Focusing on Darkness

Making happiness is not easy for me.  I have dealt with depression and anxiety since I was a teenager.  I have never been medically diagnosed with either one, but I feel certain I struggle with them.  I have sought counseling and it did help, but that was the problem.  Because it helped, my therapist said I probably didn't need to keep coming, so I didn't.  But it was because I was going that I was feeling better.  That was last fall.  I have been in conflict with myself whether I should go back.  My anxiety has been worse than ever.

Every day it is a struggle to be happy.  It is a lot of work.  Is it this much work for everyone or just some people?  Are some people just naturally happy and optimistic?  For me, it's a choice to be happy and optimistic, one that I struggle making. I feel that I am naturally a pessimistic person and the first thing I see is the negative, even if I'm not trying to see it.  I have to look hard for the positive in every situation I'm in, every situation, even the little day-to-day things like getting up in the morning, paying the bills, living life.

One main concern of mine is why does the world seem so bleak to me?  It's like my worries and fears are so much bigger than anything else that they overshadow everything.  I can't seem to find anything happy to focus on because even those happy moments seem so fleeting and small that they just don't overshadow the bad.

I remember reading or hearing once a general authority talk about beautiful vistas in life.  He gave an analogy of riding along on a train through tunnels and darkness and every once in a while you emerge from the darkness to a beautiful vista.  I think I have missed many beautiful vistas because I seem to only know how to focus on the darkness.

Is it even possible to learn to focus on the light when you've only ever known about focusing on darkness?

The High Cost of Child-rearing

Yet again, we are bombarded with another news story  that tells us how expensive it is to raise a child to adulthood.  I'm guessing 150 years ago, this wasn't even really a topic of discussion.  Of course parents worried about how to provide the basic needs for their children, but I seriously doubt they were freaking out about specific costs involved.

The advertisement I heard for this news story gave these statistics:  "$910 for diapers for a year" and "$13,000 for clothes for one child for 18 years". Those were the only two stats I heard in the ad.


I don't like it when news stories like this pop up.  Giving a huge figure that accumulates over the space of nearly two decades, most often a figure that isn't correct, scares people from having kids.  It makes them think that they can't ever afford them because the numbers are often huge.  I've heard anywhere between $100,000 and half a million to raise ONE child to adulthood. 

So I decided to do a little figuring of my own.  The news said $910 for diapers for one year.  I buy diapers at Costco, often using a coupon, so generally I spend about $35-$45 on a box of 175+ diapers (depending on size and brand of the diapers how many are in the box).  In the first year, I tend to buy about one of those boxes per month.  Given an average of about $40/box, I spend about $480 for diapers in the first year.  During the next two years, as they eat more solid food and have to eliminate less, they go through less diapers.  I tend to buy a box only once every two months, sometimes stretching into a third month.  That ends up amounting to between $160-$240/year for diapers.  Of course, in our family, we've often had more than one in diapers at once, but depending on the age and size of kid, generally, we still are able to get by in the second and third years with only buying 1 box a month, which is still only $480/year.  And if you do cloth diapers, which I've always felt I should but never been brave enough to try, you'd spend several hundred up front and then you'd re-use the same diapers for all your kids.

Clothes.  I don't know about you, but I don't see any point in spending full retail price to buy clothes that they will outgrow in two to three months.  I tend to buy most of my kids' clothes secondhand or at hugely discounted end-of-season clearance prices.  For one child, if I spend about $50-$100 twice a year on clothes to fit them and that aren't rags for each new season as they grow, that ends up being $3600 over the span of 18 years for the higher prices.  This does not double or triple with more kids because if you have kids of the same gender, anything not completely worn out can be passed down and worn again.  No need to be wasteful in a world that is always talking about "going green", right?

The news story also mentions housing.  For housing, you'd be living somewhere regardless of whether or not you had kids.  Many couples without children and single people live in a house close the size we have with five kids.  Our house is 1950 square feet with four bedrooms and two-and-a half bathrooms.  It's plenty of space to have five growing children.  Our daughter has her own room and so does our baby.  Our three older boys share a room.  There is so much space in their room that we could probably turn it into two smaller rooms if we needed to, and if we stay put, we just might.  I think a lot of people believe that each child has to have their own room.  That is simply not true.

The cost of food is also mentioned.  I'd like to explain that the cost of food doesn't multiply with each child.  It's not that hard to make a four-person meal into a six-person meal with a little manipulating.  Add an extra piece of chicken or some extra pasta, like in old times when they'd add more water to the soup.  I can make a three pound pot roast that I serve on Sunday last for two or three more meals with savvy planning and cooking.  So for four meals in one week for seven people, I will often only pay about $15 ($8 for the meat and $7 for the extra ingredients for all the meals).  All it takes is good budgeting skills and meal planning skills and taking the time to learn how to prepare meals from scratch (which taste better, cost less and are usually more healthy anyway). 

Raising a child to adulthood isn't as expensive as the news media wants you to think it is.  Sometimes I feel like this is media propaganda to convince people to limit family size.  All I know is that we live well on not a very large income with me staying at home even.  Our kids are even spoiled in a lot of ways where we give them too much and I feel like we need to cut back even more.  A friend of mine suggested I write a book about this--how to raise a family and not spend a fortune doing it--and I just might!

To Wanda?

You arrive at the public library with all five kids in the car with you.  You have to turn in books and figure that you might as well check some out, so you need to park to go inside.  The public library is next door to an elementary school.  Today is Saturday and it's soccer game day, and there are about four soccer games happening on the elementary school field.  The parking lot between the library and the school is full.  You circle around once and finally find a spot.  Actually, it's two open spots, right next to each other, only a few rows from the library.  You go to pull in only to have a car pull into a spot right before you can.  No biggie, right?  There were two spots.  But then, you notice that the person has parked in such a crooked fashion that about 1/3 of their car is hanging into the empty parking spot, a considerable amount over the line dividing the spaces.  What do you do?

Here is what I did.  As the woman got out of her car, I rolled down my window and said, "Excuse me.  I don't mean to be rude or anything, but that is the only spot near the library.  You've pulled your car in over the line so I can't possibly fit my van in the space next to you.  Would you mind just straightening up so I can park there, please?"

I felt like I was polite.  I felt like what I was asking her to do wasn't unreasonable.  When I park, I'm always careful to make sure my car is not hanging into another spot.  Sometimes I get a little close to the line, but if I'm over the line, I always straighten up.  Not necessarily because I'm trying to be this super-polite person, but mostly because it really, really irks me when I am in a FULL parking lot and the one and only empty space is half taken up by the person the next space over who didn't take the extra 20 seconds to straighten up their vehicle.  Kind of a "Golden Rule" thing--treat others as you want to be treated.

The lady did get back in her car and straighten up, but all the time she was muttering and looking very cross and angry at me for even thinking to ask such an insane thing of her.  So I thought about what I would do if the tables were turned and it was someone else asking me to move my car.

If they yelled at me or were rude, I'd probably be a little ticked off.  But I was as polite as I could be, asking nicely if she could straighten up after presenting the problem and even saying "excuse me" and "please".  And I thanked her afterward, even though she looked like she wanted to strangle me.  I think, I hope, that if someone asked me kindly to move my car, I would move it and be apologetic to them for being in the way in the first place.

What do you think?  Was I entirely in the wrong?  Or is it okay to politely ask strangers to do such things?

Book Review: Free-Range Kids

Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry by Lenore Skenazy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Since I am really on board with Lenore Skenazy's Free-Range Kid movement, I thought I would be giving this book five stars. I ended up shorting it a star because there were some parts of her whole concept that I don't agree with.

She set her book up like a set of commandments--the Ten Free-Range Commandments but added four more to them, so there are fourteen commandments. Then she has a section that is about common parental fears A-Z and whether or not they are grounded in reality, or what the statistical probability of the fear happening to your child. I felt it was a very organized approach to the concept and a very easy read.

I loved Commandment Four: Boycott Baby Knee Pads (and the rest of the kiddie safety-industrial complex). She talks about a lot of safety items that are marketed to parents that are just not needed, like baby knee pads for when babies crawl and helmets for when they first start walking. She also talks about "educational toys", you know, the Baby Einstein product line and the LeapFrog product line. I wholeheartedly agree with her that it's only become this competition to raise the smartest baby in recent years and that somehow people think that the things parents did to raise babies before isn't going to make them smart enough so now they have to invest in all these gadgets to make them smarter. In reality, it's the social interaction between them and their caregivers (playing with them, talking with them, working with them alongside, singing to them, reading to them) that makes all the difference and these gadgets aren't really going to change that.

I also loved how in Commandment Five: Don't Think Like a Lawyer, she gives a list of wacky warning labels that are on products now thanks to the onslaught of ridiculous lawsuits: "Remove child before folding" on a baby stroller; "This product moves when used" on a scooter; "Never iron clothes while being worn" on an iron; "Do not use on roof" on a snowblower; and on a box of birthday candles "Do not use soft wax as ear plugs or for any other function that involves insertion into a body cavity."

In Commandment Six: Ignore the Blamers, she points out that only a few states actually have laws stating an age that is appropriate to leave a child home alone for a short period of time, which I found interesting since numerous parenting boards people are always posting that there are laws that don't allow you to leave, say, an 8-year-old home alone for an hour.

In Commandment 7, she dispels the myths surrounding Halloween candy, that there have been no reported incidents ever where children were poisoned by Halloween candy.

I really enjoyed Commandment 8 where she talks about what children were doing throughout history at different ages, which really puts into perspective how over-protective parents have become. Not just of not letting kids play outside unattended but also not allowing them to do things like bake a cake when they're nine or mow the lawn when they're ten.

The part that forced me to give this book four stars instead of five was Commandments Eleven and Twelve. In Commandment Eleven: Relax, she talks about how so much of how kids turn out (intelligence-wise, interests, etc.) is due to nature, not nurture. But she made it sound like parents could sit back and do nothing and their kids would turn out the same as if the parents were always doing something for them. I disagree. I think parents are there for a reason, for guidance, to teach between right and wrong, to help them learn from their mistakes and recognize learning moments. I don't really think she was trying to say that parents aren't needed, but that's how she came off in that chapter. In Commandment Twelve: Fail! the whole point was to let kids learn from their failures. I am all on board with that, but she made it sound like you couldn't ever push them to succeed or set high expectations for them because you'd end up doing the work so they wouldn't ever fail. I don't think it's bad to have expectations and encourage kids to succeed and even give them guidance on how to succeed but then let them do the work.

I totally agreed with everything she said about the importance of creative play both outside and inside and how standardized tests and media frenzy over child abductions and the electronic equipment that has taken place of playing outside have contributed to the obesity epidemic and the whole education problem in America. And she even talks about how so many toys these days take the creativity out of play, like the talking, dancing Elmo where the kid just pushes a button and watches Elmo have all the fun.

I enjoyed this book. It was easy to read, funny, and eye-opening. I already was a "Free-Range Parent" but I recognized some of the baby steps I have already taken in the last couple of years to become one. I would like to see more of a movement back to this type of child-rearing just so my kids aren't the only ones allowed to ride their bikes around the neighborhood or walk to school, wherever we end up. Hopefully this catches on and people start to relax a little about everything and realize that kids are smart and capable.

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Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones, But Words Will Never Hurt Me...

Or will they?

One of the chapters I read in the book Loving the Little Years by Rachel Jankovic talked about using good words and teaching your children to use good words.

In the beginning, that's what we were doing.  We were more careful about keeping our language clean and using positive, uplifting words. But lately, I feel, we've been using more harsh words.  We get frustrated and exasperated with our kids and we say things like "That's stupid!" or "Shut up!" when our anger is elevating.  The kids have picked up on this and have started saying these unkind words to each other.

Because of our Family Declaration, I felt it was time to talk about cleaning up our language around here.  So on Monday night, I gave a little *FHE lesson on that very subject.  Then it was funny that the very next day, Mormon Mommy Blogs posted a post about how it's silly that people get offended by words like "stupid".  But if you think about it, when is stupid ever used in a positive, uplifting way?  When is it ever used not to offend?  Even if all you're doing is saying how something looks stupid or seems stupid or was stupid, not referring to a person, it's still said with a negative connotation.  On the flip side, there was a post yesterday on Raising Homemakers about the overuse of the word "no" and how to substitute other words and phrases for the word "no" to get across what you really want to say.  It was a great, uplifting post.

When I taught this lesson, I grabbed the dry erase board and a marker.  I drew a line down the middle of the board and wrote a title on each side of the line:  Mean, Hurtful Words and Nice, Uplifting Words.  Then I asked the kids what words they wanted to write up on the board.

Interestingly enough, for all those people who don't think "stupid" is offensive enough to take out of their vocabulary, that was the first word they listed under Mean, Hurtful Words.  They went on to list crybaby, retarded, dumb, and idiot.  Then they listed name-calling as a category under that section and insults.  Last they listed swear words and put-downs.

Under Nice, Uplifting Words, they listed super, fantastic, I love you, really nice, and saying sorry nicely.  We made a poster that says:  If you can't think of anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.  We coined the phrase that way instead of the typical "If you can't say something nice...."  because we decided that our thoughts lead to our words, so we need to focus on the thoughts first.

I feel the activity really resonated with them.  I even let the word "stupid" slip out yesterday and they all called me up on it.  I think it's really going to help the spiritual atmosphere of our home by focusing on speaking kind, uplifting words.

*FHE means Family Home Evening, something we members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints try to do once a week, usually on Monday nights, to teach our children the Gospel and spend quality family time together

Music and Me

A few years ago, my ward choir director asked me if I would sing a solo at a stake relief society meeting.

Yep, me, sing a solo.

She was under the impression that since I went to ward choir and knew quite a bit about music (as in, I could read music and understood the terminology) I could actually sing.

Fortunately, I was able to snag up a partner and we sang a duet, which was a much better proposition than me singing a solo.

It's interesting, though.  I've often been tagged in wards as a music person.  I've always been interested in music theory and history and so I paid attention in choir and in orchestra and learned about phrasing and dynamics and actually committed those things to memory.  I bet some of the kids I sang in the high school choir with don't remember some of that stuff.  But I do because I just love music.

What's funny is that I'm really NOT a musician.  I do a pretty good job at faking it, though.

I started out teaching myself how to play the piano.  I don't remember ever NOT knowing how to play it or to read music.  I think that once I could read, around the age of four, I just couldn't stop reading and one of the books I ran across was a beginning piano book.  So I took the book to the piano, read it and applied what it was saying to the piano in front of me and it worked!  I was able to play notes, then songs.

When I was in the third grade, my parents put me in piano lessons. I took lessons for about nine or ten months. In the fourth grade, I started to play the violin, due to our school's beginning music programs in fourth grade and my parents' access to a free violin.  I even got to take private lessons for the violin starting in seventh grade until I quit orchestra in the ninth grade.

In the ninth grade, I decided to join the choir.  I really didn't know anything about singing, but I knew how to read music and I knew that the majority of cute boys in school were in the choir.  I tried out for the mixed chorale but to my utter sorrow, I was placed in the all-girl choir.  Read music I could, but singing, I'm not sure I ever could sing.  I still try to sing to this day, but I've never even heard myself sing (and I avoid the idea of that like the plague) so as far as I can tell, I have a "choir" voice and not a very good one.  Which is why I always sang second soprano and never made any parts I tried out for.

In tenth grade, the only music I did was take piano lessons for about four months.  Junior year, I joined choir again and stayed in choir through high school.  I did University Chorale at BYU (no auditions).  I took piano lessons for one semester at BYU.  I even took guitar lessons one semester.  I sang in various ward choirs.  In my singles ward after college while I was teaching school, I was asked to be the ward choir director, which was an epic failure.  I took violin lessons again from January 2010 to December 2010 and participated in a community orchestra. 

Even now, people still think that I'm a "music person".  I understand music.  I love listening to music by classic composers and have introduced that love to my kids.  I've even taught the older ones basic piano lessons.

Hopefully nobody will ever ask me again to sing a solo in church.  Let's leave that to people who actually have a voice!  In the meantime, I might join a ward choir again just for the fun of it and I'll always love music.

Two Things On My Mind

The last couple of days I've seen two different topics popping up on blogs and new sites:  reviews of Hunger Games (both the book and movie) and the topic of religion and politics.

I have been asked by many friends, acquaintances, and even family members if I've read that series of books.  They know I'm a reader and probably figured since they liked it, I would like it too.  After reading a brief synopsis of the books after they came out and reviews by other readers, I decided against reading the books.  Since I haven't read the books, I really have no interest in seeing the movie either.  Mostly, I'm just not interested in reading books where the setting is a dystopian society.  I really can't stand books or movies that are about the end of the world, or post-apocalyptic societies or dystopian societies.  I find them, as a whole, to be disturbing.  I don't like coming away feeling uneasy, which is how I'm left feeling after viewing or reading such a work.

Then I stumbled onto some blogs that railed on Hunger Games as being something not worthy of reading or watching, as Latter-day Saints.  The 13th Article of Faith states that "if there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things."  These bloggers were talking about how Hunger Games, both the books and the movie, did not fall into this classification.  Not having read the books, I couldn't say for sure whether they did or didn't, but reading what content was in the books, I could see how people would make those judgments.  Then people were commenting that Harry Potter was equally dark and violent and equating that to something that is not worthy for us to read or view.  But then that brings to question most entertainment generally.  I felt Harry Potter contained pretty strong Christian symbolism and the classic literary theme of good versus evil as well as following some of the classic archetypal characters you find in good literature.  Having not read Hunger Games, I can't say whether Suzanne Collins utilized those classic literary tools in her writing or not.

I still have no desire to read the series or see the movie.  I am just not interested in plots that take place in such a dismal setting. 

With politics and religion, many bloggers have been harsh on LDS people for supporting a certain candidate.  They feel that those of us who support him do because he is Mormon.  I feel that upstanding moral character is of great importance in a strong leader.  Those who say that moral character isn't important are mistaken, in my opinion.  A leader's way of thinking is formed by his moral grounding (or lack thereof) and often that relays back to the tenets of his faith.  If that person is truly living, as best as they can, by those beliefs, they often possess stronger moral character than someone who picks and chooses which tenets of their faith to live by and only live by the ones they like.  Most religions teach that sex should only be practiced within the bonds of marriage, that how we treat others is of great importance, that there is sanctity in the creation of life, that there is a great Creator or Supreme Being who is over all.  There are certain leaders we've seen in the last several years who profess to follow a faith but then they do not stay true to the tenets of that faith.  That, to me, shows a lack of moral character.  If a man (or woman) cannot hold true to the beliefs they claim drive them, what else are they deceitful about?  That is why I believe that what shapes a person is of vital importance to understand them.  If they claim to be Christian but have no issues with things like gay marriage or abortion or living with a partner outside of marriage, and so forth, I don't believe that they understand what their religion teaches, or they choose not to follow all of their religion.  If they are like that with something so influential of character as their religious roots, how will they be in other areas of their life?  Where is their integrity?

So whether or not I vote for a candidate because he's Mormon shouldn't matter.  The fact is that his Mormon faith shaped him to be a man of upstanding moral character, at least compared with many of his opponents (not all--some were equally moral, just with different parts of their platforms I didn't feel were sound).  If a man's Muslim faith, or Jewish faith, or Evangelical Christian faith did the same and he remained a person of integrity, I think I would feel the same way.

Integrity, moral character, those are things I look for in a good leader.  Our current president I feel is lacking greatly in those qualities.  He might be a fine orator and even a well-intentioned person, but he lacks qualities of character I think are necessary to be a good leader.