Does anyone else hate the Sunday screen time notification? Two weeks ago I received the report and realized I'm spending about as much time on my phone every day as I should be sleeping every night (I'm embarrassed to admit that). After receiving that report, I knew it was time to deactivate my accounts and step away from social media for a week.
It was a really good and intentional week away. As a friend pointed out, I've been home with my kids and working remotely longer than my maternity leave with both kids. 10 weeks with Nick, 9 with Jade. I want to be present during this time and really take in my kids, they are growing SO fast I can barely stand it. This time can be so difficult and yet so sweet. I could probably use more time without social media, but for a millennial, it's how I sort through news sources and get updates from school/daycare. Plus, with no garage sale opportunities, Facebook Marketplace is where it's at. In my week away, I had time to consider all the social media platforms I use and what purpose they serve, and feelings they provoke. Here's what I found: 1. Instagram- Pretty safe and neutral space if you mostly follow people you know and love. Dangerous when you start "exploring" and realizing there are people with bigger, better, smaller, prettier, and tidier. 2. TikTok- Easiest subconscious time waster. Ever. 3. Snapchat- I have this one. I don't fully get it. I rarely use it. My husband thinks it's funny and my kids love to see themselves as dogs. Then there's #4...Facebook. 4. Facebook- Things have gotten ugly for me in this space. Every single time I open the app I have to remind myself it is often not worth it to share my thoughts on political posts. It will not change the outcome and it will only cause more division. In knowing that, I haven't directly commented on posts but that doesn't mean I don't feel convictions about both the current political climate/stay home order as well as the ongoing racism and killing of black people. I feel so much about both. So, I wrote a letter to Facebook and users. Dear Facebook... A. It doesn't work to ask for prayer and understanding for one politician while shaming, de-humanizing, and being derogatory towards the other. If you are a Christian, your allegiance is to God not political party. B. You can really hate the stay home order and dislike our governor. You can be angry, worried, frustrated, and scared for businesses and livelihood. I too, don't get how some stores and business have been able to remain open this entire time while others still don't have a remote timeline. In addition to being outraged, let's be honest, you can outwardly defy most of the order and continue living life how you wish (not wearing a mask, seeing whoever you want, and undercover getting your dog groomed) with little consequence. However, Nazi Germany and "Whitler" are not an appropriate comparison. ***I want to stress I'm genuinely sad for friends who own small businesses. I can't imagine watching entire years of hard work and sacrifice be drained in 10 weeks. It's not fair and there is a lack of reasoning in some areas. I'm simply stating this is not comparable to treatment of Jewish people in concentration camps under Hitler's rule in World War II *** And yes, there are real concerns regarding domestic violence. child abuse, and education. Please recognize funding for mental health has been on the decline for a long time. Also, programs necessary for people to leave violent and abusive situations (think affordable food/housing/healthcare/childcare) have taken hit after hit. It's hard to see the increase in depression, suicide, domestic violence, and child abuse being used as talking points/pawns. If you're angry about it, use your vote, time, and resources to make services accessible and affordable. This means supporting SNAP benefits (food stamps), Medicaid, daycare assistance, etc. Same with education. I see what educational services kids who attend private school are receiving. It's phenomenal and their teachers are busting. I also see the "education" most kids I work with are receiving. Their teachers are also busting but it's pretty difficult when your device is your mom's smart phone that she takes to her essential job and you have no home Wifi. No doubt in my mind these schools will receive cuts first. Remember my post about when there was a Spanish long-term substitute WHO DIDN'T SPEAK SPANISH? These disparities have been around a long time... One last thing I need to say. Please stop comparing abortion rates to COVID-19 deaths. If you know 4 women (we all know 4 women), it's likely you know someone who has terminated a pregnancy. Let's love them better. C. We can be kind. Sometimes it's hard, but we can do it. You can see a post you widely disagree with and scroll past it. If it's not factual or science-based, you can gently call it out in hopes people make wise and educated conclusions. You can share pictures of your dogs, DIY projects, and children and remember we are all human with real experiences and fears in time of pandemic. Next up, ongoing racism in our country. A. If you support the right to an armed protest at the capitol but don't support the right to an unarmed and masked protest for George Floyd, what do you believe in? Rights or privilege? B. Placing more emphasis on looting versus the murder of a black man is wrong. As Austin Channing Brown said, " Why would we put equal (or greater) emphasis on looting rather than an officer murdering a person? Why is this country so clear that looting is wrong, but is unclear about what should happen to a police officer who takes a persons life?" C. Personally, I've realized this week (thanks to a friend's post) sharing about black death when I never share about black life (music, art, culture) isn't necessarily helpful. I have areas to grow and learn. I'm not an expert, I do it wrong, I say dumb things, and at the same time I really care about the lives of black people. I can't imagine sitting my son down to talk about personal safety when he's simply existing. There's too much, all to much. Sincerely, Confused, sad, and uncertain, Haley I don't know what to do with all the division and hate. I don't know how to navigate relationships with people who don't have the same thoughts and values as I do on this issues. But I'm trying and hope you are too. End goal is justice and unity.
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My sister isn't getting married until December but last weekend, I decided to sit down and start writing out my MOH speech. I was expecting it to be emotional, and it was. I also knew I would be less than 3 months postpartum at the time of her wedding and needed to get my words on paper before emotions were even more heightened and full on baby brain took over.
I'll wait to share the best and funniest parts until the day of, but today I want to share my favorite part. Mostly, because I need space to be way more emotional and detailed than one can be at a wedding (we've all sat through those speeches...). As I've wrote before, every moment that is supposed to be entirely joyful becomes a mix of joy and grief after loss. A wedding is no exception. For our wedding, we decided to light a candle in memory of my brother and that turned out to be more difficult than I expected. I couldn't stop crying, and they weren't happy wedding tears. They were "my brother should be here on my wedding day tears." Trying to figure out how to honor loss without making the whole day about death is tricky. I anticipate my sister's wedding will be the same mix of such great joy and yet, moments of intense grief too as this will highlight yet another milestone we navigate without our son and brother. The grief is unique for me. I'm gaining a brother and my kids, an uncle. When Austin and I got married this happened in a different way, or at least it feels like it because this brother/uncle enters in on our family traditions. Nick's death has created a seriously strong loyalty between the Stegeman originals. We can call out things in and to each other, but if someone else does...yikes. The term ride or die? It's literal, we've done both. Even if I'm sad or angry with a family member, I would defend them to the end if someone else *cough husband* tries to validate my feelings. As you can imagine that makes for some fun and confusing marriage experiences. I wish I could explain it better but I feel if you know, you know (and I'm sorry that you know) but if you don't, you don't and it's impossible to explain or understand. I thought it would take me a lot longer to accept whoever my sister married. Newcomer? No thanks. Then along came Austen and he made it way, way too easy (with the exception of having the same name as my husband). I wanted to be resistant but it's impossible when your sister chooses the biggest nicest teddy bear there is. Austen has brought out the best in my sister and has made her softer, stronger, and better. I also never have to hear my sister use the line, "I'm never going to find someone," ever again for which I'm grateful. Austen plays on the floor with my kids and is just as into spoiling them as my sister is. He feeds into Jade's unicorn obsession and Nick's Lego. It gets me how much Nick and Jade love him. When my sister calls, Jade's first words are, "Where's Austen?". They hit the jackpot. He rocks at surprises and is a great gift giver. Seriously who flies down to Florida for a surprise engagement? He's willing to take and dish out the jokes. He had the courage to come bring a meal and stay for dinner when we were miscarrying. He is faith-filled. As my dad would say, "he's the real deal." And he is, and he officially gets to be my brother in December. Losing a brother is horrific. The worst. I still feel robbed of many childhood and adult experiences. I'm still miss my brother. I'm sad and experience grief and heartache. There is also room for hope and new joys like gaining a brother. It is such a gift and I'm thankful. Thank God for love stories that provide redemption for the whole family. We've had a few of those stories, and they are the best ones. Turns out "shelter in place" is a really easy time for me to fall into some old thoughts and habits. Perfect breeding ground for impatience, judgement, and pride. By the looks of my Facebook and Instagram, I'm not the only one. It has been a nasty week in the social media world. Today is horrific.
I'm loving Glennon Doyle right now. This week she shared, "When you don't abandon yourself in the little things, it becomes a way of life and eventually you trust yourself-like you trust a good friend who has always shown up and never steered you wrong. The reward of not abandoning yourself is self trust. And the reward of self trust is confident peace. But to get that real hard earned peace we have to resist false peace of the easy buttons." Easy buttons are super appealing right now and for many of us, false peace wouldn't feel too bad either. I feel a lot of us are hitting the easy buttons on social media, nasty memes, unkind words, judgmental thoughts and responses. We experience false peace as a result. Because sometimes it feels really good to say it exactly the way you see it. Most of the time, it's just not helpful and isn't going to change a single person's mind. Do I have plenty of thoughts and feelings about the current protest in Lansing? Names our Governor has been called this week? Absolutely, and if I shared those thoughts, would I be validated by the same people who always validate me? Yes. Would those who are not in support of Governor Whitmer present their point? Probably, and we would all waste a bunch of time going back and forth only to end up with more division. Some times it's a great time to recognize it's not worth it. For me, today, it's not worth it. This isn't really what I wanted to share. It's vulnerable to admit how often I choose the easy buttons. It would be way easier for me (and feel better) to press harder on issues that have me angry and sad. Yet, those are my easy buttons today and in this moment, I will sit in my anger and sadness as I strive for confident peace. ***This is my experience, TODAY as of 4pm. I respect those who continue to advocate and share their words, it's needed even if it doesn't also create the change we are hoping for. I trust it's not an easy button for every person who shares something political on social media, but rather a sincere place to present thoughts and perspective that some people need to hear and see. That person might be me tomorrow, but not today*** I have been home for 19 days straight. I "left the house" twice, once to drive up the street for a work conference call and once for a walk with a friend who lives nearby. I never ever thought I would miss a solo trip to the grocery store, but here I am.
Like the rest of the world, this has been an incredible change of pace for me. I'm used to dropping my kids off at daycare, going to my office (swinging through Starbucks if I want), working, catching up with coworkers, and overall being on my own schedule a majority of the day. I miss those days and am struggling to navigate these days with no definite end in sight. Now, I'm stay-at-home mom, preschool teacher, and probation officer. Twenty. Four. Seven. I should add, being a stay-at-home wife has been equally challenging, we are not used to navigating our entire day together. Reading my own words about my current responsibilities, it's obvious, of course I'm tired. You probably are too. What is being asked of us today was not asked of us a month ago or ever before in our lifetime. Yet, I feel this pressing need to be productive. We've painted a new room for Nick and moved him into it, sorted all of our baby stuff, cleaned out our van, de-cluttered closets, started seeds for our garden, and organized our storage room. Productive? Yes. Good/important to set goals and have motivators during this time? Yes. Okay to rest and do nothing? Yes to that too. So that's what I did yesterday. Austin brought me breakfast and I hid in our room past 8. Then we watched Tangled and Onward. I didn't move from the couch from 3:30-6:30. Our kids went to bed before 7. We had game night over Zoom and we called it a day. It was not outwardly productive. I'm not usually one to brag about getting 83 steps in a day, but yesterday's physical rest and break from "to-do's" produced emotional rest and "heart productivity" that was just as needed, if not more, than finishing our next big project. Austin and I have gone through the book Dream Big, Think Small four times now. In the book, the author Jeff Manion talks a lot about rest. Rest is deliberate and planned out. It takes preparation the day before and allows you to take a rest from both vocational and domestic responsibilities. It's easy to trick ourselves into think Sabbath is just a break from vocational work but it's also breaking from the house project, mindlessly scrolling (guilty!) budget talk, trip planning, grocery shopping, etc. because that's all work too. It doesn't have to be prefect, mine wasn't yesterday, but something is better than nothing. I can't be the only one feeling the need to be hyper-productive during quarantine. I can't be the only one who's tired (like really tired) either. As we enter Holy Week, let's commit to taking care of our tiredness by resting in God's promises and the hope of the empty tomb. Grief and loss have taught me a lot of different lessons over the years including:
1. The lessons don't have to make the loss okay 2. You don't need to compare pain 3. You can experience grief and gratitude. Or not. After my brother died, my family learned a lot of lessons we wouldn't have otherwise. We encountered people who helped us along our grief journey we wouldn't have otherwise. We've walked alongside people who have experienced loss we wouldn't have otherwise. We met people we wouldn't have otherwise. We value family over everything and maybe we wouldn't have otherwise. Yet, would we choose to have our son and brother here instead of some of those lessons in hopes of learning them a different way in the future? Absolutely. We were also told a lot of unhelpful things from people with really good intentions who only wanted our loss to make sense. "God needed him." "He was too good for this Earth." "God has a plan for everything." I don't believe God needed Nick in Heaven, I don't believe he was too good for this Earth (I mean he was my older brother for 11 years, I have some memories of him being less than perfect), and I do believe God has a plan for everything but that does not bring me purpose to his death. As I watch people navigate the COVID crisis, they (we, me too) are desperate to bring purpose to this-something so horrific we never imagined in our lifetime. More family time, kinder neighbors, communities rallying, new creatives ideas, and all of the good we see we wouldn't have otherwise, doesn't have to make the COVID crisis "okay". It doesn't make you a bad person or Christian if you haven't found purpose in this pandemic. Next, on pain comparison. I can't tell you how many times people have said, "But we can't even imagine what you've been through," or "But it wasn't as bad as losing a son/brother," when sharing their personal stories of death and grief. When it comes to pain there is no need for comparison. Your pain is your pain. This week I've had several conversations with family and friends who shared real worry, anxiety, and pain and often ended with a statement making sure I know they know other people have it worse. If you are home for the foreseeable future with your family and never have to go out and are having a terribly hard time with managing, your pain is valid. If you have a newborn baby no one in your family can meet and your grieving what you thought maternity leave would look like, your pain is valid. If you're in the healthcare field and are seeing firsthand the impact of this virus, your pain is valid. You can be in pain and you can have real anxiety even if you feel someone else has it worse. God cares about your pain as much as he cares about the next person's. You don't need to compare or justify, but you can share it with people you trust and who can validate your feelings. Tonight, I'm plain sad I can't see my dad on his birthday tomorrow. We aren't huggers but I would love to play cards with him and hear him tell jokes because he laughs at his own jokes in a way you can't help but laugh. Last, you can be in incredible pain and still be grateful. Or not. When your son/breath dies, you never get over it. I'm over a decade in and still carry the pain. It takes a different shape and feel, but it's still there. I'm grateful too. I experience joy on a regular basis and those moments give me hope for what's to come. It wasn't always that way though. If you don't feel grateful right now, and you're just flat out scared, that's okay. Maybe one day you will feel gratitude again and hope too. One thing I continue to tell myself as this is the most scared I've ever been for my personal health and health of our kids/growing baby, is if I face the worst earthly outcome, the thing that comes next is the best eternal promise. I haven't written anything in months. Navigating life after a miscarriage has been really hard. I'm grateful to be pregnant again so soon after loss, but it has also complicated my grief. Every twinge of pain, speck of blood, and even lack of symptoms after lots of symptoms can send me into a tailspin. Since November, I've felt stripped of words, creativity, and motivation. I've felt a lot of fear and have become close friends with Netflix and early bedtimes.
Later in February, I took a trip to Florida and watched my little sister get engaged to the best guy, made it into my second trimester, and was starting to breathe a little easier. I felt hope. Then Coronavirus hit and I feel back in a place of anxiety and fear. Most of my fear is selfish, yet valid. I pray protection over the life I'm growing every single day. I'm scared of the unknown and what impacts Coronavirus could have on my health while pregnant but even more so, the impact on fetal development. It may sound silly, but what if come September hospitals are full and I find myself planning for an unmedicated home birth? Truly terrifying. I'm not sure I could do it. What if I don't make it full term and the baby can't receive necessary respiratory support.? I have feelings of fear and sadness for other things and people too. I have lots of friends working in healthcare. I have a grandmother in assisted living who is not allowed visitors. One of my best friends just had a baby and I want to be over there for baby snuggles. I worry about my work kids as their home environments aren't ideal and school was their place of safety, food, and nurturing. I could write about my fears and sadness until the sun came up tomorrow but I won't because at some point I have to figure out how to manage and plan for the next day. So I've made a commitment to myself during this pandemic: write weekly and process my fears/anxieties as well as my list of gratitude as well. Here are more of my thoughts on week #1: I'm scared and I'm thankful too. Yesterday my work allowed us to begin working remote whenever possible. Austin's work made the same decision, allowing us to be at home together. Today was our first work remote day, 15 minute breaks playing Uno with my son and playing house with my daughter are such a gift. No doubt these days will be hard, really hard (we are seriously considering turning our treefort into our office so we can make a phone call without someone yelling about needing to be wiped). I'm noticing how much "highlight" parenting I'm seeing on social media and although it's great to see new ideas to promote learning and pass time, sometimes it makes me feel less than. I'm thankful God continues to whisper, you're enough and doing enough during this time. Our kids are eating snacks constantly, they have more screen time than they should, and don't really seem interested in any of the projects I'm trying to plan for them. All of that is okay because we are going to take 24 hours at a time and figure it out as a family. I'm thankful for protection over our family and quick healing for Austin. On Tuesday he left work feeling sick with a fever and cough. He called the doctor who encouraged Covid screening. He went to the drive up clinic yesterday, and was not tested due to the limited amount of tests, lack of travel history/exposure to someone with the Coronavirus, and manageable symptoms. They thought he may have Influenza A. He woke up yesterday with no fever and we are praising God as we were prepping to distance ourselves for 2 weeks in separate homes. Tonight we are watching movies as a family and tucking our kids into bed all under the same roof. My family, friends, and church are supportive and although we are apart, I feel a true sense of community. We are Facetiming like it's our job. We received a book and ice cream "porch drop" tonight. Our church is hosting Zoom calls for prayer and support. We are figuring out how to host small group online. I get pictures of my friend's baby often. We are going to be okay, no matter the outcome, because we serve a God who claims victory in this life and over death. If there are any specific ways I can be praying for you, please feel free to message me. Today would have been my brother’s 31st birthday. I’m definitely feeling “it” this year, more than I ever have. Having children of my own, and recently have a miscarriage has magnified the depth of what my parents experienced in losing their son, my brother.
I have a 3 (soon to be 4) and 2-year-old. I think often about what life would be like if I lost one of them. How I would carry on every time I saw a tv remote or umbrella and remembered how my son said both as if they began with K’s (kamote and kbrella). Or in the morning, when I was putting on a pair of socks and remembered how much he HATED bumps in his socks and pulled them up as far as possible to avoid them. How would my heart be held together without hearing my son call my name, just to tell me loves me. This winter, how would I survive Frozen 2’s debut when Ana, Elsa, and “Let it Go” were my daughter’s favorites. How would I exist in a world where there was stillness after 7:30pm instead of going to help my unbelievably strong-willed daughter who is screaming “want more snuggles” and insists on getting a band-aid for her invisible foot wound every single night? She gives the sweetest eskimo kisses, what if I never felt her cold nose against mine again? I have almost 4 years of memories and when I think of losing one of my children, I think about how the world would unknowingly, yet constantly be screaming my child’s memory, with almost every ear deaf to the sound except mine. My parents had 13 years and I have so many questions. How do you watch a U of M football game again? Set the table for 4 instead of 5? Answer the question, “How many kids do you have?”? How do you get out of bed on Christmas morning knowing your son would have been up all night watching the Christmas Story with excitement like no one I’ve ever met (besides my sister now, who got it from her brother) for Christmas morning? How do you hear how Great Thou Art and function the rest of the service? What do you do with all of his physical belongings? The hospital bag? The pictures? The new bike he got for his last birthday? How about never seeing his gaping smile or hearing his loud laugh? Never looking into his big brown eyes or running your fingers through his spiked hair? What would you do with all the unfilled dreams for the future? Would he be married? Have a family? How do you exist on a day where you son should have been 31 and you have to go the cemetery to celebrate him? How do you breathe one more breath in a world where your child, your own heartbeat, no longer lives. I honestly don’t know. If it physically hurts me to think about all these questions I can’t imagine it being my life. But my parents stinking did it and are still doing it. So when people talk to me about my strength, know it’s from my parents. For making it through days no parent should have to endure a single second of. For being patient and perseverant in the face of unimaginable grief. For fighting for their marriage and beating statistics. For packing up their son’s room when it was time to move yet holding the boxes in their basement until the day they die. For giving the literal gift of life to others and choosing organ donation. For loving hard, extending our family beyond blood and welcoming a new family into ours. Again for loving hard, their grandkids and watching U of M football with them and holding them at the cemetery as they ask hard questions about death and grief. For forgiving, and clinging. Happy 31st Birthday Nick. We miss you, so much. Last year around this time, I went to a Christmas program for a first-grade student who attends a small private school grades K-5th. The program was held at the public high school and houses the city’s 9th-12th graders every school day. When I arrived, I felt like I was in a Walmart parking lot on Black Friday. There were groves of people waiting for the doors to open (not the doors to the auditorium, the doors to the school where people would continue to wait for an hour before the doors to the auditorium opened). When the doors to the auditorium opened, it felt competitive. There were coats thrown on chairs, ropes across rows, and before you knew it, there were no seats left. Eventually, the auditorium manager went on stage and announced the room was at capacity and doors would be closing due to fire hazard. People were turned away from their child’s Christmas program which made parents/grandparents/aunts/uncles/etc. super unhappy. I can’t say with certainty, but I’m sure the school received upset emails and phone calls throughout the following days. As a side note, if every white woman approached social justice issues with the same approach they do when it comes to unsatisfactory customer service for something they paid for,I wouldn’t have to write this. I wouldn’t want to hear a recording of me on the phone with Xfinity after getting billed the wrong amount again.
The same Christmas program is being held tonight in a different auditorium. To my knowledge, a bigger one. This time, each child was given 4 tickets, meaning most children there will have at least 4 supportive adults attending their Christmas program. Most will have more because a sibling in school means more tickets. October 2018, a few zip codes away, a local high school played an away game and do you know how many people (without exaggeration) showed up to support them. F O U R. Four people. It made the news. The captain of the team said, “You look at the stands when you’re losing, four people. It just makes you tired. It gets tiring. It gets old but you keep going. Can’t stop.” I remember feeling heavy hearted looking at the photo of empty stands but felt hopeful about an initiative to “fill the stands” their following home game. Fast forward to Fall 2019 and the team could rarely practice due to a variety of issues, primarily transportation and financial. Again, an article was published and the community responded with a campaign to buy bus tickets so players could get to practice. I don’t know if “fill the stands” was successful last year. I don’t know if bus tickets were provided to every player this year. I do know showing up to one game and throwing money at problems without personally investing, although nice and a start, won’t provide long term solutions to these problems. As we approach the holidays, I feel similarly to when I saw the photo of the empty stands. The world I live in and the world I work in are so completely different and I don’t want my kids to live their lives blinded by privilege and unaware of the hurts in our community. Yet, I know full well my kids will receive gobs of toys and be surrounded by family and friends throughout the upcoming month and well beyond the holidays. Meanwhile, there are so many kids I work with whose Christmas lists are the least of their concerns, probably nonexistent. They are worried about basic needs. Food, shelter, financial means to pay bills, child care for their siblings, safety in the community, court involvement, the color of their skin-survival stuff. This holiday season, remember all the tired kids looking up to the stands for support, relief, and encouragement. They keep going, in the hope someone is going to show up. Do that. Show up with the same cut throat attitude you show up to get the best seat at your child’s Christmas program. Advocate for proper education, living wage, and sufficient transportation lines. Extend an invitation for meals, buy warm clothing, provide transportation to extracurriculars week after week. Be in it for the long haul and invest yourself emotionally, financially, and spiritually. If you don’t think little you can make a big difference, I want to leave you with one story. This past weekend I attended a funeral for the father of one of the participants from run club. The youth is also on probation. When the service was over, this young boy and his brother who was previously on probation, who were surrounded by family and friends, scanned the room, found their probation officer, and walked up to him seeking comfort. A hug I was privileged to witness and will never forget. It takes on caring adult. Be the one. Last week, Austin and I had a miscarriage shortly after finding out about baby Stone #3. If we are pregnant again someday, we will be expecting a rainbow baby. Stories of rainbow babies are beautiful-tiny perfect evidence of God’s promises and faithfulness.
I’ve heard lots of stories about rainbow babies but I haven’t heard too many stories of the rain, and now I can understand why. It has rained so hard my heart is flooded and I don’t know how to surround my feelings of pain, sadness, and fear with words. But I feel all of those things so deeply. This new “grief territory” is tricky and weird. It’s death before life. It’s grieving someone you never met and that few people knew about. It’s so lonely. It’s physical pain on top of incredible emotional pain and it’s just plain unfair. Baby Stone #3, you were loved every single second from the moment we found out about you. I’m thankful to have carried you a few short weeks and though you are no longer in my belly, you will be held in my heart forever. Because love for a life that grows inside of you doesn’t increase as a certain number of weeks go by. All the love I could ever imagine, it was right there from the very beginning. “No less God within the shadows. No less faithful when the night leads me astray. You're the heaven where my heart is. In the highlands and the heartache all the same.” Words I will continue to cling to. God is still right here, in all my heartache. For that, and all those who love us so well in both joy and sorrow, I’m thankful. 4. I was number 63 on the waitlist for Tara Westover's book, Educated so I expected it to be really, really good. When I started reading the book, I couldn't figure out what the hype was. Sure, it was interesting to hear the account of her childhood but I wasn't gripped. Until yesterday. Part 2 and 3 hit my in ways that will stay with me and continually challenge me in the way I live and pursue my work.
Below are a few excerpts and my takeaways. Still, put yourself on the waitlist, her words are better than mine. 1. “I began to experience the most powerful advantage of money: the ability to think of things besides money.” Yes. All of this. In my opinion, poverty is the root of most social problems and creates pervasive and chronic trauma. For example, almost every youth I work with lives in poverty and does not know what it's like to have financial stability. They don't have the security of knowing their basic needs will always be met. Food, housing, clothing, transportation, means of communication, and present parents (plural is even a stretch as many of their households are single parents) are never guaranteed. In some ways, they are overly responsible and parentified. Yet we wonder why they commit crime, perform poorly in school, and navigate the world in such an unhealthy way with no long term vision. They don't have space to worry about anything but meeting their basic needs. 2. “The thing about having a mental breakdown is that no matter how obvious it is that you’re having one, it is somehow not obvious to you. I’m fine, you think. So what if I watched TV for twenty-four straight hours yesterday. I’m not falling apart. I’m just lazy. Why it’s better to think yourself lazy than think yourself in distress, I’m not sure. But it was better. More than better: it was vital.” The traumas Tara experienced could not be more different than mine, yet I could relate so deeply to her reactions to childhood trauma, including this. The last time I was in therapy, my therapist confronted me on using the word lazy to describe myself. It was easier for me to say I was lazy than to say I was in distress, which at the time I was. Lazy is something I can control, physical reactions to childhood trauma, not so much. I would function highly during the day but it took so much energy. Things that seem simple, running to the store to make a return, showering before bed, getting a load of laundry folded, took me so much mental energy to start and were more exhausting to complete than they should have been. 3. “I had finally begun to grasp something that should have been immediately apparent: that someone had opposed the great march toward equality; someone had been the person from whom freedom had to be wrested. I did not think of my brother as that person; I doubt I will ever think of him that way. But something had shifted nonetheless. I had started on a path of awareness, had perceived something elemental about my brother, my father, myself. I had discerned the ways in which we had been sculpted by a tradition given to us by others, a tradition of which we were either willfully or accidentally ignorant. I had begun to understand that we had lent our voices to a discourse whose sole purpose was to dehumanize and brutalize others—because nurturing that discourse was easier, because retaining power always feels like the way forward.” I don't know how to put my own words around this one but it has challenged me to think about the ways I've retained power and have been willfully or accidentally ignorant to traditions that dehumanize, brutalize, and further suppress others. 4. “I’d never heard anyone use the word “feminism” as anything but a reprimand. At BYU, “You sound like a feminist” signaled the end of the argument. It also signaled that I had lost.” I don't consider being a feminist being a negative thing, and it's surprising to me when people use it as a reprimand or a slam. Really, we just want the same social, economic, and political opportunities. It's not that crazy. 5. “The decisions I made after that moment were not the ones she would have made. They were the choices of a changed person, a new self. You could call this selfhood many things. Transformation. Metamorphosis. Falsity. Betrayal. I call it an education” “An education is not so much about making a living as making a person.” To all my teachers, both academic and non, thank you, for giving me an education and the ability to see the importance of being a lifelong learner. |
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Hi! I'm Haley. Archives
May 2019
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