Thoughts on God

Israel is 9 weeks old now. Time has flown by. It's strange, even though I wouldn't say it's been easy I was *so* afraid of how things would be with Eve, but now I see there was no reason to fear, or simply God has given me peace about it.

Eve doesn't seem jealous at all. And Peanut has been such an easy baby, I have plenty of time to spend with her. Yes, there are definitely behavioral challenges, but those are par for the course, I think, with or without a new little brother.

I've had a much better week in parenting than I was having when I last posted. I was feeling so angry and even hateful (I hate to admit it) toward Eve, and every little thing she did, even very innocent things, seemed to push all my buttons. The thoughts I had were really awful, 180 degrees from loving and gentle. As I mentioned last time, I have totally been, simply put, just too busy to spend much time with God, and doing so seemed like such a...well, waste of time when I have so many projects and responsibilities that require productivity. But, after that last post, I faced the fact that I was suffering for it, and so was my family.

So, over the past week I've been reading Amos, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and John. I'm reading Amos because that's what our Pastor is preaching on. Proverbs, because I can just choose the chapter based on the date of the month, so it's easy. Ecclesiastes on a whim, and John, because it's the gospel with which I am least familiar. I find my days simply go better, and I have more Patience and peace when I start my day relating with God before I face the challenges of parenting (and, erm...wifing?). Tom's been great in trying to give me a somewhat uninterrupted time in which to read, drink my tea, and eat breakfast.

I'm not doing any deep study, just reading and reflecting. I notice that Solomon, or whoever wrote Ecclesiastes is bitter. The great wisdom he had didn't bring him happiness or peace. Contrast this with King David, his father, and this "man after God's heart" shows that Love is better than wisdom. I am a knowledge seeker...and this, combined with some other reading I've been doing, convicted me that I need to seek God more and rely on his spirit when parenting, and that will serve me much better, not to mention my children. I can't be the parent I need to be under my own power, and when I try I feel defeated and frustrated, and my goal of having a deep and loving relationship with my children is hindered by my behavior and reactions.

Praying for guidance in parenting is not a new idea, and I've frequently in the past realized I needed to do it, and then failed to follow through, a total un-piphany.

I've also been reading Heartfelt Discipline. It's not new to me to read a different perspective on the "Rod" verses in Proverbs, but it was a fuller explanation than I'd previously had. Common Christian belief about these verses is that they constitute a Christian imperative to spank and punish our young children. One really interesting point the author made is that the word for Rod is not a symbolic word, so if you're going to implement it biblically, you're talking a big heavy stick, used to beat slaves and animals. Additionally, the age group that is being addressed, contextually in Proverbs, is young men and fathers of young men, who need to be guided to the path of life and light--not to young children.

The book reminded me, again, to seek God for guidance in parenting, and to be led by the holy spirit. It also has some practical guidelines for relating to our children. So far it's covered having sympathy for our children, and encouraging them biblically. I especially like one idea for encouragement that points back to the stone monuments in the Old Testament, which father's were supposed to point out to their children to tell them about God's faithfulness. The author suggests as a family reflecting on God's faithfulness over the past year, month, whatever, and then drawing pictures to represent those instances of God's work in our lives, and collecting those in a notebook that can be reviewed whenever we need encouragement or are facing tough times. Seems like a good Thanksgiving activity.

Quick update

There's the post-op patient making a silly face. And the cute little guy actually awake! That pic was taken on Saturday of last week, some 30 hours after surgery.

Since I last updated you, we went to Seattle to have the stitches removed this past Thursday afternoon. Not a great time for traveling to and from Seattle, it made for a long, late night. But, everything looked good and I got to see Tom in some really cool shorts made of paper. :)

His patience with recovery is beginning to wear thin. Yesterday he was pretty down. Bored, frustrated, in pain.



Eve seems to be losing patience as well. Today she told my mom that she wanted to spend the night there again (second night in a row) because daddy is busy playing video games and mama is busy giving Peanut nummy nums.

Friday as I was fighting her to get her strapped into her carseat, she was totally uncooperative. It went through my mind that the way she was acting really motivated me to spank her hand to just get her to stop for a minute. the rational side of me of course knew that she wouldn't stop, she'd go farther into hysteria.

Just as I was thinking all this and telling her she needed to turn so I could get the strap over her shoulder, and physically attempting to help her do so, she wound up and slapped me so hard in the face that it didn't stop hurting for 30 minutes. my reaction was immediate, I gasped and smacked her right back. Angry and more angry at my reaction, I told her it was completely unacceptable to hit me, and then stepped back to say how angry I was, and take a few breaths. I had peanut in the wrap, and was driving Tom's beast of a van (because mine is having transmission problems), so the whole thing was more difficult to begin with. I was at a low level of frustration all day due to Eve's behaviors and having to drive this van, and because on our way to our errand I'd hit every red light possible, and Peanut cried hard whenever we weren't moving.

Ugh. I'm so frustrated with myself for that reaction. I felt terrible after I did it. And yet still really angry at her, and still wanting to do some sort of more correct discipline to teach her that hitting me is not okay. I did tell her it wasn't okay for me to hit her either, and I asked her forgiveness.

I'm definitely feeling somewhat hopeless. My only consolation is she hadn't had a nap and was more tired than usual. So, maybe her bad behavior was due to that more than anything, but she kind of woke up on the wrong side of bed that day anyway. Sigh. I know it's been tough for her to deal with Tom being chair-bound and mostly glued to the TV (I am not a fan of having a TV in our living room, but since Tom isn't much of a reader, it was important that we have something to keep him entertained. So he watched TV, movies, and plays the borrowed Xbox 360 his brother loaned us. And tends to tune everything else out, Eve included. And I've been just feeling haggard and busy, and part of the reason I hate the TV is because I get sucked in and distracted myself. And for the past few days, Peanut has been on a growth spurt and nursing a ton more.

I definitely need to show her some grace.

Reading

So I've been enjoying my reading of Siblings Without Rivalry. It's interesting and enlightening, and at the same time challenging.

Principles:

Validate feelings.

I don't think I'm great at this, especially when it's something like, "I don't like him" because there's no reason for her to feel this way, usually. I'll have to keep in mind that feelings are often not based on good reasoning or logic. Heaven knows mine aren't. Validating feelings doesn't have to mean allowing bad actions or behavior. Yay!

Give in fantasy what can't be had in reality.


Basically, just state in clear language what it appears the child wants. Not sure how I feel about this one.

Not sure how I feel about this one. I can't see myself saying, "I can see you are angry. You wish that we could send the baby back and have mama all to yourself again."

Suggest creative or otherwise non-harmful outlets to express negative feelings.

Meh...I've never much liked this, myself. Although I have made great use of writing letters that never get read, that is a little hard for non-literate children. I guess I could always suggest punching pillows or screaming at the top of your lungs--I use those myself.

Don't compare, positively or negatively.

I know I've already been guilty of this with other kid's Eve's age or a little older.

"Oh, Eve, Hannah wears big girl panties all the time because she goes potty in the potty! She's such a big girl!"

I will have to make sure this isn't something I continue.

The hardest part of this includes non-direct comparisons: praising one child in front of the other. I have a hard time already with over-praising Eve. Of course, I think she's the most awesome kind on the planet, so it's hard to keep that to myself, and in my house as a child everything we did was always the best and the greatest, and we were the smarted, most attractive, most athletic, etc. kids EVER.

It's going to be a real challenge to keep praise private as the family grows. Also not sure how this applies to praising infants for milestone accomplishments...something to think about.

The next section is Fair is Unfair, which I've just begun and which says equal treatment is unnecessary and harmful, and that each child should be treated according to his or her needs.

I'm definitely interested in this section, because while I don't feel my parents did this, I get the sense that Tom thought his whole life was unfair...and he's frequently mentioned how certain unfair treatments bother him in other families we are close to.

So far, my only hang up with this book is that the things parents say seem to be way over the top...but then, I guess it's easier to portray extreme examples than more subtle ones in such a format.

Additionally, a lot of the long-lasting hurt feelings and resentment can be healed through forgiveness, given time and God, so I didn't identify with a lot of what the parents said about their own histories--even though I hated my brother, I really love him now and I'm closer to him than to either of my other brothers, who were never subjects of my wrath. And although I recognize that in many ways my feelings toward him had a lot to do with what my parents did, I know they only did what they felt was best and have always had the best of intentions, and simply didn't have the tools or training to do what would have been better. I've forgiven them for it, even though I fear repeating their mistakes.

I guess I should let that be a lesson to me...

Even if I fail as a parent to foster a close and loving relationship amongst my children, all hope is not lost as long as God's in the picture--He can change hearts and minds dramatically, as He has mine.

Of course, that puts the pressure back on teaching Eve the Truth about God, and praying that she chooses to follow him, and back to my fear of screwing her up!

What's my motivation?

Well, I'm just having one of those days today. I shouldn't be, as I'm feeling showered with love and care from every direction. Despite that, my thoughts are drawn toward self-reflection and I find myself lacking--always disappointing.

It's been a somewhat slow journey to this frame of mind, and I wouldn't say I got here until yesterday evening. But it all started Saturday night.

I brought up sibling rivalry with a friend who has quite a few kids. I figured if she'd dealt with it and figured out how to deal with it, then I could safely take her advice on it--because her kids all seem to get along and love each other.

I'll be honest that she didn't seem to have much practical advice, but she assured me that she doesn't think it will be a problem in our family.

I wish I could share her conviction.

You see, when I got my first sibling, it ruined my life. I felt betrayed, bereft, abandoned and unloved. And it was ALL. HIS. FAULT. Dumb little brother going and messing up my life like that. Who did he think he was?! I literally hated him. I wasn't much for the physical abuse, although I'm sure that he got his fair share of shoves and whatnot, but I was much more about the emotional manipulation and cruelty. To this day, I believe that I can see evidence in my brother of damage done by me and by my parent's reaction to my behavior towards him.

I'm very afraid of the same occurring between Eve and her little brother. I'm afraid she will feel unloved and displaced. I'm afraid she'll take it out on her little brother. I'm afraid that anything I try to do to "fix" their relationship will only further harm things. I'm afraid of putting distance between Eve an I, after working so hard to foster closeness and attachment and trust, I'd hate to see it all go to waste, wiped out by the arrival of a sibling.

You might see something in the above paragraph that my friend picked up on. Fear.

She told me she got the feeling I was afraid and implored me not to be. Reminding me that fear is not of God. Unless, of course, it's fear of God. But I can't seem to help myself. It's ingrained in me, and probably something I need to really work on.

Yes, I'm fearful about sibling relations in my home. This led me to examine my parenting in general. I am very much motivated by fear in my parenting.

Now, unlike perhaps many (not all) parents (I suspect), I am not really much afraid that my daughter will misbehave. She does misbehave, but I'm not a behaviorist, or at least, I'm not hung up on the here-and-now of behavior, and I recognize that a lot of what we might think of as misbehavior is really just developmental behavior. Yes, I get frustrated by that behavior, but most of the time, I can deal.

What I am afraid of is screwing her up. I'm sure my fear will double soon as I have a whole new little life I can screw up too. Maybe I'm giving myself too much credit, maybe I don't have so much power.

I really try to trust God over my daughter, and to an extent, I feel I've succeeded. I'm much less fearful for her physical well being and health than I used to be. I'm not perfectly fearless in the face of danger or disease, but I think I've come a long way.

I feel I'm well-equipped to be a nurturer of little lives. I find it easy to be a responsive mother of a newborn and infant (although I do anticipate struggling a bit with doing the infant thing at the same time as the toddler thing). I guess I should say, I know what to do with a baby. I know that they don't have mere "wants" and every desire is truly a need. Every moment is a learning one for a baby. And the goal of the first year is to teach trust and self-worth.

After that, things get more complicated. When do children begin to have mere "wants" and when can such desires be safely denied? When does age-appropriate behavior cross the line into inappropriate behavior (besides the obvious of bringing harm to others), when is it disrespect, when is it something else equally unsavory that should be stopped? I've been stumbling through that with Eve, and I still honestly don't know. I feel fairly confident that at her age of several months past 2 and a half, she's long been in the stage of everything not being a need, I'm just not sure when the transition occurred, and I still have a little trouble deciphering which is which.

I'm not afraid that I'm doing too much in the way of discipline, although I'm certainly afraid of going there. Instead, I'm afraid I'm too far on the "permissive" end of the spectrum in which I'm not establishing enough boundaries, and I'm not training her in good behavior, decorum, or work ethic. I'm also afraid I'm leaving God out of the equation--although He is in my thoughts and I am trying to do things in a Godly fashion, I'm pretty sure I don't communicate that to Eve enough, and I don't feel that we're doing much to teach her about God. Very frustrating, really.

I'm also dreadfully afraid of teaching Eve a God that doesn't exist. I've shared that before. I don't want to present to her "God" who is not true. I want to only present the True God to her, but I am, again, afraid that I'm failing.

I hate failing. It makes me feel really lousy. Failure in general is just one more thing I fear. And being fearful makes me feel I've once more failed.

Discipline

I have a feeling this post won't interest all of you. I promise that my next post will be entertaining, or full of crafty goodness, or at the very least, I'll post some more recent pictures of everyone's favorite 2.5 year old.

So...Eve's been going through a bit of a difficult time lately. I think a lot of it is age. I know some of it is the recent and temporary change of being cared for by daddy while mom's away at work and not by Grandma. I know some of it is that fact that she weaned a bit over 2 weeks ago, and had been on the fast track to weaning for several months prior to that. Some of it might be due to my pregnancy and change in my level of energy and patience. And of course, it has much to do with her age.

Disobedient and willful seem like pretty good descriptions of her behavior right now. Coupled with very recent bouts of extreme clinginess, and general whininess and emotional bouts of tears for no apparent reason. I'm sure there's a reason, I'm just not sure what it is.

This has brought discipline and my approach and philosophy regarding her behavior to the forefront of my mind as well as Eve's dad's. He's always been one for swift negative discipline and chastisement. I've swung more toward the positive reinforcement of good behavior and gentle discouragement of bad behavior. Of course, my natural inclination when sorely tested is often negative discipline, and so time-outs are used rather liberally in our house. Tom spanks Eve's hand for more severe infractions. None of what we've done recently has changed her behavior any, at least not an hour or so after the previous incident. I, of course, wonder if we're making things worse. It's hard to tell though, since living in time as we do, we can't go back and try a different approach and see how the rest of the ride goes had we done y instead of x two days ago. Too bad, really, as it would make for a much more scientific approach.

What brought me to posting on this today is a book that's making its rounds at our church called Shepherding a Child's Heart by Tedd Tripp. Now, I've never read the book, and only one of the couples studying the book do I *know* to share my beliefs about nurturing children, so I really can't say much about it first hand. However, in various conversations with other ladies in the church, I've gotten the impression that the message is: when we punish our children for misbehavior, we need to reinforce our wishes with scripture to show how they are not only disobeying and making *us* unhappy, but that they are disobeying and making God unhappy as well. From my conversations, there's also some self-discipline, heart-examining stuff for the parents (to try to be calm rather than reacting in anger) and the advice to pray for our children (which I wholeheartedly agree with).

So, here's the conundrum. I do want to teach Eve about God, the bible, and that obedience to her parents and the bible is...um, biblical. However, I don't want to make God into the bad guy. "Don't do that because it makes God upset." "God says to do X, not Y" "Is that a Godly way of...?" Using scripture is great, but scripture is meaningless and downright foolishness to someone without the Holy Spirit of God in their heart.

So that brings up that question, I guess. Does my 2.5 year old have the Holy Spirit? I come from a "Conversion" background and one that emphasises the idea that we choose Christ. I'm moving toward the idea that Christ chooses us and we then respond, but I'm still not sure how that works with young hearts that I would previously have labeled as being below the age of accountability--as in, can't be held accountable for their Sin because they are too young to understand "Sin" and the separateness from God due to sin, and our need for forgiveness, and can't "convert" because of this lack of understanding.

I do believe that apart from Christ, we can't please God, and that all our behaviors could have some scripture applied to show us how we are displeasing God. Only the Holy Spirit living in and through us allows us to please God in any way. In the same way, we understand sin and can turn from specific sinful behaviors as those behaviors are revealed to us through scripture and the Holy Spirit, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is the Grace and Forgiveness of Christ which allows us to get to this place.

I feel like this book instead teaches our children that they must try harder to meet the expectations of their parents and of God, and that they must do it under their own power, which will simply lead to failure and frustration, and a belief that we have to work to earn God's approval. I think it's this kind of message that leads so many children of Christian parents to rebellion and to turn from God and their parents. Because the God their parents taught them about is not the God of the bible, of the Gospel of Grace and Love, but a distortion that shows God to be concerned with what we do rather than our hearts, and makes him out to be a big meanie who has impossible expectations and metes out punishment when we fail to attain perfection on our own.

So, I'm left with the knowledge that I want to communicate to Eve that God is a God of forgiveness. I've known that all along. But I still don't know what that means practically speaking. I don't know how to teach her of God's goodness. I don't know how to encourage her toward good behavior while having God in the picture in any way--honestly, I don't even, at this point, want to use God in the positive reinforcement. For instance, I can tell her that it makes me and her daddy (and any number of other loved ones) very happy when she sets her cup down instead of dumping out the "excess" water when she's no longer thirsty, but I can't honestly say that makes God happy, because is God ever happy with our measly "righteousness" when the bible refers to such as filthy (bloody) rags?

Honestly, I'm really frustrated with the situation. I feel like our attempts at discipline aren't working. I feel like we're not doing much to teach Eve about God in any fashion. And I simply don't know what to do about it. And if the best our church can give us is a method for guilting our child into better behavior whilst slowly turning her heart against God, then where do we turn for a more Gracious way of going about all this?