Life Goes On...

Lyra, my Lyra. Sweet 7 year old Lyra who is missing her Daddy more than even she understands. I have spent night after night with her while she cries unable to wake up from a bad dream, or when she does wake up tells me she dreamt that Daddy got hurt or worse...that I told her Daddy was never coming home.

People can tell me all day how resilient kids are and I will tell them all the questions my kids have asked while Daddy's been gone. You can never completely bounce back from that kind of fear I think. I thought as they got older the deployments would be easier, I was wrong...way wrong!

So, back to Lyra (Leer-uh...rhymes with "Bartender, can I have a beer, uh make it two") Her full name is ILYRA. It's an Albanian name, that loosely translates to "freedom." And if I had any notion that naming her that would give her the personality to find her own freedom, I may have hesitated on the choice.

As far as I can remember she has done things her way. She has never been known to try to "impress" many of her relatives. This mainly goes to her Grandparents. Although she has a fun filled relationship with my father that has the two of them in a constant battle of who snuck the last spank, most days she doesn't give my mother the time of day. She's not outwardly malicious or nasty, just aloof. And it's worse with Charlie's parents. But, where my mother just ignores Lyra right back (which seems to maintain her respect), Charlie's parents try to force her to engage with them. This doesn't work out so well. It has gotten me in trouble for not "teaching that child how to respect her elders" and has gotten her a bad reputation for being a pill. For anyone who is agreeing with the elders comment; if you really use the word "elders" you're probably a little too prim and proper for this blog. Feel free to stay, I'm just sayin'...

The last time Charlie deployed to Afghanistan was in '07 and the child in question was 5. Although seemingly fine on almost every other front, she developed a ginormous fear of darkness and guns.

+++Note to parents: The musical OKLAHOMA, while seemingly innocent and fun, does nothing to reassure a phobic child when the theatre lights go down and the cowboys start kicking up their heels and firing their guns. However, should you forget this tidbit of advise, the guy working the lobby at Allenberry Playhouse in Carlisle, PA is very nice to chat with.+++

This deployment has been a bit different. She no longer screams bloody murder at the movie theater. This has been extremely helpful to the rest of the family as well as hundreds of theater goers. Nor does she blink an eye when her brother and 1/2 the neighborhood play Army Man.

She does however get angry. Very angry. So much so that after repeated unprovoked attacks on her siblings, I have put her into therapy. (I should mention here that I'm a big proponent of therapy. Everyone can use someone uninvolved in your life to talk to...and a professional usually gives you much better advise than the drunk sitting next to you at the bar.)

A few months ago, Lyra announced that she would be making her First Holy Communion when her Daddy came home and not on April 10th when the rest of the CCD class would. She told me "I want Daddy to see me do it with his own eyeballs, not through a camera." I had to admit, she made a good point. She was very upset that he did not get to see her play basketball this year. It didn't seem to matter that he didn't see Tali or Josie play either because "He saw them last year, he's never ever seen me."

I know this whole deployment thing has been hard on me and my brain can process why he's there. Tali made her 1st Communion while Charlie was in Afghanistan. It was hard for her, but Tali somehow has the ability to do what she needs to do and move on. She is mature beyond her years and my most emotionally stable child.

Lyra, not so much. So, when she announced she wanted to wait, I understood. After talking to friends and family I got up my nerve to go see the parish priest. Father Blank (no, not the real name, duh) is a very nice guy and is not any more threatening than any man of the collar. As a good Catholic, all priests make me a little nervous. Really, if you can completely let loose in front of a priest, you probably also use the word "elders" and we've already discussed your options to stop reading.

So, Father was cool and said "No problem. We'll figure it out once he comes home and do whatever you want to do." What was great was that he made this decision without the help of the DRE (Director of Religious Education). I did not want her involved any more than necessary. Let's just say she's a bit of a fanatic about Religious Ed., and loves to lay the guilt and any blame on the parents who are not "displaying a faith based example" for the children to follow. She announced at the beginning of the school year that "at least one parent of any child in a sacramental year shall sign up for an adult Bible study at the chapel." I refused for several reasons:

#1. The best way to get Mary Carlton to not do something is to tell her you are forcing her to do it. (Maybe why some of those college assignments didn't go so well)

#2. I had already signed up to go to the Women of St. Ignatius (WOSI) on Thursday mornings and they did a Bible study there. The DRE announced that WOSI and/or Knights of Columbus Bible studies did not count toward the sacramental year requirement. (I quit WOSI out of protest-- and the desire to have Thursday mornings free.)

#3. I have 5 children...given the choice, do you really think I would rather stay at church while they go to CCD instead of go back home and be alone for an hour and 1/2? Do you even have to think about that one???

#4. Perhaps, most importantly, the kids go to CCD at 8 AM on Sunday mornings. Please re-read reason #3 and then think about where I'd rather be at 8 AM on a Sunday morning. I kick them out the door and go back to bed!

Back to Lyra. We avoided the initial discussion with the DRE, and things continued along the chaotic path that has been this deployment. Lyra continued to fulfill all of her requirements and attended the day long retreat in mid-March. That afternoon they had a professional photographer come to do pictures. I signed up and we had Lyra's picture taken. Truthfully, I was afraid if I didn't do this, she would end up making her 1st Communion some random Sunday and never put the "outfit" on.

The pictures came out beautiful and the dress fit and all was well. The Friday before the Big Day, I mentioned to Lyra before she went to school, that if she had any intention at all of making her 1st Communion the next day, she HAD to go to practice that afternoon. I was very worried she would wake up Saturday and say "Let's go do my Communion thing now." I didn't really think that would happen, but with Lyra, you never do know. So what does she do...she says "Yes, I do want to make it tomorrow!"

After scraping my jaw off the floor (and washing my chin as the floor is perpetually filthy) I told her we would go to practice that afternoon.

So we went and it was entirely too long and the kids were losing their minds by the time we left. The morning of Communion was full of the typical chaos. The boys were fussing because they didn't want to go to childcare, the girls were annoyed I made them go at all BUT THEN I made them dress up. Evil Mother!!!

Mass was held at 10am on Saturday. We were instructed several times at practice AND at the actual mass that this DID NOT fulfill our Sunday obligation! (Thanks for nothin!) The mass itself went on for TWO HOURS! How many second graders do you know that can hang that long in church? Then, put them in uncomfortable outfits...

Lyra was horrible during mass. Fidgeting, fussing, whining and complaining. I finally realized she is at her worst behavior when she is nervous (it all makes sense now). When I questioned her about being scared she nodded and provided me with enough "What ifs" that I started to worry. I honestly was not sure she would go through with it until the host was actually in her mouth, and when it was, I'm sure the entire church heard my huge sigh of relief.

All I kept thinking was it's done, it's over, I don't have to stress anymore. As mass continued another 15 minutes the boy in front of us was crawling under the pew and the girl in front of him was twisting her head piece around so that the veil was against her face and she was sticking her tongue out against it...pretty!

Lyra was more than ready to go (so was I, so were Tali and Josie) when the DRE stood up and said "We have a few children out there whose Mom's or Dad's are deployed..." At this point, I was thinking that we were going to pray the "Peace Prayer for Deployed Soldiers" that we usually pray at the end of each mass which seemed like a nice touch. But no, they asked that the kids with a deployed parent to stand up. I stood up with Lyra because she was looking a bit pale. We were the only ones who stood up, and everyone looked at us with those pity filled faces and Lyra burst into tears.

As the DRE continued to talk I'm sure what Lyra heard was: "Lyra Carlton, please don't forget that your Dad is not here on your special day. Everyone else's Dad is here and we'd like to rub that in your face! Please stand up so we can all stare at you and make you feel worse than we already have."

It was then time to process out of the church, so there we went. I looked really tall surrounded by little girls wearing white. Lyra was hysterical. And after all that do you think that Father or the DRE talked to Lyra afterwards? NOPE! How sad is that?

I didn't realize I had stopped listening when Lyra started to cry, but my friend told me that the DRE ended her talk with "We're sorry they cannot be with us today, but well, life goes on. And the closing song will be..."

LIFE GOES ON??? Those are your words of wisdom for a heartbroken 7 year old? Thanks for your insight and "faith based example" lady!!!