That Time of Year

It's that time of year again. For many - for most, I would venture to say - Halloween is one of the pleasures of fall. For us, it's what makes this time of year rather difficult for our family. We don't celebrate Halloween in any way, shape, or form. We try not to make a big deal about it, and we completely respect the freedom of fellow believers to celebrate it. (So please hear me - this is not a commentary on anyone's choices but ours). Our kids understand our choice, and the reasons behind it, and respect it for the most part (even taking a stand themselves) but still, some years are harder than others, and I think this is going to be one of those years.

I had a conversation with one of my children about it last night. We talked again about why we've made this choice, and about any reasons that might change our mind to allow us to be less...well, weird on this occasion. So first - the reasons we don't celebrate. I'm pretty sure I blogged about this last year, but we have some new friends this year, so I'll explain them again. After all, my kids have to do this almost daily through the month of October each year. It boils down to two main reasons:

1. The current Halloween traditions seem to us to be too closely tied to their origins. Even the most harmless are echos, bu pretty clear ones, of their original forms. They have no other meaning. There are some Christmas traditions for instance, that may have also had pagan roots, but they are, to me, redeemable. They have other expressions and can relate other meanings. Now, we have some friends who don't even do those things, because of those pagan roots, and we completely respect and understand that. But - TO ME - there seems to be no redeemable value to any of the Halloween traditions.

2. Even the most "harmless" traditions don't seem very harmless. I see no positives about spending money on costumes and going door to door to ask for things - indeed, not just things, but candy, which, if you know me at all, you know I regard as the food of the devil, anyway. I JOKE. (Mostly.)

And that brings to any reasons we might change our mind about this. This is so hard for me each year. Every once in awhile , one or more of my children will ask if we can please just this once go trick or treating. Just this once! I hope they believe me when I tell them that this really does tug at my heartstrings, and that I have no desire whatsoever to make them unhappy. So each year I consider our options. Is there any way we can make this easier? Is there anything we can allow them to do that gives them the fun without compromising our convictions? Last night I asked the child in question to provide some of these answers, if they could. After a good talk, the most I got was, "I just really want to, just once," "It doesn't seem that bad - I don't understand what the big deal is," and "So-and-so is doing it, and you like that person!" And I explained, in turn, why that isn't enough. I want my kids to be happy. I don't want them to feel uncomfortable and out of place for the entire month of October. I want them to have fun. But that's not enough. The fact that we have good friends who celebrate Halloween, to various degrees, isn't enough. Nor is the "what's the big deal" approach a good enough reason to overturn our convictions in this matter. We have to be able to do something because it is a good thing to do. It may be that one day I have to relent in some area in order to prevent a greater problem of simmering resentment - I don't know. I do know that this year isn't the time.

I have no desire to be legalistic or alarmist about Halloween. I hope my kids know that, as well as our friends and family who make a different choice about this holiday. When the subject comes up, I tell my children that when they grow up of course they will be free to make a different choice, too. Unfortunately, that's little consolation for them when they are struggling with being the only one (in the whole wide world, and probably even the universe) who doesn't celebrate Halloween. I am truly sorry about that. The child with whom I had this most recent conversation wanted to know if I had thought about how hard this would be for them when I made this decision, and I can say that I absolutely did know how hard it would be. My sisters and I grew up the odd ones out each Halloween, having to mutter some unintelligible response each time a chipper cashier asked us what we were going to be that year. Oh, I know. I lived through it, obviously, but again, not much consolation for the ones enduring it now. I hope that no matter what they decide when they grow up, they will at least know that, as always, we did the best we could with the information we had. I hope that they will be able to respect the fact that we tried to weigh all that information with an open mind, and that we stood by our convictions when it seemed that was what we had to do. I hope!

Being Free

Despite the rather lofty title, this isn't a post with great spiritual or emotional significance - sorry to have misled you! With it, I actually refer to the more mundane; to be more specific, to food. I posted some time ago about eliminating dairy from my diet for Scarlett's benefit, as she seemed to have a sensitivity to it at the time. It turned out I felt worlds better being off dairy myself so even when she appeared to grow out of her sensitivity, I continued a mostly dairy free diet. I give myself one "cheat" meal a week (usually pizza on Friday night!) ,and use butter on occasion (soy margarine works quite well in recipes, but I don't feel entirely comfortable using soy on a regular basis, and I am still experimenting with coconut oil as a replacement), but other than that, I avoid any dairy products on their own or in other foods. Avoid is probably the wrong word, actually. It sounds like I make great sacrifice to do so, when the truth is that I don't miss it at all. I have tried milk in my coffee only once or twice since I began my dairy free journey, and I have found that I can barely stand the taste and that it makes me feel ill afterwards. I have even cut the amount of cheese on my Friday night pizza in half, because I not only crave it less, but have gradually found it to be less appetizing at all. I don't even miss ice cream. Truly. So for me, it doesn't feel like a "free" sort of diet. I simply choose other foods instead, and am happy with them.


I take this to mean that my body probably doesn't handle dairy well and doesn't need it, for reasons that I can't see outright. But I have still been fighting a battle against eczema, an enemy that has has attacked me with increasing frequency and ferocity over the years, and eliminating dairy hasn't helped in that war. I have tried just about every natural remedy anyone has ever suggested or that I've ever researched on my own....to no avail. Things that work like magic for other people have had no effect on me - even with initial improvement, the eczema has always crept back up and taken over, usually with a vengeance. I had been talking with my doctor here about it, though, and she has been most helpful in having me consider what kind of internal inflammation would be causing this. Whereas before, I considered it only a skin-deep fate/doom, she has always prompted me to think about what's going on internally that would cause an external reaction. And so I recently talked with her about what might be next on the diet list to try, since dairy wasn't the culprit - or the sole culprit, perhaps.

And she said what I had heard before, but what I hoped she wouldn't say - gluten. Eliminating gluten seemed much more intimidating than eliminating dairy. It seems like everything has gluten in it! But at the time we discussed this, I was seeing her for a very bad bout with my eczema, one that reminded me how desperately I wanted to be rid of it. So I left that day, determined to give a gluten free trial a go, and I started the next day. The first week was really dreadful, at first because I hadn't really prepared for it, so there was nothing to eat. Then even as I stocked up on good foods with no gluten, I still had an empty, gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach, no matter how much I ate of them. Into the second week, I wondered if I was just really missing something vital, or if gluten was such an addictive substance that I was having withdrawal. Since that feeling eventually passed, I think, alarmingly, that it was the latter. But even as I felt better, I was a bit dismayed to read one night that a proper gluten free trial should last TWO MONTHS, and I confess, I didn't think I could make it that long. More reading and research, though, led to finding gluten free flours, and other subsitutes and tricks of cooking and baking, and as the weeks went on, I found I could live quite nicely, in fact, on a gluten free diet.

Cut to three months later, and I am still strictly gluten free and finding, as I did with the dairy, that I don't miss it. Some things I actually prefer. And best of all, I feel much , MUCH better off of it. Really, I had no idea it was dragging me down so much. As for the eczema, there is no sign of it. The winter months are approaching, and that's typically when I have my worst bouts, so we'll see, but at the moment, I'm quite pleased with the results. In fact, when we were at the beach a couple weeks ago, I woke up one morning feeling foggy and sluggish, with a rash starting on both wrists. I thought about what I had eaten the day before, and couldn't think of any problem foods, but a little research revealed that the grilled chicken I had had on my salad for dinner had been seasoned with gluten-laced seasoning. I know that makes it sound like poison...but that's actually how it felt! It was good to get a confirmation that I am on the right track.

So...here I am, "free" dairy and gluten, and actually glad of it. Often in fat-free or sugar-free foods, the replacement is something even worse, and taste and nutrition are often compromised, so I don't really like the "free" connotation. I'm really just choosing something else, and those choices mean almost no processed foods..They mean that I eat lots of fruits and vegetables, nuts, roasted meats, and "ancient" grains. Almonds are my best dietary friends, really, as I use almond milk and almond meal which is absolutely key in my gluten free baking! Check out this chocolate cake, for instance. Does it look like a sacrifice? It isn't.
I will say that the one area in which I have not found happiness in with pasta. I hate gluten free pasta. Corn pasta is tolerable, rice pasta is just really awful, although with careful cooking and rinsing, it can be made passable, and quinoa pasta is no good, either. I can eat it, but it's the one time I'm left feeling like I've missed out.

However, that's a sacrifice I'll still make for the sake of well-being, and certainly one I'll make if it means I've actually won the war against my eczema (or have at least turned the tide). I get practically giddy contemplating the notion that it might actually be gone for good. In that case, it won't feel like sacrifice at all. It will feel like really, truly being free!

What Does a Mother-of-Many Look Like, Anyway?

This may begin to sound a trifle vain - please, please, please don't imagine I'm being self-congratulatory or anything of the sort. In sharing a personal experience, I'm only relating what actually happens in order to illustrate a larger point.

So.

It often happens that if I'm in a group of people, and I happen to share that I have five children, people say lovely things like, "You don't look old enough to have five kids!" or, "You look great to have had five!" (And I'm not being unkind - those really are lovely comments.) My fellow mothers-of-several get this kind of reaction, too, and it always makes me wonder what exactly a mother of five is "supposed" to look like. I think I know - I think, given the supposedly ghastly effects of childbirth (and if you multiply that times FIVE - oh my!) and the way raising young children can sometimes seems to suck years off one's life, it would be expected that we would sag in all sorts of places and look (and feel) chronically tired and harried, not to mention rather frumpy (because who with that many kids would have time for personal grooming?). What's interesting to me is that I don't know any mother-of-several who is actually like that! I will even venture to say that it's quite the opposite, in more than one way. Most of the mothers-of-several (or even -of-many) that I know are fit, active, lovely, and nicely groomed (we DO manage to fit showers in now and then!). And what's more, they often become more so with age and with added children, rather than the reverse.

It's almost as if...could it be?...that children don't actually take away from our lives, but that they add to our well-being. It's as though life gives birth to more life, all the way around. It's really a beautiful thought.

I also often hear that people don't know how I "do it," and how I get anything at all done, much less have any time for myself. But here's another area in which I think our society has been neatly decieved. Among my friends who are mothers-of-several, there are intelligent people who are well read and who have all kinds of interests, hobbies, and pursuits. Some of them even write books in addition to reading them. A few have nicely kept houses, but I'll confess, most of the time those pursuits take away from our being able to have immaculate houses. They don't usually take away from time with our children, though. I think that instead of feeling burdened by our kids, and instead of feeling that we are making huge personal sacrifices for them, most of us feel we are surrounded by people with interesting personalities and viewpoints. Just as they watch us and learn, we learn from them, too. And of course we can read and pursue various interests while we're with them (the laundry might not get done, but hey...)

I've been a mother for just over twelve years. Of course it's hard work, Of course having five people needing me all the time can be tiring. Of course my opportunities are different than that of a single and childless 30-something woman. But I think I'm wiser and healthier than I was when I started this journey, and I think I'm far from exceptional in that. Motherhood hasn't been just good for my soul - like a nice sacrifice that has been worth a weary, battered body and the loss of brain cells. Motherhood - and especially motherhood that involves all these little people everywhere! - has been good for my mind and my body, too. I think my fellow warrior-mothers - all you beautiful, smart women - would probably agree.