A Quick Hello and Update :)

Hello everyone,

So my blogging has been VERY very sparse lately. I really apologize, but I have been going through a lot in the past few months. Long story short, there has been a lot of negativity in my life for a very long time - negativity over where I am (grad school can do that to you - I try not to worry about this), negativity over missing home, and negativity in how I see the world. So a few months ago I decided to take some control. I took a look at my life, and tried to figure out where my awful feelings were coming from.

One thing that I noticed was that for awhile now, a new view had started creeping into my consciousness. I started seeing everyone around me in a new light. Instead of loving them for who they were, and taking them as they are right now, I started focusing way too much on the wrongness of their views. And lets face it, I'm at a Canadian university, which means that pretty much every single person I meet is pro-choice. It really takes a toll on you, and a toll on how you can relate to others, when you stop seeing people as flawed and instead see them as wrong. So I stepped back from my blog, and I stopped spending ages reading pro-life news (though I've stayed pretty active on my Twitter account). And I finally realized that I wasn't seeing other people as wrong per se, but I was actually seeing myself that way and was comforting myself by thinking "Well, at least I don't think that abortion is a good thing". And why was I telling myself this? Because, in all honesty (and I am very ashamed of this, which is perhaps why it took me so long to admit to myself), other than this blog and the odd debate with a friend or family member, I don't really do much to forward the pro-life cause. I don't attend rallies. I'm not part of my school's pro-life group. I've never gone to March For Life. I don't volunteer at a Crisis Pregnancy Centre. But as soon as I realized that I was actually feeling awful about myself, I started being afraid. And the more I thought about being pro-life the more terrified I became. Every time I met someone new I was worried that they would hate me because I am pro-life - and this is strange, because I have never, ever in my life before this point cared about what others thought of me. This part of the negativity was coming from the pro-choice side of the debate and all the blame and anger and terror that I see there. I was starting to view the average person, who is only pro-choice by default, as a pro-choice activist and someone who would immediately start hating me if they knew my views. So I knew I had to take a break from all of this - both to get myself in line, and to get my views of the people around me back to a healthy and normal place.

Therefore, my absence. 

My other sources of negativity I can't do much about. I need to finish my degree before I decide what to do with my life, and I'm stuck far from home until I finish my degree. I think my main worry here is that I love doing my PhD and I LOVE the work that I do, but ultimately my goal in life is to be a stay at home mom - and after spending so much time reading pro-life blogs I've become exposed to how sahm's are treated by the mainstream, and I've started feeling as if my friends and family would never accept my life's choices once I started a family, even though I have told them that I want to stay at home with my kids and everyone has seemed supportive of it (but really, I secretly think that they have lost their respect for me because I'm degrading myself by one day aspiring to be a homemaker). So you see, again, a source of negativity that I thought had to do with my circumstances, but instead has to do with reading too much on the internet.   

So, as I said before, I decided to take charge. I stopped blogging - or at least blogged much less. I focused more on school. I made a commitment to go to church at least twice a week, and I have mostly kept it. Things are looking up. My next step, once I have all these new habits down, is to start volunteering again. And once that has happened, I will start blogging regularly again. Hopefully by that point, I will have my life under control and I will be a strong person so that imersing myself in the pro-life movement won't take such a toll to the point that I am no longer able to sympathize with those who's minds I am trying to change. And maybe then I will be braver and more able to speak with eloquence and compassion about why abortion is wrong.

Oh, and unless I'm stuck working on an experiment, I will be at the March for Life this year. Hopefully I get to see some of you there!

Anyway, I just wanted to let you all know why I've been away for so long. You have all been so amazing, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate all of your comments, follows (both here and on Twitter), retweets, and prayers. Thanks and I will be blogging lightly again within the next week or so, so see you all then!

Love,
Me :)