i think i've had writer's block for the past 4 months. i always want to think of some clever way to update you on our lives, but nothing comes to me. i'm 30 now. sounds like big news, but it's really not. it's been a fun month of celebrating so i might go through withdrawals now, but i felt loved and special, and i like my new decade. i know i've said it before, but i didn't love my 20s. a lot of great things happened...i mean i met, dated, and married brett, lived in 2 states, had 2 kids, and got pregnant with another...but to me, atleast in my experience, there's not much that's more refining than marriage or parenting, so the good things came with a lot of growing pains. besides, more than circumstances has just been this awkward decade of figuring myself out. looking back on it, i had no idea who i was at 20 and before. i didn't know what i was thinking or feeling. i hated those personality tests where you had to answer questions about yourself. i always answered them based on who i wanted to be. i remember doing one in high school, and i answered all the questions that i knew would diagnose me as "orange"...the fun, outgoing life of the party, because that's who i wanted to be. i knew it would be dorky when blue won and showed my ridiculous need for order and organization and deep relationships and alone time. i like being 30 because i know that's who i am and i know who god made me has been the basis for the way my life has shaken out. i know without a doubt i married the man more perfect for me than anybody in the world, and i know the way god made me is what drew him to me. i know the friends that i've walked through these past few hard years with are the ones i've connected with because of my make-up. i don't always love my personality make-up on paper, and i hate that when there's silence in a conversation i say dumb stuff to fill the space because i hate the awkwardness of it, and i hate that even if i saw one of my very best friends at the grocery store i would act awkward because it wasn't a planned meeting, and i hate how moody i am. but i do like that with age i start to care a whole lot less about trying to change my personality to be cool. i'm way more comfortable being dorky, and it's so much more fun that way.
really there's not much more depth to offer about my thoughts on life lately. i know i come out with random speeches every once in awhile about my latest revelations on life, but those usually happen when i'm not doing so well because that's when i'm forced into deep introspection and times of growth. pretty obvious why we're to count trials as blessings, huh? but right now, life is just good. i hesitate to even write those words because i know in 4 months, when our new little butterbean is here, i could be a psychopath. you know i didn't have the best experience with newborns before, so i'd be lying if i said i wasn't a nervous wreck. i've been fine up until now and could kind of pretend i'd never really have to take care of this baby outside of her living in me, but something changed when we found out the sex. i started to feel her move about the same time, and she became real and i remembered that she was going to actually come out, and i think i forgot how to take care of babies. i'm in a groove now with kennedy and blakely, and it's safe to say it's easy and fun and there are not many days anymore where i want to pull my hair out. there are some, but not many. as you know, blakely has been our difficult one most of these 4 years, but something has happened to that kid. she told me when she was 3 and horrible that she would start being sweet when she turned 4 and she did. she wasn't lying. we have had very few problems out of her since her 4th birthday. it just had to be her idea. we've had more problems out of kennedy, but i think that's been her adjusting to how to function when her role wasn't "the good one" anymore. we've tried lately to give her more attention so she can start seeing her value in other ways than good performance. i think it's going to be a lot of years of figuring out their dynamics as they get older and trying to parent them as individuals accordingly, but for now, i think i'm just in a honeymoon phase. i love to watch my kids talk and play with each other and can't believe there was a day i didn't like them. maybe it feels so good because the first 3 years were so hard, but i'm just in a sweet spot right now. not only are k and b sweet and fun, but pregnancy is good. i never understood people who said they liked being pregnant, but it's got to be because of this 20ish week mark. the nausea ended about 3 weeks ago and i only get sick now if i go longer than 3 hours without eating. zits, heartburn, and the uncomfortable hugeness aren't here yet, so i'm in that good in-between spot where i can still work out hard and do pretty much whatever i want to do, and sometimes i forget i'm pregnant. i'm trying to soak it up right now because believe me, i know what's to come and i DREAD it! i've never known misery like the heartburn i had at the end of my first pregnancy, then once the baby's here, i know it's no sleep for awhile, and then i get to create a new rug for my bathroom floor when the baby is 3 months old (for those of you who've never had a baby, or who's baby is less than 3 months old, get ready. the clumps of hair that fall out everytime you touch your hair are ridiculous. my hair's really thick and i really think i had a receding hairline). anyway, kind of like all of the lessons learned in my 20s, i know it's all for good and i'm excited for this new little life, but i know i better enjoy the bliss of these next 2 months before the hard times come. then again, maybe it was twins and won't be as bad as i think, but i like to prepare myself for the worst so i can be pleasantly surprised when it's better. for now, i'm just enjoying life as it is.
onto lighter things...we put a clock in kennedy and blakely's room yesterday. they're crazy early risers. they wake up at 6 or 6:30 most mornings, and they don't wake up and read books quietly in their bed. whoever wakes up first wakes the other up, then it's time for one of their concerts. they get on the stairs and sing, or come downstairs and talk reeeaaaallly loud. i guess they missed each other while they slept and have a lot to catch up on. it hasn't been a problem so far, but we realized that it's not going to fly when our new little one is here. i don't know yet what kind of sleep schedule she'll be on, but it will obviously be different than theirs and we're trying to start teaching them to be quiet and respectful while others are sleeping. anyway, brett showed them what 7:30 looks like on their clock, and told them that's when they get to come downstairs, and until then, they are to play in their room. they don't like this new idea. this morning i was sitting on the couch drinking my coffee and was entertained by their conversations revolving around their new clock. i think 7:30 is the only number they recognize so they were scared to death to miss it in case it passed without them seeing it. they must not have taken their eyes off of it because i heard one of them say something about "seven thirty" every 45 seconds, and every 50 seconds kennedy yelled out "i'm 'hongry'". when it was finally time for them to come down, blakely informed me that she wanted to come down at "that different o'clock. not that thirty o'clock. it took too long". i kindof like our new system and am excited about quiet and peaceful mornings.
have a good rest of the week and weekend!
Showing posts with label thoughts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label thoughts. Show all posts
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
good read
this weekend was pretty low key. brett and i had a movie night after we put the kids to bed friday night, then had our nephew riley's t-ball game and niece ansley's birthday party saturday. i forgot my camera AGAIN, which seems to happen at every event since i got the thing. maybe i subconsciously feel silly pulling out the humongous machine and keep waiting for people to call picture man over and pose when i've got it (georgia friends, does he still exist? i'd hate to know how much money i gave him over the years). sunday was lunch with my mom and coach, then a day of lounging at home and reading with the fans on and windows open...perfect, and just what my soul needed to remember how very much i love my home and the 3 people living in it with me, and all of the blessings i've wanted to ignore lately. speaking of coach (that's my stepdad for those of you who don't know. it's coach because he's my high school's football coach, but he and my mom married when i was in college. coach stuck, and has now become grandcoach), please pray for him if you think of it. he was diagnosed with prostate cancer a few months ago and is having surgery tomorrow. they caught it early, so hopefully will be able to remove it all. we'll be spending the day at st. joseph's with he and my mom, so any prayers you can send his way for a successful surgery and recovery would be appreciated.
on another note, my friend keri, who was a friend/acquaintance in college, but who i've now realized through blog land i think a lot like (and if we saw each other in person might never stop talking), posted this as a comment to my last post, and i loved it and wanted to share. the writer put what i've been feeling so well, and i loved the reminder of how fleeting this time is (and of course cried over the thought of looking in my rear view mirror and not seeing their little heads). my latest thought of k and b being a fourth of the way to driving is killing me...
from proverbs31devotions.blogspot.com:
"Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway." Proverbs 8:34 (NIV)
Life wouldn't be so hard if it wasn't so daily. As I sit here surrounded by laundry and dishes piled high in the sink, I see more than ever how life wears us down one day at a time.
Crumbs litter the floor and dirty smudges cover the windows. And I have yet to discover where that smell is coming from. For this mother of four, a simple trip to the grocery store requires an act of God and Congress – attempted only when we are down to powdered milk and Ramen noodles. Not thirty minutes ago a little one-year-old boy clung to my legs, belting out that scream - you know the one, bats can hear it. And I felt my coping skills slipping away. Not because he was crying but because he cries every day.
The daily-ness.
The job of motherhood feels so vast, and frightening, and unending. I am called to raise these children in the fear and admonition of the Lord and yet there are days that I can't seem to get out of my pajamas much less lead them in a time of prayer. I think anyone could endure the temper tantrums of a small child or the rebellion of a teenager or the constant needs of another if they lasted just one day. But the truth is that these things are the stuff of daily life. And when I am honest with myself, they grind down the rough edges of this woman. Because parenting can not be all about me when diapers must be changed, noses wiped and beds made.
In those moments I force myself to take a deep breath and thank God for this season of life. These children. The privilege of wiping noses and bottoms and countertops. A privilege many women would love to have, but don't. I remind myself that the days are long but the years are short. And one day I will look in the rear-view mirror and see empty seats. The cup that is overflowing right now will slowly drain. The stretch marks will fade. And I will find that a new set of daily struggles has overtaken me. When that day comes I will find the strength to face them as well because God gives the grace, daily.
The daily-ness.
As C.S. Lewis once said, "The thing is to rely on God… Meanwhile, the trouble is that relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing has yet been done."
Your daily-ness is probably different than mine, but it is nonetheless God-ordained. It is exactly what we need to live dependent on His grace instead of our own strength. The One who knows us best, who knit us together in our mother's womb, has allotted these days that are equal parts trial and triumph. And He knows that we will see Him most clearly from a place of dependence.
So today I embrace the normal things. The daily things. Another round of laundry. The ring in my toilet. The dust on my dresser so thick a child could write his name. But even more than that I want to celebrate the important things. A child slowly learning to read. A husband that finds his comfort in my arms. A baby who learns to walk and talk. Because all these are the things of life: some mundane and some holy. And all of them must be received daily.
Dear Lord, sometimes daily life is just hard. And we're tired. And overwhelmed. But You promised to be our strength and our hope and our comfort. So today we look to You for what we need. Would You meet us in this, our daily-ness, and help us receive Your grace? In Jesus' Name, Amen.
on another note, my friend keri, who was a friend/acquaintance in college, but who i've now realized through blog land i think a lot like (and if we saw each other in person might never stop talking), posted this as a comment to my last post, and i loved it and wanted to share. the writer put what i've been feeling so well, and i loved the reminder of how fleeting this time is (and of course cried over the thought of looking in my rear view mirror and not seeing their little heads). my latest thought of k and b being a fourth of the way to driving is killing me...
from proverbs31devotions.blogspot.com:
Friday, May 07, 2010
Ariel Allison Lawhon, She Reads Co-Director"Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway." Proverbs 8:34 (NIV)
Life wouldn't be so hard if it wasn't so daily. As I sit here surrounded by laundry and dishes piled high in the sink, I see more than ever how life wears us down one day at a time.
Crumbs litter the floor and dirty smudges cover the windows. And I have yet to discover where that smell is coming from. For this mother of four, a simple trip to the grocery store requires an act of God and Congress – attempted only when we are down to powdered milk and Ramen noodles. Not thirty minutes ago a little one-year-old boy clung to my legs, belting out that scream - you know the one, bats can hear it. And I felt my coping skills slipping away. Not because he was crying but because he cries every day.
The daily-ness.
The job of motherhood feels so vast, and frightening, and unending. I am called to raise these children in the fear and admonition of the Lord and yet there are days that I can't seem to get out of my pajamas much less lead them in a time of prayer. I think anyone could endure the temper tantrums of a small child or the rebellion of a teenager or the constant needs of another if they lasted just one day. But the truth is that these things are the stuff of daily life. And when I am honest with myself, they grind down the rough edges of this woman. Because parenting can not be all about me when diapers must be changed, noses wiped and beds made.
In those moments I force myself to take a deep breath and thank God for this season of life. These children. The privilege of wiping noses and bottoms and countertops. A privilege many women would love to have, but don't. I remind myself that the days are long but the years are short. And one day I will look in the rear-view mirror and see empty seats. The cup that is overflowing right now will slowly drain. The stretch marks will fade. And I will find that a new set of daily struggles has overtaken me. When that day comes I will find the strength to face them as well because God gives the grace, daily.
The daily-ness.
As C.S. Lewis once said, "The thing is to rely on God… Meanwhile, the trouble is that relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing has yet been done."
Your daily-ness is probably different than mine, but it is nonetheless God-ordained. It is exactly what we need to live dependent on His grace instead of our own strength. The One who knows us best, who knit us together in our mother's womb, has allotted these days that are equal parts trial and triumph. And He knows that we will see Him most clearly from a place of dependence.
So today I embrace the normal things. The daily things. Another round of laundry. The ring in my toilet. The dust on my dresser so thick a child could write his name. But even more than that I want to celebrate the important things. A child slowly learning to read. A husband that finds his comfort in my arms. A baby who learns to walk and talk. Because all these are the things of life: some mundane and some holy. And all of them must be received daily.
Dear Lord, sometimes daily life is just hard. And we're tired. And overwhelmed. But You promised to be our strength and our hope and our comfort. So today we look to You for what we need. Would You meet us in this, our daily-ness, and help us receive Your grace? In Jesus' Name, Amen.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
bored
nothing new here, so i don't really know why i'm writing. i think i'm bored and attempting to sort out my thoughts, and writing is how i do it. and i wanted you to know i'm not in a pit of depression (since you know i have those tendencies) :). to be honest with you, life is a little boring right now. does anybody else feel like the past 4 weeks have lasted 6 years? i feel like i've been pregnant for 12 years already. how am i only 10 1/2 weeks?! it's one of those times...and i go through it every 6 months or so, where i say "what's the point of life?". not in a suicidal sense. more like ecclesiastes. every once in awhile, life just feels boring and mundane. every day of being a mom convinces me that it's the hardest job on the planet, and i've never felt so exhausted in my life as over these past 4 years, and especially these past few pregnant weeks. do other moms ever feel like you'll never survive long enough to raise your kids and send them off? 18 years seems like sooooo looooooong. then i cry thinking about how k and b have grown up so fast.
i wanted to be a mom because i thought it suited the things i like to do. have i told yall this before? i thought it would be so fun to stay at home all day and get to go to the gym when i wanted to and watch tv when i wanted to and read magazines while they frolicked about the house. basically it catered well to me. i forgot i would produce sinful little people who i would have to discipline all.day.long. today's just been one of those days. i feel like i try to make every day so fun, but somehow the attitude of little miss turns south each and every time. how many times can you discipline each day before you just give up and say "turn out how you want to?!". because that's what i want to yell some days. and that's all by 10 in the morning. how can one little kid's will be so hard to break? yes, i'm talking about you-know-who, and i know yall are sick of hearing about her, but i can't tell her that i'm about to go crazy and i'm pretty sure my family and friends are sick of hearing about how at a loss i am or how to stop the all day battles. i try to tell her i'm sick so she'll feel sorry for me, but i think her capacity for empathy is a negative 5. it's been so constant today that kennedy asked me this morning if i was ever going to leave blakely. it broke my heart to think that she would actually ever worry about that. i guess she sensed the exhaustion.
being sick has slowed life down a lot, and made for an unusual amount of time at home. going anywhere with k and b in tow sounds exhausting right now, but it's been good to find creative ways to fill the time. i hate using the term "fill the time", but i kind of feel like that's what i'm doing. it just goes along with life's monotany right now. i know i'm being a debbie downer and not focusing on my many blessings. i'll get to that in a few days i'm sure; this is just where i am right now. this whole monologue is not to complain or make you feel sorry for me. i know most people have it waaaaaay worse than me. no comparison. my whole point is to share with you (or maybe moreso with myself) the depths of my sin and the way i struggle in trying to live life abundantly. i know the truth of my blessings and i know that if i lived out of that truth, i would be so happy you couldn't stand to be around me. you would beg me to find a problem to have. but why do i get so bored when i'm living my "dream life"? i've talked before about my previous medicating strategies, and how they've gotten me through life without having to face real issues, and i think i'm just still dealing with those. i'm bored with everything that's normally fun. tv is trash and pretty much anything on is inappropriate to have on with k and b in the room (and i can only take so much sid and super why), shopping is pointless with my ridiculously large and ever-growing belly, i can only come up with so many crafts to entertain k and b, cooking makes me sick, and i don't have the energy to hang out with people. i do this to myself, where i crawl in a hole when i'm tired because it seems to take so much energy to have a conversation, and isolate myself from the world. i know i need to run to the lord and ask him to fill me (always the last resort after all of my medicating strategies fail. ha!), but i'm just not at a point of brokenness. i keep sitting down to try and talk to and connect with god, and it's just not happening. obviously my deal and not his, and i know he just wants me to sit for awhile and see my sin long enough to feel sorry for it, then look to him and see how very much he loves me and forgives me. but i'm ok with mediocracy right now and i hate that. i don't want to take the mental energy to think about what's hiding in the depths of my heart. part of monotany for me is also not struggling with the typical "big sins". when i'm apathetic, i don't really struggle with the usual materialism or gossip or vanity because i just don't really care that much about anything. that makes it easy to not see how dirty my heart is and fail to still see the little minute by minute sins i hide in my heart. repentance doesn't seem as necessary, but in not seeing my sin, i'm not seeing my need for the gospel (i.e. a savior). but when the gospel has been revealed to you, and you've experienced the riches of it, living life without feeling it's power leaves a pretty obvious void. i know it won't last forever and soon i'll be sick of it and to a point of desperation, but for now i'm just living each day to get through it. i'm not really living my life, and i know it because i have no life to breathe into anybody else. i'm bored and i'm boring, but i'm a performer and want to be something to people to feel loved, and since i don't have anything to give i stay alone. the real miracle in all of this is i don't feel depressed. even in that, i can see god's work in my life. i know depression fully, and it's not the same as feeling bored and lifeless. the depression thing has been a huge picture of god's faithfulness to me because i went off of my lexapro as soon as i found out i was pregnant because i didn't feel safe feeding it to my fetus. i was a raging bitch (very sorry for the language, but there's no sweet way to put it) for 2 weeks...seriously, if you would have seen how snappy i was to brett and k and b you would disown me as your friend or family member...but once my angry phase was over, i've done really, really well without it, and felt normal again. i've been scared of coming off of it since i started it, so it's a huge relief to know i can function without meds. i'm starting to pray now that i don't experience post-partum depression again after this little one is born and can be off of it forever.
so i just re-read all of this and these are the most random thoughts and nothing really seems to have a point. goes along with how i feel about life right now :) sometimes even i think i'm weird for the things i share on this blog, but if i'm going to tell you about the fun i have with my cute little family, you'll never have a complete picture of what life in our home really looks like if i don't share the thoughts that aren't so fun to hear about. i know i incriminate myself with some of the things i say and set myself up for criticism and a reputation as miss negative, but i don't want to pretend like my life is something it's not. i did that for way too many (exhausting) years. hiding makes me tired. i'm a deep thinker by nature (atleast that's what i always show up as on those personality tests), so if reading my thoughts wear you out, imagine having to think them (and i only share a fraction of them) ;) sometimes i wish this blog was anonymous so i could avoid the reputation i set myself up for.
since i'm queen of random thoughts today, has anyone else ever read the book "love you forever" to your kids without crying? pregnant? oh my gosh, i was a mess this morning reading that to k and b. they thought my sobbing was hilarious, but that book gets me every time. even after an hour long battle (including 3 spankings, time alone in her room, and what seemed like hours of talking) i had with b trying to get her to break and repent for something she said to me. how can you love your kids so much even when they drive you crazy?! if you don't have the book, you've got to get it.
the good news now is i feel better. writing is so therapeutic for me, and i knew i was blah but didn't really know what i was thinking. thanks for listening and being my therapist ;)
i wanted to be a mom because i thought it suited the things i like to do. have i told yall this before? i thought it would be so fun to stay at home all day and get to go to the gym when i wanted to and watch tv when i wanted to and read magazines while they frolicked about the house. basically it catered well to me. i forgot i would produce sinful little people who i would have to discipline all.day.long. today's just been one of those days. i feel like i try to make every day so fun, but somehow the attitude of little miss turns south each and every time. how many times can you discipline each day before you just give up and say "turn out how you want to?!". because that's what i want to yell some days. and that's all by 10 in the morning. how can one little kid's will be so hard to break? yes, i'm talking about you-know-who, and i know yall are sick of hearing about her, but i can't tell her that i'm about to go crazy and i'm pretty sure my family and friends are sick of hearing about how at a loss i am or how to stop the all day battles. i try to tell her i'm sick so she'll feel sorry for me, but i think her capacity for empathy is a negative 5. it's been so constant today that kennedy asked me this morning if i was ever going to leave blakely. it broke my heart to think that she would actually ever worry about that. i guess she sensed the exhaustion.
being sick has slowed life down a lot, and made for an unusual amount of time at home. going anywhere with k and b in tow sounds exhausting right now, but it's been good to find creative ways to fill the time. i hate using the term "fill the time", but i kind of feel like that's what i'm doing. it just goes along with life's monotany right now. i know i'm being a debbie downer and not focusing on my many blessings. i'll get to that in a few days i'm sure; this is just where i am right now. this whole monologue is not to complain or make you feel sorry for me. i know most people have it waaaaaay worse than me. no comparison. my whole point is to share with you (or maybe moreso with myself) the depths of my sin and the way i struggle in trying to live life abundantly. i know the truth of my blessings and i know that if i lived out of that truth, i would be so happy you couldn't stand to be around me. you would beg me to find a problem to have. but why do i get so bored when i'm living my "dream life"? i've talked before about my previous medicating strategies, and how they've gotten me through life without having to face real issues, and i think i'm just still dealing with those. i'm bored with everything that's normally fun. tv is trash and pretty much anything on is inappropriate to have on with k and b in the room (and i can only take so much sid and super why), shopping is pointless with my ridiculously large and ever-growing belly, i can only come up with so many crafts to entertain k and b, cooking makes me sick, and i don't have the energy to hang out with people. i do this to myself, where i crawl in a hole when i'm tired because it seems to take so much energy to have a conversation, and isolate myself from the world. i know i need to run to the lord and ask him to fill me (always the last resort after all of my medicating strategies fail. ha!), but i'm just not at a point of brokenness. i keep sitting down to try and talk to and connect with god, and it's just not happening. obviously my deal and not his, and i know he just wants me to sit for awhile and see my sin long enough to feel sorry for it, then look to him and see how very much he loves me and forgives me. but i'm ok with mediocracy right now and i hate that. i don't want to take the mental energy to think about what's hiding in the depths of my heart. part of monotany for me is also not struggling with the typical "big sins". when i'm apathetic, i don't really struggle with the usual materialism or gossip or vanity because i just don't really care that much about anything. that makes it easy to not see how dirty my heart is and fail to still see the little minute by minute sins i hide in my heart. repentance doesn't seem as necessary, but in not seeing my sin, i'm not seeing my need for the gospel (i.e. a savior). but when the gospel has been revealed to you, and you've experienced the riches of it, living life without feeling it's power leaves a pretty obvious void. i know it won't last forever and soon i'll be sick of it and to a point of desperation, but for now i'm just living each day to get through it. i'm not really living my life, and i know it because i have no life to breathe into anybody else. i'm bored and i'm boring, but i'm a performer and want to be something to people to feel loved, and since i don't have anything to give i stay alone. the real miracle in all of this is i don't feel depressed. even in that, i can see god's work in my life. i know depression fully, and it's not the same as feeling bored and lifeless. the depression thing has been a huge picture of god's faithfulness to me because i went off of my lexapro as soon as i found out i was pregnant because i didn't feel safe feeding it to my fetus. i was a raging bitch (very sorry for the language, but there's no sweet way to put it) for 2 weeks...seriously, if you would have seen how snappy i was to brett and k and b you would disown me as your friend or family member...but once my angry phase was over, i've done really, really well without it, and felt normal again. i've been scared of coming off of it since i started it, so it's a huge relief to know i can function without meds. i'm starting to pray now that i don't experience post-partum depression again after this little one is born and can be off of it forever.
so i just re-read all of this and these are the most random thoughts and nothing really seems to have a point. goes along with how i feel about life right now :) sometimes even i think i'm weird for the things i share on this blog, but if i'm going to tell you about the fun i have with my cute little family, you'll never have a complete picture of what life in our home really looks like if i don't share the thoughts that aren't so fun to hear about. i know i incriminate myself with some of the things i say and set myself up for criticism and a reputation as miss negative, but i don't want to pretend like my life is something it's not. i did that for way too many (exhausting) years. hiding makes me tired. i'm a deep thinker by nature (atleast that's what i always show up as on those personality tests), so if reading my thoughts wear you out, imagine having to think them (and i only share a fraction of them) ;) sometimes i wish this blog was anonymous so i could avoid the reputation i set myself up for.
since i'm queen of random thoughts today, has anyone else ever read the book "love you forever" to your kids without crying? pregnant? oh my gosh, i was a mess this morning reading that to k and b. they thought my sobbing was hilarious, but that book gets me every time. even after an hour long battle (including 3 spankings, time alone in her room, and what seemed like hours of talking) i had with b trying to get her to break and repent for something she said to me. how can you love your kids so much even when they drive you crazy?! if you don't have the book, you've got to get it.
the good news now is i feel better. writing is so therapeutic for me, and i knew i was blah but didn't really know what i was thinking. thanks for listening and being my therapist ;)
Monday, April 26, 2010
checking in
so, i think i haven't been writing because i don't want to lie and talk about pregnancy bliss. i really am so, so thankful for the opportunity to be pregnant again and (hopefully) welcome baby lane #3 into this world, but i sure pay for these kids. i don't want to complain because i'm so scared of something happening and me losing the baby, then wishing more than anything that i could be sick every day just so i could be pregnant, but as of now, each day is marked by praying that it goes by quickly so i can go to sleep and forget the nausea. i really don't want to wish the next 7 months away because that means missing sweet moments in k and b's life that i'll never get back. i hate how snappy i've been with them, and i'm tired of saying "can you go away and play together? that's why god gave you a twin" when they ask me to order at their restaurant. they've eaten nothing but processed and fast food since the little butter bean started growing in me, and i'm a firm believer in the way kids eating negatively affecting their behavior, which has certainly seemed to be the case in our youngest (sweet blakely, always keeping things exciting).
on a positive note, these are the times i'm reminded how incredibly sweet my husband is. he waits on me hand and foot and has taken up so much of the slack i've left with k and b, and calls each day to take my "order" on dinner. he hasn't complained about our ridiculous credit card bill, which reflects my ever-changing "i think i might could eat that when i order it at the drive thru but by the time i get to the window to pick it up it sounds gross and i have to find something else" phase. i'm thankful to not have to go to work each day and to have someone that never complains when i call him every 30 minutes just to make sure he knows i'm still sick. and i'm thankful for my sweet mother-in-law who knows the gag reflex i have when i get around raw meat and is bringing freezer dinners tomorrow so the processed food phase can finally end and i can be put out of the guilt-induced misery i'm in over what i'm feeding my family. if i knew the nausea would be over at the end of this trimester, i think i could do it and not be discouraged, but if my pregnancy with k and b was any indication, it'll be here another 7 months. so while it's not very fun right now, i definitely have the best case scenario if you're gonna be sick. i'll never understand those who make it through pregnancy without getting sick. so lucky. but i'm sure there are those who will never understand someone like me complaining for even a minute when the gift god has given me isn't given to everyone. so that's why i've been in hiding. i don't want to complain because i know in my head it's nothing but a blessing. at the same time, i don't feel like "rejoicing" in the nausea, so i think i'll just wait until i feel better to say much at all. i'm thankful to atleast have k and b in my face each day to remind me how very worth it it all is. even on their worst days (and there are some bad ones), i know that i'd go through this every day for the rest of my life to have these sweet little angels...
on a positive note, these are the times i'm reminded how incredibly sweet my husband is. he waits on me hand and foot and has taken up so much of the slack i've left with k and b, and calls each day to take my "order" on dinner. he hasn't complained about our ridiculous credit card bill, which reflects my ever-changing "i think i might could eat that when i order it at the drive thru but by the time i get to the window to pick it up it sounds gross and i have to find something else" phase. i'm thankful to not have to go to work each day and to have someone that never complains when i call him every 30 minutes just to make sure he knows i'm still sick. and i'm thankful for my sweet mother-in-law who knows the gag reflex i have when i get around raw meat and is bringing freezer dinners tomorrow so the processed food phase can finally end and i can be put out of the guilt-induced misery i'm in over what i'm feeding my family. if i knew the nausea would be over at the end of this trimester, i think i could do it and not be discouraged, but if my pregnancy with k and b was any indication, it'll be here another 7 months. so while it's not very fun right now, i definitely have the best case scenario if you're gonna be sick. i'll never understand those who make it through pregnancy without getting sick. so lucky. but i'm sure there are those who will never understand someone like me complaining for even a minute when the gift god has given me isn't given to everyone. so that's why i've been in hiding. i don't want to complain because i know in my head it's nothing but a blessing. at the same time, i don't feel like "rejoicing" in the nausea, so i think i'll just wait until i feel better to say much at all. i'm thankful to atleast have k and b in my face each day to remind me how very worth it it all is. even on their worst days (and there are some bad ones), i know that i'd go through this every day for the rest of my life to have these sweet little angels...
Friday, March 26, 2010
love and relationships
this is a daily reading from ransomed heart ministries that my friend kate sent me. god has been showing me lately the degree to which i try and protect myself in relationships, and what this reveals about my heart's trust being not in the lord but people. this excerpt put it well, so thought i would share...
"Honest communication in love is the only way to live and grow in friendships. There are ebbs and flows. There may be real hurt and disappointment. But with the grace of God firmly holding us, it is possible to nurture and sustain deep friendships. We are designed to live in relationship and share in the lives of other women. We need one another. God knows that. We have only to ask and surrender, to wait, to hope, and, in faith, to love. We must also repent.
For a woman to enjoy relationship, she must repent of her need to control and her insistence that people fill her. Fallen Eve demands that people “come through” for her. Redeemed Eve is being met in the depths of her soul by Christ and is free to offer to others, free to desire, and willing to be disappointed. Fallen Eve has been wounded by others and withdraws in order to protect herself from further harm. Redeemed Eve knows that she has something of value to offer; that she is made for relationship. Therefore, being safe and secure in her relationship with her Lord, she can risk being vulnerable with others and offer her true self." (Captivating pgs 181-82)
and one of my favorite quotes of all time...
"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable . . . The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers . . . of love is Hell." (C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves)
have a good weekend!!
"Honest communication in love is the only way to live and grow in friendships. There are ebbs and flows. There may be real hurt and disappointment. But with the grace of God firmly holding us, it is possible to nurture and sustain deep friendships. We are designed to live in relationship and share in the lives of other women. We need one another. God knows that. We have only to ask and surrender, to wait, to hope, and, in faith, to love. We must also repent.
For a woman to enjoy relationship, she must repent of her need to control and her insistence that people fill her. Fallen Eve demands that people “come through” for her. Redeemed Eve is being met in the depths of her soul by Christ and is free to offer to others, free to desire, and willing to be disappointed. Fallen Eve has been wounded by others and withdraws in order to protect herself from further harm. Redeemed Eve knows that she has something of value to offer; that she is made for relationship. Therefore, being safe and secure in her relationship with her Lord, she can risk being vulnerable with others and offer her true self." (Captivating pgs 181-82)
and one of my favorite quotes of all time...
"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable . . . The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers . . . of love is Hell." (C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves)
have a good weekend!!
Friday, March 12, 2010
more thoughts
psalm 16
"preserve me, o god, for in you i take refuge...you are my lord; i have no good apart from you. the sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply. the lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot. the lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed i have a beautiful inheritance. i bless the lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure. for you will not abandon my soul or let your holy one see corruption. you make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."
i don't trust god's control in my life. i don't trust that he really gave me the kids he wanted for his glory and for my good. i don't trust that he really gave me the husband or the financial situation or the body or the friends or family he gave me for his glory and for my good. before you send an e-mail to share "the good news" with me, hear me out...
i think i know what life should look like. i have this perfect plan i've put together for my life, and the life god has given me lines up close enough to the one i think i should have for me to believe i've had control over it and made it this way, but because it falls short JUST A LITTLE in every area, i still fight and scramble thinking i have control and if i just fight a little more, i'll get it JUST RIGHT. maybe if it were way off, it would be a little easier to know i wasn't in control. maybe if i wanted kids and didn't have them, hated my husband, and was on the verge of losing my house and going hungry, i could easily believe that life is full of pain and i was made for another world. but the life i have looks so close to my "perfect" one. so i keep fighting for perceived perfection. and i keep winding up short. and i despair because i feel hopeless to ever get it right. so what am i looking for? heaven on earth. i want life to feel right. i want to stay in a state of peace. i want to pretend, even if i don't say it out loud, that i was made for this world. i want life to serve me well, and offer me the right husband, kids, look, friends, house, energy. i think all of these things are the real keys to life. so ultimately, i think having control and being able to move my life circumstances around like chess pieces is where true peace and life lies. i don't know how to play chess, but i'm guessing you win if you make the right moves. i keep making the right moves...the ones that should lead me to win, but just as i'm on the verge of winning, my opponent moves in and blocks my move. in the past, i might have thought this opponent was satan, but now i'm thinking differently. god hasn't let me get it "just right" because his "just right" is different than mine. his plan is for his glory and for my good; not necessarily the good i think is good.
i want ______ plus or minus ________:
- brett because i think he's pretty much perfect, plus _____ ( i won't air a flaw in cyber world, but fill in the blank for whatever you wish your husband did or didn't do :))
- the kids i've got because i love them more than i could ever love another kid, minus blakely pooping her pants every day for 2 weeks or kennedy asking to eat 28 times a day
- the way i look because i'm "fearfully and wonderfully made" (right?), plus 6 more inches, plus a bigger head (i have a peanut head), minus a few inches from my hips, plus bigger eyes and a smaller nose, blah, blah, blah
- the mind i have, plus more creativity, minus a constant need to maintain perceived order
- the schedule i have, plus more naps
- the house i have, plus a california closet.
- etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc
get my point? do you like my equation? it looks good to me, and i think if all of it really happened, THEN i would be happy, because THEN i would be in control and THEN god would really be good (and i wouldn't just be saying it out of truth). but this has been the story of my life. i know god has been gracious to me. my life is full of blessings, and i can honestly say i wouldn't trade my life for anybody's in the world. but i also think it's funny that god has allowed my life to keep lining up more and more closely the older i get to my perceived perfect life. because now i think he's showing me that i'm "almost there", and i live in more despair now than ever. i lived my whole life dreaming about the future. when i would feel hurt in my heart, instead of entering into the pain and asking the lord to meet me there and heal me, i would suppress it and think about something fun. for example, when i was working, i felt a lot of anxiety regarding my unhealthy fear of authority and quest for approval, but instead of taking those 2 years to enter into these dark places of my heart and ask god for healing, i spent 2 years dreaming about the day i would have kids and be a stay-at-home mom since that's all i ever wanted to do, because then all my problems would go away. i didn't deal with those fears; i suppressed them and lived for the future. so here's one of the (probably many) things that have led me to where i am today: the future i've "lived for" for 29 years is here, and i'm still the same me with the same baggage. when i thought about my perfect future, i forgot that sin and brokenness would exist there too. i guess i thought that girl i saw in my future would be a different person. i'm changed, yes, but i'm still me. duh. so i thought restoration and redemption came through fixed circumstances, not through the person of christ (even though i would have said it did). my "fixed circumstances" are still broken. the kids i've lived to have still disobey me and embarrass me in public and hit each other and demand every ounce of energy i've got. the husband i counted on to fix my life still has flaws (imagine that). the perfect days i had planned for myself as a stay-at-home mom are often marked by exhaustion and loneliness and telling k and b to read to each other because i don't want to read the same freakin book again. the countless kingdoms i've built here on earth...the places i've tried to find life...aren't lasting. i don't know if you got this message from the song "eve" by sandra mccracken i posted awhile ago, but my favorite line is "when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?". my old answer would have been "screwed and depressed because life didn't work out like you wanted it to". the words of the song, and the refreshing and life-changing truth, is "sweet redemption rings in the air; sweet redemption will hold you there". god dwells in our broken places. he is a god of redemption, and he loves entering the filth of our hearts. he lives in the rubble of my broken kingdoms, even knowing that i'll build more today, tomorrow, the next day and the next. growing in a knowledge of his unconditional love and grace towards me...letting it grip my heart and not just remain a truth in my head...is leading me to trust the only one who is good.
"you are my lord; i have no good apart from you." - psalm 16:2
"preserve me, o god, for in you i take refuge...you are my lord; i have no good apart from you. the sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply. the lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot. the lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed i have a beautiful inheritance. i bless the lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure. for you will not abandon my soul or let your holy one see corruption. you make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."
i don't trust god's control in my life. i don't trust that he really gave me the kids he wanted for his glory and for my good. i don't trust that he really gave me the husband or the financial situation or the body or the friends or family he gave me for his glory and for my good. before you send an e-mail to share "the good news" with me, hear me out...
i think i know what life should look like. i have this perfect plan i've put together for my life, and the life god has given me lines up close enough to the one i think i should have for me to believe i've had control over it and made it this way, but because it falls short JUST A LITTLE in every area, i still fight and scramble thinking i have control and if i just fight a little more, i'll get it JUST RIGHT. maybe if it were way off, it would be a little easier to know i wasn't in control. maybe if i wanted kids and didn't have them, hated my husband, and was on the verge of losing my house and going hungry, i could easily believe that life is full of pain and i was made for another world. but the life i have looks so close to my "perfect" one. so i keep fighting for perceived perfection. and i keep winding up short. and i despair because i feel hopeless to ever get it right. so what am i looking for? heaven on earth. i want life to feel right. i want to stay in a state of peace. i want to pretend, even if i don't say it out loud, that i was made for this world. i want life to serve me well, and offer me the right husband, kids, look, friends, house, energy. i think all of these things are the real keys to life. so ultimately, i think having control and being able to move my life circumstances around like chess pieces is where true peace and life lies. i don't know how to play chess, but i'm guessing you win if you make the right moves. i keep making the right moves...the ones that should lead me to win, but just as i'm on the verge of winning, my opponent moves in and blocks my move. in the past, i might have thought this opponent was satan, but now i'm thinking differently. god hasn't let me get it "just right" because his "just right" is different than mine. his plan is for his glory and for my good; not necessarily the good i think is good.
i want ______ plus or minus ________:
- brett because i think he's pretty much perfect, plus _____ ( i won't air a flaw in cyber world, but fill in the blank for whatever you wish your husband did or didn't do :))
- the kids i've got because i love them more than i could ever love another kid, minus blakely pooping her pants every day for 2 weeks or kennedy asking to eat 28 times a day
- the way i look because i'm "fearfully and wonderfully made" (right?), plus 6 more inches, plus a bigger head (i have a peanut head), minus a few inches from my hips, plus bigger eyes and a smaller nose, blah, blah, blah
- the mind i have, plus more creativity, minus a constant need to maintain perceived order
- the schedule i have, plus more naps
- the house i have, plus a california closet.
- etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc
get my point? do you like my equation? it looks good to me, and i think if all of it really happened, THEN i would be happy, because THEN i would be in control and THEN god would really be good (and i wouldn't just be saying it out of truth). but this has been the story of my life. i know god has been gracious to me. my life is full of blessings, and i can honestly say i wouldn't trade my life for anybody's in the world. but i also think it's funny that god has allowed my life to keep lining up more and more closely the older i get to my perceived perfect life. because now i think he's showing me that i'm "almost there", and i live in more despair now than ever. i lived my whole life dreaming about the future. when i would feel hurt in my heart, instead of entering into the pain and asking the lord to meet me there and heal me, i would suppress it and think about something fun. for example, when i was working, i felt a lot of anxiety regarding my unhealthy fear of authority and quest for approval, but instead of taking those 2 years to enter into these dark places of my heart and ask god for healing, i spent 2 years dreaming about the day i would have kids and be a stay-at-home mom since that's all i ever wanted to do, because then all my problems would go away. i didn't deal with those fears; i suppressed them and lived for the future. so here's one of the (probably many) things that have led me to where i am today: the future i've "lived for" for 29 years is here, and i'm still the same me with the same baggage. when i thought about my perfect future, i forgot that sin and brokenness would exist there too. i guess i thought that girl i saw in my future would be a different person. i'm changed, yes, but i'm still me. duh. so i thought restoration and redemption came through fixed circumstances, not through the person of christ (even though i would have said it did). my "fixed circumstances" are still broken. the kids i've lived to have still disobey me and embarrass me in public and hit each other and demand every ounce of energy i've got. the husband i counted on to fix my life still has flaws (imagine that). the perfect days i had planned for myself as a stay-at-home mom are often marked by exhaustion and loneliness and telling k and b to read to each other because i don't want to read the same freakin book again. the countless kingdoms i've built here on earth...the places i've tried to find life...aren't lasting. i don't know if you got this message from the song "eve" by sandra mccracken i posted awhile ago, but my favorite line is "when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?". my old answer would have been "screwed and depressed because life didn't work out like you wanted it to". the words of the song, and the refreshing and life-changing truth, is "sweet redemption rings in the air; sweet redemption will hold you there". god dwells in our broken places. he is a god of redemption, and he loves entering the filth of our hearts. he lives in the rubble of my broken kingdoms, even knowing that i'll build more today, tomorrow, the next day and the next. growing in a knowledge of his unconditional love and grace towards me...letting it grip my heart and not just remain a truth in my head...is leading me to trust the only one who is good.
"you are my lord; i have no good apart from you." - psalm 16:2
Sunday, March 7, 2010
long and candid
*all quotes are from from fear to freedom by rose marie miller*
i'm in the middle of reading a book that god is using to change me. i'm not a reader and i can honestly say that in 6 years i haven't read a book cover to cover. isn't that crazy? when i was little, i would go to the library every 2 weeks and check out 14 books and read one a day. i would get sucked into fiction series and not be able to stop reading. i think it's why i love writing and grammar and editing and spelling and probably missed my call as an english teacher. in my really young years, it was the boxcar children, then i moved on to babysitter's club, then sweet valley twins and high. i wanted to be elizabeth or jessica wakefield so bad, or atleast have an identical twin. kind of funny that i got my own set (and for those of you who intimately know these characters like i do, k is clearly elizabeth and b jessica). anyway, i'm sure i would like fiction now, but i just really haven't found something i love, and i think that in my bondage to performance i've always felt that if i was reading a book, it needed to be self-help. the problem is, i get excited about the book fixing me, then give up because i become bored with getting fixed and see that words on a page don't change my heart. which leads me to what's going on in my heart right now...
i read from fear to freedom (or skipped around in it. that's what i always mean when i say "i read ____") about 2 years ago. i loved (the parts i read) then and even recommended it to people. i recently found it in brett's office and decided to pick it up again, and i'm almost done. seriously. i know this doesn't sound like an accomplishment to anyone else, but it's pretty huge for me because it shows that my heart is being gripped in a way it hasn't before. it doesn't speak of a magical solution for the sins and fears that grip my heart. it is pointing me to the one way out; the one way to be rescued from myself. nothing will grip you like the freedom you get from being released from fixing yourself.
you know how characters in a musical walk around like life is normal, then all of a sudden break out in a random song? i feel like that's what my blog is like. i talk about my kids and maybe share a random recipe or idea here and there, then all of a sudden i break out in these deep thoughts and share depths of my heart that you might find inappropriate for a blog that anyone can read. but the truth is, if i've learned anything over the past 3 years, it's that i sin and you sin and there's no use in trying to pretend like we don't. our hearts are dirty and there's sin beneath the sin, and the filth doesn't end with our outward actions. i know when i share things going on in my heart with who knows what audience, i am exposing myself to potential criticism and judgment. but i'm tired of hiding. trying to act like you've got it together all the time is exhausting, and if the bible didn't tell you i was born sinful, i might could keep trying to fool you. but even if you bought it, i'm tired of running. i've known in theory for the past few years that i was born completely depraved and hopeless without the grace of a savior to step in and rescue me. my change in theology began in college when i was under the teaching of gary purdy. it was the first time that i really heard, or atleast my heart heard, the teaching of our total depravity and god's perfect grace. i had never understood justification by christ's death alone. i loved the ideas and loved gary for preaching this message week after week for the 4 years i was under his teaching. these are the truths that i have clung to since hearing that message 10 years ago. the weird thing is, i feel like in some ways my heart is just now grasping the theology that has been in my head for a decade. i think life was just so good and easy in college that i didn't see the deep need for a savior like i do now. this book has not been a magic fix, and maybe it will touch no one else like it has me, but it is definitely a tool god is using to help me put words to my story.
from fear to freedom is rose marie miller's self-written biography (is that called an autobiography? i can't remember, but she wrote it and it's her own story, so whatever that is). i obviously can't go into her life story in one blog entry, and it's not that our life stories and circumstances are the same, but i've never identified so much with someone's stream of thinking. the entire book is covered now in pink highlighter because there are so many statements that i just want to scream out "ME TOO!" about. i didn't even know some of these things about myself, but the way she puts them into words explains what i was thinking and didn't even know i was thinking.
the subtitle of the book is "living as sons and daughters of god" and is an encouragement to relinquish the role of spiritual orphan and embrace my role as the daughter of god. i've heard these words before. i've known in my head that i was a child of god. my heart hasn't known that, and it has been the basis of the hiding game i've been caught in..trying to cover up sin or pretend like it isn't really that bad because i ultimately haven't believed god's unconditional love and grace was real. i'm his daughter. even in my imperfect love, there is nothing k or b could do to change my love for them. and the amazing thing is, them being really good all the time wouldn't make me love them more either. christ's death on the cross rejects our bad AND good works. i feel like i need to have a whole series of blogs to document the truths that are penetrating my heart. i know i could just journal and keep these thoughts to myself, but they've been too life changing and brought too much freedom to my heart to not share them. and no, this isn't some evangelical, religious speech to those of you out there who don't believe in god. it actually kind of makes me sick to know that there are probably some of my readers that i knew in high school who i tried to "share christ with" by telling you to straighten up your act. after all, wasn't i good at being good? couldn't everybody get it together like i could? i know i've spoken before about the self-righteous pride i carried around, but i want to say it again to make sure you understand my heart here. that's not the gospel, so if you've heard that message from me in the past, pretend like you didn't. this (really) long monologue is not a bunch of religious words meant to make you feel like christianity is weird if you haven't had much exposure, or have had exposure of the wrong kind. it's just a story of my heart that is real and changing me and writing it down helps me process it.
so just getting down to the honest issues of my life and letting you (whoever "you" is) on me: again, probably inappropriate to be so personal, but i don't know what harm i can do other than have you think less of me, and frankly i'm starting to not care so much about that. i never thought i would say that because my reputation has been my god and the thing i idolize and strive to protect more than anything in this world. at the same time, i feel like the past 3 1/2 years have been a roller coaster for me, so if somebody else is feeling the same way, i like to atleast offer the hope i've found because there was a time i thought it didn't exist....
i haven't sugar-coated the fact that i struggled with the first few years of k and b's life. it wasn't just because they screamed their heads off all.the.time. i was depressed. i think i might could be the poster child for post-partum depression...if it was just post-partum. the truth is, it is still a struggle that i go in and out of. go ahead and think i'm weird if you've never been depressed, but i wouldn't be too quick to judge because i never in a million years thought i would struggle with it. i used to think depressed people were weird and just needed to get happy. call it hormones that still swing in and out of balance, or call it the thing god has used to get my attention and show me his goodness, but i can't get it to go away. i tried to get through it on my own for 2 years, then finally went to a psychiatrist a year ago and found the right combination of medicine. i thought i was fixed and was so happy to be happy again. the truth is it's back and i'm wondering if it ever goes away forever. it's the reason my blogging has been sporadic and the reason i might not have called you back if you've called me. on low days, i crawl into a hole and feel paralyzed in relationships and in life. i don't want to talk to anybody and i don't want to do things i usually love to do. there have been more low days than high lately, which is what ultimately drove me to a desperation for answers. my first instinct was to call my psychiatrist and see if he could up my medicine. in half-heartedly praying through it, my heart felt like this phase is a spiritual battle. i do feel crazy if i miss my medicine for a few days, but i think medicine in me has been used to get me to a place where i can think straight and process my thoughts. it's not the total fix i had hoped it was going to be. so, here i am...in the valley, forced to deal with real thoughts, real hurts, and real issues of my heart. "crises become god's means of forcing us to turn away from circumstances, feelings, and our own strength, and to turn toward god."
if you've never been depressed, i don't expect you to understand why it's a struggle for me. i'm well aware that my life is really, really good. i can honestly say there is not one circumstance in my life right now that is bad. so it doesn't make sense to me either. or atleast it didn't up until now. i do believe depression is very often a chemical or hormonal problem, and that has been part of my problem. but i know the valley i'm experiencing now is different, and something god is using to show me issues i would never face if i wasn't forced to out of desperation. which is where from fear to freedom is coming into play in my life. it's showing me some patterns of my heart that have left me where i am. my life probably doesn't look any different from the outside, but my heart is being changed daily in a way i haven't experienced before. i've been a christian for so long, but every time i go through times of heart changes like this, i realize i just didn't get it before.
i had a day last week where i was lower than i've been in awhile. i was praying through what was going on in my heart when god revealed it to me. this doesn't happen that often, but it was real and i knew that as much as i didn't want to admit it, it was a truth that would begin to catapult me into everything else i'm learning right now. i realized that when things go wrong in my life, i do 1 of 2 things: blame or medicate. when things don't go my way, my first instinct is to figure out whose fault it was. and it's usually brett's (poor thing) because he's safe and i know i can beat him up and he'll still love me. if i can't find someone to blame, i medicate. i don't mean medicate in the sense of lexapro (though i obviously do that too). i mean that instead of facing the hurt, i pick up a magazine or turn on keeping up with the kardashians or go shopping or re-decorate my house. sometimes i even do "good" things like make my family their shampoo...further proof that our actions aren't the problem. i'm not coming down on any of these things, because there are times i do these things when i'm emotionally healthy and they're fine. at other times, i do them to avoid having to deal with real issues. i've become an expert at medicating to suppress hurts and disappointments because to admit them might make me face one of my biggest fears: feeling out of control or tarnishing my reputation. control and a good reputation are the 2 things i've always thought were the key to life. i've never said that out loud, but these seem to be the 2 roots of most of my sins: maintaining control and approval from others, both of which i think are ultimately rooted in pride. and this has been the cycle of my life. i've medicated for 29 years, and so often it's looked so good and felt so good that i didn't feel a need to change. it's usually helped me get ahead in the world's eyes. my usual methods of medication have contributed to an improvement in looks (i'm not saying i'm a beauty queen...just that you can learn some pretty good hair and makeup and fashion tips when you medicate through reading magazines like i do), so i've felt more loved and successful, and less of a need for life through christ. and that's the beauty of depression. depression has made me lose interest in my old ways to medicate. this is not a medical problem. this is god's goodness to me because he wants me to meet him in this valley. he wanted to bring me to a point of desperation, where i finally learned that i am a "caterpillar in a ring of fire" who crawls to the things i think will save me, but really i have one hope of rescue...god in his grace reaching down and picking me up. "think of the human state as one of stubborn blindness. we will rely on everything but god. he in turn will prepare us for grace by closing our favorite escape exits until there is only one way left. healthy despair drives you to drop pretenses and seek god from the heart. it ends with a real beginning - new life energized by grace. unhealthy despair drives you into the role of victim, in which all responsibility is denied and blame is shifted to others. it ends with immobilization, intense self-preoccupation, and false humility. most of us want quick solutions to our problems. we have more interest in immediate deliverance from pain than in what god wants to teach us through the pain. but the father does not let us escape; he lets us alone until we become fed up with our own self-centered attitudes. when a healthy despair of self sets in, then god begins quietly to breathe into us a new teachability". this is where i am. i'm tired of the cycle of feeling hurt by life, blame-shifting, then medicating, because when none of these work, as is happening right now, i enter into depression. why am i just now learning this?!? i've been a christian for so long, so why am i just now learning that i have one hope? i don't have to blame anyone and i don't have to cover sin or ignore it through my methods of medication. i think deep down i thought it would go away if i pretended it wasn't really there, but the truth is, i've been relying on myself while talking about god's power. "the confidence i had always had about my life was not faith, as i had assumed, but a reliance on my own competency, be it real or imagined." i'm tired of depending on people or life to make me happy. i didn't think i was doing this because i knew in my head that god was the only source of true joy, but if i really believed it in my heart, i wouldn't put so much stock in others liking me or everyone, especially brett, performing to my standards.
so these are just some of the truths that are making my heart more alive. i'm sure there will be more. and along with that, i'm sure there will be more low days where i forget all of this and go back to my usual methods of coping with the pains of life. my hope is that i will continue to be reminded of christ's work on the cross and the way his death justified me and set me free from having to perform and hide to ensure his love for me. my prayer is to rely on his grace since he's the only good thing in me anyway.
i'm not done with my thoughts, but i'm tired of writing (and thinking :)). i'm too tired to edit it too, so forgive any typos :). plus, i have so many thoughts running through my head that they're all getting jumbled, and i've written so much already that i feel like i've been all over the place and might not make much sense. i'll continue some other day. hope you had a good weekend!
i'm in the middle of reading a book that god is using to change me. i'm not a reader and i can honestly say that in 6 years i haven't read a book cover to cover. isn't that crazy? when i was little, i would go to the library every 2 weeks and check out 14 books and read one a day. i would get sucked into fiction series and not be able to stop reading. i think it's why i love writing and grammar and editing and spelling and probably missed my call as an english teacher. in my really young years, it was the boxcar children, then i moved on to babysitter's club, then sweet valley twins and high. i wanted to be elizabeth or jessica wakefield so bad, or atleast have an identical twin. kind of funny that i got my own set (and for those of you who intimately know these characters like i do, k is clearly elizabeth and b jessica). anyway, i'm sure i would like fiction now, but i just really haven't found something i love, and i think that in my bondage to performance i've always felt that if i was reading a book, it needed to be self-help. the problem is, i get excited about the book fixing me, then give up because i become bored with getting fixed and see that words on a page don't change my heart. which leads me to what's going on in my heart right now...
i read from fear to freedom (or skipped around in it. that's what i always mean when i say "i read ____") about 2 years ago. i loved (the parts i read) then and even recommended it to people. i recently found it in brett's office and decided to pick it up again, and i'm almost done. seriously. i know this doesn't sound like an accomplishment to anyone else, but it's pretty huge for me because it shows that my heart is being gripped in a way it hasn't before. it doesn't speak of a magical solution for the sins and fears that grip my heart. it is pointing me to the one way out; the one way to be rescued from myself. nothing will grip you like the freedom you get from being released from fixing yourself.
you know how characters in a musical walk around like life is normal, then all of a sudden break out in a random song? i feel like that's what my blog is like. i talk about my kids and maybe share a random recipe or idea here and there, then all of a sudden i break out in these deep thoughts and share depths of my heart that you might find inappropriate for a blog that anyone can read. but the truth is, if i've learned anything over the past 3 years, it's that i sin and you sin and there's no use in trying to pretend like we don't. our hearts are dirty and there's sin beneath the sin, and the filth doesn't end with our outward actions. i know when i share things going on in my heart with who knows what audience, i am exposing myself to potential criticism and judgment. but i'm tired of hiding. trying to act like you've got it together all the time is exhausting, and if the bible didn't tell you i was born sinful, i might could keep trying to fool you. but even if you bought it, i'm tired of running. i've known in theory for the past few years that i was born completely depraved and hopeless without the grace of a savior to step in and rescue me. my change in theology began in college when i was under the teaching of gary purdy. it was the first time that i really heard, or atleast my heart heard, the teaching of our total depravity and god's perfect grace. i had never understood justification by christ's death alone. i loved the ideas and loved gary for preaching this message week after week for the 4 years i was under his teaching. these are the truths that i have clung to since hearing that message 10 years ago. the weird thing is, i feel like in some ways my heart is just now grasping the theology that has been in my head for a decade. i think life was just so good and easy in college that i didn't see the deep need for a savior like i do now. this book has not been a magic fix, and maybe it will touch no one else like it has me, but it is definitely a tool god is using to help me put words to my story.
from fear to freedom is rose marie miller's self-written biography (is that called an autobiography? i can't remember, but she wrote it and it's her own story, so whatever that is). i obviously can't go into her life story in one blog entry, and it's not that our life stories and circumstances are the same, but i've never identified so much with someone's stream of thinking. the entire book is covered now in pink highlighter because there are so many statements that i just want to scream out "ME TOO!" about. i didn't even know some of these things about myself, but the way she puts them into words explains what i was thinking and didn't even know i was thinking.
the subtitle of the book is "living as sons and daughters of god" and is an encouragement to relinquish the role of spiritual orphan and embrace my role as the daughter of god. i've heard these words before. i've known in my head that i was a child of god. my heart hasn't known that, and it has been the basis of the hiding game i've been caught in..trying to cover up sin or pretend like it isn't really that bad because i ultimately haven't believed god's unconditional love and grace was real. i'm his daughter. even in my imperfect love, there is nothing k or b could do to change my love for them. and the amazing thing is, them being really good all the time wouldn't make me love them more either. christ's death on the cross rejects our bad AND good works. i feel like i need to have a whole series of blogs to document the truths that are penetrating my heart. i know i could just journal and keep these thoughts to myself, but they've been too life changing and brought too much freedom to my heart to not share them. and no, this isn't some evangelical, religious speech to those of you out there who don't believe in god. it actually kind of makes me sick to know that there are probably some of my readers that i knew in high school who i tried to "share christ with" by telling you to straighten up your act. after all, wasn't i good at being good? couldn't everybody get it together like i could? i know i've spoken before about the self-righteous pride i carried around, but i want to say it again to make sure you understand my heart here. that's not the gospel, so if you've heard that message from me in the past, pretend like you didn't. this (really) long monologue is not a bunch of religious words meant to make you feel like christianity is weird if you haven't had much exposure, or have had exposure of the wrong kind. it's just a story of my heart that is real and changing me and writing it down helps me process it.
so just getting down to the honest issues of my life and letting you (whoever "you" is) on me: again, probably inappropriate to be so personal, but i don't know what harm i can do other than have you think less of me, and frankly i'm starting to not care so much about that. i never thought i would say that because my reputation has been my god and the thing i idolize and strive to protect more than anything in this world. at the same time, i feel like the past 3 1/2 years have been a roller coaster for me, so if somebody else is feeling the same way, i like to atleast offer the hope i've found because there was a time i thought it didn't exist....
i haven't sugar-coated the fact that i struggled with the first few years of k and b's life. it wasn't just because they screamed their heads off all.the.time. i was depressed. i think i might could be the poster child for post-partum depression...if it was just post-partum. the truth is, it is still a struggle that i go in and out of. go ahead and think i'm weird if you've never been depressed, but i wouldn't be too quick to judge because i never in a million years thought i would struggle with it. i used to think depressed people were weird and just needed to get happy. call it hormones that still swing in and out of balance, or call it the thing god has used to get my attention and show me his goodness, but i can't get it to go away. i tried to get through it on my own for 2 years, then finally went to a psychiatrist a year ago and found the right combination of medicine. i thought i was fixed and was so happy to be happy again. the truth is it's back and i'm wondering if it ever goes away forever. it's the reason my blogging has been sporadic and the reason i might not have called you back if you've called me. on low days, i crawl into a hole and feel paralyzed in relationships and in life. i don't want to talk to anybody and i don't want to do things i usually love to do. there have been more low days than high lately, which is what ultimately drove me to a desperation for answers. my first instinct was to call my psychiatrist and see if he could up my medicine. in half-heartedly praying through it, my heart felt like this phase is a spiritual battle. i do feel crazy if i miss my medicine for a few days, but i think medicine in me has been used to get me to a place where i can think straight and process my thoughts. it's not the total fix i had hoped it was going to be. so, here i am...in the valley, forced to deal with real thoughts, real hurts, and real issues of my heart. "crises become god's means of forcing us to turn away from circumstances, feelings, and our own strength, and to turn toward god."
if you've never been depressed, i don't expect you to understand why it's a struggle for me. i'm well aware that my life is really, really good. i can honestly say there is not one circumstance in my life right now that is bad. so it doesn't make sense to me either. or atleast it didn't up until now. i do believe depression is very often a chemical or hormonal problem, and that has been part of my problem. but i know the valley i'm experiencing now is different, and something god is using to show me issues i would never face if i wasn't forced to out of desperation. which is where from fear to freedom is coming into play in my life. it's showing me some patterns of my heart that have left me where i am. my life probably doesn't look any different from the outside, but my heart is being changed daily in a way i haven't experienced before. i've been a christian for so long, but every time i go through times of heart changes like this, i realize i just didn't get it before.
i had a day last week where i was lower than i've been in awhile. i was praying through what was going on in my heart when god revealed it to me. this doesn't happen that often, but it was real and i knew that as much as i didn't want to admit it, it was a truth that would begin to catapult me into everything else i'm learning right now. i realized that when things go wrong in my life, i do 1 of 2 things: blame or medicate. when things don't go my way, my first instinct is to figure out whose fault it was. and it's usually brett's (poor thing) because he's safe and i know i can beat him up and he'll still love me. if i can't find someone to blame, i medicate. i don't mean medicate in the sense of lexapro (though i obviously do that too). i mean that instead of facing the hurt, i pick up a magazine or turn on keeping up with the kardashians or go shopping or re-decorate my house. sometimes i even do "good" things like make my family their shampoo...further proof that our actions aren't the problem. i'm not coming down on any of these things, because there are times i do these things when i'm emotionally healthy and they're fine. at other times, i do them to avoid having to deal with real issues. i've become an expert at medicating to suppress hurts and disappointments because to admit them might make me face one of my biggest fears: feeling out of control or tarnishing my reputation. control and a good reputation are the 2 things i've always thought were the key to life. i've never said that out loud, but these seem to be the 2 roots of most of my sins: maintaining control and approval from others, both of which i think are ultimately rooted in pride. and this has been the cycle of my life. i've medicated for 29 years, and so often it's looked so good and felt so good that i didn't feel a need to change. it's usually helped me get ahead in the world's eyes. my usual methods of medication have contributed to an improvement in looks (i'm not saying i'm a beauty queen...just that you can learn some pretty good hair and makeup and fashion tips when you medicate through reading magazines like i do), so i've felt more loved and successful, and less of a need for life through christ. and that's the beauty of depression. depression has made me lose interest in my old ways to medicate. this is not a medical problem. this is god's goodness to me because he wants me to meet him in this valley. he wanted to bring me to a point of desperation, where i finally learned that i am a "caterpillar in a ring of fire" who crawls to the things i think will save me, but really i have one hope of rescue...god in his grace reaching down and picking me up. "think of the human state as one of stubborn blindness. we will rely on everything but god. he in turn will prepare us for grace by closing our favorite escape exits until there is only one way left. healthy despair drives you to drop pretenses and seek god from the heart. it ends with a real beginning - new life energized by grace. unhealthy despair drives you into the role of victim, in which all responsibility is denied and blame is shifted to others. it ends with immobilization, intense self-preoccupation, and false humility. most of us want quick solutions to our problems. we have more interest in immediate deliverance from pain than in what god wants to teach us through the pain. but the father does not let us escape; he lets us alone until we become fed up with our own self-centered attitudes. when a healthy despair of self sets in, then god begins quietly to breathe into us a new teachability". this is where i am. i'm tired of the cycle of feeling hurt by life, blame-shifting, then medicating, because when none of these work, as is happening right now, i enter into depression. why am i just now learning this?!? i've been a christian for so long, so why am i just now learning that i have one hope? i don't have to blame anyone and i don't have to cover sin or ignore it through my methods of medication. i think deep down i thought it would go away if i pretended it wasn't really there, but the truth is, i've been relying on myself while talking about god's power. "the confidence i had always had about my life was not faith, as i had assumed, but a reliance on my own competency, be it real or imagined." i'm tired of depending on people or life to make me happy. i didn't think i was doing this because i knew in my head that god was the only source of true joy, but if i really believed it in my heart, i wouldn't put so much stock in others liking me or everyone, especially brett, performing to my standards.
so these are just some of the truths that are making my heart more alive. i'm sure there will be more. and along with that, i'm sure there will be more low days where i forget all of this and go back to my usual methods of coping with the pains of life. my hope is that i will continue to be reminded of christ's work on the cross and the way his death justified me and set me free from having to perform and hide to ensure his love for me. my prayer is to rely on his grace since he's the only good thing in me anyway.
i'm not done with my thoughts, but i'm tired of writing (and thinking :)). i'm too tired to edit it too, so forgive any typos :). plus, i have so many thoughts running through my head that they're all getting jumbled, and i've written so much already that i feel like i've been all over the place and might not make much sense. i'll continue some other day. hope you had a good weekend!
Thursday, January 14, 2010
eve
"though the apple is still in her fist she swears it shouldn't have to be like this. she is now strung up and strung out from wherever you look, it doesn't matter now how much she took.
where are you now? when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?
i live in a house of pain and lust, before the glory and after the rust. some of it's yours and some of it's mine. if i could just love you enough maybe i could let it lie.
where are you now? when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?
your fallen worth and your falling tears have left you stranded there in the garden of your fears. sweet redemption rings in the air; sweet redemption will hold you there.
where are you now? (i am calling you by name)
where are you now? (come to me and leave your shame)
though your kingdoms have crumbled down...sweet redemption."
-sandra mccracken
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGOfLX3DEfs&feature=PlayList&p=5C20782FFA423011&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=19
where are you now? when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?
i live in a house of pain and lust, before the glory and after the rust. some of it's yours and some of it's mine. if i could just love you enough maybe i could let it lie.
where are you now? when your kingdoms have crumbled down, where are you now?
your fallen worth and your falling tears have left you stranded there in the garden of your fears. sweet redemption rings in the air; sweet redemption will hold you there.
where are you now? (i am calling you by name)
where are you now? (come to me and leave your shame)
though your kingdoms have crumbled down...sweet redemption."
-sandra mccracken
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGOfLX3DEfs&feature=PlayList&p=5C20782FFA423011&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=19
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
2010
well, i guess it's time i put my 2010 goals in writing for everyone to see in hopes that i'll live them out this year. i'm hoping that having a blog will help, as i can record my progress. i love setting goals and i love the new year for it's new beginnings. i know i can make new goals and start working on them at anytime, but the new year brings a new energy for me. here they are (and there's a good chance more will be added since it's already mid-january and i've added a new one almost every day this month.)
1. limit wasted time. i spend WAY too much time getting lost in stalking people in blogworld or on facebook. i want to make my "free time" more purposeful. i like having my goals as a gauge to ask myself if what i'm doing during this time lines up with what i want to accomplish/work towards this year.
2. blog more. i'm a sporadic blogger, but writing organizes my mind more than anything else, plus i love having a virtual family scrapbook that i can look back on one day.
3. recycle. i've been convicted about how i give no thought to taking care of god's creation. i used to think this practice was reserved for tree huggers, but apparently i'm one now (according to brett) because of my next goal...
4. go natural/homemade/organic. this is probably the goal i'll give the most attention to this year because of so many reasons. i'm already experimenting with the many, many things you can make yourself, so i'll be recording a lot of those here if you're interested in joining in with me. i started this last year, but i've been working heavily towards it this year already. part of this goal is to not buy anything i can make myself (a lofty striving when you start to learn everything you can make from scratch). there's a good chance i'll burn out so i may need some encouragement here.
5. stop treating my awesome camera as a point-and-shoot (i.e. take a photography class).
6. learn to sew. my mom and grandmother both sew, so i'm going to get sporadic lessons from them. i'm horrible and impatient, so i'm not sure it's my thing, but i want to work towards it.
7. be more consistent in teaching scripture to k and b. we bought them a little bible that we are reading with them every day, but all they ever want to read about is baby jesus. they don't really care to hear about him as a man. not sure how to get there?! :)
8. start playing tennis. i'm thinking i'll need lessons here too. my mom plays and just started like 5 years ago, so i think it's ok to pick it up at 29.
9. learn to ski. this is brett's favorite thing in the world, and i really want to be able to go with him. we went to park city last year, but i just couldn't do it. i think people who ski look so cool, but i don't know if i'm not built for it or what. we got to the top of the mountain, and the first problem is he didn't tell me i had to ski off of the lift, so he skied off without me, then i had to jump off and about broke my hip. once we started down the mountain, every time i would gain momentum i would get nervous and fall down on purpose, so after an hour of 3 feet then fall, 3 feet then fall, brett held my skis, put me on his back, and skied down that way. after awhile, we saw a guy on a snow mobile driving food up to one of the restaurants and i asked him to take me down. needless to say, i might need a miracle for this one (or atleast lessons on a bunny slope).
10. yoga atleast once a week. i started yoga last year and am now hooked. i used to avoid it because i felt like if i was going to spend an hour working out, i needed to be efficient and burn calories. i've seen an improvement in my weight training and cardio workouts because of it, so i want to be more consistent with it. plus, it's the most relaxing thing i do and forces an hour of selfishness.
11. drink more tea. in making our family's plan to go natural i'm learning about all of it's benefits.
12. start k and b in gymnastics.
13. wallpaper my half bath (if you're thinking i might as well go ahead and put a border halfway up or stencil some folk art at the top, be assured it's not gonna look 80s...there's some awesome wallpaper out there now. i just ordered a sample of the one i think i'm going to use, so hopefully i'll get it done soon (actually, i should probably say my mom will get it done soon. i don't know how, and don't really care to learn :)).
14. decorate k and b's room. brett's mom just gave us some old twin beds for their big girl room, so we'll be painting them and the room and working on bedding. i've got the idea in my head, so it's just a matter of putting it into action.
15. do something to our backyard. it's hideous.
16. start a garden (goes along with the backyard and going natural). i want to plant herbs and fruits and vegetables, but i've killed everything i've ever tried to plant. i don't mind planting stuff but i think it's supposed to keep itself alive. i'm not very diligent in following through with the many projects i begin, so maybe that should be my goal instead.
17. start making k and b do chores. not sure what all a 3 year old can handle, but they are MESSY right now, so i want to figure out how to give them more responsibility around our house.
18. go to orlando. brett and i lived there our first few years of marriage, and i've been wanting to go back and visit. we haven't been since the girls were 1, so it's time to pay a visit. i'm thinking it may be time to take the girls to disney anyway.
19. brush k and b's teeth. this is the most embarrassing one because we sound like a dirty family, but does anyone else HATE brushing their kids' teeth?! it's such a fight, so i usually end up telling myself they'll fall out anyway (so brett ends up doing it and i feel like an irresponsible mom).
this is a lot, but remember it's goals, not commitments :). i wish i was a marathoner, but i'm definitely a sprinter. i tend to start strong and burn out quickly, so wish me luck. good thing there's 352 days left. i'll post my progress along the way!
1. limit wasted time. i spend WAY too much time getting lost in stalking people in blogworld or on facebook. i want to make my "free time" more purposeful. i like having my goals as a gauge to ask myself if what i'm doing during this time lines up with what i want to accomplish/work towards this year.
2. blog more. i'm a sporadic blogger, but writing organizes my mind more than anything else, plus i love having a virtual family scrapbook that i can look back on one day.
3. recycle. i've been convicted about how i give no thought to taking care of god's creation. i used to think this practice was reserved for tree huggers, but apparently i'm one now (according to brett) because of my next goal...
4. go natural/homemade/organic. this is probably the goal i'll give the most attention to this year because of so many reasons. i'm already experimenting with the many, many things you can make yourself, so i'll be recording a lot of those here if you're interested in joining in with me. i started this last year, but i've been working heavily towards it this year already. part of this goal is to not buy anything i can make myself (a lofty striving when you start to learn everything you can make from scratch). there's a good chance i'll burn out so i may need some encouragement here.
5. stop treating my awesome camera as a point-and-shoot (i.e. take a photography class).
6. learn to sew. my mom and grandmother both sew, so i'm going to get sporadic lessons from them. i'm horrible and impatient, so i'm not sure it's my thing, but i want to work towards it.
7. be more consistent in teaching scripture to k and b. we bought them a little bible that we are reading with them every day, but all they ever want to read about is baby jesus. they don't really care to hear about him as a man. not sure how to get there?! :)
8. start playing tennis. i'm thinking i'll need lessons here too. my mom plays and just started like 5 years ago, so i think it's ok to pick it up at 29.
9. learn to ski. this is brett's favorite thing in the world, and i really want to be able to go with him. we went to park city last year, but i just couldn't do it. i think people who ski look so cool, but i don't know if i'm not built for it or what. we got to the top of the mountain, and the first problem is he didn't tell me i had to ski off of the lift, so he skied off without me, then i had to jump off and about broke my hip. once we started down the mountain, every time i would gain momentum i would get nervous and fall down on purpose, so after an hour of 3 feet then fall, 3 feet then fall, brett held my skis, put me on his back, and skied down that way. after awhile, we saw a guy on a snow mobile driving food up to one of the restaurants and i asked him to take me down. needless to say, i might need a miracle for this one (or atleast lessons on a bunny slope).
10. yoga atleast once a week. i started yoga last year and am now hooked. i used to avoid it because i felt like if i was going to spend an hour working out, i needed to be efficient and burn calories. i've seen an improvement in my weight training and cardio workouts because of it, so i want to be more consistent with it. plus, it's the most relaxing thing i do and forces an hour of selfishness.
11. drink more tea. in making our family's plan to go natural i'm learning about all of it's benefits.
12. start k and b in gymnastics.
13. wallpaper my half bath (if you're thinking i might as well go ahead and put a border halfway up or stencil some folk art at the top, be assured it's not gonna look 80s...there's some awesome wallpaper out there now. i just ordered a sample of the one i think i'm going to use, so hopefully i'll get it done soon (actually, i should probably say my mom will get it done soon. i don't know how, and don't really care to learn :)).
14. decorate k and b's room. brett's mom just gave us some old twin beds for their big girl room, so we'll be painting them and the room and working on bedding. i've got the idea in my head, so it's just a matter of putting it into action.
15. do something to our backyard. it's hideous.
16. start a garden (goes along with the backyard and going natural). i want to plant herbs and fruits and vegetables, but i've killed everything i've ever tried to plant. i don't mind planting stuff but i think it's supposed to keep itself alive. i'm not very diligent in following through with the many projects i begin, so maybe that should be my goal instead.
17. start making k and b do chores. not sure what all a 3 year old can handle, but they are MESSY right now, so i want to figure out how to give them more responsibility around our house.
18. go to orlando. brett and i lived there our first few years of marriage, and i've been wanting to go back and visit. we haven't been since the girls were 1, so it's time to pay a visit. i'm thinking it may be time to take the girls to disney anyway.
19. brush k and b's teeth. this is the most embarrassing one because we sound like a dirty family, but does anyone else HATE brushing their kids' teeth?! it's such a fight, so i usually end up telling myself they'll fall out anyway (so brett ends up doing it and i feel like an irresponsible mom).
this is a lot, but remember it's goals, not commitments :). i wish i was a marathoner, but i'm definitely a sprinter. i tend to start strong and burn out quickly, so wish me luck. good thing there's 352 days left. i'll post my progress along the way!
Saturday, December 5, 2009
the good life
though my blog and the thoughts i share here are fairly new, some of you have walked through this crazy journey of motherhood with me for the past 3 1/2 years and have known my struggles. you've seen me hate it, wonder why being a mom wasn't always what i thought it would be, and wonder why everybody else seemed to adore their kids and always have matching bib/burp cloth combos for them and i left mine in my car in the driveway one day hoping somebody would take them. you've seen me experience the death of a dream when the job i had waited my entire life for finally came calling in the form of a husband, kids, and a home to keep, and i was disappointed beyond the ability to hide it when it was accompanied by colic, months of no sleep, whacked out hormones, and depression. others of you might know me but didn't know that the pictures i posted on facebook at the time were only a facade (gasp! facebook, a facade?). we looked like a sweet, happy family, but the majority of months since june 2006 have been filled with my kids screaming, me screaming back at them, me screaming at brett because i wanted to be mad at somebody that i couldn't control my kids and didn't know who else to be mad at, and brett trying to start and run a company and still love and serve his crazy wife and screaming kids. in an effort to try and figure out how to like my life again, i started a cupcake company with my sweet friend pollye to add to the chaos. sounds pretty bad, huh? it was. and granted it's easier to say this since i'm saying "i WAS crazy and didn't like my kids" and not "i AM crazy and don't like my kids", but i have good news to report: i love my life and i adore my kids so much that i want to bite them. i really do. sometimes i squeeze them so hard i think i hurt them. while i used to live for times i could get away from them for a weekend trip, now if i'm away for an evening, i can't wait to get home to them and go in their room to stare at their sweet sleeping faces. i tear up when i look at the little angels deep in sleep and wonder how i could ever think i would have been better off never having kids. they ask me all the time when they are going to grow up and be like me and i tell them what i wish i could make happen: "i'm not letting you grow up. you're gonna be my little girl forever and i'm always going to hold you and hug you and kiss you and love you more than anybody in this world". i can say it over and over again that i regret the years i spent running from them, but if it hadn't happened, i wouldn't be able to see god's incredible work in opening my heart to love these 2 kids more than i ever could have imagined. now that they are in school 2 days a week, i treasure the days they're not because i see how quickly it will be 5 days that they are away from me. i'm not ready for it. i never thought i would say that, but i'm not. i love the days we spend together playing and running errands and making up silly songs and laughing. they're my little buddies now, and i must say they make really good companions. they make me laugh all day long and they're just fun...like i have these new little friends. i don't know why i felt the need to tell you all of this. i just had a sentimental moment thinking about how much i love my kids and i like to capture these thoughts for memories' sake, plus i thought i would share it in case you've wondered where my mental state is after the times i've talked about them driving me crazy. god's sweet gift of kids and the love he grows in our heart for them+ the most loving, supportive, and grace-giving man i've ever known walking through it with me (+lexapro :)) = bliss.
Friday, December 4, 2009
proud and humbled
along with all of the trying times as a mom, there are those moments when you reap reward for the tiny seeds you try and sew in your child day to day. that happened for me the other day with something kennedy said. i hate that i'm using an example with kennedy, because she's really not the perfect child, and blakely is capable of the same, it just so happened this way. anyway, k was pitching a huge fit on our way to the gym because of something silly. she didn't want to wear socks under her rain boots or something dumb...i don't remember exactly what it was even about. in a moment of annoyance, i told her if she didn't stop, she was going to spend the rest of the day in her room when we got home (not something i'm proud of saying because a.) that's the easy way out and really i just wanted to stick her there so i didn't have to deal with her. i didn't want to follow through with my whole spanking routine because i was late to my yoga class. yes, i was wrong., and b.) i never would have followed through with it so shouldn't have threatened it. besides, i knew it wouldn't work to tell her that because she knows i'm not going to leave her in her room for 12 hours or however ridiculously long she would have been there). when i finally got her calmed down enough to walk inside, we were waiting in line for me to check them into childcare, and she looked up at me and said "mommy, i'm sorry for pitching a fit". i was so proud of her that i didn't even know how to respond. the most important thing brett and i are trying to instill in k and b is repentance. good behavior is convenient and makes our life easier, and we do want them to learn to submit to authority, but at this age most kids aren't behaving well because they love mommy and daddy enough to want to be obedient to them. at least in my experience, most kids act "good" because they're either easy, laid back kids (usually kennedy) or they're scared not to. we want our kids to obey us out of love and respect, not because they're scared of our wrath. we are still in the (long) process of teaching k and b first-time obedience. maybe it shouldn't take 3 1/2 years, but k is a little stubborn and b is a lot stubborn, so who knows how much longer it will take. what we do believe in though is the power of repentance. sure, god loves our obedience and good works, but how many million times a day do we sin, even if just in our thoughts? if forgiveness of these sins comes through repentance, and it's a given that our kids will sin over and over and over again, what better to teach them than repentance? if i have to name a "big" sin that all of my "little" sins revolve around, it's pride. it has been my whole life, and i see bits of it in my kids, so i'm guessing there's a good chance they'll struggle with it too. repentance is hard for prideful people. i don't like admitting i'm wrong. it's easy for me in a blog to who knows what readers to admit little things i'm wrong about in parenting, but when real issues come up (mainly) with brett, there are few things i would rather not do than admit i'm wrong or say i'm sorry. in a grace-filled, gospel-centered relationship, nothing is more freeing though. i've never said "i'm sorry" to brett where he didn't offer forgiveness and i've never repented to the lord where he didn't embrace me with his love. i want to be able to model that grace to my kids by embracing them with love and offering total grace and forgiveness so they have a picture of how our heavenly father loves us as his children. i want them to see the power of repentance and practice it often. it was probably my proudest moment as a mom so far to see one of my kids repent to me without me telling her to.
on another note, as parenting always promises to do, a little while later i was humbled again. we haven't really known what to tell k and b about santa. we're not against them believing in him, but we didn't want this to be the focus of christmas. i loved the years i still believed and think it's a fun part of being a kid, but it's been a non-issue until this year. we took k and b to see the lights at lake lanier and santa was there and that was the first time they've seen him since they will actually remember it. kennedy sat on his lap and told him she wanted a ball, but blakely didn't want anywhere near him. she said she was scared he might bite her. i guess she thought he was some sort of animal. santa told k he was coming to our house and k told b and neither of them could go to sleep that night because they said they didn't want that man coming to our house. but what they did figure out is that you're supposed to ask santa for things, so they started talking about everything they wanted for christmas. i told them that christmas is not about getting things, but a time to celebrate jesus. the next day, i asked k and b what christmas was and blakely proudly announced that "it's when you ask jesus for lots of things". i guess i've failed in teaching the meaning of christmas. she's definitely got jesus and santa confused, but don't we all? brett and i have got a lot of teaching to do over the next 3 weeks.
have a good weekend! a picture of k and b at lake lanier (maybe i shouldn't post them riding illegally, but they had so much fun)...
on another note, as parenting always promises to do, a little while later i was humbled again. we haven't really known what to tell k and b about santa. we're not against them believing in him, but we didn't want this to be the focus of christmas. i loved the years i still believed and think it's a fun part of being a kid, but it's been a non-issue until this year. we took k and b to see the lights at lake lanier and santa was there and that was the first time they've seen him since they will actually remember it. kennedy sat on his lap and told him she wanted a ball, but blakely didn't want anywhere near him. she said she was scared he might bite her. i guess she thought he was some sort of animal. santa told k he was coming to our house and k told b and neither of them could go to sleep that night because they said they didn't want that man coming to our house. but what they did figure out is that you're supposed to ask santa for things, so they started talking about everything they wanted for christmas. i told them that christmas is not about getting things, but a time to celebrate jesus. the next day, i asked k and b what christmas was and blakely proudly announced that "it's when you ask jesus for lots of things". i guess i've failed in teaching the meaning of christmas. she's definitely got jesus and santa confused, but don't we all? brett and i have got a lot of teaching to do over the next 3 weeks.
have a good weekend! a picture of k and b at lake lanier (maybe i shouldn't post them riding illegally, but they had so much fun)...
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
lost sheep
i listened to a sermon by one of my favorite pastors, tim keller, this morning. it was an interesting teaching on jesus's referral to us as sheep. when reading of myself as a sheep before, i pictured myself as a sweet, cuddly little lamb that jesus likes to hold and pet because i'm cute and sweet. this morning, i was given a new view of myself that lined up even more with the ultimate picture of redemption god has been been showing me over the past 8 or so years.
i spent most of my life trying to do better. i grew up in church and pretty much always knew in theory that i needed a savior, but really i thought i needed a savior to save me and get me into heaven and the rest of it was about doing better and trying to emulate jesus's perfect life. i was pretty good at being good. i'm a people pleaser by nature. i like approval and i like for other people to think i've got it together. it's why i understand kennedy so well and struggle to understand blakely sometimes. i like to cooperate and meet people's expectations. so my life looked good. the truth is that my life looked like a life surrendered to jesus, but my heart was a phariseeical mess. i thought others should have it together like i did. i was self-righteous and propped myself up above others, demanding that they act like i was acting. that's not to say that i've arrived now and grown out of that; it's just that the older i get, the more i see my sin, my need for a savior, and god's complete and total pursuit and redemption of his people.
i like when i'm given a new picture to point me towards god's redemption of my rebellious heart, and tim keller's reminder of us as sheep was a good picture of who i really am and the amazement of god's love despite it. here's what i learned about us as sheep:
when the bible calls us sheep and god our shepherd, it's a very well-meant insult. a sheep is a stupid animal. it loses its direction continually in a way that a cat or dog never does. and even when you find a lost sheep, it goes to and fro and won't follow you home, so when you find it you must seize it, throw it to the ground, tie its 4 legs together, throw it over your shoulder, and carry it home. that's the only way to save a lost sheep.
i love this picture of myself as a sheep. i like being insulted in this way. when i was the sweet, cuddly lamb, anyone would want to love me and rescue me. there was something in me that called for that. when i'm a rebellious, wayward, stupid animal, if i'm rescued it's because jesus just loved me that much. nothing in and of myself deserved the rescue. even in the ugliness of my sin, he wrestles me to the ground, throws me over his shoulder, and takes me home. i don't waddle over to him, rub up against his leg, and ask to be petted. my heart is rebellious. i'm not good. he is. and i constantly need to be rescued. like the sheep, i am completely and utterly lost and the shepherd must do everything for my salvation. i'm not a dog or cat who will willingly follow my master home. it wouldn't have helped me for god to send a great teacher who tells me how to live and gives me a great picture to emulate. it's not okay for me to just try and live like jesus. i need a savior. i need someone to do everything i should have done, who has to live the life i should have lived, and die the death i should have died to bring me all the way home. i'm the infinitely lost sheep, but i have an infinitely loving shepherd. my shepherd will do anything to bring me home, and he does do everything to bring me home.
in my old identity, i was a good person, and i took a lot of pleasure in that. it left me feeling good about myself, but left me feeling superior to those who couldn't perform as well as me. the more i see my new identity as being completely wretched, but completely loved in spite of that fact, the more i'm learning to love others and see myself as better than no one. do i do it perfectly? not even close. i don't even do it to my own husband or kids. if i did, i wouldn't demand performance out of others the way i do. but the more i see how very sheep-like i am, the more i am able to see the great love of my savior, and that love is slowly transforming my self-righteous, wayward heart. it's a slow process, but he promises in his grace to continually rescue me and take me all the way home.
i spent most of my life trying to do better. i grew up in church and pretty much always knew in theory that i needed a savior, but really i thought i needed a savior to save me and get me into heaven and the rest of it was about doing better and trying to emulate jesus's perfect life. i was pretty good at being good. i'm a people pleaser by nature. i like approval and i like for other people to think i've got it together. it's why i understand kennedy so well and struggle to understand blakely sometimes. i like to cooperate and meet people's expectations. so my life looked good. the truth is that my life looked like a life surrendered to jesus, but my heart was a phariseeical mess. i thought others should have it together like i did. i was self-righteous and propped myself up above others, demanding that they act like i was acting. that's not to say that i've arrived now and grown out of that; it's just that the older i get, the more i see my sin, my need for a savior, and god's complete and total pursuit and redemption of his people.
i like when i'm given a new picture to point me towards god's redemption of my rebellious heart, and tim keller's reminder of us as sheep was a good picture of who i really am and the amazement of god's love despite it. here's what i learned about us as sheep:
when the bible calls us sheep and god our shepherd, it's a very well-meant insult. a sheep is a stupid animal. it loses its direction continually in a way that a cat or dog never does. and even when you find a lost sheep, it goes to and fro and won't follow you home, so when you find it you must seize it, throw it to the ground, tie its 4 legs together, throw it over your shoulder, and carry it home. that's the only way to save a lost sheep.
i love this picture of myself as a sheep. i like being insulted in this way. when i was the sweet, cuddly lamb, anyone would want to love me and rescue me. there was something in me that called for that. when i'm a rebellious, wayward, stupid animal, if i'm rescued it's because jesus just loved me that much. nothing in and of myself deserved the rescue. even in the ugliness of my sin, he wrestles me to the ground, throws me over his shoulder, and takes me home. i don't waddle over to him, rub up against his leg, and ask to be petted. my heart is rebellious. i'm not good. he is. and i constantly need to be rescued. like the sheep, i am completely and utterly lost and the shepherd must do everything for my salvation. i'm not a dog or cat who will willingly follow my master home. it wouldn't have helped me for god to send a great teacher who tells me how to live and gives me a great picture to emulate. it's not okay for me to just try and live like jesus. i need a savior. i need someone to do everything i should have done, who has to live the life i should have lived, and die the death i should have died to bring me all the way home. i'm the infinitely lost sheep, but i have an infinitely loving shepherd. my shepherd will do anything to bring me home, and he does do everything to bring me home.
in my old identity, i was a good person, and i took a lot of pleasure in that. it left me feeling good about myself, but left me feeling superior to those who couldn't perform as well as me. the more i see my new identity as being completely wretched, but completely loved in spite of that fact, the more i'm learning to love others and see myself as better than no one. do i do it perfectly? not even close. i don't even do it to my own husband or kids. if i did, i wouldn't demand performance out of others the way i do. but the more i see how very sheep-like i am, the more i am able to see the great love of my savior, and that love is slowly transforming my self-righteous, wayward heart. it's a slow process, but he promises in his grace to continually rescue me and take me all the way home.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
weekend recap
this weekend was a much needed one for brett and i. we try to have a date night once a week to re-connect apart from our kids, but lately we haven't spent as much time together as our marriage needs. in an effort to crack down on some of the discipline problems we've encountered, we haven't wanted to leave k and b much for fear that they would fall back into some of their old habits. they've been in boot camp. it's been pretty effective, but it's hard to know how to find a balance between parenting our kids effectively and making sure we pour enough time and energy into our marriage. kennedy and blakely have been different kids for almost 2 weeks now. i really don't even know what we're doing that different, but whatever it is, we need to keep it up. i want to figure out a way to be what k and b need, but be what brett needs at the same time. always a balancing act...
anyway, brett was in a wedding of one of our friends from college friday night, so between the rehearsal dinner thursday night and the wedding friday night, we got some much-needed time together. we were surrounded by people both evenings, but it was fun to enjoy a couple of nights out with friends, and to have saturday to spend time with just brett. my aunt and uncle kept k and b, so it was good to know they were having fun and not missing us too much ("not too much" as in they didn't want to come home and begged to stay 3 nights). i love to be alone with brett and laugh and have good conversations that have nothing to do with our kids. i love being married to my best friend and i love that every time i'm with him i realize new ways he's perfect for me. not to mention, i'm pretty sure he's the only guy that would put up with me for 6 years. i've had some pretty psycho mood swings with these crazy kids of mine ;) i had some cute pictures i was going to post from the weekend, but i can't pull them up for some reason. if i figure it out, i'll post them later. good night!
anyway, brett was in a wedding of one of our friends from college friday night, so between the rehearsal dinner thursday night and the wedding friday night, we got some much-needed time together. we were surrounded by people both evenings, but it was fun to enjoy a couple of nights out with friends, and to have saturday to spend time with just brett. my aunt and uncle kept k and b, so it was good to know they were having fun and not missing us too much ("not too much" as in they didn't want to come home and begged to stay 3 nights). i love to be alone with brett and laugh and have good conversations that have nothing to do with our kids. i love being married to my best friend and i love that every time i'm with him i realize new ways he's perfect for me. not to mention, i'm pretty sure he's the only guy that would put up with me for 6 years. i've had some pretty psycho mood swings with these crazy kids of mine ;) i had some cute pictures i was going to post from the weekend, but i can't pull them up for some reason. if i figure it out, i'll post them later. good night!
Saturday, October 24, 2009
parented
if i would have written this post earlier in the day, there would be a different tone to it. i spent most of the day feeling defeated and angry. i have that child. the one, pre-kids, i used to think "that mom needs to learn to control her kid" about. i have that child, and i feel absolutely powerless to do anything about it. i don't know what to do, not just to make my child obey and show respect, but to just make her not a miserable person. from the time we brought blakely home from the hospital at a month old, she cried. i thought she was in pain, so we put her on reflux medicine, but she kept crying. i thought she was frustrated that she couldn't crawl or walk, but when she became mobile she kept crying. i thought surely when she could begin to tell us what she wanted she would finally be the happy and content baby i would see other moms with. but, you guessed it; she started talking and kept crying. remind me to delete this post when she can read, because i don't want her to see herself as the "difficult one", but i'm at a loss. i've said that for 3 years now, but i really am.
so i suppose you can guess how the photo shoot went. i always try to create an exciting and energetic tone in our house in the mornings to hopefully start the day out with good moods all around. it was great until 7, then b's complaints started rolling. she didn't like where the blueberries were placed in her kashi waffle, she wanted to wear a pink bow instead of white, and she didn't like the shirt brett was wearing for the picture; she said it looked like a dress and she was mad daddy was wearing a dress. she wanted to wear her tennis shoes (with a smocked dress...classy) and she wanted to make sure we were getting brusters' purple ice cream; no other kind. once we arrived exhausted at the shoot, the real crying began. she cried from the time we got there until we put her down for a nap. i know it sounds like i'm being dramatic because it was just pictures and not a life or death situation, but it's exhausting to face the rebellion day in and day out. and you can guess what she said about the ice cream once the shoot began: "i don't want ice cream". told you.
in any other case, i would say "that kid's 3...WAY too old to be acting like that". but i mean it when i say i don't know what to do. i don't know why she's so unhappy, and you can only discipline a child so much. blakely can be such a sweet little girl, and when she finally breaks, she breaks hard and just falls in our arms and wants to be held and cuddled. she wears a tough shell, but when you get through to the core of her, she has the sweetest and most tender little heart. i want to know how to make that come out more. i don't know what i'm doing wrong.
i hesitate to even write this post because i know how many women out there have either been unable to get pregnant or have lost a child, and would give anything for a child who screams all day long. i'm grateful even in the tough times for the sweet gift god has given me in blakely; it's just i want to find a way to bring more peace to our home. though my love has been constant and strong and unconditional, i have struggled over the past 3 years to fully enjoy my kids the way i feel like most moms do. i still feel sadness when i see moms strolling around with their happy little babies at the mall. the times i tried to do this when k and b were babies, i would have to hold a baby in each arm and pelvic thrust the stroller through nordstrom to hurry back to my car so no one called dfacs, since i surely must be hurting or neglecting or starving my kids to make them scream so loud.
but, i digress. i can't live in the past, and i can't know why motherhood hasn't been the bliss i always thought it would be. i can't keep living in guilt that i didn't bond with my babies the moment i held them. i have to stop analyzing whether i didn't hold them enough as babies or if i fed them the wrong foods or gave them bpa filled bottles to make them act that way. they're toddlers now, and i have to deal with them as such. i have more regrets than i can count about not enjoying them enough as babies, but i honestly didn't know how. our pregnancy wasn't planned and i wasn't ready to be a mom and didn't know what to do with 1 happy baby, much less 2 mad ones. but now it's time to move on and not make the same mistake with k and b as toddlers. kennedy is easy to enjoy, but i want to break blakely's will without breaking her unique spirit so we can stop the constant battles in our home. more than that, i want to learn to enjoy even the hard times and listen to what god wants to teach me through this state of refinement called motherhood.
as i was putting blakely to bed tonight, i started out telling her that she's no more sinful than me, and that we need a savior in the same way; not because it sounds good or spiritual, but because everything in me sees the weight of my sin, even in the hypocrisy i display in getting mad at her for rebelling against me the way i rebel against god. i wanted her to go to bed reminded of the gospel and knowing that despite her actions, no amount of disobedience or good works could change my love. that's the way god loves us. his love for me wouldn't have changed today if i would've sinned against him by murdering someone, or propped up my good works by being imprisoned for sharing the gospel in a closed country. at bedtime every night, i sing jesus paid it all and amazing grace to k and b. i intended for those words to minister to b's heart tonight, but instead god used them to minister to mine...
"twas grace that taught my heart to fear" reminded me that the only thing in me that sees god's truths or chooses to obey is the spirit he has given me. at the core of our natural being, we're all blakelys; rebellious and hard and wanting our own way. it's only by god's grace that anything good is in us at all.
"through many dangers, toils, and snares i have already come. 'tis grace that brought me safe this far and grace will lead me home". these words were sweet to me as i remembered the hard days of the last 3 years and the way god in his grace has brought me through them; not just letting me survive, but teaching me lessons i never would have learned if i wouldn't have walked through trying to figure out how to be a mom to a "strong-willed child". it's evident through the growing pains i've felt in parenting the kids i've been given that god knew exactly what he was doing when he knit them together in my womb and gave them to me to mother. the same grace that brought me through the newborn and toddler stages is going to continue to grow me up and give me just what i need to make it through the rest of k and b's life, whether is gets easier or harder.
"when we've been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun we'll no less days to sing god's praise than when we first begun." i love my life, and as much as it may sound like i'm complaining, i wouldn't trade any part of it. i love my sweet husband and my precious little girls and my friends and family and the privilege of being a stay at home mom. at the same time, the older i get, the more i realize just how broken our world is. i was made for another, and i'm humbled to go to bed knowing this life is not the end. as defeated as i may feel at times, i can rest tonight in knowing that because of his love, he's preparing a place for me in heaven despite the condemnation to hell my sin deserves.
his grace really is amazing.
so i suppose you can guess how the photo shoot went. i always try to create an exciting and energetic tone in our house in the mornings to hopefully start the day out with good moods all around. it was great until 7, then b's complaints started rolling. she didn't like where the blueberries were placed in her kashi waffle, she wanted to wear a pink bow instead of white, and she didn't like the shirt brett was wearing for the picture; she said it looked like a dress and she was mad daddy was wearing a dress. she wanted to wear her tennis shoes (with a smocked dress...classy) and she wanted to make sure we were getting brusters' purple ice cream; no other kind. once we arrived exhausted at the shoot, the real crying began. she cried from the time we got there until we put her down for a nap. i know it sounds like i'm being dramatic because it was just pictures and not a life or death situation, but it's exhausting to face the rebellion day in and day out. and you can guess what she said about the ice cream once the shoot began: "i don't want ice cream". told you.
in any other case, i would say "that kid's 3...WAY too old to be acting like that". but i mean it when i say i don't know what to do. i don't know why she's so unhappy, and you can only discipline a child so much. blakely can be such a sweet little girl, and when she finally breaks, she breaks hard and just falls in our arms and wants to be held and cuddled. she wears a tough shell, but when you get through to the core of her, she has the sweetest and most tender little heart. i want to know how to make that come out more. i don't know what i'm doing wrong.
i hesitate to even write this post because i know how many women out there have either been unable to get pregnant or have lost a child, and would give anything for a child who screams all day long. i'm grateful even in the tough times for the sweet gift god has given me in blakely; it's just i want to find a way to bring more peace to our home. though my love has been constant and strong and unconditional, i have struggled over the past 3 years to fully enjoy my kids the way i feel like most moms do. i still feel sadness when i see moms strolling around with their happy little babies at the mall. the times i tried to do this when k and b were babies, i would have to hold a baby in each arm and pelvic thrust the stroller through nordstrom to hurry back to my car so no one called dfacs, since i surely must be hurting or neglecting or starving my kids to make them scream so loud.
but, i digress. i can't live in the past, and i can't know why motherhood hasn't been the bliss i always thought it would be. i can't keep living in guilt that i didn't bond with my babies the moment i held them. i have to stop analyzing whether i didn't hold them enough as babies or if i fed them the wrong foods or gave them bpa filled bottles to make them act that way. they're toddlers now, and i have to deal with them as such. i have more regrets than i can count about not enjoying them enough as babies, but i honestly didn't know how. our pregnancy wasn't planned and i wasn't ready to be a mom and didn't know what to do with 1 happy baby, much less 2 mad ones. but now it's time to move on and not make the same mistake with k and b as toddlers. kennedy is easy to enjoy, but i want to break blakely's will without breaking her unique spirit so we can stop the constant battles in our home. more than that, i want to learn to enjoy even the hard times and listen to what god wants to teach me through this state of refinement called motherhood.
as i was putting blakely to bed tonight, i started out telling her that she's no more sinful than me, and that we need a savior in the same way; not because it sounds good or spiritual, but because everything in me sees the weight of my sin, even in the hypocrisy i display in getting mad at her for rebelling against me the way i rebel against god. i wanted her to go to bed reminded of the gospel and knowing that despite her actions, no amount of disobedience or good works could change my love. that's the way god loves us. his love for me wouldn't have changed today if i would've sinned against him by murdering someone, or propped up my good works by being imprisoned for sharing the gospel in a closed country. at bedtime every night, i sing jesus paid it all and amazing grace to k and b. i intended for those words to minister to b's heart tonight, but instead god used them to minister to mine...
"twas grace that taught my heart to fear" reminded me that the only thing in me that sees god's truths or chooses to obey is the spirit he has given me. at the core of our natural being, we're all blakelys; rebellious and hard and wanting our own way. it's only by god's grace that anything good is in us at all.
"through many dangers, toils, and snares i have already come. 'tis grace that brought me safe this far and grace will lead me home". these words were sweet to me as i remembered the hard days of the last 3 years and the way god in his grace has brought me through them; not just letting me survive, but teaching me lessons i never would have learned if i wouldn't have walked through trying to figure out how to be a mom to a "strong-willed child". it's evident through the growing pains i've felt in parenting the kids i've been given that god knew exactly what he was doing when he knit them together in my womb and gave them to me to mother. the same grace that brought me through the newborn and toddler stages is going to continue to grow me up and give me just what i need to make it through the rest of k and b's life, whether is gets easier or harder.
"when we've been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun we'll no less days to sing god's praise than when we first begun." i love my life, and as much as it may sound like i'm complaining, i wouldn't trade any part of it. i love my sweet husband and my precious little girls and my friends and family and the privilege of being a stay at home mom. at the same time, the older i get, the more i realize just how broken our world is. i was made for another, and i'm humbled to go to bed knowing this life is not the end. as defeated as i may feel at times, i can rest tonight in knowing that because of his love, he's preparing a place for me in heaven despite the condemnation to hell my sin deserves.
his grace really is amazing.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
picture time
we have a family picture session coming up saturday. i know it's pathetic that my kids are 3 and we've only had their picture taken once (when they were 3 months old), but it's because i know my kids. i adore kennedy and blakely and wouldn't trade them for any other kids in the world, but one (her name begins with a b) is the textbook definition of a strong-willed child. brett and i truly believe that if we can steer her in the right direction, focus on her strengths, and give her a lot of grace along the way (and ask god for a lot when we sin during our times of extreme frustration as we're trying to [still, after 3 years] figure out how to parent), she will find a cure for cancer or something crazy one day. the kid is brilliant and she knows what she wants and won't give up 'til she gets it. great for whatever company she becomes president of; a little frustrating for us as her parents. (sweetheart, if you're reading this one day, you know the depths of my love for you. i would lay down and die for you, and nothing you could ever do can change that.)
with that disclaimer, it's hard at times to know how to parent blakely. if you try to get her to do something that's not her idea, it's met with screaming the neighbors can hear through closed doors and a sound machine. we spank, use time out, take away privileges, bribe her. i've read books, sought advice from older moms, been scared by james dobson when he says that 74% of all strong-willed kids rebel as teenagers. we've tried everything. you know it's bad when one of the nursery workers at church asks if you discipline your child and you say "have you seen her butt?", so she asks if you've thought about calling supernanny. all that to say, i'm a little nervous about the pictures. my friend, katie, is doing them (you can check out her blog at http://katiedavidsonphotography.blogspot.com. she's doing really well-priced mini-sessions this weekend so you can e-mail her and she if she has openings if you're interested), and i've already warned her about our "strong-willed child", but i really hope to get some good pictures out of the session, especially for christmas cards.
k and b had their school pictures monday, so i told them what was going on, and blakely even practiced her picture smile that morning (adorable), but when their teacher brought them out to the carpool line, she broke the news to me that blakely refused to have her picture taken. they tried everything, even putting kennedy in the picture with her, but she still screamed and pitched a fit. after all, she didn't schedule the photographer to come that day, pick out her outfit, or tell the class that it was time to go get their pictures taken and lead them there. when i drove off from her school, i asked her why she wouldn't get her picture made. the answer? "because i didn't want to". of course. i get it now. when i asked kennedy what blakely did, she said she cried and made miss susan hold her. always being defensive of her connected-at-the-hip best friend, she affirmed me "but she didn't mean to cry. she'll do it next time". let's hope next time is this saturday at 10am. and any suggestions for making her do something she doesn't want to do (not just in this instance, but each of the 56 times i ask her to do something throughout each day) is welcomed. i don't cringe at parenting advice anymore the way i did when they were babies. i know it's out of control, and i know i've failed miserably at getting my child to obey me. and in case you're going to mention bribery, i've already thought about that. i would tell them we'll go get ice cream, their favorite, but i can guarantee blakely's response: "well, i don't want ice cream". but isn't it crazy how you love your kids no matter what? as much as they can frustrate the heck out of me, the thought of something happening to either of them makes me want to lay down and die. even after a rough morning with blakely of repeated disobedience, something strange inside of me is ready for her to wake up from her nap so i can see her again. i'm sure i'll bite my tongue for that one come 6 o'clock, but for now i miss the little booger and all of her mischievous ways that make her blakely. she and all of her little quirks have definitely got my heart.
prayers for us on saturday please!
with that disclaimer, it's hard at times to know how to parent blakely. if you try to get her to do something that's not her idea, it's met with screaming the neighbors can hear through closed doors and a sound machine. we spank, use time out, take away privileges, bribe her. i've read books, sought advice from older moms, been scared by james dobson when he says that 74% of all strong-willed kids rebel as teenagers. we've tried everything. you know it's bad when one of the nursery workers at church asks if you discipline your child and you say "have you seen her butt?", so she asks if you've thought about calling supernanny. all that to say, i'm a little nervous about the pictures. my friend, katie, is doing them (you can check out her blog at http://katiedavidsonphotography.blogspot.com. she's doing really well-priced mini-sessions this weekend so you can e-mail her and she if she has openings if you're interested), and i've already warned her about our "strong-willed child", but i really hope to get some good pictures out of the session, especially for christmas cards.
k and b had their school pictures monday, so i told them what was going on, and blakely even practiced her picture smile that morning (adorable), but when their teacher brought them out to the carpool line, she broke the news to me that blakely refused to have her picture taken. they tried everything, even putting kennedy in the picture with her, but she still screamed and pitched a fit. after all, she didn't schedule the photographer to come that day, pick out her outfit, or tell the class that it was time to go get their pictures taken and lead them there. when i drove off from her school, i asked her why she wouldn't get her picture made. the answer? "because i didn't want to". of course. i get it now. when i asked kennedy what blakely did, she said she cried and made miss susan hold her. always being defensive of her connected-at-the-hip best friend, she affirmed me "but she didn't mean to cry. she'll do it next time". let's hope next time is this saturday at 10am. and any suggestions for making her do something she doesn't want to do (not just in this instance, but each of the 56 times i ask her to do something throughout each day) is welcomed. i don't cringe at parenting advice anymore the way i did when they were babies. i know it's out of control, and i know i've failed miserably at getting my child to obey me. and in case you're going to mention bribery, i've already thought about that. i would tell them we'll go get ice cream, their favorite, but i can guarantee blakely's response: "well, i don't want ice cream". but isn't it crazy how you love your kids no matter what? as much as they can frustrate the heck out of me, the thought of something happening to either of them makes me want to lay down and die. even after a rough morning with blakely of repeated disobedience, something strange inside of me is ready for her to wake up from her nap so i can see her again. i'm sure i'll bite my tongue for that one come 6 o'clock, but for now i miss the little booger and all of her mischievous ways that make her blakely. she and all of her little quirks have definitely got my heart.
prayers for us on saturday please!
Thursday, October 15, 2009
glory baby
my dear friend, sarah (my little sister in the sorority, and the one i so lovingly to this day call "sister") sent me a sweet card after my miscarriage and reminded me of a song we used to listen to on our many roadtrips and drives around athens. we spent many hours over the course of college bopping around town in her silver 4 runner, listening to this cd while we drank starbucks, ate tcby, and parked illegally (i've talked about college in 25% of my blog so far. i promise i'm not stuck.). it's a watermark song, and i can't remember the name of the cd it's on, but it's green with a star or something on it. anyway, this song obviously meant nothing to me at the time, except i liked the melody, but she quoted a line from it in her note, and i dug it up to let brett listen to on our 12 hour trip to and from st simons last thursday. if you've got a second, try to find it online so you can hear it. i couldn't find a link to it to post, but it's a sweet song if you've ever lost a baby, or know someone who has. here are some of the words:
"glory baby, you slipped away as fast as we could say baby, baby. you were growing. what happened dear? you disappeared on us, baby. heaven will hold you before we do. heaven will keep you safe until we're home with you. but we'll miss you every day, miss you in every way, but we know there's a day when we will hold you. and you'll kiss our tears away when we're home to stay. can't wait for the day when we will see you. but, baby, let sweet jesus hold you 'til mom and dad can hold you. you'll just have heaven before we do. sweet little babies, it's hard to understand it 'cause we're hurting. but there is healing, and i know we're stronger people through the growing and in knowing all things work together for our good, and god works his purposes just like he said he would. i can't imagine heaven's lullabies and what they must sound like. i will rest in knowing heaven is your home and it's all you'll ever know."
being really busy with k and b, i don't think a whole lot about the child we lost. i don't know if that's a good or bad thing, but i haven't really dwelled there. i like the emotion this song brings out in me, and the comfort it gives me in being reminded that heaven is the only place our baby will ever know. it's easy to just let the miscarriage be an "event" in my life, but hearing the words "let sweet jesus hold you 'til mom and dad can hold you" reminds me that we have a little baby that we'll never hold on this earth. it definitely makes me long for heaven even more. can't wait to meet you, little one.
"glory baby, you slipped away as fast as we could say baby, baby. you were growing. what happened dear? you disappeared on us, baby. heaven will hold you before we do. heaven will keep you safe until we're home with you. but we'll miss you every day, miss you in every way, but we know there's a day when we will hold you. and you'll kiss our tears away when we're home to stay. can't wait for the day when we will see you. but, baby, let sweet jesus hold you 'til mom and dad can hold you. you'll just have heaven before we do. sweet little babies, it's hard to understand it 'cause we're hurting. but there is healing, and i know we're stronger people through the growing and in knowing all things work together for our good, and god works his purposes just like he said he would. i can't imagine heaven's lullabies and what they must sound like. i will rest in knowing heaven is your home and it's all you'll ever know."
being really busy with k and b, i don't think a whole lot about the child we lost. i don't know if that's a good or bad thing, but i haven't really dwelled there. i like the emotion this song brings out in me, and the comfort it gives me in being reminded that heaven is the only place our baby will ever know. it's easy to just let the miscarriage be an "event" in my life, but hearing the words "let sweet jesus hold you 'til mom and dad can hold you" reminds me that we have a little baby that we'll never hold on this earth. it definitely makes me long for heaven even more. can't wait to meet you, little one.
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