Tag: happiness

A wedding is a promise of best days to come

The wedding of my littlest sister gave me the opportunity to remember the start of "best days" in my life.
The wedding of my littlest sister gave me the opportunity to remember the start of “best days” in my life.

This weekend I had the privilege of witnessing a wedding. Weddings are such happy occasions, filled with love, friendship and support and the opportunity to further cement ties of various kinds. At one point after this wedding, someone commented that the day would be the “happiest day” of this young couple’s lives. I thought immediately, “You know, it is a great day, but there will be many more and even happier days to come.” I can definitely say my wedding day was not the happiest or best day of my life; it was 21 years ago, and I was 23, and I loved my husband and was excited for the day and all it meant, but I have had so many wonderful days, better days, since.

The groom in this scenario was the next-to-youngest of eight children, and his parents were blessed to have all their older children married already, and these couples were all in attendance. I’d venture to say, from my own experience, that this day may very well have been one of the best days of the groom’s parents’ lives to date, as they were able to celebrate a beautiful, meaningful occasion not just as a couple, but as a family: the family they themselves created and nurtured.

My view is that marriage isn’t just about putting a legal or cultural stamp of approval on a romantic relationship. It’s meant to be the start of a family. And my faith teaches that families are forever: that marriage is a vow between a man and a woman that can be “sealed” in the presence of God in a temple and last forever, more than just “till death do you part.” And that promise to be faithful to each other and support each other and grow together includes having children and teaching them and loving them. That big picture, the years spent growing together as a couple in love and being able to rear children, is what brings the best days of all.

I definitely appreciate the sentiment expressed by Bruce Hafen in one of his excellent books, The Broken Heart: “One new bride reportedly said to her mother on her wedding day, “Oh, Mom, I’m so happy! I’m at the end of my troubles.’ ‘Yes, dear,’ replied the wise mother, ‘but which end?'”

A wedding day may seem the culmination or the end of a courtship, the fulfillment and denouement of romantic love. But it’s really just the start of something much bigger, deeper, and wider. I’ve enjoyed some wonderful days with my love of 21 years, as well as a bunch of stinky ones. We’ve had our share of troubles and stresses and real difficulties. We’ve had our share of disagreements and I’ve had moments or even hours during which I’ve been very frustrated with him (and I’m sure he’s been in the same boat with feelings about me), to the point where I was beside myself and unsure where to go next, how to resolve our problems, how to feel less angry or disappointed. But I’ve had moments of pure contentment, absolute satisfaction, utter bliss. I’ve been satisfied that despite the difficulties, I made a good choice of spouse and that despite everything, I still just LIKE him a lot almost all of the time.

We’ve been blessed to have four daughters, three biological and one adopted. And we’ve had days and weeks of frustration in parenting, of being at wits’ end, of not knowing how to proceed with parenting challenges. As our kids have gotten older, these moments have become more frequent and intense, because they’re more and more their own people with distinct personalities and very definite plans to exert independence. They can and do make their own decisions, and it’s our job to guide them and provide meaningful consequences, discipline and teaching, combined with big doses of love and compassion. But the whole job has gotten almost exponentially harder and more challenging with each year each gets older.

At the same time, these independent people we’re rearing are also sources of immense joy and happiness. At the best of times, when everyone is getting along, when we’re just having fun, simply being ourselves together and laughing and being distinctly us, the unit that is uniquely the Marce and Cathy Lim family, it is the best of anything I’ve ever experienced. It really does feel like heaven on earth, the best version you can dream up.

Here’s why these years can contain the best days I’ve ever had: there are more of us than just the two we started out with. Our little couple expanded into a sixsome composed of some amazing people who are wonderful to be around as individuals but even better when combined. I cherish our wedding day as the start of what we have now. But it was just a seed, an embryo, of what we were meant to be and to have. And as time goes on past today, past this year, past these moments where I can enjoy other young couples’ “seed” days of weddings, our Lim tree is growing and growing. There are far more “best days” ahead, and I look forward to them with great anticipation.

Parenting … joy or misery?

Apparently, the world needs studies to “prove” just about anything. Troll the Internet and you’ll find some great examples, both “duh” ones and ridiculous ones (“clothing keeps you warm” or “soap operas lack accuracy”). The latest I read about today regards parenting.

New studies now refute some previous studies (and isn’t THAT typical as well?) that indicated that parenting made couples unhappier than their childless peers. Now, several are saying that “parenting makes you (relatively) happier.”

I’ve thought about this for, well, about 16 years now. First, I think I can say as a parent, I can speak from both perspectives: as a wife without children and a wife with children, because I was married for almost three years before I had my first child. So I know the difference. Honestly, can people who have chosen not to have children speak from both perspectives? No.

But on to my opinions on this subject. I think that there are days I’d say, yep, parenting can be the pits. It’s sometimes miserable. I was just talking with my 16-year-old a few days ago about the stage of parenting infants and how it can just drive you to sheer desperation. Those early months in which you’re constantly being awakened at night and during the naps you MIGHT be able to try to take during the day are miserable. They’re foggy and hazy and overcast by exhaustion. I don’t do well on small amounts of sleep, and while I was eager to get up and take care of my babies for the first few weeks, my energy and enthusiasm dimmed a bit over time as my sleep meter went down into negative numbers. The sleep loss alone can turn you into a zombie, hungry for energy. Add to that the irritants of incessant crying or fussiness and the huge demand one little baby can create, and yeah, I felt desperate. I can still remember that feeling even now, it was just so strong and overpowering, so much that I simply can’t put it into words. Holding and putting down and picking up again an infant who’s overtired or gassy or just doesn’t like to be put down can make one go quickly insane. Doing that four times? Insanity, indeed.

And that’s only the first months of each new life. Then there are the “terrible twos” and the days they say “no” over and over and throw fits or scratch pictures into the surface of your new wood table with the little tab from an aluminum can (that was merely a week ago with my 5-year-old…). There are the years where you’re in and out of the car, ferrying children to and from school and activities. … I couldn’t possibly keep this post to a reasonable length if I went into even a few examples of each age and stage. Other parents know what I’m talking about here, and non-parents have heard many of the “horror” stories.

But at the same time, I have felt my most sublime joy holding or watching my children. Just this week, I stretched out in my recliner on a Sunday evening after the younger three kids were in bed and invited my oldest to climb in next to me. We cuddled and talked for an hour, which wasn’t what I had planned, but it was wonderful. I don’t consider myself a super-emotional person, but just thinking about it right now makes me a little teary-eyed, it was so perfect. And as much as I remember those days of exhaustion and desperation with that same kid a mere 15 to 15 1/2 years ago (she was a very demanding baby, and there were many times I thought I couldn’t wait for her to grow up), I would not trade away that hour in the cozy chair to save myself those many, many hours of struggle.

I think frequently of a scripture in my faith. A father is talking to his sons and explaining life, starting with the story of Adam and Eve. That first couple could have stayed in the Garden of Eden (in fact, many people think they should have), but if they had, they would have not known the transcendent joys of life. As this prophet put it: “And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin. But behold, all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things. Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy.”

Yep, the studies are right: parenting can induce misery. And the studies that show parenting can lead to great happiness are right too. As that same chapter says, very wisely: “For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things.” You can’t experience true joy without experiencing misery. You can’t be happy to eat if you’ve never been hungry. And on and on.

Smack in the middle of parenting, if a researcher comes in and asks a few questions on any given day, in one slice of time, the odds are that researcher is going to find that parent frazzled. It’s unlikely he or she will find that mom or dad right in the middle of a sublime moment of happiness. But just because there are more moments of craziness than not doesn’t diminish the importance and amazingness of the moments of joy. And that’s true with everything in life; parenting is just one example. Anything great that requires hard work and sacrifice is worth that work and sacrifice, but don’t ask those people about how great it is while they’re in the middle of buckling down and sweating and crying and pouring their whole selves into the work.

No, I’m not going to go on and on about how amazing parenting is, and be a rah-rah cheerleader about it. I’m a realist in many ways, but I’m also an optimist. I’m not going to sugar-coat, but I will be happy to share both sides of the parenting coin, the hard work and the beauty. If others choose not to go through the experience because they don’t want the bad parts, that’s their choice. But they will surely be deprived of a kind of joy that they couldn’t possibly experience any other way. That’s their choice too. For me, I’ll take the good and the bad, the misery and the joy, just to be able to savor those moments out of time that are almost beyond normal happiness. And I’ll try to laugh about the misery, because that’s the best I can do with it.