At work we often have little seminars and sessions. An email came in today regarding one, that I laughed about. Tell me you don't see the irony in this?
Due to illness, the "Thriving In the New Year Presentation" is cancelled today.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Monday, January 28, 2008
A New Form of Sorrow
My wife just miscarried. I am experiencing a form of sorrow I have never experienced before. It's been a very long time since a family member passed away, and a few years since any friend passed away, too, so of late I've been quite sheltered from the realities of the end-point of life on this Earth. Even so, I consider myself not quite ignorant of the emotional experiences that one must experience when a loved one passes away.
But this is different. This is a sorrow bred of denial. I have been denied the opportunity to know this little person, to parent him or her. Lost are the opportunities that could have been, the experiences, the potential, the joys, and the sorrows. My family's future is suddenly and irrevocably changed from what I thought it might have been.
I have an intellectual understanding that miscarriages are nature's way of bringing forth only healthy babies. The nurse at the doctor's office called the miscarried fetus "tissue", as if to de-humanize what it was. She said the miscarriage happened because of "chromosomal" reasons. I get all this, but all this clinical understanding doesn't change the fact that this was a little baby, and it still hurts to lose it.
What my wife and I have discovered, being largely ignorant on this topic, is that miscarriages are incredibly common, with perhaps up to 30% of all conceptions being terminated prematurely in this way. It seems that everybody we speak with has had this experience before -- something comforting to discover, but it is odd to find out since nobody ever really talks about it. It is clear that there is a social stigma to this discussion and families often keep it private.
It hurts. It is sad. But we want another baby, so me and my wife will try again, and risk this again. Each one of our live children was worth this risk, and any future child will be, too. We'll make it through this, together.
But this is different. This is a sorrow bred of denial. I have been denied the opportunity to know this little person, to parent him or her. Lost are the opportunities that could have been, the experiences, the potential, the joys, and the sorrows. My family's future is suddenly and irrevocably changed from what I thought it might have been.
I have an intellectual understanding that miscarriages are nature's way of bringing forth only healthy babies. The nurse at the doctor's office called the miscarried fetus "tissue", as if to de-humanize what it was. She said the miscarriage happened because of "chromosomal" reasons. I get all this, but all this clinical understanding doesn't change the fact that this was a little baby, and it still hurts to lose it.
What my wife and I have discovered, being largely ignorant on this topic, is that miscarriages are incredibly common, with perhaps up to 30% of all conceptions being terminated prematurely in this way. It seems that everybody we speak with has had this experience before -- something comforting to discover, but it is odd to find out since nobody ever really talks about it. It is clear that there is a social stigma to this discussion and families often keep it private.
It hurts. It is sad. But we want another baby, so me and my wife will try again, and risk this again. Each one of our live children was worth this risk, and any future child will be, too. We'll make it through this, together.
A Downer Day
So yesterday was church. I got up at the usual time and went to my normal early Sunday meetings at 7 am. It was busy, and went well enough, but my family wasn't able to join me for sacrament meeting. My wife had a need to go to the sacrament meeting of the ward that meets before us, and choosing not to subject the children to two hours of sacrament meeting, she skipped ours and took the kids home for a few hours between the sacrament meeting she attended and the remainder of our own church meetings. Therefore, I ended up sitting alone during our own sacrament meeting while my family was at home. (Did you catch all that?) Normally, this would be a good thing as I can usually focus much better on the speakers when my kids aren't talking aloud and hopping on my lap. However, I just didn't really enjoy being alone yesterday.
So church proceeded as normal, and, again, it went well enough, but it just wasn't quite as nice as it usually is. Something just felt amiss. After church, I stayed around to help facilitate the bishop's interviews, as usual, and they, too, went well. They even ended early, so I was able to be home by 3:15 (remarkable!), just in time for my wife to leave to go back to church to lead choir practice. This put me on child watch. All things considered, it was a decent time -- my youngest was asleep and the older kids were well behaved. But again, things just felt off.
Then dinner came and went and our home teacher was supposed to come at 6. Before that, I got a call from the family I was to visit that night for home teaching and there was some drama going on there. After fighting that fire, I waited with my family, and waited, and our own home teacher never showed up. My own home teaching companion showed up at 7:15 (he was supposed to be there at 7) and so I left and went to my home teaching appointment.
Again, this appointment went well enough, but fifteen minutes into it, my wife called and told me that the prophet, President Gordon B. Hinckley, had just died a few hours before. It was sad news. We had a good discussion after that about succession in the presidency of the church, and we wrapped it up. It wasn't a great visit, but good enough.
So we then went to our second appointment and sat down to visit with that family. We had a good visit there, and shared a lesson about how to feel more comfortable at church. Since this particular family doesn't attend church, it was an honest and frank discussion, and I think they just might come next Sunday. I'll fall out of my chair if they do, but I've vowed to never give up on them.
Anyway, so after that, my home teaching companion took me home. My wife called when we were half-way home, and I decided not to answer my cell phone since I was going to be there in a minute or two, anyway. Well, I went into my house and my wife was sitting on the couch. She told me to be fast and to go get my home teaching companion, but he had already driven away. So, what was up?
My wife is pregnant. Well, she might be pregnant. We've kept it somewhat quiet, but chose to announce it a few weeks ago since we were confident the pregnancy was going to take (history was on our side!). She is over ten weeks along in her pregnancy, and for some reason she was bleeding last night. When she told me, my stomach sank. The pregnancy and birth of our previous three children went so very well that we often call them "textbook" pregnancies. This was something new. She had never bled during her pregnancies before, so immediately we concluded she might be miscarrying.
We called a friend from up the street to come down and to help me give her a blessing. He came over and we did so, but for some reason it just didn't feel very comforting. The balance of our evening found us trying and failing to distract ourselves from the fears in our minds. Going to bed, neither of us slept well, and I just kept having nightmares about her losing the baby.
This morning, her bleeding continued to get a little worse. She called the nurse at the doctor's office to ask some advice, and they put her off for two hours before calling her back. (They were busy, I guess, but still ... my wife might be losing our baby!!) She's been discharging not just blood but some other substances, too. It seems evident that she has indeed miscarried the baby.
We had an ultrasound already scheduled for tomorrow, and after finally talking with the nurse, who had consulted with the doctor, we've been instructed to keep her flat and hydrated, and to wait for tomorrow's appointment rather than going in to see the doctor today. Apparently, there wouldn't be anything they could do, anyway. Tomorrow's ultrasound will be either extremely wonderful or extremely horrible; it all depends on if we hear a heartbeat.
Now, I know that miscarriages are perfectly normal. They are nature's way of ensuring that only mostly healthy children are born. Nevertheless, we tried so very hard for this baby (it took us a year and a half to conceive) and we were so excited when everything finally "came together." It's a double-whammy since we were so confident that things were going well. My wife has never miscarried before, and never had any issues other than the usual morning sickness and dietary changes forced on her by the baby.
So now until at least tomorrow, we have a constant fear. It's looking quite likely she has miscarried. If so, we get the lovely opportunity to tell everybody what has happened. While we're sure that informing all our friends and family (some of whom will probably read this soon ...) will elicit plenty of sympathy, it is telling our children that will be the hardest if the baby is, indeed, lost.
We don't need any calls right now -- we handle emotional trauma together, as a married couple, and we do just fine. Nevertheless, we won't ever turn down some prayers on our behalf. Indeed, this past day has been a downer.
So church proceeded as normal, and, again, it went well enough, but it just wasn't quite as nice as it usually is. Something just felt amiss. After church, I stayed around to help facilitate the bishop's interviews, as usual, and they, too, went well. They even ended early, so I was able to be home by 3:15 (remarkable!), just in time for my wife to leave to go back to church to lead choir practice. This put me on child watch. All things considered, it was a decent time -- my youngest was asleep and the older kids were well behaved. But again, things just felt off.
Then dinner came and went and our home teacher was supposed to come at 6. Before that, I got a call from the family I was to visit that night for home teaching and there was some drama going on there. After fighting that fire, I waited with my family, and waited, and our own home teacher never showed up. My own home teaching companion showed up at 7:15 (he was supposed to be there at 7) and so I left and went to my home teaching appointment.
Again, this appointment went well enough, but fifteen minutes into it, my wife called and told me that the prophet, President Gordon B. Hinckley, had just died a few hours before. It was sad news. We had a good discussion after that about succession in the presidency of the church, and we wrapped it up. It wasn't a great visit, but good enough.
So we then went to our second appointment and sat down to visit with that family. We had a good visit there, and shared a lesson about how to feel more comfortable at church. Since this particular family doesn't attend church, it was an honest and frank discussion, and I think they just might come next Sunday. I'll fall out of my chair if they do, but I've vowed to never give up on them.
Anyway, so after that, my home teaching companion took me home. My wife called when we were half-way home, and I decided not to answer my cell phone since I was going to be there in a minute or two, anyway. Well, I went into my house and my wife was sitting on the couch. She told me to be fast and to go get my home teaching companion, but he had already driven away. So, what was up?
My wife is pregnant. Well, she might be pregnant. We've kept it somewhat quiet, but chose to announce it a few weeks ago since we were confident the pregnancy was going to take (history was on our side!). She is over ten weeks along in her pregnancy, and for some reason she was bleeding last night. When she told me, my stomach sank. The pregnancy and birth of our previous three children went so very well that we often call them "textbook" pregnancies. This was something new. She had never bled during her pregnancies before, so immediately we concluded she might be miscarrying.
We called a friend from up the street to come down and to help me give her a blessing. He came over and we did so, but for some reason it just didn't feel very comforting. The balance of our evening found us trying and failing to distract ourselves from the fears in our minds. Going to bed, neither of us slept well, and I just kept having nightmares about her losing the baby.
This morning, her bleeding continued to get a little worse. She called the nurse at the doctor's office to ask some advice, and they put her off for two hours before calling her back. (They were busy, I guess, but still ... my wife might be losing our baby!!) She's been discharging not just blood but some other substances, too. It seems evident that she has indeed miscarried the baby.
We had an ultrasound already scheduled for tomorrow, and after finally talking with the nurse, who had consulted with the doctor, we've been instructed to keep her flat and hydrated, and to wait for tomorrow's appointment rather than going in to see the doctor today. Apparently, there wouldn't be anything they could do, anyway. Tomorrow's ultrasound will be either extremely wonderful or extremely horrible; it all depends on if we hear a heartbeat.
Now, I know that miscarriages are perfectly normal. They are nature's way of ensuring that only mostly healthy children are born. Nevertheless, we tried so very hard for this baby (it took us a year and a half to conceive) and we were so excited when everything finally "came together." It's a double-whammy since we were so confident that things were going well. My wife has never miscarried before, and never had any issues other than the usual morning sickness and dietary changes forced on her by the baby.
So now until at least tomorrow, we have a constant fear. It's looking quite likely she has miscarried. If so, we get the lovely opportunity to tell everybody what has happened. While we're sure that informing all our friends and family (some of whom will probably read this soon ...) will elicit plenty of sympathy, it is telling our children that will be the hardest if the baby is, indeed, lost.
We don't need any calls right now -- we handle emotional trauma together, as a married couple, and we do just fine. Nevertheless, we won't ever turn down some prayers on our behalf. Indeed, this past day has been a downer.
A New Disease
There's a disease out there. It's terrible. It's everywhere, and most people don't even recognize it as a problem. My wife and I used to suffer from it until we were cured nine years ago. It's called "Nearby Family Syndrome" (NFS). It's a nasty disease that is caused by two things: close proximity to very social extended family members, and an inability to say "no".
It's pretty easy to recognize. Whenever you need time or attention from somebody to go home teaching, or to go visiting teaching, or to come over to dinner some night, or to come help with some event, service or otherwise; and the person chronically says they can't because of any variety of non-immediate-family obligation, it's very likely that that person is suffering from NFS.
Sometimes people don't even recognize that they have it. Everybody wants to be close to their families and, of course, the best way to do that is to spend time with them. This is natural, good, and encouraged. Nevertheless, when spending time with extended family begins to prevent you from doing your duty, from providng service, or from socializing with others on a casual basis, and even from spending some alone time with your own family, then something is clearly wrong.
Typically, NFS can be cured by addressing one of the two causes. You can move away or you can learn to say "no" to your own family. It is important for people to realize that they just don't have to go to every family dinner or get-together. Before moving, we often had a hard time saying no, and since we were cured by moving, we can more deliberately plan the events that we get together (and it takes a lot of planning ...). Ironically, we actually feel closer to our parents since we now call them every week, something we never did faithfully before we moved.
I am particularly frustrated by others who suffer from NFS around me. It's vexing when I get to the end of the month without being able to go home teaching because every night that I could go (of which there are many), the family couldn't receive us at their house because of NFS-induced conflicts.
So, if you are a victim of NFS, please address it immediately. While it may not cause suffering in your own personal life, consider the lives of others who may be experiencing secondary suffering, and do something about it! After all, NFS is a preventable and curable disease. We should all work tirelessly to combat it.
It's pretty easy to recognize. Whenever you need time or attention from somebody to go home teaching, or to go visiting teaching, or to come over to dinner some night, or to come help with some event, service or otherwise; and the person chronically says they can't because of any variety of non-immediate-family obligation, it's very likely that that person is suffering from NFS.
Sometimes people don't even recognize that they have it. Everybody wants to be close to their families and, of course, the best way to do that is to spend time with them. This is natural, good, and encouraged. Nevertheless, when spending time with extended family begins to prevent you from doing your duty, from providng service, or from socializing with others on a casual basis, and even from spending some alone time with your own family, then something is clearly wrong.
Typically, NFS can be cured by addressing one of the two causes. You can move away or you can learn to say "no" to your own family. It is important for people to realize that they just don't have to go to every family dinner or get-together. Before moving, we often had a hard time saying no, and since we were cured by moving, we can more deliberately plan the events that we get together (and it takes a lot of planning ...). Ironically, we actually feel closer to our parents since we now call them every week, something we never did faithfully before we moved.
I am particularly frustrated by others who suffer from NFS around me. It's vexing when I get to the end of the month without being able to go home teaching because every night that I could go (of which there are many), the family couldn't receive us at their house because of NFS-induced conflicts.
So, if you are a victim of NFS, please address it immediately. While it may not cause suffering in your own personal life, consider the lives of others who may be experiencing secondary suffering, and do something about it! After all, NFS is a preventable and curable disease. We should all work tirelessly to combat it.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Cinnamon Rolls
This afternoon after the Family History fair, my wife was panicky because my oldest son's basketball pictures were an hour earlier than she expected. As it turned out, she was halfway through making cinnamon rolls when she had to rush out the door. That left the remainder of the task to baking-challenged me and my six-year-old daughter. Well, I'm proud to report that we were up to the challenge. I read the instructions carefully (they were pretty good ones!) and we proceeded from one step to the next together. It was pretty fun spending this kind of time with my daughter. She usually is off in her own little world (as she is right now), so when we have quiet time alone, I'm not usually invited. It's weird, but true -- she's a very independent little girl that enjoys her solitude and her own imagination.
Nevertheless, we had a good time making the rolls. She enjoyed greasing the pans, mixing the sugar and cinnamon, cutting the rolls, and helping me lay them in the pans. It was a good time. We're not awaiting the results, and when they're done baking, I'll get a picture and post it here ...
Okay, so they ended up a little crispy, but she and I both had one and we wouldn't turn down another one ...
Nevertheless, we had a good time making the rolls. She enjoyed greasing the pans, mixing the sugar and cinnamon, cutting the rolls, and helping me lay them in the pans. It was a good time. We're not awaiting the results, and when they're done baking, I'll get a picture and post it here ...
Okay, so they ended up a little crispy, but she and I both had one and we wouldn't turn down another one ...
Family History Fair
I attended a family history fair this morning learning about the new FamilySearch website. It's a wonderful new tool for members of the church (or family history volunteers in family history centers) to help people manage their ancestral information. It's intent is to help manage ordinance work being done in the temple to reduce duplication and to aid cooperative genealogical research. It also streamlines the process to submit names to the temple to have their temple ordinances performed.
It's awesome. Earlier this week, I went to the site and registered and immediately up popped on the screen my entire line up at least 8 generations. This new website will help me to go find out if that is really true. So far, I have barely scratched the surface of what's in there, so my problem is really going to be verification of the content and combining duplicate records.
It turns out that I am the beneficiary and unfortunate victim of being the descendent of very long lines of church members, many of whom were gung-ho about doing genealogical and temple work. What this means is that, as far as I can tell, "all" of the temple work for my ancestors has been done. Additional research of lines that have not been done will not be easy, as they are very far in the past or the records are not readily accessible, if they exist at all. Nevertheless, I'm doing my best, and will probably begin going "sideways" and "down" my family tree.
Last year, I actually pulled some bishop's records from a church in England to research a dead-end line on my family name. I found all sorts of interesting records, including one that gave the actual marriage date of my great, great, great grandfather, which, to my knowledge, nobody contemporary ever knew. However, when I went to look to see if the ordinances had been done for the people that I had "found", it turned out that the ordinances had already been done through the "extraction" program. Now I need to piece together the puzzle and make sure the temple work that's been done is comprehensive. It is a lot of fun to make these discoveries, but it is very frustrating to find that the temple work has already been done for these people, because I want to do it myself!
Ah, well, that's the breaks. I'm very excited to learn more about this website and to finally clean up my family history. It'll be a long road, but one that's worth it.
It's awesome. Earlier this week, I went to the site and registered and immediately up popped on the screen my entire line up at least 8 generations. This new website will help me to go find out if that is really true. So far, I have barely scratched the surface of what's in there, so my problem is really going to be verification of the content and combining duplicate records.
It turns out that I am the beneficiary and unfortunate victim of being the descendent of very long lines of church members, many of whom were gung-ho about doing genealogical and temple work. What this means is that, as far as I can tell, "all" of the temple work for my ancestors has been done. Additional research of lines that have not been done will not be easy, as they are very far in the past or the records are not readily accessible, if they exist at all. Nevertheless, I'm doing my best, and will probably begin going "sideways" and "down" my family tree.
Last year, I actually pulled some bishop's records from a church in England to research a dead-end line on my family name. I found all sorts of interesting records, including one that gave the actual marriage date of my great, great, great grandfather, which, to my knowledge, nobody contemporary ever knew. However, when I went to look to see if the ordinances had been done for the people that I had "found", it turned out that the ordinances had already been done through the "extraction" program. Now I need to piece together the puzzle and make sure the temple work that's been done is comprehensive. It is a lot of fun to make these discoveries, but it is very frustrating to find that the temple work has already been done for these people, because I want to do it myself!
Ah, well, that's the breaks. I'm very excited to learn more about this website and to finally clean up my family history. It'll be a long road, but one that's worth it.
Baptisms for the Dead
Last night I took my wife and we went to the temple. The occasion was a baptism for the dead excursion where three new members of the church were to go and perform temple service for the first time. Each of them are in their 20s, and newly married, so their spouses came with them. There were several other people from the ward who came with us, so we had a total of 15 people there.
We started the evening going out to eat. We went and enjoyed dinner at The Cheesecake Factory -- an overpriced restaurant, but one which, as far as we can tell, doesn't have a bad dish on their entire menu. We ate too much and were a bit uncomfortable the rest of the evening, but it was a very nice dinner. It was so stress free without the kids that we wondered why we hadn't taken a night out without them for over a month. We didn't have any good reason other than that we've been very busy.
In any case, after dinner we finished the trek to the temple and arrived right on time, as did everybody else. We went in and after having our temple recommends examined, went in and got changed into white clothing. The evening progressed with most people being baptized and confirmed for about fifteen people who have passed on to the other side. I spent nearly the whole evening recording the ordinances, a task I was comfortable with since actually performing the baptisms with the grown adults would have wreaked havoc on my bad back.
I did have the opportunity to perform a few confirmations at the end, and that was nice. I did not get into the water, just out of circumstance, but still felt quite content to have been there and had a role to play in helping these people on the other side receive these saving ordinances.
We arrived home late (okay, it was 10 pm) and my wife took the babysitter home (who babysat for free for us -- her parents "encouraged" her to do so, and we are grateful).
Altogether, it was a great evening. We are so grateful to be able to perform this type of service, and it was wonderful to be there with these fine young people who are just beginning a wonderful journey in life together, which hopefully will include many, many trips to the temple.
We started the evening going out to eat. We went and enjoyed dinner at The Cheesecake Factory -- an overpriced restaurant, but one which, as far as we can tell, doesn't have a bad dish on their entire menu. We ate too much and were a bit uncomfortable the rest of the evening, but it was a very nice dinner. It was so stress free without the kids that we wondered why we hadn't taken a night out without them for over a month. We didn't have any good reason other than that we've been very busy.
In any case, after dinner we finished the trek to the temple and arrived right on time, as did everybody else. We went in and after having our temple recommends examined, went in and got changed into white clothing. The evening progressed with most people being baptized and confirmed for about fifteen people who have passed on to the other side. I spent nearly the whole evening recording the ordinances, a task I was comfortable with since actually performing the baptisms with the grown adults would have wreaked havoc on my bad back.
I did have the opportunity to perform a few confirmations at the end, and that was nice. I did not get into the water, just out of circumstance, but still felt quite content to have been there and had a role to play in helping these people on the other side receive these saving ordinances.
We arrived home late (okay, it was 10 pm) and my wife took the babysitter home (who babysat for free for us -- her parents "encouraged" her to do so, and we are grateful).
Altogether, it was a great evening. We are so grateful to be able to perform this type of service, and it was wonderful to be there with these fine young people who are just beginning a wonderful journey in life together, which hopefully will include many, many trips to the temple.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
The Winds of Change ... on Mars
Wow, check out this picture. Click on it for a high-resolution version of it. It's part of an article that was released from my place of work.
This picture was taken by the spacecraft I work on, and this article heavily quotes a guy who sits less than 100 feet from me. With every new spacecraft we send to Mars, we seem to discover Mars all over again. Truly miraculous. Mars really is a whole world unto itself.
This picture was taken by the spacecraft I work on, and this article heavily quotes a guy who sits less than 100 feet from me. With every new spacecraft we send to Mars, we seem to discover Mars all over again. Truly miraculous. Mars really is a whole world unto itself.
It's Snowing!
It's snowing in the mountains right behind where I work! It's unbelievable. People have been complaining about the weather all morning. A guy I work with said it was sleeting when he came in this morning on his motorcycle. Crazy. It's been so cold around here that there's been major delays on some freeways, people are stranded in mountain villages, and accidents are beginning to pile up from the slippery roads. Oddly enough, at home (on the other side of the mountain range from where I work) we haven't dipped below freezing, as far as I can tell. Even so, it's pretty remarkable weather for sunny southern California!
This picture came from an article that talks about people getting stuck on the I-5 freeway heading north through Gorman. This is just north of where I live. It is up in the mountains and is the primary route to get from anywhere in L.A. to anywhere up north. Quite a mess!
This picture came from an article that talks about people getting stuck on the I-5 freeway heading north through Gorman. This is just north of where I live. It is up in the mountains and is the primary route to get from anywhere in L.A. to anywhere up north. Quite a mess!
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Sexist at Six
We were sitting at church today and my six-year-old daughter was sitting next to me. The opening hymn music began to play and one of my good friends -- a man -- got up to conduct the congregation in singing the hymn. My daughter leaned over and asked, "What is he doing up there?" I about burst out laughing.
You see, most of the music conductors in our church are female (okay, nearly all of them), so it would be only natural that she would have that response since she's never seen a male music conductor. Nevertheless, her question was such a surprise to me that I couldn't help myself, and I snickered.
To make matters worse, we were on the second row, about fifteen feet from him, and I'm certain he heard her. Throughout the meeting, he did a brave job of conducting, even though he often waved his arm in the air off-tune (is that the right word?) and didn't know the words to many of the songs. He clearly looked uncomfortable standing up there, being the center of attention.
Nevertheless, despite her question and my own little snicker, he is a good example of one who is willing to do his duty and try new things, and I'm grateful for him. I'm confident he'll eventually learn to conduct better. The better question is: can I teach my six-year-old to not be so sexist?!
You see, most of the music conductors in our church are female (okay, nearly all of them), so it would be only natural that she would have that response since she's never seen a male music conductor. Nevertheless, her question was such a surprise to me that I couldn't help myself, and I snickered.
To make matters worse, we were on the second row, about fifteen feet from him, and I'm certain he heard her. Throughout the meeting, he did a brave job of conducting, even though he often waved his arm in the air off-tune (is that the right word?) and didn't know the words to many of the songs. He clearly looked uncomfortable standing up there, being the center of attention.
Nevertheless, despite her question and my own little snicker, he is a good example of one who is willing to do his duty and try new things, and I'm grateful for him. I'm confident he'll eventually learn to conduct better. The better question is: can I teach my six-year-old to not be so sexist?!
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