The Indispensable One and Only

June 27, 2012 by Elizabeth Duffy

Continued from Page 1

My husband and I have never had a problem conceiving, so I had somehow tricked myself into thinking that this pregnancy had everything to do with my will, and not much to do with God at all. When my friend put my status into the proper perspective, I could no longer grumble about it. The final choice was God's, and this revelation made me feel more peaceful than I had in months.

This particular friend of mine has struggled for many years with infertility, though she is the mother to four adopted children. Accepting God's will as something totally contrary to her own was not a foreign concept to her.

When we have so many choices, we are easily fooled into believing that the outcome of our lives is one hundred percent ours. Even a non-believer must admit, as Slaughter has, as my friend has, that there are other factors acting in our lives besides our own self-will. There are complications with our bodies, with our abilities. There are other people. We are never fully the masters of our own destiny, which is something that I find a complete relief when I pause to think on it.

And maybe this is the controversy that's ringing through in Slaughter's article. The revelation is not really that "Women can't have it all." Rather, that when made to choose between career and the kids, as with so many other things, "There really is no choice."

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About Elizabeth Duffy

Elizabeth Duffy is a freelance writer and author of the blog, "Betty Duffy." Her writing has appeared online at Faith and Family, the Korrektiv Press Blog, and numerous other venues. She and her husband live in rural Indiana with their five children.

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