Once bitten...

I admit, I've taken a hiatus from writing on the blog that has far more to do with my last appearance on KSL and less to do with how busy we've been this Summer (although we've been plenty busy).  It's taken a while for me to adjust to the fact that commenting and giving my opinion on things could attract such hate and ugliness and that I would be in the throws of such a controversy.  I'm all about learning from an experience and then moving on, but this has been particularly difficult to move past because of the personal attacks.  Saying I'm uneducated, a ditz, can't use the English language properly, etc; it's almost too much and made me truly evaluate why I do this and if I want to continue doing this.

I was talking to a friend yesterday about this very subject and she had referred to another blog where the author is sick at the beginning of her pregnancy.  NieNie Dialogue's Stephanie Nielson was the victim of a horrible accident and burned over a majority of her body.  She is now recovering after countless surgeries and is moving on with her life.  She has wanted to have another baby for quite some time and is finally able to do so.  I think this is a time to celebrate.  If she wants to vent about how sick she is and how difficult it is to throw up all the time, who cares?  Blogs (people forget) are an informal writing format.  They are a place for people to express their opinions, share their lives, etc.  Yet she has received hateful comments about how she should just be grateful that she can have more babies because many can't.  I am in that category by the way...I lost my ability to have more children at 28.  I've had people tell me I should be grateful I have four children because many can't have children at all.  Feeling the loss of the ability to bring a life into this world in no way diminishes the lives that I celebrate here.  It's a loss nonetheless.  But I would never resort to commenting on another person's journey or even their opinion on this topic because it differs from mine unless I could do so in a respectful manner.

I have been known to 'stick it' to people.  I could (if I chose) verbally beat another person down- I've been trained well by my mother who is the queen of verbal lashings and I'm not short on whit.  What stops me is considering the other person's feelings- something that I think we all can learn from and I am certainly not perfect at it.

The reason I started this blog was because I believed I had a different approach.  I'm not Emily Post (who wasn't an expert in her own right until she published- so if that's how we are defining now, that's fine), I'm not the Countess, I'm just a mom with four kids who has had the opportunity to learn a lot of things in my life that pertain to etiquette and manners; whether by education or experience.  My desire is always to help those around me feel more comfortable, not uncomfortable.

I guess what blows my mind is that there is so much hate and ugliness out there and that it's not limited to the people who we would assume are "bad" by society's standards.  The ugliness that I'm speaking of wells up inside and spews out in attacks and ill informed verbal lashings.

I welcome diversity and different opinions.  Certainly mine is not absolute.  I would, however, be hard pressed to truly value and welcome hatred that is being thrown my way just for hatreds' sake.

So....there you have it- my personal journal entry of sorts.  The reason that I've not written on this blog in four months.  However, the best lesson that I have learned from this experience is something my mom taught me when I was young and only now does it really make sense:

Don't let other people determine how you're going to act.

Pure and simple.  It's my choice whether I'm paralyzed by the fear of being ripped apart for my opinion.  If I were to talk about it again, would I choose my verbiage more carefully?  yes.  Would I change my opinion?  no.  That's what makes us as intelligent human beings so magnificent: our ability to reason with one another- but let's be kind as we do it.

P.S.

I do apologize that I didn't graduate college with a degree in English.  I hope it doesn't offend that I may not be grammatically correct 100% of the time or that my punctuation is imperfect.  Occasionally the misspelled word even slips by.  My only solace is that my sister DID graduate with a BA in English and is an English teacher. She has given my grammar and punctuation the 'thumbs up'.  What a load off- but thank you to all of you who felt the need to attack my writing as well, I think the only think that was left off the table were my mothering skills- anyone?

I'm now officially stepping off the soap box and putting it away.  I have let people determine how I'm going to act and that is over.  But if you are a hater...don't bother reading my blog...go make someone else miserable.

My two cents