What was that noise? Was it a noise? Ugh! you're just making stuff up in your head, now. I can't hear over the fan. I have to turn the fan off so I can hear downstairs. Better.

God, I need you to help me. I can't let go of this fear. I'm laying here completely drenched in sweat with irrational fears. I know this doesn't make sense! I know this isn't go to help or prevent anything! I know this is just making my life worse. and I try. I try to let it go and just trust in you. But, I don't trust you. Please help me to trust you. please. I don't want to live in this fear anymore.

******

If we are going to be murdered in our beds, please just make it quick for the little ones. No fear. No pain. No torture. No rape. No witness. Just fast and done so I can hold them on the other side. Please just let them go quickly. Focus on me, if you need to cause pain. Just let them go. And let them go first so they don't have to be afraid of what is happening to mama. Don't let them see me go into the rug. If I can just stay awake until morning, then we'll be ok.

*panic* I shouldn't have taken that Ambien! Dammit! I can't fall asleep. I need to stay awake so I can hear when they come in. Please God, I know that you promise to keep us safe. I know that we are commanded to take heart and not to worry. lilies of the field and all that. But, I can't trust you with these darling ones.

What kind of a parent are you, anyway?! Free will?! What is that shit?! If I'm with my children and one of them goes to hurt another, I step in and stop them. I don't just let them act on free will! Would it be ok if I did that?! Just let them hurt each other because it was their choice?! Would that absolve me of any wrongdoing if I just standby and watch it happen, just because it was their free will?! I'm sorry but that is just too damn convenient. I'm not buying it! And if that's the way you parent, if that is the way you care for your little ones, then how can you wonder that I would fight you for protection of my own little ones?!

Dammit. I need. to. relax. I can't do this every night. This is ridiculous. Nothing is going to happen. But, maybe this is my intuition. Maybe, I'm feeling this way because I can sense that something is coming. something dark. I can feel the evil approaching.

or maybe the evil is eating me alive.

I don't have enough arms...
One way that I spend hours and hours laying in bed at night, is trying to figure out how to get all of the children out of the house in various emergency scenarios.

I'm starting to panic right now just thinking about it. Fire? we would probably do ok b/c we have two exits from the second floor. But what about intruders. ax murderers. people bent on killing my entire family. staying calm but still conveying to the little ones they have to get out while mommy throws herself on top of the gunmen coming up the stairs. what if they get scared and won't go? What about the baby?

The children get scared and I tell them Mommy is here. Daddy tells them that God is here keeping them safe. But, I can't say that. God doesn't keep children safe. everyday. all over the world. I can't trust God to keep them safe. It has to be Mommy is here. God isn't going to throw himself on the gunmen coming up the stairs. Only I can do that. God will just allow "freewill" and all that. Just sit back and watch it happen. completely detached.

They had to go one by one. I guess the oldest first. A new game to play, dear. Just stand on this chair in the closet and tie this scarf around your neck. It will be like a swing! Weeeeee! See how much fun she had?! Now you. Here's a pretty tie for you. It matches your dress. Don't be scared. It's great fun. Now jump! Ok little one. hop on up. It's your turn. oh what a big girl. Here's a nice satin sash for you to play with. Let's get it just right. What a big girl! Now weeeeeee! And last, the baby. a nice piece for you tiny, dear. It will all be over soon and we will be safe on the other side. I'll be able to hold you in paradise for ever. (hums a lullaby)

did each one get a gentle kiss before their jump? Was mother finally at peace?

please don't let them have been scared. please. just a new game. no fear. no screaming. no dragging or forcing those darling ones. forevermore into a closet. Always to be together. but the one. the one that didn't make it to the other side. left here all by herself with no sisters. no mother.

poor darling ones. at peace, now.

For three nights it won't let me go. Even during the day it will pop up at random and cause me to double over. I have been haunted...

by the pain and agony. the screaming of the poor darling one.

being cooked in a microwave oven

Ladybug woke at 5:30am. I had just fallen asleep at 4a.

In my head I said, "oh God, just give me one more hour of sleep."

and then the panic hit me. God was saying, "Fine, you ungrateful bitch. You want to sleep? fine. You got it. I'll just take that small nagging inconvenience away from you. See, I knew you didn't deserve her. She should have gone to someone who wouldn't mind the sacrifices that are necessary to take care of one of my most precious gifts." etc. etc. etc.

So, up I hopped. Ran to her crib. snatched her up before He could. See, I love her. I'm up. I love her. I love her. I love her. I am so sorry. I didn't mean that. I didn't mean it. of course, I'll get up with you, Darling. of course. You are my darling. I love you beyond words. I don't deserve you. but I love you. I do. I didn't mean that. Bad Mommy. Bad Bad Mommy. You are my darling. I love you. oh, how I love you. my darling darling one. I am so so sorry. I will show you. I will show you how much I love her and that she belongs here with me. Please, I am so so sorry. oh please, she belongs with me. here. she's my darling. and I love her. I will make it up to her. I so sorry. Please....

please...

I'm not supposed to have children.
I stole every last one of them.

My first, I had at 19 years old. I wasn't supposed to get pregnant. and I wasn't supposed to keep the baby. He was supposed to go to the beautiful young couple I had been talking to. but I stole him back.

as penance for that, we suffered through years of infertility and lost baby after baby. When I was down on my hands and knees scrubbing the blood stains from the grout in the bathroom, after losing a baby while Chowder was in Guatemala doing mission work, I had finally been broken. I began screaming, "Fuck you, GOD! You can't keep doing this to me! What kind of parent are you?! I could never be so cruel! I've had it! I'm through with you! I taking this out of your hands and putting it into Dr. Campbell's hands!" And then I stole my twins.

I quickly stole another child when I saw the look on my OB's face. It was the briefest of looks. It passed over her face so fast. The look of terror as she delivered my fourth child. But, both Chowder and I saw it. We asked her what was wrong. She said "oh nothing! He's perfect! Look, he has a complete knot in his cord. That means he'll have a life of good luck!" We found out later from the nurse, that he also had the cord wrapped around his neck two times. By all accounts he was very lucky...to be alive.

We tried to have another child using the embryos we had created when we stole our second and third children. But, all of those embryos died. As penance, I delivered my next baby on the bathroom floor, tiny and perfect, still inside her little bag of waters.

But greedy as I am, I snuck in another baby.

I'm trying to keep quiet over here and just blend in. I don't want to call much attention to ourselves, because if God notices what I have done, it's all over. I'm like the woman in the gospel who touched Jesus' cloak as he walked by. Stealing a miracle...but I'm not as brave as she was. She came out of the crowd and said it was her. I have slinked back into the crowd. I can't come forward.

oh. I have tried. I have confessed this sin over 20 times in the last 5 years. But, God just won't absolve me. I know how it feels when God forgives you. There is this drenching of fresh cool water that falls from above and washes you clean inside and out. I have felt it before. but I can't get it now. I will keep doing my penance. I will be the perfect mother so he'll see that I am worthy of these children.

And then...he'll forgive me.

And then...I'll get to keep them.

but until then, I'll be hiding over here in the corner desperately grasping onto my stolen children.

mothers....

My heart is in a very dark place right now. I've been spending hours and hours reading the stories of mothers around the world and suffering that they endure. Chowder wants me to stop. I'm not sleeping. I'm awake until 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning...thinking of them. seeing their faces. and Chowder thinks this isn't good for me. He wants me to stop.






What an extravagant luxury that is. What an extravagant luxury that I am not an Israeli mother who's baby was shot in the head by a sniper, not a Palestinian mother who's 3 yr old son was killed in a military action, not a Darfurian mother who's husband and sons were killed in front of her while she and her daughters were raped, not an inner city mother whose 2 year old daughter was killed in a drive-by shooting, not a Rawadan mother, an Iraqi mother, a Bosnian mother, a Chechen mother, a Northern Irish mother, a Sierra Leone mother. What an extravagant luxury that I could just stop looking at it. I could just turn and point myself inward to my beautiful happy middle-class white American family. How extravagant. How luxurious.


But, I'm looking at these mother's faces. They are looking back at me. Their eyes are pleading, or worse they are blank, dead. And then as they look at me my computer screen goes blank. I'm gone. Her face falls. Her moment of fleeting hope, has passed. I've turned away because it was just too much. too horrible. Their tragedy was effecting me too much. And then what? What happens to the mothers when I avert my eyes? What happens when I turn myself away? It all goes on the same. the atrocities continue. And in turn, what happens to me?