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Embracing Vulnerability in Motherhood

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Embracing Vulnerability in Motherhood

Twenty years ago, I curled up in the backseat of my parent’s Nissan Quest and spent an eight-hour road trip with only one book: Little Women. By the time we returned home from visiting my grandparents in North Carolina, I loved the four March sisters as if they were my own.

Over time, the exact details of the plot faded, but the deep satisfaction I felt after finishing the novel never left me. When I heard that Greta Gerwig was remaking a film version of the story, I knew I had to re-read the beloved book before heading to the theater.

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Love in a Pile of Shoes

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Love in a Pile of Shoes

All of my shoes have been removed from my closet. They now sit in a pile at the foot of bed. My toddler, shoe relocation engineer, beams up at me with pride, handing me the last remaining shoe.

And I’m surprised by what I feel. Not frustration about the mess, or preoccupation with the burden of bending my 7-months-pregnant self over to put them all back again. No, this morning grace whispers in my ear…

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Fighting Perfectionism By Embracing Weakness

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Fighting Perfectionism By Embracing Weakness

Even before the age of Instagram, the impetus to present an idealized image of our lives to the world has been a pervasive temptation. Somewhere along the line, humanity bought into the lie that success and strength are products of independent self-reliance, rather than shared reliance on community. The more we buy into this lie, the more desperate the need to cover our wounds and hide our vulnerabilities becomes.

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Dismantling the "Just a Mom" Myth

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Dismantling the "Just a Mom" Myth

One of the hazards of bearing a baby bump is the avalanche of advice on how best to raise your children. Friends and strangers suddenly feel the impulse to touch you without warning and share harrowing stories of traumatic birth experiences. And they always want to know, “Are you going back to work?”

For some mothers, this choice is easy, and their circumstances and desires align. For others, “choice” is dictated by circumstance. For many, this question is not simple, the answer is not apparent, their desires conflict, and the matter is never fully settled.

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The Bump as Invitation

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The Bump as Invitation

Any woman who’s ever been visibly pregnant knows that her baby bump is an invitation. Whether she likes it or not, friends and strangers alike regard the bump as a signal. It alters the laws of social interaction, eliminating the concept of personal space surrounding the protruding area. The bump also elicits a flood of commentary on one’s personal appearance, amount of weight gain, parenting preferences, and – my personal favorite – unsolicited delivery horror stories.

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What I've Learned in Becoming a Stay-at-Home Mom

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What I've Learned in Becoming a Stay-at-Home Mom

It was the middle of the night when I drove myself to the emergency room. My lungs were burning and I had coughed up a bit of blood. I tried to keep myself calm, to avoid panicking prematurely. If it was what I thought it was, there was a very good chance that I could die.

I don’t want to leave this all behind, I prayed, but if tonight is the end, please bring me home.

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Using Negative Feelings in Discernment

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Using Negative Feelings in Discernment

The word discernment is like the word vocation. We hear it and immediately think of the priesthood or religious life - something specific and set apart. We do this even though we know that God is calling us, too. Yes, we are all called to a life of holiness, and some of us live that out by taking specific vows. But discernment is not only about hearing God’s call in the “big picture” decisions of lives. It is a much broader practice of becoming attuned to God’s call as it manifests in our everyday lives.

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Saints Have Issues, Too

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Saints Have Issues, Too

Yesterday was the feast day of St. Catherine of Siena. She was a medieval mystic, and one of the first female Doctors of the Church. Her influential writing on prayer and politics transformed the Church of her time and continues to inspire us today. She even wrote letters chastising the pope and changed his mind. Basically, St. Catherine was a badass.

She also had issues.

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5 Ways Ignatian Wisdom Can Help You Cultivate Work/Life Balance

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5 Ways Ignatian Wisdom Can Help You Cultivate Work/Life Balance

I stumbled over the toys strewn across the living room floor before sneaking into my daughter’s dark room to kiss her goodnight. I had looked forward to this night “off” all week, but now that it was over, I found myself coveting missed bedtime cuddles.

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The Art of Allure in Marriage

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The Art of Allure in Marriage

I found myself crying in the dressing room. All I wanted was to find one thing I felt beautiful in, one thing that I could slip into and become that confident woman who used to lure her husband with a pair of stilettos and a bat of her lashes. Now, the mascara from those lashes was running down my face.

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Mercy for the Outcast

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Mercy for the Outcast

Mere moments on Twitter are enough to alert us that our culture is plagued with demons. We live in a culture that responds to polarized politics and social values with contempt and hateful accusations that serve only to drive us further from one another, rather than seeking common ground. Even voices claiming to speak for our good God are raised in accusation and derision. Among so many voices and so much anger, through all the noise, how do we hear a God who whispers? Why doesn’t God speak more loudly, to be heard above the hate, or better still – to silence it forever?

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Edith Stein on the Body of Christ

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Edith Stein on the Body of Christ

Today is the feast of St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, a religious sister who died in a concentration camp in Holland on August 9, 1942. She began life as Edith Stein, a Jewish atheist, philosopher, and professor. After her conversion in 1922, Stein spent 11 years writing, teaching and living as a witness to her Catholic faith before entering a Discalced Carmelite monastery in 1933.

Am I Enough?

Am I Enough?

My life is a little slice of paradise. Sitting in my chair for morning prayer, I look out the big picture window at our backyard. The primary colors of a big plastic slide bright are bright against the green of the grass. Hummingbirds, squirrels, and rabbits visit. Birdsong fills the air. My vegetables are finally starting to produce, and the butterfly garden is flowering. My prayer is one of peace and gratitude, but also of disquiet.

Is what I do enough? I ask myself.

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When God Says No

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When God Says No

As I was preparing to embark on parenthood, I read several books and articles from reputable sources that offered a counter-intuitive piece of advice: don’t say “no” to your child.

“Don’t say, ‘no’?” I wondered incredulously. “Have modern parenting techniques really deteriorated so drastically?”

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My Daily Bread

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My Daily Bread

I’m always perplexed when I see people at concerts trying to film the experience. What we can capture on our phones won’t look or sound all that great – certainly not as great as the recorded version or professional photos we could look up later. Really, the purpose of being at a concert is just that: being there. Feeling the music vibrate through you, being among the crowd of fans, enjoying proximity to someone whose talent you admire. None of what is great about a concert can be captured by our devices. In fact, trying to do so actually places distance between us and the experience we seek to capture.

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This Is My Body

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This Is My Body

“This is my body, given up for you.”

Morning sickness. Heartburn. Backache. Sciatica. Weight gain. Labor. Stretch marks. Nursing. Everything I am, given for you. Sleepless nights, given for you. Anxiety, worry, arms holding you all night in illness. Every waking moment, given for you.

My thoughts are not my own any more. My time is not my own. And my body is beyond the recognition of my childless self. Then again, so am I.

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The Temptation of the Checklist

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The Temptation of the Checklist

Pay attention. Soon, these days will be no more.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of surveying all that is left undone, and think: failure.  Dirty dishes, laundry wrinkling in the dryer, emails to be answered. It’s easy to fall prey to the lure of the checklist: each checkmark, validation.  The more checkmarks, the better – the better job I’m doing, the better mother I am. The better I am.

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God Works in the Waiting

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God Works in the Waiting

I am not a person who waits. I take my time to think, to research, to plan and to pray. But once I reach a decision, I do not like to delay execution. When I made the decision to enter the Catholic Church, I did not want to wait. The image I have of my excitement is Harry’s line at the end of When Harry Met Sally: “Once you realize that you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.” I wanted to receive Jesus in the Eucharist as soon as possible.

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A Prayer for "Good Girls"

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A Prayer for "Good Girls"

I am, and always have been, a good girl. I don’t break the rules. I arrive prepared. I don’t make trouble. I earn everyone’s affection, including the Lord’s (at least I like to think I do).

When I imagine myself in the story of the prodigal son, I am the older brother – the brother who is glad when his good-for-nothing sibling leaves home because it makes him look so much better by comparison.

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Come Out of Your Hiding Place

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Come Out of Your Hiding Place

My daughter eats crayons. She is a crayon eater. In the past, it has been just a nibble here, or a bite there. This time, I came out of my son’s nursery to discover her hiding under her toddler-sized table, crayon wrappers littered about.

“Why are you hiding?”

“Because I did something bad.”