You're lucky!

Grew up on a farm.

Got picked on, ridiculed and mocked - never walked away from a fight and got beat up several times. Smallest kid in his class including the girls until 8th grade.

Senior year in high school was the captain and quarterback of his football team and the captain of his wrestling and baseball teams.

Graduated valedictorian of his high school class.

Wrestled and played division three football in college. Majored in physics, minored in math and military science.

Jobs he's held:
Farm laborer
Cheese plant worker
Electrician's assistant
Day care worker
Art Museum caretaker
Fusion research team
Bartender
Restaurant manager
Chef
Waiter
Insurance cubical worker (ie. Dilbert)
Phone solicitor
Day laborer (handing out fliers at a mall)
Flat work/concrete laborer 
Slaughter house worker
Salesmen
Business owner
Enlisted Solider (Fire specialist for MLRS and Driver)
Captain in the US Army (MLRS Platoon leader, MLRS Battery XO, Infantry PL, Battalion S1)

On June 3rd he'll have been married for 18 years and has three children. 

Not lucky.

Vow to not quit.

My kids have heard this story soooo many times. I was a freshman on the best wrestling team our high school ever had. We finished 3rd in the state. I know that isn't awesome compared to others. However, there were a grand total of 15 of us with 11 weight classes. That same class won our city's first state championship in football. I was one of three non-seniors on the varsity. The seniors were awesome. They made a habit of beating the crap out of anyone that thought they belonged on the team.

I took the worst beatings of my life that year. There were twins that beat me every single night until I bled and cried. I longed to get a takedown once per week against them. One was a state champion that year. Getting that single takedown was the reward to keep me going. Week in and week out he destroyed everyone put in front of him. He went undefeated that year. Nobody came close. In the practice room, I could score...sometimes. That was seed for my success.

The next year our team had nothing. Everyone graduated. We sucked. I was the leader left over. I had to recruit. I tried bringing in the jocks that weren't playing or starting at basketball. They didn't have the hunger of the guys I found to wrestle. Since that time, I can tell when someone is going to win at any cost or will make excuses. By my senior year we had rebuilt to having a good team, not great, but good. We ended up ranked and won some tournaments. That was a vast improvement over the previous two years of bottom dwelling.

The team I left was 40-50 strong. There was much more inclusion of willing warriors. My original team was strictly alpha heavy. The team I left challenged each other but respected those that would strive for greatness out of themselves. The following years they won some conference championships and achieved some things never before done by my home town. I didn't do it alone. I had young men around me that bought into what I was preaching.

One guy that bought into me was a kid that had never wrestled until his senior year. He lost his mother to cancer around ten years old. He was the oldest of three boys. His senior year, his father got his leg caught in a combine and bled out. The boys watched as it happened. It shouldn't surprise anyone that he could not be pinned. He didn't win much. His record was maybe 4-24, but you couldn't pin him. That young man saved us many points during the season.

Winning isn't always as clear as the end score. Improvement at a personal level is winning. I taught my wife how to recognize a wrestler quit. It is very apparent when you know what to look for. It's the drop of their head, the relaxation of their arm, or the look in their eye. Quitters are going to quit. Men recognize when they quit and vow to not do it again. And when they do it again, they revow to not do it again. Losers whine about how unfair it is.

Lift Heavy Things

Today I saw my goal for my future. I was working out with a woman at the gym today who is in amazing shape. There is no fat on this woman's body. Just fantastically fit. She has long blond hair, a nice tan and a warm smile. Her face reveals a few deep lines - the only indication she is not in her twenties. Today I asked how old she was and was just ecstatic to hear her say "I'm 50." I replied, "You,...are doing it right! Wow!" She's been married at least 25 years and looking forward to her oldest son's wedding in a couple weeks.

Today's workout was great. I achieved new PR's in my bench press and my clean. Something clicked with the clean. Prior to today, I had been relying solely on my arms. Before I went to the gym I studied videos teaching the clean. (There's a tip there). I visualized in my mind exactly how to get under the bar using the whole of my body. When I went to do my previous PR (93 lbs) I couldn't believe how effortlessly I was able to hoist the bar. I loaded another 10 lbs and did it again. So I loaded another 10. That didn't happen. But I was elated none the less.

I saw a great article today for the ladies out there (posted by another woman that goes to my gym): Three Reasons Why You're not losing Fat

A man can learn a lot from observing women in a book club for five minutes. I would know because my wife is part of a one, and every time I spend a little time with those ladies I come away much wiser and more convinced that men and women could not be much more different-unless you're talking about exercise.

You see, the exercise techniques that work best are universal to men and women. And yet most women wouldn't dare approach the gym like a guy. How do I know? Because the 10 women at my wife's book club told me so last night, and it's the same thing I've heard for the last 10 years in the fitness industry. The reality is that training "like a man" will actually make you leaner, sexier, and have your friends dying to know your secret. 

So forget gender differences for a moment. Here are three tips that are part of the foundation of my New York Times best-selling book, Man 2.0: Engineering the Alpha. They work well for men, but like most things in life, by following these simple rules, the end result will look even better on a woman. 

My gym's website today featured the essay written by Henry Rollins called "The Iron." I have read it before but it's one of those that should be read periodically especially by young men, especially by my son. He'll be going to the gym with me for the month of June while he's on break from football. Practices start again in July. He gets frustrated feeling small right now and from getting pummeled by massive linemen. He's 5'10 and only weighs 150 pounds. He's growing like crazy - up, but is struggling to get big. Once he's done growing tall he'll be a monster like so many of the men in our family on both sides. It'll come - his size will be there. What matters most in the interim is his heart. It is for him that I'm posting "The Iron" in its entirety I've highlighted a few of my favorite lines:

When I was young I had no sense of myself. All I was, was a product of all the fear and humiliation I suffered. Fear of my parents. The humiliation of teachers calling me "garbage can" and telling me I'd be mowing lawns for a living. And the very real terror of my fellow students. I was threatened and beaten up for the color of my skin and my size. I was skinny and clumsy, and when others would tease me I didn't run home crying, wondering why.

I knew all too well. I was there to be antagonized. In sports I was laughed at. A spaz. I was pretty good at boxing but only because the rage that filled my every waking moment made me wild and unpredictable. I fought with some strange fury. The other boys thought I was crazy.

I hated myself all the time.

As stupid at it seems now, I wanted to talk like them, dress like them, carry myself with the ease of knowing that I wasn't going to get pounded in the hallway between classes. Years passed and I learned to keep it all inside. I only talked to a few boys in my grade. Other losers. Some of them are to this day the greatest people I have ever known. Hang out with a guy who has had his head flushed down a toilet a few times, treat him with respect, and you'll find a faithful friend forever. But even with friends, school sucked. Teachers gave me hard time. I didn't think much of them either.

Then came Mr. Pepperman, my advisor. He was a powerfully built Vietnam veteran, and he was scary. No one ever talked out of turn in his class. Once one kid did and Mr. P. lifted him off the ground and pinned him to the blackboard. Mr. P. could see that I was in bad shape, and one Friday in October he asked me if I had ever worked out with weights. I told him no.

He told me that I was going to take some of the money that I had saved and buy a hundred-pound set of weights at Sears. As I left his office, I started to think of things I would say to him on Monday when he asked about the weights that I was not going to buy. Still, it made me feel special. My father never really got that close to caring. On Saturday I bought the weights, but I couldn't even drag them to my mom's car. An attendant laughed at me as he put them on a dolly.

Monday came and I was called into Mr. P.'s office after school. He said that he was going to show me how to work out. He was going to put me on a program and start hitting me in the solar plexus in the hallway when I wasn't looking. When I could take the punch we would know that we were getting somewhere. At no time was I to look at myself in the mirror or tell anyone at school what I was doing. In the gym he showed me ten basic exercises. I paid more attention than I ever did in any of my classes. I didn't want to blow it. I went home that night and started right in.

Weeks passed, and every once in a while Mr. P. would give me a shot and drop me in the hallway, sending my books flying. The other students didn't know what to think. More weeks passed, and I was steadily adding new weights to the bar. I could sense the power inside my body growing. I could feel it.

Right before Christmas break I was walking to class, and from out of nowhere Mr. Pepperman appeared and gave me a shot in the chest. I laughed and kept going. He said I could look at myself now. I got home and ran to the bathroom and pulled off my shirt. I saw a body, not just the shell that housed my stomach and my heart. My biceps bulged. My chest had definition. I felt strong. It was the first time I can remember having a sense of myself. I had done something and no one could ever take it away. You couldn't say s--t to me.

It took me years to fully appreciate the value of the lessons I have learned from the Iron. I used to think that it was my adversary, that I was trying to lift that which does not want to be lifted. I was wrong. When the Iron doesn't want to come off the mat, it's the kindest thing it can do for you. If it flew up and went through the ceiling, it wouldn't teach you anything. That's the way the Iron talks to you. It tells you that the material you work with is that which you will come to resemble. That which you work against will always work against you.

It wasn't until my late twenties that I learned that by working out I had given myself a great gift. I learned that nothing good comes without work and a certain amount of pain. When I finish a set that leaves me shaking, I know more about myself. When something gets bad, I know it can't be as bad as that workout.

I used to fight the pain, but recently this became clear to me: pain is not my enemy; it is my call to greatness. But when dealing with the Iron, one must be careful to interpret the pain correctly. Most injuries involving the Iron come from ego. I once spent a few weeks lifting weight that my body wasn't ready for and spent a few months not picking up anything heavier than a fork. Try to lift what you're not prepared to and the Iron will teach you a little lesson in restraint and self-control.

I have never met a truly strong person who didn't have self-respect. I think a lot of inwardly and outwardly directed contempt passes itself off as self-respect: the idea of raising yourself by stepping on someone's shoulders instead of doing it yourself. When I see guys working out for cosmetic reasons, I see vanity exposing them in the worst way, as cartoon characters, billboards for imbalance and insecurity. Strength reveals itself through character. It is the difference between bouncers who get off strong-arming people and Mr.Pepperman.

Muscle mass does not always equal strength. Strength is kindness and sensitivity. Strength is understanding that your power is both physical and emotional. That it comes from the body and the mind. And the heart.

Yukio Mishima said that he could not entertain the idea of romance if he was not strong. Romance is such a strong and overwhelming passion, a weakened body cannot sustain it for long. I have some of my most romantic thoughts when I am with the Iron. Once I was in love with a woman. I thought about her the most when the pain from a workout was racing through my body.

Everything in me wanted her. So much so that sex was only a fraction of my total desire. It was the single most intense love I have ever felt, but she lived far away and I didn't see her very often. Working out was a healthy way of dealing with the loneliness. To this day, when I work out I usually listen to ballads.

I prefer to work out alone.

It enables me to concentrate on the lessons that the Iron has for me. Learning about what you're made of is always time well spent, and I have found no better teacher. The Iron had taught me how to live. Life is capable of driving you out of your mind. The way it all comes down these days, it's some kind of miracle if you're not insane. People have become separated from their bodies. They are no longer whole.

I see them move from their offices to their cars and on to their suburban homes. They stress out constantly, they lose sleep, they eat badly. And they behave badly. Their egos run wild; they become motivated by that which will eventually give them a massive stroke. They need the Iron Mind.

Through the years, I have combined meditation, action, and the Iron into a single strength. I believe that when the body is strong, the mind thinks strong thoughts. Time spent away from the Iron makes my mind degenerate. I wallow in a thick depression. My body shuts down my mind.

The Iron is the best antidepressant I have ever found. There is no better way to fight weakness than with strength. Once the mind and body have been awakened to their true potential, it's impossible to turn back.

The Iron never lies to you. You can walk outside and listen to all kinds of talk, get told that you're a god or a total bastard. The Iron will always kick you the real deal. The Iron is the great reference point, the all-knowing perspective giver. Always there like a beacon in the pitch black. I have found the Iron to be my greatest friend. It never freaks out on me, never runs. Friends may come and go. But two hundred pounds is always two hundred pounds.

MGTOW flurry.

The MGOTWs have returned. Even after vowing to never read here again. They can't help themselves. Truth is addictive. There is a reason this site gets so much attention. There is a reason that what I say hurts at the core for the MGTOW losers. They don't like losing. They hate it. They aren't willing to change though. They want me to just shut up about what losers they are. They don't want solutions. Sloth is deeply imbedded with them. You will never break them out of it with out addressing it head on.

Real men don't care what the odds of success are. If one man has done it, then I can. No one cares who ran a four minute mile second. No one cares who climbed the Himalayas second. But, once one guy did it, then real men know it can be done. They don't whine about their wives/girlfriends support when doing it. They just do it...because it has been done before and can be done again.

If it is worth doing and a real man has done it before, then I/any-real-man can do it. The only defense I have ever heard from MGTOWs for what they do is either about money or hurt feelings. Neither of which are things that God cares about. You display weakness when doing this. You are no man that I want on my side when the SHTF. Molly Pitcher would be more able at my side. You are a coward.

Why you don't have a wife/girlfriend.

Update:
Dragon Slaying

Update:
I'm referring to whiny bitches #1 and whiny bitches #2 (in the comments).

Her body, her choice - the baby's pain

It took his daughter's death for him to understand life but Dr. Anthony Levatino has had a change of heart:

 "For the first time in my life I really looked at that pile of goo at the side of the table, and all of a sudden I didn’t see her wonderful right to choose, and I didn’t see the $600 wad of cash that I made in 15 minutes, and I couldn’t think about what a great doctor I was because I took care of her problem. All I could see was somebody’s son or daughter,"

 Here is his sworn testimony:
“Our patient today is 24 weeks pregnant. At twenty-four weeks from last menstrual period her uterus is two finger-breadths above the umbilicus. If you could see her baby, which is quite easy on an ultrasound, she would be as long as your hand plus a half from the top of her head to the bottom of her rump not counting the legs. Your patient has been feeling her baby kick for the last month or more but now she is asleep on an operating room table and you are there to help her with her problem pregnancy.
The first task is remove the laminaria that had earlier been placed in the cervix to dilate it sufficiently to allow the procedure you are about to perform. With that accomplished, direct your attention to the surgical instruments arranged on a small table to your right. The first instrument you reach for is a 14-French suction catheter. It is clear plastic and about nine inches long. It has a bore through the center approximately ¾ of an inch in diameter.
Picture yourself introducing this catheter through the cervix and instructing the circulating nurse to turn on the suction machine, which is connected through clear plastic tubing to the catheter. What you will see is a pale yellow fluid that looks a lot like urine coming through the catheter into a glass bottle on the suction machine. This is the amniotic fluid that surrounded the baby to protect her. With suction complete, look for your Sopher clamp. This instrument is about 13 inches long and made of stainless steel. At the business end are located jaws about 2 ½ inches long and about ¾ of an inch wide with rows of sharp ridges or teeth. This instrument is for grasping and crushing tissue. When it gets hold of something, it does not let go. A second trimester D&E abortion is a blind procedure. The baby can be in any orientation or position inside the uterus. Picture yourself reaching in with the Sopher clamp and grasping anything you can.
At twenty-four weeks gestation, the uterus is thin and soft so be careful not to perforate or puncture the walls. Once you have grasped something inside, squeeze on the clamp to set the jaws and pull hard – really hard. You feel something let go and out pops a fully formed leg about six inches long.
Reach in again and grasp whatever you can. Set the jaw and pull really hard once again and out pops an arm about the same length. Reach in again and again with that clamp and tear out the spine, intestines, heart and lungs.
The toughest part of a D&E abortion is extracting the baby’s head. The head of a baby that age is about the size of a large plum and is now free floating inside the uterine cavity. You can be pretty sure you have hold of it if the Sopher clamp is spread about as far as your fingers will allow. You will know you have it right when you crush down on the clamp and see white gelatinous material coming through the cervix. That was the baby’s brains. You can then extract the skull pieces. Many times a little face will come out and stare back at you.
Congratulations! You have just successfully performed a second trimester Suction D&E abortion. You just affirmed her right to choose.
If you refuse to believe that this procedure inflicts severe pain on that unborn child, please think again.”

I will continue to pray for men and women who have participated in the atrocities of abortion to have this change of heart. To repent and turn away from it and stand boldly for life. 

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's...breasts

From the mailbox: 

I'm glad you posted about breasts. It's been coming up in my husband and I's bed time conversations lately.
He loves my breasts. I am very thankful for this because if he didn't love mine, he'd be loving someone else's. Okay… I was a 32-34A BEFORE the eating healthy started 6 months ago. Now, I'm a 32 AA if that. How can I say this… how can you love something that's not there? I breast fed for 6 months with my first and approximately 4 months with my second. I never exclusively breast fed with either because my body just couldn't keep up. At my largest I think I fit nicely into a 34 A. So, I've grown and shrunk and I notice the slight sag.
I feel very unattractive because the state of my breasts and the only time I get turned on by my husband touching them is during those three days of the month where my hormone (testosterone?) levels are higher and I'm 1/17 as horny as he gets every day vs the other 25 days of the month where I'm 1/50th as horny as he is every day. (thats the next story)
Interjection: I don't know what I would do if either one or both of us didn't know Jesus. The world would probably have me committing suicide.
Can I combat these emotions? I can't change the fact that it doesn't turn me on when he touches my breasts. Its so sad cause they don't even fit in his hand. Anyway, I thought I'd let you hear from someone who has a different reason for not loving her breasts (cause I don't have any!)

My response to her was as follows:

Your husband loves your breasts. Would it be acceptable for you to have brown eyes, for your husband to love your brown eyes and for you to continue to wish you had blue eyes. You believe blue eyes are the only eyes that are beautiful. You've allowed your opinion to be projected on those around you to the point where you can not conceive of anyone finding brown eyes beautiful. You live in denial of this truth, that indeed many people, including your husband DO find brown eyes beautiful. Can you see how your continued refusal to accept your own brown eyes as beautiful and believe your husband that they are is a form of coveting.

You are lusting after/yearning for breasts you don't have. So much that you have allowed it to define your self worth. You find it unjust that God created your body as He has.  You need to confess this as sin, ask forgiveness and repent of this. Only then can God assist you in overcoming what you are calling emotions (what you are calling emotions are sinful desires).

Our self worth/self love is indicative of our acceptance of God's love. You have put walls up and called yourself unworthy when He has already called you worthy and showed it on the Cross. You will be able to experience the pleasure in God's wonderful gift of sex and intimacy with your husband when you turn away from the lies Satan is telling you. God made it Good. Satan confuses it. You allow Satan to negatively influence the most beautiful aspect of your marriage relationship. You need to let it all go and give it to God. Release yourself to your husband as God has commanded it and allow your husband's complete enjoyment of your body.

Don't fear or anguish over your husbands desire for you. It is a blessing to give him fulfillment of this desire. Yes, he desires sex more than you do (now), that is completely natural. As you begin to release yourself and fully give yourself to him, God can work within your heart to give you a desire for him as well.

Oh, I also thought you'd like to know, many men love small breasts.  My brother-in-law is one of them. He is more turned on by small A cups than voluptuous DD cups. He is a single man in his mid 30's and kind of a heathen. Never the less, he can't help his attraction to women with what he so eloquently (sarc) calls "itty bitty titties."  :)

Honor and Remember

 

In Memory of

TAPS

Day is done...
Gone the sun
From the lake...
From the hills...
From the sky.
All is well...
Safely rest
God is nigh.
Fading light....
Dims the sight
And a star....
Gems the sky....
Gleaming bright
From afar....
Drawing nigh
Falls the night.

- Major General Daniel Butterfield

Those who have sacrificed

&

 

Those who paid the ultimate price

 

We Thank You

 

Nature is cruel

My favorite animal ever has been missing for several days. He was a cat named Odysseus. He showed up in our garage and decided to stay. I decided he would be an outdoor cat. Apparently, he has either met his demise or moved on. He returned every night for over a year, so I doubt the moving on thing. However, pussy can be a powerful thing. Pun intended.

I don't regret stoking the fire of debate as it relates to MGTOWs and their relationship to Christians. The Truth of the situation will sort out. No amount of protesting gravity will stop it from being true. The same is true of God's laws, especially since gravity is one of His laws. Changing the future of mankind requires showing up for it. Demographics wins the day. That makes feminism a dead end as well. It isn't hard to understand the long term view of Catholicism opposing birth control at a purely pragmatic level. Even outside the debate of when life begins, more Catholic babies mean more people to win the next generation's debates and wars.

One of the problems I see from MGTOWs view on this debate is that they think the traditionalists want their assistance. We don't. It is the desire to help you live better that motivates us. OTOH, I will never allow your views to be unchallenged when presented to my progeny. If I allowed that, it would defeat my goal of showing up for the future with more descendents than my opposition. I consider my long term opposition to be Islam, btw. I consider communists, feminists, and MGTOWs to be short term adversaries. They have no future. Such is the cruelness of nature.

Become what you were denied

This may be the single most difficult post for me to write. Even as I begin, I'm hesitating and I'm frustrated by that.

When it comes to speaking of my own sins and past behavior, I'm much more comfortable. I can take the judgement. I've encountered spiritual battles that make random commenter's/blogger's indictments of me seem sophomoric and petty.

But when it comes to talking about someone who is no longer alive and unable to defend themselves, rationalize their behavior, or explain their decisions, I cower. I've been shamed into silence for twenty-one years. Sometimes by individuals close to my mother but most of the time by my own guilt. No matter the pain I experienced, no matter the loneliness, the longing for a normal, stable home, the mourning of innocence lost, the mourning of loved ones ripped away from me...don't speak of it. She suffered. She was ill. It wasn't her fault. She didn't know any better. You'll be okay. 

She did as much as she could.

As a child of a parent who made many decisions with careless disregard of their outcomes, I vacillate between preserving her honor and helping others who may be living an experience close to my own. I vacillate between "Fuck that, she failed!" and "My life turned out good, all is okay."

I got to spend some time with a young woman whose mother also died very early. Her story has haunted me since. Her mother, the woman who was charged to be her guardian, her nurturer...her mom, was anything but. This woman left a legacy of pain and anguish. She abandoned her family, was addicted to drugs and a self absorbed life, and died all alone - her corpse was decomposed when she was finally found. No more truer example of "Fuck that, she failed!"

I asked this young woman to try and recall something good. Something she could go on that at least her mother did ____... Nothing but the fact she wasn't aborted. She was given a chance to live life. I have many memories of good times with my mother. It is those memories I've clung to in order to justify the painful memories. Though, I'll admit, being a mother of a teenage daughter who is a virgin, who has never given into peer pressure, who is on fire for the Lord...it makes it more difficult to accept the life I lived, knowing my mother abdicated her role, for whatever reason, at my expense. When I analyze what it has taken for me to mother the way I've chosen to and the results I see of that, I struggle with the anger that comes over me - why was this too hard for my own mother?

Forgiveness.

My struggle always brings me back to the Word. And the Word says to forgive.

Should I forgive and not speak of it? How then can I help another? How can I give comfort to this young woman who had it far worse? How do I give her hope if I don't tell my testimony of overcoming, of grace, of perseverance...of knowing the protection of a loving Savior, who, in my darkest times, surrounded me in His loving embrace and told me "You are worthy."

It honestly isn't the way she lived that troubles me the most. It's sensing that it was best that she died that haunts me.

God only gives you as much as you can handle. Right?

That's what we're told. That is what gave me comfort in the days after her death, days that I was supposed to be elated that I was graduating high school, instead I was helping to plan a funeral. When I was planning my wedding, again it pained me to write a memorial for my mother in the program instead of having her there to help me plan. When I was pregnant with my first child and clueless, again I was overwhelmed with a longing to have my own mom there with me.

What would her advice to me have been when I was struggling early on in my marriage? When I was failing miserably fourteen years into my marriage? When I was pulled in the direction she chose so flippantly - twice...to divorce.

What would she think of our adherence to biblical instruction on parenting and marriage? When she was the one who had dropped me off at a church she refused to attend?

What would she think of my anti-feminst views? That my children have never seen the inside of a daycare, yet she dropped me off as an infant of four weeks. I remember it being a liberal badge of honor, "you've been in school since you were four weeks old." - Yes, I'm brilliant. Unattached, lacking empathy, without discretion or a sense of right or wrong... but I'm SMART!!! And isn't that all that matters?

What would she think of my foregoing a "you go grrrl" career in exchange for being my husband's helpmeet? For making his vocation the priority and under-girding his ship in every way I possibly could?

Would any of this have happened...if she was still alive?

Would I have sought marriage at age nineteen? Would I have cleaved to my husband? Would I have accepted mentor-ship from my mother-in-law?  Would I have returned to my Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ?

And still, I have not mentioned what was so terrible. Yes, she was a feminist - a liberal democrat. She voted against Reagan but failed to monitor my television time...I saw all the speeches. I remember Reagan fondly. She forgot to tell me to hate him.

She lost control completely once when I was fourteen. She resorted to dealing with me physically. I don't remember the details of the argument but I know she had lost it in an irrational rage. She began beating me over the head with a cordless phone. I used all the strength I had left in my body to push her off after about the tenth blow, I ran to my bedroom, dazed with welts growing on my head, and escaped out my bedroom window.

I had nowhere to go. I walked aimlessly around town for hours. It would have been shameful to go to the authorities, so I returned home. I accepted full responsibility for the beating. It was my fault. I deserved it. I hated her. But I felt such pity for her.

I didn't regain much more for her than pity for the last three years of her life. I had no respect for her. I stayed away from her as much as I could. I worked as many hours as I could. When I finally had my drivers license I was able to stay away even more.

The last months of her life were awful. She was confined to a hospital bed. Her brain tumors had rendered most of her brain non-functioning. I fought horrible thoughts every.single.day. "God, please just take her." She had a bell she would ring when she needed something. I dreaded hearing the bell. Every morning I would go to her bed with hope that she'd be gone. It wasn't just the long, drawn out death from cancer, it was the crazy shit she'd say, the guilt trips, the indignation she verbalized. She was void of compassion and full of self pity. She seemed to desire for us to suffer as she was suffering.

This sounds awful as I read it back. These were the thoughts of a seventeen year old, messed up, angry girl. Or maybe that's just the guilt talking. Maybe I want to believe these are the thoughts of a seventeen year old girl when they are the reality of watching someone die who lived a life of entitled selfishness - and again, I feel wrong writing that.

Here's what I've learned. This is for any of you who have lived anything similar. Whatever your parent wasn't...You Can Be!

For the young woman I spoke to recently, you can be the mother you were denied. You can make it all right. It takes an acute awareness, faith, forgiveness, and likely a strong example/mentor in your life.

Any of you who came from the selfishness and destruction of feminism...you too can make it right, you can turn the tide. For all the lies you've been told and lies you've lived, you can bring forth the truth and the hope. 

I have been immensely blessed in having a mother-in-law who has been for me all that I was missing. Her unfailing love, support, and encouragement has replenished in my life all that I had longed for. She is married to a mighty strong man and provided me a mighty strong man who married me. Their patience with me has been overwhelming. They embody all I had heard whispered in my heart of God's provision. That He can make things good. And that He did.

The young woman I spoke to will also have this all available to her. It's possible she'll be asked to marry into our family.

If you are reading this, darling, I encourage you to do all you must do to receive this honor.
I know your life has been broken. Through no fault of your own you have been broken. It can all be made whole.

You must forgive. You must release the pain and poison of unforgiveness. This in no way erases it, but it does release you from its burden. There will be times you will have to forgive daily, hourly even. But you keep at it. Praying for His help and guidance. Release the bitterness, release the injustice. Give it all to Him.

Guest post - testimony: Beauty for Ashes

As the youngest of six children, I often felt invisible.  My mother was impatient and critical.  I grew self-protective and decided being a wife and mother was not for me.  Later, I made a habit of only dating casually, but when I noticed a man at work in my late twenties, my attraction was greater than my defenses.  To my surprise, he reciprocated my interest.  Within a few years, we married, and soon thereafter, had a son.  At thirty-two, I found motherhood the greatest gift of my life.  

Yet, our marriage was difficult.  We argued loudly and often.  He threatened divorce.  I turned inward to keep the peace, and considered leaving, but how could I trust myself to make a better choice?  How could I separate father and son?  

Despite the discord, we stayed together, even hoped for more children.  We tried for years and saw an infertility specialist, but to no avail.  I never cried out to God because I didn’t believe in Him.  I did muse, however, if He existed, He certainly knew how to taunt me, for how could I know the longing to have a baby if I hadn’t been given one, then denied another?  Having done all I could about infertility, I became distraught and heart-broken.  My husband and I grew distant.  I focused on preserving our family, but giving up on more children was excruciating.

I was run down physically and prescribed a medication later taken off the market for deadly side effects.  Within a few doses, my mood became so dark, I decided to stop taking it.  The next day, panic and psychic chaos seized me.  After hours of tortured thinking, I decided to end my life.  This resolution brought peace, and in that quiet, I heard a voice that sounded like mine say, “It’s not your time to go.  You need to stay for your son.”  I knew this was true but didn’t like it.  The torment returned, and for months, anxiety and depression plagued me.

 

That spring we moved and a flyer came to our house about classes at a nearby church.  One dealt with depression.  Despite no faith in God, I went and listened to scriptural teaching that eerily matched my experience.  In class, I bowed my head in prayer.  Eventually, I revisited that desperate morning and came to believe the voice that told me to stay was not mine, but the still small voice of God.

It was a revelation and relief.  The veil of depression lifted.  I was filled with gratitude and hope.  I attended the church that held the class and heard about ministry opportunities.  I didn’t know what that meant, but signed up for Crisis Pregnancy Center training, certain I had much to offer women in crisis over unplanned pregnancy since I knew the crisis of pregnancy unfulfilled.

Yet, nothing I knew mattered.  The first day of class, the center director explained the CPC was a ministry of Jesus Christ.  I didn’t know what that meant and cringed inwardly at “Jesus.”  (God was one thing, but Christ was too narrow.)  He also said if anyone was abortion-minded, there might be better places to serve.  I was more than abortion-minded; I was firmly pro-abortion: it was the only issue that guided my voting.  Despite these conflicts, I stayed.

Week after week, I listened and read about abortion.  I ruminated over what I learned, ashamed of my prior willful ignorance.  One day at a stoplight, the story of a woman who’d reluctantly had an abortion but bitterly regretted it haunted me.  Through tears of humility and shame, I cried over and over, “Lord, why did you spare me?”  I wouldn’t have hesitated to have an abortion.  Why did I not suffer that fate and this woman did?

 

Our marital struggles continued.  Good Friday, my husband confronted me about my selfishness.  Despite the urge to point out his faults, I could not refute him.  The self-protecting heart that had warmed to let him in had grown cold as stone.  Later, his parents came to dinner.  Unexpectedly, he told his father, a minister, I was curious about baptism.  I thought he was mocking me.  Angry, but also distraught, I listened politely, hidden behind the smile I so often wore.

The night before Easter, I prayed with our son at bedtime.  “Amen,” we said together, then my son added, “God, please put a heart in mommy’s chest.”  I left the room, stunned.  Later, my husband confront me again, this time, annoyed because I hadn’t prepared an Easter basket as I had in years past.   I explained that in my budding faith, I was unsure about bunnies and jellybeans.  Confused and upset, I barely slept.  At daybreak, I drove to the store and shopped to fill a basket.

Back home, I stared out the window in despair.  The conflicts with my husband kept escalating. No matter how justified I thought my actions to be, life was not adding up.  “I may as well give this Jesus a try,” I heard myself say.  “Nothing I’m doing is working.”  I knew I couldn’t bargain with God, and in that moment, felt something give way - the wonderful terrible surrender of having held on too long with belief only in myself.  There was nothing left but to trust in Jesus.

I called my father-in-law and was baptized that morning.  A few months later, I shared my story with a college roommate who’d remained a dear friend despite living hundreds of miles apart.  She had planted a seed for Christ in me years before with her open profession of faith, and her joyful and transparent nature.  Through tears, she said she’d prayed for me unceasingly by name, often with prayer partners, for nearly two decades.  What faithfulness! 

Choosing Christ is forever life-changing, but doesn’t magically erase the consequences of one’s actions.  Our marriage is still challenging, but as God has transformed me, I grow in appreciation and respect for my husband.  We had no more children and giving up that hope was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, but the gain in that loss is beyond anything I ever imagined.  God does give beauty for ashes.  

Thank you so much to commenter ioweenie for sharing this. It is so encouraging to hear of the transformation that happens in fellow Christian's lives. Testimonies are such a joy to read, they are hope to the weary and confirmation to those in the fight. If reading this moves you to desire to share your own testimony, please email me.

May 20, 2013 - Pray for Moore

Twenty-one years ago today my mother died of breast cancer (May 20, 1992).

She was diagnosed when she was forty-one years old and fought for five years. She had a partial mastectomy, underwent chemotherapy, and enjoyed remission for a couple of years. The cancer came back in her lymph nodes and lungs. She then underwent extensive chemotherapy (three - one month stays in the hospital). Following this she was given the all clear. All tests showed the cancer was gone... except for the tumors that were growing in her brain. Her doctors failed to check her brain. Six months after being given her clean bill of health, she started becoming disoriented and was losing her equilibrium. A CT scan revealed twenty-five metastasizing tumors in her brain. She went through as much radiation treatment allotted for the brain. It was successful in reducing the tumors down to only two small masses. But, it was just a matter of time after that. Those two masses grew and grew until they finally claimed her life at age forty-six.

I was seventeen at the time. I got to experience one of the most amazing moments in my life to date, the passing of a soul from the body to beyond. I held her hand as it happened. Those of us with her encouraged her to go. She nodded and cried as slowly her energy left her body.

I got to spend some time alone with her after everyone had left the room. I did what I felt I had to do as a young woman. Perhaps it was for closure, perhaps just curiosity, what it turned out to be was one of the most intimate moments I ever had between me, my mother, and God. I lifted her eyelid so I could look into her eye. Nothing was there. Her beautiful blue eye was as a doll's glass eye. Lifeless.

Her soul had left.

Today, twenty-one years after her death, I have been overwhelmed with sadness and tears. Seventy miles separates me and my family from Moore, Oklahoma. All day today we watched as these horrific storm systems have sailed by our home to the East. All day today we have watched in horror as the images on the television have shown us just how small and helpless we are. All day today I have cried out to our Almighty God for comfort for the families, neighbors, and friends who have lost so much.

Yesterday a friend showed up at our home, just back from deployment.

Safe.

Today we mourned as lifeless babies were brought out from a school. As fellow Okies dug through the remains of their homes. As fellow Christians gathered together in prayer. As fellow mothers and fathers wailed in grief over the loss of their children.

When there's nothing...nothing we can do, we pray.

Today we mourn the devastation. The lives lost. Tomorrow I pray we hear of the miracles. The lives spared.

Many souls passed from their bodies to beyond today. To be joined with God in heaven. They've been taken home.

There may have been some confusion of my perceived callousness regarding the attempt to preserve life by extreme surgical methods.

I am not deceived. This life is a blink.

It is far from the end.

Do not live in fear.

Cherish your days. Cherish your relationships. Learn. Grow. Surrender to God.

Live.

The boobies...they are Good!

I've got a soft spot for breasts because I happen to really like my own. All this talk of cutting off breasts and breast cancer can really put a damper on a woman's positive feelings about her breasts. They aren't there to kill you, that's not why God gave them to you. Breasts cause breast cancer as much as hearts cause heart disease (the leading killer of women). You do understand this, right?

It is very difficult to find an article about breasts and a woman's health without scouring through hundreds of breast cancer articles. Being the second leading cause of death among women, this makes sense but how much of this becomes a self fulfilling prophesy: Breasts = Cancer, Breasts = Death.

I'm not going to discuss the obvious great thing about breasts - breast feeding. I would hope all mommies would know this already. Pregnancy is a state of health. Delivering a baby is preventative medicine for a woman. Breastfeeding babies even more so. 

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,The fruit of the womb is a reward. - Psalm 127:3

The Bible talks a lot about sex, obviously. It saddens me to hear how low of a priority sex is for women in their marriages. This belief that it is not sinful to deny your husbands. Aside from that, you are denying your body even more preventative medicine. Sex is good for you! And as it turns out, sex that involves your breasts, may help in the prevention of...breast cancer:

LOVE PLAY may have a role in protecting women against breast cancer, according to an Australian professor whose patients are offered a programme of nipple care.

Nipple stimulation promotes the production of a useful female hormone which encourages cells to expel cancer-causing chemicals from breast ducts, it was said yesterday by Professor Tim Murrell, of the Department of Community Medicine, at the University of Adelaide.
Professor Murrell said they recommend two to three minutes of nipple stimulation twice a week. 'We ask our patients . . . to involve their partners. Women who are alone can do this for themselves by squeezing their nipples or by using a rough flannel.'
[...]
Breast cancer risk is known to be lower in women who have breast- fed their babies, and his theory is based on the properties of the hormone oxytocin produced during lactation. Oxytocin is also produced at orgasm. One of the functions of the hormone is to cause breast cells to contract to expel milk or other breast fluid from them.
Professor Murrell said that 5,000 women at his general practice university clinic had enrolled in the nipple stimulation programme, started three years ago. 'We would expect to be seeing two or three breast cancers a year based on a population of this size. All I can say is that we have not seen one since we began,' he said.
In his paper he says that sexual activity in women who have no children protects them as oxytocin levels are shown to rise in orgasm. 'Oxytocin systems in the brain are intricately linked to oestrogen and progesterone levels and it is possible that these hormones may have an effect on the secretion of oxytocin in the breast.'
Professor Murrell said the idea had started after a woman patient, who suffered from lumpy and painful breasts, had remarried. 'When I next saw her, I asked about her breast problem. She said the difficulties had disappeared, because her second husband was much better at loving her breasts.'

You may read Professor Murrell's hypothesis here. 

It's a hypothesis, yes. I encourage you and your husband to do everything necessary to prove it.

A friend of mine had a common complaint about her breasts after having three children and three decades of gravity, they were sagging. So she underwent plastic surgery. Talking openly with her about sex has never been a problem so I asked her about her nipples. Does she still enjoy nipple stimulation? "No," she said, "it has actually become an annoyance, I don't even want them touched anymore."

Oh, hell no!

The risk of permanent nipple numbness following this surgery is 15% nationally. And according to Loftus Plastic Surgery Center: "If loss of nipple sensation is unacceptable to you, you should carefully reconsider this operation."

Consider it off the table.

This is one of the many reasons why I oppose complete mastectomy as a means of preventing cancer. I've read that in the event a woman does develop breast cancer, she may have a better chance of survival with lumpectomy surgery rather than mastectomy.

Of course I'm not the only one who finds this war on breasts ridiculous:  How Angelina Jolie was duped by cancer doctors into self mutilation for breast cancer she never had:

The very idea that breast cancer is a "percent risk" is a complete lie. In reality, everyone has cancer micro-tumors in their bodies, including myself. Cancer is not a disease you just "get" like being randomly struck by lightning. It's something you must "manage" or "prevent" day by day, meal by meal, through a lifestyle choice that involves vitamin D supplementation, nutrition, superfoods, vegetable juices and avoidance of cancer-causing chemicals and radiation.

So when a doctor says you have a "chance" of getting cancer, what he's implying is that you have no control over cancer, and that's an outright lie. Cancer quackery, in other words.

In researching for this post, I came across this very sad indictment on the mental health and stability of women unsatisfied with their breasts: women who have breast implants for augmentation were three times more likely to complete suicide as women in the general population of the countries studied.

As with every area of my life, I return to the Bible. Let's speak some Truth about breasts: 

Your two breasts are like two fawns,
Twins of a gazelle,
Which feed among the lilies.

Until the day breaks
And the shadows flee away,
I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh
And to the hill of frankincense. 
You are all fair, my love,And there is no spot in you. - Song of Solomon 4:5-7

As a loving deer and a graceful doe,
Let her breasts satisfy you at all times;And always be enraptured with her love. Proverbs 5:19

Ladies, the men already believe this, I hope you believe it too,  the boobies...they are good!

If she wants the baby, it's murder. If he wants the baby, it's choice.

I'll admit, I approach this issue with tremendous bias and a bit of solipsism, being married to a man who could do nothing to convince a feral female to not kill his baby. And, I'll be completely honest, when I first read this story, I didn't think immediately of the horror of another baby killed, I felt a bit of righteous indignation. I felt anger yet again for the pro abortion crowd and the cognitive dissonance it must take to consider themselves moral individuals. However, as I wrote the title of this post I read back what I wrote: "baby." And I sadly contemplated again the horrible human condition.

Another baby - killed at the hands of his parent. What has become of us?

TAMPA — The son of a Lutz fertility doctor killed a girlfriend's unborn child by tricking her into taking an abortion drug, federal authorities said Wednesday.
The act could put John Andrew Welden, 28, in prison for life.
 [...]
The federal Unborn Victims of Violence Act of 2004 defines "unborn child" as "a member of the species homo sapiens, at any stage of development, who is carried in the womb."
If someone kills an unborn child while committing a federal crime, it's considered murder, said Tampa lawyer Todd Foster, a former assistant U.S. Attorney and FBI agent who is not associated with this case.
Welden's first alleged crime? Product tampering, "with reckless disregard for the risk that another person would be placed in danger of death or bodily injury."
A federal grand jury indicted him Tuesday on that charge, along with one count of first-degree murder.

Of course he won't be charged with First-Degree Murder. However, to say his first crime was product tampering "with reckless disregard for the risk that another person would be placed in danger of death of bodily injury?" Which person? The baby? Or the mother - who could have been one of thousands each day who consume this drug.

Oh how the mind must twist to hope for his conviction yet continue to support this atrocity of abortion.

It's only logical

A couple years ago I asked Spacebunny what she recommends for teaching logic. I wanted it not only for my children but for myself as well. It isn't something I had been taught. I knew some basics but logic and reasoning just isn't something that comes natural to women. For a very long time I believed what I had been told and had observed, feelings = truth.

She recommended a website called Trivium Pursuit. I recommend it to you as well. All women should read the Bluedorn's book, The Fallacy Detective. I read it with my son and will do so again next school year with my daughters. We learned so much from it and would make games out of spotting logical fallacies when we'd watch television or read the news.

Our son likes to debate issues with his friends. He used to get a little frustrated that not only do they use logical fallacies in their arguments, when he points them out, they haven't a clue what he is talking about. He laughs at it now.

Hans Bluedorn has a recent blog post up called "How Logical Are You?"  Go take a look, take the quiz, and see if you can spot red herrings.

There are exercises similar to those in every lesson of The Fallacy Detective (and thankfully they provide the answers in the back of the book).

Understanding logical fallacies and being able to spot them is highly useful in debating issues. But more importantly you'll learn how to spot them in your own reasoning. This leads to a much more rational approach to issues. Especially useful, is becoming a more rational conversationalist with your husband. (You may even become a more rational commenter on the blogs you visit).

When I think of what advertisers and activists do, I think of the collars I need to use to walk my basset hounds. They require a prong collar. They are very low to the ground, are strong, and are easily distracted by enticing scents. Also, their skin is very thick, in order to get their attention and obedience, we need to tug on the leash so the collar pokes them. And, no, this isn't cruel, they feel no pain when they obey.

Propaganda works the same way and is very effective. Instead of a physical poke, propaganda often pokes at our emotions.

Consider the appeal to fear and breast removal surgery as a preventative measure for breast cancer.

Consider the appeal to pity and all the advertisement you are bombarded with to send money to charitable organizations.

How about repetition: "Children need public school to be socialized."

Here's another great quiz from Nathaniel Bluedorn: Name the Propaganda

Recognizing these techniques will allow you to set aside your emotional response in order to take a logical analysis of the issues. You will seek the truth. Can I prevent death by removing my breasts? Is this charitable organization credible? Are children in public schools better socialized than homeschoolers - and is that our priority?

The wise women builds her house

Rollo has an enlightening post up about Soft Dread over at The Rational Male that I'd like to expand on a bit. It'd be helpful if you read that in its entirety first.

Consider this personal experience of he and his wife: 

Mrs. Tomassi and I were recently talking with a woman of about 49. She’s the ever-present front desk host at our gym and a casual acquaintance and friend. She’s not particularly unattractive for her age, reasonably good shape from a body perspective – I can tell she used to enjoy a lot of male attention in her 20s and maybe 30′s – but now just this side of 50 she’s moved not so much into a regret stage, but rather a hopeful sense of well post-Wall self-remorse. That might sound odd, but she’s at least optimistic about her ‘chances’ of getting with a “good man” in the near future.
She’s quite upfront and honest about the Alpha Bad Boy Jerks she’s dated, married one and then divorced from her past. In fact she’s one of the more lucid women I’ve encountered about her present state and how she came to it. Although she’s the typical result of a hypergamous life prolonged past the “eating her cake too” phase, she owns her mistakes.
Although we generally hit Gold’s at different times, occasionally  the wife and I go together in the mornings. It was on one of these mornings, and our friend at the counter stopped us to say,

“I love you guys, I really do. I see a lot of people pass through here but when I see you both together it gives me hope that I can have a good relationship like you two. You’re such a team, I really hope I can meet a guy I can connect with like that.”

We were on our way out, and she always has something else to say about her personal life so, while I guess I was somewhat flattered, I didn’t pay it much mind. That is until our ride back home when Mrs. Tomassi looked me square in the face and said, “I am so glad I didn’t end up like that!” I was actually kind of surprised at the tone of her voice. “Thank God that’s not me, how horrible to be in that position at her age.” I nodded my head because I knew she was expecting my usually analyzations of post-Wall women and the beds they make. Then, with a hint of a tear in her eye, she gave me one of the best compliments I’ve ever heard from her, “I hope Bebé finds and marries a Man just like you.”
That made me feel really good, and what I’m about to type here sound really shitty. After not a small swell of pride, I thought, while it’s nice to be appreciated in this respect, would this realization have come without the influence of our friend and her state of life?

What happened here with them is very common with women but I wonder if we, as women, can approach this more cognitively. Is there a way for us to make sure the answer to his final question is "yes?"

Do we need to see the man with no shoes to appreciate the shoes on our own two feet? Do we need to see poverty in order to see our abundance? Do we need to witness heartache in order to know the joy in our own hearts?

Does it take these instances for us to express our appreciation to our husbands?

I'm guilty of it. My life abounds in awesome fulfillment and joy, yet often times I fail to express this to RLB until I see what could have been. And even then there are times I fail to give him the words of respect and appreciation he deserves for having provided all of this for me and for being faithful, loyal, patient, and committed to loving me.

Pride - it's as dangerous as coveting.

The example Rollo gave hit home with me because of a very similar situation in my life. I'm often at the gym at the same time as a very friendly woman my same age. She is always positive and uplifting and is very forthcoming about her personal life. She is single, 38 years old, has succeeded financially in her own business and travels frequently. Her motivation for working out so hard at the gym: to get her body in shape to undergo her second $15,000 attempt at in vitro fertilization with sperm from a sperm donor.

I've felt the same thing Rollo's wife was feeling that day: "I'm so glad" and "Thank God."

Christian women (talking to myself too), lets commit to acknowledging our blessings all the time and not wait until we see what could have been. Say thank you to your husband for what he's provided for you, the relationship you have, the children you have, the lifestyle you live. Make it a priority to dole out that appreciation and respect all the time.

Make it a priority, keep it in the forefront of your minds, speak it often, and build your house.

 The wise woman builds her house,But the foolish pulls it down with her hands. - Proverbs 14:1