Tree of Life Mothering

Here’s Chapter 5, Part 2: Kate’s Letter #5, from my new novel Dates With God: How Four Mormon Women Beat Satan With the Book of Mormon. In this part, Kate reels from 3 people asking her in one week if she is pregnant, when she’s not. She determines what she has to do about sugar, learns a strategy from the Nephites about sleeping on swords, records the hand of God in her porn addict brother’s life, and catches satan shaming her for her Facebook gossipping. She also delves into the wisdom of Napoleon Hill as applied to beating the devil and picks out a drill for herself. If you want more background information read, Like Dragons Did They Fight and come take the Mothers Who Know class.

Kate’s #5

 

Dear God,

 

I had another dream. Yep, that makes 5 weeks in a row of having this dream once a week. The same dream of giving birth to a baby girl. In the dream, I feel so happy and relieved to have another baby to hold and love and feel attached to. So, yes God, I soooo get the picture! Thou art calling me to have another baby. Frankly, it seems rather crazy to be thinking about having a baby right now with Dave’s cancer. I know Thou wants me to have another baby but Thou hasn’t told me when. I’m afraid to even pray about it. If I felt like it was for now and asked about it and got a confirmation, then I would be held responsible for not acting on that sure knowledge. Whereas if I avoid praying about it, then I won’t have the sure knowledge and hopefully won’t be held responsible. I don’t think it’s right that we have a baby right now with Dave’s cancer. I like to think that this is a good omen for the long way-off future, that Dave’s going to get better and we will have a baby two or three years after the cancer is in remission. And after I’ve lost weight.

 

The hardest thing about the past week is not the cancer, it’s people’s unkind remarks to me. Three, count them, three people have asked me in the past week if I am pregnant! I have just looked at them and smiled and said coldly, “No, just fat. And you are being rude to ask me that!” I can’t believe the nerve of some people. I have worked hard for a month now on limiting my calories to 1500 calories a day. I have missed one battle every week, but other than that, I have kept to the limit. I can go for a few days but then I get soooo hungry that I just feel like I have to binge.

 

I’ve been thinking about what behaviors Thou wants me to eliminate so that I don’t fall asleep prior to satan’s attacks. I always want to be aware of him sneaking up on me, the bully!

 

So, I hate to say it, but I’ve decided that one activity for me to eliminate for sure is eating sugar. That is something that definitely makes me figuratively fall asleep prior to satan’s attacks. I’ve been fooling myself to think that I can even have any of it as part of my 1500 calories. It just makes me want more and then that is torture to try to stop the desire to have more. So then I start eating more, and that’s when I fall asleep to satan’s attack as he gets to me to justify more and more why I should keep eating more sugar.   I am sooo tired of people asking me if I am pregnant and me not being able to fit on rides at the amusement parks with my kids that I’ve got to do something differently. I hate to acknowledge it, but that means kissing sugar good bye out of my house. sugar is not my friend. Instead I view it as a seductive siren, the sleek, seductive, Miss S. Actually, for me, it’s more like a seductive male, a Mr. S! Suave, sneaky, subtle Mr. S.

 

So God, I commit to Thee to get Mr S. out of my house. That’s just how it has to be with me. It’s sad in a way. Gone are the days of eating a whole half-gallon of ice cream with the girls watching Anne of Green Gables or P and P. Or whipping up 8 dozen chocolate chip cookies with the kids and eating a whole dozen more or so myself in less than 10 minutes before they have even cooled down from the oven. Or giving into that craving after I drop the kids off at piano lessons and I feel so tired and hungry that I just want to pull over to that Cupcake Cuties store and get cupcakes for me and the littles to share.

 

Another behavior for me to eliminate is sitting at the computer without a checklist and a timer next to me. We talked about this in class when Emma brought up the checklist idea. I added that a timer would be good to use as well. Being at the computer without a plan is another way I fall asleep right before satan’s subtle, sneaky approaching attack. Gone are the old days of mindlessly wandering the Internet. I’ve noticed that it makes me go into my animal brain, if I am there for any amount of time without a plan, written down, in view. I feel embarrassed about it, but here’s a story. I am writing it down not because I am proud but because by writing it down hopefully I will remember the awful feelings I felt that I don’t want to repeat. The other day I was looking at Pinterest. Elizabeth came running and crying into the room. She had fallen out of a tree in the backyard. I held her but I was so in my animal brain that I didn’t even want to get up and wash the big scrape on her knee and bandage it, like I have always done with every scrape or cut. I just let her sit on my lap and keep crying while I kept clicking and gazing. Finally, I heard a voice ask myself, “What are you doing Kate? Be your kids’ mom!” So I finally got up and carried her upstairs to wash and bandage it and comfort her.

 

The little boys have become fascinated with swords in our homeschooling. I decided it would be fun to read all of the scriptures about swords with them and talk about them as we make swords out of different materials. Lately every day for our homeschool we read one of the verses, mark it, and then talk about it while we make swords out of PVC pipes, foam, and duct tape. So I noticed this scripture in Alma 57:9, “And it came to pass that we did camp round about the city for many nights; but we did sleep upon our swords, and keep guards, that the Lamanites could not come upon us by night and slay us, which they attempted many times; but as many times as they attempted this their blood was spilt.” It teaches us all about how to be a great warrior. The Nephite soldiers were ready to fight even when sleeping. It tells exactly how they were able to always be ready to fight. Their readiness to fight involved two things: 1. have their weapons right under them, even when sleeping, and 2. have guards.

 

I realize that this scripture is Thee speaking to me, telling me how to win my battles. Because they slept on their swords, the Nephites could immediately grab their swords after waking up to fight back and spill blood in defense, if necessary. This is a great example for us. We can be the same way. We can’t say that we are never going to sleep. Sleep isn’t just physical sleep but it is symbolic of any time when we aren’t completely alert and aware. We can’t just say that we aren’t ever going to sleep because sleep is needful for rest and renewal. But we can have certain things we do to guard our sleep.  Any time we are descending into that state, of rest and renewal, when we don’t want to be 100% alert and aware, we can first make sure that we have a figurative sword and guards right by us. I view my checklist of things to do on the Internet as my sword and my timer as my guard so that my relaxing time doesn’t fall into sleeping time which makes me forget my long-term goals.

 

I’ve also noticed that whenever I engage in physical sleep, I can have some twisted, horribly evil dreams. I have started wondering if satan tries to take advantage of me in my sleep. Maybe he sends his minions to whisper horrible things to me that I end up dreaming about? So I have started acknowledging my vulnerability to Thee God right before I go to sleep. I ask Thee to be my guardian of sleep in my nightly prayer, that I might have good dreams. I’ve also been asking me to give me any answers I need to my problems in my dreams. So far it has worked! I have had good dreams every time I ask for Thy protection. I also got an answer in my dreams for something I had lost.

 

A phrase keeps coming into my head that we sang in sacrament meeting last week. It’s the phrase from the hymn “Hark All Ye Nations.” It says, “The God of Jacob does not sleep.” I take comfort in that, especially since satan probably doesn’t sleep either. I however have to sleep to maintain my health, so I am feeling blessed that Thou hast provided a way to protect myself when I have to sleep and am not aware of the approaching enemy’s grasp.

 

In my study with the boys I found another scripture, Ether 15:24. It shows the same idea of sleeping on the swords but in this example it doesn’t work for the soldiers. It’s because they are drunk with anger. Verse 20 says “But behold, the Spirit of the Lord had ceased striving with them, and Satan had full power over the hearts of the people; for they were given up unto the hardness of their hearts, and the blindness of their minds that they might be destroyed; wherefore they went again to battle.” They then go to war, and fight all day, then retire at night to sleep on their swords. They repeat the cycle for several days, losing people every day in battle. First they have 52 men, then 32, then it gets down to the mortal combat that my little boys love to hear about, between the only two guys left. One of them chops off the other guy’s head, while he is headless himself amazingly, and then Coriantumr is left alone. So it doesn’t work to sleep on your swords, or have a checklist, if your heart is not soft, if you haven’t let go of anger or rebellion. These hard-hearted Nephites who went into battle after sleeping with swords lost because they were going through the motions with hard hearts.  If I have already lost the Spirit and become hard-hearted, blind-minded and drunk with anger, I will find a way to get around the list and the timer.

 

I’ve been reading Outwitting the Devil by Napoleon Hill. The basic idea is that this guy, the author, Napoleon Hill, claims to have been allowed to interview the devil. The devil shares all of his secrets for getting people to fail. One of the biggest secrets he shares is that he can get people in his control if he just gets people to drift ever so slightly from their intended goal by distracting them with temporary pleasures or just plain forgetfulness. Then he gets us to drift more and more. I can see how this is true with so many people including myself. This is definitely one of the best self-improvement books I have ever read, next to the Book of Mormon. I can see that for all of my life, the devil has been getting me to drift away from all of my goals! I did graduate from college, but it seems like with everything else good, besides my marriage and having kids and my testimony, I have allowed myself to go off course. I have set all kinds of goals and usually drift away from them by simply forgetting them because of so many shiny distractions.  This is especially true for my weight loss goals, and my goals for spending more time with my husband and children, increasing my talent at drawing and playing the piano, and more time reading classic books.

 

I have let the devil get me to waste more and more time on the computer or my phone. No more I say! From now on I am going to picture the devil sitting on my computer. That gets my mother bear chemistry going, thinking about him attacking my little brother. When I go to my computer with a checklist of tasks it’s like I am saying, “OK, God, I acknowledge that my time is Thy time. I dedicate my time to Thee. This time of my life is sacred. I don’t want to waste it. I am dedicating my life to Thee by making a plan and not wandering from it.” I do have my favorite blogs to read like Lauren’s and Jill’s, but there is a time and place to read them. I can’t read all of my favorite blogs every single day. I’m only going to go there when I’ve planned out my Internet time, and put a timer to get off.  I am sad to say this, but I am also going to disable the Internet connection on my phone.

 

I feel blessed that my mind is getting more clear. I am finding that as I work daily being anxiously engaged in the good causes of my six goals, I don’t slip into sadness and hopelessness like I used to.

 

My brother won his most recent difficult battle with porn. That so makes me smile while I write this. My brother, Jake, has been fighting a porn addiction. He was home alone two weeks ago and started looking at porn. Then the Internet shut off. He realized that his wife’s threat had gone through. She had been threatening to cut off their Internet if he didn’t go get counseling. So then he we went into his bedroom and lay on his bed, feeling shameful, dark and miserable. He then decided he was going to kill himself. He pulled his gun out of the gun safe and was about to go through with it when he looked up and saw the huge beautiful picture in their bedroom of him and his wife on their wedding day. He saw how gorgeous she is, as she gazed into his eyes in the picture, and he decided he didn’t want to leave her. He saw a Book of Mormon on her dresser and picked it up and flipped to a random page. Then he read these words, in Alma 39:10: “And I command you to take it upon you to counsel with your elder brothers in your undertakings; for behold, thou art in thy youth, and ye stand in need to be nourished by your brothers. And give heed to their counsel.”

 

He started sobbing. That was the perfect answer for him, straight out of the most correct book on earth. After a while he called up our older brother, Mark, and asked if he could come stay with him and our other brother, Alan, for awhile. Mark has let him stay there for over a week now and has let him work at his business so he can be in a better atmosphere than what he was in with his old job where he was surrounded by porn addicts. He quit his old job and has gone to counseling. Jake’s wife has moved back home; she and Jake Skype each other every day, on Mark’s computer which has tons of filters. Jake has been sober from porn from the day he moved in with Mark. We don’t know when he will move back in with Chelsea, it might be next month, if he stays sober and keeps up with the counseling, or it could be longer. I am so grateful that Thou reached out to Jake through the power of Thy Spirit and Thy Word in the Book of Mormon. It saved my brother’s life. Praise Thee God! This was a miracle. I want Mark’s children to know someday of how Thou saved him, so I have written it down here.

 

So we had that joyful event in our family, among my brothers, but we also had something not so joyful happen. I’ve been feeling lots of shame this past week that I have let go. Now I simply feel sorrow and regret. Satan almost got me really good. As Thou knows, I have a sister who has left the Church. I have definitely felt a lot of judgment towards her. The other day I wrote a message on Facebook to send to our other sister, who lives in Texas and is a strong member. I am sad to say that I wrote some things that I would not have said to her in her presence, about how awful she was being. I succumbed to gossiping about her, and that was wrong. Then I clicked “send,” and then I realized that I had sent it to my wayward sister, accidentally! Oh I wished I could bring it back and send it to the intended sister! I spent the next 2 days feeling horrible!

 

Then I finally realized satan was shaming me. He wanted me to feel crappy so he kept reminding me of what I did, and that no loving woman would treat her sister that way, that I was a lowlife. After 2 days I finally realized, duh, do your drill! Run to the flagpole. So I did. My flagpole is my journal and my drill is to write what I am fighting for. It used to be all those other things I wrote about earlier but now I simply write out what I am fighting for, why I am fighting for those things, and why I don’t give up. So I did that. Then I wrote some affirmations about forgiveness. I humbly then called my sister and asked her for forgiveness. I feel soooooooooo much better now, although satan continues to remind me of my sin. I just have to repeat the scripture out loud, “Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more.” (D&C 58:42) whenever I start feeling the yuckies about the whole thing. Then I get busy with a passion project and the bad feelings go away.

 

I thank Thee so much God for my Savior, Thy son, and his redemptive power. I rely on his enabling and redemptive grace every day.

 

Love,

Kate

copyright 2015 Celestia Shumway

Be sure to check out Maurice’s blog here! 

Here’s Chapter 5: Part 1, Emma’s Letter #5 of my fictional book, Dates with God, about four women who take the Mothers Who Know Class. If you haven’t been reading all of my excerpts, you are missing out! Start by going here to read the first one. 

In this part, Emma applies the “Stony Pool” story to herself, organizes her pantry despite her lack of Tupperware, learns from Lehi’s example, makes her own Liahona for her own wilderness, comes face to face with her two decades-old stupid conversation as a Franklin planner rebel, and decides to limit sugar with a firm determination. God blesses her with a dream that shrinks her problems down to the size of a dinner plate. If you want to know more background information and terminology used in this fictional letter, please read the 5 star amazon book Like Dragons Did They Fight by Maurice Harker and Lucas Reynolds, and take my Mothers Who Know Class.

Emma’s Week #5

Dear God,

 

Today in class we heard the Stony Pool story written by Maurice Harker. I find it so fascinating. It’s about a guy who goes to the beach. He sees the sign to avoid swimming in the tidepool because of the danger involved with the rocks and the waves. So he stays away and then he lies down on the beach to relax. He falls asleep and then a sneaky prankster comes up and injects him with heroin so he’s stoned.  After he wakes up, he feels horrible and then he sees the syringe in his arm and thinks he did it himself. So he’s stoned and he also feels even worse because he thinks he is the cause, when really it was the deviant prankster who cowardly ran away. Then the guy stumbles over to the tidepool and ends up getting caught in the rocks when the waves come in because he was too stoned to comprehend the sign or remember that he had seen it before.  The basic idea is that a person can get attacked so subtly by satan getting him stoned, after the person falls asleep, that that the person thinks that he did it to himself. This is just like in the story how the guy saw the syringe that the deviant prankster left in his arm and thinks that he did it to himself. He doesn’t know that satan is the culprit because satan blindsided him.

 

Hmmm…so how does this apply to me? Does satan attack me subtly after I let my guard down and fall figuratively asleep? I do know of some activities in general that I can eliminate so that I don’t “fall asleep on the beach” like the guy in the Stony Pool Story. I hate to say it, but maybe for me I need to severely limit my Internet usage. Like only do it for 1 hour a day, max. Also, I am thinking of making a list of what to do when I am online, before I sit down and do a single click. Then I am going to keep the list taped on the screen right by me to keep me on track, like a Liahona or compass to guide me. The Liahona guided Lehi’s family in the wilderness. When I sit down at the Internet, I am about to enter a wilderness and I need a compass to guide me.

 

I can see how that happens in my life. Especially with yelling at my kids, fighting with my husband,  and eating sugar. I have to realize that sugar for me is pretty much like porn. I touch it, and then I want more and more, and I end up eating way more than I should because I feel so awful. Last Valentine’s Day I ate 2 dozen pink frosted sugar cookies. They tasted so good going down but I felt so crabby afterward. It wasn’t pretty. I don’t want to feel that way again. OK, God, I commit to Thee to keep it out of my house. Having it in my house is akin to the guy in the stony pool story who chooses to lie down on the beach. Lying down on the beach makes him much more likely to fall asleep, and that makes him so ridiculously vulnerable to getting stoned by the enemy. Having sugar in my house makes me figuratively fall asleep at the beach, putting me in direct line of an attack from satan. So I’ve got to keep it out of my house.

 

In regards to yelling at my kids, I can see that there are certain activities that make me more likely to yell at them, or lose a battle, akin to falling asleep on the beach so that I am vulnerable to his attacks. Number one is eating sugar. Number two is staying up late on the Internet so that I feel tired and snappy the next day. Number three is not working with them on their chores, and letting everybody play. Then when it’s bedtime I all of the sudden call them all to do their chores and I tell them to do them while I keep playing on the Internet. Then I get mad because they get distracted. I finally figured out that if I just get off my rear and do the work WITH them right after dinner, they actually don’t get distracted as much and we get the work done. Sometimes I just have to get them started, and then I can actually sit and read aloud to them while they scurry around working. When we have a really fascinating book we are in the middle of, they are more likely to stay on task working while they listen to me. If I can’t read to them for some reason then I will play an audiobook.

 

After the dishes are done and the toys are put away, then we watch 2 funny videos on YouTube, if they got done within 30 minutes. If they got done in 45 minutes they get one video.  If it takes longer than that they get no videos and they just have to get ready for bed when they are done. I actually learned this from Jill in class this past week. She has struggled with the same thing. I was thinking of the scripture from D&C 58:26-27 “…be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness; For the power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves. And inasmuch as men do good they shall in nowise lose their reward.” Jill and I talked about this in class. As we talked we realized that anxious in this context doesn’t mean to be fearful, but it means to be eagerly looking forward to something. We decided that part of being agents  “unto themselves” and not being acted upon means we have to have something to look forward to, some reward, to help us be motivated to work hard to do something, or get involved in a good cause. Our kids are the same way. In other words, we have to have vision! Then at the end when we do get the reward, our vision is reinforced and it primes us for next time. I’ve been applying this principle to all sorts of activities in my very own life. Like I give myself 45 minutes of Internet surfing time after 3 if I got my morning routine done by 10 and the homeschool and lunch and clean up routine by 2. For each deadline I don’t meet I have to subtract 20 minutes. So If I miss both deadlines I only get 5 minutes. It really motivates me!

 

I’ve noticed that I am less likely to even want to slip into those old habits of fighting, yelling, and eating sugar when I work on nurturing myself. This helps me stay at a Level 0. A big self-nurture habit I’ve noticed is getting to bed by 9:30 and having lights out by 10 PM, instead of my original goal of 10:30. Another one is making sure I get enough whole, good fat every day, like butter and cod liver oil. The sleep and fat definitely help me to feel much more even-keeled, so that if somebody spills milk I can just go with the flow (pardon the pun) instead of getting bent out of shape about it. I can just remind the kids where the rags are in the kitchen and help them clean up. It has helped a ton that I finally bit the bullet and organized the kitchen and dedicated a drawer, low enough for the kids to reach, for rags. So I am learning to structure my life,  really my whole environment, with sleep, and food, space and time management with a schedule for me and the kids, so that I am much more nurtured. Then because I nurture myself, I am better able to nurture them.

 

All of this fits in with another thing I learned about lately which is the Plimsoll line. The Plimsoll line is named after a guy, Samuel Plimsoll, an English politician. It is the line on the outer hull of ship that marks where the water has to hit the hull in order for the boat not to sink under a heavy load. If the water goes above the line then then the boat is in danger of sinking.

 

Wow, this concept came at the same time that I joined a Mom’s Night Out discussion group. Every month we discuss a book on the first Thursday of the month and on the third Thursday of the month we discuss a General Conference talk. We discussed Elder Bednar’s April 2014 talk about burdens. I realized that burdens are just part of life. I am always going to have some kind of burden. It’s part of being mortal. It’s going to be a long time when I don’t have the burden of filling up the fridge and pantry, and then keeping them organized, pulling out the gross stuff that went rotten, and then planning meals and supervising clean up of meals. It’s going to be a long time until I am released from the burden of child discipline. But I can be yoked to Christ, and because of that, my burdens are light. The yoke he offers me is the covenant to follow Him. I’ve noticed little things lately that happen in my house that can load me up with greater unnecessary burdens and put me WAY past my Plimsoll line. In addition to not enough sleep before 11, and too much sugar, it involves other things. Like the counter right by the garage door getting piled up with days’ worth of mail, papers and clutter. Or not having clean underwear when I need it. It really bothers me when I open up a drawer and I have no clean underwear! Or the kids putting their shoes by the front door instead of on the shoe shelf in the front closet. Another thing that puts me past my Plimsoll line is having to scramble to fix lunch. When I make menus on Sunday afternoon and then go shopping on Monday that keeps me WAY above my Plimsoll line. I hate foraging in the fridge  for food to fix lunch. I hate finding ingredients in the fridge instead of ready-made lunches. But if I plan the menus, I don’t mind so much putting the ingredients together. A bonus, I’ve noticed, is that when I involve the kids in the planning of all the meals, not just lunch, they are much more desirous to fix the food! I have a page dedicated in my Girl Power Journal to listing all the little things I notice that make me sink below my Plimsoll line.

 

So how does the stony pool story apply to my husband. Hmmm…how does Satan sneak up on me in my life with Clark? I’ve never really thought about this before. Clark just seems to be the source of all the bad in our relationship, but I guess it’s really satan and Clark is his unwitting dupe. Or maybe I am the unwitting dupe? Or maybe we both are! Satan is working really hard to get me to feel so frustrated about Clark. I realized the other day in class that satan wants me to stay mad at Clark. It’s so hard though to deal with this anger! I feel like shaking Clark and saying, “Dude, wake up! Start being a man and take care of your family’s needs! Provide for us so we know that we have a stable financial future, not a dwindling inheritance you didn’t earn and that you have no right to spend!” But that wouldn’t work. He would just go ballistic, yelling at me and say I wasn’t appreciative. That book Lost Classical Womanly Arts that Kate is always talking about says not to attempt to change a man. Just accept him at face value. OK, but….what if the change is for his own good and his family’s good. What if his family is suffering because he won’t change? Then isn’t it OK? What if he has depression? What if he can’t recognize what is going on because he is in such a funk? He can’t even see and appreciate my efforts at being a Becky Homecky Domestic Goddess.

 

Last week I spent the whole week reorganizing. I did the kitchen, the living room, and the bedroom.  I got rid of a boatload of junk. It’s hard for me to organize. I have attempted it so many times. i always get stuck as to how to put things back together to look pretty after I’ve thrown away the stuff I don’t want. Like when I organize a closet or my pantry, I can’t just go to Target and buy some shelf organizers, plastic bins, or canisters. I can’t go buy Tupperware that is matching and has sizes custom picked for the amount of food I have and the depth and height of my shelves. I simply don’t have the money. I have to make things look pretty with cardboard boxes or my #10 cans. This time around I just decided to fight back the tears of frustration and anger about being poor and cover up the cardboard with the recycled cardstock I have from my stash of homeschool supplies and chalkboard labels and markers.

 

I also added flowers in the main living rooms and put up family pictures on the walls. I baked cinnamon rolls and counted them as my three legal treats for the week. They smelled delicious! I curled my hair, wore jewelry and perfume, and talked nicely to him. He didn’t say a word. I have had all the meals on time, the rooms clean, and the kids in bed by 9 PM. I am not only fulfilling my wife and mothering and homemaking duties, but I am going the extra mile! When is he going to work hard for me?

 

Remember what I was saying about Lehi in the wilderness? I was reading the Book of Mormon this morning about Lehi’s family in the wilderness. I found such a cool thing! It’s the Plan for Success, right in the Book of Mormon. It’s in 2 Nephi 5:5-13. It’s in Four Steps.

 

Step #1, in verses 5-6: Follow revelation from God, and that might might mean changing your environment, like leaving a place, like Lehi’s family did, in order to be away from wicked people or tempting things. I pondered over this and realized that I can’t change my environment much in terms of moving into a new house, but I can change the outside stimulus that enters into my senses. I can change my internal environment. I can always be putting positive things in my brain through my eyes and ears and nose. Like positive mp3s to listen to, beautiful surroundings to see, and yummy aromas to smell, like my essential oils. I am going to create a system of listening to the classic books on audio that I’ve always wanted to read, and podcasts about my passions, like nutrition and parenting.

 

Step #2, in verse 12: As Thine children embarked on their God-inspired pilgrim journey to escape wickedness with certain things Thou instructed them to take, I am too. I am to take with me on my journey of escaping wickedness the scriptures (brass plates), and my compass (the Liahona) which for me is my planner full of my plans guided by the Spirit. My planner is my compass because it directs me through the wilderness of my free time in the afternoon, after the kids and I are done with our homeschooling and lunch duties. Sometimes when I am done with lunch clean-up with the kids, I pull out my phone and start checking Facebook. Then I look at the clock and realize that 2 hours have passed! Then the next day I check my planner and think, oh yeah, I was going to do such-and-such yesterday. If I would look first to my compass, or planner, before I went into my wilderness of free time I would not get lost in cyberworld on my phone. Then if I would keep checking it, and then doing my tasks, checking them off, I would accomplish a lot.

 

Step #3, in verse 11: Sow seeds of every kind and raise flocks. My seeds and flocks are my husband, my children, my garden,  my desires for good things, and my relationships with people outside my family, and whatever else Thou directs me to do to fulfill the mission Thou hast for me.

 

Step #4, verse 13: Reap abundance and prosper exceedingly.

 

I pictured my Grandma’s sister. She is the epitome of abundance and prosperity. When I came to live with her sister, my grandma, from Indiana, to go to junior high school in Utah, Franklin planners were a big thing. She always had hers in a tote and carried it with her, along with her scriptures. She ran her own life like a CEO and had tons of checklists. She proudly showed me her unwieldy planner with all the pages, the pouches, and the compartments in the ugly nylon tote cover thing that held the planner.  My inner rebel of organization bristled at the thought of being so scheduled and lugging such a big, unwieldy pack everywhere I went like she did. I used to think that was such a nerdy Utah Mormon thing. I would laugh at the sight. I smugly thought, I don’t need a planner, I can remember my schedule. When I went off to college she tried to get me to go to a Franklin Covey seminar. I didn’t want to and told her no thank you.

 

She thought it would be such a wise thing to do before I went off to college. I thought it was unnecessary. I resisted planning my life in college and even after I got married and started working. After I left my job and started adopting kids life as a mom got hectic quickly. Clark started bugging me to make more written plans, at least weekly dinner menus. I resisted, saying I liked to be creative every day and that plans were restrictive. Looking back at Great Aunt Elaine’s life, however, I have to admit she has accomplished some amazing things since I left home. Like heading up a nonprofit organization to raise money for African orphans of AIDS victims to help them get adopted. Like getting her PhD in neuroscience at age 65. Like being an illustrator of several picture books for kids. Like growing an organic garden every year with the neighbor kids and letting them sell the produce at the farmers’ market. She also helps at a homeless shelter 5 days a week. One time I went to her Relief Society night meeting and saw her do yoga with all the young moms. The rest of the old ladies could not even bend to touch their knees! They just sat there and watched while Great Aunt Elaine was Plastic Woman. I admire her for being so fit in body and mind and social skills with young and old. She is always learning new things and could run circles around Jill and Lauren with her blogging and techno savvy. OK, Aunt Elaine, I give in, I should have listened to you! I still struggle with not having a schedule everyday so I admit I can learn some things from you.

 

Now that I’ve learned how satan whispers inside of me, I am waking up to the fact that he, the dirty rascal, is behind my life as a rebel to planners. When I was in college, his voice said, “I don’t need a planner, I can remember my schedule and all of my assignments. Only dummies need planners.” After I became a mom, it was, “Don’t bother planning your day. It’s not like your some bigwig CEO or anything. You’re just a mom. Just wing it, it’s more easy.” Now that I realize this was satan the whole time, and those were all lies so I would fail at homemaking and mothering, I feel soooo mad! I’ve had so many days where after I get the lunch cleaned up and the little kids down for naps, I feel totally lost. I have a million things I want to do but I am not sure what to do first. Just as if I were in a wilderness. Just like Lehi’s family in the wilderness, I need scriptures and a compass to guide, me every day. I have to admit, I need a planner and I need to actually LOOK at it throughout the day so I don’t get lost. It’s not a sign of weakness to have a planner and to refer to it often. It’s kind of like the children of Israel and the serpent on the pole in the wilderness. As long as they did the simple, easy step of looking at the serpent, they lived. Whenever I heard this story I used to always think, who would be dumb enough not to look. Wow, now I am realizing that I have been dumb enough not to look at a planner by using one. Satan got me to think that for a long time but I am not falling for his stupid lies anymore! Get thee hence, satan!

 

I guess I have been having a stupid conversation for two decades about not needing a planner. Clark was actually right about it. Maybe that’s how Satan works between us. He makes me feel irked or bothered when Clark, or Grandma, or anyone, suggests something that’s good. If I know I am not using that good thing like I could be doing, I get defensive and want to justify myself and explain away why I don’t do it. Please help me to let go of the desire to be irked by good things, and be defensive over silly things, no matter who it comes from.

 

The other night I had a dream. In this dream I was on a cruise. This sad, forlorn old lady who was missing both legs was on the cruise. She was in a wheelchair and had no family. She had a little dog that she treated like her own baby. In the dream I talked to her. I remember feeling so sad for her. She said that all she had was her dog to love, and the only place she had to live was the cruise ship. When I woke up, I started thinking about the meaning of the dream. I remembered earlier in the day, listening to one of my favorite podcasts about prosperity. The host of the podcast had a guest who mentioned that if you think you have problems, maybe if you change your perspective your problems will shrink to the size of a molehill. She said that if your problem can be changed with more time and more money, then it’s really not a problem. After I had the dream and woke up pondering over it, I finally understood what the guest on the podcast meant. The lady in my dream couldn’t get her legs back with more money or more time. She couldn’t get a family with more money or more time.

 

So, God, I thank Thee that all of my problems can be solved with more time and more money. They don’t seem much like problems anymore. I have a passel of kids to love. I get to see them be adorable sometimes. I have a husband who is capable of earning money. These challenges I am dealing with are only temporary.

 

Love,

Emma

copyright 2015 Celestia Shumway

Be sure to check out Maurice’s blog here! 

I am so sorry I have been late in getting my serial excerpts up for my novel, Dates with God: How Four Mormon Mamas Beat Satan with the Book of Mormon. 

Here is Chapter 4: Part 4, Lauren’s Letter #4, in which poised, professional Lauren inwardly acknowledges that her life is in shambles and she needs help. Will she ever be humble enough to admit this to her husband?

Lauren Week #4

 

Dear God,

 

My life is falling apart. The porn addiction is gripping Logan like a vise. I am supposed to be leaving tomorrow to speak on natural birth in Houston at a conference but I just feel like I need to stop being gone from home so much. I have got to figure out what I can do on my part to get Logan help without him rebelling and rejecting it. I can’t leave when he is in the depths of his addiction. He can’t babysit the kids in his addiction and I don’t want to get a babysitter with him being here at the house. And I don’t want to leave him home and have all of the kids at the babysitter’s house. Of course, James has to work all night. It will just be one long marathon of screen time and eating junk food if I go and a marathon of porn for Logan.  I’m also having a strange rash on my upper arms and I pulled a muscle in my back that makes it hard to even move. I am calling today to regretfully say that I can’t make the speaking engagement.

 

I’ve thought about writing another letter to James, but what would be the point? I already tell him everything I am feeling and everything he needs to do. He’s been working for his dad all these years even though he has his own general contractor’s license. He could totally start his own business. I really don’t like living in this neighborhood because it has too many kids my kids ages’ who I don’t like. Logan has two friends whose moms have told me that Logan introduced them to porn. So they are mad at me. I don’t blame them. So now we also have neighbors who don’t like us. Well, that’s another reason to move. I don’t know how to describe it, but this neighborhood is on the ever increasing fast track of life to consume as much money and status as the people can. I feel like my kids have too many friends just in this neighborhood that distract them into talking about superficial things like fashion and pop music too much. I have always dreamed of my kids getting into an Ivy League school like me. They can’t do that unless they study and none of my kids are studying because of all the fun they are having with friends and digital distractions.

 

We’ve talked about building a house on our property on the outskirts of town in a humbler neighborhood. It would be so nice to move there and have a fresh start with different friends for my kids. But Dave never seems to find the time to even start. He’s always doing extra work for his dad. I would love to get away from this neighborhood and the schools and his family.

 

I remember seeing my sister’s comment on Facebook. She asked “How do you press the pause button on life?” Her friend replied by saying that a pause button is called homeschooling. Oh, those homeschoolers, I thought, they are so smug! But the more I’ve talked about it, the more appealing homeschooling sounds. I don’t want to tell James though. He asked me to do it years ago and I said I couldn’t because of all my other stuff going on, like my midwifery practice and my blogging and my nonprofit.

 

So I am just exploring the idea inside me right now, not telling anyone but Thee God. If I am going to homeschool then I would have to let something go. Even I couldn’t keep that balancing act going on. I’ve been controlling the finances because I know how to manage money better than James does with my accounting degree. So I feel like how we spend our money is up to me. All of my various hobbies actually bring in an income. I don’t know which one I could give up. James would have to start making more money, a lot more, for me to quit.

 

Hmmm…there’s my midwifery business. Maybe I can cut back to one birth a month. Then I would never have more than one prenatal a week, and even then it wouldn’t be every week.

 

How about my doula business? I consider it a way to get potential clients. I guess if I cut back on my midwifing I won’t really be needing any more clients so I could probably drop the doula thing.

 

What about my nonprofit org and my blogging? I guess I can cut back here, maybe. I have a huge amount of people following me, with over 200,000 page views per month and 200K Facebook fans. People think I’m funny. I love sharing my life about being a high-powered attorney turned naturally crunchy green mom. I love sharing stories and pictures about birth and breastfeeding and kids and family life and organization and time-management for moms. By looking at my blog, you would think that I have a picture perfect life with a perfect husband and perfect kids.  But there’s so much that my readers don’t see about my life that needs fixing, namely my kids and my marriage.

 

James and Logan both generally avoid me and go to their screens every night. James just does it later in the night because he comes home around 9 PM from working late. I am thinking we need to get screens out of this house! Or at least take away Logan’s phone. My kids are not getting the education I want them to have. We moved into this neighborhood so we could live by this charter elementary school where they could have Chinese language immersion in all of their classes but they hate it. The older boys tolerated it, then graduated from grade school. Now that they are in junior high and high school I would like them to take honors and AP classes but they say only nerds do those and they just want to be in classes where all their friends are. They never do their homework. Every night, we don’t really connect. We each go to our devices after dinner. If we even have dinner. Sometimes I am at a birth and then they have to fend for themselves with convenience food or I will order take-out or pizza for them. It feels like we live in a hotel where we don’t know the other people living in the building with us. For the younger kids, I used to help in their classrooms for a few hours each week. It’s been ages since I could do that. I liked that I knew what was being talked about in class. Now I see their homework occasionally, when I am home and they remember to bring their homework home. I also hate that it’s so much busywork.

 

I’ve also got to stop spending so much money. When I am in the moment looking at something I want to buy, I feel like I have to buy it. I don’t want to even remotely remember that I have been wanting to curb my spending. I love getting cool organizing and decor stuff for my office, the home, and my midwifery business.  I just got some killer shelves at Ikea for only $49. I’ve been thinking of getting some training in energy healing to help my pregnant clients, but that training costs $3000. But I have already maxed out my credit cards.

 

I’ve actually been feeling hugely depressed about all of these issues. If Logan doesn’t recover from his addiction, his mission will be delayed, or maybe he won’t even go on one. If I don’t do something about my kids’ time after school, they are going to just keep sinking into zombie screen time deeper. If I don’t control my spending, I am going to have to start dipping into my savings. I am thinking that maybe we could live on James’ income if I stopped working, because then I wouldn’t have all of these expenses. But I get so much gratification from my work.

 

I don’t want to think about my depressing issues any more. The homework for the class this week is to think of something that generates Mother Bear chemistry. Hmmm…that’s easy. I picture a doctor taking away my baby boys right after they were born and circing them. Or I think about one of the OB-GYNs in town who has a reputation for inducing lots of births early and handing out C-sections like they are candy. He even has a sign in the reception area of his office saying that he does not accept patients who are taking Bradley childbirth education classes. That makes my blood boil! I picture him talking smoothly to pregnant moms, telling them horror stories about natural births and how the best answer is to just accept all of the interventions that the doctor says. That makes me want to run in between them, cover up the mom’s ears, and stick a sock in the doctor’s mouth. Then I want to challenge him to pass a bowel movement, with him strapped to a table, lying down, as people watch, under bright lights, according to a timetable. And that if he doesn’t do within the 30 minute deadline, I am going to give him an enema. Or I think about a young mom I overheard in the park on Saturday when I was there with the little girls. She was telling her friends about how all teenage boys are porn addicts. OK, so one of my boys is, but that doesn’t mean they all are! Austin is 13 and so far, he’s not showing signs. I am sure Logan has exposed him to it, but he’s not addicted. As far as I know. Aargh, that gives me another thing to stress about. I just want to go up to that young, know-it-all mom, and tell her that I know over a hundred young men who don’t touch porn.

 

God, I just don’t know what to do with my life. Please help me.

 

Love,

Lauren

 

Why would you want to make water kefir? Because it is good for you, chock full of probiotics! Watch this video and make some yourself!

 this handsome young man pictured above is my wonderful son. He is offering speech and debate classes in Bountiful UT this school year. He has tons of experience and would love to help your scholar age youth hone their speech and debate skills. He has won numerous awards at the Wasatch Homeschool Debate League tournaments, and his team took second place in state for the mock trial competition in 2014.

If you want your children to be articulate and virtuous have them take this class so they can verbally fight for what is right!

Right now, your child is preparing for adulthood. They are preparing for a life of work, career, having a family, raising kids, and making a difference in society. Are you preparing your child to effectively influence others for good?

This school year, join Liber Speech and Debate as they prepare students to become men and women of influence. By mastering the art of rhetoric and debate, students learn important skills such as critical thinking, swaying a crowd, and personal development, through a good class environment, and healthy competition. Liber Speech and Debate is a branch of the Wasatch Independent Debate League (formerly the Wasatch Homeschool Debate League) or WIDL. WIDL will be offering seven speech and debate tournaments within the coming year that students will get to participate in.

 

See the info below for more details. If you are interested, or have any questions please contact Dallin Shumway, Director of Liber Speech and Debate, at 801-544-7548 or dallshum@gmail.com. He would love to hear from you!

Classes will be held every Tuesday from 12:30 to 2:00(ish) starting September 8th at the American Legion Building in Bountiful, UT (52 W 200 S Bountiful UT, 84010)

Classes are taught by Dallin Shumway, director of Liber Speech and Debate. Dallin is a long time member of the WIDL. For the past two years Dallin has helped lead the league’s Mock Trial team to the finals in the Utah State High School Mock Trial Competition, taking 2nd place in the 2014 season. Dallin also has received an honorable mention for Diversity of Accomplishment in speech and debate from the WIDL and was named the league’s best mock trial attorney in 2014.

Dallin’s mentoring style is one that focuses on personal development, rather than just the content of the class. He uses a process of planning, doing, checking how things went, and adjusting accordingly, to help his students grow and improve. “Ralph Waldo Emerson sums up my teaching style this way,” Dallin says,”Treat a man as he is, and he will remain as he is. Treat him as he could be, and he will become what he should be.”

Here is what homeschoolers, just like you, are saying about this program;

Our experience in debate with Dallin Shumway at the Liber Academy has been wonderful. He has inspired my daughter to seek knowledge in subjects in which she initially had no interest. He believed in her and led her down a path where she learned how to think logically and how to find the truth in an argument. He provided a safe environment for her to experiment with her writing style, her study habits, and public speaking. He encouraged her to honestly look at herself and grow into who she wanted to be. She is a different student coming out of his class at the end of the year than she was going into the class. His mentoring style has made a world of difference. I am so happy that we made the decision to attend his class. He gave her more than the ability to debate, he showed her how to find confidence in herself. ~Lori King, Homeschool Mom, Ogden Utah.

When I took Dallin’s debate class, one of my favorite and most useful things that he taught me was to plan, do, check, and adjust. Plan or prepare a speech or argument, do the argument, check to see what you can improve on and adjust accordingly. I loved that he gave us challenging homework every week to make sure that we were prepared for the tournaments. And most of all, he was understanding when we didn’t do as well as we wanted. ~ Emily, age 14, Utah Homeschool Student

Your child too can have this experience! To register, contact Dallin Shumway at 801-544-7548, or email him at dallshum@gmail.com

 

In today’s installment of my novel Dates with God, we see Kate go deeper in her sugar addiction, find some Mother Bear Chemistry, get confused by her cancer research, and have recurring dreams calling her to have a baby. Here’s Chapter 4: Part 3, Kate’s Week #4.

Kate Week #4

 

Dear God,

 

I got some great insights from reading Alma 54. The first insight is that Moroni, in communicating with the enemy, uses stratagem. We’ve seen Moroni use stratagem in going to battles with the enemy but now we see him actually using stratagem in just communicating with the enemy. So that is a great lesson to us to use stratagem in communicating with the devil. We can’t just communicate willy nilly with him. We have to always have it foremost in our minds just exactly how sneaky, craven, despicable, unsportsmanlike, cheating, deplorably icky, creepy, destructive, and dastardly he is. We have to use stratagem so we are always on our guard with the upper hand and communicate clearly and strongly with him. So lately sometimes when I realize I am at Level 3, hearing a lie that’s a Dude Moment, I will just say right out loud, “That’s not true, that’s a lie! Get thee hence, Satan!” Then I strike my yoga warrior pose and do some stuff that I am going to write about in a little bit.

 

Second point that I got from the chapter is that the Lamanites have been passing down a satanic spin for generations, with the same lie at the core of the spin. In Alma 54:23 Amaron says that he is a descendant of Zoram, whom he says was “pressed and brought out of Jerusalem.” So Amaron feels that Zoram was kidnapped by the Nephites. Hmmm…I hadn’t thought about it that way. Was he really kidnapped? I checked out the story in 1 Nephi 4. I found that it says that Nephi told Zoram, that he could be a “freeman” if he came with Nephi. So for some reason that I don’t know, Zoram would not have been free if he stayed in Jerusalem. The scripture passage says that he was Laban’s servant. Does that mean a type of slave? Possibly. The truth is that Zoram was offered his freedom by Nephi. This was an escape from bondage, not being pressed into bondage. This contrasts with what Amaron implied which is that Zoram was brought out of Jerusalem against his will. This is an example of how the truth of an event can get twisted into a lie and then passed down as a lie through generations. Or, not even passed through generations but through the lifetime of a person. As I have been thinking about it I realized that hey, Zoram would not have been free if he stayed in Jerusalem, because not only would he have remained a servant, but even worse, he would have been killed. Jerusalem was destroyed, just like Lehi saw in his vision! That statement that had been passed down from generation to generation about Zoram being put into bondage was a total lie! It makes me wonder what lies are subconsciously going on inside me that have been passed down from generations.

I have decided to change my goals. At least one. The 1500 calories a day one to a different diet-related goal. I’ve been researching about cancer prevention. A lot of people say animal products cause cancer. I think I need to get my family especially Dave, on a vegetarian diet, and maybe a raw diet. So my new goal is no animal products for the whole family. As part of that I am going to be serving either a green smoothie or salad at every meal.

 

I’ve been doing the drill of having my phone go off every hour and asking myself which Level I am at on the chemical scale. I think at least half the time I’m at Level 2, usually feeling sad and depressed about Dave’s possible impending death. If I am at Level 2, What I usually do to fight back is to say what I wrote above about getting hence, then I strike my yoga warrior pose, then I either go cuddle with my kids and read a picture book from my basket of favorite picture books, go jump on my mini-trampoline for 10 minutes, or I go look at a picture of my family with 5 generations including me, my baby, my mom, and my grandma and great grandma. It reminds me of the chain of life we’re in and that families are eternal. That I am part of something bigger than me that lasts longer than this life. Then I look at the family picture of our family taken a year ago. We all look so happy! After I look at these pictures, then I sit down and play the piano till I don’t don’t feel sad anymore.

 

I am realizing now that I used to medicate my feelings of fear and stress in Level 2 moments like this, with food, especially sugar. It’s really hard, but I don’t do that anymore. I was driving from Matthew’s piano lesson the other day. It was rainy and gloomy. I sooo wanted to stop at Krispy Kreme and get some donuts to bring home to lighten the mood! I was thinking, it’s not an official goal to be off sugar. I can have a donut. I started to turn in that direction of the store. I don’t know what exactly happened, I think angels came and took over the driving because I ended up at my house. It was God’s grace that saved me in that moment.

 

I’ve been thinking about what generates Mother Bear Chemistry for me. I’ve been thinking about it all week. I’ve been thinking about the lady in my ward who brought over all that sugar a few weeks ago. That definitely brings it up for me. I know she meant no harm, she actually thought she was doing a kind thing. I am not feeling mother bearish towards her so much as I feel mother bearish about the culture that has created such a cheap, non-nutritious, addictive substance that attacks everyone from the cradle, actually, even the womb, to the rest home.

 

Another scenario that brings it up for me is thinking about my brother, Ryan. He is fighting for his life against his porn addiction. He got exposed at a friend’s house when he was 10 on a sleepover and he’s been addicted ever since. Now he’s 24 with a wife and two kids. His poor wife has a shell for a husband. I think about the devil sitting on top of a computer, stealthily throwing darts at him when he was this innocent 10 year old, and it sure brings up the MBC for me! He was such a cute, loving kid and now he’s a shell of a man, or shall I say, a shell of a boy, in a man’s body. The devil ensnared him in bondage before he even had a chance to grow up. Grrr!!! I found this scripture just the other day. It shows that Thou, God, knew that satan would be getting people into chains of bondage. Thou showed a vision to Enoch about it. This is the scripture, it’s Moses 7:26:  “And he beheld Satan; and he had a great chain in his hand, and it veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness; and he looked up and laughed, and his angels rejoiced.” Knowing that satan laughs at us when he has my brother in the chain of pornography, and me in the chains of my self-defeating behaviors, like emotional eating of sugar, makes me so mad! I just want to go chew something raw and then go fight for my life! I love a good fight and I am never going down! I am like a dog who won’t ever let go his bone!

 

Last night, it happened again. I dreamt for the 4th time this month that I gave birth to a baby girl. OK God, I get the picture! You want me to have a baby! But do you really want me to have another one with cancer going on in Dave’s body and death in his near future? Please help me to have the courage to pray about it. I feel so confused.

 

Love,

Kate

Here’s Dates with God, Chapter 4: Part 2, Jill’s Letter #4, in which Jill adequately avoids the appraising eyebrows, while in Costco, of her former-best-friend-cheerleader-from-high-school whom she hasn’t seen in years. 

Jill #4

 

Dear God,

 

What technique did the enemy use on me to get me to lose my most recent difficult battle? It’s a long story. Here goes. I had to do errands and that took much longer that I had planned. First off, I had to go to the dry cleaners, then the bank, then Walmart, then Costco, with three little kids in tow. My worst nightmare happened while shopping when I happened to see one of my high school cheerleader friends far away across the store. Thank you God for letting me see her first before she saw me! It was Cami Knight. Aargh! I totally did not want her to see me. How could I avoid her? I have gained about 20 pounds since I last saw her. I felt totally frumpy with my t-shirt and sweats on and no makeup and two months of roots showing. Lacy had some holey jeans on, Mackenzie’s hair wasn’t even combed because I had to get out the door at a certain time, and Tanner ‘s nose had been constantly running so he had some dried goobers I couldn’t get off because I was out of baby wipes and the tissues aren’t wet enough.

 

Before I could even think of an escape route, she turned and walked away. Whew! I was temporarily saved from the walking Facebook. By that I mean she was social media before it ever was. Always talking to people, finding out what everybody was doing, who was dating who, who was crushing on who, sharing everybody’s news with everyone and then asking you how you felt about the news and broadcasting how you and she felt about everything. Her super high energy and ambition allowed her to become yearbook editor on top of being cheerleader so she strategically posted as many selfies in the yearbook as she could before selfies were even a name. It has been about 10 years since I have seen her. Hmmm…I couldn’t help but notice that she had obviously had some plastic surgery help with her breasts. I couldn’t tell if she still had a thigh gap because she was wearing a skirt. That was something we talked about all the time back then. Wow, I don’t even care about such things now.

 

We haven’t talked in years. I lost track of her after I got married way before she did and started having kids. It’s funny how marriage and having kids changes who your friends are. She had stayed single for a long time, then got married, and had two kids, very widely-spaced apart. Just from seeing her Facebook posts, I could tell we live in extremely different worlds.   I was in no mood to connect with her and feel such appraising, glamorous eyes on me. I was not ready for the “judging by the raised eyebrows” look. She was my best friend in high school, so I remember those looks. We did cheerleading together. As I was contemplating my not-fit-to-be-seen-by-Cami appearance I asked myself what emotions was I feeling?

 

Definitely stress, fear, and feeling ugly and fat on top of those. Not to mention feeling inadequate and unworthy. All the feelings from high school came back to me. Knowing I would see Cami’s judging eyes every morning was a huge motivation to spend every penny of money I earned at McDonalds on brand-name clothes. Cami was the best-dressed girl in the school, and as I got more and more brand name clothes, I gradually felt my approval rating with her rise until I reached the rank of “Cami’s best friend.” After having all these high school memories come back, I recorded my feelings as notes on my smartphone. I headed to the produce section. Surely Cami wouldn’t be buying any broccoli. She never ate anything remotely healthy. Lunch for her was a bag of M & M’s and a diet Pepsi. I peered cautiously around the corner to see if the coast was clear, then proceeded to the apples. I was getting some when I saw her coming out of the corner of my eye. I retreated with the adrenaline racing to the baby clothes section. Cami always said she was only having 2 kids, and I knew from Facebook that her youngest was 7. So it was a fat chance she’d be looking for baby stuff. I spent the next hour dodging her. I felt my heart racing the whole time. Every ten minutes my phone alarm went off and I recorded the increasing buildup of feelings. Finally, as I was hiding behind a display of Hello Kitty umbrellas, I saw her leave. Whew!

 

Later in the day I lost my battle with getting a dinner on time. I actually did the Lost Battle Analysis and traced the roots of the lost battle to the Cami sighting. After I got home, the older kids were home from school. Usually I try to be home when they get there but my Cami avoidance cost me an extra hour. After I greeted them and saw them getting their snacks and into homework I settled into Facebook. I put my phone by  me with the timer set right by me so I could come off after an hour and meet my Girl Goal. The first thing I did was change my Facebook profile picture and cover photo to something more showy. Then I posted 10 links to tutorials on 3 of my blogs: my fashion blog, my princess hairstyles blog, and my home decorating blog. I noticed the ads on my blogs were showing products for Zendo company. Lauren had told me she doesn’t like any ads from Zendo because they use child slave labor in Cambodia. I had been meaning to do something about that so I attempted to get online help from the customer service people of my blogging network. I couldn’t get any immediate response so I decided to call. While was on hold waiting for someone, I took a peek at Cami’s Facebook page. She had pictures of her latest cruise to Kokomo, then before that she had pictures of her new mansion.

 

Then Taylor came to me and asked where his poster and paints were. “What?!?!” I asked  Aack! I was supposed to pick up black poster board plus neon paints for his homework while I was out doing errands. I had completely forgotten all about that! Because I had promised him that I would do it today, and had forgotten, I felt like such a dingbat/dirtbag. His project was due tomorrow! I had already put him off getting the stuff all week. It wasn’t his fault that the deadline was tomorrow, he really hadn’t been procrastinating. It was me! I couldn’t take him after dinner because he was going to a Jazz basketball game with his Jr. Jazz team, which he had been looking forward to all season. He had a small window of time to create his timeline of ancient Egypt. So we went to Target and then it was after 6 when we headed home. I was sooo hungry so I picked up some Burger King on the way.

 

It was only after I woke up the next morning that I realized that dinner last night was the third night this  week of non-home-cooked dinners. Noooooo!!!! I had used up my two nights a week of restaurant food so I missed at my goal of doing a made-from-scratch dinner 5 nights a week. WAAAHHH! I am so tired of losing.

 

I am writing this Lost Battle Analysis now, before I forget any more details.

 

Q5 “Where and when were you when you said forget it?”

I didn’t really say forget it when I went through the drive-thru, but that is the action that shows that I lost. I’m still figuring this one out. It was at the drive-thru when I got the food that sealed the fact that I did not serve home-cooked food for my family that night.

 

Q4 “Where and when were you when you had a stupid conversation?”

Hmmm…I am having a hard time identifying that. I don’t think I had one. I just decided to get the food. There wasn’t any stupid conversation. Maybe that’s my problem. Half the time I can’t tell.

 

Q3 “Where and when were you when you had the first thought of temptation.”

I was in the intersection at the car wash and thought, I am so hungry! The kids are going to be whining at me when I get home or into the candy. I’ve got to stop and get something so we can eat as soon as we get home.

 

Q2 “Where and when were you when you had the build-up of negative feelings?” That one is easy. It was at Walmart fleeing Cami.

 

Q1 “Where and when were you when you had the first chemical spill?” Hmmm. That one is hard. I learned in class that if you can’t easily find an answer for this one, ask yourself “When was the last time you were at a Level Zero?”

 

Hmmm…that is a tough one. Maybe it was as long ago as over a week ago. First off, it was my 40th birthday over a week ago. I had hoped that

to be continued! Come back tomorrow for Chapter 4, part 3, Kate’s Letter #4.

I have some catching up to do with posting this week’s installments of my new book, Dates with God. Here is Chapter 4, Part 1: Emma’s Letter #4, in which Emma gives gets a blow from her mother-in-law’s sugar artistry.

Emma Week #4

 

Dear God,

 

It’s getting harder to keep to my only 3 sugar treats a week goal. I have lost nearly every week on it. It doesn’t help that my husband’s mother is the Rachael Ray of cupcakes. She treats them like an artist’s canvas. Last night she feted Clark to a birthday dinner. She had 4 dozen cupcakes of various colors, flavors, and every imaginable Pixar character featured in frosting, surrounding a centerpiece made of a chocolate caramel 3-tiered cake that would make any foodie envious. Let’s just say I am glad she doesn’t know anything about food blogs, or she would have had even more of a sensational masterpiece. It’s all old school for her, with her piles of Better Homes and Gardens and Housekeeping that she refuses to throw away because they give her so much inspiration. She also had 4 different flavors of ice cream, and a Baskin Robbins assortment of toppings. I had been planning all day to cash in on my last day of having treats this week. I count a treat as one nice generous bowl of 3 scoops of ice cream or one huge slice of cake or 3 cupcakes since cupcakes are little. I had already had two treats this week so the treat I had at the party would be the last for the week.

 

We had tons of leftovers, so Clark brought it all home, of course. I never make stuff like this for him, and it’s all love incarnate from his mom. He put the cupcakes on the counter and the ice cream away when we got home, after 10 PM. So in the morning when I went into the kitchen, I so wanted to just serve it all for breakfast. But I was good, I had enjoyed it last night and I knew that I remain rational when I eat sugary treats on a full stomach, but if I eat any on an empty stomach, that just makes me want more and more to satisfy myself. I quickly got rid of the food porn by burying it all in the fridge, for Clark to unearth on his own. I had to package it up first of course and that was dangerous. I kept getting frosting on my fingers and had to be on my toes to remember not to lick my fingers. Instead, I had to keep rinsing them off. When I went to the fridge I had to hide it all behind the cabbage and the bean sprouts. Then I tried to forget it was all there, all day, calling to me. Pure torture!!!!

 

Everything went well until I had to pick up my kids and my friend Danielle’s kids from the homeschool art class. I agreed to babysit the kids while she got her hair done. We came home and discovered we were locked out! I had to send Christopher to a back window to see if he could crawl through an open window after popping out the screen.  It took 45 minutes because a Curious George book was stuck upright right against the glass of the small window in the laundry room. That made it so we couldn’t slide the window. We had to bang the book down and then the window was really sticky and didn’t glide easily.

 

By the time everyone was gathered inside we were all tired, grumpy, and hungry. Those cupcakes were calling me by name! I had been off sugar for 3 days and my body was screaming for it. One of the ladies in class last week said that that is common when you go off sugar, to feel cravings. She said that it’s the yeast in my body dying off and fighting death by begging for more sugar to keep them alive. In addition to my yeast clamoring to be fed, the kids were yelling too. It would be so much easier to just place a platter of cupcakes in front of them than to actually make something healthy, I thought. So I caved in.

 

As I watched the kids devour them, I felt so left out and envious. Then I thought, Well, you’re only on Day 3, and those look so good. It doesn’t really matter, you can eat them. You aren’t a bad person for eating sugar. You can start over tomorrow. And you will be less likely to lose your temper at the kids when you don’t feel deprived and left out. So I gave in, and ate one. Then I ate another, and another. They did taste good, but then I felt totally gross the rest of the evening. First I felt hot and spacey with my increased blood sugar, and then after the blood sugar crash I felt groggy as I slogged through making dinner and doing evening chores and getting the kids to bed.

 

Here is my lost battle analysis.

 

Q5

Where and when was I when I said “forget it”?

At the kitchen table staring at the cupcakes on the table, yesterday around 4:15, and then deciding to eat them.

 

Q4

Where and when was I when I had the stupid conversation?

Hmmm…well, it’s what I just wrote about above. I guess that wasn’t really me having those thoughts. It was satan whispering them to me.

 

Q3

Where and when was I when I felt the Dude Moment?

Yesterday at the kitchen table when I thought, Just eat those cupcakes. They will taste so good and you won’t have to fix anything else. Yes, that was definitely a lie. Because after I ate them I felt such a sugar crash that I definitely needed some protein and fat for dinner to balance the carbs out. Another lie was that eating the cupcakes would make me less likely to get angry at them. I actually lost my temper with my kids because I had eaten the cupcakes. They made me feel less patient.  Another lie that was part of the Dude Moment was “It’s easier to just give them the cupcakes then to fix something healthy.” It was easier at first, true, but in the end it wasn’t easier because the kids got more grouchy after eating pure white sugar and I had to referee bad behavior and arguments among the kids as I fixed dinner.

 

Q2

Where and when was I when if felt the build-up of negative feelings?

I was going to say it was after the art class when we were stuck outside and we had to work to get the window open. But after thinking more about it I realize it was actually all day and it started the night before at the birthday party with me eating the allowed treat and then feeling lousy about it when I went to bed because even though I ate what was allowed by my written goal, I ate past the point of being pleasantly full. I also had a lot of feelings of annoyance from my mother-in-law building up inside me during the party as well. She can be such an approval suck that it drives me crazy! Those carried over into the next day.

 

Q1

Where and when was I when I had the beginning of a negative chemical spill?

It was definitely at the birthday party. Clark and I had an argument on the way over to the party and then his mom was in such an obnoxiously cheerful mood that I felt slightly bugged for the rest of the evening.

 

What could I do differently if I replayed the event over again?

 

As I think about it, those cupcakes weren’t that good. Frankly, I’ve had more enjoyment from my chewy, fudgy brownies that I make from scratch. Next time I am going to a party or event where I am planning on allowing myself a treat, I am going to bring a treat that I make myself, like my brownies. Those brownies don’t give me as high of a sugar rush and crash because of the whole, natural, fat and sweetener in them. Then, I am also going to ask Clark to keep the sugar at his office and share the poison over there for people who aren’t as sensitive to sugar as I am. I realize that for some people, it really doesn’t affect them. Not everyone is sensitive to it as I am. Some people can eat a little bit and then stop and it’s no big deal, like Clark. Not me. If I eat it, I want more and more. I don’t want to leave it alone! It’s time that I just don’t let it into the house. I am not going to bring temptations like that into my house again!

 

Heavenly Father, I thank Thee for this lost battle. I thank Thee for the time and skills Thou hast blessed me with that allow me to do these Lost Battle Analyses. I thank Thee that I am learning to be grateful for my failures so I can be thankful in all things. I am learning so much!

 

I noticed a chemical shift just the other day that really got me spinning. I was listening to a radio show on marriage while driving. One of the callers said her marriage was so wonderful, that even if she had to live in a shack with a dirt floor and a palm tree roof, she would be happy, as long as she could be with her sweetie-pie husband. When I heard that I wanted to gag. I felt annoyed at how people talk so cloyingly sweet about their marriages like that. I felt sad and mad and frustrated that I can’t say the same thing about Clark. It takes more than love to be happy! It takes more than just being married to be happy. I wish I knew how I could be happy, regardless of what he does or how much money he makes.

 

Speaking of money, I have been learning more about being frugal. This stuff takes me back to days with Grandma. She was quite the frugal queen. My friend Jana gave me some books about frugal living and shared with me her blog. OK, God, I can handle certain things, like recycling Ziploc bags and using coupons. But, dear God, I really wish my husband brought more money in because some of this frugal stuff is just ridiculous. Jana has a bunch of zealous frugal tips that make me laugh. I just can’t quite bring myself to do all the stuff she does. Like going to the cemetery the day after Memorial Day to gather up leftover flowers so she can transplant them in her front yard and dry the rest and decorate her house with them. Or asking to have heavy-duty plastic plates at the end of a dinner party so she can take them home and wash them and reuse them. Or dumpster diving. Or spend four hours every Saturday morning to hit all the garage sales in town. Can I just be done with being poor?

 

Love,

Emma

 

So today I was going to work on the rosters for our commonwealth school, as I am the registrar, but my husband took the forms with him to do work on the file at his office, since he is the treasurer. So while I was waiting to get the paperwork back, I had fun cleaning out my closet. My R.M. son was making Navajo tacos with his younger brother for dinner so I luxuriated in having this free time. I have had this project on my list all summer, and today seemed the best day to do it, since I have lost 56 lbs! I have gone from a tight size 18-comfortable-20-very-loose-22, to a size 10 in 5 months! I asked my teen daughter, who is home on her college break, to help “hold my hand” emotionally as I let go of all these old clothes that were large and extra large. I now wear small to medium sized clothes. It was hard to let go of some these clothes, I tell you! I feel more vulnerable and insecure than ever, thinking, but wait, what if I want that back? What if I miss it? My daughter kept telling me, “Let it go, something better will come in its place.” 

We had fun trying on my wedding gown, from 24 years ago, which we can both fit into (not at the same time, of course)! We had fun talking about her college roommates, her boyfriends, and Carol Tuttle’s Dressing Your Truth energy types. My daughter has told me that she thinks she is Type 4/1 and that I am a Type 1/4. I fought her on it for a while, thinking we both are primary Type 2s. But now I think that I put on a mask of Type 2 for most of my life because my mom is Type 2. I picked out Type 4 and 1 styles today. I am still getting the hang of how to pick the right colors of the types. I bought a hot pink skirt which I thought was Type 1 but dear daughter claims the hot pink is Type 3. Anyway, here’s a fun video of the how Type 4 and 1 go together. Sometime soon I will post my “D.I. haul” that I am not ashamed of. I found some majorly cute clothes today, and more are on the way, since I have created a huge vacuum. 

Back to school time means packing school lunches, even if you homeschool sometimes. Is raw milk something to include in “school lunch” (homeschool lunch or away from home lunch)? What are the secrets of nutrition of raw milk? Watch this video and learn.