Lately, things have been a little CRAZY. Part of it, I think, was due to all of the busyness of the holidays- we were still trying to take down all the decorations and find a place for all of the hundreds of new kids toys and just get the house back in shape. And, of course, there was the laundry. Loads & loads of it. Then Hannah started acting like such a grump, I knew something was wrong. She had her first ear infection, which wasn't so bad once we figured out what it was and started antibiotics. (Side note, if you don't already know this about me, I
hate antibiotics. But she was miserable, and with her crabbiness, the rest of us were pretty miserable too!) Then Lydia started having a terrible runny nose and congested head (and you can't give anything to little ones anymore because some moron somewhere didn't read the box and now the FDA wants to protect us all from the HORRIBLE threat of decongestants. Lead paint, they apparently can overlook, but phenylephrine, no way!) Couple all of this with a few weeks of rain, so the dogs were nice & muddy & unable to run around & get their energy out, and I was not exactly enjoying life. In fact, when Sophie jumped up one night & scratched Hannah right under her eye, we even looked into finding her a new home- in an effort to control SOMETHING in our lives.
But, the sun came out, and the ear infection cleared up. I found a trustworthy website with the old dosage amounts to tell me how to give Lydia a baby-sized dose of decongestant (shh!) and worked like a mad woman to get the house together. I felt good! Supermom was back... except for one more thing: With all of our traveling, Lydia's night waking had become a very bad habit. She moved into the room with Hannah when we got back from traveling, but in an effort to protect Hannah's sleep, we were going to get Lydia whenever she stirred. It was beginning to get exhausting. I knew we needed to let Lydia cry a little, to learn to soothe herself and stay asleep, so I pulled out the baby sleep bible in our house:
Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Dr. Marc Weissbluth, but it didn't have anything to say about room sharing. Nothing else I could find offered much help either.
I am, by nature, a problem solver. I LOVE to analyze a problem, develop my own hunches, research, and come up with a solution. Usually, thanks to lots of parenting books and the world wide web, I am able to come up with the perfect answer to our problems. On the rare occasion when I can not, I take it very personally. I realize, on some level, that there may just not BE an answer, but there is a part of me that just can't accept that! My job is to be a mom, to fix things for my girls, my family, my home, whatever. Nothing causes more frustration than when I feel like I am failing at that job. That frustration spills over, and suddenly
I am the grumpy one. Oh- and did I mention that the fix needs to work
immediately?
I'm reminded of an "expert" who appeared a few times on Weekend Update- Seth & Amy asked him what should be done for our current financial crisis, and his on reply was that "Somebody needed to
FIX IT!" How? "They need to get together, talk about it, and FIX IT!" If only things were that easy. One thing I have to be reminded of over & over is that nothing is an immediate fix with my kids- or myself for that matter. People just don't work that way. You might be able to paint a wall or change a tire and be finished with it, but people are always changing, always learning & growing & coming up with new challenges. Even when an obvious change is necessary, it takes time, consistency & discipline. I'm not just talking about sleep training my infant anymore. I'm thinking of the weight watchers diet John & I began, the bad habits in my life I've tried to break, and especially my relationship with God.
I think we fall into this "FIX IT" mindset for a lot of reasons- fast food & consumerism, laziness, fear of investing too much in something that might fail, etc. As for the church, I think it is probably because we are taught as young children that all we have to do is say a prayer & ask Jesus into our hearts and it fixes everything. It does & it doesn't. When we begin a new life with Christ, it is just that: a new life. There is still a lot of growing to be done. Even though our past is immediately forgiven, we're still the same broken people. We just look perfect because God sees us through the perfection of Jesus. So we begin a journey to look more like Him, and it, like everything else in our frail humanity, takes time & discipline.
I struggle all the time with giving up (or at least slacking off) when I don't see immediate results- in diet & exercising, in Spiritual disciplines like prayer & studying Scripture, and yes, in raising my kids. It's easy to get discouraged and think that its not worth it. But sometimes, the process is its own reward. I may not get the answer to prayer I am looking for, but I am spending time with the One who loves me more than I can ever comprehend. I may still have some weight to lose, but I conquered one more day of cravings! I may not get Lydia to sleep through the night or Hannah to happily pick up her toys, but I am teaching my children that I love them (and that I mean what I say). To use an over-quoted, yet fitting phrase: life is about the journey, not just the destination. I'm trying to remind myself that as I side-step the leftover Christmas cookies, snuggle an eight-month old at 2 AM, and steal a few quiet moments to read a passage in the book of John.
Of course, it helps when you start seeing the results too! As of today, I've lost a little over 7 lbs, and Lydia slept for 12 hours straight last night. Tomorrow, a new challenge will present itself (or it may be the same old challenges all over again) but today I am going to savor these small victories and thank God for granting me grace on this journey. I pray you can do the same.
