babies, bathtubs, and Emmanuel
God with us, in the mess
Recently, our baby girl decided the bathtub terrified her. After months of happily splashing, a flip switched — perhaps sparked by a bad experience when ill, or too much splashing. Whatever the reason, she was not having it. Bath time now involved her standing in the slippery tub and trying to claw her way out, while I attempted to speed wash her hair. I was over it. We’d emerge from the bathroom, both of us wet, bedraggled, and a little defeated. There had to be a different way.
A few days before Christmas, while the boys were happily situated with dad and a movie, I attempted bath time again. Seeing her terror at the impending prospect, I wondered if there was something I could do. In a moment of inspiration, or maybe desperation, I picked her up, climbed in the tub, and sat down, both of us fully clothed, the tub completely dry.
She screamed and screamed. Her little fingernails dug into my neck as she propelled her body up mine, using my hair as some sort of escape ladder. I tried to stay calm and quiet, and slowly, her body began to settle. Tears glistened on her cherubic cheeks as she looked at me reproachfully. The wounded stare of indignation was broken by sudden curiosity. What’s that knob on the side of the bathtub? She reached out to touch it, caught between her need to hate the bathtub and her need to explore it.
And so it continued for almost 30 minutes. I’d inch my leg to the side so her feet could touch the bathtub. She’d recoil and cry. Eventually she started to play in the dry bathtub, then I slowly moved to sitting on the edge of the tub, my feet staying in. Then we turned on the water, just a trickle. Finally, hanging on to my knees, a stubborn sign of her refusal to sit down, she reached down to touch the warm water pooling around her toes, her curiosity overcoming her fear. Without ceremony, she squatted, then sat down, and began swishing a wash cloth in the water as if nothing had ever happened.
What a silly baby. What an ordeal. Doesn’t she know what’s good for her? Why couldn’t I just explain that the water wouldn’t hurt her? Why couldn’t I reason with her?
This image of my terrified little baby trying to crawl up my neck has stuck with me. I woke up the day after Christmas with a gigantic case of “what’s the point-itis”and a holiday mess hangover to boot. Why does this matter? Why did we do all of this? What am I celebrating? Were those allergy free cinnamon rolls really worth it? My own griefs and frustrations felt crushing, and on top of that I was tired and it looked like someone had vomited Christmas on my countertops. But in the midst of all my post-holiday angst and frustrations it felt like God kept nudging me to say,
“You’re the baby in the bathtub.”
I’m the baby in the bathtub. I’m the squalling, terrified, avoidant and ambivalent child, who had one bad experience and would rather never take a bath again. Sure, if you make me I’ll get through it — kicking and screaming and throwing a fit. We’ll all be a mess when we’re through. You can make me do it, but it won’t be pretty.
One of the primary tasks of early childhood is learning to regulate emotion1, and what babies need, as much as food and clothing, is to borrow a regulated adult’s nervous system so they can learn how to manage their own. This process is called “co-regulation” and is a well documented phenomenon that progresses throughout our whole life. If it goes well, we gain resilience and the ability to regulate ourselves, having internalized our caregiver’s calm as our own.
It turns out we don’t outgrow this need to co-regulate. Even as adults our dysregulation and wounds show up. We panic and grasp for control, doing almost anything to avoid our pain. We desperately need someone to be with us so we can engage the things that are too much to handle on our own. The bodily presence of another human being has profound impacts for our ability to handle hard things.
As if to drive the point home, I encountered this passage in Aundi Kolber’s Strong Like Water only a few days later,
This is why it matters in such a profound way that God, in the person of Jesus, came to be near us; came to take on humanity and defeat death. God came for us and to be with us: Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us. This is the power of the Incarnation. It’s not that God didn’t love us before Christ came, but in the same way my loving attunement to my children communicates something important, so too does God’s physical presence here on earth. (p. 104)
If I, a sinful and human parent, with all the limitations of both those conditions, can be patient with my child2, then how much more will God, the perfect parent, be patient with his children? I wasn’t angry with the baby for fearing the bathtub, I just wanted her to enjoy bath time again. I knew that if she could get over whatever spooked her, she’d be okay. I was willing to stay in there as long as it took. My baby didn’t need me to tell her what to do, or explain why she shouldn’t be scared. She needed me to be with her. She needed to borrow my nervous system for as long as it took to feel safe.
And so, as I ponder this picture, I have to believe God will exercise this same lovingkindness and more with me. That he will provide presence3, patience and grace, guiding me with the firm love of a hand that requires me to face my fears, but promises not to leave me. It’s as if in this image I hear a clear message:
I love you too much to let you hate something good, and that’s why I came.
It’s why Christmas matters. It’s the point. That God came to be with us, because we are his children and we need him. And rather than standing far off, telling us how silly we are for hating the bathtub, he came down to us, to be with us, so we could have life.
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Lately:
Reading: I’m going heavy on the neurobiology I guess? Working my way through Curt Thompson’s The Soul of Shame and Aundi Kolber’s Strong Like Water. Both are very good. The Soul of Shame is compelling, incisive and so insightful. As someone for whom shame has been an almost constant companion, it’s really helpful to see the way he frames it. I appreciated this quote:
Shame is a primary means to prevent us from using the gifts we have been given. And those gifts enable us to flourish as a light-bearing community of Jesus followers who work to create space for others who wish to join it to do so. Shame, therefore, is not simply an unfortunate, random, emotional event that came with us out of the primordial evolutionary soup. It is both a source and result of evil's active assault on God's creation, and a way for evil to try to hold out until the new heaven and earth appear at the consummation of history.
Listening: Again with the neurobiology, but this episode from Adam Young was helpful. I think it was the second time I’ve listened to it, but I appreciate the way he unpacks the importance of listening to our body’s signals. There’s also some practical questions to guide approaching this practice. Personally, this is where I’ve seen the most breakthrough. Bodies are wise and truthful when we take the time to listen. An important distinction he makes is that the messages our body sends may not apply to our current situation, but will always make sense in the context of our story. There is always a reason, even if it no longer applies
Loving: Can little babies in Christmas dresses become my whole personality? Asking for a friend. I almost died from the adorability. I also ordered matching Christmas pajamas this year which was totally out of character (and only because they were very on sale). Will I do it again? Meh, I can’t see us needing that many pairs of pajamas on a regular basis. But they were really, really cute and made me happy. I even got one picture of all five kids smiling at the same time — a Christmas miracle.
Eating: These cinnamon rolls were a hit, and we’ve been eating peppermint bark (I use dairy free & Enjoy Life chocolate and reverse the dark chocolate and white chocolate layers), sugar cookies and fudge (and a lot of Brussel sprouts, because #balance). I also made an ice cream cake for the 5 (!!!!) year old’s birthday. He’s such a good sport about his birthday dinner getting delayed by a day. Try as I might I just cannot make anything happen the day after Christmas so the compromise is usually that he gets his present on his birthday and his dinner and cake the next day.
The cake is very easy. First you make an Oreo crust (crush gluten free Oreos and melt with about 4 Tbs of butter - vegan if needed, bake for 15 ish minutes in the bottom of a small Pyrex), then layer one flavor of ice cream (we use the So Delicious coconut milk flavors), freeze, drizzle with chocolate syrup, layer the next flavor and finish with more chocolate chips and another drizzle of chocolate syrup. It’s more method than recipe, but no one who eats it complains. It’s a family tradition from my husband’s side and far easier than baking a real cake!
Asking:
published a list of end of year reflection questions that I’m hoping to take some time in the next day or two to journal through. We’re planning a family coffee date for the weekend, which I suppose has become a bit of a Christmastide tradition, and will use the questions as a springboard for some family reflection. There are a lot of big decisions on the horizon but most of our conversations have more questions than answers right now.4Wishing you all a joyful Christmas season and a Happy New Year!
Dan Siegel refers to this work as “feeling felt”— emotions exist as sensation before they are translated to words, so what a baby learns early on has profound implications for their development. As much as we like to think our narrative is formed by our thoughts, the reality is that body and mind are in a conversation to create a story. When we undergo trauma as young children we create a story with the information we have at the time. The story makes sense — from the child’s perspective, but often begins to trip us up as we outgrow its survival strategies. Dan Siegel, Stephen Porges, Aundi Kolber, Dan Allender, Adam Young and Curt Thompson have all been great resources for learning about this, in addition to all the work I’ve done with my own counselor.
I just want to be very clear that I am not some unicorn fairy parent. I aspire to patience and kindness and not losing my temper. I also snap and am short and respond unkindly or without understanding on the daily. I lean heavily on repentance, God’s grace and the knowledge that secure attachments only require “good-enough” parenting and the strength of a relationship is determined not by our perfection, but our willingness to repair rupture.
A presence and kindness that I am learning often involves the physical presence of another human being despite (because of?) my ambivalence around needing people
See: me as screaming baby in bathtub
Annelise, reading your post (finally!) on the sixth day of Christmas and I was taken by these lines,
"It’s why Christmas matters. It’s the point. That God came to be with us, because we are his children and we need him. And rather than standing far off, telling us how silly we are for hating the bathtub, he came down to us, to be with us, so we could have life."
Your writing is proof that when our lives are God-steeped we'll find Him in everything, even bathtubs.
So, so good, Annelise. I, too, am a neuropsychology nerd and I took a DEEP dive on Dan Siegel, Adam Young, Aundi Kolber, etc. a year or two ago. It's all been incredibly eye-opening for me, and I love reading how you tie together these truths with the truth of Christmas and Emmanuel.