Sunday, July 29, 2012

A beautiful pro-life message

From a facebook wall discussion:

 Until a child is out, born and breathing in the world, it is just Potential. I've seen too many still born babies at full term and too many late term miscarriages in friends and family to feel otherwise. The loss of potential is sad, painful, heartbreaking, the loss of a potential person who could become anyone, be anything, even more so. But to choose a potential person over the well being and best interests of a being who is already here, with years of experience, choices, friends, family, and everything else already behind them, is to denigrate the value of lives already here just in the hopes of a better "what if". To me, it is to say that all a woman has done, achieved, and impacted in her life is not as worthy or important as what her child MIGHT achieve IF it manages to survive.

I'm 23 weeks pregnant. We chose to have this child, made the conscious decision as two committed, loving adults that if we got pregnant, baring health risks and life threatening birth defects in the child or risk to me, we would carry through. I wish no child was ever conceived except in those circumstances, by people willing and able to take care of it. I don't understand the mentality of someone being worthy enough to sleep with, but not have a child with, but that's just me, and I don't want to force my views on others.

But if something happened tomorrow, and we were to face a choice over my well being and safety, my life, over that of our baby,Jericho and I both agree we would tell them, "Save Me, save Em." From our first pregnancy, we discussed and worried about this, that dark fear of "What if" the worst happened. And Jericho told me then, it would be unfair and selfish for me to choose our baby over him, leaving him alone with a baby to raise, and no me to help or love either of them. In that case it's choosing the baby over the fathers well being, the same thing just with no physical risk to the dad, just a huge burden of sadness and loneliness, and a child he might resent to boot. And every time since that, the decision was already made. "Save Me, Save Em." if something should happen, because otherwise it would be choosing the unborn child not only over myself and my husband, but over my other already born children as well.

It would not matter to me if in a bit of clairvoyance God were to tell me that should my child live, he would cure cancer and bring peace to the world, unless he also promised my other kids and husband would be better off without me, proof that would never come, the answer would always be, "Choose me, Choose Em." Its not that I think I'm better than what my kids could potentially be, its that I know, as long as I'm here, I will do my best to love, protect, and guide them. It's the one little power I have on this earth, and something I won't give up without a fight.

I'm 23 weeks pregnant. We chose to have this child, made the conscious decision as two committed, loving adults that if we got pregnant, baring health risks and life threatening birth defects in the child or risk to me, we would carry through. I wish no child was ever conceived except in those circumstances, by people willing and able to take care of it. I don't understand the mentality of someone being worthy enough to sleep with, but not have a child with, but that's just me, and I don't want to force my views on others. 
But if something happened tomorrow, and we were to face a choice over my well being and safety, my life, over that of our baby,Jericho and I both agree we would tell them, "Save Me, save Em." From our first pregnancy, we discussed and worried about this, that dark fear of "What if" the worst happened. And Jericho told me then, it would be unfair and selfish for me to choose our baby over him, leaving him alone with a baby to raise, and no me to help or love either of them. In that case it's choosing the baby over the fathers well being, the same thing just with no physical risk to the dad, just a huge burden of sadness and loneliness, and a child he might resent to boot. And every time since that, the decision was already made. "Save Me, Save Em." if something should happen, because otherwise it would be choosing the unborn child not only over myself and my husband, but over my other already born children as well.
It would not matter to me if in a bit of clairvoyance God were to tell me that should my child live, he would cure cancer and bring peace to the world, unless he also promised my other kids and husband would be better off without me, proof that would never come, the answer would always be, "Choose me, Choose Em." Its not that I think I'm better than what my kids could potentially be, its that I know, as long as I'm here, I will do my best to love, protect, and guide them. It's the one little power I have on this earth, and something I won't give up without a fight.

Sunday, July 22, 2012

Just Checking In

My first semester is over, and one thing I have learned: life is not going to get any easier for the next 20 months.  The school is not hard except in the most critical area: actual hands on learning of technique. We are given brief verbal instructions, once (sometimes not everyone gets them even) and then expected to perform like professionals. I kept waiting for the written instructions, checklists, visual aides, videos and helpful hints to be offered, in any format.  I finally found out (after flunking the hands on portion of the test) that they never will be offered.  It is expected that everyone who is not finding their own way to learn these skills (i.e. developing their own curriculum) and/or is not in the group who is lucky enough to hear the brief instructions in the first place, they will all be eliminated at the end of the next semester.

That, at this point, looks like it will include me.  BUT, I am now aware that I am waiting in vain for real teaching, and so I will spend my three weeks between semesters doing my best to develop my own curriculum for this skill.  Also, I know better now the level of expertise expected, though it is possible that starting out slow I will always lag behind the curve.  If that turns out to be the case, no worries. I will do my best to transfer to a different medical training school for a similar job.  The other option relies more on academics and scientific acumen, which are my strengths.  But I will have wasted a year and a lot of time and money.  :\

So, I am hoping that my home education skills at putting together my own curriculum will pay off in a big way.  Wish me well and pray for my success, all who read here.  I will need the cooperation of others so pray that I will have favor with the right people for this to work out.

On another note, my husband is happier and healthier than he has ever been.  He is working on his shame issues with his therapist, and that seems to be the foundation of all his depression and repressed anger.  Life with him is really good.

Also, I started doing thirty minutes of gentle yoga most mornings and evenings.  I got my first yoga lessons as a Christmas present.  I am now twenty pounds lighter, way more limber, and also happier.  Did you know the "Ohm" sound is really the first and last letter of the Sanskrit alphabet (Alpha and Omega, anyone?) followed by the MMMM sound because it is made with mouth closed reminding one of the presence of God within (...the kingdom of God is within you).  Why are Christians so scared by yoga?  Crazy.

I have thought about taking the blog off line, but I still get regular visitors reading for how Bill Gothard negatively affected my life.  So, though I will rarely post, I am going to leave the blog up for now.  I wish more evangelical women in crappy home school marriages would read here.  They would find the bread crumbs I left, and maybe be able to follow them out to freedom for their own family.  That's my wish.

Peace and good will, SS

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

My husband is outside playing basketball with our six year old neighbor kid.  It is so sweet to watch.  I think every smile on that little one's face brings a bit more healing to my husband's heart.  It makes me very happy to watch.

70/04/2012