self-reliance.

"self-reliance is taking responsibility for our own spiritual and temporal welfare."

robert d. hales.

after a lengthy chat with my visiting teachers i have given considerable thought, as of late, to self-reliance. i have concluded that i have been blessed with a) a strong desire to support myself, my husband, and my children emotionally and physically, and b) a husband who takes great pride in supporting us financially. i am grateful that mw and i worked part-time, and sometimes full-time, while we attended byu. we did not live luxuriously. but neither did our contemporaries, i.e. ben and brit. we lived in a studio apartment, which we dubbed "the love lair." we paid $425 a month for this gem. we had no air conditioning; we could see the living room television from our bed; we had to sit sideways on our toilet; we had to sit on a stool in the stand-up shower because the shower head hit both of us right between the shoulder blades. we had no washer and dryer. we did our laundry at shell's or at the laundromat. we spent $25 a week on groceries. we never bought meat or pop. we lived on stove top and au gratin potatoes. our big splurge was whatever hole-in-the-wall mexican joint ben picked on friday. and we never ordered pop. we shared one car. a car that i could not even drive. very well. we worked the 9p-1a shift at the fieldhouse, on campus, cleaning the athletic locker rooms. we traveled to indiana and washington, to see our families, only by their good graces and many long hours on the road. and yet, we survived. mw graduated the same week i had cw. he worked 35 hours a week at a phone center and took 18 credits. he was also an anatomy t.a. i tutored at a middle school, which i hated, hated with a burning passion, until three weeks before cw was born. i had already finished school. we took out loans to pay rent when we didn't have enough money. i can remember calling my dad one time, asking for a loan to cover rent. i prayed that he would never actually ask for it back. and he didn't. we took out loans to cover mw's dental school applications. we rarely, if ever, used credit cards. mw's parents bought us a family car when cw was born and we felt like we were living the high life. mw drove himself to school at 7a. ate a packed lunch on campus. came home and hung with cw and i for an hour. and then we drove him to work at 4p and dropped him off. i picked him up at 9p.

things were so much better when we started dental school. and by better, i mean that mw didn't have to work and go to school. he went to school 40 hours a week and studied for another 10-20. i stayed home with cw. and then aw. we lived on loans. we splurged a little more. we bought meat and pop at the grocery and ate at qdoba a couple of times a week. after eating out, instead of thanking mw, we would all thank sallie mae. oh, how we are indebted to sallie mae. things were still tough. we had to swallow our pride on a few occasions and ask our parents for help. on more than one occasion, mw's parents covered the bill for board tests and plane tickets and during one particularly low week, groceries. we were blessed to live in a state that insured all low-income-family children under the age of 18. we were able to buy a nicer car. we made payments on my student loans and kept the credit card debt at a minimum.

going over it now, it is almost funny to think about all of the things that we did without. on more than one occasion we returned presents that had been purchased for us or the kids and put the money towards diapers and milk and whatever else we needed at the time. we had aunts and uncles and kind parents who dropped us $20, now and then, to spend recklessly. mw and i saved our birthday money and put it towards christmas gifts for the kids. we sacrificed a lot. but we have been blessed so many times over in return.

we were not saints with our money. we made some dumb decisions. none that cost us too dearly, thankfully. but we have worked hard to find solutions to our own problems, to overcome challenges when they occur, and to support ourselves to the best of our abilities. at times we have had to rely on our families' generosity. i think most young families have, at one time or another. and i am immeasurably grateful to them for their support. asking for help only humbled us and furthered our desire to provide for our children. i am grateful that mw and i have worked; and scrimped; and gone without; and been sweaty in utah in august with no house or car ac; and walked six blocks to campus; and scrubbed fat football-man whiskers from sinks; and spent hours in malls buying nothing; and driven through the night to watch high school football games, paying for gas with rolled coins; and charged plane tickets to see family; and laughed until we cried in albertsons when we could only afford a single roll of toilet paper; and used our younger siblings' dining plus cards; and worked (mw) in the berry fields to make extra money; and sold things we have loved, loved, loved on ebay because we needed the money;, and driven to cleveland and philadelpia and richmond and indianapolis for dental school interviews because we couldn't afford airfare. we have been poor and we have been financially without. but we have never wanted emotionally or spiritually. we have never had to fully rely on the financial, physical, or emotional support of our families. we have been emotionally and physically capable of caring for our four wonderful children. and though date nights are nice, i find joy in the everyday mess that is cw, aw, bw, and gw. i am grateful that my education was a priority, for me and mw. i would love to get my masters' degree in medieval russian history. i have been humbled by a heavenly father who knows me and has helped me understand that this is not the right time for that. i know that my time will come.

mw provides for us in a way that i don't think either of us could have imagined. he has always found a way to make it all work. and the doing without? it has paid off. we have our families to thank for some of that. but mostly, we have each other to thank.

"let us work for what we need. let us be self-reliant and independent. the responsibility for each person's social, emotional, spiritual, physical, or economic well-being rests first upon himself . . ."

thomas s. monson.