My Family Is Perfectly Imperfect Too: A Book Review

(Topic: Book, Children's Book, siblings, talking about loss)

Book:
Perfectly Imperfect Family
By Amie Lands

Just to be frank and up-front, I got a free advance e-copy of this book in order to be able to review, but my health prevented me from reviewing the book before it was released. The advance copy was not given with any financial incentive or any particular slant I had to write about (if I had hated it or had strong criticisms, they would be in this post! I actually really liked it, though!). I haven't read any other picture books intended for children subsequent to a pregnancy or infant loss yet, though when I do, I'll review them here too, even if I don't have advance copies! I promise I will always give you my honest opinion if I'm reviewing something, and will always tell you if I get any benefits (like the free advance copy in this case).
If you click the title above, you will be taken straight to the Amazon page for it, and if you click on the author's name, you will be taken directly to the author's own page about the book.

It is a picture book, with only short amounts of text per page. I believe it is clearly comprehensible to young children. The illustrations are simple and touching. They are not overly busy with detail, but clearly show the love in the family, and include enough texture and small details to be realistic and interesting, rather than blank feeling (such as wood grain on the floors, there's a potted aloe plant that has spots, etc). The family featured is Caucasian, with a mother, father, and two living boys, both younger than the sister that is the featured topic. The main character is the oldest living boy.
The first thing I like about this book is that it is matter-of-fact. There is no beating around the bush, euphemisms for death, or overly religious metaphors that would not be clear to children.

The book doesn't specify whether the first child - a girl - died as a pregnancy loss or after birth as an infant loss, and honestly, that is great - it makes this book much more versatile. It is specified a bit more at the end of the book, but not during the story.

The book sweetly shows how the family integrates the sister into life, through pictures, memories, and rituals. Several holidays are specified with examples (Thanksgiving, Christmas), and the main character - a boy who looks to be about 6 - compares his birthday to how they celebrate his sister's birthday, with a family gathering, cake, and a ladybug release.

The ladybug release is actually the only caveat I would comment on - it is a great suggestion as an alternative to a balloon release (which is actually deadly to many animals, and many families decide that causing death in memory of a death is not fitting). However, if you choose to release butterflies, insects of any kind, or even planting flowers, please do a bit of research and make sure that what you are releasing is friendly to your environment and won't cause harm.

The book continues by addressing common thoughts that siblings might have about a sibling who died before they were born, such as what they might have been like, and concludes by reinforcing that the sister's death affected their life, but primarily through love.

The book concludes by having a section where the reader can think about how their family honors their own missing sibling, and write in their answers in parallel to examples from the book. There could have been more examples, but I think this book is aimed at a pretty young crowd - maybe as young as four? - and I think the hardback version may be a board-book format, so the small number of blanks keep it straightforward for a young crowd, and fits the physical format.

I really like how simple, direct, and loving this book is. I hope to someday own it, actually.

Yours,

Sarah

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Resource list: Visit my spreadsheet at www.tinyurl.com/infantloss

What's the Reason? A Book Review

(Topic: book, illness, grief, what to say)

Image credit: Kate Bowler's Website

Book:
Everything Happens For A Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved 
By Kate Bowler

This is probably not a book I would have picked up on my own.

Lately, I read mostly fiction, if I read. I don't read nearly as much as I used to - picking out a book that's "safe" (not heavy emotion, and no pregnancy or infant death...) is a lot of work, and then having it be good, engaging, something that has me coming back to finish it... I struggle with reading more than I used to. So I pick a lot of light stuff, when I read.

This book isn't light.

It's not written densely, and it doesn't delve super deeply into the topics it brings up, but it involves very big, very deep topics, so even a shallow treatment is heavy at times. My husband has an interest in books addressing death (and our society's reaction), religion, and philosophical exploration. This book touches on all those themes. He read it, and chatted with me about it, to the point that I was curious and interested to read it for myself.

The author has cancer, and is struggling with religious questions, and life questions, and generally with life, and whether or not she's dying. She has a toddler son and a husband, and she loves them both dearly.

She addresses aspects of her upbringing and research (on the "prosperity gospel": in short, the idea that if good things happen, God is blessing you, and if bad things happen, God's either testing you or punishing you. This perspective doesn't let the earth be a broken place with happenstance or "shit happens", and doesn't allow room for God to grieve with you. I'm not an adherent of the prosperity gospel perspective, but it's pretty pervasive in American culture and thinking). She also addresses aspects of the Mennonite traditions, because she grew up surrounded by a Mennonite community and married a man who grew up in that community. The Mennonite community appears, from her comments, to view suffering as a tragic part of life on earth, and something that people should be supported through.

What's interesting, is that she wrote this during. This book seemed to me to be a way she was processing. Processing what was going on to her, but more, processing how she sees the world and God, and what she actually thinks about what people are saying to her.

She came to a lot of similar conclusions to what I found. People like to say things that "fit" with what they think, usually from a place where they haven't been through senseless tragedy. They want the tragedy they see us going through to fit the "rules" they think the world runs by (side note: it doesn't. The world is arbitrary, and has accidents, and illness, and senseless tragedy). Her book seems to show that her notion of God resolved to a new (different) clarity, how God is love and not human interpretations of what God is.

She ends the book with two helpful appendixes. Even if you are not interested in the book, pick it up in the bookstore and just read the appendixes before putting it back on the shelf. The first appendix is 10 things not to say to a grieving/ill person. They all fit with the same things I've struggled with people saying to me. The other appendix is a list of things to do, to help. The main theme that comes through is to be with, and not to try to explain to the griever what they are feeling (they already know) or why they are going through it (chances are, there really isn't a good reason, and you cheapen their pain by trying to explain it away).

This book is a quick read, and again, she doesn't go super theological or super medical, or really super technical in any way; this is a fascinating exploration of her own experience and thought process as she goes through a cancer journey.


Yours,

Sarah

To subscribe, find the "subscribe by email" note in the left column and enter your email there. Links to posts will be emailed directly to you whenever I post them! Nothing else gets emailed.

Resource list: Visit my spreadsheet at www.tinyurl.com/infantloss

Movie Review: Dolly Parton's Coat of Many Colors

Hi Friends,

Not long ago, I was poking through the DVD options at the library, for something to watch while knitting. I do this often, and, as usual, came home with a handful of titles that caught my eye, some of which I was familiar with, and some of which just sounded interesting based on the blurb on the back of the case.

One of the movies I came home with is Dolly Parton's Coat of Many Colors. At the time, I did not realize that it had aired as a Christmas special, but that was only relevant to the intro where Dolly Parton introduced it. Click here to read the summary on IMDB

My review that follows WILL INCLUDE SPOILERS. I will discuss important plot points. If you want to watch it and be surprised, do not read further.

Museum of the Alphabet

On Monday, September 18th, my husband and I had the opportunity to visit The Museum of the Alphabet, outside of Charlotte, NC. In fact, we knew nothing about it before we got there, having found it by chance when looking for interesting museums to visit while we were in the area.

The museum is run by and associated with JAARS, ILS, and the Wycliffe Bible Institute. Essentially, the organization wants to be able to provide Christian Bibles to all peoples, and to do so, they sometimes have to help create alphabets and writing systems for languages that have heretofore been purely oral.

The museum appears to have been created to help educate the public about that last aspect of their work. Aside from a few instances where the museum leans biblical-literalist, the exhibits are fantastic and do a wonderful job of explaining how various cultures and individuals through the ages have invented or adapted ways of putting language into a written system. I had the impression that some of the staff's opinions were much more literalist, but the exhibits were fabulous.

The museum starts out with a short film, and then a staff member introduces an interesting steel sculpture of the tower of babel, representing how multiple languages formed on earth. This is the only exhibit where the display took the Bible completely literally; the remaining exhibits were based on language research and language history.

For instance, the lovely tree of written language evolution, shown here in a postcard I purchased from their little gift-nook (sorry the quality isn't high level. Wish I'd taken a picture myself. Basically, the top row is modern writing systems, and the branches show what was influenced by what other system or older form of the same system):

Once past that tree, the museum is divided into alcoves that each address a particular language or alphabet, and how their writing system came into existence and how it functions. There were also interactive portions, allowing you to answer questions, decode alphabets, or make sounds.

I was particularly fascinated by two exhibits, which I got permission to photograph:

This chart is a FABULOUS explanation of various things that affect the crazy English spelling! Each tree matches the color of the paragraph below, which explains the cause of that particular type of spelling change or effect on modern spelling, and the leaves give example words.

I also was fascinated by this one, explaining that Korean orthography is actually based on the physiology of sound production. I have not researched this myself, so I am dependent on the museum's research on this - but if this is true, this is awesome.

To return to my mention of Biblical influences, I would like to mention that each language exhibit has a Bible there, simply as an example of the orthography of that particular language. Given the purpose of the organization as a whole, I find this a completely reasonable example to have on hand.

The exhibit on Hebrew (the original form, not the modern form), posits that Moses himself came up with the alphabet when writing down the 10 commandments. Whether or not that is true, the concept that the ancient Hebrew alphabet came into existence in about that same era is still worth paying attention to.

Later exhibits focus more on the JAARS/SIL/Wycliffe work: since they are often working with languages that still have no written form. In these exhibits, there are examples of the linguistic work they do, which is fascinating to see! The linguists involved in this project learn the languages, try, at least in most cases, to find a writing system that will make sense with that language, and then also work on establishing and supporting literacy.

In all, this was a truly fascinating museum. It is small, but there is no entrance fee, and they do not accompany you on your tour, so you have as much time as you need and want to read all of the information - or to skip past it if you prefer!

Book Review: Beyond the Sling, by Mayim Bialik

Hi Friends of all stripes,

I'm currently reading a book. A real book, with hardly any pictures! One of the things I've noticed on my grief journey is that I am having a much harder time reading than I expected. This is very odd for me, given that I used to read constantly, and fly through books at an amazing rate! Last summer, I did escape into books for a while, and did read a fiction series over the winter, but a book really has to grab me (and I have to find the wherewithal to start it in the first place). These are not problems I used to have.

A friend of mine really helped when she suggested graphic novels. There are some pretty amazing ones out there now! Not all of them are my style. For instance, not only do the writing and story topic have to appeal, but the artwork is a factor too. But, since I am visual, reading a book that is heavy on the visual and light on the text is actually a very natural way for me to ease back into reading. I also credit the library for running an adult summer reading program, right when I needed a little push!

Recently, I was poking through YouTube, and stumbled across an interview with Mayim Bialik. I am familiar with her as an actress on the nerdy sitcom Big Bang Theory, but she is ever so much more than "just" an actress! She is a truly fascinating person, being everything from a Neuro-biologist to a Lactation Consultant. (If I get any of this wrong, it is purely my mistake.)

The interview I watched touched on the books Mayim Bialik has written, and all sounded interesting (and I plan on reading the others too) but the one that sounded most interesting was her book Beyond The Sling, which is about her family's experience with attachment parenting, which is something I am also interested in. Additionally, when I ordered all of the books from the library, this one came first, which was ideal :)

It's really fascinating. It touches on the actual science (neuro-biology, hormones, physiology) that underpin many of her descriptions to practice this particular approach to parenting and child rearing. She is clear and concise, and her sense of humor also pervades her writing. I'm finding it very easy to stay interested, to the point where I stayed up much too late last night, fascinated by her descriptions! She covers birth, nursing, baby-wearing, co-sleeping and bed-sharing, and elimination communication (a form of potty training, only not as much "training" and more understanding each other). I know there is much more to discover in this book that I haven't even gotten to yet! That's just what I've read so far!

When we give Charlie a little sibling, and I actually get to learn parenting hands-on, I hope to give several of these same approaches a go. This is what I was hoping to do with Charlie, so some of reading this is hard, because it is so much of what I'd hoped his future would be. I didn't really expect myself to be ready to be reading parenting books yet. They talk a lot about things that are difficult for me - natural births going as planned, or mostly as planned, healthy babies, happy families who do not spend holidays in the cemetery. However, the upbeat but forthright style hooked me, and I am actually going to encourage my husband and mother to read this book as well. It contains a lot of useful information for parents with living children, and is a fun read, as well!


~ Sarah

Infant loss resource document: www.tinyurl.com/infantloss