Witness

In this room of hush and 

Holy, Holy, Holy

A life winds down

Wait. Breathe. Wait.

Quiet, the murmur of 

Voice in the next room

Wait. Breathe. Wait.

Witness to unspeakable 

Beauty

I am blessed to see

Her skin translucent clarity

Scaffolding of bone

More apparent than ever

Her breath, it rises and falls

As daughter 

Become midwife

To this tender end

Labors with tiny kisses

And gentlest caress

As mother had given

To infant daughter

Wait. Breathe. Wait.

Her body, true and faithful

To the end

This very end

Wait. Breathe. Wait.

Wrapped in deep peace

Peace, like a river

Like her life

Running through

The expectant hush of 

Christmas Eve long after

The guests have gone

Wait. Breathe. Wait.

DNA of all who came

Before her and the 

Traces of children

Whom she bore

Written, witnessed, locked

In the fleshy tables

Her slowing heart

Wait. Wait. Wait.

For my cousin as she

waits upon my beloved Aunt P

The evening before her

death at 3:47 am.

Preside Over

 So... 

I have been working like a crazy woman on, well, my crazy.

I got diagnosed as having ADHD a few years back, and it also became apparent that I have a crap-ton of PTSD and CPTSD. I have been seeing a psychiatrist about once a month, and a therapist for CBT, EMDR, and IFS modalities once to twice a week for a couple of years. Trauma Massage therapy from the most amazing woman ever- about once every two months.

Not a single mental health care provider has said anything about OCD or Religious Scrupulosity (a form of OCD) in all that time. And I have discussed that I have OCD in my close genetics with them, plus the Phychiatrist is literally treating one of my kids for OCD.

Last week in Marriage counseling the therapist casually mentioned the OCD/Religious Scrupulosity that it looks like I have. In the moment I clocked it and it set off alarm bells. I couldn't call it out in the moment because I couldn't even keep up with what was happening, but it made me feel dismissed and diminished. Like my questions aren't real. They just be more mental illness.

That night I emailed my therapist to ask if the marriage counselor was even qualified to diagnose OCD (she is) and if my therapist thought it was accurate. It isn't. and also maybe it isn't appropriate to casually toss that crap in during marriage counseling. It could be weaponized against me by my husband. Most assuredly it feels like a weapon in the hands of the marriage counselor. Like, it gives me a sense of how she hears me and my concerns as a pathology.

Not a fan of that.

I saw a reel this morning about how undiagnosed neurodivergent kids who are raised in strict religions often pick up a good dose of religious trauma. Uhhhh... yeah. That Venn diagram is pretty much a circle. I left the church around age 15-16 and came back after an "Alma the Younger" experience at 27. Served a mish, got married in the Temple and had four kids in quick succession after that. 

Caught right now between spiritual experiences I cannot (also don't WANT to) deny, and my brain which insists on deconstructing the heck out of everything it encounters.

Started with going to see an LDS therapist once I realized what I was experiencing were panic attacks. During the work I did with that therapist it became clear that, while triggered by ice, snowy or muddy roads, it had it's roots in the disaster of a first marriage in my 20's. Also, I NEEDED to start talking about some of the problems I was beginning to experience going to the temple, and my inability to square some of the things I was experiencing with what I believed about my eternal worth. Like, where is Heavenly Mother and am I actually a 2nd class child of God? Was She a second class God? What's going on? LDS therapist pretty much fired me on the spot. Kindly. By saying well, I guess you're all healed now! Good luck!

Turns out that my faith in God is inextricably wound together with healing my trauma, both the PTSD and CPTSD kind.

So the question of Mother is something that MUST be addressed. Misogyny in the church, baked into the DOCTRINE cannot just sit there. How much and how literally can I take the "doctrine" that is offered? Like, make D&C 132 make any kind of sense when placed next to the Book of Mormon? 

What about the assertions of the Proclamation on the Family? Polygamy just in general? The fact that every woman could leave the church and it would still roll on JUST FINE for at least a generation.

During the sacrament on Sunday I was pondering these things. It came to me, that in the same way that it was not Adams place to make the decision to partake of the Fruit in the Garden, it is not any of his son's place to restore the knowledge of Mother. Adam was in perfect balance in the Garden, or at least it seemed like he was. He had his job of naming animals that he'd been given and he was busy doing so. Eve, however, who had never been commanded by God to not partake, was unable to keep the commandment to "multiply and replenish the earth" that both she and Adam had been given. She was NOT in balance. And frankly, neither was Adam, he just wasn't feeling it yet. After all, he was also given that commandment that he couldn't keep while dwelling in the Terrestrial World of the Garden. Same as Eve.

Here we are, and the church of Jesus Christ has been fully restored and the men are perfectly balanced and happy. They aren't looking. They have everything they need. Except Mother. They don't have Mother OR a fully restored Priestess-hood. But they aren't feeling the lack yet. 

But.

It isn't their job to restore Her any more than it was within Adam's job description to partake of the fruit and initiate the Fall. It was Eve's.

I am worried that Her restoration, at the hands of a Prophetess would destroy this church that I love. Everything has literally been set up in such a way that our theology it cannot allow for any sort of authority from women. Not actual authority. 

Mother, as half of Elohim along with Father has Authority... even Authority over men. The ONLY authority that a female has over a man that cannot be overridden by a higher male. 

Only wait. Father could override even Her decisions, I guess.

Maybe this fits right in. 

Depressingly, maybe there will be room because even with all Her Godhood, she can be reigned in by Heavenly Father, according to our Doctrine.

Crap.

Looking for My Mother

 Last Sunday during RS I had a thought. 

Preface this… I had listened to a podcast recently where two women were trying out the idea that the Holy Spirit was a female spirit… possibly Heavenly Mother. I thought this was interesting… but not possible. While I love the symmetry of the Father, the Mother and the Son, or even God (the Mother and the Father) and the Son and the Daughter… We actually know the HG is a male spirit. 

But then. Wait. How do we know that?

So when I got home I went digging first in the D&C, then the BoM and then, after not finding ANYTHING other than gender neutral references to the Holy Ghost… I went to the New Testament. There I DID, in fact find the Gospel of John refers to the holy ghost as “He.” 

OK…it’s the NT, and we don't actually think the thing was necessarily translated correctly. My heart dropped when I found that in Joseph Smith’s translation he left the He in there.

But then I was interested in the Greek that John had written his text in. Turns out…

This is Chat GPT's take on it. Yeah. I know… but I don't know enough Greek to translate it myself.

"Outside of John 14–16, there is no clear use of grammatically masculine language (e.g., pronouns like he/his) directly referring to the Holy Spirit in the Greek New Testament.

In most of the New Testament, neuter pronouns and forms are used for the Spirit, in keeping with the neuter noun πνεῦμα.

John is the only Gospel that intentionally uses masculine demonstratives (like ἐκεῖνος) to describe the Holy Spirit — likely to emphasize personhood, not biological gender.

English translations tend to carry over “he” across all references for consistency and theological reasons, even when the Greek doesn't."

Ok… so I then asked CGPT if there were any specific revelations or scripture in the LDS canon that explicitly state that the HG is male. 

Nope. It really looks like some assumptions may have been made by Joseph Smith and Co.

Why is such ungendered language used in ALL the scriptures? Like, I get the NT and BoM, But the D&C, where we have the Saviour speaking as Himself and for Himself throughout most of it? It was written in English, fairly modern English even. Written in legalese in places. WHY such ungendered terminology when it seems every possible loophole is closed in the D&C? 

Was this an assumption that the Lord just allowed to slide? Did He encourage the assumption that the Holy Spirit is male? What is going on here? 

Sure… there are a number of explanations for using ungendered language… but most of them challenge the idea that the HG is a male singular personage. Could the HG be a priesthood office? OK, if so, why not use “He/Him” in scripture even if it is an office acquitted by multiple priesthood holders? Perhaps it is a Priesthood office that male AND female spirits can hold? A different kind of priesthood, as we are assured repeatedly that The Priesthood is for men and will not ever be for women to hold. 

Yes, I am aware that Mormondom is rife with “He/Him” when referencing the HG… but since it is very possible, likely even, that JS had just ASSUMED based on the language of the translations of the NewTestament… it seems apparent that he never actually asked if that were the case.

But why does the Lord never use “He/Him”? Sure… the Lord never used “She/Her” either… is the HG an ungendered Spirit? Is this an example of non-binary in Heaven? If so… not too thrilled with THAT either. That would indicate that Female spirits are SO useless to God that they are entirely absent in our theology other than a vague, as yet undisputed, sorta encouraged, idea of a Heavenly Mother.

Assumptions on MY part, granted. But after a lifetime of assumptions of the lesser nature of women. The lesser nature of myself. After a lifetime of this I am kinda pissed. Also, I have a heart that HAS to consider the possibility that I am lesser. Because which is it..? That God is no respecter of persons… but SOME persons hold the priesthood and all the visible authority in the church, and that SOME persons do not. SOME persons are trophies to be collected via matrimony to bolster only SOME persons righteous fiefdoms in heaven. 

How is it that half of God's kingdom seems to be respected in terms of calling ALLLLLLL the shots, and having alllll the meaningful interaction with deity and half do not. 

I am not asking this of myself. I am no Prophetess…. But then. Kinda, there aren’t ANY Prophetesses according to the LDS church. But there IS a Heavenly Mother? Where is Her Priestesshood? Who attends Her? What would that even look like?

I know I am a Child of loving heavenly parents… but we seem to have the road map for men… but only kinda for women. We have Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost supposedly… Dudes. All parts of the Godhead. Dudes.

If gender is eternal and of eternal importance… who am I?

Who is SHE? Who is Mother? Please come out that I may worship you as well. Am I NOT supposed to worship Her? Am I NOT supposed to emulate Her? To want to be like Her? No? I am supposed to WANT to ONLY be like men? How? I am not a man.

I am also, not a defective man. Other than habits left from a lifetime of living in a Patriarchal society where I HAD to lean masculine or be rolled over, there really isn't much that IS masculine about me.

I am a woman. A female spirit with a female body.

My only takeaway from the search: I am a woman and I'm looking for my Mother.

Just Shy

 Eulogy (Just Shy)

just shy of a funeral for my boy

really, almost

      so close

so much blood

and pain

but we are planning a LIFE here

not a funeral

then why?

why do I breathe in grief

and every exhalation is

       heavy 

with bitter tears

my mouth stretched 

wide to ripping

behind frail hands

        covering 

airless screams

but we are planning a LIFE here

not a funeral

then why?

why do I hear a dirge 

and a keening ululation 

echoing in my newly

      emptied

eviscerated heart

as I lay to rest the boy 

that was before

      before

before he did THIS

selfishly I weep

as I bury that boy

the one who was

who came just shy

really, almost

      so close

so much blood

and pain

and then I turn to embrace

this stranger 

   with his face

with the path

this LIFE before him

that I never dreamed 

or imagined 

or wished

O, God

O, angels attend

as I bury my sweet boy

who is gone

there is room for his lifeless body 

here, in my heart

so much room now

and I then will turn to my son

who is left

who is living

scarred and scared

but alive

We are planning a LIFE here

not a funeral

Stuff

 It's pretty great cruising through the old posts of this blog. So much of the childhoods of my kids. Some of whom are not kids anymore.

My darling Birdie is "Sister Chaos" now, serving a Mission and sharing the Gospel of Christ in Texas. She turns twenty in a few days.... and I will not be making her a cake or a trifle or a Pavlova or anything. For some reason this punctuates how "gone" she is, in a way that didn't even hit when we did this past Thanksgiving and  Christmas without her.  Not gonna lie, I'm a little desolate over it.

My LaLa girl will be an adult (18) two weeks later, and she is graduated from homeschool and working at Target. She drives herself to work and back and takes her little brother to the dollar store as Birdie used to do for her. She's looking at a digital media program at a college down south, and we'll see if either of us survives it come August. A nearly four hour drive away. We shall see.

Sweet Pearl has a drivers license and a FaceTime interview this evening at a local ice cream shop. It will likely be her second job, her first one having been a seasonal gig packing books for shipping over the holidays. She is super private and I'm not allowed to hear her play or sing or be privy to anything she has written, but she WILL watch coming-of-age shows on Netflix with me. Thank you, I'll take it.

Henry is as thirteen as thirteen years old can be. Dude. I'm 5'8" tall and he's several inches taller than I. His voice is already quite deep and yet is STILL cracking and changing daily. He codes and designs games and laughs at the kinds of things that adolescent boys find funny. I wouldn't say he's Beavis and Butthead level, but it IS a bit of a thing.... I'd say the 13 year old dude watchword is "Random" or maybe even "Silly," but I would not rule out "Gross."

I'm working on resurrecting myself here... I find that after 20 years of squashing myself to fit the needs of a growing family and get my day to days, and priorities taken care of, that I cannot recall some portions of "me." I'm betting that some are gone for good and "don't let the door hitcha on the butt on the way out," but some of who I am I think I really need back. I have a few years to track that woman down before a serious crash, but track her down I must.

Brain Death

 When I was a teenager and into my early twenties, I thought, for reals, that adults were numb. Numb to joy AND to pain, just sort of floating through their infinitely dull lives of banal nothing-burgers. I watched them for signs of life and judged them to be barely breathing.

Welp.

Here I am an adult, mom to three teenage girls and one dude who turns thirteen this December... I turn fifty-two in one week... and I think I might DIE of feeling, freaking EVERYTHING. I literally cannot drive alone down the street without having to either mop up the tears from my face to put everything back in order, or stuff down the expression of horror on my face. How on earth did I think the grown ups around me were on auto-pilot to brain death?! Possibly the boundless selfishness of youth?

I am heartbroken.

None of this is what I thought it would be. 

I can barely move, I hurt so much.

Hosanna!!!

Yesterday and today was the bi-annual General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. If it's your thing then you KNOW how amazing and satisfying the past few days have been... if not, then Imma keep that to myself... except. Just. Wow!

Hosanna!!

Also... a bunch of the young missionaries, as well as a married couple of the "senior" missionaries have all been sent home early from the mission fields. There are yet a few missionaries from our Ward stuck in the Ukraine and Peru, and some who are sheltering in place, but these Elders and Sisters who've been forced home have all come back in the past few weeks...

Usually we get to hear from each missionary upon their return, but Coronavirus. Today someone sent out a message on Facebook that we could all drive around the neighborhood honking and waving and calling out to the eight returned missionaries as they sat on their porch or stood in their yard. A time was chosen and signs of welcome and celebration were made with whatever paper or posterboard was on hand and the neighborhood lit UP!

Ya'll. It's almost ridiculous how much I needed that... to see and celebrate from a distance, the honking car horns and ringing bells and clamor of joy. My friends and neighbors and... everything we've been missing... y'know, from a distance!