It was late May of 2016 and I was just about a week into recovering from the birth of our third baby when I discovered I was also the proud possessor of a fairly large kidney stone.

Having given unmedicated birth three times (so far), I can now safely say that anyone who experiences a run-in with these nasty little stones suffers far worse pain. I have yet to shed any tears while giving birth. This particular stone had me in tears multiple days during the week it took to finally work itself out.

At one point, I found myself curled in a ball on the bathroom floor (because kidney stone pain makes you feel like you're about to throw up) with my newborn crying in the other room and my three- and nearly-two-year-old hovering over me asking questions, crying and generally trying to get Mom to respond.

It was not a particularly high point in life. But it brought strongly to the forefront something that's been growing in importance the more children I have: the necessity of having fortitude.

Fortitude is an old word you don't hear much these days. The Miriam-Webster dictionary defines it as the "strength of mind that enables a person to encounter danger or bear pain or adversity with courage".

Over the past five years I've done things I wouldn't have thought possible before I had children. Illness is often one of the biggest challenges, personally. During an epic bout of whooping cough which coincided with the first trimester of one pregnancy, I spent my nights getting up every hour or so to help a frantic child try to stop coughing (did you know that cough medicine does nothing for a pertussis cough?) while feeling pretty generally miserable myself. I wouldn't have thought I could actually do that. Turns out...I could. I had to keep telling myself I could, but in the end we got through.

It's amazing what you can actually do when you might've thought all you could manage was to lie around on the couch in your pajamas. A person can accomplish some unbelievable things so long as they don't allow themselves to simply check out and give up.

The key is the mindset: do you believe you have it in you to do what needs to be done or do you think everything is just too hard and you can't possibly do more than you are?

Perhaps one of the worst things we're losing as we go further and further from our pioneer roots is the fortitude which allowed families to accomplish almost super-human feats by simply knowing they had to meet great challenges or die. We've softened to the point that I'm watching young mothers insist on having someone watch their new babies so they can go to the grocery store because taking the baby with them is just "too hard". What?! Just a few generations ago, mothers were carrying babies the same age on their backs while planting giant gardens and washing family laundry by hand. Are we just weaker today...or are we no longer convinced we need to have courage in the face of adversity?

In the case of that kidney stone run-in, I managed to get up, reassure two little girls that Mama was not dying, crawl into bed and nurse the newborn. Why? Because I did not allow myself to just give up and say it was too hard. I convinced myself I had the strength to speak kindly to my children and attend to the needs of the baby. Because my mind was convinced, I had the courage to carry through. People have the ability to rise to these occasions. And most peoples' capability to do so is probably way higher than they imagine. I know mine is.

In a world filled with news of everyone taking offense at everyone else and being unable to handle the least little hint of adversity, something we desperately need to rediscover is the value of Fortitude. It's a vastly underrated character quality, something even more elemental than Courage because without Fortitude there won't be Courage. "Fortitude is the guard and support of the other virtues," John Locke once wrote. Cultivate fortitude today. I promise it's worth it. There is strength hiding in most of us we never bother to tap unless we're really convinced it's important. Our families, our neighbors and our world need us to have it. Besides, you never know when you might be hit with that kidney stone and need to get up and nurse a baby anyway.