79. Journey towards being a "Trad Wife"?! From feminist to the feminine genius

Happy Summer! We hope you are all enjoying a break with your family!

This is a different format this week as I offer a short reflection, and a glimpse of my journey of exploring the femininity vs. feminism.

This is a story of how I fell last year and it has taken more than a year to recover from that fall. I had a tendon tear, a TCL dislocation, muscle sprains etc. It's been quite a journey. I finally got an MRI nearly 7 months after I fell.

All because I didn't listen to my husband's advice of being satisfied with a photo from a moving car. Instead, I decided to visit the site of an encampment. The visit was uneventful as there were no longer any occupants there. However, as I was returning to the car, I had a very unfortunate slip/trip wearing my winter boots.

If you would like to hear more of my journey exploring feminity and feminism, please feel free to sent us "Fan Mail"!

Thank you + God blesss!

Transcript

Welcome And A Personal Lent Story

Speaker 0:01

Sisters in Christ, welcome to the Veil and Armour Podcast. And this episode is a little bit different. I'm just going to share what happened to me last year at the start of Lent and actually the start of the um the start of March break. Is that uh I um so I had a little bit of a mommy time break. So my husband said, "I'll take the kids and you can have the day to yourself. "So I decided, "Okay, I'm going to have my hair cut, have my hair done." I didn't hadn't done it in a while. So I went to the salon. It was actually like a sunny day. It was cold because it was March. But um it was, yeah, it was actually the day was going very well. Um had a great a great um time at the salon, and then I was I was gonna go home, and I thought, um, you know what? Uh why don't I do just this one

Photography Assignment And Homeless Tents

Speaker 1:05

little thing, and it'll be very quick, and yeah, because previous to that, my husband and I had been talking about my assignment. I was taking a Catholic Photojournalism course, and the topic was Catholic social teaching, and so I wanted to look at poverty and homelessness, and at that time there were a lot of tents, homeless tents in our city. One of them was nearby, actually, at a park, and I thought uh that would that would probably make a you know a picture that would fit this assignment. And so my husband was saying, why don't we just drive by? Uh slow down, you roll the window down, and then you take your pictures. Um, and and we did that. We did that. Um, but because I actually I didn't roll down the windows because it was cold. So I looked at the pictures and there was a glare, and I thought, no, that's that's not good enough, in my opinion. Um, but it probably was. So anyway, I thought, "You know what, I'll just head over there because I don't have the children with me, my children with me. And you know, I if anything happens, you know, I'm just by myself and I can have greater movement, more mobility, because I'm just worrying about myself."

Speaker 2:25

So before I went there, I passed by the Tim Hortons uh in Canada. It's uh it's a famous coffee company, and uh and I bought a bagel, and I thought, you know, in case there's somebody there, and uh, you know, I might, you know, I'd like to offer them this bagel because I'm not, you know, I'm not there. I come in peace, basically it's a peace offering that you know I'm not there to do anything harmful. I just wanted to take a photo, um, a better angle of the the homeless tents. Um, but I when I got there, it was actually it looked like it was abandoned. They were just tents, there was nobody there. So as I was coming back to the car, I had to cross the Tim Hortons parking lot,

The Fall outside the coffee shop

Speaker 3:10

um, the drive-thru section. And as I said, it was winter. I was wearing my boots, and it was asphalt, the the the ground, you know, where uh the drive-thru was, and I had to cross. So anyway, I I it was a simple trip. I really I just tripped, but it was like slow motion, you know. I don't know if you ever had the sensation, like I could see that I'm falling, but I can't do anything about it. So as I'm falling, I hit the ground, and I my head also hit the ground. Um, but yeah, so to break the fall, I I held out my hands, but actually, because I was holding the bagel in my right hand, that hand was closed. So the left hand was open to break the fall. I opened my hand like this, and as you can see, I have a cat, um, it's not a cast, it's uh it's just a brace uh with a thumb stabilizer. Um, so yeah, so I hit the ground, and I, you know, I I had a bunch of um like I ripped up my knees really a couple of because it was the the surface was asphalt and it was yeah, it was not good. Um, and then you know the the skin ripped off here too on the right, the my palms, both palms. Um actually the the fingers on the right because I it was closed holding the bagel, and the left hand, yeah. So the palm was the one ripped up, and and as I said, I hit my head uh not too hard, but I still hit my head as I went down, and I was very actually I was very feeling very embarrassed because it was in front of the lineup of the Tim Hortons for the drive-thru. Um, and a lady came out of her car actually to ask me, "Are you okay?"

Speaker 5:01

But because I was embarrassed and I just wanted to go home. I just wanted, I was thinking I have to clean up these wounds. Um actually I should have just gone to the hospital because they would have cleaned it up for me. Um and they maybe they could have done uh the scans right away. Uh but anyway, went home and sent a message to my husband that uh, you know, I fell. And anyway, so I cleaned up the wounds, and then I I guess I didn't

Waiting On Care And Symptoms

Speaker 5:30

want to wait in the emergency room for eight hours. So I decided to wait it out and I asked my husband, you know, any symptoms of concussion? What do you think? Because he's trained in first aid, and I decided to wait it out. So I waited it out for a couple of weeks, and then there was something wrong with the hand. It was uh it was hurting, it was they couldn't move it too much, and so then the waiting game kind of began where I'm taking ultrasounds, I'm getting x-rays to figure out is it broken, what's happening. Finally, uh the doctor said, Okay, do an MRI because it's not conclusive. And so then the wait for the MRI started, and so I fell in March, and I'm trying to think now when the doctor asked or sent out the requisition for the MRI. Um in Canada, there's unfortunately a long wait, it depends, but um for myself, uh there was a long meet, and so let's say let's say May or June is when she sent it out. And I finally got an appointment at the end of September, although I wasn't sure when it was gonna come because that's how sort of our system works. Um, I was even thinking of going to Buffalo to pay for an MRI because I needed to know if if I needed surgery, you know, I didn't want the bones to heal the wrong

The Long Road To Diagnosis

Speaker 6:55

way, and now I'm gonna have a problem because I would have needed the surgery right away to fix the broken bones. Um, but anyway, so finally, by the grace of God, before I was I, you know, I even um set up the meeting in Buffalo or anything like that, I did get the call out of the blue at the end of September. So that's March, you know, May, June, July, August, September. So like six, so six months after I fell, I finally got the MRI. And I and so the I I did see a physiotherapist in June, and basically she said, I can't give you any exercises without the MRI. So at that point, I'm thinking, if this if I don't move it or anything, it's probably not gonna heal properly. So um I actually got very good advice, um, actually from Mrs. Tammy Peterson, who I had interviewed her for our podcast for her one-year anniversary, and she saw my my brace um as I was interviewing her, and she had asked about I I she had asked about it later, and I just mentioned her, yeah, I fell and um you know don't know what to do. And she recommended laser therapy. So that's where I went. Um, so I I had to do any physiotherapy, conventional physiotherapy, because the physiotherapist told me she can't give me any exercises until she got the MRI. So waiting, waiting, waiting, except I was just doing the laser. And I can't, I'm just trying to think what was the point of this whole

Healing Help And Hard Lessons

Speaker 8:40

story. Is basically I really needed to trust my husband more. I needed to try I need to trust my husband more. Um, it's I guess the former feminist in me that sometimes doesn't want him to lead or is afraid to let him lead. But you know, he had good advice that I should have just been happy with a picture I took. And um, and also when my arm was um just in I was just in great pain. Like it was I couldn't sleep um maybe for a week or two, and he recommended I do an ice bath, and so I did that, and it actually really helped a lot. It really helped a lot. Um, and I guess the brace too. So the physiotherapist, the one thing that she did say was get this this brace with a thumb stabilizer, and it that also helped a lot. Um, and I just yeah, so I I just wanted to read this Bible passage actually, which is from 1 Corinthians uh chapter 13, verse verse 4 to 8. Name the Father and the Son of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Love is patient and kind, love is not jealous or boastful, it is not arrogant or rude, love does not insist on its own way, it is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things,

Trusting My Husband And Rethinking Feminism

Speaker 10:05

believes all things, oh hopes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. And I just yeah, that was I I guess a lot of people have this as the part of their wedding uh liturgy, but that was also one of our readings and kind of made me reflect that yes, I pro for the year that I've had this injury, I've had to have a lot of patience. Um and also to as a reminder that my husband does have a lot, you know, that I do have to listen to him because I do listen to myself uh when it is convenient for me. But I need to also give him that honor and give him that respect that um, you know, just because you know I think I know everything, which is not true. But if I am stubborn in my ways, um a lot of it, you know, a lot of it is yeah, basically our choice, but also I think a lot of women have grown up with feminism, um, that you know, we don't need a man, we we can do it ourselves. Um, but I think there's a lot of it's actually a lot of woundedness with the beginnings of feminism that you know we felt women felt like they needed to be protected because they weren't being protected. And the the good intentions that came out of that unfortunately became I guess it morphed into something different, uh, that then it became this thing

Scripture, Prayer, And Closing

Speaker 12:05

about choice and then the battle over abortion and I think it started from a good place, but when it when it sort of became uh a battleground over not over equality anymore, but but sameness and then superiority. And so basically what I'm just trying to say is that we are all made in the image and likeness of God.

Speaker 12:42

Um but we unfortunately this society culture has tended to beat up on men. Um if we look at you know Homer Simpson, the character of Homer Simpson in um in uh The Simpsons, or or even Papa Pig and the dad, who unfortunately is kind of clueless and kind of a bumbling kind of person who's not a very very strong leader. Uh and and yeah, so we we we kind of tend to forget that we are supposed to be equal, that we are and we each have our own strengths, and we don't have to immediately dismiss an idea or an opinion just because it's coming from a man. You know, we we should look at the person and what expertise do they have. Um anyway, that's just sort of my thought for the day. And um just to say that I apologize to my husband, and um, and let's uh let's honor our husbands the way that God uh wants us to, is calling us to, and that we want to, because we we do appreciate them, we do appreciate what they do, the sacrifices they make, and as the husband also realizes all the sacrifices that their wives make. In Jesus' name. We pray, hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

Speaker 14:20

In Jesus' Name we pray, Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven. Give us this day of daily bread, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Sisters in Christ, God bless!