doctor conference in Maryland

We went to our second doctor conference together this past weekend in Maryland (home of the those agressive U of M turtles! haha).

I, having a sometimes bad attitude about doctor events (zzzzz..zzz..z), had brought a stack of books and was prepared to skip out on most sessions to do my own thing. But I didn't skip out (it's hard to say no to those puppy doggie eyes--see above) and was refreshingly impressed by the speaker, the small group times and random chats with all kinds of doctor types.

I really hope God isn't trying to tell us something too specific--but we got A LOT of parenting advice from young families. And marriage advice too.

Some of the ideas we heard about strengthening marriage, especially marriage to those whose profession, like medicine, is a 'jealous lover':

1. Fast and pray together for your marriage and each other, each month (on or around the date of your wedding)
2. Avoid loafing around the television, or avoid even having one, in the early years of marriage
3. Go through your stack of wedding cards one at a time to pray for the families and couples represented there
4. (I know this is pretty obvious...but..) Meet up with older couples regularly (we may have found ourselves an older doctor + non-doctor wife couple to meet up with in New York...)
5. (And according to that couple above...AND I QUOTE: ) "We made sure we made love at least 3 times a week." (She then gave some disturbing stats on doctor-nurse affairs, blehhhhhh)

On parenting (again, some of these are really obvious, but I'll list them anyway):

1. Take Moses' advice up and make sure your children hear, early on, and repeatedly, the grand faith (Biblical) story they are a part of, and stories of your own family's faith journey
2. Perhaps the best way to love your children is to make sure you love your spouse first
3. Don't have a television. Ok, if that's unthinkable, limit television severely.
4. Consistent family dinner table conversation is perhaps one of the greatest contributing factors to a child's emotional health, intellectual and spiritual development
5. Don't try to dumb down, make nice, or avoid completely the violent, horrible passages in the Bible that are, whether we like it or not, part of the story...oh that's a tough one...

***

All in all, a time to refocus, to re-centre on God and the disciplines. I personally, was extremely glad to be reminded to build a life on things that last, not on hay and straw and silly stuff. I was getting so sucked in to the glittery, manic, angst-driven urban life that without examination, can seem better than anything else. Lies!