Cinderella victory, everyone came over to my house. My tiny house. The adults sat in the living room and the kids played old fashioned party games that were really fun.

(trying to pop each other's balloons)
It was a fantastic time.

And it was all grace. I mean the angels cleaned our house, cooked the food and gave me energy to be "camp fun director" for three hours today.

This kid, stuffing his face with my husband's homemade soccer ball cake just lost his mother to cancer four weeks ago. (I actually cried when I bought him chicken nuggets at the soccer field today. I was so honored just to be able to do something tiny for him. Then he actually came over to my house!!!)

And this girl has a tough life and rarely smiled the whole soccer season. Look at her today!

I would have missed it all, if I had tried to be "sensible" about my limitations in motherhood. Thank the Lord we are Catholics. As Saint Paul said "when I am weak, then I am strong."

To My Special Carmelite Friend....

2011-11-04T08:58:00.003-04:00

Darling, not just anyone can get me to post a video that advocates heavy drinking on my blog, but this song hook is seriously the best mantra to fighting the Devil of Despair. "I get knocked down, but I get up again! You're never gonna keep me down!"

Remember that putting on our brown scapular paints a giant Target on our back. In the words of the late, great Peggy W. "don't tell anyone the truth about suffering in Carmel. Keep it under wraps. Otherwise, they'll never come in the door."

I'm your personal prayer warrior. I've totally got your back in any bar brawl with the Devil!

Chumbawamba - Tubthumping

(PS Everyone else, please pray for all the Third Orders and all of our dear priests and religious. It's unbelievable how much stress we endure before making vows of obedience.)

On the Bookshelf: Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations On Life with John F. Kennedy

2011-11-02T11:59:00.005-04:00

I've really enjoyed listening to this recently released oral history on Jacqueline Kennedy. Four months after her husband's assassination, Mrs. Kennedy sat down with noted historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr had had a series of seven "conversations" about her husband's presidency. These conversations were quite candid, because she knew they were not going to be made public for at least 50 years. (This was also basically the only time she allowed herself to be interviewed about her life as First Lady.)

There are all kinds of unexpected gems which put a more human face on the imposing political figures of the day. Here is one I enjoyed about Mrs. Kennedy's meeting with Khrushchev. After running out of conversation topics with Mr. Khrushchev, she mentions that one of the famous Russian "space dogs" had puppies...

"I knew all the names of those dogs- Strelka and Belk and Laika. So I said, "I see where-I see one of your space dogs just had puppies. Why don't you send me one?" And he just sort of laughed...

We were back in Washington about tow months later, and two absolutely sweating Russians come staggering into the Oval Room with the ambassador carrying this poor terrified puppy who'd obviously never been out of a laboratory, with needles in every vein. And Jack said to me--I had forgotten to tell him that- he said, "How did this dog get here?" And I said "Well, I'm afraid that I asked Khrushchev for it in Vienna. I was just running out of things to say."

(pg. 210)

Because Flying Around the World With Me, Enduring the Kidnapping of the Century and Bearing Me Four Children is Evidently Not Enough!

2011-11-02T09:49:00.010-04:00

I'm reading a biography of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, a bookish Smith Grad who married famous aviator Charles Lindbergh. (First guy to fly across the Atlantic Ocean in the 1920s).

This quote made me laugh out loud. Turns out the dashing Charles was NOT a perfect husband. During her pregnancy with their fourth child, he turns critical of the "slowness" of her poetry output. According to Anne: "He goes over the record-nine years and only two books and wonders why it is. Has he not given me the right kind of environment?"

Anne replies in her diary:

"But you ask for too much, I want to cry out. I cannot be having a baby and be a good housekeeper and keep thinking and writing on the present times (in my diary) and be always free to discuss anything with you and give to the children and keep an atmosphere of peace in the family (the bigger family which is so scattered and distraught now, all of us disagreeing) and keep my mind clear and open on present day things and write a book at the same time. I cannot be an efficient woman and housemanager and an artist at the same time.

Yeah, Chuck. You want to much!

Interestingly, Anne admits to herself that having children is a mark of improvement as a writer. She also states:

"the richest writing comes not from the people who dedicate themselves to writing alone... For instance, in spite of my admiration for their beautiful writing, I think there is a kind of fungus quality to the books of Vita Sackville-West and Virginia Woolf. I know they are marred. V.S.W. has children, but it is a question of attitude. They think of themselves as writers, not as mothers or wives ever (what a statement!), so their point of view, it seems clear, is always the same.

(Herrmann, Dorothy, "Anne Morrow Lindbergh: A Gift for Life", pg. 237)

Here's to all of us writers who dedicate themselves "not to writing alone," but to primarily following the bigger adventure which is the Christian Life itself!

Me and My Tiny Tumbler

2011-11-01T22:42:00.001-04:00

Maria had her gymnastic show last night. I love age 4!

I Made It Into Carmel!

2011-11-01T22:38:00.004-04:00

I got an email today confirming that Jon and I have a place in the Profession Mass on November 20! Hurrah! Thanks for all of your prayers!!!!

(Seriously, I had some doubts that I was getting in after an awful, awful interview last month.)

To my dear Jesus, "I used to think maybe you loved me ----now baby I'm sure!"

(PS If you're a member of my Carmel profession group and didn't get a confirmation email, don't fear. Your letter is coming by snail mail. It's just that I'm anal retentive and asked Mr. A to send me proof that the post office delivered my temporary promise letter.)

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T17:55:00.000-04:00

from the Benjamins!

Steven Curtis Chapman - Do Everything (Official Music Video)

2011-10-30T10:30:00.000-04:00

I love this song. This is the Carmelite theology of the "little way" in song form!

Bruno Mars - Just The Way You Are [Official Video]

2011-10-27T17:57:00.011-04:00

A Catholic told me recently "God doesn't love us with affection!" It was so shocking, I listened to him repeat that exact statement three times during his speech. "God doesn't love us with affection!"

In my heart I said "NO WAY!"

And I prayed for him. Because he obviously never drank in the glowing words of St. John of the Cross.

God loves each of us, in an affectionate, uniquely personal way. And just because He loves the whole entire world and forgives us all of sin, it doesn't diminish that between Him and me there is a unique, teasing, personal love. He has real affection for my soul.

As one of my wise Carmelite friend likes to say "I'm God's IT GIRL!"

(And her counter-point, "I don't even mind that your God's IT Girl, too. Because I know for certain, I am so the IT GIRL!!!!)

This has been an unbelievably hard week. I am fighting the Devil tooth and nail. It's three weeks before my first Carmel promises, and I'm in the boxing ring with evil. Those bad forces, bad thoughts, bad situations never seem to let up for a second.

And I'm falling down.

I'm falling into sin. I'm screwing up. I'm letting down the Church Militant.

I mean, man if I was a Carmelite soccer goalie instead of a hidden prayer warrior, my current score board would not look good. Something like Evil 256, Pathetic Carmelite 1.

So I was moping around the house today, praying to God for Help and feeling totally miserable.

This song came on the radio.

I can't explain it.

It's personal. It's affectionate.

I might have a million sins still clinging stubbornly to my soul.

I might be a pathetic washout as a mother, a wife and a Catholic.

Yet my pre-engaged spouse, Mr. Jesus Christ, Himself, he still sings to me that "when you smile, the whole world stops and stares for a while....."

It's personal, our love affair. It's affectionate.

Who Knew?

2011-10-20T21:48:00.000-04:00

So the new neighbor with the annoyingly loud Great Dane was the one who rescued me and four kids when we ran out of gas at soccer practice tonight. Goes to show, "you never can tell!"

5 Paul Simon BBC TV (Love Me Like A Rock)

2011-10-19T14:19:00.002-04:00

I heard this song on the radio for the first time last night. I love it! It's all about Mommy Mary and the vocation of Catholic Motherhood (even if poor Paul Simon doesn't it know it yet)

When I was a little boy,
And the devil would call my name
I'd say "now who do,
Who do you think you're fooling? "

I'm a consecrated boy
I'm a singer in a sunday choir
Oh , my mama loves, she loves me
She get down on her knees and hug me
Like she loves me like a rock
She rocks me like the rock of ages
And loves me
She love me, love me, love me, love me

Receiving Contempt With Joy (Sort of)

2011-10-18T09:10:00.016-04:00

My baby annoyed someone at church on Sunday.

No, not that one......

the one that is still in my belly!

As I registered the words I heard, I looked down at my budging 18 week belly. I had this silent debate with myself:

"You mean this one?
The one who is completely silent and still fully wreathed in my stomach muscles?
This is the baby who is most annoying you in this second?
For real??????"

I mean, come on. At least, give my youngest kid a little time. He's a Benjaminite, after all.* I have no doubt that in a few short months he'll crying during the exact moment of the Consecration. However, in this specific moment in time, I'm pretty sure that I, his mother, am the ONLY human being in the planet who is remotely affected by my little sweet pea's presence.

I talked about this later with my husband on the phone (because I'm so rotten at practicing the art of silence, of letting bad things die with me and not further troubling the waters--hence this blog post). We were laughing about how EVERY SINGLE pregnancy brings a fresh batch of trouble.

You receive contempt.

You make new groups of people mad.

It never gets easier.

We were reviewing the situations from last to first--number six--making some people mad at church. Number 3 (a miscarriage), Number 4 and Number 5 (getting scorn heaped on us by the medical professionals at my obs office). Number 2 (conceived less than 9 months after the first) got us disowned by our extended families.

I was stumped on Number one.

"Every lets you have a first child," I said. "Oh wait, work." Yeah, I was working during my first pregnancy and my co-workers so angry at being inconvenienced I quit as soon as I discovered I was pregnant with baby number two.

In the middle of the 40 days of life campaign, I just want to remind us--do not be scandalized. Pregnancy = contempt. The world is a harsh place. The world does not welcome new life. If you are currently pregnant, and you find yourself at the other end of a verbal thrashing equal to a grizzly bear attack, just remember "I am in good company."

Rumor, has it that Mommy Mary couldn't find a kind face from the midst of a crowded inn while the poor dear was in labor!

*No, I don't know yet if its a boy or a girl. I just assigned a gender for the sake of clarity in this post.

Prayers Please

2011-10-15T22:43:00.001-04:00

Tomorrow my husband Jon and I have our formal interview to see if we get the green light to make our temporary (three year) promises to be Carmelites.

St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross, please pray for us!

Leaving Academia

2011-10-12T05:02:00.010-04:00

I don't know why my beef with the American Librarian Association has me so rattled. Yet I'm up at 3 AM thinking about it.

I'm the daughter of a college professor. I grew up in academia. To date, I'm still far more comfortable in a classroom or a library, than I am in my own kitchen or praying in a quiet church pew. Academia is my natural habitat.

In the back of my mind there was this assumption that certain rules applied--however, imperfectly executed my individual historians. We don't use foul language. We don't make sweeping generalizations about that past that are unsupported by facts. We don't "pander" to public opinion.

To discover that the American Librarian Association thinks that this book is an excellent example of scholarship for juvenile readers,---it's sort of like discovering that the emperor has no clothes.

Jesus said "whoever follows me must loose all possessions." I guess following Him means stripping myself of self-identification with intellectualism or academia. I've got to be willing to put Him ahead of everything else. I need to be willing to be seen in public as the poor, pregnant slob of a girl who is a prissy about children reading foul language and poorly constructed historical arguments against our Faith.

Mary, I'm totally yours!

Admonishing Sinners

2011-10-11T20:31:00.008-04:00

Ahh, such a talent I have---NOT!

Today, I told my small city librarian today that I didn't think an American History book where the first chapter is subtitled "Notorious Whores" and the author's insulting thesis is that "the early roots of American Democracy are identical to the Taliban" should be shelved in our children's section.

Her response: "Well, not every book is going to be right for every family!"

Prayers for Logan

2011-10-10T12:52:00.000-04:00

For those that read my last post, Logan is number 4 in this picture. My son is number 13.

"When you feel like you don't belong somewhere, it doesn't mean that you're not supposed to be there"

2011-10-08T21:15:00.027-04:00

I watched the "cool parents" of my kid's soccer team fall apart this morning. The Mom of the super star of our Under 8 soccer team died of leukemia on Thursday. Before Friday, I'm not sure that anyone on the team knew who she was, or that she was sick. The lone father in attendance during our Fall soccer games seemed like just another product of a divorced family. (Man, does it suck to judge!)

Most of the parents were horribly uncomfortable with sudden appearance of death on our kids soccer team. We got an email saying that if we told our kids about Logan's Mom's death, then it was important for the kids not to mention it at practice. Someone made our team armbands that were orange, not black.I asked Alex about it before the game and found out the coaches had passed out orange armbands for the team to wear without any instructions that orange is a symbol for leukemia patients, or why this was suddenly important for our team. Then the coaches had an uncomfortable meeting with the parents post-game where we decided to collect money to send flowers to the house.

Because I'm a foolish Carmelite, I took my whole family to the viewing today. The funeral home was a 2 hour drive from our house. All during the trip I worried about what I would say to the widower, or how my six year old son (a man not famous for his spirituality or his tact) would react to the viewing.

Why do I worry?

We got to the viewing and knelt uncomfortably down as a family to say a Hail Mary and an Our Father. My husband looked up and noticed that their was a crucifix above the coffin. "She was a Catholic!" he whispered to me.

After our prayers, we found Logan to give our condolences. My husband introduced Alex as a member of his soccer team.

Logan, said "I remember you!" with his face lit up with a huge smile for Alex. Then he asked a surprising follow-up, "Do you want some candy?"

A relative had sent a funeral wreath filled with tiny whopper candies all pinned out on an ivy wreath--a totally unique floral arrangement.

Logan went up to the wreath and pulled off a bag of candy for Alex. Then he got candy for Hannah and Maria.

These four kids hung out in total normalacy inches from his mother's open coffin. They munched on candy. They joked. They make those little twitches and jumps that only little kids can make. It was such a moment of grace, of connection, and of hope. I couldn't believe that my kids were the ones who could gracefully walk into a funeral parlor and offer friendship to a six year old kid who had just lost his Mother.

(Wow! When Jesus says "I will comfort the sorrowful," He really keeps his word!)

Later, Jon got to talk to the husband. He found out that the Mom had made a strong friendship with a priest during the last stage of her illness. The funeral was held so far from their home town because they wanted to have the funeral services within the parish boundaries of this priest. My Jon said "you made the right decision."

I found out today, that my life has no accidents. I thought we were the odd fish on the soccer team. Honestly, I really wanted us to drop out. I felt uncomfortable with the other parents, tired from pregnancy, and my kid is the one watching cloud formations while everyone else is running after the ball.

Yet this was all a part of God's plan all along.

I also found out that there are no strangers inside of a funeral home. We don't need a long history or deep connection to be instruments of God's grace. We just need to be willing to be his servants to someone in need.

Please pray for the soul of Tara Semak and for her husband Pete and her wonderful sons Dustin and Logan.

Mother Mary, pray for Tara. Blessed John Paul the II, please comfort a fellow soccer lover and motherless child named Logan.

Mentally Rewriting the Corporal Acts of Mercy

2011-10-04T09:25:00.006-04:00

Since I'm clearly not holy enough to merit having angels to do my housework like the beautiful St. Zita (or rich enough to hire a cleaning lady!) I've been working on my terrible mental attitude regarding "the daily grind" of Motherhood.

My husband came up with the idea of tying specific tasks to the Corporal Acts of Mercy. It has really helped!

Previously when I thought about "sheltering the homeless",

I got a mental picture of volunteering for "Habitat for Humanity." As the mother of four young kids (and another one the in belly) I'm unlikely to get a Saturday free to use a staple gun to help the homeless for approximately THE NEXT SEVENTEEN years, I'd get depressed. I'd think "I'm not really doing anything." But when my patient husband explained that every time I cleaned up clutter from the living room, I was creating a home for my own family and thus "sheltering the homeless", my heart expanded.

So here is my mental revision of the Seven Acts of Corporal Mercy, adjusted for a pregnant SAHM of very young children.

To feed the hungry;---- cooking AND grocery shopping AND cleaning out the yucky junk in the fridge

To give drink to the thirsty;--give milk to the toddler AND paying the water bill online

To clothe the naked--doing all tasks associated with the laundry

To shelter the Homeless--cleaning up the living room, paying the mortgage, etc.

To visit the sick--buying cough drops and making routine ped. appointments

(Still working on visiting the imprisoned and burying the dead.)

When I have a task, if I take a few seconds and put it in the appropriate work of mercy slot, I find I have a much better attitude. I'm finding it easier to combine a life of prayer AND work, or "work as I pray."

Better than A Dozen Roses

2011-09-30T06:18:00.011-04:00

Last Wednesday sucked! I don't know what makes some days worse than others as a Stay-at-Home Mother, but last Wednesday was a for me low point. I feel into cussing. Yes, I'm the Carmelite who cusses. Better yet, the Home-schooling Carmelite mother who cusses. With chagrin I realized that I've protected my children from the horrors of public school only so that they could learn directly from their dear Mother's lips the wonderful phrases of "I'm so pissed off at you!" and "this is f***ing hard!"

Great!

Just so no one is shocked at my poor behavior come Judgement Day.

By the grace of God, I get myself collected enough to decide that cheap pizzas and a cheap DVD at Target could create an impromptu "Movie Night" in order to hold things together until my husband comes home at 7 PM. I mean, this took all of my brain power. This was an equally heroic task to writing my senior thesis.

When my husband came home the pizzas were baked. The kids were happily watched "Cats and Dogs." We took the teething baby for a long walk around the neighborhood and talked in peace. I cried when I chatted about my day. We came to the conclusion that life is just hard for me right now. This pregnancy is still in a hard, early stage. Home-schooling under new state regulations is unsettling. It stinks to have no friends in a new town and to suddenly lose my husband to a commuter train for an extra 5 hours a day. In the end, I decided that I basically need to just gut through the next few weeks and trust that things will get better soon.

After our walk, I crawled into bed at 8:10 PM, exhausted.

Some time later my husband crawled into bed next to me and whispered "I called in sick tomorrow."

"What?" I said, instantly awake.

You have to understand, my husband never, ever misses work. Jon has stepped over my puking body racked with the stomach flu to get to work on time. The man even conscientiously made plans to return to work on his cellphone from a Children's Hospital NICU room as soon as we discovered that Baby Tessy's emergency heart surgery was delayed for 12 hours.

"I told them I wasn't coming into work on Thursday," Jon said. "You seem like you need me more at home tomorrow."

It was a gift better than a dozen roses.

Jon stayed home from work on Thursday. I got to go to Mass. I got to go to Confession. I had a normal day at home-schooling with my husband backing me up every time I ran into discipline trouble. We're apart for 14 hours a day during the workweek, but I don't feel like I'm doing this job alone anymore.

I love being married!

On Teaching Class

2011-09-25T11:59:00.008-04:00

I'm teaching 3rd/4th Grade Religious Education at my new parish church. It's such a gift. Our year long goal is to learn how to be "friends of Jesus" by following the Beatitudes and the Ten Commandments. Today's lesson was on "hearing Jesus through Sacred Scripture."

So what does the little Carmelite do? I taught 8 kids how to do Lectio Divinia! In the middle of reading some verses on friendship with Christ from the Gospel of John I start thinking "this is going is such a failure." Most of the boys couldn't sit still. Our classroom doesn't have walls (of course!) so it's super noisy.

I was shocked to discover, however, that my kids adored it. Two boys actually said they "they never felt anything like that in their life" and "something good came into my heart."

So these totally ordinary 8 and 9 year old kids ASKED to do Lectio Divino at every one of our future Sunday School sessions. Then they voted to designate Saturday as the first day as a class that they would try to read Sacred Scripture at their own homes. These guys were so eager, I had to track down two Bibles to give to kids that didn't have them at home. I mean, who knew an eight year old kid would ASK to take a Bible home?

It's so humbling to teach, because He does all the work. One of my fellow teachers is very concerned about all of the kids "who aren't here every Sunday." But I was telling my husband today "I'm totally amazed at the kids who ARE here. He's got them marked. He's got each of them lined up for some special plan."

What an honor to have a special time to pour love into these little souls.

(I'm extra blessed because Hannah is in my class. Jon stops by often with Baby Tess. Meanwhile, Alex and Maria are both really enjoying their respective religion classes.)

Our Lady of Ransom

2011-09-24T07:03:00.000-04:00

Beautiful Feast Day today!

ht: Father Dan G.

On Being Little

2011-09-23T20:21:00.022-04:00

So after I read this heart-breaking piece about the one-child policy in China, I was FIRED up for today's OB visit, Baby! I reviewed all these different scenarios in my mind. If they gave me any grief about declining testing for down syndrome--I was walking out the door! If they gave me any flack about "having too many c-sections" or being an "elderly" mother, I was going to give them an ear-full.

I even figured out how to tell my doctor point blank to stop doing abortions on sick babies in utero. Because I hung out in the NICU ward of Children's Hospital, darn it--and each one of those critically ill babies were PRETTY DARN CUTE!

Guess what happened?

NOTHING!

My darling husband wanted to be there for the sonogram. So he walks into my OB appointment with four kids ages 8 to 1. He carries the Tess inside her car seat carrier. My family stops traffic! Our shiny light stops the anti-life people in their tracks. The pro-life staff start jumping up and down. Everyone is so stunned to see a father genuinely excited to welcome a brand-new fifth child into his life.

After Jon appears, I start to receive the gold-star treatment. My doctor gives us an up-graded sonogram. We get souvenir photos for the baby book. Even the mean nurse who yelled about me about lawn chemicals during our pre-appointment interview happily gives me a special trick to get through my flu shot without any pain.

After our happy visit, I go to the Lab to get my blood work started. Jon takes most of kids back to the car. I keep my eight year old Hannah for moral support.

The Lab Tech is very cheerful and starts talking to Hannah. She starts to coo over my newest pregnancy. I cynically think "Wow, people are so nice when they think I only have two kids. Wish that could happen all of the time!"

Then it comes--that awkward moment in the conversation. Do I lie about what number pregnancy this is to keep up the good will, or do I tell the truth? I take a deep breath and tell tell the truth. "Actually I have other kids who are with their Dad. This baby is number five for us!"

Without a word, the Lab tech flashes me her palm.

I look at it with confusion. "What's that for?" I ask. "Do I need to show you my insurance card again or something?"

"I was trying to give you a high five!" she said. "I LOVE large families!"

I clapped her hand but my wide eyes kept looking at my oldest daughter. This was NOT the usual response we receive in wealthy suburban Maryland. Hannah and I were both stunned into silence.

Soon I come to discover that my blood is being drawn by a fellow Catholic survivor of the Rwandan genocide. She was from an original family of 10 who lost 4 siblings in that horrible tragedy. She is also a friend of Immaculee Ilibagiza, the author of "Left to Tell!"

What are the chances? I got see pictures of Immaculee on my lab tech's i-phone. So we're all chatting about the Virgin Mary and "the Lady of Kibeho" (which Betty Beguiles will remember sending me a copy of three years ago!) I was so happy. It was nuts!

Later, as I recounted this story to Jon, I had to laugh. "I was all ready to make a huge show-down for the pro-life cause today. But what did Mommy Mary have in mind? She wanted my husband and I to be joyful. She wanted us to silently shine our light. Then she wanted to give me a personal high five for having number five."

I truly get all the smallest job assignments possible from Our Mother! Yet I so love being so little!

My Penance Today Is Offered Up For Them

2011-09-23T07:57:00.008-04:00

Off to my first OB visit to sneak a peak at the youngest Benjamin today. I've got normal HMO insurance, so this is major penance. I'd whine more about getting OB care for my sixth pregnancy smack in the middle of the culture of death, but I've got these images of suffering pregnant Chinese women (with their "illegal" second children) fresh in my head.

Jesus and Mary, pray for us!

Prayer Request

2011-09-23T07:54:00.005-04:00

One of my little "Sacred Heart of Jesus" babies (in this case a toddler) is getting open heart surgery in one hour. Can you pray for Tommy today and his family?

Updates on facebook report that Tommy's surgery was successful and he's now breathing on his on. Please keep praying for a speedy recovery for this little tike! Thank you!

Purity of Heart

2011-09-20T22:02:00.009-04:00

Thank you. Thank you.

So surprise, surprise. Carmel meetings are not always a bed of roses. Or rather, there are heavenly roses sent down from our buddy St. Therese of Lisieux along with some sharp, juicy thorns from our other buddy St. John of the Cross that are aimed RIGHT at the most sensitive part of the back of my knee.

As I YELP in shock and pain, Mr. John of the Cross gives me a huge thumbs up sign. "Just making sure you're staying awake Miss Abigail" he shouts with a smile. "Wouldn't want you to get too comfortable. Carmel is not a spa treatment! This is hard work for Jesus, baby!"

(This was not my Carmel experience for the month of September!)

To wit I reply with complaints and tears "I work SO HARD for Mr. J.C. all month! Don't I deserve a little break? Isn't there one place where I can come and not get surprise jabs in the heart when I least expect them?"

So far the answer seems to be an emphatic "NO!"

I'm slowly becoming more and more okay with that.

Maybe, instead of a place of rest and relaxation--an easy well of spiritual renewal, Carmel meetings are a place of hard work for me right now. A place to give love. A place to donate smiles. A place to deposit more peace, and hope, and joy--than I withdrawl from right now.

Maybe Carmel is supposed to be more about serving Our Mother, and less about having a comfy place to crash among all my Marian siblings.

You duped me Lord, and I let myself be duped! But lead me on! I know you always have my best interest at heart.

St. Teresa of Avila, pray for me.

Struggling!

2011-09-20T07:05:00.021-04:00

Thank you for all of your kind prayers. I'm actually starting to see the light at the end tunnel in regards to my morning sickness. (Of course, I'm so neurotic that my first thought at not feeling nauseous 24/7 was not "Thank you Jesus!" but "Does this mean I'm having a miscarriage?" See how much He loves me? He gives me frequent morning sickness so I do not lose sleep about possibly losing another baby). Now that I'm at the 12 week mark, I have SOME morning sickness still but I no longer have that emotional fog of depression that seems to accompany a constantly upset tummy.

Great!

Now, it's time to move onto my struggles with seasonal allergies. (Why did I volunteer to sign up my son for soccer if that means sitting outside for long periods of time in the Fall when pregnancy denies me use of Claritin? Oh yes, it's because I completely forgot that I now live in the country with actual mountains full of fall foliage.)

and.....

total doubts about making my temporary promise to my lay Carmelite order in November.

I had a stressful, intense weekend--which ended with one of the most awful, stressful Carmelite meetings ever on Sunday. I went to my husband in tears at 4 PM and said "I think I totally lost the ability to communicate." He said that I was extra sensitive because of my pregnancy and just noticing things that I wouldn't normally see--but that it was still totally cool to go home early.

Later, that Sunday night, while we walked our sick, non-sleepy baby in a stroller outside our house, my husband was so patient with me. My husband calmly explained to me "We've been going to Carmel meetings now for two years and ten months. If it was truly "completely impossible" and a "total waste of time" like you feel, I think we would have figured that out before now! Instead, it's slightly coincidental that all of these doubts are suddenly hitting you eight weeks before we make our temporary promise."

I admitted to him that the timing was slightly suspect. Still I was confident that the thoughts and feelings that I was experiencing were the truth.

Then I went inside and read an email that was sent at 9:30 PM on Friday night. My extreme agitation during Sunday's Carmelite meeting caused me to ask my husband to take me and the kids home at 4 PM in the afternoon. This previously unread email was asking Jon and I to come to our profession "pre-interview" between 5 PM and 6 PM.

I CAUSED US BOTH TO MISS OUR INTERVIEW!

Thankfully we can make it up on October 16th.

However, I now have to stay calm for the next four weeks while my whole psyche is screaming "this whole thing is impossible" and "I do not need this extra grief and agitation in my life."

Will Abigail make it up Mount Carmel? Or will Johnny be climbing this Holy Mountain alone? I don't know. Tune in and find out.

Choosing "Life" Over A Perfect Life

2011-09-16T20:34:00.015-04:00

A Reaction to this quote in the NY Times.

"Jenny’s decision to reduce twins to a single fetus was never really in doubt. The idea of managing two infants at this point in her life terrified her. She and her husband already had grade-school-age children, and she took pride in being a good mother. She felt that twins would soak up everything she had to give, leaving nothing for her older children. Even the twins would be robbed, because, at best, she could give each one only half of her attention and, she feared, only half of her love. Jenny desperately wanted another child, but not at the risk of becoming a second-rate parent. “This is bad, but it’s not anywhere as bad as neglecting your child or not giving everything you can to the children you have,” she told me, referring to the reduction."

(ht: the Anchoress: Repugnant Non-Parenting)

My father-in-law was an identical twin, born in 1933 at the height of the Great Depression. At the time of his birth, his mother had two older children ages 3 and 5. (She would eventually go on to have six children). His family was poor. His father was addicted to prescription medication.

At some point, his mother became overwhelmed by the needs of her young children. When her husband was called into service during WWII, she gave away one of the six year old twins to his paternal grandparents.

This abandonment left a huge scar on my Father-in-law. Even though his grandparents lived close by, he never came home again! When his father came home from the War, his mother invited her son back home. However, her little boy refused to come home. He said he was "used to" his grandparent's home now. For some reason, she never forced her nine(or ten) year old to move back in. (She later expressed regret to my Mother-in-law. She said it was a mistake to ever send him away.)

As an adult, my Father-in-law still spoke about "the exile" as though he were sent to a different country, rather than 100 yards across a gravel country road. There was a lasting distance between him and his birth family. At age 20, he got a job for the State Police and moved hundreds of miles away his family. Even though he talked often on the telephone to his twin brother, he rarely returned home to visit his brother or his mother.

The boy grew into a man. He had an important job in the community, locking away criminals. He married and had three children. The intimacy scar affect his family life. He found it hard to talk to his children, especially to his only son. He didn't attend his children's sports events or talk much about their friends.

Work was hard and took a lot out of him. He worked hard 12 hour shifts some days/some nights. He had a soft spot for the poor and gave money to the desperately poor he came into contact with through his police work. He hated seeing kids abused or neglected.

And my Father-in-law was mad at God. Very mad at God.

At age 73, he caught a rare form of blood cancer that for some reason was ubiquitous in his small town. A victim of an environmental toxicant, perhaps? He was dead within 12 weeks of his diagnosis.

Yet something amazing happened to my Father-in-law during those last 12 weeks. His twin brother, the favored one--the one that got to stay with Mom while he was sent far from home--prayed for him. His son prayed for him. The twin brother called his little known nephew, my husband. These men prayed together on the phone for my Father-in-law's conversion.

My Carmelite husband called a priest, and asked him to gave his Father the Sacrament of Confession and the Sacrament of the Sick. His Father's heart was opened.

The last three weeks of my Father-in-law's life was beautiful. It was a living example of the men in the vineyard who were called "late in the day." The priest brought the Eucharist four or five times. Three Nuns came to visit the sick man in his house. He died in the full grace of the Roman Catholic Church. He died a holy death and gave a sign of seeing the Virgin Mary.

*****

I was horrified when I read Jenny's reason for aborting a twin "so that she wouldn't be a second rate Mother." It seems so horribly close to the same reasons that I've been beating myself up for having morning sickness with a fifth child and spending weeks "abandoning" my own older children. Who knows how much this sick culture of death has infected all of us American women. What is a "good mother?" Why are we so afraid of failing or children?

My husband's grandmother was in Jenny's shoes. She lived Jenny's worse nightmares. For some reason, Grandma Ruth felt like she couldn't "handle" twins. Her decision to give my Father-in-law to his grandparents had a lasting effect on his psyche. I came into my Father-in-law's life when he was more than 60. He still talked of that hurt with fresh tears in his eyes.

And yet....

My Father-in-law was alive. He went on to become the father of my dear husband. The Father of a Carmelite. The possible Grandfather of a Nun.

What would my life be like if Grandma Ruth had the option of "twin reduction" abortion?

How much love would the World have missed out on?

My father-in-law with me and two of his grandchildren in October 2007.

We're coming up on the 2nd anniversary of my Father-in-law's death. Blessed Virgin, pray for the soul of Bob Benjamin. Pray for all of our beloved dead.

Real Saints are Hidden

2011-09-16T04:08:00.005-04:00

I've been staying away from reading Father Corapi posts. (I've simply prayed for him instead). Yet this post was a really insightful read.

This quote just knocked me out. This is something my husband has been trying to tell me for a long, long time.

From a blog by Father Dwight Longenecker:

“Where shall we find a holy person? Where shall we find a saint? It is difficult because the real saint is hidden and humble and holy. Instead of looking for the hidden holy ones we fall for the celebrity ‘saint.’ We want the big dramatic conversion story. We want the dynamic, uncompromising speaker. We like the one who speaks out on sin and rails against the devil…

“…Stop and consider that the real saints are hidden. They follow the little way. If you were to tell them they were saints they would laugh and tell you to keep searching. If you even had the sense and discernment to see the saint next to you–the ordinary person who perseveres–the little person who serves others–the plain Jane who takes life easily and simply loves people–then you would learn again what true holiness really is. If we only had eyes to see the simplicity of the saints, the extraordinary ordinariness of holiness, the practical good humor and humility of the truly grace filled ones…

“It is the little way that leads to salvation. Not the way of pride and pleasure and power. Not the way of wealth and the world. Not the way of ego and ambition.

“Only the way of the cross. When are we going to learn this?”

Wow! This is Carmelite spirituality in a nutshell. Yet again, God is teaching me some really great lessons from my morning sickness and forcing me to take life super easy for a while.

Blessed Mother pray for Father Corapi, Father Pavone, and all of our dear priests.

Wow, Totally Amazing Comments

2011-09-15T11:27:00.011-04:00

I should go underwater more often. Your support and prayers and advice are totally amazing!

My friend in real life Maria B., wrote in from her tropical vacation to help me!:

"I feel the same way during pregnancy. Depressed, joyless, overwhelmed with feelings of failure on every level. Deep guilt for not joyfully embracing my cross and my seeming total inability to offer up physical suffering.

During my last pregnancy, I went to Fr. Jaffe for some spiritual direction on the while situation. He helped me come to embrace a spiritual attitude I had used in other tough situations, but I mistakening thought was "weak." Stop carrying the cross. Give it to Jesus. In fact, He actually has already carried it for us. He just wants us to embrace Him, walk along with Him. He does all the heavy lifting.

It was very freeing for me to be able to just tell God, "I can NOT handle this. I'm dumping it all on YOU!" The amazing thing is....that is what He wants.

I think this approach is right there with St. Therese's wisdom on spiritual poverty. Once we just embrace the reality of our absolute spiritual poverty and hand the whole mess of to God, the the guilt and heaviness lifts and the freedom of being a child of God can begin to seep in.

I have to constantly keep doing this over and over. And it doesn't really change any externals or make life much easier in a phyical sense. But there is the internal change you talk about. Freedom from the illusion that I can do this (because I can't, only God can) and a deep sense of hope that God is carrying me through life, like a Father carrying a sleeping child."

Melanie from the Wine-Dark Sea posted this AMAZING letter on Faith during pregnancy written by our buddy St. Francis De Sales. He hit the nail on the head. Go read it right now! That should be required reading for all pregnant Christian ladies out there!

Then my friend Patrick sent this link to a super cool St. Francis of Assisi post on "pure joy." This is a must read also!

Finally, Carla, who has never met me in person, also had this important insight

"Abigail was trained as a lawyer (me too) - we were graded and measured by our accomplishments...and we often bring this expectation to motherhood AND prayer..."

I feel like there is this major "purging" that is going on right before my temporary Carmelite vows. (Pray for me! God willing, I will make my 3 year vows to be a lay Carmelite in November 2011). It's really humiliating because I'm NOT in a good prayer schedule right now. I don't know how the entrance interview is going to go next month. (The guys doing the interviews are a little intense and I'm trying to picture my responses. "Well, I'd LIKE to have more prayer in my life but I'm currently flummoxed on how to do that with five kids! I'm sure God has some sort of plan, though. He sent me a Carmelite vocation at the same time I have all these angels to care for, after all!")

Still I think this lack of perfection is really, really positive for me. I need to figure out in the deepest part of my mind that just because I 'check off all the boxes' doesn't mean that I'm a good Carmelite (or a good Mom!) And the counter statement is also true. Just because my 30 minutes of prayer turned into a mere 5 seconds, or just because the kids are eating cereal for dinner and I'm buying extra underwear at Target because the laundry pile is so back-up--that does NOT mean that I'm automatically out of God's will. In fact, not being a perfect "Clair Huxtable" Mom might mean that I'm right where God wants me to be!

Blowing Prayer Bubbles Up From Under Water

2011-09-14T04:11:00.008-04:00

This is me.

Underwater.

Blowing prayer bubbles up to God.

Saying "Help!" and "SOS" and "You've got to get me out of the mess, right?"

I'm in week eleven of pregnancy. Which means it feels like I'm on week nine of perpetual flu sickness. Fatigue. Nausea. Dragging my weak body along after four older kids.

I told my husband yesterday that "I've invented a new game. I drag my sorry body into different positions around the house for variety's sake. This morning, I laid down on the rug in my son's room for an hour. I talked to him about his new Lego creations with my cheek pressed against the floor. Then I went to the girl's room watched Mimi cut up chunks of our newspaper with safety scissors."

I'm reading about St. Elizabeth of the Trinty writing about suffering being a "purging fire that brings us closer to God." I'm not there yet.

Then I had this intense experience in the parent waiting room during my kid's gymnastics practice, where I'm asking God "when am I going to experience real joy?" Because I looked around at the other home-schooling Mothers (Hannah has a special home-school P.E. class) and they all look terrible! Depressed. Anxious. Sickly. Either overweight or overthin. And none of them appears to be pregnant or have young kids in the house. (Because I'm the only idiot who shows up pregnant with three kids to entertain while my oldest plays in a gym class meant for 6-18 year olds. Most Moms appear to have wisely waited until their YOUNGEST was six to enroll in an optional P.E. class).

In my green in the gills, awful state, I match the exterior stress of these Mothers completely. I prayed "Please God, I don't want to still look like this when my youngest is six!"

It really shook me up, because I think so much of my sadness, my "lack of joy" comes from simply not sleeping well because I have so many young children in my house. There is always someone who is teething, or someone who has nightmares. But what if all my lack of joy isn't physical? What if its because I'm not yet centered truly on Christ? If so, my kids are going to get older, but I'm still going to be their same sad, tired Mom.

In sharp contrast, the only guy in the room was a work-at-home I.T. father. He looked jolly. He looked together. He spoke cheerfully. One of his jolly, cheerful comments was "Yes, we only have two children. I was afraid to have more!"

At the exact moment that he said this statement, Tess and Mimi were both crying at the same time. I held the hands of two girls while trying not up chuck myself onto the shiny clean floor. Those words hit my ear and I thought "You were right to be afraid. This stuff is kinda hard."

I took my sobbing girls outside. Alex immediately saw a black, mud spattered jeep in the parking lot. "Look Mom, a jeep!" he said excitedly.

"Yeah, your Dad used to have a red one of those. See the doors are even off. Your Dad used to drive me around town with the doors off back when we were dating. Go check it out!" Alex went over for a closer inspection. Dad's old jeep that got traded in for a family car when I became pregnant with Hannah is a source of endless fascination for my only son.

Twenty minutes later, I watched happy I.T. guy load his two children, one girl and one boy, into the back of his mud spattered, doorless black Jeep. He looked happy. His kids neatly folded up into the back seat his Jeep--which was really a symbol of his family neatly folding up into the back of his formerly single life.

As I watched them drive off, I prayed hard. "God I know this is an illusion. I know that the whole idea that you should limit your babies to a number that your life can easily handle is a complete lie. BUT YOU HAVE GOT TO HELP ME MAKE IT. You have got to help me find real peace and joy as a Mother of five. You've got to help me make it, on this Christian path.

Remembering 9/11

2011-09-10T18:34:00.006-04:00

This is Jeremy Glick, a fallen hero from Flight 93. I listened to his widow tell the story of his life and their marriage in an interview on September 11, 2001. I was twenty-six years old and a newlywed who had been married for less than three months. Watching that TV interview was the exact moment that I discovered that I really, really wanted to become a mother.

Blessed Mother, pray for the soul of Jeremy Glick. Pray for his dear family. Blessed Mother, have mercy on the enemies of the United States. St. Micheal, Keep our soldiers, fire-fighters and police safe from harm.

9/11 Oral History Project

2011-09-10T18:26:00.004-04:00

Columbia Center for Oral History Project

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States

Getting Clair Huxtable Out of My Head!

2011-09-10T14:33:00.010-04:00

In chatting with my husband today, I realized most of my troubles with my first trimester pregnancy symptoms are in my head, not in my body. I'm counting myself as a "poor excuse for a Mother" right now, because I suffer from a complete lack of realistic expectations of motherhood in general, and "motherhood while pregnant with a fifth child" in particular.

My favorite job as a kid was "camp counselor" and I consider myself a "camp counselor" kind of Mom. I'm happiest when my kids and I are having a grand time designing some sort of fun project together. High energy, laughter, and loudly singing show tunes--those are not really a big part of my life motherhood right now that I'm feeling tired, quesy, and "green around the gills" for most of the day.

If the perfect "Mom" in my head is Clair Huxtable, a Mother of five who appears to be always witty with her husband, always engaged with her children, and with perfectly coiffed hair to boot-- no wonder I'm feeling like a failure at this stage in my life.

So Johnny and I talked about "reframing" my interior monologue to make it slightly more likely that I stay out of the crazy house during this fifth pregnancy. I therefore submit the following resolutions.

Number One: Resting counts as an activity while I'm pregnant!
I make the mistake of not really counting Baby Olive as a "real kid" until she (or he) appears outside the womb. This is false! As a pregnant Mom, resting counts as an activity equal to rocking Baby Tess to sleep. Taking naps while pregnant does not count as "shirking" my Stay-at-home duties. I need to stop mentally judging myself as harshly as if I were spending all the time holed up in my bedroom watching HGTV reruns and eating chocolate bon bons.

Number Two: Dinner is my primary domestic contribution right now.

I'm not going to get all pharisaical on this topic, and there is plenty of room for misses in this area. In general, however, I will try my best to get dinner on the table before my husband gets home from work. Cleaning can wait until the weekend. Laundry can wait. Home-schooling doesn't even need to happen each and every day. But my family always needs to eat! If I get something easy into the oven by 4:30 PM, then I make a smooth and happier night happen for everyone else. So in my mind, if I get dinner made each night I get to check off the "good Mom" box in my head, even if the floors are messy and no one has seen fresh sheets on their beds for more than a week!

Sometimes Religious Tolerance Is NOT Love, It's Laziness Instead!

2011-09-06T16:46:00.009-04:00

When I was 25, I lived in an interesting housing situation. I was a member of "St. Francis House", an experience in "religious tolerance" at the University of Wisconsin. Twenty students lived in the basement of a beautiful old Episcopal Church in downtown Madison, Wisconsin. We received practically free room and board in exchange for doing tasks around the church and participating in Sunday Mass.

It was so much fun! Most of my roomies were international students from Africa, Asia or Europe. I think there were only three or four Americans in the bunch. It was a huge blend of different religions: Shinto, Buddhism, Muslim, Catholics and unfamiliar (at least to me) Protestants like "the Dutch Reform Church."

Every weeknight we took turns cooking massive dinners for the whole community. I will probably never eat so well again in my life. I developed a special fondness for "Blue Crab Soup" (from Japan) and "Pineapple Mashed Potatoes" (from Columbia).

After three months of living in this diverse religious community, I (a firm Christian) imagined that I was "Miss Tolerance Herself."

Every Faith had something valuable to contribute to world. Each of us were "equal" in dignity. No spiritual path had a "monopoly on truth." Yada Yada Yada.

Then I met Jon.

My tall, thin boyfriend was a Catholic. No surprises, there. He had some odd New Age/Buddhism influences in his Christian thought. No surprises. Jon never said anything odd about Jesus that I hadn't heard a thousand time before by other college students.

The surprising thing, was that I, Miss laid back Christian girl, suddenly cared deeply about he thought about this Jesus Guy. I wanted to correct my sweet boyfriend's mistakes.

So I started arguing with him. I mean, it was INTENSE. One time I remember fighting so intensely about this crazy issue of "if Jesus said no to dying on the cross could God have found a replacement." Jon said "yes." I started yelling at Jon in the car "God only had ONE son. No one could have taken over his place." We were arguing so passionately that neither recognized that we took a wrong turn on the high way. After one hour, we suddenly saw the Mackinaw Bridge in front of us--telling us that we had gone North on a central Michigan highway instead of South!

I didn't recognize this "formerly" laid back girl who was suddenly fighting so hard with her boyfriend--as if it matter what he personally thought about God. In fact, when we got engaged, I remembered our atypical fights over religion with shame. "What if this fighting spreads to other areas?" I worried.

Now that dear husband and I are both Carmelites, I laugh.

I think my deep interest in my boyfriend's personal thoughts about Jesus and God because I loved him! His religious viewpoints directly mattered to me! Jon was about to become my husband. My fellow Carmelite. The Father of my children. In our joint vocation- matrimony-- it is intensely important that BOTH of us are pointing in the right direction in matters of faith.

Sometimes fighting over Faith is a sign of True LOVE and "Tolerance" is simply lazy, self-interest.

(inspired by thoughts from He Adopted Me First and Little Catholic Bubble).

AHHHHH BABY BOOMERS!!!

2011-09-06T07:50:00.007-04:00

This past weekend was the one year anniversary of my grandfather's death. My grandfather died after a hard battle with cancer while Baby Tess was in her first hospital, being treated for simple jaundice. Everyone was scared to add to my stress by telling me that my grandfather died, so I found out the news from Facebook.

On September 4, my Dad left his dying father's bedside to race to Maryland. He (and my Mom) where there the infamous day of September 5, when Baby Tess went from "fine" to needing an emergency baptism and a transfer to Children's Hospital. My parents were there to witness the baptism and drive home their completely exhausted daughter from downtown D.C. They even got a hotel room across the street from my apartment, so they could watch over Jon and I.

Then in the morning, before we even left to see Miss Tess, my father organized my life for the next month. He rented me a car so we could get to the hospital easily (we were poor Carmelites who relied on the bus at the time). He took my three older children to his house for two weeks, so we could live in the NICU. He even handed me cash so that Jon and I could easily get meals in the hospital cafeteria.

All that happened and it was a gift. My Mom was her normal self during Tessy's home-coming. But my father "got it." There are expressions in his face when he held his totally held granddaughter that I'd never seen before.

All that is so precious to me.

Somehow slathered on top are these maddening photos I received in my in-box this morning. My aunt and my uncle celebrated the anniversary of my Grandfather's passing by going to a lake on Sunday and throwing pine cones into the water.

Throwing pine cones into the water???????

There is this piece of me that is screaming--who are you baby boomers??? GO TO CHURCH! It's Sunday. Say a prayer. Sing a hymn. Remember your father in a place that makes sense both to Him and to God!

Grandpa would have gone to church!!!

Pine cones in the water? The guy didn't even fish!

The whole world needs prayer. Most American Baby Boomers seem to need it double! I'm off to go make my contribution to the improvement of society by enduring my morning sickness bravely today. Hope everyone had a happy and restful Labor Day.

Having Peace While I'm Screwing Up

2011-08-31T21:03:00.008-04:00

This officially marks the first time that I've been awake past 8 PM for several weeks. Gosh, what a humdinger of a time I've had over here. A move. Early Pregnancy. My rock of a husband suddenly leaving his inept and fragile wife Home Alone for 13 to 14 hours each day.

On Tuesday, I didn't get ANY Carmelite prayers done for the first time in several months.

I was completely CRUSHED by the various demands of my life by 10:15 AM.

Today was better, of course.

I'm trying to find meaning in all of this struggle. I feel like I'm very much a black/white thinker in terms of self-esteem. When I bake cupcakes with my daughter, or clean up a messy paperwork mistake over the phone, or I find the elusive size 2 soccer cleats for my son, then I feel like a "good Mom." However, when our home-schooling sessions go horribly wrong, or I'm so sick I can't leave the living room couch for an entire afternoon, then I feel like a "bad Mom."

I thought I left most of that perpetual race of "I have to be productive and competent all the time or I'll be fired" back at the workplace.

But it seems like I dragged much of it home with me as a stay-at-home mom.

And now whether its failing behind in home-schooling, or falling behind in housework, or my failure to even get the frozen shrimp thawed before my husband comes home at 7 PM at night, all of those "mess ups" have my irrationally afraid of screwing up my dear children for life.

I have no idea what a "normal" home-life is supposed to look like when your newly pregnant with baby number five. In God's eyes, its probably perfectly okay for my husband to do all the work, make dinner, put all the kids to bed, and dig out dirty pajamas from the laundry pile, all while a newly pregnant Mommy slinks off to bed at 7:45 PM.

Here's to hoping the cross will help break me of my "irrational Mommy perfectionism" soon!

K-LOVE - Steven Curtis Chapman "Do Everything" LIVE

2011-08-31T16:49:00.000-04:00

CATHOLICISM - An Epic TV & DVD Series, Book & Study Program

2011-08-30T15:44:00.001-04:00

"The Christian Faith was never meant to be a private matter. It was meant to be shared?"

Are you a missionary?

Laundry ---Ideas? Tips? Commiseration?

2011-08-28T22:02:00.005-04:00

The only bad part out of moving out of a tiny apartment, is that I'm suddenly finding it overwhelming to do laundry in a house with three floor and an unsteady toddler who likes to always be in eye sight of her Mama.

How do you guys survive?

My old laundry routine was a) have a family closet in our room three steps away from the dryer (I put all the dresser drawers in our room. My young kids tend to throw clean clothes on the floor and that way I could quickly clean up the mess without resorting to tons of unnecessary loads.)
b) fold clean clothes on my bed
c) make it a rule that we always had to fold up any extra clean clothes before the parents went to bed

The new house doesn't have a system yet!

Now I've got my kids on the second floor, our bedroom on the first floor, and our washer/dryer unit on the first floor. Our dryer is old and on the fritz, so we're talking about having to run each load through multiple times. Also, my only safe place to put Baby Tess while I'm doing laundry in our dangerous basement is leave her in her crib, and she hates that! Her crying sort of add this added pressure to get all laundry tasks done within 2 to 4 minute spurts. All that post-moving chaos combined with my fatigue, have just made me feel so hopeless about the situation.

Just today, I'm trying to figure out a big-picture solution to this task.

First, I thinned out the kids clothes to things that they actually wear. I'm putting everything that is not currently a summer-time favorite, on a hanger in their bedroom closet. Then I moved down their dressers to the basement. I've got a place for "hanging items" and now places for clean laundry. Now it should be easier to fold things straight out of the dryer, or hang up wet delicate to air dry.

I also found these two interesting articles on green laundry methods and practical laundry collection ideas.

Does anyone have some wisdom to share? I'm open to trying almost anything but FlyLady.

St. Clare, patron Saint of Laundress, pray for us!

How to Host A Kid's Birthday Party While Pregnant

2011-08-28T20:12:00.008-04:00

Some day I will have a chance to write my stylish "how to host parties in the real world". Throwing a Birthday bash for a special birthday girl with no time, no money, and no energy was a challenge. Yet I ended up having some cool ideas that I wanted to share.

We picked a party time of 10:30 AM on Saturday. (I like having parties first thing in the morning because I think that it doesn't interfere with other peoples precious "family time" on the weekend as much. Plus, my kids are extremely hyper with excitement before a big party. If I pick at 1:00 PM start time, I've already driven myself crazy trying to keep them from eating the cake for five hours AND I still have not had time alone to get additionally prepared from the night before.)

For this early morning party, we had simple breakfast hors d'oeuvres. I picked up frozen mini-bagels from Target and arranged an elaborate "bagel bar" with different type of toppings like mini oranges and smoked salmon. We had sausage on toothpicks.

For the fruit salad, I picked up mini cookie cutters at Michaels ($5).
I cut up cantaloupe into 1/4 inch planks. Then I used the small cookie cutters, instead of a knife, to remove good parts from the rind and seeds. (Don't remove the seeds first). Then I tossed them into a fruit salad. (Imagine fruit salad with little yellow hearts and butterflies.) The result was so cute that its going to be my new "go to dish" for Church Socials.

Happy Birthday Baby Tess

2011-08-27T20:32:00.002-04:00

You are a gem of a girl! So glad you are still here with us!

We're Celebrating Tessy's First Birthday Tomorrow!

2011-08-26T07:26:00.009-04:00

She was a pretty special kid right from the start!

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

Pray for me! The house is not clean. The laundry pile is ridiculous. I've got low energy from morning sickness. But it's fine. Kate and Tharen are willing to look over a few dust balls, right? The important thing is that we're all grateful for an incredible year with Miss Tess.

Instead of my whiny rebuttal to the "don't have your kids too close together" argument

2011-08-26T07:16:00.005-04:00

I'm re-posting this "oldie but goodie" about the joys of having new babies while home-schooling.

Honestly, I don't know how long its going to take me to learn how to be Silent and let the things of my life speak for themselves!

Oh Holy Virgin, please come and kill off the incessant debater in me!

Alan Jackson - Small Town Southern Man

2011-08-25T20:52:00.006-04:00

Because my Jon is exactly like the lyrics in this song!

And he bowed his head to Jesus
And he stood for Uncle Sam
And he only loved one woman
He was always proud of what he had
He said his greatest contribution
Is the ones you leave behind
Raised on the ways and gentle kindness
Of a small town Southern man

What Really Counts As Meaningful Work?

2011-08-24T05:17:00.021-04:00

I'm very thankful for all the interesting thoughts posted as comments to my recent post.

I wanted to put a deeper Carmelite question to you thoughtful readers.

What really counts as meaningful work?

There are many dramatic examples of 'important' work, that I witnessed first-hand during my daughter's stay at Children's National Hospital. The most amazing thing was that there was literally one guy, Dr. Kanter, who had the ability to fish an 18 inch plastic tube OUT of my daughter's heart without open heart surgery.

(For those who missed the initial story last year, Baby Tess had a type of IV called a PICC line that broke off in her foot during her hospital stay. An 18 inch plastic piece immediately got sucked up into each of the four ventricles of her heart. The x-ray of what appeared to be a large tangled ball of yarn inside her tiny newborn heart is an image I'd like to forget!)

There was my three week old baby who needed emergency open-heart surgery UNLESS this one guy on the entire hospital staff could fish it out using some tiny heart angioplasty tools.

At first we heard hopeful rumors. Then late at night, we meet the man himself.
Dr. Kanter stood by the NICU crib-side of the baby with the scary chest x-ray. Dr. Kanter promised he could fix it. Dr. Kanter did!

After one hour under a live streaming x-ray, Dr. Kanter used a tiny tool called a "lasso" to fish out that nasty PICC tubing through a tiny slit in her thigh. My beautiful girl was returned to me, with a tiny band-aid on her leg, instead of a giant nasty post-open heart surgery gash up her chest. (Not that Dr. Kanter doesn't do lovely sutures from open-heart surgery, because my buddy Joey T. looks awesome post surgery.) I'm just saying, that this Mama so is grateful for the wonders worked inside the Heart Cath Lab.

So it's kind of weird to have your baby saved by someone with an extremely rare talent. I remember going home and wishing I could match Dr. Kanter's socks. I just wanted to do something to make is life easier, something to help him keep focused on that amazing gift of rescuing other needy babies with walnut size hearts from horrible PICC entanglements.

The odd contrast is that as a Carmelite, I'm starting to understand that all work is "nothing." I mean really, it kind of is. God has all things in his hand. He lets us "help". We can be "co-workers" with God, but it's a loving, invited role only. God doesn't truly need us to do anything. He lets us help Him because He loves us! Sort of like, how I invite my little girls to help me in the kitchen (even though its a far easier and cleaner process without their inept 'help') because I find it to be so much more fun to make cupcakes with friends!

Add to this line of thinking my buddy St. Therese of Lisieux's little way; "picking up a pin for love." If I understand her correctly, she is saying that "that picking up the smallest pin, for the pure Love of God, is more important that all the amazing heart surgeries in the world." Not that heart surgery is "bad", per se. Just that LOVE is what makes an action beautiful for God. "Love of neighbor" is the praise of glory to God.

What my addled Carmelite brain is trying to focus on, is that if I pour my children's cereal into a bowl in the morning with pure, holy Love THAT is meaningful work that is EQUAL to Dr. Kanter's angioplasty skills for little Tess.

I think that is right.

Work isn't "meaningful" or "not-meaningful" based on some outside objective criteria--work is meaningful when it is done as a prayer.

That's a really wild concept to me.

To close, I wanted to share two more vivid examples of love from my NICU stay. (My one year anniversary of Tessy's illness begins on September 5th, so indulge me!)

The second surgery for Tess was so much more awful for me than the first. (Tess had a birth defect called duodenal atresia and she needed emergency abdominal surgery at eight days old to correct her blocked small intestine.) For the first surgery, it was clearly an emergency. My kid looked awful. We were handing her over to a caring surgeon with the hope that she could be cured.

For the second surgery, it was a result of a medical equipment failure, which was some how so much harder to accept. A scary foreign object was lodged inside my kid's HEART! One of the hardest things was that Tessy looked fine. She was pink. She was alert. And my kid was FURIOUS! They yanked Tessy's food for more than a 24 hour period to prepare her for this procedure. Tess hated that!

To transport her to the Heart Cath Lab, they put Tess inside this special movable tube called an isolette.

Tess hated it. She knew something was up, and that something was NOT good.

Needless to say, I was a mess. In the prep room for the first surgery, I have sweet memories of holding my little girl's precious head and singing "Be Thou My Vision". In the second surgery waiting area, I was a blubbering mess. I couldn't believe my little girl was crying. I couldn't believe that her skin was so red from pure rage. I didn't want to be there. I didn't want to be away.

In the middle of this, her anesthesiologist came. He checked with us to confirm that last time she ate. He asked if she was breastmilk or formula. He looked at the pacifier in Tessy's mouth and teased tenderly "What is a breast fed baby like you doing with a binky?" Of course his kind statement made me burst into loud tears. I didn't want my newborn sucking on a pacifier before we had firmly established a breast-feeding routine. However, NOTHING had gone normal with Tess and eating ever since we entered the hospital four weeks ago.

While I'm in the middle of this wrenching tears, a beautiful thing happen. The nurses started to wheel Tessy's isolette into the surgery room when Dr. Rich stopped them. "She doesn't need this!" he said. He opened the isolette and picked up my baby. He carefully cradled Tess in his arms, mindful of her thousands of IV poles. Dr. Rich carried Tess into the surgery room himself, in his arms.

I can't tell you what that meant to me. A doctor holding my sick little Tess like she was a normal newborn baby. I felt his love. I felt like I could trust everyone on that team now to look after my Tess. That unexpected gesture of reassuring "normalcy" was the only way my husband was able to drag his mess of a wife from the spot where she last saw her baby girl disappear from sight.

The second example of "meaningful work" happened while I was waiting for Tessy's heart surgery to finish. A very kind blog reader wrote to me "have a rosary, will travel" and showed up at Children's National Hospital. She had a very cheerful conversation with myself and my husband. At one point in the conversation, however, I needed to take a break. I wanted to purely focus on Tess and pray for her little heart.

I went all by myself on this lonely hospital corridor and curled up in a big window. I held my crucifix in my hands and prayed. I prayed and I prayed and I prayed. It was such a weird feeling to have something be so "thumbs up or thumbs down." Dr. Kanter could either fish that thing out, or he couldn't.

In the middle of my prayer, a janitor came by with a mop and a pail. "It's going to be okay," he called out. I shook my head. I couldn't explain that this wasn't a routine heart angioplasty. Instead, some freak accident had happened to lodge a gigantic foreign object inside my daughter's heart.

"He doesn't really understand how bad things are for Tess," I thought. I couldn't even meet his eyes. I looked down at the cross in my hands and started to cry.

"It's going to be okay," he firmly said again.

I didn't believe him. I didn't look at him. I started praying again instead. After a while, the man moved on down the hall. When I left the windowsill after a long while, I didn't see any trace of him.

Many minutes later, Dr. Kanter emerged from the surgery room flush with success. One of the first things that I thought after (oh my does that PICC tube look super scary close-up!) was "The janitor was right! How did he know for certain that my Tess would be okay?"

I never saw the janitor again. Who was he? But I give you this closing thought, who had the more meaningful work that day in the Heart Cath Lab of Children's Hospital? The amazingly talented Dr. Kanter who fished a PICC line out of a newborn's heart without causing any soft tissue damage? Or the janitor who encouraged a mother to have Hope?

More Reasons for My Smith College Diploma to be Revoked for My Failure to Toe the Feminist Party Line

2011-08-24T04:26:00.016-04:00

I took my kids to Staples yesterday to load up on home-school supplies. They are so cute right now and so independent! Hannah (age 8), Alex (age 6) and Maria (age 4) each grabbed their own individual carts and had a blast browsing the sale racks for great finds. Afterwards, I was reviewing their selections to make sure that each item was truly in the $1 to $3 price range.

Each kid had gone with a color theme. Maria had chosen all pink: pink scissors, pink pens, a pink pencil case and a pink notebook. Alex had chosen all blue--except for one glaring exception. His notebook was a deep purple.

I struggled inside. "Do I say something, or let it go?"

I was raised with the firm social truth that "Gender is a construction in the mind, and a child's freedom of expression should trump 'outdated' social norms." Yet deep in my gut, I didn't like it. I decided "Well, I might be just a socially phobic jerk, but the truth is that I'm going to be totally embarrassed if my son's main notebook for school has a deep purple cover."

So I said something. "Er.....Alex, this notebook is purple. That's usually considered a girly color. Wouldn't you rather have a notebook in blue or red?"

My son looked deep into my eyes and said something that rocked my whole world.

"Mom, I thought it was deep blue. I wanted it to be blue. Sometimes I can't tell the difference between blue and purple."

This was light a lightening moment for me and the Holy Spirit, right there in the middle of the Staples aisle!

A ton of thoughts hit me at once.

First, my kid is color blind! Which I sort of suspected was happening between the colors red and green, but I never expected it to also be a confusion between purple and deep blue.

Second, there were all of these moments in the past where my son had chosen the purple candy, or the purple pencil--all these times when I assumed he was just a boy heavily influenced by having three sisters clustered in close proximity around him. But that wasn't the truth at all. My son couldn't see! Each time, he thought he was choosing the blue lollipop!

Third, it is clearly OKAY for me to be more bossy as a parent when it comes to color selection choices. Pink and purple are for girls. My son wants (and medically needs!) those type of leadership decisions from me.

I treasure that precious interaction with my son inside of Staples. Unless I tell the microscopic truth about myself, even embarrassing things like "I'm NOT cool with my son choosing a purple notebook", I miss out on so many things going on around me.

My Beef With Women Doctors

2011-08-21T02:56:00.011-04:00

Six years ago, I walked out of a wildly successful legal career to take care of my babies. I never looked back. I rocked newborn babies. I struggled with infertility. I learned how to swaddle, cook and home-school. I never paid attention to the debate that raged around me about "retaining female talent" in the workplace. I was convinced that making my baby laugh far outweighed any theoritical legal victory I might have won in the Appellate Court.

Then came the dramatic day of September 5, 2010, when my baby girl Tess started dive-bombing towards death.

I found myself dramatically thrust into a room at Children's National Hospital surrounded by women. There were three female pediatricians, and female respiratory therapists. Female residents and female nurse. Thirty medical personnel surrounded my newborn's crib. The most striking fact to me at the time was that not one of them was male.

In that helpless moment, I felt chastised. "I was wrong," I admitted to myself. I was so profoundly grateful that some women dedicated their lives to specializing in one field. They sacrificed many things in their personal life to learn medicine, years of medical school and residency and extra long hours in on the job training. In that frightening search for the exact cause of Baby Tessy's distress, I was grateful for every single hour they spent learning how to save newborn babies.

I gave birth to my baby girl.

I loved her.

But I couldn't save her.

And in that moment, I was so profoundly grateful that a place like Children's Hospital even existed. A place where extreme specialists gave hope for the "almost goners."

For two weeks, I admitted defeat. This "Mommyhood" vocation was simply a path that I had chosen. It wasn't naturally superior. It was very important that other women chose to stay in their careers. The world clearly needed female NICU doctors.

I tiptoed around the exalted NICU doctors, especially the residents who visited my daughter's crib side often. I learned their names and their family histories. I learned who was newly married and who was divorced.

And then something happened which changed my opinion again.

First, a surgeon complained that her surgery schedule was double that week because another colleague was ordered on immediate bed-rest after her premature labor pains put her unborn twins at risk. I remember overhearing the conversation and thinking "This is not good!" and "What an irony!" Here is hospital that is dedicated itself to saving premature babies, yet it's own 10 to 14 hour a day surgery schedule put one of it's own female surgeons at risk for premature labor. The apparent lack of concern expressed by these two consulting doctors for the babies at risk really shook me up both as a mother and as the mother of a hospital patient.

Then there was my buddy Sachika. (I'm nicknaming her this because I can't clearly remember her Indian name and Sachika supposedly means kindness in Indian). Sachika was my angel in the NICU ward. She was a resident assigned to my daughter--super tiny, super petite, a newlywed with an extra large wedding ring, who gushed with kindness and knowledge. Sachika was the one who explained my daughter's frightening diagnosis in plain English. She would give us the heads up about what to expect in the NICU room before we got there in the morning. She would see us out when we left late at night. One of the most precious conversations we had was when she warned me that a cardiologist was currently conducting an "echo" on my little girl's heart "purely as a precautionary measure." It was if she knew beforehand that for a Mother to walk into a NICU room and see a doctor from an entirely unknown department working on her kid, that was enough to start a chain reaction of new panic attacks.

At the end of her hospital stay, Tess had recovered from her emergency surgery on her small intestine and we were just waiting for her special feeding schedule to end. Jon went back to work and I spent nine hours a day rocking my baby girl alone in her NICU room. I positioned the special NICU rocking chair towards the hallway door. Tess and I sat and rocked and rocked.

One morning, I kissed Tessy's little forehead. I looked up and meet the gaze of Sachika.

She had this look.

Her look was one of such intense longing.

Overcome with emotion, she dropped her gaze and stumbled into the women's bathroom across the Hall.

I sat there, holding my almost perfectly healed Baby Tess, and I realized what a profound gift I had in being her Mother. We brought her to that hospital dying, and many, many people rushed around dedicating their lives to fixing her broken body.

But now the drama was done.

And I was the one who was getting to take her home.

All around me were these wonderful amazing professional women, who dramatically saved the lives of newborns every day, while meanwhile almost none of them had little babies of their own to rock to sleep every night.

Almost a year later, I'm still mixed up about all of this. I know in my bones that staying home is the right thing for my life.

Yet if one of my three girls announced that she wanted to become a pediatric surgeon at Children's National Hospital, I burst my buttons with joy. Heck, if one of my kids wanted to wash dirty hospital linens at Children's National Hospital I'd be overjoyed. That hospital is simply amazing.

At the same time, however, I'd be praying hard to Mommy Mary that if someone I loved chose the obsessive careers of medicine, law or police work, that it didn't ever stop them from raising up their own children for the Lord. Not even the most important job in the world can beat that joy.

A First For Us

2011-08-19T15:26:00.007-04:00

So I took my four sandal clad kids to Daily Mass this morning. I ran into a long, green and yellow SNAKE on the church side walk. The snake flecked it's forked tongue at us for several seconds and then finally slunk away into a nearby stone wall.

I've never seen a wild snake's head up that close. I've never seen something like that coming out of a City parking lot.

I didn't say anything at all. Yet my kids were filled with various opinions about our encounter. My favorite was from my six year old son who said "They need to get that Mommy Mary statue fixed at our Church pronto! Snakes don't scare kids like that when she's around."

Loving My Little Olive

2011-08-18T07:26:00.010-04:00

I'm in the ninth week of pregnancy. My baby is the size of an olive.

Man, do I suck at this!

Tuesday, I spent 3 1/2 hours in the ER waiting room for Alex. (Poor guy found out rather dramatically that our front screen door window pane was made of glass and not plexiglass when he pounded hard on the door and then had glass smash all over him. He's fine! Surface scratches only, no need for stitches).

So I'm in the ER waiting room, feeling nauseous. I'm trying to intellectually compare the two events. "This is the same thing. Waiting here with an injured son Alex. Feeling nauseous from new baby Olive. Both acts of a love for a beloved kid...."

But of course my ever active intellect is saying "I don't want to have massive stomach flu systems anymore! What is this "olive" thing in me and WHY do I have to feel so tired, crabby, and miserable just because I want to add a new person to my family? Come on, God! Don't I get a "pass" on morning sickness just for doing a sixth pregnancy for you?"

Of course I read St. Augustine yesterday in the Divine Office who said "in every affliction we suffer, count it as both a punishment and a correction."

Honestly, sometimes I hate doing my Carmelite reading because it's a constant reminder that I have VERY FAR TO GO in the Spiritual Life!

I'm pretty far from rejoicing in suffering, but I am trying to more affirmatively love "little olive" this week. I take my pregnancy vitamin every day (even though it makes me want to throw-up). I do it as a prayer for my little olive. I try to pray. And I try to just be happy that my little flock has grown from six to seven.

I'll be hanging out on the couch today, thinking of all of you. Have a blessed week!

Happy Feast of the Assumption!

2011-08-14T12:58:00.006-04:00

Seeing Mommy Mary At Work, Part 4

2011-08-13T21:40:00.011-04:00

(Part One, Part Two, Part Three)

I found an old post from 2008 that describes my conversion of heart on "the Mary issue."

In my post I said: "I became a Catholic in 2002, yet I've always had a "block" when it came to Marian devotion. I remember clearly my first Holy Day Celebration in 2001. As a new RICA member I slid into a pew at the evening service of the Immaculate Conception. "This feels pretty weird, what am I getting myself into?" as I struggled to understand why I needed to be in church at night to celebrate an "invented" doctrine from 1950 which I'd never heard before in my 25 years of being a Christian.

This year, I formally consecrated myself to Mary, through the method of St. Louis de Montfort on the Feast of the Annunciation.* It's been a slow-a pathetically slow- process. I stumble along in darkness, groping through the nightly rosary, staring a devotional pictures, trying on unfamiliar concepts like "Mediatrix" and "Assumption."

This year [ 2008] is the 150 anniversary of Our Lady of Lourdes. I feel a special kinship with Saint Bernadette. Her "dullness" at the her catechism consoles me. Just as her trust and faithfulness in suffering inspires me. I've gradually gone from viewing Mary as this strange, fearful BVM, to my Blessed Virgin Mother too.

"Through this journey, I've always felt this "Mary block" must be mine alone. "I must have some weird mother issues" I thought. I could figure out why so many other Catholics leaped confidentially into the lap of Mary, why I always felt shy and uneasy."

My parish had a program where a Statue of Our Lady of Fatima "visits" individual households. Having a visiting statue of Our Lady in my living room was a real turning point for me. I talked about learning more about the "Five Saturday" devotion.

"First Saturday's making reparations to our Blessed Mother's Heart." The premise behind this devotion is beautiful. The faithful devote the first Saturday of five consecutive months to going to Confession, Daily Mass, saying the rosary and my favorite "keeping our Mother company for fifteen minutes."

The reason for choosing the number five, has to do with the five major ways the world hurts our Blessed Mother's heart. First, we deny the Immaculate Conception of Mary. Second, we deny the perpetual virginity of Mary. Third, we deny Mary the title of "Mother of God." Fourth, we desecrate the holy images and statutes of Mary. Fifth, we "uprooted the devotion of Mary, particularly among the young."

The priests on the video carefully explained how each of these "hurts" harm our relationship with God. The Immaculate Conception was God's first gift of redemptive grace. Mary is "the dawn of Christ's perfect day." Her quiet, hidden sanctification was God's signal to the world that we will able be saved through Christ.The perpetual virginity of Mary, was Mary's gift back to God. He accepted that gift and insured that she remained forever a virgin, even through the birth of Jesus.

At this point, I gasped openly. I felt this sting in my heart. My Methodist faith, which I'd always seen as sort of sweet and harmless, was actively promoting four of the five harms to Mary. The Methodists (and most other Protestants) recognized Mary as "the Mother of God" and trotted her out in nativity scenes at Christmas. Otherwise, my religion was actively seeking to destroy devotion to Mary as "incompatible with the true worship of Jesus Christ alone."

We denied that Mary remained a virgin and taught that she had other children beside Jesus. We denied that she was special or above us, through the special circumstances of her conception. We tore down her "idolatrous" shrines and built crisp white churches with plain walls. We "uprooted" Marian devotion, particularly among the young, particularly among ME.

You can read my entire post here.

* I have to give a special shout out to fellow Catholic Blogger, Conversion Diary Jen, for encouraging me to first finish this challenging month long devotion. I fell completely off the daily prayer schedule during a week long Florida vacation trip. In a fit of perfectionism, I was about to give up finishing this devotion completely. Jen encouraged me with the memorable quote "I think Mary understands that we're not going to be perfect the first time we try this. She's a Saint after-all!" The very day I dedicated myself to Mary, I "mysteriously" won 4 tickets to the Papal Mass from my parish lottery draw.

Going to the Papal Mass in April 2008, helped my husband and I realize that we called to become Carmelites. I was about to completely drop the idea of contacting my local Carmelite group before making an initial phone-call because I felt so unworthy. Jen said to me "I don't think people are exactly beating down the doors to become Carmelites. Why don't you just call them and see if they'll take you?" The funniest thing was my reaction: "Oh no, Jen. The Carmelites! The Carmelites! Everyone wants to become one of them!" She's a good friend to have in your corner, that Jen!