Valentine’s Day: here we are writing love notes/smelling roses/eating candy and then we hear about another senseless school shooting. The news shakes us. It breaks us. It reminds us we are but dust, and to dust we shall return. Our parents, our friends, our children — dust.
We are so hungry for good news… and there is good news that comes to us on Ash Wednesday: God is with us in our pain. God loves us so much that he sent his son to live with and die for us. To save us from our brokenness. And if we dare to love others in the big way God loves us, we can begin to heal.
Happy New Year! As I write this, I’m hiding out in my bedroom while my husband entertains our 11-month-old. I have my laptop, my coffee, a cozy blanket and snuggly dog, and I’m feeling especially grateful to be indoors on this chilly day in the city. It’s heavenly.
It’s been pretty quiet on this blog the past few months. Jay and I are on the other side of a particularly difficult parenting season. To keep things simple and maintain my sanity, I gave myself permission to take a writing break both professionally and personally during that season. In doing this, I was reminded of a valuable lesson: Sometimes, the only way to find inner peace is to let go of the expectations you set for yourself.
I missed writing. I missed this space.
I often found myself composing blog posts during my commute home only to arrive at my doorstep with an overtired baby, overtired mind and daily chores to complete. Once I had a free moment to myself, choosing to consume content versus create it was the easier course of action. After a difficult string of sleepless nights, I was reminded of my therapist’s advice to be gentle with myself. I stopped feeling guilty about getting lost in a good story or scrolling through my phone and just enjoyed it—particularly season two of The Crown, this YA novel, this book, this podcast series and my fair share of Instagram stories.
In 2018, I want things to be different. I don’t want to stop reading and watching and listening and learning, but I do want to start creating and sharing more with all of you, friends. God has put a deep, burning desire to write on my heart–and I’m eager to lean into this passion and see where it leads me.
I won’t call this a resolution. By now, I know myself well enough to know I am not a resolution maker. (Frankly, the barrage of life and health and wellness challenges for the new year on social media this year is a bit overwhelming!) Instead, I’ll borrow from the yoga world, as I have done in the past years, and set an intention, a focus, going forward.
This my intention for 2018: to use this space and all the other channels available to me to tell my story, to create + connect with you. I intend to write and post more regularly, to not let fear, excuses, overwhelm and busy-ness get in the way of carving out a little space to reflect and share. The connect part is important to me too—this is my way to make my small corner of the Internet a more positive space, to find common ground with others, to keep in touch with friends, to inspire and encourage you on your journey. Speaking of which, I’ll start with some thoughts on the past year.
My year in review
For me, 2017 was a year of change marked by the highest highs and lowest lows I’ve ever felt. The biggest change? Becoming a mother, which involved learning to get comfortable with change and challenges as our son moved through various stages of infancy. He’s on his way to becoming a toddler right now and I am amazed by the growth that happened right before our eyes. It seems like just yesterday we were bringing Jack home from the hospital, and now he’s on the verge of taking his very first steps.
As for highs and lows, here’s my list . . .
Highs: Giving birth to my son, breastfeeding and nurturing him, watching him grow and hit major milestones, growing closer with husband and other family members through parenthood, reuniting and connecting with Valpo friends, witnessing our goddaughter grow older, sharing in our godson’s baptism, getting back into yoga, publishing a couple essays, leading Living Lutheran‘s first theme issue, writing about Millennials and the church, sharing stories through this blog.
Lows: Processing postpartum trauma, transitioning back to work after maternity leave riddled with anxiety/heartache/doubt, vacillating from worry to disgust with the current U.S. administration, feeling lonely in our new neighborhood, struggling to keep up with work and home, dealing with my own newfound forgetfulness, receiving rejection emails, sleep-deprivation, illness, grieving the loss of innocents to more mass shootings, grieving the loss of two beloved grandfathers.
Undoubtedly this was the most challenging year of my life and my marriage. And it was also the most rewarding. Becoming a mother opened my eyes to the simple beauty and wonder of childhood and the deep joy and love of parenthood. It also pushed me to build greater resilience and grit.
Although I was at best an intermittent church-goer, I continued to pursue my faith in other ways, through reading and listening to podcasts and praying. I’ve prayed a lot more since becoming parent, and I’ve found the simple word, “help,” (of Ann Lamott’s “Help. Thanks. Wow.“) to be my particular Hail Mary in times of stress.
Our family lost two incredible men of faith this year–my Grandpa Joe and Grandpa Richard. Grandpa Joe was the strong silent type, but he loved baseball, square dancing with grandma, tending to his garden and going to church. Grandpa Rich, too, was an avid church-goer and he sung in the choir. He was incredibly outgoing, a good listener and a diehard St. Louis Cardinals fan. Both were dedicated husbands, fathers and, first and foremost, Lutherans. I really miss them both, but know they’re smiling down on us from heaven.
All in all I’m deeply grateful for the rich blessings God has bestowed on our family this past year, especially the gift of our son. That God entrusted this little wonder to our care never ceases to amaze me. Just today I found myself changing the diaper of my wild baby who would prefer to be naked wistfully wondering when the “real” adult/parent would step in and rescue me. While washing my hands, I looked at myself in the mirror and remembered, “Oh yeah, that’s… me. I’m the parent. I get to deal with this poop on my son’s leg. On my own. (Also, when did I start looking so tired? Have I looked like this all year?)”
This may sound trite, but the poop, the tears, the sleepless nights, the dogged tiredness, the doubt, the forgetfulness, the frustration, the annoying pump sessions… they’re all worth it. All it takes is a giggle, a smile, a snuggle, a hug from my son and my heart just melts. This joy, this love, this wonder–I never knew life could feel so full of brightness until I became a mother.
And that is what I’ll take with me from 2017. I’m leaving behind all the other icky stuff (I know, there was a lot of it) and remembering this: 2017 was the year I became a mother. It was the year Jay and I received the greatest gift of all, our son.
credit: Resurrection Lutheran Church, Lakeview – Chicago
When our son was born in January, my husband and I, like many first-time parents, were so wrapped up in getting used to our new reality that we barely had time to eat or sleep or clean or think. Naturally many of our pre-baby commitments ended up tabled for a while – me, book club, my husband – lifting, both of us – church. Eventually he made it back to the gym, and although I still haven’t made it to book club I did make it out of the house (book club ladies, I’m coming back soon–I promise!). There were a few Sundays early on on which we tried our best to get back to church, but, alas, baby had other plans.
Days ran together in a haze of feedings, dirty diapers, dirty laundry, dirty dishes. Suddenly it was April, and looking at the calendar we realized that we’d nearly given up church–of all things–for Lent. Oops. That had not been our intention.
It was time to go back.
So two weekends ago when we approached the front doors of our church, a place that had once been so familiar but now felt a bit foreign, I was a little afraid of what to expect, namely, because I had an unpredictable infant to worry about, but also I worried I might not like it anymore after being gone for so long. My diaper bag slung over my shoulder, I followed my husband, who was carrying our son, up the stairs. I peeked over my shoulder across the street at the soccer players skittering back and forth, envious of their seemingly carefree morning. I stepped inside.
A familiar tune filled the familiar space, familiar faces, words of grace–all put my heart at ease and made me feel at home.
It was Palm Sunday, the day on which the church observes Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem the week before his crucifixion and resurrection. My congregation’s Palm Sunday practice is to process into the sanctuary while singing, palms in hand, imitating the crowds who rejoiced for Jesus years ago. We then read aloud the Passion story–full of drama, intrigue, betrayal, darkness–and remember Jesus’s great sacrifice for us, God’s beloved, broken people. This is how Holy Week begins.
This story is exactly what I needed to hear after such a long time away. It wasn’t the melodic hymns or the thoughtful prayers or the beautiful, homey space, it was hearing the Bible, getting uncomfortable, getting back to the basics of my faith–why we need Easter, why we need a Savior–that reminded me why my family makes church a priority. (To answer the former “why”: I know I mess up a lot and I can’t save myself, I am a broken person without Jesus and I desperately need God’s grace and forgiveness.)
The world, however, would have you believe that the road to Easter Sunday is paved with jelly beans, pastel-colored eggs and sunny spring outfits. If that’s your Easter–that’s OK, but sorry, it’s not the original Easter. The Easter story is *not* for the faint of heart.
I bought a children’s book for my son’s Easter basket, which was so aptly titled, “The Easter Story.” I read it to him the other night, the Passion story fresh in my mind from Palm Sunday. I kept commenting along the way, “Jack, they left out this part, that Jesus was betrayed–and we are all culpable.” (Pretty heavy stuff for an 11-week-old, I know.) And “Jack, the interesting thing here is that only the women who followed Jesus came to his tomb that day.”
Yes, there are so many details about Jesus’s death and resurrection that can’t be captured in a simple children’s book. We seek to shelter our children from the darkness, but the darkness–when the people demand Jesus’s crucifixion, for example–is an important part of the Easter story.
There’s no shortage of darkness in our world today. During these past few months, I did my best to take a break from the news and the worry it brings because I wanted to focus on bonding with my son. But leading up to Easter I could not ignore it. Recent events instilled in me a new, sharper (parental) anxiety about the future. I’ve been thinking about the Syrian man whose twins died after being gassed, the horrific terror attack on Palm Sunday in Egypt, the acts of terror and acts of war that persist in the U.S. and across the world today. We are all culpable, we are all victims. This is why we need a Savior. We need mercy. We need grace. We need healing.
Because I hadn’t been to church in so long, I’d forgotten this.
Back in church that Palm Sunday I let the words of the Passion story wash over me, the hymns of praise, the prayers of the people. I thought about how disconnected from my faith I had been this Lent, caught up in the day-to-day activities of life with a newborn. How that morning I had come to church a little afraid.
That morning, church started to fill up my empty tank. Hope–for something bigger than my small life, for divine intervention for a broken people, for a Savior–filled my heart.
It felt incredible to be welcomed home by our fellow members the last two Sundays. I am deeply grateful to belong to a church of open arms, love and no judgment. One of my favorite moments on our first Sunday back was bringing little Jack up to communion with us and watching our pastor as she made the sign of the cross on his forehead and blessed him.
Now Easter and Palm Sunday have since passed and for the majority of folks that means to back to “normal.” As for us, though life with a baby is never predictable, we’re attempting to find a new normal that includes more regular attendance at church each Sunday. One thing is certain: in this season my faith life has been reinvigorated and for that, I’m grateful.
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Have you ever lost your way from something that was important in your life? What brought you back?
Erin Strybis 