Today I am 35 weeks and 2 days pregnant. The last time I was this many weeks pregnant was almost 4 years ago exactly. My two baby girls' birthdays will be roughly 2 weeks apart. I posted a picture to my social media of my belly last night. I have done a few more of those this pregnancy than I did when I was pregnant with Sally, but I do have some from Sally's time in utero to reference. The last of these is from the 38 weeks and 2 days mark (so many numbers, yeah?) and, though I am not there quite yet, I looked at the picture for comparison...and then I saw the girl and I just thought "Here is me in an nearly identical state in life but as two very, very different versions of myself...wow I am so different. If I could go back and tell 'that' girl some things, what on earth would I say?"
I have spoken before about my experiences on sort of "channeling" other versions of myself in order to provide healing or even rescue for the previous versions of who I am as a human - a being physical and spiritual. Tonight the thought crossed my mind that the "girl" from 4 years ago might need a bit of a pep talk because it wasn't too long after that picture was taken that life got real, real hairy. In fact, let's be fair - life became an utter nightmare that would prove to last an indefinite period of time, and she had zero equipment for what was about to come barrelling towards her face. So if I could go back and have a sit down with her, what would be our checklist?
What would I want "me" to know?
1. Your life is going to change absolutely entirely. Not a shred of the life you built for years and years will be left. There is a storm coming with a force so huge that the structure of work that you have built is going to be completely annihilated. It's all going to be gone. I'm so sorry, but it's all going to be gone.
2. Your self doubt is going to remain but its going to morph into something that is more virtuous - more productive. Life is going to happen in such a way that you will not have the luxury of insecurity. You, like many others that have come before you, are going to have to do things that, if I shared their specifics with you right now, you would believe to be impossible. They're not. You're going to actually pull off some of the craziest, most improbable things, and you won't be thinking about it while you're in the thick of the experience, but just get ready to act on some instincts that you didn't know you had and then turn around afterwards and just be like "Whoa......" with some big half dollar sized eyes.
There is currently a part of yourself that doesn't feel strong enough to fight. Get ready for that part to totally die because the part of you that knows you MUST fight is about to be awakened, and when that happens, there won't be anything anyone can do to quiet it. The only thing that will win will be victory. Necessity will drive a lot of this, but it will be ever present.
3. You are going to be so brutally beaten by life in the coming months. I'm sorry for the pain you're about to feel. It will actually be in addition to the decimation of your dreams - not just part of it. The depth of hellish pain that you're about to know is something that I don't have a way to describe. It's really going to be something bad...but there's some healing coming. Some of the pain that you're going to feel is like the stretching of grafted skin. There is nothing to which we can compare that type of pain, but what is left is going to leave you WAY better equipped than what you would have been before...with what you have now. It's all going to get peeled off and discarded in the bio hazard of life. You will be given a NEW skin that is thicker and stronger and better.
4. There will be surprises. Your life will end up including things that right now you are thinking are things that are "just not my lot in life". Screw the butterfly effect, I'm going to tell you that you're going to get to know the love of a partner complete with adoration and exclusive respect. You will know what it feels like to be endlessly beautiful to someone even on days that you can't find that beauty anywhere in yourself, but he will see it and he will see it in you alone. You will regain the permission to reveal the goofy part of yourself, and you will be celebrated. That part is going to feel so nice, because the goofy part of you is a really big part.
5. You will not get some things figured out at all. There will be some things that remain a mystery. There will be parts of your heart that heal really, really well, but there will be so many things that will continue to frustrate you. Healing takes so, so, so much time. Give yourself that time. You will begin to feel stronger and stronger. Soak up the enjoyment of all that healing and let it carry you on the days that you feel confused.
6. You're going to recognize yourself again. I see the saddened look in your eyes right now. I know exactly how absorbed you are by the things happening around you and the nefarious intent of ones that don't value you. I'm telling you that you are getting ready to become reacquainted with the rescue provided by the Truth. The Truth is honestly about to set you free. Things and people in life are going to try SO HARD to make you feel like you are still bound by their lies and hatefulness and accusations, but the Truth knows and it is going to yank you right out of those lies. Don't be afraid to reach out for it any time the lies and liars start to catch up to you. Truth will win every single time. Let Truth fight the battle for you.
7. You're not alone. Never forget that. You were never alone.
That's what I would tell "her"...if I could go back to that day the picture was taken.
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Monday, November 16, 2015
On reading my map
"What do I DO with all of this, Dan?" I asked my husband for what feels like the 4 billionth time.
"I don't mean to sound preachy, but...you need to write", he replied.
I didn't ask him what he thought I should write about, and he didn't supply any suggestions. He just said to write, and as soon as he said it, I knew he was right.
It has been a year since I resurrected this blog. A full year ago my life changed really drastically, and I moved without my children from Florida to Norman, Oklahoma to live with Dan. Think what you may or adopt as your own opinion things you may have heard, but it was definitely not by choice. It was absolutely out of necessity, like if I don't do this, I'm going to become homeless again and these limitations would no longer meet the criteria for staying at the shelter I had before.
It's been a year...a very long year. What a weird ride. I have grown a LOT as a person. I HAVE developed things within myself (with help) that have enabled me to become a way better parent, but as I have said before, things are not easier. A lot of them are actually more difficult than they were before, and I am just sort of confused about what exactly I'm supposed to do with all of it...so I'm doing what I know to do. I have opened up this machine, and I am pressing keys.
Have you ever found yourself to be completely and utterly lost, and you come to a fork in the road (like a literal fork on a literal road while you're on a trip) and it hits you that you have no GPS because you are out of range, and you have no idea whether you are supposed to go right or left? You just sit there trying to draw from your sense of direction and some memory of the last thing that looked sort of familiar, and then another car pulls up behind you forcing you to go one way or the other. You gingerly make the turn hoping there's a place nearby that will show you a sign for where you are or you will happen upon a cell tower that re-enables your GPS so you can get direction that way.
That's where I'm at. I'm at the weird fork thinking "Okay...I followed the map...I followed the rules for where this journey SAID it was going to take me, but something somewhere was either an inaccuracy supplied to me or my own errancy as a human has brought me here. At this point, it is completely impossible to determine which of those is actually true...impossible. All I know is that I am at a complete loss for what step I am supposed to take next. I have no strategy anymore. I'm just going to take a leap and try to overcome misinformation or inadequate information that has been supplied to me and rely on every resource I have right now to get on a more effective track."
Oh. I guess I should also mention that there are now FOUR people that are depending on me to get us all where we need to go. I'm not in the vehicle of my life by myself.
I'm positive I'm not the only person this has happened to, but these experiences have a very keen way of making us as humans feel incredibly isolated. I find myself to be alone at least until I can reach one of the above mentioned resources.
Would you like to know the other frustrating part? Over the course of this past year, I have found myself sitting at NUMEROUS forks. The one at which I now sit is NOT my first one. I'm beginning to feel like I mistakenly picked up the map that is for a totally different journey - someone else's or just a different destination altogether. I have found myself picking up my "map" a bunch of times re-reading the writing on the front to confirm that I chose the correct one and getting that confirmation each time only to continue finding myself at these dad-blasted weirdo forks!!!
I don't know, you guys. I don't know why this has been my life. This feels like the most cruelly circuitous route for something that looked at the outset to be a straight shot. I have no more explanation than I did since the FIRST fork as to why that has not been true...except for this...one...thing.
This trip has led me down roads that I never would have seen had my expectations of the straight shot been my reality. I have seen parts of the journey of life that would have been a total mystery to me had I been given the choice to avoid the loops and curves. It has also given my three already born little ones the ability to watch me navigate. Journeys are especially hard for navigators, and we ALL end up finding ourselves in the position of being the navigator at some point. They have watched me with rapt attention to see how I reacted to all of this craziness. Sometimes I have shouted out at incompetant fellow sojourners or mumbled under my breath at how arduous this task has been. I have fallen flat on my face...but there have been other times that the speed of the traffic around me has been so intense and dangerous or the landscape indescribably treacherous and I have narrowed my gaze, taken a deep breath and gotten us through to safety. They have watched all that too. They have seen things that they will tuck away into the boxes of their memories, and one day, while they are on their own journeys and THEIR GPS fails or THEIR maps don't make sense, they will simply open up that box and find the answer there. I know this to be true because there have been times on my journey that I have done the same thing. My parents' journeys seemed to have SOME parts that were simpler, so I haven't felt like I had materials for every single circumstance. I mean, that's really an impossibility anyway, but what if the complexity of my journey is just a greater help to all four little hearts later?
You know what too? I've covered a lot of ground in just shy of 34 years...a lot. I now have the ability to tell other people where this thing or that is located. There are parts of this journey that are so indelibly imprinted on my brain that, if someone seeks information about a path or a landmark, I will immediately be able to recall how to get there and what things surround it.
I have to be honest. There are times that I feel so very like Wesley on the rack in The Princess Bride. How FAR can we crank this sucker up? or How WEIRD can we possibly make this?
Whatever.
I guess I'm still holding on to that dream of being the little old lady that finally feels content with the amount of answers that I ended up with by the time my hair has totally greyed and my whole face crinkles when I smile instead of just my eyes.
Someone called me wise the other day. People call me strong all the time. I get so embarrassed when those comments come my way. My first impulse is to turn around to see the person behind me that they must be talking about because THIS lil mama feels more confused than anyone I know...but what if I represent those things to other people? What if I represent some semblance of safety and calm to just a few other people looking at their wacky maps too?
I'll take it.
This CAN'T all just be a big ol mistake (in fact, I don't truly believe it is. I just really hate feeling lost or ill prepared. It's very scary to me).
There is a problem with me analogizing life to a map, really. Maps are set pictures. We can immediately see the beginning to the end, and life is not like that at all. Rather we are sometimes given large portions of information for the next steps to take and sometimes we are only given a little bit. We are actually NEVER supplied with information regarding the entire journey.
So why do we allow ourselves to think of things in those terms? Do we not all do that to a degree? Or maybe life ends up being like a cumulative map rather than a completed page that we're given.
Either way...here I sit at the fork - biting the skin off my lip and hoping that opening my eyes a little wider makes them catch something that gives me a clue. In the mean time, I'm just going to take a breath and then look in the rearview mirror at the three sets of eyes that expect me to do well...and I'll do it.
"I don't mean to sound preachy, but...you need to write", he replied.
I didn't ask him what he thought I should write about, and he didn't supply any suggestions. He just said to write, and as soon as he said it, I knew he was right.
It has been a year since I resurrected this blog. A full year ago my life changed really drastically, and I moved without my children from Florida to Norman, Oklahoma to live with Dan. Think what you may or adopt as your own opinion things you may have heard, but it was definitely not by choice. It was absolutely out of necessity, like if I don't do this, I'm going to become homeless again and these limitations would no longer meet the criteria for staying at the shelter I had before.
It's been a year...a very long year. What a weird ride. I have grown a LOT as a person. I HAVE developed things within myself (with help) that have enabled me to become a way better parent, but as I have said before, things are not easier. A lot of them are actually more difficult than they were before, and I am just sort of confused about what exactly I'm supposed to do with all of it...so I'm doing what I know to do. I have opened up this machine, and I am pressing keys.
Have you ever found yourself to be completely and utterly lost, and you come to a fork in the road (like a literal fork on a literal road while you're on a trip) and it hits you that you have no GPS because you are out of range, and you have no idea whether you are supposed to go right or left? You just sit there trying to draw from your sense of direction and some memory of the last thing that looked sort of familiar, and then another car pulls up behind you forcing you to go one way or the other. You gingerly make the turn hoping there's a place nearby that will show you a sign for where you are or you will happen upon a cell tower that re-enables your GPS so you can get direction that way.
That's where I'm at. I'm at the weird fork thinking "Okay...I followed the map...I followed the rules for where this journey SAID it was going to take me, but something somewhere was either an inaccuracy supplied to me or my own errancy as a human has brought me here. At this point, it is completely impossible to determine which of those is actually true...impossible. All I know is that I am at a complete loss for what step I am supposed to take next. I have no strategy anymore. I'm just going to take a leap and try to overcome misinformation or inadequate information that has been supplied to me and rely on every resource I have right now to get on a more effective track."
Oh. I guess I should also mention that there are now FOUR people that are depending on me to get us all where we need to go. I'm not in the vehicle of my life by myself.
I'm positive I'm not the only person this has happened to, but these experiences have a very keen way of making us as humans feel incredibly isolated. I find myself to be alone at least until I can reach one of the above mentioned resources.
Would you like to know the other frustrating part? Over the course of this past year, I have found myself sitting at NUMEROUS forks. The one at which I now sit is NOT my first one. I'm beginning to feel like I mistakenly picked up the map that is for a totally different journey - someone else's or just a different destination altogether. I have found myself picking up my "map" a bunch of times re-reading the writing on the front to confirm that I chose the correct one and getting that confirmation each time only to continue finding myself at these dad-blasted weirdo forks!!!
I don't know, you guys. I don't know why this has been my life. This feels like the most cruelly circuitous route for something that looked at the outset to be a straight shot. I have no more explanation than I did since the FIRST fork as to why that has not been true...except for this...one...thing.
This trip has led me down roads that I never would have seen had my expectations of the straight shot been my reality. I have seen parts of the journey of life that would have been a total mystery to me had I been given the choice to avoid the loops and curves. It has also given my three already born little ones the ability to watch me navigate. Journeys are especially hard for navigators, and we ALL end up finding ourselves in the position of being the navigator at some point. They have watched me with rapt attention to see how I reacted to all of this craziness. Sometimes I have shouted out at incompetant fellow sojourners or mumbled under my breath at how arduous this task has been. I have fallen flat on my face...but there have been other times that the speed of the traffic around me has been so intense and dangerous or the landscape indescribably treacherous and I have narrowed my gaze, taken a deep breath and gotten us through to safety. They have watched all that too. They have seen things that they will tuck away into the boxes of their memories, and one day, while they are on their own journeys and THEIR GPS fails or THEIR maps don't make sense, they will simply open up that box and find the answer there. I know this to be true because there have been times on my journey that I have done the same thing. My parents' journeys seemed to have SOME parts that were simpler, so I haven't felt like I had materials for every single circumstance. I mean, that's really an impossibility anyway, but what if the complexity of my journey is just a greater help to all four little hearts later?
You know what too? I've covered a lot of ground in just shy of 34 years...a lot. I now have the ability to tell other people where this thing or that is located. There are parts of this journey that are so indelibly imprinted on my brain that, if someone seeks information about a path or a landmark, I will immediately be able to recall how to get there and what things surround it.
I have to be honest. There are times that I feel so very like Wesley on the rack in The Princess Bride. How FAR can we crank this sucker up? or How WEIRD can we possibly make this?
Whatever.
I guess I'm still holding on to that dream of being the little old lady that finally feels content with the amount of answers that I ended up with by the time my hair has totally greyed and my whole face crinkles when I smile instead of just my eyes.
Someone called me wise the other day. People call me strong all the time. I get so embarrassed when those comments come my way. My first impulse is to turn around to see the person behind me that they must be talking about because THIS lil mama feels more confused than anyone I know...but what if I represent those things to other people? What if I represent some semblance of safety and calm to just a few other people looking at their wacky maps too?
I'll take it.
This CAN'T all just be a big ol mistake (in fact, I don't truly believe it is. I just really hate feeling lost or ill prepared. It's very scary to me).
There is a problem with me analogizing life to a map, really. Maps are set pictures. We can immediately see the beginning to the end, and life is not like that at all. Rather we are sometimes given large portions of information for the next steps to take and sometimes we are only given a little bit. We are actually NEVER supplied with information regarding the entire journey.
So why do we allow ourselves to think of things in those terms? Do we not all do that to a degree? Or maybe life ends up being like a cumulative map rather than a completed page that we're given.
Either way...here I sit at the fork - biting the skin off my lip and hoping that opening my eyes a little wider makes them catch something that gives me a clue. In the mean time, I'm just going to take a breath and then look in the rearview mirror at the three sets of eyes that expect me to do well...and I'll do it.
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
On living in a fish bowl
Well I have not been disciplined about writing on the blog this summer and fall. I have indeed had a bit of a mental block against it, but I have felt weight bearing down on my soul now for too many weeks in a row. It's time. I need to clear some space up there. I gotta think some of this through.
As of late the thing that is causing me the greatest amount of frustration is feeling like I am living under scrutiny - like a fish in a bowl. I do not mean to say that I am prominent enough in any sect of society to draw attention or interest from a very large group of people. I am referring to that feeling that we ALL encounter - that someone - anyone is picking apart parts of your life. It's so unsettling.
I have moved a bazillion times. I have loves literally all over the world. I use Facebook specifically as a way to keep in touch with everyone and also share with them trials and struggles as well as blessings and doses of happiness that come into my life. Without Facebook, I would not have the ability to do that. I live in a place around zero family, so this is vital for me - someone who is incredibly emotionally close with my family and close friends who are family except for genetics. I am also part of Facebook groups for my children's activities. That is the only update, in some cases, that I get for their goings on. I mean, let's be real. It's almost 2016. Snail mail and paper copies are just not something people use as much with paper costs, printing costs and postage.
I use social media as a necessity. First world problems - yeah, but guess what. That's where I live. If I lived in a different place, then those cultural norms would dictate my life.
So we've established the things I like about social media - quick access to family and other loved ones and to the things my kids have going on. It's so nice for me when someone takes time out of their life to send me a private message to tell me that they love me. That goes a million miles for me to know that there are people who are willing to read through some of my more cryptic statuses and choose to love my heart and understand what I mean but am not at liberty to say.
Here's what I don't like: Remember how I've referred before to those that "wait like a devil in the dark"? I've got a few of those. I know they're there, and I even know who some of them are, but there are some whose identities I don't know. I also have a problem with the "there are two sides to every story" people. THOSE are the people I would love to sell ANYthing to. God forbid they accuse someone of being dishonest (on one side of the coin) or be "forward" enough to ask for real answers. I am not referring to people that I'm only casual friends with. I'm talking about those people that have known me for years and years and just choose to stay (and I DESPISE this word) "neutral" so they don't have to sacrifice their own comfort or get their hands dirty.
The reason THIS person seems to me to be the most nefarious or at least damaging is because they ALSO usually seem to be the ones that it gets back to me have criticized me. THESE are the people that are the most hurtful to me. These are the first people about whom I think "But you weren't even THERE for the thing about which you are speaking. How dare you speak with authority about something you did not witness while at the same time claiming that you don't have a dog in the fight?". These people hurt me the most.
I have felt SO many times lately "Okay, so if I share struggles that are going on in my life and get even remotely specific, then I get accused of being petty or ungrateful (and yes. Lately I have had someone say that to my face) If I share happy things that I are going on, then I have fear that people will accuse me of being disingenuous instead of them understanding that I refuse to ignore the fact that my life does and always will contain beauty that I want to celebrate even in the midst of the ugliest storm". And it's basically all because of the people about whom I am unsure of their loyalty. It's so hurtful. I never have to worry about the people that I "keep close" because it's easier even though I do not trust them at all. I already know what to do with them. It's because of the people that leave me unsure.
But Sarah, that is true for everyone at every point in life. You're always going to have people that do that everywhere you go. YES!!!! If you were thinking that thought, then you hit today's sentiment spot on. My difficulty is this. I am not perfect, but there is a Pollyanna-esque part of my soul that always wants to look on the bright side - to believe that everyone I encounter will do the same amount of research I do to get hard and fast truth before even conversing with someone about something that has happened. I guess that's virtuous because everyone does always deserve their own chance. There is a vicious side too, though. That's the abuse survivor part of myself that sticks my head in the sand so I don't have to face the ugly truth that there are TRULY ugly, selfish people in the world who want to do just enough to appease their own consciences or have something interesting to talk about because they keep their own worlds so small. There is the part of my heart that knows what it's like to allow that kind of behavior in someone JUST BECAUSE they act nicely towards you part of the time. I want so much to believe that people will be careful with my heart...but they aren't.
I also don't want to be so closed off that my heart does not give love to other hearts that need hugs and love. If I choose to ONLY protect myself and my own, I will create an effective buffer, but I will also create terrible limitations on what I'm able to do and receive.
BALANCE. IS. HARD.
It's a scary world, you guys because you know what? We are never going to have a way to totally and completely effectively protect ourselves from being used by others. That is something that I have definitely learned the hard, heartbreaking way. There is not a way to go to each of my Facebook friends and ask "Um, do you really honestly love me? Do you protect my heart when you speak of me and the things in my life or do you use me for something selfish or incomplete?" First of all, that is weird and very desperate. It's also not going to work. I wouldn't get honest answers. So I am left with the same thing with which I started, right?
Yes, except I haven't acknowledged yet in this post what all I have in my arsenal and what you also have in yours. I have truth. I know the truth. I know what I have lived first hand, and I know who did or did not witness it. I also know my own shortcomings and the areas where I have grown leaps and bounds - especially in the last 11 months. Those are things that no one can take away from me. If I forget that because someone gossips about me or acts a little fishy, that is my fault - not theirs.
Truth is so powerful, guys. On the days that the legs of my soul feel the most wobbly, it is because I have brushed past the shoulder of truth because I have ignored its silent presence for the sake of lies that are just so loud. (Isn't it funny to think about the fact that truth is most often a "silent" presence in our lives? We almost have to LOOK for it more often than we LISTEN for it)
So this has been my frustration for a WHILE. This is another one that was mostly another reminder for me. If you glean something from it that helps, I am forever grateful for your attention and that maybe this can help.
Meanwhile, what do you say about the next post being about how awesome true friends have been to me and what I did recently when I realized I'd mistakenly thrown one away?
I love you guys.
As of late the thing that is causing me the greatest amount of frustration is feeling like I am living under scrutiny - like a fish in a bowl. I do not mean to say that I am prominent enough in any sect of society to draw attention or interest from a very large group of people. I am referring to that feeling that we ALL encounter - that someone - anyone is picking apart parts of your life. It's so unsettling.
I have moved a bazillion times. I have loves literally all over the world. I use Facebook specifically as a way to keep in touch with everyone and also share with them trials and struggles as well as blessings and doses of happiness that come into my life. Without Facebook, I would not have the ability to do that. I live in a place around zero family, so this is vital for me - someone who is incredibly emotionally close with my family and close friends who are family except for genetics. I am also part of Facebook groups for my children's activities. That is the only update, in some cases, that I get for their goings on. I mean, let's be real. It's almost 2016. Snail mail and paper copies are just not something people use as much with paper costs, printing costs and postage.
I use social media as a necessity. First world problems - yeah, but guess what. That's where I live. If I lived in a different place, then those cultural norms would dictate my life.
So we've established the things I like about social media - quick access to family and other loved ones and to the things my kids have going on. It's so nice for me when someone takes time out of their life to send me a private message to tell me that they love me. That goes a million miles for me to know that there are people who are willing to read through some of my more cryptic statuses and choose to love my heart and understand what I mean but am not at liberty to say.
Here's what I don't like: Remember how I've referred before to those that "wait like a devil in the dark"? I've got a few of those. I know they're there, and I even know who some of them are, but there are some whose identities I don't know. I also have a problem with the "there are two sides to every story" people. THOSE are the people I would love to sell ANYthing to. God forbid they accuse someone of being dishonest (on one side of the coin) or be "forward" enough to ask for real answers. I am not referring to people that I'm only casual friends with. I'm talking about those people that have known me for years and years and just choose to stay (and I DESPISE this word) "neutral" so they don't have to sacrifice their own comfort or get their hands dirty.
The reason THIS person seems to me to be the most nefarious or at least damaging is because they ALSO usually seem to be the ones that it gets back to me have criticized me. THESE are the people that are the most hurtful to me. These are the first people about whom I think "But you weren't even THERE for the thing about which you are speaking. How dare you speak with authority about something you did not witness while at the same time claiming that you don't have a dog in the fight?". These people hurt me the most.
I have felt SO many times lately "Okay, so if I share struggles that are going on in my life and get even remotely specific, then I get accused of being petty or ungrateful (and yes. Lately I have had someone say that to my face) If I share happy things that I are going on, then I have fear that people will accuse me of being disingenuous instead of them understanding that I refuse to ignore the fact that my life does and always will contain beauty that I want to celebrate even in the midst of the ugliest storm". And it's basically all because of the people about whom I am unsure of their loyalty. It's so hurtful. I never have to worry about the people that I "keep close" because it's easier even though I do not trust them at all. I already know what to do with them. It's because of the people that leave me unsure.
But Sarah, that is true for everyone at every point in life. You're always going to have people that do that everywhere you go. YES!!!! If you were thinking that thought, then you hit today's sentiment spot on. My difficulty is this. I am not perfect, but there is a Pollyanna-esque part of my soul that always wants to look on the bright side - to believe that everyone I encounter will do the same amount of research I do to get hard and fast truth before even conversing with someone about something that has happened. I guess that's virtuous because everyone does always deserve their own chance. There is a vicious side too, though. That's the abuse survivor part of myself that sticks my head in the sand so I don't have to face the ugly truth that there are TRULY ugly, selfish people in the world who want to do just enough to appease their own consciences or have something interesting to talk about because they keep their own worlds so small. There is the part of my heart that knows what it's like to allow that kind of behavior in someone JUST BECAUSE they act nicely towards you part of the time. I want so much to believe that people will be careful with my heart...but they aren't.
I also don't want to be so closed off that my heart does not give love to other hearts that need hugs and love. If I choose to ONLY protect myself and my own, I will create an effective buffer, but I will also create terrible limitations on what I'm able to do and receive.
BALANCE. IS. HARD.
It's a scary world, you guys because you know what? We are never going to have a way to totally and completely effectively protect ourselves from being used by others. That is something that I have definitely learned the hard, heartbreaking way. There is not a way to go to each of my Facebook friends and ask "Um, do you really honestly love me? Do you protect my heart when you speak of me and the things in my life or do you use me for something selfish or incomplete?" First of all, that is weird and very desperate. It's also not going to work. I wouldn't get honest answers. So I am left with the same thing with which I started, right?
Yes, except I haven't acknowledged yet in this post what all I have in my arsenal and what you also have in yours. I have truth. I know the truth. I know what I have lived first hand, and I know who did or did not witness it. I also know my own shortcomings and the areas where I have grown leaps and bounds - especially in the last 11 months. Those are things that no one can take away from me. If I forget that because someone gossips about me or acts a little fishy, that is my fault - not theirs.
Truth is so powerful, guys. On the days that the legs of my soul feel the most wobbly, it is because I have brushed past the shoulder of truth because I have ignored its silent presence for the sake of lies that are just so loud. (Isn't it funny to think about the fact that truth is most often a "silent" presence in our lives? We almost have to LOOK for it more often than we LISTEN for it)
So this has been my frustration for a WHILE. This is another one that was mostly another reminder for me. If you glean something from it that helps, I am forever grateful for your attention and that maybe this can help.
Meanwhile, what do you say about the next post being about how awesome true friends have been to me and what I did recently when I realized I'd mistakenly thrown one away?
I love you guys.
Friday, August 28, 2015
On boxes for moving and babies in bellies
This summer has been an absolute whirlwind. My head is spinning still as we spend up the rest of summer's days. I think I had an idea in my mind on what it would be like when I got back here, and every experience completely defied all my preconceived notions. There were things for which I felt sure I would be totally prepared that have knocked me on my back side. It has all left me feeling quite lost and very confused about how I'm supposed to proceed.
The biggest surprise this summer was, indeed, the baby! My husband and I had discussed for a while the idea and the planning necessary for bringing another baby into our family. We had made plans to try starting the beginning of the year, but, knowing about our impending move, to take a year long break from trying if we were not successful by March. In March I began to have terrible and familiar pains, so off to the hospital we went. After having these pains for a year and a half, I was diagnosed with ovarian cysts (pain level: think kidney stones). There were some in both ovaries. It seemed like our fate was sort of sealed - at least temporarily. I had never had them in my life until the couple years, so I began to research articles and ask a lot of friends about how this could affect my health. Bottom line - infertility was a GIANT likelihood.
We began the dialogue about not adding any more children to our family and just loving the three that we have, but it seemed pretty safe to bet that babies any time soon were NOT going to be a possibility. We resigned ourselves to the fact that we would need to wait that year and get life settled. Getting pregnant after March would mean a bit of a logistical nightmare, after all.
One night I began to have the same terrible pain, but there was another sensation added. The only way I can describe it is being electrocuted from my hips all the way to my knees. The cyst had burst (it was as fun as it sounds...ask anyone who has had one). It was about 20 minutes of the most cruel and unusual punishment my body had every dealt me. I was starting to get really exhausted by having constant physical pain...every...single...day.
Well guess what happened. 3 weeks later, I peed on the stick and saw two lines. I was SHOCKED! Also immediately terrified. My pregnancies tend to be very impeding and extremely uncomfortable, and I had a LOT to do!!!! BODY!!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING???
Very soon after, I had my first ER visit this pregnancy (I dehydrate SO easily, so I often have to get help for rehydration). During that visit's ultrasound, the tech rattled off everything she was seeing, but something she said caught my immediate attention. She mentioned the ovary from which the egg had been released. It was from the same ovary that had the bigger cyst in it - the one that had so furiously ruptured and ripped through my nether regions...4 days before that tiny little egg needed to make its way on its journey. 4...days. If that cyst had remained or ruptured 4 days later, who knows what would have been the fate of the egg?
I'm just going to tell you. Being pregnant right now has been so, so, so difficult, but if any kid was supposed to exist, I have to argue that this little bean is. I don't know what the story for her life will be (yes. it's a girl) but it's going to be a ride if her start is any indicator. Do you know anything about ovarian cysts? Do you understand how high against me the odds should have been stacked? I had just days of remote health after having these vicious things for over a year! I was misdiagnosed at another hospital when I first began to have these pains, so they went untreated an unmonitored for how every many months I had them. The possibility of damage is another likelihood with this kind of thing, I've heard. The orchestra of events that needed to play in order for this baby to happen is an intricate one. It is music indeed. I am still confused and still terrified (sidenote: it doesn't matter how many children you have. It's still terrifying every time) but grateful.
So in January, Audrey Hazel Cheon is going to show the world what her face looks like.
The rest of my challenges mentioned in other posts still exist. Some of them have grown. Some have arrived - new ones (I know. I'm shaking my head about it, but roll with the punches, right?) I'm trying to reenter the world of being healthy of mind and heart. Though I never really left because the lessons of healing from earlier this year are seared into my soul, I don't want to stagnate. It's hard, though, folks. It's work to grow, and if something is zapping your spiritual or physical energy, you may not feel like it. Choose it. Choose with me to grow in spite of being exhausted.
I apologize that I have done so poorly with making additions to this blog, but I'm still hoping to do better. Thank you again for every minute you've spent reading all my disjointed thoughts.
Adieu, friends.
The biggest surprise this summer was, indeed, the baby! My husband and I had discussed for a while the idea and the planning necessary for bringing another baby into our family. We had made plans to try starting the beginning of the year, but, knowing about our impending move, to take a year long break from trying if we were not successful by March. In March I began to have terrible and familiar pains, so off to the hospital we went. After having these pains for a year and a half, I was diagnosed with ovarian cysts (pain level: think kidney stones). There were some in both ovaries. It seemed like our fate was sort of sealed - at least temporarily. I had never had them in my life until the couple years, so I began to research articles and ask a lot of friends about how this could affect my health. Bottom line - infertility was a GIANT likelihood.
We began the dialogue about not adding any more children to our family and just loving the three that we have, but it seemed pretty safe to bet that babies any time soon were NOT going to be a possibility. We resigned ourselves to the fact that we would need to wait that year and get life settled. Getting pregnant after March would mean a bit of a logistical nightmare, after all.
One night I began to have the same terrible pain, but there was another sensation added. The only way I can describe it is being electrocuted from my hips all the way to my knees. The cyst had burst (it was as fun as it sounds...ask anyone who has had one). It was about 20 minutes of the most cruel and unusual punishment my body had every dealt me. I was starting to get really exhausted by having constant physical pain...every...single...day.
Well guess what happened. 3 weeks later, I peed on the stick and saw two lines. I was SHOCKED! Also immediately terrified. My pregnancies tend to be very impeding and extremely uncomfortable, and I had a LOT to do!!!! BODY!!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING???
Very soon after, I had my first ER visit this pregnancy (I dehydrate SO easily, so I often have to get help for rehydration). During that visit's ultrasound, the tech rattled off everything she was seeing, but something she said caught my immediate attention. She mentioned the ovary from which the egg had been released. It was from the same ovary that had the bigger cyst in it - the one that had so furiously ruptured and ripped through my nether regions...4 days before that tiny little egg needed to make its way on its journey. 4...days. If that cyst had remained or ruptured 4 days later, who knows what would have been the fate of the egg?
I'm just going to tell you. Being pregnant right now has been so, so, so difficult, but if any kid was supposed to exist, I have to argue that this little bean is. I don't know what the story for her life will be (yes. it's a girl) but it's going to be a ride if her start is any indicator. Do you know anything about ovarian cysts? Do you understand how high against me the odds should have been stacked? I had just days of remote health after having these vicious things for over a year! I was misdiagnosed at another hospital when I first began to have these pains, so they went untreated an unmonitored for how every many months I had them. The possibility of damage is another likelihood with this kind of thing, I've heard. The orchestra of events that needed to play in order for this baby to happen is an intricate one. It is music indeed. I am still confused and still terrified (sidenote: it doesn't matter how many children you have. It's still terrifying every time) but grateful.
So in January, Audrey Hazel Cheon is going to show the world what her face looks like.
The rest of my challenges mentioned in other posts still exist. Some of them have grown. Some have arrived - new ones (I know. I'm shaking my head about it, but roll with the punches, right?) I'm trying to reenter the world of being healthy of mind and heart. Though I never really left because the lessons of healing from earlier this year are seared into my soul, I don't want to stagnate. It's hard, though, folks. It's work to grow, and if something is zapping your spiritual or physical energy, you may not feel like it. Choose it. Choose with me to grow in spite of being exhausted.
I apologize that I have done so poorly with making additions to this blog, but I'm still hoping to do better. Thank you again for every minute you've spent reading all my disjointed thoughts.
Adieu, friends.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015
On encountering injustice
Back in the saddle. It's time to write some more. Just as before, this is mostly for my own catharsis. If it becomes beneficial to you, then I am so glad. My return ends up being even more than what I hoped for.
I have been very frustrated as of late. I have encountered injustice again...and again and again and again. I have had more barbs thrown my way. I have experienced more things that have broken my heart. It has left me feeling indignant and, in some ways, paralyzed because there is nothing I can do about it. So I have had to ask my myself "Okay, if I can't do anything ABOUT it, what am I going to do WITH it?"
What do you do when you cannot change injustice when you encounter it?
This is another one of those things that you have to approach from behind the scenes rather than full on straight ahead. My first instinct has been to draw my sword and shield and furrow my brow in righteous rage. Let me tell you. This has been exhausting...and fruitless. I mean it hasn't been a total waste. I have accomplished some things, but I have spent more time concentrating on how to find the weaknesses in the thing that I find to be my enemy instead of on myself and how to grow myself past my OWN weaknesses. Remember those? All those battles I was fighting so valiantly within my own soul? Well I had gotten preoccupied and forgotten them. It's time to readdress them. That is what is going to make my battles winnable. That is what is going to make these struggles worth it. That is the thing that is going to leave others feeling thankful for my victories.
Concentrating solely on the enemy allows bitterness to grow. And bitterness is a terrible vulture of a thing.
I have to reacquaint myself with the reality that there are people whose minds I can never change. There are circumstances beyond my control. There are hurdles bigger than the well of my resources. To wage those battles is embarrassingly futile. I had already learned that, and then I forgot.
I have found myself increasingly frustrated with people lately. We have had several issues come up all over social media that had people in outrage...but only one social media. There were people with whom I wanted to continue to share parts of my life to whom I had to bid a permanent farewell. As few friends as I've been able to have over the last 2 1/2 years, that was so difficult. That caused me to be even more frustrated.
But I can't change them, right?
Literally as I was typing this, we got some more disappointing news. More struggles ahead. More things...I...can't...change.
So what is my responsibility? How do I spend my life so that it isn't totally fruitless? I mean, no I can't change these things, but I also don't mean to sit idly by - slug-like - doing nothing. I still have to find a way to make my life worth the few days I'm going to spend on this giant ball.
How?
I don't know very much about life. I realize more and more the older that I get that the preconceived notions and trite formulas that my younger self felt sure I could trust are nothing but papery apparitions.
I do know this though. Love always wins. I have a love in my heart that, for whatever reason, has never been totally quenched. There has always been left at least a tiny remnant. I'm going to give it. I'm going to give it to anyone that will take it. I will choose it FIRST as the weapon from my arsenal. I don't mean to say that I won't mark those that I know to be dangerous or even monstrous individuals, but there is a way to protect yourself and not engage hatred or bitterness. I will do that.
I'm also not going to give up. Being told no is not something that has ever stopped me in my life. Ever. You can ask my mother and my grandmother. They will both attest to the truth of that statement.
I'm going to pray. It matters not to me if you adopt this one or not. If you don't, it's okay with me. Just use the others. I just know in my own life that I am the beloved of a God who doesn't want to see me fail. Struggle - maybe, but struggling causes growth. Failure, however, is not in His plan for me.
I'm going to go back to the principle several posts ago, and I'm going to PURSUE happiness in each day.
This life is a crazy ride. It just is. Just the moment you feel like you've got your feet under you, something collapses. Sometimes it's your own legs.
Just get back up...and take my hand. Let's just keep going. Slowly but surely, the injustices we face will be exposed for what they are. If we keep our hearts in check, our overcoming our struggles will give us a louder voice than we'd have ever had if our lives had been predictable.
So clear your throat and square your shoulders, dear heart. If the injustice has not already hit, it's probably on its way...and we're going to be just fine.
I have been very frustrated as of late. I have encountered injustice again...and again and again and again. I have had more barbs thrown my way. I have experienced more things that have broken my heart. It has left me feeling indignant and, in some ways, paralyzed because there is nothing I can do about it. So I have had to ask my myself "Okay, if I can't do anything ABOUT it, what am I going to do WITH it?"
What do you do when you cannot change injustice when you encounter it?
This is another one of those things that you have to approach from behind the scenes rather than full on straight ahead. My first instinct has been to draw my sword and shield and furrow my brow in righteous rage. Let me tell you. This has been exhausting...and fruitless. I mean it hasn't been a total waste. I have accomplished some things, but I have spent more time concentrating on how to find the weaknesses in the thing that I find to be my enemy instead of on myself and how to grow myself past my OWN weaknesses. Remember those? All those battles I was fighting so valiantly within my own soul? Well I had gotten preoccupied and forgotten them. It's time to readdress them. That is what is going to make my battles winnable. That is what is going to make these struggles worth it. That is the thing that is going to leave others feeling thankful for my victories.
Concentrating solely on the enemy allows bitterness to grow. And bitterness is a terrible vulture of a thing.
I have to reacquaint myself with the reality that there are people whose minds I can never change. There are circumstances beyond my control. There are hurdles bigger than the well of my resources. To wage those battles is embarrassingly futile. I had already learned that, and then I forgot.
I have found myself increasingly frustrated with people lately. We have had several issues come up all over social media that had people in outrage...but only one social media. There were people with whom I wanted to continue to share parts of my life to whom I had to bid a permanent farewell. As few friends as I've been able to have over the last 2 1/2 years, that was so difficult. That caused me to be even more frustrated.
But I can't change them, right?
Literally as I was typing this, we got some more disappointing news. More struggles ahead. More things...I...can't...change.
So what is my responsibility? How do I spend my life so that it isn't totally fruitless? I mean, no I can't change these things, but I also don't mean to sit idly by - slug-like - doing nothing. I still have to find a way to make my life worth the few days I'm going to spend on this giant ball.
How?
I don't know very much about life. I realize more and more the older that I get that the preconceived notions and trite formulas that my younger self felt sure I could trust are nothing but papery apparitions.
I do know this though. Love always wins. I have a love in my heart that, for whatever reason, has never been totally quenched. There has always been left at least a tiny remnant. I'm going to give it. I'm going to give it to anyone that will take it. I will choose it FIRST as the weapon from my arsenal. I don't mean to say that I won't mark those that I know to be dangerous or even monstrous individuals, but there is a way to protect yourself and not engage hatred or bitterness. I will do that.
I'm also not going to give up. Being told no is not something that has ever stopped me in my life. Ever. You can ask my mother and my grandmother. They will both attest to the truth of that statement.
I'm going to pray. It matters not to me if you adopt this one or not. If you don't, it's okay with me. Just use the others. I just know in my own life that I am the beloved of a God who doesn't want to see me fail. Struggle - maybe, but struggling causes growth. Failure, however, is not in His plan for me.
I'm going to go back to the principle several posts ago, and I'm going to PURSUE happiness in each day.
This life is a crazy ride. It just is. Just the moment you feel like you've got your feet under you, something collapses. Sometimes it's your own legs.
Just get back up...and take my hand. Let's just keep going. Slowly but surely, the injustices we face will be exposed for what they are. If we keep our hearts in check, our overcoming our struggles will give us a louder voice than we'd have ever had if our lives had been predictable.
So clear your throat and square your shoulders, dear heart. If the injustice has not already hit, it's probably on its way...and we're going to be just fine.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Old ghosts and new challenges
They come and they go. I hate the old ghosts. I can't ever be totally rid of them. As I have said before, I think I'm not supposed to be rid of them. I think, instead of seeing them as something that I should fight and then waste my time battling something permanent, I should acknowledge them and figure out how to do something productive with them.
We have moved back to be with the kids now. We've been back just over a month. It has been an absolute roller coaster. The logistics of moving across the country are bad enough, but apparently this time of year in this area presents its own kind of nightmare. It has left all involved in a state of exhaustion. Now we are just acclamating to all the new that is around us.
I can't say that I've been very proactive with my healing over the last month. My brain has been working so hard just to keep everything straight. That would normally be hard enough as it is with all the changes, but I also found out some more information regarding my health - I'm currently sharing it.
Yep. Pregnant.
I am so grateful to finally be growing this little life, but the timing probably could not have been worse. It makes me feel so guilty to even say that. I have so many friends that struggle with fertility that I very quickly recognize that I should be celebrating every beat of the heart of this little person, but I also feel torn. I did want to come back and give attention to my three little "already here" ones and to the new job I had planned that I would acquire. While the inhibitions are minimal and certainly not crippling, it leaves my heart asking yet another "Why?".
That sounds so terrible to me. My husband and I started trying to get pregnant months ago. We talked through all our options and how to plan and we had even agreed that, if we didn't conceive by March, we would wait until next calendar year. We did not conceive by March, and then the next two months brought a lot of really painful, hospital trip inducing pain that left me feeling a little certain that we actually may have to abandon the idea of getting pregnant altogether....well, gosh I was wrong. I think I got pregnant like 4 days before we made our cross-country trek.
Here's the funny thing. This is baby number 4 for this uterus and body, so morning sickness started two days after I found out the now grape-sized baby was cooking, and my belly IMMEDIATELY began to make room for its new occupant. ..awesome. So the whole idea of waiting to tell my new employer so she wouldn't worry about me not being able to handle things or even the awful experience of being treated like I was fragile (I am a princess. We know this, but something that my life has revealed is, fragile I AM NOT!) At about week 5, I told her I was going to sit at the restaurant where my husband works and relax and wait for him to get off, and she told me I should sit and have a beer. I had almost an out of body experience while I just felt the words vomit out of my mouth before I could stop them "Uh...actually I'm not drinking right now", and then I just stood there with an expression on my face that was so awkward, it still makes me hurt. She immediately guessed why, because DUH! The belly was a giveaway. One of my coworkers had even already noticed it. My ploy of loading up the pocket of my smock with bulky items did nothing to obscure the fact that there was a belly behind all the crap.
So also with pregnancy comes the emotional roller coaster and the fatigue. The fatigue I try to combat in my own ways, but the emotions. My poor husband. On one of the nights that I was leaving my job to go wait for him to finish his, I asked him to put in an order for me for the tuna melt (made by their chef - Oh my gosh. So delicious). He regretfully told me that they had run out of tuna. I literally blinked away tears while I drove. I straight up cried.
And there's also the being back in this place. At no point has being in this place been a positive experience for me. I have lived in 7 different states and moved more times than I care to count, and never have I lived in a place that represented so much terrible pain and utter failure. I have literally lost everything in my life TWICE in the 3 1/2 years that I've lived here. I don't like it here. It's hard for me to be here and feel the nearly tangible oppression that I have felt since my arrival.
And there is the reintegration with my 3 munchkins. Life has presented new challenges with them individually and collectively. I spend a lot of my day trying to figure out just how to tackle each problem. My heart has weighed a million pounds nearly every day since I've been here. More on that at a different time.
So my hiatus in Norman was so incredibly painful but helpful. It was my opportunity to come up for air, but upon my return I could feel the struggle of the waves I see now every day push against every muscle in my soul. This resuming of the "swim" has indeed brought back some old ghosts. Some I have fought well, and some have caught me off guard and left me crying and confused.
I apologize that there is not much of my usual presentation of a challenge followed by a solid confidence in a resolution. At this moment, I'm not sure of the resolution. I'm not sure of my next opportunity to come up for air. Right now, I'm just concentrating on surviving.
We have moved back to be with the kids now. We've been back just over a month. It has been an absolute roller coaster. The logistics of moving across the country are bad enough, but apparently this time of year in this area presents its own kind of nightmare. It has left all involved in a state of exhaustion. Now we are just acclamating to all the new that is around us.
I can't say that I've been very proactive with my healing over the last month. My brain has been working so hard just to keep everything straight. That would normally be hard enough as it is with all the changes, but I also found out some more information regarding my health - I'm currently sharing it.
Yep. Pregnant.
I am so grateful to finally be growing this little life, but the timing probably could not have been worse. It makes me feel so guilty to even say that. I have so many friends that struggle with fertility that I very quickly recognize that I should be celebrating every beat of the heart of this little person, but I also feel torn. I did want to come back and give attention to my three little "already here" ones and to the new job I had planned that I would acquire. While the inhibitions are minimal and certainly not crippling, it leaves my heart asking yet another "Why?".
That sounds so terrible to me. My husband and I started trying to get pregnant months ago. We talked through all our options and how to plan and we had even agreed that, if we didn't conceive by March, we would wait until next calendar year. We did not conceive by March, and then the next two months brought a lot of really painful, hospital trip inducing pain that left me feeling a little certain that we actually may have to abandon the idea of getting pregnant altogether....well, gosh I was wrong. I think I got pregnant like 4 days before we made our cross-country trek.
Here's the funny thing. This is baby number 4 for this uterus and body, so morning sickness started two days after I found out the now grape-sized baby was cooking, and my belly IMMEDIATELY began to make room for its new occupant. ..awesome. So the whole idea of waiting to tell my new employer so she wouldn't worry about me not being able to handle things or even the awful experience of being treated like I was fragile (I am a princess. We know this, but something that my life has revealed is, fragile I AM NOT!) At about week 5, I told her I was going to sit at the restaurant where my husband works and relax and wait for him to get off, and she told me I should sit and have a beer. I had almost an out of body experience while I just felt the words vomit out of my mouth before I could stop them "Uh...actually I'm not drinking right now", and then I just stood there with an expression on my face that was so awkward, it still makes me hurt. She immediately guessed why, because DUH! The belly was a giveaway. One of my coworkers had even already noticed it. My ploy of loading up the pocket of my smock with bulky items did nothing to obscure the fact that there was a belly behind all the crap.
So also with pregnancy comes the emotional roller coaster and the fatigue. The fatigue I try to combat in my own ways, but the emotions. My poor husband. On one of the nights that I was leaving my job to go wait for him to finish his, I asked him to put in an order for me for the tuna melt (made by their chef - Oh my gosh. So delicious). He regretfully told me that they had run out of tuna. I literally blinked away tears while I drove. I straight up cried.
And there's also the being back in this place. At no point has being in this place been a positive experience for me. I have lived in 7 different states and moved more times than I care to count, and never have I lived in a place that represented so much terrible pain and utter failure. I have literally lost everything in my life TWICE in the 3 1/2 years that I've lived here. I don't like it here. It's hard for me to be here and feel the nearly tangible oppression that I have felt since my arrival.
And there is the reintegration with my 3 munchkins. Life has presented new challenges with them individually and collectively. I spend a lot of my day trying to figure out just how to tackle each problem. My heart has weighed a million pounds nearly every day since I've been here. More on that at a different time.
So my hiatus in Norman was so incredibly painful but helpful. It was my opportunity to come up for air, but upon my return I could feel the struggle of the waves I see now every day push against every muscle in my soul. This resuming of the "swim" has indeed brought back some old ghosts. Some I have fought well, and some have caught me off guard and left me crying and confused.
I apologize that there is not much of my usual presentation of a challenge followed by a solid confidence in a resolution. At this moment, I'm not sure of the resolution. I'm not sure of my next opportunity to come up for air. Right now, I'm just concentrating on surviving.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
On letting scars stay
The past 2 days have included some really unpleasant emotions for me. I saw a video online of a boy at a poetry slam expressing the effects of his rapist being suggested as a Facebook friend for him. He was completely eloquent. As much as I try to give a voice to victims, it is such a rescue for me when I am able to listen to someone else be a voice for me. I "shared" the video with a caption of my own explaining that some of my Facebook friends are Facebook friends with my attacker or members of his family. The moment made me feel strong. I had a platform of activism and exposure to the issue after being given the resource of this guy's words. It felt good...and then it didn't.
Within a couple hours of watching the video and sharing it on my wall with my caption, I began to feel the darkness of my trauma come back. I felt the sludgy filth start to stain my insides again. I recognized what I felt and tried to put it in the lock box I have crafted for this type of trauma, and then I forced my mind to concentrate on other things. The sludge stayed though. It was content to stay in the background of my thoughts as it laid in wait for the first moment that my mind was not distracted by other things.
It crept forward a couple steps today, but I didn't recognize it. It disguised itself as the stress I'm feeling over our impending move. The disguise was only partly effective though. As I sat today telling a friend about some really wonderful things that are happening in my life, I found that a weird angry passion had entered uninvited into my contributions to the conversation. "Why am I so angry?...I sound so angry...what is this?" I thought. Even with this internal questioning of myself, the sludge's sloppy ruse was sufficient to distract my attention from it.
It crept forward another couple of steps while I was at the grocery store. I forgot to eat until late afternoon, so I was "hangry" by the time I got to the store with my husband and another friend. I wanted a cupcake. I had even picked out the cupcake that I wanted (because that specific cupcake was going to taste noticeably better than the other ones on the ceramic tray). The girl working the bakery was taking her sweet (see what I did there? "sweet") time filling out an order form with a lady ordering a cake for the birthday party of the child standing next to her. I walked across the aisle to where my husband was standing at the deli sandwich line. I ordered my food and then made excuses to Dan for my short temper by explaining that I was just so hungry. He made a teasing comment to me. I snapped at him and said a bad word to him that he did not deserve to hear. I began to feel frustrated that I was so on edge and apologized to him nearly immediately, but the feeling of something being present that wasn't invited was starting to register. Still the sludge had not totally revealed itself until later in the evening.
My husband is a very, very tender person. He is so attentive to me. Sometimes to the point of being embarrassing to me to be treated as someone so valuable. This evening he made a tender gesture towards me, and the sludge came charging forward to the front of my being. I literally physically pushed Dan away. I didn't shove him. I moved his hand away. He was offering me love and tenderness, and I rejected all of it and walked out of the room. He had done something completely sweet, but it triggered a memory. Something about it reminded me of a different time. The moment the sludge had been waiting for came. It swallowed up the tenderness my husband was offering to me and replaced it with the memories of times that I had been stolen from. I felt the infection of it poisoning our evening together, and I felt totally helpless and really frustrated. I asked myself and I asked Dan out loud when the day would come that these things wouldn't haunt me anymore. Neither of us were able to find an answer so we spent a couple hours in different rooms.
After our sabbatical from the presence of the other, he stepped into the doorway of our bedroom and, with the same careful tenderness that he always employs asked the same careful question that he has used every time this sludge has stolen a moment from us - and there have been so many. "Do you want to talk about what happened tonight?" I am ashamed to admit that my first impulse was to continue to "protect" myself from letting someone get close to my heart and to tell him "no", but I felt my head nod in a "yes". I asked him to turn on the light so he did and then laid down on his belly next to me on the bed. Then he just looked at me...and waited.
I began to talk through how I haven't been as vigilant about continuing my healing process over the last few weeks. If you pay close attention to my blog (so...my mom), you may have noticed that there have not been as many posts during that span. (again, this is probably only my mom) I am so thankful that people have found some of my words here to be helpful, but the primary purpose of this blog is, in fact, my own catharsis. When I don't actively pursue that healing, not only does the healing not happen, but the muscles of what is left of my spirit begin to atrophy a bit.
As I was talking, the light of sense shone through to my brain. I was ready to admit something that had been fighting its own way to the front of my brain in a battle against the sludge. This is permanent. These scars and amputations of my soul are permanent, and to pretend they are not does nothing but make me look like the emperor with his "fake" adornments. Cloaking myself in the denial that there are parts of me that have been severed and stolen only leaves my spirit vulnerable in a way that is not productive.
That is a hard thing to accept. I have fought that admittance since the first experience I had with being forced to do something to which I did not consent or being treated as an object. I waged my war against this realization even more furiously each time a new event would occur. I have spent more than 10 years of my life training my brain and soul to believe that, if I fought hard enough, I could gain back the things that were irretrievably broken or that I could make the scars from the darts and knife marks of acts of hateful people just disappear. That's just not how it works, so it is no wonder that I have spent so much time confused.
They are permanent. I have to accept that, and on this day, I choose to. There are now parts of me that are gone forever, and there are now scars that I will carry on my spiritual skin for the rest of my days. So what will I do about that?
The first thing I'm going to do is stop looking around for the things that are gone. I cannot regenerate or resurrect the things that have died or been cut away. Then I will be even more vigilant about strengthening the parts of me that are left. I have found myself to be able to compensate in ways that make life more beautiful than it would have been if I had never been altered. I have come to be aware of what strength in those parts actually feels like. I know now how to train those parts of myself, so I will not let myself forget that attention needs to be given to that. I will also celebrate victories. I have admonished others to celebrate victories amidst their struggles. I will allow myself to do the same. I will also give love, and I will accept love.
My journey has been really circuitous and really bumpy, but I have learned some things along this path of mine. I have learned that doing the things I listed above will result in the ugly voice of the sludge being quieted. So, sludge, go back from whence you came. You're not welcome here. I hope you've enjoyed your stay, but it's time you found the door.
Within a couple hours of watching the video and sharing it on my wall with my caption, I began to feel the darkness of my trauma come back. I felt the sludgy filth start to stain my insides again. I recognized what I felt and tried to put it in the lock box I have crafted for this type of trauma, and then I forced my mind to concentrate on other things. The sludge stayed though. It was content to stay in the background of my thoughts as it laid in wait for the first moment that my mind was not distracted by other things.
It crept forward a couple steps today, but I didn't recognize it. It disguised itself as the stress I'm feeling over our impending move. The disguise was only partly effective though. As I sat today telling a friend about some really wonderful things that are happening in my life, I found that a weird angry passion had entered uninvited into my contributions to the conversation. "Why am I so angry?...I sound so angry...what is this?" I thought. Even with this internal questioning of myself, the sludge's sloppy ruse was sufficient to distract my attention from it.
It crept forward another couple of steps while I was at the grocery store. I forgot to eat until late afternoon, so I was "hangry" by the time I got to the store with my husband and another friend. I wanted a cupcake. I had even picked out the cupcake that I wanted (because that specific cupcake was going to taste noticeably better than the other ones on the ceramic tray). The girl working the bakery was taking her sweet (see what I did there? "sweet") time filling out an order form with a lady ordering a cake for the birthday party of the child standing next to her. I walked across the aisle to where my husband was standing at the deli sandwich line. I ordered my food and then made excuses to Dan for my short temper by explaining that I was just so hungry. He made a teasing comment to me. I snapped at him and said a bad word to him that he did not deserve to hear. I began to feel frustrated that I was so on edge and apologized to him nearly immediately, but the feeling of something being present that wasn't invited was starting to register. Still the sludge had not totally revealed itself until later in the evening.
My husband is a very, very tender person. He is so attentive to me. Sometimes to the point of being embarrassing to me to be treated as someone so valuable. This evening he made a tender gesture towards me, and the sludge came charging forward to the front of my being. I literally physically pushed Dan away. I didn't shove him. I moved his hand away. He was offering me love and tenderness, and I rejected all of it and walked out of the room. He had done something completely sweet, but it triggered a memory. Something about it reminded me of a different time. The moment the sludge had been waiting for came. It swallowed up the tenderness my husband was offering to me and replaced it with the memories of times that I had been stolen from. I felt the infection of it poisoning our evening together, and I felt totally helpless and really frustrated. I asked myself and I asked Dan out loud when the day would come that these things wouldn't haunt me anymore. Neither of us were able to find an answer so we spent a couple hours in different rooms.
After our sabbatical from the presence of the other, he stepped into the doorway of our bedroom and, with the same careful tenderness that he always employs asked the same careful question that he has used every time this sludge has stolen a moment from us - and there have been so many. "Do you want to talk about what happened tonight?" I am ashamed to admit that my first impulse was to continue to "protect" myself from letting someone get close to my heart and to tell him "no", but I felt my head nod in a "yes". I asked him to turn on the light so he did and then laid down on his belly next to me on the bed. Then he just looked at me...and waited.
I began to talk through how I haven't been as vigilant about continuing my healing process over the last few weeks. If you pay close attention to my blog (so...my mom), you may have noticed that there have not been as many posts during that span. (again, this is probably only my mom) I am so thankful that people have found some of my words here to be helpful, but the primary purpose of this blog is, in fact, my own catharsis. When I don't actively pursue that healing, not only does the healing not happen, but the muscles of what is left of my spirit begin to atrophy a bit.
As I was talking, the light of sense shone through to my brain. I was ready to admit something that had been fighting its own way to the front of my brain in a battle against the sludge. This is permanent. These scars and amputations of my soul are permanent, and to pretend they are not does nothing but make me look like the emperor with his "fake" adornments. Cloaking myself in the denial that there are parts of me that have been severed and stolen only leaves my spirit vulnerable in a way that is not productive.
That is a hard thing to accept. I have fought that admittance since the first experience I had with being forced to do something to which I did not consent or being treated as an object. I waged my war against this realization even more furiously each time a new event would occur. I have spent more than 10 years of my life training my brain and soul to believe that, if I fought hard enough, I could gain back the things that were irretrievably broken or that I could make the scars from the darts and knife marks of acts of hateful people just disappear. That's just not how it works, so it is no wonder that I have spent so much time confused.
They are permanent. I have to accept that, and on this day, I choose to. There are now parts of me that are gone forever, and there are now scars that I will carry on my spiritual skin for the rest of my days. So what will I do about that?
The first thing I'm going to do is stop looking around for the things that are gone. I cannot regenerate or resurrect the things that have died or been cut away. Then I will be even more vigilant about strengthening the parts of me that are left. I have found myself to be able to compensate in ways that make life more beautiful than it would have been if I had never been altered. I have come to be aware of what strength in those parts actually feels like. I know now how to train those parts of myself, so I will not let myself forget that attention needs to be given to that. I will also celebrate victories. I have admonished others to celebrate victories amidst their struggles. I will allow myself to do the same. I will also give love, and I will accept love.
My journey has been really circuitous and really bumpy, but I have learned some things along this path of mine. I have learned that doing the things I listed above will result in the ugly voice of the sludge being quieted. So, sludge, go back from whence you came. You're not welcome here. I hope you've enjoyed your stay, but it's time you found the door.
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
A brush with luck
When I was a junior in high school, a Mary Kay lady came to our health class. She brought with her wares a set of makeup brushes. "One of you is going to win this brush set!" She instructed us to write our names on scraps of paper and drop them in a basket.
I really wanted those brushes....like real bad. I didn't wear makeup, but my mom did, and it was almost Mother's Day. Our instructor spent the class period telling us how to put on various products waiting until the end of class to draw the name of the winner. I spent the whole class period casting sideways glances at the brushes standing statuesque in their lucite jar. I was totally distracted and kept thinking about how badly I wanted them for my mom but how unlikely it was that I was actually going to be taking them home to her.
And then it happened...she did indeed draw my name.
I will never forget how lucky I felt. So embarrassed. It seemed to me that any other person in my class should have been given the privilege of being acknowledged as the winner, but it WAS me! I carefully packed them into my backpack and felt all day like I was carrying around the Hope Diamond. I hid them until Mother's Day and then exulted in the joy I saw on my mom's face when she opened them. She was amazed by my gift. She loved them, and that just made me feel even more lucky.
She still has them - or at least the jar they came in. Those brushes - my brushes with luck - had a lasting impact on my mom's life. In a small way, they have changed things for my mom for the last 16 years.
Lucky. That makes me feel so lucky.
Let me tell you something else that makes me feel lucky.
Tonight a friend of mine posted on my Facebook wall that Rachel Platten's "Fight Song" reminded her of me. I had never heard it before, so I gave it a listen...and then bawled my eyes out as I sat listening to it on repeat. What my friend was effectively telling me was that, to her, my name was synonymous with the sentiments of the lyrics. I am blown away by this.
A few years ago I found myself in a position that required me to fix my resolve and push ahead past some very huge challenges. There were people depending on me. I did not have the luxury of giving way to any self doubt, so I just pushed ahead. Then more challenges came and then more and then more and then more. It became exhausting. In an effort to gain some strength, I started telling people my story. I would share about a challenge I was facing and ask people to pray on my behalf. They would do that and offer me help any way they could, and I would watch myself scale the mountains that stood in the way of my spirit and then find myself standing on top of them looking over the splendor created from overcoming struggle. This would make me so happy and feel so grateful for the encouragement I received that I would share the success in a public way so everyone could feel happy about their contributions to my success. I was highly motivated to succeed by the knowledge of the people that depended on me, but I must tell you that the constant barrage of challenges left quite a bit to be desired in my faith and inner resolve at certain points. So I would keep repeating the cycle of sharing my challenges, waiting for encouragement and then watching my obstacles disappear into my past.
Then something new started to happen. When a fresh challenge came, instead of being totally thrown for a loop, I would remember "Oh wait. I can fight past this. I have been given the tools and the knowledge that this can all be used for good. Okay. I'm gonna find a way to accept this challenge and conquer it and then store the experience to be used for good. This cannot defeat me." This, apparently, has spoken to the souls of a few people. This, apparently, has given inspiration to a few people. This, apparently has started to provide me with a more far reaching ability to provide love and rescue to the hearts of people. I do not feel worthy of this. Sometimes it actually feels like I'm watching this happen to someone else.
I have more challenges that are coming in the future. I know what some of them are, and some of them are still a mystery to me, but I know that they are coming. I can also see something else coming, though. I can feel it, actually. My platform. For whatever reason, people are reading my words (someone in Brazil reads this blog...I don't even KNOW anyone in Brazil!...So..Hey, Brazil!), and they are listening, and then they are spreading the message that I spoke to them. People are asking for my story. They are literally seeking me out. That platform about which I spoke - I can feel it being hammered together under my figurative feet. I am watching more heads turn when the sound of the voice of my spirit utters the words I want to share. That...is a lucky thing. That...is how the world begins to change. To think that I am being ANY part of that blows my mind, but it's happening.
Have you ever thought about the fact that you inspire someone? That doesn't register very easily. I'm gonna be honest, it is really hard for me to associate myself with inspiration, but if I don't acknowledge that this is happening, I waste this. I am NOT willing to do that. I am NOT going to waste this, so, at the risk of sounding like a total narcissist, I'm going to embrace it! Because you know what? Me and my army of lovers of my life HAVE survived all this crazy stuff. If that gives me the ability to change things for the good, then I would be a FOOL to be self deprecating and pretend that I did not actually survive these things.
So I'm going to do my best to inspire people. I'm going to keep telling my stories...and you can bet I'm going to keep fighting my challenges. I will remember that I will have more brushes with "luck". I will be the "small boat" of which Ms. Platten speaks knowing that my little ripples can cause some big ol' waves because it's not a set of makeup brushes anymore that hangs in the balance - it's lives and souls. I will get tired and discouraged, but I will remind myself...every...single...day...
I really wanted those brushes....like real bad. I didn't wear makeup, but my mom did, and it was almost Mother's Day. Our instructor spent the class period telling us how to put on various products waiting until the end of class to draw the name of the winner. I spent the whole class period casting sideways glances at the brushes standing statuesque in their lucite jar. I was totally distracted and kept thinking about how badly I wanted them for my mom but how unlikely it was that I was actually going to be taking them home to her.
And then it happened...she did indeed draw my name.
I will never forget how lucky I felt. So embarrassed. It seemed to me that any other person in my class should have been given the privilege of being acknowledged as the winner, but it WAS me! I carefully packed them into my backpack and felt all day like I was carrying around the Hope Diamond. I hid them until Mother's Day and then exulted in the joy I saw on my mom's face when she opened them. She was amazed by my gift. She loved them, and that just made me feel even more lucky.
She still has them - or at least the jar they came in. Those brushes - my brushes with luck - had a lasting impact on my mom's life. In a small way, they have changed things for my mom for the last 16 years.
Lucky. That makes me feel so lucky.
Let me tell you something else that makes me feel lucky.
Tonight a friend of mine posted on my Facebook wall that Rachel Platten's "Fight Song" reminded her of me. I had never heard it before, so I gave it a listen...and then bawled my eyes out as I sat listening to it on repeat. What my friend was effectively telling me was that, to her, my name was synonymous with the sentiments of the lyrics. I am blown away by this.
A few years ago I found myself in a position that required me to fix my resolve and push ahead past some very huge challenges. There were people depending on me. I did not have the luxury of giving way to any self doubt, so I just pushed ahead. Then more challenges came and then more and then more and then more. It became exhausting. In an effort to gain some strength, I started telling people my story. I would share about a challenge I was facing and ask people to pray on my behalf. They would do that and offer me help any way they could, and I would watch myself scale the mountains that stood in the way of my spirit and then find myself standing on top of them looking over the splendor created from overcoming struggle. This would make me so happy and feel so grateful for the encouragement I received that I would share the success in a public way so everyone could feel happy about their contributions to my success. I was highly motivated to succeed by the knowledge of the people that depended on me, but I must tell you that the constant barrage of challenges left quite a bit to be desired in my faith and inner resolve at certain points. So I would keep repeating the cycle of sharing my challenges, waiting for encouragement and then watching my obstacles disappear into my past.
Then something new started to happen. When a fresh challenge came, instead of being totally thrown for a loop, I would remember "Oh wait. I can fight past this. I have been given the tools and the knowledge that this can all be used for good. Okay. I'm gonna find a way to accept this challenge and conquer it and then store the experience to be used for good. This cannot defeat me." This, apparently, has spoken to the souls of a few people. This, apparently, has given inspiration to a few people. This, apparently has started to provide me with a more far reaching ability to provide love and rescue to the hearts of people. I do not feel worthy of this. Sometimes it actually feels like I'm watching this happen to someone else.
I have more challenges that are coming in the future. I know what some of them are, and some of them are still a mystery to me, but I know that they are coming. I can also see something else coming, though. I can feel it, actually. My platform. For whatever reason, people are reading my words (someone in Brazil reads this blog...I don't even KNOW anyone in Brazil!...So..Hey, Brazil!), and they are listening, and then they are spreading the message that I spoke to them. People are asking for my story. They are literally seeking me out. That platform about which I spoke - I can feel it being hammered together under my figurative feet. I am watching more heads turn when the sound of the voice of my spirit utters the words I want to share. That...is a lucky thing. That...is how the world begins to change. To think that I am being ANY part of that blows my mind, but it's happening.
Have you ever thought about the fact that you inspire someone? That doesn't register very easily. I'm gonna be honest, it is really hard for me to associate myself with inspiration, but if I don't acknowledge that this is happening, I waste this. I am NOT willing to do that. I am NOT going to waste this, so, at the risk of sounding like a total narcissist, I'm going to embrace it! Because you know what? Me and my army of lovers of my life HAVE survived all this crazy stuff. If that gives me the ability to change things for the good, then I would be a FOOL to be self deprecating and pretend that I did not actually survive these things.
So I'm going to do my best to inspire people. I'm going to keep telling my stories...and you can bet I'm going to keep fighting my challenges. I will remember that I will have more brushes with "luck". I will be the "small boat" of which Ms. Platten speaks knowing that my little ripples can cause some big ol' waves because it's not a set of makeup brushes anymore that hangs in the balance - it's lives and souls. I will get tired and discouraged, but I will remind myself...every...single...day...
"I've still got a lotta fight left in me"
And hey, after you read this, why don't you think about joining me? How about finding that "fight" in yourself and traveling with me? COME ON!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVxon65u3tA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVxon65u3tA
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
On leaving Norman
I didn't sleep last night. Not at all. I'm literally trembling from exhaustion, but my respite from my troubles has come with the rising of the sun....it's my back yard.
We will only live in this house for 3 more weeks. I have lived here since November, and my husband has lived here for 5 years. 5 years is a long time to live anywhere for me. I don't know that I've ever lived in any house for 5 years in my whole life, but this place has been his and then ours. To be honest, I hated it when I got here. I missed the 4 bedroom house with a giant yard and fire pit that I left. I missed all my girlie everything. I was annoyed with all the natural wood everything and the fishing pole picture frames and everything being so masculine. It just wasn't my house. It was someone else's house, and, for the first 4 months, I felt like I was squatting here.
But then something started to happen. Somewhere along the way, I got "my" dresser and "my" side of the couch and the mugs I like to use for my coffee. (My favorites are the one that says "Dan" that he got from his mom and the ones that say "Baby's Coffee" from a coffee shop in the Keys) Maybe it was when we had a few days of snow and the whole place looked like something out of a movie. Maybe it was on one of our walks to the grocery store or one of my favorite boutiques. Maybe it was after "his" friends started to become "my" friends too....not sure, but I'll tell you this. I'm going to miss this place.
I'm going to miss being able to walk absolutely anywhere. I even walked to our wedding. I'm going to miss the buildings on campus. They're so much older than the ones I lived around for the 3 years before I got here. I'm going to miss the restaurants. Dan has taken me places with foods I still can't pronounce. I'm going to miss the birds. Anybody who knows me well at all knows my recent but deep connection with birds and feathers. Norman has this chubby, little grey bird variety that always seems to find me when I'm having a bad day. I'm going to miss the seasons here. I know the summers are unbearably hot, but I have so enjoyed getting to see snow again. Makes me think of my childhood in the suburbs of Chicago. I'm going to miss the one street of downtown. It's little, but it's cute. There's enough there to spend a day wandering. I'm going to miss the gazebo where we got married. I'm going to miss the walking itself. We have had so many talks and learned so many things about each other during those walks. Oh the things we've talked about. I didn't realize I could love Dan more than I already did, but I do....and a lot of that happened on those walks.
I'm going to miss the people here. I've spent my life leaving people, and that has left me with a lot of friends in a lot of different places. The leaving is always hard though. Dan spent years telling me about all his wonderful friends. Dan is nearly an eternal optimist who will see good in the ugliest of people, so I thought he was exaggerating about what his friends were really like. He wasn't. These people are gold. I've grown to truly love them. A long time ago, I had a sizable group of close friends. We spent time at each other's houses just about every weekend and always time during the week too, and then I went several years without having very many close friends at all. That was a sad, lonely time for me. I will never forget being at a barbeque about a month and half ago, and the thought struck me "Oh my gosh.....this is what it's like to have friends"....not hypothetical...not an abstract thought....me. This is what it's like for ME to have friends. I'll also never forget realizing that people here were talking with me because they just might actually enjoy my company. I got invited to things...without Dan. Just me. These people here gave something back to me that I thought was gone for me. I hope some day I'm able to express what exactly that has meant to me, so maybe this will help do the job.
And my back yard. We don't really have a back yard. We have sort of some space between the back of our duplex and the fence line of someone else's property, but when I look out there and see so much green, I just feel peace. The big trees speak to me, and those lovely birds prance around and stare at me while they cock their tiny heads to the side in silent conversation with me. I have watched the picture change from barren and cold and empty to covered with beautiful snow to burgeoning with new spring growth. It has become a view that is just for me. Somewhere along the way, it became mine.
I have not felt "at home" in a very, very, very long time. Dan and I have even talked about my frustration with this....but I'm feeling it now. This place, this town, this funny little apartment just off of campus has become home to me just in time for me to leave it.
So Norman, I love you, and I will love you forever. You made my life a more wonderful story. You gave me things and people that no other place could. For that, I am in your debt. I will carry your picture in my heart for the rest of my life, but I do have to go. There are 3 babies that have tugged on my broken heart every day that I have spent here. It's time to write the next chapter. It's time to continue this adventure of my life.....but we'll always have each other, Norman, won't we?
We will only live in this house for 3 more weeks. I have lived here since November, and my husband has lived here for 5 years. 5 years is a long time to live anywhere for me. I don't know that I've ever lived in any house for 5 years in my whole life, but this place has been his and then ours. To be honest, I hated it when I got here. I missed the 4 bedroom house with a giant yard and fire pit that I left. I missed all my girlie everything. I was annoyed with all the natural wood everything and the fishing pole picture frames and everything being so masculine. It just wasn't my house. It was someone else's house, and, for the first 4 months, I felt like I was squatting here.
But then something started to happen. Somewhere along the way, I got "my" dresser and "my" side of the couch and the mugs I like to use for my coffee. (My favorites are the one that says "Dan" that he got from his mom and the ones that say "Baby's Coffee" from a coffee shop in the Keys) Maybe it was when we had a few days of snow and the whole place looked like something out of a movie. Maybe it was on one of our walks to the grocery store or one of my favorite boutiques. Maybe it was after "his" friends started to become "my" friends too....not sure, but I'll tell you this. I'm going to miss this place.
I'm going to miss being able to walk absolutely anywhere. I even walked to our wedding. I'm going to miss the buildings on campus. They're so much older than the ones I lived around for the 3 years before I got here. I'm going to miss the restaurants. Dan has taken me places with foods I still can't pronounce. I'm going to miss the birds. Anybody who knows me well at all knows my recent but deep connection with birds and feathers. Norman has this chubby, little grey bird variety that always seems to find me when I'm having a bad day. I'm going to miss the seasons here. I know the summers are unbearably hot, but I have so enjoyed getting to see snow again. Makes me think of my childhood in the suburbs of Chicago. I'm going to miss the one street of downtown. It's little, but it's cute. There's enough there to spend a day wandering. I'm going to miss the gazebo where we got married. I'm going to miss the walking itself. We have had so many talks and learned so many things about each other during those walks. Oh the things we've talked about. I didn't realize I could love Dan more than I already did, but I do....and a lot of that happened on those walks.
I'm going to miss the people here. I've spent my life leaving people, and that has left me with a lot of friends in a lot of different places. The leaving is always hard though. Dan spent years telling me about all his wonderful friends. Dan is nearly an eternal optimist who will see good in the ugliest of people, so I thought he was exaggerating about what his friends were really like. He wasn't. These people are gold. I've grown to truly love them. A long time ago, I had a sizable group of close friends. We spent time at each other's houses just about every weekend and always time during the week too, and then I went several years without having very many close friends at all. That was a sad, lonely time for me. I will never forget being at a barbeque about a month and half ago, and the thought struck me "Oh my gosh.....this is what it's like to have friends"....not hypothetical...not an abstract thought....me. This is what it's like for ME to have friends. I'll also never forget realizing that people here were talking with me because they just might actually enjoy my company. I got invited to things...without Dan. Just me. These people here gave something back to me that I thought was gone for me. I hope some day I'm able to express what exactly that has meant to me, so maybe this will help do the job.
And my back yard. We don't really have a back yard. We have sort of some space between the back of our duplex and the fence line of someone else's property, but when I look out there and see so much green, I just feel peace. The big trees speak to me, and those lovely birds prance around and stare at me while they cock their tiny heads to the side in silent conversation with me. I have watched the picture change from barren and cold and empty to covered with beautiful snow to burgeoning with new spring growth. It has become a view that is just for me. Somewhere along the way, it became mine.
I have not felt "at home" in a very, very, very long time. Dan and I have even talked about my frustration with this....but I'm feeling it now. This place, this town, this funny little apartment just off of campus has become home to me just in time for me to leave it.
So Norman, I love you, and I will love you forever. You made my life a more wonderful story. You gave me things and people that no other place could. For that, I am in your debt. I will carry your picture in my heart for the rest of my life, but I do have to go. There are 3 babies that have tugged on my broken heart every day that I have spent here. It's time to write the next chapter. It's time to continue this adventure of my life.....but we'll always have each other, Norman, won't we?
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
On keeping Sally - Part 2
Sally was given her release from the hospital, so we headed home. It was so wonderful. She started eating consistently, and our whole family got to be together. I remember one day while Natalie was at school, Noah went outside and took me on an adventure through our yard. I carried Sally in a little sling, and we investigated all the things in our yard. He even showed me how strong he was by picking up this giant branch!
This vigilance ended up being to Sally's advantage because there was more coming down the pike for her.......stay number 2 was not going to be her last.
I remember feeling such a sense of rest that life was getting back to normal. My new baby was healthy again, and I was getting to enjoy sweet little moments with my family.
The thing I did not enjoy was that I was now receiving very condescending advice. I surmise that, because my baby experienced a nutritional anamoly, people were assuming that it was actually my own ineptitude or lack of attention that caused the whole thing. I will never forget venturing out to church for the first time carrying Sally in the little sling mentioned above. I had used it with all three of my babies, and, though this model had been recalled because some babies had smothered, I felt confident in my attention to making sure the babies were always safely elevated within the sling and I was always very careful to make sure their airways were totally unobstructed. My mothering decisions and judgment were not sufficient for one of the ladies in the church, however. She mentioned to me that the sling had been proven to be unsafe. "Yes I read about that, but I....." she interrupted me before I could even finish a sentence. She actually continued to interrupt me and offer me LOADS of unsolicited advice on things so simple as how to hold a baby.....yes. I have been caring for babies since I was literally 9 years old, and I had to stand there and listen to this woman give me instructions on how to hold one. I was absolutely disgusted at the liberties she took after she assumed that an unforeseen medical problem was my fault.
What I had needed in that moment was support and reassurance and gratitude to God in my presence that Sally had survived something that, had I waited probably just a couple more days, would have claimed her life. Instead I got criticism. What was even more irritating is that no one in my "group" stood up to my defense. They all just stood there letting this woman drown me in her gratuitous, condescending and even archaic advice.
We went home and spent the next few days trying to settle in to regular life. Natalie went to school. Noah stayed with me and played and napped and learned things. Sally ate and slept, and I had started to do some hair for family and friends.
On about our 4th day home, a relative my age came over for some highlights. She is well known for the liberties SHE takes in sharing her opinions on other people's lives with little regard for the FEELINGS of others or what is or is not appropriate to say. As I was foiling her hair, she looked at Sally laying in her bouncy seat. "LOOK at her neck, SARAH!" she shouted at me. "Yeah. She's still putting back on the weight that she lost. She's still skinny" I replied. "NO Sarah!" she went on "That's what MY daughter looked like when she had RSV! My husband is a nurse. Look at when she breathes!" She pointed at my baby. "There is just no way......" I thought. "She just left the hospital. Please don't speak such an awful illness over the baby of mine that just got out of danger...." I spoke to this woman - all in my head. I finished her hair and then got ready for a date with Sally's dad that evening. I kept watching Sally though. Something was definitely a little off, but, because of her low weight at that point, I really could not tell if she was having trouble breathing or if more of her breathing activity showed because of her low weight.
We took the kids to their grandparents' house for our date, and I told them to just keep an eye on her. If anything looked remotely off, let us know when we got back, but if she seemed to be going into ANY kind of distress to phone us immediately - not to wait - just call us and we would take her straight to the hospital.
The evening wore on, and we received no phone call interruptions. My mind began to worry though. I resolved in myself that I wasn't going to let my indignation at people speaking to me condescendingly get in the way of this little baby being healthy. When we returned to their house, they gave us the news. "She did okay...the other kids are asleep....she's alright, but she does look like she's struggling." "Okay" I said and looked at Sally's dad "We are going to the ER right now. I'm not gonna mess around with this. We're going". I turned to his parents and asked "Can the kids stay with you?" They answered affirmatively. Then I gave them strict instructions. For Sally's first stay, we appealed to everyone on Facebook and in churches across the country. Sally's grandfather even stood behind his own pulpit asking for prayer for her. This time, however, I felt the need for privacy. I told them they were not allowed to announce this at church or anywhere publicly. They could ask a few people to pray but to even instruct those people to keep their mouths shut. I wanted us to be able to focus on Sally's care and recovery without the unwanted advice from people like the woman mentioned above. They agreed and we loaded Sally up and went to the ER 30 minutes away.
When we got there, I seem to remember carrying Sally in my arms - no carseat. I wanted to hold her. I wanted to walk in and them sense my urgency and just take her straight out of my arms to be evaluated. I walked up to the window "I think my baby has RSV, and she left the hospital in Pensacola for 'failure to thrive' four days ago." The nurse handed me a clipboard.....clearly I wasn't getting through. I was beginning to feel a little frantic worrying that Sally would go into some kind of respitory arrest or worse, but all we could do was wait.
Eventually they called us back, and after quick examination the medical personnel confirmed that she presented as a case of RSV. This confirmation was quickly followed by a chest x-ray. Sally had to be held up in a strange sort of bicycle seat/head vice apparatus. They snapped the needed images, and I asked to see what they had found.
I have always been a researcher. I learned very early in my life that having the most information as possible when something crosses your path is the easiest way to navigate through it, so during Sally's hospital stay the week before, I kept to the same idea. Every time someone would utter a medical term, I would look it up and read as many articles as I could. Apparently I informed myself so well that multiple physicians either asked me "Are you a nurse" or even "Where are you a nurse". When I would inform them that I was actually an out of work hair dresser, their eyebrows would raise. But when your baby is sick, you research. When she got RSV, I was ready and waiting to resume my research, so I asked to see the images from the x-ray. Sally's lungs looked like a sky full of an angry storm......Sally was, once again....in danger.
The hospital in Miramar Beach does not have inpatient accomodations beyond the birthing hospital where I'd had her just a month prior. It is a satellite of the hospital in Pensacola, so we got the news we'd been expecting. We were headed back to Pensacola for her to be treated. There was one ambulance that ran the route from Miramar Beach to Pensacola. That ambulance was going the wrong direction for Sally's first illness - hence her doctor instructing me to drive myself. This time, though, that ambulance just happened to be in Miramar Beach, and the gurney inside had Sally's name on it. She was loaded into the back, and I took the passenger's seat in the cab while her dad drove behind us.
They did not turn on the sirens for our hour and a half ride. This was strange to me, but I had to trust their judgement. The EMT's in the back were watching over her very carefully, so I just sat in the seat and watched the street lights slip past my line of sight one by one. They began to glow even brighter as the tears welled up in my eyes like shining sentinals saluting us on our journey each one granting us passage past its own post until we reached our destination.
Sally's arrival for stay number 2 is a little blurry to me. I remember very little except that I felt funny wearing heels and "date clothes" in the PICU with my baby so sick. Seemed sort of irreverent to me.
We weren't there very long before the attending nurse came in to check on us.....guess who it was. The smiley nurse. Sally had just so happened to be admitted on another night when this nurse was on duty. I immediately breathed a sigh of relief when I saw her. Something in me knew that, if she was the one watching over Sally, Sally would be just fine.
Because Sally had a virus that could be deadly for the other babies in the unit, upon entering we had to scrub up, put on a paper gown from a drawer that was outside her room door and then disrobe from the paper jacket and scrub up upon every exit. We were also strongly discouraged from touching Sally with ungloved hands. This was especially difficult for me and was not a rule that I followed all the time. I would always wear the robe and scrub on my entry and exit, but I found myself sneaking off those rubber gloves so I could touch my baby's little cheek or hold her hand while I spoke to her. I just wanted her to feel me touching her. She was once again hooked up to so many wires and even back on a feeding tube for a time. I couldn't help but realize that this was going to set her back from all the work that they'd done to help her in the previous week. I couldn't help but worry that my already weak baby was going to succumb to the ravages of this virus. So I just stared at her, and I sneaked little touches, and I talked to her.
It took another 4 days for her to show signs of recovery and reestablish consistency with her feedings, but with the tender care of our special nurse and rounds of antibiotics, breathing treatments, and everything else, we were given the go ahead to take her home again.
This time I didn't feel quite so relieved to take her home. I stayed worried. My tiny baby was further weakened, and despite the reassurances from the hospital staff, I was going to be watching her like a hawk. I was going to make sure nothing else went wrong. I wanted to make sure we got to keep this little lady.
Monday, March 23, 2015
On keeping Sally
Today, my friends, I'm going to tell you a little story - about Sally.
I was overjoyed when I found out I was pregnant with my third child. I was amazed at the number of people that were confused that I would want to get pregnant after already having had a girl and a boy. "So you already have a girl AND a boy?" they would ask. When I would answer "Yes", they would then ask "Then why would you want another baby?". I would just always say "My kids are nice people. I want to add to the group."
My pregnancy with her was difficult in absolutely every respect. I spent most of the second trimester and all of the third trimester having really painful Braxton-Hicks contractions, so when the slot came open for an induction at the hospital, I begged for my OB/GYN to ink down my name.
My labor and delivery with her was definitely the most tumultuous as well, but after about 10 hours of labor versus the 18 I'd had with the other two babies, Sally made her entrance. Out came Sally weighing 7 pounds 8 ounces and 20 inches long with cheeks for days. She was delicious in every way. We were excited to take our little bundle home from the hospital.
I had always nursed my babies. I knew that, as long as I was able, despite the extreme pain for me right at the beginning, it was the best option for both momma and baby. During my nursing days with the older two kids, I had done a lot of research on how to nurse correctly to make sure baby was getting enough and how to avoid the discomfort of incorrect latches and such the like. I had even helped other people navigate the world of nursing, so I felt totally comfortable nursing baby number 3. She seemed to do so well, but her pattern for feedings was different. She did what her pediatrician described for me as "cluster feeding" as in, she would nurse smaller amounts but for longer stretches of time followed by longer periods of rest. This was new to me, but she was still wetting and soiling diapers at the suggested rate, so I just let baby do her thing.
I started to notice something though. Sally started falling asleep just a handful of minutes after she began to nurse. It was very difficult to keep her roused. She didn't seem to be eating much, and I didn't feel her drawing out very much milk, so I tried to give her a bottle. I thought maybe just the close physical contact was so soothing to her that she was just snuggling and going to sleep. She wouldn't take a bottle, though. I attributed this to a sort of bottle nipple aversion and just figured she preferred nursing.....until one Monday. She was 20 days old.
I always had small babies, and, for whatever reason, my babies always LOOKED even smaller than they actually were. I was often asked all 3 times if my little bundles were preemies. None of them were. They were all born at 40, 38 and 39 weeks respectively. So when my baby looked "a little small" to me after a couple weeks post delivery, I really wasn't alarmed until day 20. Something had happened between the night of day 19 when I put on her pajamas and the morning of day 20 when I went to change her outfit. I saw bones. All of them.
"What?!....no.....I don't think this is right. I don't feel like she should look like this. This is TOO skinny. I don't feel like I should be seeing ribs through her chest......something is wrong."
So, knowing that some of my Facebook friends are medical personnel, I appealed to social media. I have a friend from high school who I referenced in a different post. She commented on my status encouraging me to just have Sally weighed - that it would not draw any ire from the nursing team at her pediatrician's office. I had expressed on my inquiry to everyone that she had her one month checkup on the upcoming Friday, but this friend told me in a private message "If you're worried, don't wait until Friday. You can always drop in to your Ped's office without an appt for a weight check."
A healthy 3 week old baby will consume about 2-3 ounces per feeding. Sally was only taking in about 10 ml. That's an amount smaller than a bottle of nail polish. That's all she would take and then she would fall asleep.
So I packed up my baby and headed to the pediatrician's office. When the nurse undressed her and put her on the scale, I gasped. She looked even worse under the lights....and then came her current weight flashing on the scale's little display - 5 pounds 8 ounces. Sally had lost a third of her body weight. I began to tear up. I felt like a failure. I racked my brain trying to think of what I had done differently with nursing her than I had done with the other two children that had nursed very successfully...nothing. My poor baby!
She sort of solemnly wrapped Sally up in her blanket and handed her back to me. We headed to an exam room where I waited for the doctor. When he came into the room, we went through rounds of questions that yielded no answer. Then this sweet old man held out his arms for my tiny, sick baby and laid her in his lap. He silently unwrapped her and very promptly but gingerly wrapped her back up again. He looked up at me and broke his silence with "I want you to drive to Pensacola right now. You can go home and very quickly pack a bag, but then head straight to the ER there. I will call ahead so they know you're coming. I want you to drive because you will be able to get there faster than an ambulance."
"FASTER THAN AN AMBULANCE?! I need to be faster than an ambulance?!" I thought. My eyes were wide open with fear. My baby was officially in danger. I fought back tears while I waited for the last bit of instruction and then loaded her into the car to make the 30 minute drive home to collect a small bag and get in the car with Sally's dad for the trip. I made several phone calls to the important people in my life to beg them to begin to pray.
When I got to the house, Sally's Grammy opened the door. She was taking care of the older children, and everyone was in position for getting Sally to the hospital as quickly as possible. She pulled back a corner of the blanket around my baby and then started to cry. Then I fell to pieces for only a matter of seconds before the importance of my assignment overtook me. I had to leave with Sally. I had to be faster than an ambulance. It was time to go.
I don't remember the trip there, but I remember sitting in the busy waiting room of Sacred Heart Medical Center in Pensacola. I found myself getting annoyed with all the coughers and non-hand washers that were being seen before my baby. I went to the desk multiple times after our check in just to make sure that I hadn't missed our number. Finally our turn came.
We went back to the exam room where the doctors asked me similar rounds of questions to the ones Sally's pediatrician had used. Their prospects for what was hurting my baby were grim to say the least.
"She's very weak and severely dehydrated. We need to get a line in her to get some fluids in her. Then we're going to run some tests."
The nurses came in and tried with all their might to get a needle to successfully penetrate a vein. Blow. Try number one exploded the vein in her hand. They tried the other hand. That vein blew. They proceeded to try both feet as well and then 3 different spots on the top of her head. She was too weak to cry for the first few, but by the end, my baby was letting out these little squeaks begging us to stop. My heart was broken.
When they came in to cathedarize her, they required me to move away from her to a stool against the wall. Her tiny body writhed around in pain while she squeaked out the biggest cry she could muster. My baby was in excruciating pain, and I HAD to let those people hurt her. There was nothing I could do to ease her pain. I sat on the stool not blinking. My hand reached up to Sally's dad's. He was standing next to where I sat. We both just stared silently at the baby on the table. I was later informed that the nurses were alarmed because, when they cath'ed her, absolutely no liquid came out.
So many people came in and out of that room asking the same questions as the person before, and they were all perplexed.
"We want to rule out meningitis. In order to test for that, though, we have to do a spinal tap. Because she is so small and so young, she will have to be awake for the procedure. You will have to leave the room for this because it has to be a surgically sterile environment."
Then the doctor explained to me what a spinal tap actually is further cementing the horror in me when I came to grips with the fact that Sally would be awake for this.
We were directed to some chairs far down the hall from the room where they were performing the procedure. After a couple of minutes, I heard an absolutely blood curdling scream. I looked at her dad "OH MY GOSH! DO YOU HEAR HER?" I asked with emphasis - though I could not utter more than a whisper through my angry, horrified tears. "That's not Sally. That's a bigger baby. That's a different baby" he told me trying to reassure me. But there's this thing with a mother and her baby's cry. You always know which one is yours. You can pick your baby's cry out of a crowd of screaming infants. THAT cry.....was from my baby. THAT cry meant they were shoving a 22 gauge needle into her tiny and very awake little back. I just sat there and cried.
Very soon after that, we were ushered back into her little room where I grabbed up my baby and cradled her while I worried and prayed.
It took a couple of hours to wait for a room in the PICU to open up. The hospital was up to the gills with sick little people and sick big people alike. During our wait, they informed us that the spinal fluid was crystal clear. We were not facing deathly meningitis, so that news was good, but the doctors still seemed so confused. This was very unsettling to me. When they would come into the room, the expression on their faces was always very urgent concern. They could not figure her out.
Our turn came to go to a room upstairs....finally. They got Sally hooked up to more machines and inserted a feeding tube. Then into the room came a pretty red-headed nurse with a giant smile on her face. I couldn't help but wonder if she realized how sick my baby was, and if she had, if she would be smiling so big. She quickly went to work standing over my baby's bassinet and untangling the spaghetti plate of wires. She did this over and over again and kept the smile on her face. I decided to be thankful for her smile because she had been the only one to offer one during the entire day's events.
As the evening wore on, Sally's dad stepped out of the room, so I was there alone. The head pediatric physician entered her room and offered me a quick greeting. He then stood over Sally's bed and just stared at her. I had been used to the medical team saying at least something to me about their opinion, and I wanted to start a repoir with this man as well, so I said "She looks pretty bad, huh?" I had totally expected that he would give me a very canned, diplomatic response that they were going to help her every way they knew how - that they were working hard to figure out what was going wrong - that she was in good hands....SOMEthing.....no. He just kept his gaze fixed on her little body, sighed while he shook his head and said "...yeah.." and then turned and left the room.
My baby was dying right in front of my face, and not even this man with all of his years of experience and all the state of the art equipment in that hospital could figure out how to stop it.
This is the first time this image has appeared anywhere even remotely publicly. I have looked at it many times and have been unable to have any reaction except to burst into tears. Even now, I feel ill.
This picture was actually taken at the end of our second day at the hospital. By this point, she had been receiving nutrition via a feeding tube for an entire day, so she had begun to fill out a tiny, tiny bit.
So this is what that doctor looked at so hopelessly.
We spent the next few days signing endless numbers of papers giving permission to the hospital to run absolutely every kind of test they had. Every time they ran a test, the results would come back totally normal. They checked her blood. They checked her spinal fluid. They checked her heart. They ran tests to see if she was a very mild case of Down Syndrome....everything. There was one last test that I just can't remember. Every single doctor in that place was scratching their head trying to figure out what was wrong, and their last resort was a test that would require that she be be given a general anesthetic. We were given very clear warning that the anesthesia alone could compromise her health so the running of the test was our decision, but they wanted to try if we were willing. "No." I said. "No. I don't want to do that one. All of these tests are coming back normal. I just don't feel like this one is going to give the answer. I'm sorry I just don't want to do it. I just have this feeling that you're not going to find anything." So that same physician mentioned above looked at me and smiled a small smile. "You know, I've been doing this a long, long time" he said. I braced myself for a chiding for balking at his medical knowledge, but then he continued "...and I have been proven wrong several times by a mommy's intuition. That intuition is strong. You should trust it."
Part of me was thankful that he felt I'd made the right decision but this mental celebration was quickly followed by a fear that I might just be wrong.
As luck would have it, after sleeping in a chair on our first night in the hospital, my back decided to seize up, and my sinuses revolted, so that just added to the difficulty of the situation. There was that smiley nurse though. Every day she would come in and untangle Sally's chords, and she would talk with us about our other kids and our lives away from the room we occupied just then. She would also update us on everything she could. She would break things down and explain what the next step would be. On day 4 of our stay, she informed us that the speech pathologist would be paying us a visit. My brow furrowed because......Sally did not use speech. She was 3 weeks old. She did not talk. This made me skeptical, but the SP came nevertheless.
I will never forget the wavy haired brunette coming into Sally's room. She scooped my baby right up and scooted herself back into the rocking chair in the room. The smiley nurse stood at staunch attention over her shoulder watching every move the Speech Pathologist made. The SP touched a bottle nipple to Sally's lips and then slid it into her mouth. Sally's chin bobbed for just a second and then stopped. "OH!" the Speech Pathologist exclaimed. Then she kind of smiled smugly as if to say "These people are going to be so relieved, and I am SO excited to tell them this". She did more wiggling and then SUCK! Sally drew in some of the formula. Then she did it again, and then she stopped. The nurse sort of hunched forward as if to cradle Sally with the top half of her body while the baby lay in her lap. "Okay" she explained "This is called 'failure to thrive'. We do not have a way to know why this happens. There is no way to prevent it. It just happens sometimes. What has happened here is that she gets sort of lost when it comes to eating. Babies use a suck, swallow, breathe reflex when they eat. This pattern allows them to sort of eat and breath at the same time to maximize their energy. Sometimes, though, babies just get.....off track. They get mixed up on which thing to do next, and it just wears them out so they end up using more energy than they should. They tire out before they're full so they don't eat enough.....This is what has happened with your baby. So we just have to reteach her how to eat." She did not seem remotely alarmed. She did not seem like this was at all insurmountable. It was just a thing. It was a totally fixable problem.
Sally was going to recover. There were no congenital, neurological or cardiovascular anomalies in her body. Just this weird, slightly rare but not unheard of one of "failure to thrive". The SP continued to talk giving instructions to our sweet red headed nurse about the process for reteaching a baby to eat. The steps were very simple. She could and most likely would make a total recovery from this, and I should feel no guilt, because this was not caused by negligence or ineptitude on my part. It was just one of those crazy things.
Over the next two days, the smiley nurse came into Sally's room more times than I can count. She would go through her same routine of untangling all the leads while she cooed at my baby. Then she would spend hours and hours wiggling a bottle in Sally's mouth per the instructions given by the speech pathologist. With every feeding, Sally would suck down a little bit more formula until the feeding tube wasn't needed any longer. Soon Sally was off of every monitor except the one charting her heart rate. That nurse was tireless. That nurse showed love to my baby and had a presence that could nearly calm a soul in the heart of a hurricane.
By day 6, Sally had begun taking a couple ounces per feeding. She was beginning to show weight gain, and all her vitals were very steady. I was given a strict regimen for how much she should eat and for how long and how often. It was a fragile situation still, but she had been given the help she needed to get back on track - to find her way so her little body could grow.
During the middle of the morning, we were informed that Sally was being given papers for release. I took those and my instructions and cases and cases of formula the hospital gave to us, and we headed to the car. We stopped at Red Robin across the street so I could eat real food.
And then our next stop.....home to the biggers. I had gotten to see my older children just a couple of times in the last week, and I couldn't wait another minute to kiss their faces and hug their little bodies. I was bringing their baby sister back home to them. Sally was going to be just fine.......
.....until she wasn't.
More tomorrow.
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
On being told no
There are many things in life that humans almost universally try to avoid. One of those things is being told "no". We have all witnessed very small children absolutely fall to pieces when those two letters are uttered together and in that sequence.
As we get older, the being told no can get harder. Your understanding of the world deepens and you develop the enablement to make decisions for your own life, it gets harder to hear the word "no". It's not the procurement of toys or cookies that hangs in the balance of the type of answer we receive. It's bigger things. It's our dreams. It's our goals. It's the payoff for a bunch of work that we did. It may even be our welfare or the welfare of others. Hearing "no" can feel like the ultimate destruction of things that are genuinely important - not just important "to us" but actually important. But sometimes in life, you still get told that word at times when you NEED to be told yes.
So then what do you do? What do you do with the pieces that are left after you have been told no?
There have been so many things for which I have prayed to people and to God during the coarse of my life for which I have received a negative answer when I wanted and felt like I needed a positive one. There have been situations to which being given a negative answer invoked absolute horror in me. I felt completely stripped down and then beaten by the realization that my ultimate fear had become reality. My head spun, and my heart broke. Over and over this has happened. I spent many moments being very frustrated and resentful....
But then light would shine through.
As more and more of this began to happen, I started to notice patterns. I learned some things.
The first thing I learned is that you canNOT change other people. You are never responsible for another person's behavior (unless that person is your small child and even then there's only so much you can do). If you assign yourself the responsibility of absorbing the consequences of someone else's behavior, you're going to end up very limited and very frustrated. You also do not have the ability to change someone else's heart or mind. You can do your best to present facts to them so that they are informed, but the final decision for what they are going to do is totally their's. There are even certain folks that, the harder you try, the farther from your objective they're going to go. They're actually going to do the opposite of what you ask or say just out of spite, so it's best to abandon that effort altogether.
I also learned that there are circumstances that are out of your control....and you have to be okay with that. In lieu of my point above, once another brain outside of your head makes a decision, there will be events that follows, boundaries that exist that didn't before, consequences and limitations....that you cannot change. They're set in stone unless or until someone somewhere changes their mind. When this occurs, you have to be okay with it. Worrying is futile. It will do nothing but make YOU sick. The other person or people or the abstract idea of the situation that exists is not going to be affected by the amount of worry you devote to circumstances that you do not like.
Also happiness. You've got to find it. You're entitled to it. You can go to any war torn country or empoverished society, and you will always find this: there will always be at least one child with a smile on their tiny face, and they will have found something to play with. They do not go for lengths of time without inventing ways to enjoy themselves. Adults only do that. We are the ones that, despite our inability to force everything to go our way, spend energy trying to do just that. Go find a toy. Go find a smile. If you do not find any happiness, then you are CHOOSING sadness. Maybe ask yourself why because you can't tell me that a little pumpkin with flys crawling on his eyes and dirt covering his blistered feet should wipe the smile off his face. He found happiness because he looked for it. He put in the effort because that robbery for his entitlement to it has not yet occurred. Go back to that. Look as aggressively for it as that little guy.
Remember the "long game". These words were used with me the other day by a grown child of divorce in regards to how I relate to my children. He was encouraging me on how to love them and what strategies to use. It was very good advice on keeping things in perspective. It makes me think of when I had my babies. I will never forget the first push. It felt SOOOO difficult! I would always be so worn out from at least 12 hours of painful contractions that the notion that I was going to have to muster strength to push this baby out seemed ludicrous....but every time I would just think "But I HAVE to! I'M the only person on planet earth that can push THIS baby out of THIS body.....cause it's MY BODY!" so I would take a breath and bear down and push and push as many times as it took to give them their first breath of air. Long game - I had to get those babies out. Long game - life can be very, unbearably painful, but you are the only person who can live your life. There are goals that only you can bring into the world. You have GOT to push past the pain so you can accomplish those things. No one else in the world has YOUR life - just you. Push past the crazy. Give birth to everything that your life is supposed to represent.
Another huge lesson I've learned in "hearing" "no" (I used all those quotes on purpose....wait for it) is because sometimes when we "hear" "no", someone or something else is actually "saying" "wait" or "not yet". Don't assign a hard "no" when that's not what has been offered to you. If there is something that is terribly important to you, do not be dissuaded by obstacles or struggles. Keep working towards your goal. If the desire is still burning in your belly to accomplish something or become something, do not stop until you've achieved it.
The last one is this: Don't.....get....bitter. Bitterness is the daughter of worry, so watch out for both of those. Unproductive worry leaves you frustrated, and staying frustrated with something you cannot change will make you bitter. Bitterness is a terrible thief. It does not a single thing but steal from you. Find a way to take your hands and your heart away from things you cannot control, and don't you let that weed take root. You prevent this by being honest with yourself. Arrogance has no place in struggles in life. If your attitude is wrong or your efforts to change things outside your control futile, admit that and move on.
These are hard things to implement, but they are necessary. Take them for what they are - the ramblings of a girl just barely in my 30's, but trust me. They are usable. They are true. They work.
As we get older, the being told no can get harder. Your understanding of the world deepens and you develop the enablement to make decisions for your own life, it gets harder to hear the word "no". It's not the procurement of toys or cookies that hangs in the balance of the type of answer we receive. It's bigger things. It's our dreams. It's our goals. It's the payoff for a bunch of work that we did. It may even be our welfare or the welfare of others. Hearing "no" can feel like the ultimate destruction of things that are genuinely important - not just important "to us" but actually important. But sometimes in life, you still get told that word at times when you NEED to be told yes.
So then what do you do? What do you do with the pieces that are left after you have been told no?
There have been so many things for which I have prayed to people and to God during the coarse of my life for which I have received a negative answer when I wanted and felt like I needed a positive one. There have been situations to which being given a negative answer invoked absolute horror in me. I felt completely stripped down and then beaten by the realization that my ultimate fear had become reality. My head spun, and my heart broke. Over and over this has happened. I spent many moments being very frustrated and resentful....
But then light would shine through.
As more and more of this began to happen, I started to notice patterns. I learned some things.
The first thing I learned is that you canNOT change other people. You are never responsible for another person's behavior (unless that person is your small child and even then there's only so much you can do). If you assign yourself the responsibility of absorbing the consequences of someone else's behavior, you're going to end up very limited and very frustrated. You also do not have the ability to change someone else's heart or mind. You can do your best to present facts to them so that they are informed, but the final decision for what they are going to do is totally their's. There are even certain folks that, the harder you try, the farther from your objective they're going to go. They're actually going to do the opposite of what you ask or say just out of spite, so it's best to abandon that effort altogether.
I also learned that there are circumstances that are out of your control....and you have to be okay with that. In lieu of my point above, once another brain outside of your head makes a decision, there will be events that follows, boundaries that exist that didn't before, consequences and limitations....that you cannot change. They're set in stone unless or until someone somewhere changes their mind. When this occurs, you have to be okay with it. Worrying is futile. It will do nothing but make YOU sick. The other person or people or the abstract idea of the situation that exists is not going to be affected by the amount of worry you devote to circumstances that you do not like.
Also happiness. You've got to find it. You're entitled to it. You can go to any war torn country or empoverished society, and you will always find this: there will always be at least one child with a smile on their tiny face, and they will have found something to play with. They do not go for lengths of time without inventing ways to enjoy themselves. Adults only do that. We are the ones that, despite our inability to force everything to go our way, spend energy trying to do just that. Go find a toy. Go find a smile. If you do not find any happiness, then you are CHOOSING sadness. Maybe ask yourself why because you can't tell me that a little pumpkin with flys crawling on his eyes and dirt covering his blistered feet should wipe the smile off his face. He found happiness because he looked for it. He put in the effort because that robbery for his entitlement to it has not yet occurred. Go back to that. Look as aggressively for it as that little guy.
Remember the "long game". These words were used with me the other day by a grown child of divorce in regards to how I relate to my children. He was encouraging me on how to love them and what strategies to use. It was very good advice on keeping things in perspective. It makes me think of when I had my babies. I will never forget the first push. It felt SOOOO difficult! I would always be so worn out from at least 12 hours of painful contractions that the notion that I was going to have to muster strength to push this baby out seemed ludicrous....but every time I would just think "But I HAVE to! I'M the only person on planet earth that can push THIS baby out of THIS body.....cause it's MY BODY!" so I would take a breath and bear down and push and push as many times as it took to give them their first breath of air. Long game - I had to get those babies out. Long game - life can be very, unbearably painful, but you are the only person who can live your life. There are goals that only you can bring into the world. You have GOT to push past the pain so you can accomplish those things. No one else in the world has YOUR life - just you. Push past the crazy. Give birth to everything that your life is supposed to represent.
Another huge lesson I've learned in "hearing" "no" (I used all those quotes on purpose....wait for it) is because sometimes when we "hear" "no", someone or something else is actually "saying" "wait" or "not yet". Don't assign a hard "no" when that's not what has been offered to you. If there is something that is terribly important to you, do not be dissuaded by obstacles or struggles. Keep working towards your goal. If the desire is still burning in your belly to accomplish something or become something, do not stop until you've achieved it.
The last one is this: Don't.....get....bitter. Bitterness is the daughter of worry, so watch out for both of those. Unproductive worry leaves you frustrated, and staying frustrated with something you cannot change will make you bitter. Bitterness is a terrible thief. It does not a single thing but steal from you. Find a way to take your hands and your heart away from things you cannot control, and don't you let that weed take root. You prevent this by being honest with yourself. Arrogance has no place in struggles in life. If your attitude is wrong or your efforts to change things outside your control futile, admit that and move on.
These are hard things to implement, but they are necessary. Take them for what they are - the ramblings of a girl just barely in my 30's, but trust me. They are usable. They are true. They work.
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