The miracle I never noticed

So the more I read and study and think, the more I realize that Jesus is the key.  He's the key to everything in Christianity, not that the rest of the Bible isn't interesting.  It gives context.  But the whole of the Bible, the whole reason for it's being is to point to Jesus.  Since I've come to realize this, I've started re-reading the gospels.  I want to refine my beliefs to what Jesus says.  Not the old testament covenant, not the writings of the apostles. Just Jesus.  All Jesus.  So that's where I'm focusing.

Now I've known the story of Jesus since I was a little girl.  I grew up in church and my parents read Bible stories to me from a very young age.  You would think that at mumble mumble years old I'd know it.  Right?  Yet I keep being surprised by the new things I realize each time I read the Bible, and to find something new in the gospels is really quite surprising to me.  After all, I know this story, I've heard it all my life.  But to read something and have it hit me with a new meaning gets me all excited, so I have to share.  So here it is:

Luke 19:30 - Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here.

Really?  There's something new here?  I've heard this, read this, and I thought internalized it's meaning YEARS ago.  But today I realized something.  What does it take to break a horse?  A lot of work, it's not a matter of just hopping on and riding, you have to teach a horse to let you ride.  And donkeys are WAY more stubborn than a horse, right?  So what does it take to get a donkey to let you ride it?

So here Jesus is, hopping on a donkey that's never been ridden before, and there's no mention of it bucking, running around, trying to throw him.  He doesn't just ride it a little either.  He rides it into town, in a crowd of cheering and screaming people, enough to startle the steadiest of beasts.  But it doesn't trample anyone, or try to run off.  It LET Jesus ride.  The very first time.  No other man could have done this, but Jesus wasn't just a man.  It just goes to show yet again, even a colt of a donkey knew that Jesus was special.

Distilled Christianity

So I have this philosophy about getting down to the roots of Christianity.  I'm trying to get rid of all the trappings, all the extra stuff that goes with the belief system that I follow, in order to understand what the core of Christianity really is.  A lot of folks don't understand why, they think I'm taking something away from their belief system, but it's not about that.

People have been muddling up God's creation from almost the very beginning. The first documented proof is Genesis 3:3 when Eve adds the "don't touch" to what God said about the tree they weren't supposed to eat. He didn't say anything about touching, or climbing or rolling around in the fruit of the tree of life.  Heck, according to the word of God, Eve could have picked great quantities of the fruit, made a body mask, and steeped herself in it. Not saying it would have been a good idea, but it would have followed the letter of the law.

Ever since then, people have been trying to put words in God's mouth. They add rules where no rules we given. Some of these rules might even have been good ideas in the beginning, I mean, if it helps you to resist temptation, then don't touch the fruit, just don't misrepresent the self made rules you live by, to God. And I make plenty of rules for myself, it's why I'm not on Facebook. I make rules for my life to help me follow the path I think I'm supposed to follow, but they're my rules, not to be attributed to God nor imposed on others.

The nature of religion is to add trappings, pomp, circumstance, to build an awe of not just God but all the things surrounding Him. I'm not sure why we do this, but I think it might be out of selfishness. By building awe around our belief system we build awe around ourselves. We self elevate, and that by itself is the purest nature of sin, putting self above God. In case you haven't figured it out, I don't really like religion.

I prefer to have a relationship with Jesus Christ. I believe God has had two contracts with humanity. The first, the contract of old testament, was based on rules and sacrifice. It lent itself to pomp and legalism. And it was impossible to live up to. The second contract between God and humanity is all about love and forgiveness. It's about Jesus's sacrifice and redemption of our sins instead of conviction for them. It's about accepting ourselves for who we are, knowing that we're loved by God DESPITE our fallen nature. So when it comes to core beliefs I throw out the old, after all, the real purpose of the old testament was to point toward Jesus coming. Instead I focus only on the words of Jesus, and make those the foundation of what I believe.

I'm not saying that's all I live by, after all I want to be the best me possible, but I need to distinguish between God's contract with all people, and the rules I have built for myself. My rules may help me to resist temptation, to overcome my specific struggles, but they are NOT to be imposed on other people. I try to judge myself conservatively, but be liberal in my acceptance of others.

You might think this a contradiction, but I see it as the example Jesus set for us. He was sinless, blameless, perfect; an example I can never live up to. But he associated with the worst of the worst, the poor, sick, prostitutes, the hated tax collectors, and he always dealt with them in love. The only time he showed anger was in fighting the trappings that had grown up around religion, and those who had instituted them.

So I look at the rules that I was taught growing up in church, many of them with their roots in the old testament. A lot of them are good ideas to aspire to, they may be a guide that helps me to live my life, but I have to be careful that it stops there and not let it color my opinions or acceptance of other people. I need to "live my best life" (thank you Oprah) but not impose it on other people.

101 ways my life is better now than 20 years ago (when I was younger and thinner)

Sometimes I need to take a moment or 20 to remind myself how much good is in my life now, and how even though I used to be young and thin things are still much, MUCH better now!

1.  I'm married to the most wonderful man in the world who keeps me sane and cleans house and cooks better than I do (seriously, he even makes pie crusts).
2.  I have the most amazing little girl who I love more than I ever imagined possible.
3.  I get to take bubble baths on a regular basis.
4.  I have a great big garden tub for taking bubble baths in.
5.  I have company for my bubble baths (which makes the garden tub even more important).
6.  I have some nice fluffy towels.
7.  And a stained glass window over the tub (I've totally wanted one of those for years).
8.  For that matter, I married a man with pretty stained glass in his coffee table and lamp.  I tell him I married him just so I could live with his coffee table.
9.  I have a smart phone, and it's red, and has games!
10.  I drive a car that I bought new, and it gets 42.6 MPG.
11.  I care about the gas consumption of my car.
12.  I know that my hair is curly, not just frizzy, and sometimes I know what to do with it.
13.  I have hair dye, and I'm not afraid to use it, in a variety of colors... some of them never occurred in nature.
14.  I only have one zit at the moment, and sometimes not even one, and I don't have that many wrinkles yet either.
15.  I've realized that I have pretty good eyebrows with very minimal (and not at all painful) maintenance.
16.  I know enough to get confused by the rule differences between college and pro football.
17.  I have really comfortable pajamas, with pockets!
18.  I know how to knit.  Not that I know everything about knitting, but I tried to learn three times, and failed the first two.
19.  I know how to sew well enough to make my own purse.
20.  I'm beginning to understand what colors look good on me, what a "soft summer" is, and that I don't look good in black.
21.  I have walls in my house that are different colors, and not a single one is off-white.
22.  I get along well with my mother despite her predilection for off-white walls.
23.  I have a really great duvet cover of good thick, heavy cloth that stands up really well to cat claws.
24.  I have several different kinds of ice cream in my freezer, and know of at least three kinds that are better than anything I had growing up.
25.  I have popsicles too.
26.  And Yorks.
27.  And dark chocolate M&M's (not in the freezer) which they didn't even make 20 years ago.
28.  I know what good grapefruit is, and that I can only get it at one time of year, and that time is now so I have a bag of it in my refrigerator.
29.  I have a job that is intellectually stimulating, but not all-consuming (so I still have time to knit and do laundry).
30.  I know several different salad recipes that I like well enough that I could easily eat salad every day.  I probably should eat salad every day, but that's another story.
31.  I live in a neighborhood with a pool, not that the pool's open most of the year or anything, but it's nice to have one in the summer when I remember to shave my legs.
32.  I know what ADD is, and how it affects my life, and some things that I can do to work with it, and sometimes how to medicate it.  That's a nice change of pace to just not understanding why I was so terrible at school.
33.  I have learned what to do to take care of my back so it doesn't hurt randomly.  Yay inversion table!
34.  I have toe socks.
35.  I have The Sound of Music on DVD.
36.  I have read the Lord of the Rings, several times.
37.  And The Wheel of Time, but only once (it's a lot longer).
38.  And a lot of other good stuff, not just SciFi and Fantasy.
39.  And a lot of other complete and utter crap, so I have something for comparison.  It helps to really appreciate the good stuff.
40.  I have an understanding of why some literature is really great, and have read some really great stuff on my own.  I also know enough to feel that my opinions are valid, so I can intelligently say that some of the crap they made us read in school really was crap.
41.  And some of it would have been good if they hadn't edited out the good parts and let us have enough time to read the whole thing (hello Odyssey!).
42.  I have a Kindle, and it fits in my purse a LOT better than most of the books listed above, and can hold many of them at one time (which makes reading serieses back to back a lot more convenient).  The dictionary says series is already plural and then goes on to use it repeatedly in examples as "a series".  I have "a cat" in my lap, but not "a cats" so I'm respectfully disagreeing with the dictionary and saying that series is singular and using "serieses" as the plural form to refer to multiple serieses.
43.  I feel free to disagree with the dictionary.
44.  Kindle text-to-speech, makes all kinds of house work more bearable.
45.  I have a bed in which I sleep more comfortably than I have ever before in my life, now if only I had the time to use it.
46.  I have a really old and squashed into shape body pillow without which I can't sleep worth anything, but with which my back doesn't hurt.
47.  I've learned enough about art, all the arts really (visual, written, performing...), to understand its progression and how the forms relate to each other so it really is only one progression followed by all the arts, and don't feel like I've missed out on much just because I can never remember the various dates when things happened and the start and end of all the periods.
48.  I've learned that even if I understand it, it doesn't mean I have to like it, and to collect only what I love (that goes for paintings as well as films and music).
49.  I've learned that if I buy it simply because it was a good deal that won't make me love it later on. 

50.  Which means I should really only buy toilet paper on a good deal, cause eventually I'll use that up anyway.  If it hangs on the wall (or in my closet) I should only buy it if I love it.
51.  I've learned that I can fix a lot of things that I never would have thought possible (having the internet and a good set of tools helps).
52.  I've learned that sometimes if it's going to be done right I have to do it, and sometimes things are worth doing right.
53.  I've learned that my time is worth something, so sometimes it's worth the convenience of having someone else do it.
54.  I've learned that some things are better left to the professionals.  Maybe I COULD find and fix that leak under the sink, but the plumber will do it a lot quicker, and it'll look a lot neater when he's done.  Also, I'll worry about it coming undone less.
55.  I've learned that worrying rarely helps a situation.  That doesn't mean I don't worry, but I try not to. After all, thinking about a problem can lead to thinking of a solution.
56.  I have coffee that's better than Starbucks on a daily basis, and it's fixed by someone who knows exactly how I like it without having to ask.
57.  There's an oak tree and a Japanese maple in the front yard, I've totally always wanted those.
58.  I have every color of Play-Doh known to man on my coffee table (and embedded in my carpet), and some colors not known to man.
59.  Cable.
60.  Tivo.
61.  Netflix.
62.  Hulu.
63.  Amazon (for a plethora of reasons, not just my viewing pleasure).
64.  And a husband who doesn't regard me as a lazy bum if I spend hours viewing any of the above (when my daughter will let me).
65.  YouTube, with my daughter, for hours.
66.  My commute is from my bedroom to my basement, only way it could be shorter would be if it stopped in my living room.
67.  My hours are really flexible, and only VERY rarely start before 10:30 AM.
68.  I finally managed to stop biting my fingernails.
69.  Two kitties that like to snuggle up and keep me warm!
70.  My husband gave me a SpotBot for my birthday a few years back that does a great job cleaning up behind said kitties when they throw up on the floor.  I know, husbands are not supposed to give anything even remotely vacuum related to a wife as any sort of present, but...
71.  My husband knows me well enough to know when to break the rules.
72.  My husband values the appliances as much as I do.
73.  And uses them every bit as much as I do.
74.  Sometimes more.
75.  I've found a birdfeeder that's almost entirely made of metal and sturdy enough to stand up to the raccoons.
76.  There are raccoons that regularly show interest in the bird feeder, so I get to watch them.
77.  I get to watch the cats watching them, and that's one of the best things ever!
78.  I hold out hope for them coming early enough for my daughter to see them one day.
79.  There are deer that regularly wander through my yard, much to the chagrin of my azelias and hostas.
80.  My daughter enjoys watching them even more than I do.
81.  My daughter has learned to feed the cats.
82.  She's also learned to peel and eat boiled eggs.  These two things are not related.
83.  Recliner couch!  These used to be two separate things, but now I know better.
84.  I have neighbors close enough so that I can play in the snow with their kids.
85.  I have a daughter of an age that makes this not creepy.
86.  Instead it makes me the sainted neighbor who keeps the other parents from having to venture out far in the snow.
87.  Said neighbors also partake in my random baked goods, which are generally sweets, so I REALLY don't need to keep the whole batch of whatever my recent craving led me to make.  I LOVE the neighbors that save me from the fudge!
88.  I've come to the realization that I have more house than I need.  And I have the smallest house in the neighborhood.  It's nice to not have house envy.
89.  It's nice to not have envy in general.  I've come to realize I've been blessed in so many ways, and to be happy with enough.
90.  I have three generations of the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook, and have learned that it's a great reference for all kinds of foods.  Even if I'm making a recipe from somewhere else, if it doesn't have clear instructions I can look in the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook for similar recipes and generally fill in the blanks.
91.  I regularly have TWO Christmas trees.
92.  I've come to realize that ALL kinds of clothing can be altered in ALL kinds of ways, to make them fit better, or more comfortable, or less annoying.
93.  This includes bras.
94.  I've learned I don't have to get it right the first time.  I can keep tweaking it, and trying it until I get it the way I want it.
95.  I've learned that sometimes my Mom does a better job organizing my house/stuff than I do, and to just go with it and take advantage of her while I can.
96.  I've really just learned to appreciate my parents all around in ways I never knew possible, but particularly my Mom.  Which is awesome because we all know mother-daughter relationships tend to be a bit tenuous.
97.  I've learned I can't buy self-worth.
98.  I've learned I can feel better by exercising self control and holding off on a purchase until I've really thought it through.  And sometimes there's more power in not buying something, especially when my reasons are well thought out.
99.  I've learned that I don't need to impress the lady in the shop by showing what-all I can buy.  And that I can be friendly and nice while still saying NO.
100.  I know that sometimes it's nice to know that you have enough to cover all the bases, but seriously I could get rid of 90% of what I have in my china cabinet and never miss it.
101.  I've learned that my capacity to love is unlimited, and only needs a new person or situation or way to love to stretch it's bounds.

I've been working on this list for a couple months.  I'm sure I've missed plenty of things, and I hope I don't have to many duplicates, but it's late so I'm not going through and rereading it just to miss them the second time around.

Living with myself, in the present

I'm never here.  Oh, I look like I'm present; I've learned to smile and nod with the best of them.  But while the world passes me by I live an alternate reality inside my head.  I'm always thinking about what I should be doing, or what I could be doing, or what I'm going to do, but very VERY rarely am I focused on where I am.

I also spend a lot of time thinking on what I'll do WHEN.  When I loose the weight, when I have time to exercise, when my little girl is old enough to do whatever it is for me, and how I'll implement this project I have in mind to start 6 weeks from now (when I've already got 6 projects in various stages of incomplete).  And I live in various fantasy worlds, how I would live my life if my American Idol/America's Got Talent auditions had gone differently, or what if I got around to writing one or more of the books in my head and got it published, or what if I was an artist who actually made a living creating... ANYTHING!

I wonder if it's part and parcel of the ADD.  I've noticed this is particularly bad when I WANT to do something (usually want to make something, some project I've started) but I'm doing family things instead, and you know what?  It's causing me to miss out on what's REALLY important.  Ok, so potty training isn't glamorous, but if I let it be it can be plenty exiting!

When I can manage to focus on the present I realize, it's pretty good.  I have a fantastic husband, an amazing daughter, and a job that leaves me enough free time to occasionally create things on the side (and it's a pretty interesting job too).  Why can't I manage to be fully HERE more often?  When I do manage it I find I'm more satisfied with the way things go and my evenings move smoother, perhaps because I'm enjoying time with my wonderful husband and fantabulous daughter instead of getting frustrated at all the things I'm not doing.  But when I let my mind wander all I see is wasted time, wasted tasks, wasted effort.

I need to find a way to keep myself present, to keep from thinking that I'm wasting time at the very times I should be enjoying the most.  So in an effort to focus on the here and now I've made a few resolutions (I would call them New Year, but I've actually been working on these for several months now).

• I will medicate my ADD, not with sugar or with caffeine, but with actually ADD medications.  I will find a schedule for these medications that works for me, a way that doesn't interfere with my sleep schedule (to often, occasional insomnia comes with the territory), and will manage those awake hours in a way that makes good use of the time (not in reading the entire WOT wikia yet again).  If my current medication doesn't work for me then I will find a doctor who will work with me to find one that does.
• I will get up and move more.  I may make use of my treadmill desk, I may go for a walk, I may take up running, or I may do something drastic and try to catch up on the yard work that needs doing around here!  But I'll try to do something active starting maybe 2-3 times a week.
• I will no longer waste time shopping for stuff that doesn't make sense for me to buy.  They're very pretty, but I already know way more than I ever needed to know about diamonds.  There is no need for me to spend time browsing in stores that don't sell clothes in my size, so if you don't make an XXL or 16 you can expect me to cancel your store credit card, and just because I like your handbags doesn't mean I want to see all the cute outfits that I'll never fit in to so you can expect me to unsubscribe from your newsletter (I'll buy my handbags somewhere else, or better yet, make them).
• I've got to cut way back on sugar.  Oh, I know I can't cut it completely out (my husband's cookies and cakes and bread are WAY to good), but I can cut out the Skittles and the M&M's (even the dark chocolate peanut ones) and try to pair my sugar with whole grain flour whenever I have to bake.  I know I'm going to have some sugar, but I'd rather have one truffle from Godiva than a whole bag of Starbursts.  
• And while I'm at it, I'm gonna eat more green.  Not that I'm gonna eat a salad every day, but lately I've been so focused on making more room in the freezer that I've lost sight of what I should be eating.  Don't get me wrong, it's nice that I've cleaned out a couple of ice cream containers, but I KNOW I'm just going to go out and buy more ice cream.  It's satisfying to see more room for stews and meatballs and chili, but I've got to stop eating things just because they're there.
• And on that note, I've got to pay attention to what's just there.  I've always been bad about mindless eating, so I have to find ways to clear stuff out, put it aside, make it plain that the bad stuff is not for me.  Oh it'll still be in the house (I need the Skittles to bribe Talia), but it'll be somewhere that's designated for other people and NEVER in my office!  I need to clear out my office snack drawer of everything except healthy snacks, really only nuts.  I don't need chips or crackers or pretzels, and if I do need chocolate I need to make the effort to go get it from some other part of the house.  
• So I suppose I need to create a stash of high quality chocolate that's not in everybody else's way (boy, this to-do list is growing).

I need to be the wife I want my husband to be married to, and the mother I want my daughter to see.  That means more than my relationship to food by-the-way.  It also means I need to act like I care about myself.

• I need to wear REAL shoes when I go out, not just house slippers that I tell myself look almost like real shoes.  I should probably not even wear tennis shoes most days, but I'm still working on that.
• I need to wear makeup.  It makes me feel better about myself.  I may have the most pared down makeup routine on earth (OK, I know I don't, that honor belongs to my mother), but that routine needs to exist (it hasn't for a long time).  It needs to be something workable that I can maintain and do every day, or at least almost every day.  
• I need to wear clothes that are right for me.  Not that I'm going out and buying an entirely new wardrobe, but I need to stop falling in love with something just because it fits.  I need to learn what colors work for me (after years of wondering I think I've finally figured out that I'm a "soft summer" though I have yet to really figure out what that means I should wear), and yes that means no more black.  It doesn't matter that it's slimming, and worn by ninjas (can ninjas wear brown? purple?), and it's EVERYWHERE.  Black doesn't work with my skin.  I've known this for nearly 20 years (since prom dress shopping) and yet I still have black in my wardrobe.  It's gonna have to go.  
• So are the socks and underwear (and anything else) that have holes in them.  It's not like I don't have enough socks and underwear (if I ever get around to folding laundry so I can find it).  If it's holy and worn out and I can't mend it then it needs to go.
• And to top it all off, if I live in the present then instead of having my mind wandering, maybe I can use all that extra brain power to be more understanding of others.  Starting with my husband and daughter of course, but I look back over the years at conversations I've had (or only had in my head) and way to many of them were me spouting off about stuff I thought I knew.  I'm sure I've lost friends for it.  Maybe instead of trying to convince everyone (mainly myself) that I know everything, I should be more accepting of what other people know, or need.  Maybe I should recognize that I don't know it all, indeed as I get older I start to realize just how much I don't know, and maybe if I'm here, REALLY HERE, I'll start learning from other people what they know so much better than I do, about EVERYTHING.

Is that enough?  I don't normally make resolution lists, certainly not around New Years.  In the past I've laughed about New Years resolutions (even if I secretly made one or two to not keep on my own).  Maybe that's another thing I need to change, but this list is long enough already.  I tried not to put any absolutes in there.  I know I'll fail (there will be dark chocolate peanut M&M's) but if I don't cut things out completely, if I only do as I should part of the time, it will still be an improvement over what was before.  But then, I'm not thinking about what was before anymore.

Self-medicating

Although I was diagnosed as having ADD more than ten years ago, I never tried Ritalin or any other ADD medication until recently.  However as a read and learn more about the treatment of ADD I wonder if I've self-medicated for years, or if some unusual reactions to other medications had a lot to do with my ADD.

I have terrible allergies, though they're much better after nearly ten years of allergy shots.  I spent much of my first 10 years sick with some sinus issue or another, and as a result I've taken a LOT of Sudafed over the years.  Over that time I've heard lots of stories about Sudafed making kids hyper or buzzed, but I never experienced that.  Instead I would take Sudafed and almost always fall asleep.  I remember taking it before church and falling asleep in my mom's lap in the pew.  It's a good thing I don't snore!

It's only recently occurred to me that if ADD is treated with stimulants then it's possible that other substances that have a stimulating effect could also be used to calm or focus a person with ADD.  All the books mention self-medication with controlled substances, marijuana and heroin being the most common, but I look back at my history and see another type of self medication.

When I was very young I ate huge quantities of sugar.  This was a most common occurrence on road trips with my family.  We'd head south to visit family and at the first gas station I'd get out and spend every penny I had on various types of candy and consume them in the car.  Halloween candy rarely lasted more than a few days.  We'd go to restaurants and I'd sit quietly and eat sugar packets.  I ate ice cream topped with Nes-Quick (almost pure sugar on top of more sugar).  Seriously, it's a wonder my teeth survived!

With all this sugar consumption you'd think I'd be bouncing off the walls, but when I asked my mom about it she said she never noticed me to be particularly hyper.  I never seemed to have trouble sitting still in restaurants or in the car.  And she said it didn't worry her so long as I ate a variety of healthy REAL food as well.  So what was I doing with all that raw energy?

By the time I was in college I'd replaced sugar with coffee.  I'd go to Waffle House at 1:00 in the morning, drink six cups of coffee, then go back to my dorm and fall right asleep.  At the time I thought I just had THAT much tolerance for caffeine, but looking back now I wonder.

She was the best of friends, she was the worst of friends...

I've been thinking a lot lately about how blessed I am to have friends who have stuck with me.  There are times when ADD makes me a GREAT friend, but there are lots of times when ADD makes me... Wait, what were you saying?

I was comparing notes with one of my work friends the other day who also has ADD, and we were surprised at how our relationships have been so similarly impacted by ADD.  You see, ADD thrives on drama.  We make great friends with anyone who's life is falling apart.  We NEED to be needed, and so we find ourselves giving and giving and giving to needy friends.  Unfortunately there are only two ways for that to end.  Either we give and give at an unsustainable rate until WE'RE the ones falling apart, or our friends get their stuff together and don't need us anymore (so we don't see them for months on end).

That's not to say that I don't have good friends who DO have their lives together, but without the drama I fall out of touch with them very easily.  And it's a real shame, because I really do enjoy spending time with my friends.  For example, I recieved some VERY cute baby pictures from a friend recently, I hadn't even realized she was pregnant.  That's how long it had been since we'd been in touch, and I feel really bad because when I had my baby she and her husband were there for me, brought us dinner, and just wonderful to be around.  It's not uncommon for me to go months without talking to a friend, then when we do get together we see each other several times, spend a lot of time together, and then fall apart for more months at a time.

The ADD brain thrives on stimulation, unfortunately arguments are often more stimulating than when everyone gets along.  I look back and see friendships that I have lost simply because I couldn't stop myself from arguing with my friends.  It's never something I recognized at the time, but in retrospect I can see how I've acted like a real know-it-all, and sometimes I've down-right attacked my friends on what really should have been small differing opinions.  Heck, I think I've actually built some friendships on a basis of argumentativeness, a shaky foundation for a friendship if I ever saw one.

I fall in and out of friendships very easily.  I'll meet someone for two days on vacation, and know more about them than someone I've known for years, but I'll just as easily never see them again after we go our separate ways.  Oh, we'll trade addresses, and I'll have every intention of keeping in touch, but somehow it never happens.  It's not that I don't want to, or even that I don't think of them, I do, and often, but to actually reach out and correspond never seems to happen.

It's something I feel bad about as I look back over the years.  All these wonderful people that I have met and formed what could have been wonderful friendships with, all the lost opportunities.  As I read about ADD, what makes us tick and what we should do to make the best of our crazy brains, I read over and over that maintaining close personal relationships are so important.  I try to maintain healthy relationships, but the ones that receive the most attention are the needy codependent ones.  The very thing that I'm supposed to be doing, is so hard to do.

It leaves me very lonely sometimes, but I'm so thankful for the friends that have stuck with me through the years, through the "debates" and the long silences.  So to all my friends out there, thanks for sticking with me.  I'm sorry I don't keep in touch.  I'll try to do better.

What it really means...

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about Christianity and its various denominations, and what it really means to be a Christian.  So many denominations have split and split again, all over fine points of theology.  I think that's sad.  Churches are splitting over little piddling bits of theology, when we should be focusing on the things that unify us.  So I've spent several middle of the night feedings lately pondering what it REALLY means to be a Christian.

I told my cousin Jim about my conclusions.  His response, "Yeah, that's what happens when you start thinking theology at 3:00 in the morning, you throw out half the Apostle's Creed."  Still he listened.  Jim's fantastic, and he needs new lungs, so go help with whatever you can (www.jimhenrymedicaltrust.org).

So when it all boils down to it I think all that's really required to be a Christian is to believe in the first half of the Apostle's Creed.  Not even the whole thing!  Not that there aren't plenty of important theological issues that aren't covered here, it's just that they're not core to what it really means to be a Christian.  You can come down on either side of many theological discussions and I don't think it has any impact on the core beliefs of Christianity.  So what does it really mean to be a Christian?


1. I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.
Yes, this is core to Christianity.  I have to believe in God, and that he made everything.  Doesn't really matter HOW He made things.  Whether He did it in 7 days or 7 millennia  and whether He created everything as is or used some sort of directed evolutionary process doesn't matter.  What matters is that He did it.  That's not to say you can't believe strongly in your opinion of His methodology, but all that's core belief is that He did it and it was good.

2. I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord.
This doesn't take any belief at all.  Jesus was a historical figure, this is verifiable fact.  If you're gonna believe in God the Father, then he has to be father of something, so it makes sense that Jesus is that son.  There are a lot of prophecies that point toward Jesus, and that He was God's son, so it follows that if God is, then you're going to believe Jesus is His son.

He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.
Does it really matter how Jesus was conceived?  Really what does it matter whether the body that bore his human form had ever known a man?  Not saying it wasn't miraculous and all, but God made the whole world, I don't really find one virgin birth that significant.  Not that I don't believe in the virgin birth, I do, I just don't think that it really matters in the big scheme of things so it's not worth arguing over.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.
Again, historical fact.  The most miraculous thing here is that Jesus kept a good attitude through it all!

He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again.
Doesn't matter where He was those three days.  For that matter, the rising again is just a symbol of God accepting Jesus's sacrifice for our sins.  What matters is that He accepted it, not how he showed that acceptance, so again even the rising from the dead is not a required belief for Christians.

3. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
Ok, so it makes sense that Jesus is in heaven with the Father.  I'm not sure it's required believing, but I think you could make a pretty good case that Jesus just hanging out in the world wouldn't be in keeping with God the Father accepting his sacrifice, so I'll give you this one.

He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
Really?  It'll happen whether I believe in it or not.  His judgement stands whether I believe in its validity or not.  Yes, I believe He's coming, but I think it would be really self-important of me to think that my belief in His judgement has any impact whatsoever.

4. I believe in the Holy Spirit,
This goes along with God's omnipotence and omniscience.  Yep, gotta believe that God is with us all the time. 

the holy catholic Church, 
The church exists whether I believe in it or not, and whether you call it "catholic" or just a group of Christians doesn't matter.  However you can be a Christian and live as a hermit somewhere, so you don't have to actually participate in the church in any way shape or form.

the communion of saints,
I don't even know what this means.  Is it that we commune with other Christians  (see hermitage) That we take communion? (don't see how that's required either)  I figure if I can't understand it then I can't very well claim that its belief is core to what it means to be a Christian.

5. the forgiveness of sins,
Well, this one's kind of gray to me.  The whole point of Jesus's sacrifice is that it allows our sins to be forgiven.  But outside of my own self-importance it doesn't really matter whether I believe that my sins are forgiven or not.  What matters is does God see fit to forgive them.  And I should live my life the same way whether I believe my sins are forgiven or not, because if I believe they're all forgiven what's to stop me from just going out and sinning all willy-nilly.  That being said, if I didn't believe that my sins were forgiven, then I might be likely to point to one sin that I committed, throw up my hands, and give up.  I don't think that's what God wants us to do, so I think it's important that He gave us hope, a reason to live on and do better.  So I say forgiveness of sins is a core Christian belief if only because it allows us to start anew every day.

the resurrection of the body,
Um, this happens after I'm dead.  Really I have nothing to do with it whether I have a body or not after I die.  Not core.

and life everlasting.
It's nice to think that we have a reward coming for all of our believing, but really God's well within his rights to do whatever he wants with his creation at any time he wants to.  Do I believe that I have a soul that will live forever?  Yes.  Do I believe that you HAVE to believe you have a soul that will live forever in order to be a Christian?  Nope.

I look at this list, really a very short list, and I hear Christians quibbling over immersion vs. sprinkling, predestination vs. free will, wine at communion vs. te-totaling.  It makes me very, very sad.  Here we are claiming to love each other, and love all the people, but we can't put down our harsh words and focus on what really matters.  So instead of one Christian church we have all these denominations, and the ones that are the most similar are the ones that spend the most time throwing stones!

I'm not saying I don't have beliefs about anything other than the basics.  I certainly have no problem with the idea that God created the world in seven literal days (after all, if He's going to create adult people why not create an adult earth, complete with rocks that include a fossil record).  And I can make a case for infant baptism (Acts 16:33) but I feel better about "dedicating" myself to raising my child to know the Lord, and she can be baptized when she's ready (and I pray that she will some day be ready).  I really don't give one flying whoop whether you baptize by dunking or sprinkling, but moisture makes my hair frizz up so I completely understand someone wanting to use as little water as possible!

My point is, none of these issues are worth the time we spend arguing over them!  The church's focus should be on outreach, not on internal squabbling and beating itself up from the inside.

Myths about breastfeeding

I've run across SO many websites dedicated to dispelling the "myths" surrounding breastfeeding, but it seems like so many of them are afraid to say anything unpleasant about breastfeeding for fear it will convince you not to try it.  Now I'm all for breastfeeding, heck it's been really difficult for me and I'm still working to make it better, but I think it's worth sharing that it's not all puppies and rainbows.  I would encourage every mother to breast feed as much as she is able.  There are lots of health benefits involved for all parties, and even if you can't stick with it for one reason or another, every bit that you can do helps both you and your baby.  But if you only hear the good things about breastfeeding, never informing yourself about the ups and downs involved then how can you prepare yourself for what you'll need to do to give breast feeding a concerted effort.  So without further ado here are some myths I see all over the internet that I wish someone had dispelled for me.

Myth: Breast feeding doesn't hurt if you do it right.
Ha!  My nipples have ranged from slightly sore to downright painful for the last two and a half months.  From the week my baby was born I would cringe just to have my towel brush against my nipples when I got out of the shower.  Ever tried to dry your face without your towel touching your nipples?  Maybe if you're more flat chested than me, but I can't seem to manage it.  Now things might be better for you if you're used to having someone suck on your nipples five hours a day, yes that's 10 feedings a day at 15 minutes per breast which is the MINIMUM my lactation consultant recommended to get started, so it just stands to reason that women who haven't breast fed before are going to be sore.  It doesn't help that she sometimes kicks one boob while feeding from the other.

Now there are lots of things that can help, starting with getting your baby to latch properly.  The lanolin cream really does help, and they make these really fantastic gel nipple pads that are cooling and soothing and really fantastic!  The pain gets better with time, well, it comes and goes really.  You'll get a schedule going and be fine for a couple weeks (sore but fine) and then your baby will go through a growth spurt and be ravenously hungry and rub your nipples raw again.  Keep in mind, I haven't had anything like bad nursing problems, no cracked and bleeding nipples like I've read about.  But you'll want to have a few thick bras that  are really protective (and hide the lines from the gel pads mentioned above), and don't be afraid to take a little Ibuprofen now and then.

Myth: The pounds just melt off.
I'm sure they do for some folks, but don't count on it.  I lost weight pretty fast for the first few weeks home from the hospital and then stalled out with about ten pounds to go to my pre-pregnancy weight.  I was talking to a retired GYN nurse who works at my daughter's daycare and she says that's about par for the course.  She said it's because breastfeeding tends to cause fluid retention (makes sense, if you're providing fluid to your baby then your body would want to have plenty of fluid on hand) so most women stall out somewhere around 5-10 lbs above their pre-pregnancy weight.  Of course you can then watch what you eat and probably slowly lose more, but you want to be careful about that when your breastfeeding because you don't want your body to think you're starving.  You also don't want to loose weight to fast because that can release toxins into the breast milk.  Either one can hurt breast milk quality or quantity, so don't plan on slimming down quickly.

Myth: Breastfeeding is free.
Nope, there's still no such thing as a free lunch.  Yes, breastfeeding is more cost effective than formula, but it's still far from free.  Here's a breakdown of what you can expect to spend on breastfeeding:

• Lanolin - I go through a tube every month and a half or so, and the tubes run about $8 at my local Kroger.  It might be more cost effective to buy them online or in larger sizes, but I haven't checked.
• "Soothies" Gel Nipple covers - You may not need them all the time, but they're great help for the worst soreness, and you can put them in the fridge for even more effective soothing.  They run about $10 a pair and I forget where I got this last set.
• Sleep Bras and Nursing Bras - No, they're not the same thing.  You'll want extra protection for your boobs, so even if you don't normally need support while you sleep you'll probably want to get a couple of sleep bras (I got Medela sleep bras, $15-20 on Amazon.com, and wore them 24/7 for my maternity leave).  You'll also want some nursing bras, preferably something without under-wire for the first little while.  I got one actual nursing bra, and then found that my really old stretched out Victoria's Secret bras could be pulled down for nursing pretty conveniently.  Unfortunately, they don't make them like they used to, and you couldn't do this with their memory foam bras, and Victoria's Secret now appears to be addicted to memory foam.  You can get nursing bras that unhook from the top to fold down, or with stretchy bra cups that just pull to the side or down.  I found the second to be more convenient, but they're less supportive than the ones that unhook, so you'll have to figure out what works best for you.
• Vitamin D drops and other baby supplements - Our pediatrician recommended that unless our baby eats 32 oz or more of formula a day we should give her vitamin D drops daily.  My husband's been the one to buy these, so I don't know how much they are, but I'm sure they're not terribly expensive.  I've heard of other folks needing other vitamin and mineral supplements as well, but we've never needed more, possibly because we're feeding both breast milk and formula.
• Bottles - Unless you're never planning on leaving your baby with anyone else, or for that matter never planning to need to feed her in her car seat on the way somewhere, you'll need to get some bottles.  How many will vary according to how long you'll ever be away or how often you want to wash dishes, but my lactation consultant strongly recommended using the wide nipple bottles because they're more like a breast which can reduce nipple confusion.  However I haven't seen any wide neck bottles in consignment like I have standard size bottles, so you may find these to be more expensive than if you were exclusively bottle feeding.
• Breast Pump - Wile I've heard some people have great success with hand expression, the few times I've tried it I got much less than pumping and it took a very long time.  Breast pumps can ranbe from about $50 for the cheapest hand pump I've seen, to around $1000 for a hospital grade pump.  That's to buy.  You can also rent for about $50 a month, and there are accessories to buy to go with that.  I got a decent electric pump for $300 and it works pretty well, though some folks swear the hospital grade pump works better.  I kind-of wish I'd tried it to see if it worked any better, but at this point it seems like a waste.
• Lactation Consultant - I'm sure this is optional for most folks, but I found our lactation consultant extremely helpful and have been very glad to have someone to go to when I have questions.  I'm sure there's a wide range of cost here, but four our board certified (IBCLC) consultant it was a little under $200 for her to come to our house for three hours, and then she was available to help us by phone and email thereafter.
• Lactation support foods, herbal supplements  and medicines - You may not need these at all, and some of the foods probably shouldn't be counted.  After all, you have to eat breakfast anyway, and it doesn't cost any more to eat oatmeal (which supports lactation) than any other breakfast.  Still, there are a few things I got specifically to help with lactation including: hulled barley (for making barley water, $10 for a pound on Amazon.com but much cheaper if you buy in bulk), More Milk or More Milk plus (an herbal supplement to increase breast milk production, about $20 for a 2-3 week supply, more cost effective if you buy in larger amounts), and I also got a prescription galactogogue that was $100 for a three month supply.
• Specialized nursing pillows if you want one - I just used bed pillows, but some folks swear by their Boppys.
• Your time - It takes longer to breast feed than bottle feed, and takes more work from your baby to get the milk out.  The slower flow is actually one of the benefits of breast feeding since it prevents overeating which in turn can reduce spit-up.  It also makes a baby more aware of when she's full.  I mean, it's the difference between scarfing your food and having a leisurely meal, you have more time to detect satiation.  This can lead to better eating habits in your child's life moving forward, but it also takes more time at each feeding.  My baby can take a bottle in 10 minutes or so, but at the breast takes 40 minutes to an hour per feeding.  That's probably on the long end of things, but if you believe your time is worth something then you'll want to tally that cost.  Remember the adage "Time is money."  I also recently read that breast feeding mothers have reduced earnings over the first five years of their child's life than bottle feeding mothers.  It's possible that's because they're more likely to be stay at home moms or work reduced hours, but it's still worth keeping in mind.

Sure, your actual costs may not add up to the projected $600-1800 cost of formula for the first year.  Many of the costs of breastfeeding are optional, and my largest expenditures have been covered by FSA.  Bottle feeding may also have additional costs due to more child illness and doctor visits; here's a study that says that the extra medical costs to never breast fed babies average $331 to 475 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10103324).  But I'm so tired of hearing about this "free" feeding method.  I wanted you to know what to expect.  

I still think breast feeding is totally worth it.  There are lots of good reasons to at least give it a good try.  If nothing else, it can be an amazing mother/baby bonding experience.  But if we can take the rose colored glasses off and prepare ourselves for the reality of breast feeding then we're much more likely to be successful when we hit the bumps in the road.

Chick-fil-A, don't'cha just love it?

I've been paying attention to all this Chick-fil-A controversy.  I have a long history with Chick-fil-A, so naturally I sit up and listen whenever I hear them mentioned in the news, or in conversation.  I've found that they are neither the paragon of virtue nor the bastion of evil that everyone seems to make them out to be, but like every company out there they have their good points and their bad points.  Which outweigh the others I don't know.

I started working at Chick-fil-A at the front counter when I was 16, and continued working there off and on as school allowed for a little over five years.  When I first started working there the operator of the store I worked at had two stores, but within a year of my starting he left the store I worked at and went on as operator to other stores.  His assistant manager became our new operator.  It's worth mentioning that the corporate office at Chick-fil-A likes to keep tabs on what's going on at their stores.  All stores are owned by Chick-fil-A, not somebody at the store, and Chick-fil-A has pretty stringent rules about who can become an operator (the equivalent of owner/manager at most franchises) of any store.  There may be a very small handful of independently owned stores still out there, but Chick-fil-A stopped granting such franchises years ago, and the few that remain were grandfathered in.

Our new operator held the store together through some really rough years.  Shortly after I started, the main anchor store in the shopping center closed.  And over the next few years anchor stores came and went, but were gone more than they were there.  We also had the unique benefit of being near where several corporate executives lived, so they would often stop by the store to "check up on us" quite frequently.  It was at this point that I came to recognize the misogynistic attitude of the corporate office at Chick-fil-A.  It's worth noting that a new operator was a divorced woman.  When I started working at this Chick-fil-A store it was the closest one to my house, but by the time I left I actually passed three Chick-fil-A's to get to this one.  As more stores opened up in the area they naturally cut into the business of the pre-existing store.


One store was within 3 miles of ours.  It is debatable whether so many stores in the immediate area would have been approved had the operator at our store held any regard or received any respect from the corporate office.  During this time the store was both remodeled and major construction was undertaken to install a new playground.  Instead of corporate recognizing that difficult situation, we were expected to grow revenues as if we were still located in a busy shopping center with little competition in the area.  Despite hard times remain profitable, even though we didn't achieve the revenue growth dictated by corporate.

Instead of recognizing the achievement of holding the store together in adverse circumstances, win a new super Wal-Mart opened in our shopping center the store was taken away from our operator and given to a new operator.  This demonstrates the utter lack of respect that the Chick-fil-A corporate office had for our operator.


Yes Chick-fil-A is closed on Sundays, but it is far from the Christian work environment that you might think.  For one being closed on Sundays does nothing for orthodox Jews or Seventh Day Adventists.  Sure, I worked with plenty of youth pastors who enjoyed the freedom to work two jobs and the assurance that came from knowing that their schedules would never conflict.  But I also worked with those who were mentally unstable, had superiors who cursed like sailors, and others who displayed misogynistic behavior including leaving white flour hand prints in inappropriate places on the navy pants of female employees.  I had my butt pinched once (he got slapped) and was hit on repeatedly.  But with very few exceptions the customers were worse than my co-workers.

However, Chick-fil-A's not a den of iniquity from top to bottom.  It has it's redeeming qualities.  For starters I worked my way from front counter through pretty much every position in the store, and ended up marketing manager.  Chick-fil-A taught me about work ethic and team work, oh, and how to filet chicken.  We weren't located in the highest end neighborhood, so this particular Chick-fil-A gave opportunity to some pretty underprivileged folks, and a pretty diverse demographic.  I particularly admired one family that had escaped from some South American dictatorship, and all the women in the family worked at Chick-fil-A.  It certainly opened my eyes to a variety of circumstances and what can me accomplished with hard work.  Lots of folks have heard of Chick-fil-A's Winshape scholarships, but Chick-fil-A has a college scholarship program available to all employees who work a certain number of hours (I don't remember how many).  No, it didn't pay for an entire semester, but every little bit helps.

And let's not forget the best thing about Chick-fil-A.  I met my husband when we both worked there in high school, and we had our wedding catered by Chick-fil-A years later (by the same operator we both worked for).

Chick-fil-A's probably the only fast food place I could work at and still eat there.  In fact, up until a few years ago I still ate at Chick-fil-A at least once a week.  I eat there less now not because of any aversion, but simply because I eat out less than I used to.

So no matter what Dan Cathy says, his principles are not pervasive throughout Chick-fil-A, and what he does with his money is his own business.  That being said, Chick-fil-A is a privately held company, and I don't know what percentage Dan owns I don't know, but I'm sure its significant.  Some part of every dollar spent there is going to trickle up to him eventually.

Not to long ago I realized that in living in a capitalistic society one of the ways we vote is by what we buy.  It's a big part of why I drive the car I drive, and buy the frozen pizza that I buy, and Dan Cathy has the right to vote the way he wants as well.  It's up to you to decide whether a vote for scholarships and Sundays off outweighs a vote for Dan and misogyny.  Or if you just care about the chicken.

Why would I ever do this again?

I read an article not to long back about how pregnancy affects a woman's brain function, and I can tell you, it most definitely does!  For one thing, I seem to get songs stuck in my head and can't get them out for DAYS at a time (as opposed to the normal few hours).  But that wasn't the point of the article.  It was talking about memory.  Apparently pregnant women start losing their memories from the earliest days of pregnancy, and this memory lasts as long as a year past giving birth!  Well, I can attest to the first part of this.  For months I've been forgetting things, like words I want to use in conversation, with much more than normal frequency.  The last couple months, however, I've begun to understand that there's a reason WHY we have this forgetfulness.

BECAUSE IF WE REMEMBERED ALL THIS LATER WE'D NEVER DO IT AGAIN!

I'm not just talking about forgetting labor and delivery, though somehow I think I'll appreciate forgetting that. I'm talking about ALL the things in pregnancy that make us miserable.  From the very first symptom (unexplained heartburn for me) to the lower back pain, swelling hands and feet, and just generally miserable uncomfortableness of the third trimester.  I'm ready, OH SO READY to not be pregnant anymore.  Not ready to be a parent of course, I don't think there's any way to ever be really ready for that, but I'd like to be able to bend over and pick stuff up off the floor, to do yard work again, to be able to walk up the driveway! I'm ready to have this done and over with and be headed toward recovery.

Steve and I had childbirth class yesterday.  There was a slide shown that had symptoms that indicate labor is coming within two weeks.  I realized I'd had all the symptoms on the page, except one (rupture of membranes).  Something tells me I'm not going to make it the three weeks to my due date, and that's ok.  I'm ready.

I've started to write a post about late pregnancy several times lately, but with my memory going I don't remember what-all I was planning to write about, so I'll leave you with a little food for thought.

A few years back the small company that my husband and I worked for was evaluating health insurance plans.  We had a meeting with an insurance representative to discuss options and benefits for various health conditions we expected to treat.  Most questions were about minor surgeries, mental health benefits, and prescription plans, but I asked about how pregnancy was treated, and I'll never forget his response.

"Pregnancy is treated just like any other illness."

Pregnancy?  an illness?  Sure it's uncomfortable and there are health risks, but in what world to people consciously go out and spend thousands of dollars on infertility treatments attempting to catch an illness?  I know women who are DESPERATELY trying to get "sick," and devastated each month when they find out that once again they've failed to contract this disease.  I was one of them eight and a half months ago.  It makes me question the sanity of our entire healthcare system to know that the continuation of the human race is considered a malady.  Though sometimes I look at the state of the world and that makes perfect sense after all.

Medical Research I'd like to see

Ok, this post is not going to be interesting to most people, but it's the kind of thing that I think of that makes me go Hmmmm.

So I've been thinking about our immune systems, how they work and how they could go haywire.  First let me say, I have no background in medicine other than getting sick and going to the doctor, and know very little about biology other than what I learned from my mom or in Biology 101 and 102 in college.  This basically means you should ignore everything I say from this point on, because I'm not at all qualified to be asking these questions.

I've been thinking of the nature of several illnesses that are seemingly treated as separate entities, but at a basic level they seem to be caused by immune systems going haywire, and I'm wondering if they could be related.  The three illnesses I've notices are allergies, Celiac disease, and type 1 diabetes though there could be others that fit this profile as well.

Allergies can include a wide range of reactions to a wide variety of substances.  For instance, I'm allergic to dogs, dust mites, mold, and a variety of pollens goldenrod being the most reaction causing.  My reaction to these various allergens is mostly nasal (though I've had hives once) and disgusting but relatively short term (assuming I'm not exposed for long) and can be easily medicated using Claritin (and ten years of allergy shots helped a lot).  I had a friend in college who had other various allergies to artificial scents and smoke and these causing her throat to close up and breathing problems.  I've also heard a lot recently about allergies to peanuts which can cause anaphylactic shock and death.  Allergies have been loosely linked to heredity, for instance my dad has mild hay-fever type allergies.  I have similar allergies, though more severe, and my mom and sister don't suffer from any significant allergies that I know of.  All of these reactions, though they range greatly in their severity, have one thing in common.  They're caused by an inappropriate immune response to a substance that in most people does not cause any immune response at all.  Basically exposure to these substances causes our immune systems to go haywire, and the immunologic response itself is what causes illness.

Celiac disease is something I'm less familiar with, though I've read a bit about it and have a cousin who suffers from it.  Celiac disease is caused by an intolerance for gluten (found in wheat, barley, rye, and products made from these grains).  If you have celiac disease, when your body absorbs gluten your immune system attacks the villi in your small intestines which are what absorbs nutrients in your food.  The more gluten you eat the greater the immune response eventually destroying the villi and possibly your ability to absorb nutrients.  Damage is irreversible and the only way to keep damage from increasing is to not eat gluten.  Celiac disease also tends to run in families though the exact mechanism of heredity is unknown.

The final disease I've been thinking about is type 1 diabetes.  I have an uncle and a brother-in-law who suffer from type one diabetes, and though I'm by no means an expert I've seen their management of this disease and how it affects their lives.  This type of diabetes is caused by the pancreas either partially or completely failing to produce insulin.  Though I suppose it's possible to suffer injury to the pancreas through some other means, the most common cause of pancreatic damage is that for some unknown reason the person's immune system simply attacks the pancreas causing permanent damage.  Damage can be partial or complete.  Some diabetics still make insulin, just not in sufficient amounts to process a healthy diet, which others no longer make insulin at all.  In milder cases a person with diabetes may be able to manage the disease with diet and exercise, but more severe pancreatic damage requires insulin supplements.  We know that the risk of developing type 1 diabetes runs in families, but what we don't know is what triggers the autoimmune response that attacks the pancreas in the first place.

If you look at my family as a whole you would think we're generally healthy with no serious diseases running in the family, but looking at the incidence of these three has gotten me wondering lately.  Could there be a connection between the autoimmune diseases even though reactions and symptoms are so very different?  I wonder if the tendency for autoimmune diseases is genetic, it's just that the immune reaction that causes the disease goes haywire in different ways in different people attacking my uncle's pancreas, my cousin's small intestines, and making me a snot wad.  I hear talk of a cure for diabetes quite frequently, but never have I heard of research to cure celiac disease (though I'm sure there's ongoing research) or allergies.  I'm wondering what kind of research into autoimmune response in general is going on, and if it's being related to the causes of multiple autoimmune diseases.

Food for further thought:  I was a very sickly kid.  I caught everything that went around, and strep throat was my Achilles heel (I would get it time after time after time some years).  There were years where I missed so much school from being ill that they thought about holding me back, even though my mom would pick up the school work I had missed from my teachers and I would do the work at home.  We knew I had allergies, but couldn't find any cause for me to be so susceptible to catching EVERYTHING that went around.  My pediatrician finally sent me out for labs to see if I had some sort of autoimmune disease, but they never could find any cause.  Eventually I grew out of being so sick, oh I catch the occasional cold or strep, but I'm a generally healthy adult.  I think we finally concluded that my immune system just couldn't keep up with my growth rate and it took time to catch up.  I now wonder if it was a different problem.  Maybe my immune system was so preoccupied with it's inappropriate responses to allergens that it was to overworked to deal with the actual pathogens that came it's way.  Could my allergies have actually made me more susceptible to other illnesses growing up?  Perhaps it wasn't a matter of growing into my immune system.  Perhaps it was the ten years of allergy shots that trained my immune system to be more tolerant of allergens and allowed it to focus on more important things, like the flu.