In light of the recent news, in which a mother at a Flint restaurant was asked to nurse her baby in the bathroom, I am revisiting some older posts I wrote about breastfeeding.

I don’t think there is a place where I would not breast feed my baby if he was screaming in hunger.

I nurse in stores, restaurants, and in church.  I nurse sitting, standing and while walking.  I’m not in-your-face! about it, but I’m not about to go hide in the bathroom stall either.  I am discreet, but I’m not ashamed.

Someone once made the comment that thirteen-year-old boys seeing a breastfeeding woman would be like “oooohhh!” *googly eyes*

What?  Seriously?  I guess I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a young male seeing covered breasts portrayed in a manner besides that of the cleavage-baring, sex-kitten manner that is so prevalent.

Now, with all this being said, you may get the mistaken impression that I ridicule heterosexual males and their fascination with breasts.

You would be wrong.

Breasts are for feeding babies.

Breasts are also for pleasing husbands.

As much as I detest the over-sexualization of breasts (and women in general) in our culture, I am not against viewing breasts as sexual.  They are, and always have been.  That is not the fault of lusty men, it is the the way we’re designed.  The female form was made to entice and satisfy our husbands.

So even though I will defend the naturalness of mothers nursing their babies anywhere they happen to be,  I also recognize that breasts are, by nature, sexual and will keep my assets covered.

I have a medicine chest, so to speak, that I carry everywhere with me, ready to nourish my baby.

And I have a treasure chest, ready to delight my husband.

How do I handle my areas of weakness?

Do I have a habit of explaining any lack on my part through justification?

• Okay, so X may be true, but it’s totally natural/understandable/expected because of Y.
• That’s just my personality.  If you can’t accept me for who I am, that’s your problem.
• That’s not my gifting.

Do I have a habit of explaining any lack on my part through blame-shifting?

• Yeah, X is true, but it’s because my parents/teacher/spouse did/didn’t/said Y.  You should actually feel sorry for me.  I’m the victim here.
• Hey, I was just responding to your behavior.  It’s your own fault.  How did you expect me to act?
• Nobody helps me.  Nobody pays attention.
  

Do I have a habit of explaining any lack on my part through denial?

• I don’t know what you’re talking about.
• How dare you judge me.
• So you think you’re perfect?

(These are written in no particular order. So #1 is no more important than #56. If a product is mentioned, I am not getting compensated from some company to review or rave about their product. I’m just a mom sharing, well, things I wish I would’ve known about a long time ago.)

TIWIWKAALTA #8  ~ Avoiding food with dye is very important to the health and well-being of my children.

People often mention the effects that sugar has on children.  Most notice that some children become hyper and difficult to manage after eating a sugary treat.  But, in my experience, the problems probably arise from the dye in that food, as much if not more than the sugar.

I remember the first time the relation between food dyes and hyperactivity clicked in my mom brain.

It was Angel Imp’s birthday, my fourth child.  I don’t remember the exact age she was, but it was quite young since she chose a Blue’s Clue’s cake from the grocery store bakery.  Usually, I make a homemade cake with better ingredients, like honey or  unrefined cane sugar, but I remember life being busy and full and I thought, “well, it won’t hurt just this once.”

This particular daughter was known to occasionally have crazy periods where it seemed she had no control over her own body.  I could only describe it as energy times 100, as she practically bounced off the ceiling.  Shortly after we cleared up the cake and ice cream, it began.  My Angel Imp turned into Monster Girl.

Not again! I thought, dreading the approaching bedtime hour, where I knew she would continue her tornado-like state until she collapsed with exhaustion.

The next day, I happened to notice that her bowel movements were blue.  As in bright, Blues-Clues blue.  Ew, I frowned.  That stuff can’t be good for little bodies. Then the light came on.

I watched her closely after that, and the connection between food dye and her behavior became undeniable.  I began reading ingredient labels even more carefully and discovered that practically everything has dye in it.  Pickles, purchased baked goods and dough, and cereals all had to go.  Some colors affect her more than others, with blue and red being the worst.

Now, I see children acting like orangutans on crack and I realize it’s no wonder.  They likely just had a snack of packaged cookies with a handful of “fruit” snacks, all washed down with a glass of Kool-Aid.  Ack.

I think of the kids labeled as ADD, ADHD, or just “troubled” and I wonder how many had Lucky Charms for breakfast.  Even the roll in their school lunch probably has dye in it.  Their strawberry milk certainly does.

It is interesting to note that food dyes did not seem to have any significant effect on my 3 older children, at least not enough that I noticed it.  So it’s not like dye has this effect on every child.  (Which is why the FDA still allows dyes in food; Any study performed that does show a link also has a number of children who are not affected.  Just enough to ignore the facts, I guess.)

But, knowing how dye can affect someone so visibly, do I really want to ignore the possibility of it causing currently undetected consequences in the health of my other children?

1997 Graduate Student Research Project conducted at the University of South Florida linking artificial food additives to ADD.

Diet and behavior in children. Center for Science in the Public Interest

2007 study linking hyperactivity and food coloring.  Psychiatry Online

The Truth about Food Dyes.  CBS news

Another mom’s personal story regarding food in Gradual Change.

All right, I could post links all day.  Just Google, “food dye effects on children”.  You’ll have lots to read.

My awesome husband periodically writes here for the men, and especially for all the wanna-be-men little boys.

You may want to read the first four ways to honor your wife.

If you missed the previous posts, you can find them at Introduction and Part 2 What is a real man?

He’ll take it from here…

photo at www.credos.us/zoofythejinx

5. Honor her financially.

Provide for your family. Take this responsibility men, it’s yours, NOT hers. Sure, your wife may indeed contribute financially as mine does, but she needs to know that you bear the weight of providing financially for the family. I am sure you can think of all sorts of good reasons why this should be a “shared responsibility” but this is most likely just the little boy in you thinking of a way out of your responsibility. So, man up. I find that once men feel the weight of this responsibility it makes them incredibly focused, diligent, and creative, which makes them great providers. It also makes their wife’s level of respect shoot thru the roof, who then feel honored, secure and cared for.

6. Honor her practically.

Consider her needs and serve her. If you are like me, it’s easy to overlook the little things, the practical things. Cleaning up around the house (some of us don’t even clean up after ourselves), dishes, repairs around the house, giving her time away from the kids… you get the idea. Pretty much anything that will lighten her load. It is amazing how the little things make a big difference, but how easily we can miss these little opportunities to serve and honor our wives. Selfishness and lack of care and concern are the reason we fail to honor our wives practically, but these are no excuse, they are faults.

7. Honor her parentally.

Lead, train and be involved and engaged with the children. It may be easy to think that child training and development is the domain of our wives, school teachers and child care providers. Sorry guys, this is our responsibility too. The cool thing is that properly trained and disciplined, children are an absolute joy to be around. If your children are not a joy to be around, not only are you not training them properly, you are probably not honoring your wife parentally.

8. Honor her spiritually.

You initiate and lead prayer, Bible, conversation, church involvement and attendance. Men, even if your wife is more “spiritual” than you, it doesn’t mean that you are not once again responsible to lead in this area of your life. Be a leader in this area of life; it will honor and provide security to her to know that while you may be imperfect and perhaps even immature or inarticulate when it come to matters of faith, you have concern for hers and the families spiritual well being.

You may have noticed that the common denominator here takes us back to the original and important idea for us men: Take Responsibility. This is essence of true masculinity.

Several times a month, I consider quitting the whole blog writing thing.

There’s a lot I don’t like about it.  I mean, posting one’s thoughts for everyone to see just seems kind of a self-important thing to do.  Granted, it’s not like I’m making anyone read it, but just the act of putting it out there seems to assume I think I have something worthwhile to say that others want to read.

Oh, hey, look at what I have to say!  I’ve even taken the time to put it in black and white because I’ve made the presumptuous decision that it matters to you!  Yay, me!

That’s weird.

And then there’s the whole mess that comes along with making one’s thoughts public.  It’s inviting criticism.  If you hold something up for others to scrutinize, prepare to be hit with a few arrows.  It’s all part and parcel.  Very few people can disagree respectfully.  Heck, they usually can’t even logically participate in thoughtful discussion.  Thankfully, that hasn’t happened openly on the blog itself.  I’ve seen other blogs completely held hostage by a troll.  *shudder*

But the hardest part about blogging is how it personally affects me.  Oh, it’d be no big deal if I always kept my writing to easy things like decorating or a list of my day’s events, or even only about funny things my kids said.  If I were blogging for me, that would be the way I’d do it.  But, no.  I often write about relationships and tender mothering and passionate marriage.  I share my failures and what I’ve learned through them.  I encourage women in ideas and standards that are vastly different than what the culture says.

What I’ve found to be true is this.

Simply by aspiring to greater blessing as a woman in all that I am and do, and by inviting other women to do the same, I find that those areas in which I write about become my biggest struggles.

I’m not one of those people who see a devil around every corner.  At the same time, I cannot deny the fact that those who openly express a viewpoint are held to a higher standard than those who sit and say nothing.  And call it spiritual warfare, fate, Murphy’s Law, or just coincidence, but usually anytime one takes a stand on something, their foundation will be tried.  It’s like a whispered sneer in your ear, “Oh, you think you had this figured out, didja? We shall see!  Does it hurt here?  How about here?”

It’s like I shared yesterday; In case you haven’t noticed, I am passionate about honestly relating the way I believe love and marriage really works.  Not because I think I’m an expert, because I’m not.  Most days I feel like I am grasping and clawing just to remain someone who has any right at all to claim to be in a happy marriage.

And, call me paranoid, but I swear that there are those who are just looking for cracks in our marriage and even see it as their duty to test the strength of it by any means they deem necessary.

Yet, I cannot stop writing.  I have taken time off here and there, to no avail.  The words eventually push up through my chest and pour out of my fingers, refusing to be sentenced to a life of mulling around in my brain.  I used to be content with scrawling them out in paper notebooks, and I consider often the wisdom in returning to that practice.  After all, if I have to write, why not just have it be for me, and no one else?

And then, one of you tells me how much you appreciate the blog, or sends an encouraging note to me expressing your thankfulness of something I’ve written.  Even when I took that several month break a little while ago, so many of you conveyed your disappointment that I had stopped blogging.  I was blessed by those of you who communicated the dismay you’d experience if I chose to never continue.

But, as much as I love my readers, I don’t exactly blog for you, either.  Because then I’d have to stick to subjects you want to read about and what good would that be?  You can read garbage about how cool you are and how you can fly on the wings of eagles just about anywhere.  Not here.

The encouragement is important simply because it’s a tangible confirmation of what, deep down, I already know.

Compelled, called, intended… whatever.  I’m just supposed to be blogging.

I recently read an article in the Wall Street Journal that discussed what factor age plays in marriage.  It used numbers from a study conducted in 2002, which showed a very high divorce rate among those who married under age 18, with the percentage decreasing as age increased.

48% of people who enter marriage when under age 18 will divorce

40% of 18- and 19-year-olds will divorce

29% of those who get married at age 20 to 24 will divorce

24% of the 25-and-older will divorce

By looking at these numbers alone, one would assume that it is better to wait to marry.

This just didn’t jive with what the media has reported, however.  People are putting marriage off later and later, but supposedly the divorce rate is climbing as well.  How many times have I heard something along the lines of, “Over half of marriages are ending in divorce”?

What I found was simply shocking.  Ahem.

It isn’t so much the age we get married that affects marital success . It’s why.

The 18 and under crowd mainly married due to unexpected pregnancy.  They were usually teens still in high school.  Not a good recipe for a happy marriage.

I have a hunch that those who marry between 18 and 19 are fresh out of high school, with heads full over over-idealized romanticism.  Life hits hard and fast and the first inclination is to think, “I made a mistake” especially when everyone probably told them they were marrying too young anyways.  Even if they wait several more years till divorcing, many still fall back on the age excuse, saying things like they never got to be their own person, or find out who they were.

Those who wait until their later twenties still have a relatively high divorce rate.  The largest reason I could find was financial.  For most of these couples, both are entering the marriage with large college debts looming over their heads.  Most couples are no longer satisfied with frugal apartments and lifestyles, so they rush right into buying a new home with new furniture and all the trimmings.  Before they know it, they are over their heads in bills, a mortgage and credit card debt, all while still whittling away at the college debt.

So, is it better to wait?  As I look at the entire U.S. population as a whole, this is what I see.  Most of the females who put off marriage till later do so out of a sense of “should”.  They should get a degree, they should get a good job, they should be able to take care of themselves.  And they usually do all those things, and well.  All the while, they are keeping their eye out for husband material.

The guys, on the other hand, see it as an opportunity to extend adolescence.  They might go to college, and they might finish.  They might get a job, but they probably won’t.  If they do get a job, they whine about working 40 hours.  They tend to spend their money on junk and complain as much as possible about the economy.  What they really want is a girlfriend to pay the bills and sex with no strings.

Then there are the statistics that say Christian couples have an even higher divorce rate than the general population.  I dug a little deeper and while it still seems unclear due to all the back and forth studies of varying institutions, there are some obvious lessons to be learned from this.

First, I’m going to go out on a limb here and state that most people who claim to follow Christ have no idea what the Bible actually says about marriage, love, sex and family.  Oh, they have a lot of ideas and prejudices and habits… but not a lot of knowledge.

Secondly, when searching for the percentage of American who claim to be Christians, I found numbers ranging from 78-85%.  And yet, I know that the number of people who actually live as Christ followers is no where near that number.  I think perhaps 78-85% is how many people in America are religious (pay tithes, go to a church regularly, or go to church twice a year, etc) but have no real evidence of a transformed life.

Interestingly, the divorce rate drops to between 1-8% for Christian couples who pray together. Now, prayer is not the magic bullet, just as moving to a Northeast state like Connecticut or Massachusetts isn’t going to necessarily help even though they have the lowest divorce rates.  I would propose that husbands and wives who pray together tend to hold high respect for marriage, esteem each other as bearers of God’s image, and have a better understanding of what makes marriage work according to the principles of the one who created it (God).

Over and over, I read that the divorce rate rises significantly if a couple lives together before marriage.   Despite popular belief, cohabitation is a terrible testing ground to get to know one another and see if you’re compatible.   A couple studies stated that it is the cohabitation itself that leads to an increased risk of divorce, over any other factor.  I couldn’t really find anything on why couples who shack up eventually decide to marry.

As high as divorce rates are for marriages, they soar for second and third marriages.  Most of the numbers I found were around 60% of second marriages failing, and 73% of third marriages.

So.

It’s a lot of numbers and studies and this and that.  The kind of stuff you have to take with a grain of salt because there are always exceptions.  And yet, it can tell us so much about how worldview and lifestyle affects the relationships in our life.

I have deep compassion for those who have suffered divorce and I don’t mean to reduce you to a number or statistic.  In case you haven’t noticed, I am passionate about honestly relating the way I believe love and marriage really works.  Not because I think I’m an expert, because I’m not.  Most days I feel like I am grasping and clawing just to remain someone who has any right at all to claim to be in a happy marriage.

See, these scribblings I post regarding such unfathomable things as love do not come from ideas and beliefs of mine.  Believe me, if it were up to me I would make it a heck of a lot easier.  It would involve stuff like lots of dark chocolate and sparkly unicorns, not serving and living unselfishly.

One thing I do know, though.  There is one who created marriage and knows how it works.  He points to his word when I ask how I am to live.  And even if everything came crashing down, despite all my attempts at following his word, he would still be unshaken.  His promises would still remain true.

A while ago, someone sent me two questions.

1. How do you know if someone is “the one”?
2. What if you fall out of love?

Let me start by respectfully saying… These questions are ridiculous.

You know that little saying, “There are no stupid questions”?  Well, it’s a lie.  There are, and these are.

Now, let’s answer them.

This whole idea about there being just one person for each of us is very romantic…. and very nonsensical.  I mean, think about it for just one second.

I about died laughing one time when Matt Chandler was talking about this.  He pointed out that if just one person hundreds of years ago happened to marry the wrong person, then it meant that another person who was supposed to marry that one marries the wrong person as well, and then both of their “ones” married wrong people and on and on.  A domino effect of everyone marrying the wrong people.  By now, you could pretty much bet we’re all marrying the wrong person, because some dodo screwed it all up for everyone.

You see the problem?

And then to view love as something you just fall in and out of… sounds kind of dangerous.  Like catching the flu bug.

So let me get this straight.  A person can just be going along, minding their own business when wham they plummet into love, like dropping through an open manhole cover on the street.  And then years later they could be going in to get their taxes done and bam they tumble again… but oh dear, its with someone different now and they just can’t help it and oops, sorry, time to move on, I guess I made a mistake the first time I dove head over heels.  My bad.

I write about love a lot (see the “real love”, “marriage” and “love” Categories in the right sidebar) mainly because I think our culture has such screwed up ideas of what love is.  You don’t even have to know facts like over half of our marriages end in divorce.  You just have to watch one romantic film.

How about the earth shattering idea that you know someone is the one for you by looking at their worldview, spirituality/religion, values, habits, and future plans/goals to see if they line up with yours?  Notice how they treat others, how willing they are to serve, how they deal with conflict, how they respond to criticism, if they can apologize and take responsibility, and how they view children.  Can you deal with the facts of their past, like former relationships, possible debt, or instant step-children?  Does this person respect you?  Do you respect them?  Is this a person you enjoy being with?  More than anyone else?

And, if after marrying someone because you love them, you ever think you are falling out of love, I hope and pray someone cares enough about you to slap you across the face.

I’ll say it again.  Love is a choice. It is an action, something you make a decision to do and then follow through on.  It is doing the passionate thing, yes, and often the exciting thing.  It’s also doing the hard thing, and the right thing.

And you know what?  It ends up being a wonderful thing, and even better than you imagined.

Sometimes, Baby Daddy gets in a funk.

(I know!  Weird, right?  He’s so awesome, sometimes I forget he’s human.)

A couple things happen when he’s in a funk.  Physical affection drops reeeeeally low and his conversation basically dwindles to one word grunts.

(But this post isn’t about him.  It’s about me.  It’s always about me, me, me.)

I’m a very spoiled wife who is very accustomed to lots of hand holding, squeezes, and sloppy kisses, as well as endless compliments, long conversations and a million I-love-you’s every day.  So when I don’t receive my daily quota, things start to get a little weird around here.

Oh, at first it’s okay.  I realize he’s probably just tired, or stressed about something with work, or thinking about something in particular.  I settle in to patiently wait till he’s ready to talk or shrug it off, which usually happens relatively soon.

Every once in a while, though, the funk drags on.

When I feel even a little rejection from anyone, I withdraw.   This is even more true in regards to those I love the most, and most particularly my husband.  Any distance between us stings a bit too much, and I back away.  Soon, my little pulling back leads to cold remoteness in the name of self-protection, as a little niggle of doubt in the quiet corners of my heart becomes a silent scream.

The problem is, withdrawal is not a good defense against hurt.  It’s not as if the barriers I put up actually prevent me from hurting more.  They also end up escalating the situation because in building up barricades, I end up hurting him in return.

After the tears have flowed, the I’m-sorry’s whispered, and his arms are around me again, I always wish I had gone about things differently.  I wish I had continued to trust that he absolutely still loved me even when I didn’t feel it.  I wish that I had continued to act in love, even though he didn’t “deserve” it.  I wish I hadn’t responded so selfishly.  I wish I hadn’t allowed emotions to dictate reality.

Relationships are messy that way, especially the really good ones.

I guess the good thing about that is it teaches me much about another lover, the Lover of my Soul.  When unexpected hardships come, things that aren’t fair, or aren’t right, I want to stomp my foot and yell at God, “Don’t you care?!  Aren’t you listening?  Don’t you love me?  Do you even hear me?!”

His love and his promises are written out in black and white for me to read over and over, whenever I want. How ridiculous it must seem to him when I question his devotion, when he bears the evidence on his hands.

It’s not really about not having an easy, problem-free life.

It’s about faith in the love that carries me through them.

If you knew me several years ago, you’d remember me as a kombucha brewing, kefir guzzling, goat milkin’, wheat grindin’, as-granola-as-they-come hippie chick.

I still am, but much to my chagrin it is to a far lesser degree.

I have several things to blame for this.

(It’s not my fault, after all.  Tsk.)

First, moving to a different home is hard on my scobys and living grains, as they tend to be forgotten in the hoopla and chaos.  If they do survive the cooler ride, settling into a new place still upsets my routine of making batches with them. If things like that aren’t used occasionally, they tend to die.  So suffice it to say, between two moves and a baby being born… yeah.

Then there’s the hard to accept fact that our raw cow’s milk supply ended.  So that means no homemade yogurt or kefir.  Yeah, I still get raw goat milk, but I just don’t like to make cultured foods with that.   Speaking of, I have to admit that I don’t even drink the raw goat milk anymore.  There.  I said it.  Oh, my kids and hubby inhale it still.  But, me…?  I don’t know if it’s just that my taste buds changed with this last pregnancy and never went back, or if it’s because the herd is no longer 100% LaMancha (they are known for their mild milk) but… Ew.

Probably the biggest factor is our ever widening circle of friends and people we hang with.  No longer are the majority of them health freaks just like me.  For most of my friends, their idea of a balanced diet is to have something from the 4 standard food groups every meal; Dye, HFCS, MSG, and partially-hydrogenates.   (If you don’t know what those are, consider yourself an example of what I’m talking about, since you likely eat them all the time.)  So, when we get together (which is often) I tend to just eat what they are having or have brought, as not to step on any toes.  Unfortunately, I see some of that sliding into the rest of the week.

There’s another side effect to eating and preparing food with this larger group of people, and that is the fact that I have started to buy more packaged food (to save time) and also prepare food differently.   Why use my more expensive ingredients for those who do not care or appreciate it?  So, for the first time in years, I often purchase store bought baked goods and have white sugar and flour in my cupboard to use when making things for people other than my family.  But, of course, I and the children eat it too, and it just opens the door to continue in that direction.

And last but not least, living so close to restaurants makes it far too easy to grab take-out or fast food, and I could easily justify it.

So you see my great quandary.

Oh, I still grind my own wheat.  Sometimes.  I still bake homemade bread from scratch.  Occasionally.  I still purchase most of our meat and poultry from local farms who don’t use hormones.   I limit packaged foods.  And last year I still managed to grow a lot of produce despite where we live.  But there are so many things that I have let go.  And, really, there is no excuse.

Friends who have more recently learned about whole foods, and soaking grains, and sprouting, and culturing, and canning, and natural fermentation, and sourdough starters, and on and on, have sparked my interest in these things once again.  It has challenged me to brush off those dormant skills and put them to good use.

So if I seem a little more hippie the next time you see me, tell me so.

I’ll be thrilled.

Last week, I took part in To Write Love On Her Arms (TWLOHA) day.

TWLOHA describes their mission like this,

“To Write Love on Her Arms is a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery.

To Write Love On Her Arms Day is a day where anyone can write the words love on their arms, to support those who are fighting against depression and those who are trying to recovering.

As I colored in the black letters on my forearm, I thought about how ineffective it actually was. I mean, what good does it really do anyone to write a word on my arm?

That’s true for a lot of things though.  So often I see an enormous need, almost overwhelming in its demand, and I feel helpless. I want to do something, I want to lesson the pain somehow.

As I continued to add swirls and lines to the word “Love” I thought of the girls I know personally who have or still do battle depression.  Visions of these women dealing with pain that cut so deep they heaved under uncontrolled sobs, felt driven to pummel themselves with their own fists or watch the blood drip from a fresh self-inflicted wound.

I began to pray for each one by name, asking the one who heals to comfort them body and soul.   A crowd of faceless girls drifted into my mind’s eye, and their sheer number along with their combined sorrow pressed down on my heart.  I felt the stinging in my nose and behind my eyes that always precedes tears, but as I continued to pray I realized I was wrong.  Scribbling on my arm really did help.

Things like TWLOHA day gives people a concrete thing to do, however small it is.  The point isn’t so much the seemingly insignificant action, it’s the fact that they are taking part in something bigger than themselves.  Perhaps because so many people picked up a pen or marker and pressed it to their own skin, they were made more aware of the sufferings of others.  Perhaps compassion moved their hearts in a way it wouldn’t have otherwise because participating in a trivial activity caused them to think about something longer than just a passing thought.

Perhaps they were moved to pray, as I was.   And, really, is there anything more powerful than prayer?