Garden Variety Neurosis

A Futon and $85

2010-02-02T21:39:00.001-05:00

It's been over a month since I last wrote, which is unacceptable. Life has been busy ,though.

I started school (again) in December of last year, and I've been diligently staying ahead on my school work. I am glad to say that I am finding school remarkably easy at this point, though I am sure it will become more difficult as time progresses. This term, which is nearly over, has been a nice way to ease into life as a college student again. This is my first "tour of duty" since becoming a mother, and I appreciate the time to make the transition. I am sure that next term will be more challenging, and I feel prepared for it now.

Shortly after the new year, Jaden decided he didn't want to share a room with me anymore. It all came about quite by accident. Over New Year's weekend, I fell asleep on the couch while watching a marathon of "The Twilight Zone". I was so comfortable, I decided to sleep there all night. It turned out that Jaden and I each slept through just about the whole night, with Jaden getting up only one time. One time, as opposed to his usual three or four. The following night, I slept on the couch again, wanting another full night of sleep. The night after that, I thought I'd give sleeping in my bed a try, and I wasn't in the bedroom for five minutes before Jaden was up and crying.

Thus began my nightly routine of sleeping on the couch, allowing Jaden to sleep peacefully in the bedroom by himself. Initially, sleeping on the couch wasn't so bad. However, before too long, my body let me know in a multitude of ways that sleeping on the couch was not a long-term option. I began searching for affordable options, finally finding a solution about a month later. Last night, my dad and I went to pick up a futon I found on craigslist. I slept on it for the first time last night, and while I definitely need to buy a thicker mattress (which I will do tomorrow), it felt remarkably better than sleeping on the couch. AND, I had room to move around. It was wonderful!

I filed my taxes last week through H&R Block, and I anticipate getting my refund soon. I get paid tomorrow, which is going to help me buy the new futon mattress and a few other things. However, in the meantime, Jaden and I have been going without a few things, because it seems there was more month than money this time. We don't regularly get child support, having had no payments since we received $43 last October. That makes things difficult from time to time. We were running low on some essentials, though, so I started digging through my wallet to see what I could find.

I decided to check my balance on my prepaid Discover card, thinking I might have at least a few dollars there that we could use to buy a few things. Imagine my surprise when I found I had $85 available! As it turned out, I had put money on the card last month, and forgot about it. I am sure I put it on the card with the anticipation of using it to pay for something specific, but had a change of plans. However, with my mind bouncing between school, motherhood, and so on, I forgot that I didn't use the Discover card as intended, and the money was just sitting there. It was a very happy discovery, and Jaden and I quickly went out to Dollar General to buy the things we've needed. Our kitchen cupboards are now full, I was able to buy a few personal things, and the wait for payday tomorrow suddenly became much easier.

All of these things remind me once again that God always provides for us, whether or not we get child support, whether or not the economy sucks, whether or not we are living on an extraordinarily limited budget. Jaden and I live on an income that is about six thousand dollars a year BELOW the federal poverty level, yet, we lack for nothing. Sure, we don't have a fancy car to drive, but our 1995 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera gets us where we need to go without any problems. We don't live in a posh house, but our apartment is cozy and our landlord has become our friend. We have our family close by, allowing Jaden to know his grandparents and his aunt and his cousin, which is something I wasn't able to do growing up because we lived so far away from everyone. We live in a great community, and we are loved. In my book, Jaden and I are very wealthy.

We are living an amazingly blessed existence.

A perfectly imperfect Christmas, and a first year gone by

2009-12-27T00:24:00.002-05:00

When I imagined Jaden's first Christmas, I entertained images of my sweet-natured, giggly, happy little boy basking in the warm glow of Christmas, drinking in the love of his family as we all "oooo" and "ahhhhh" over gifts, reminisce about Christmases past, and feel all warm and safe and happy.

Christmas Eve should have told me that my plans were not to come to fruition. We spent the night at Tamara and Heidi's house, and I had hopes of watching some Christmas movies, cuddling with my baby, and sleeping snugly as we all anticipated Christmas morning. However, before we even got to Tamara and Heidi's house, Jaden's Fussy Pants were on and I knew my plans were quickly unravelling.

Jaden had not napped all day, and was very cranky. When we got to my sister's house, I gave him a bottle of milk and put him in the crib for a nap. He proceeded to throw a screaming fit, which he would repeat later when it was time for bed. As the evening wore on into the night, it was becoming evident that my Christmas dreams were about to be undone.

On Christmas Eve, after sleeping in the crib for a couple of hours, Jaden woke up screaming. I gave him a bottle, and as we headed back to the bedroom, I concluded that putting him back into the crib was not worth the fight. He slept with me in the bed for the rest of the night, either with his head on my chest, or laying next to me cheek to cheek. If I altered the positons, he would wake up and cry. It was a long night.

Morning finally came, and the Christmas happenings temporarily distracted him from his woes. During some snuggle time, I saw the source of those woes: Two teeth popping through his tender little gums. Jaden's mood did not improve, and we left shortly after eating a quick breakfast with the family...during which, Jaden tore some of Tamara's weather-seal plastic off the window. When we got home, his crabbiness continued into the night. Christmas Day turned out to be a long, crabby day, and by the end of the day I was practically dancing for joy when Jaden's bedtime came.

After Jaden went to bed and I had time to think about the day and put my thoughts down on paper, I realized what a great day it really was. We are very blessed, and while the day was far from picture perfect, it was not entirely without its charm. Jaden enjoyed his new toys. He especially enjoyed the Walk 'n' Ride I got for him, which allowed him to walk around without needing my assistance. In between meltdowns, Jaden was sweet as could be. All things considered, our Christmas was memorable for its perfect imperfection.

Today, Jaden gave me a gift that more than made up for yesterday. My sweet little boy took three steps, all by himself, toward me. He did not hold on to the furniture. He did not hold on to his Walk 'n' Ride. He simply walked forward, to me. It was amazing. It absolutely made my day.

Today...well, in five hours and 22 minutes, actually...he will be one year old. It has been an incredible year, and motherhood has been the single most exhilerating experience of my life. He is a joy. A delight. A source of endless wonder for me. I would not trade it for anything, teething fussiness and all.

2009-12-16T15:42:00.002-05:00

On Sunday, we celebrated my sweet little boy's first year in this world. He won't actually be a year old until December 27, but I didn't want his first birthday to get jumbled in with Christmas. He has plenty of years ahead of him to get cheated out of a birthday party.

Our first year together has been an amazing journey. As difficult as single motherhood is, I have no regrets about the choices I made to bring my son safely into this world, and ensure that our life would be one of peace and joy.

I have learned a lot from my son. He has taught me not to underestimate anything based on its initial appearance. He constantly amazes me as he blows my assumptions about his childlike mind out of the water. He has taught me that each moment is precious and meant to be savored, as they pass quickly and we can never have them back.

When he was two months old, he became very sick and had to be hospitalized for four days. In that time, he taught me that, while he has been entrusted to my care, he doesn't belong to me. It is my job...my privilege...to love him, nurture him, raise him to be the best person he can possibly be. When all is said and done, though, he belongs to God. I am simply honored to be his mother.

In this year, I have witnessed my sweet, helpless, needy little baby grow to become more independent, more sure of himself and his own abilities. He still needs me, and will for a long time, but not nearly in the same way that he did in those first days.

Oh, those first days...As much as I miss my tiny little baby, I wouldn't roll the clock back for anything. Those first days are utterly exhausting, and are at once the happiest and saddest days I've ever lived. I remember being bone tired, and listening to Jaden wind up for another cry to let me know he needed to breastfeed, or needed a diaper change, or just wanted to be held. In the span of 24 hours, my life had gone from one of simplicity, able to do as I please, when I please, to one of being at the beck and call of a precious little stranger. I wouldn't trade those days for anything, but I don't want to relive them. I am glad to have my little man becoming more independent every day.

More than anything, this year has taught me about God's grace. Jaden and I have been protected from so much, and we have been provided for extravagantly. That lesson has been among the greatest gifts Jaden has brought into my life.

I am blessed to be Jaden's mother. It's the best job I've ever had, and it seemed as though I was hardly living before he came into my life.

Enjoy this video montage of my son's first year. Here's to many more to come!

Thoughts on Thinking

2009-12-06T22:52:00.003-05:00

The question posed here bothers me on multiple levels, but the most bothersome part is that the person asking the question is representative of so many within the Christian community who seem incapable of making an independent decision. For whatever reason, it is common, even encouraged, within Christian circles to delay making any decisions without first confirming through various sources that what you want to do is what God wants you to do.

"Confirmation" is a buzz word in the Christian circles I was a part of. Having "confirmation" on a decision meands that God has apparently given the green light to go forward as planned. In fact, going forward with a big decision without having said confirmation is essentially inviting trouble into one's life. If the thing you have chosen to do is done without that confirmation, and it blows up in your face, it is believed that you should not have attempted it in the first place, and the blowing up part is God's way of punishing you for going forward without His "thumbs up".

Over the years, I have seen people reach far in order to grasp the coveted confirmation. I have done it myself, many times, before reaching the realization that I could find confirmation anywhere if I wanted something badly enough. Anyway, over the years I have seen people find confirmation in something as innocuous as the position of a leaf on the ground, or something more substantial, such as an alleged vision.

The problem with this kind of thinking is that it renders us useless in terms of making decisions on our own. In certain circles, such as those I grew up with, it is collectively believed that any decision we might make on our own is going to end disasterously, because our hearts and minds are naturally inclined toward evil. We utterly disregard the idea of being made in the image of God. We are made in His image, therefore having the capability of making good choices for ourselves, without the multitude of confirmations we believe we need.

I believe we have been gifted with the ability to make sound judgments based on the evidence we have before us that speaks directly to the decision we are making. Certainly, it is prudent to seek counsel from trusted friends and leaders, but ultimately we have to be able to trust ourselves to make good choices in the situations we face. To believe we are incapable of doing that only leads to a place of constant self-doubt, leaving us vulnerable to people and circumstances that may demand a quick decision.

In my own life, I grew up with tremendous self-doubt. Due in part to the impressions made upon me in church, I believed there was nothing good in me and I could not possibly make good choices in my life without having a long list of "confirmations" to support whatever choice I am inclined to make. Such thinking has lead me down many harmful roads.

Most recently, this agonizing self-doubt lead me into a very dangerous relationship with a man, and I ultimately married him. Everything in me was telling me to get away from him, yet the timing of our relationship made it appear as though this man was a gift from heaven, an answer to prayer. Further "confirmations" of this lead me to believe that my instincts were wrong, and I needed to graciously embrace what God had given me. I turned a blind eye to the red flags, hushed the words of caution that kept playing in my mind, and considered that our relationship had plenty of evidence of being from God. We both had all the confirmations we needed in order to justify our relationship as a God ordained blessing.

We got married, and I realized I had married a monster. I realized that the inclinations I had to run away from him were God-given instincts, and I should have trusted them. Shortly after getting married, I got pregnant. Upon learning of my pregnancy, and enduring one final and very frightening display of my husband's wrath, I left my marriage and began preparations for single motherhood.

I am quite sure that this was not in God's perfect plan for me, despite any confirmations I thought I had. By the grace of God, and my new found ability to trust the instincts He has given me, my son and I have a very happy life. Everything about how our life came to be this way is utterly contrary to the beliefs I grew up with. I had no "confirmations" that leaving my husbnad and filing for divorce was the right thing to do. I had no confirmations that putting measures in place to protect my son from his father was the right thing to do. I had no miraculous shows of foliage on the ground to tell me that planning a life for my son, sans father, was the best thing for us.

Yet, I trusted my gut instincts and went forward with my plans, and everything has turned out wonderfully. Furthermore, I also discovered that my husband had been seeking relationships with other women before I even filed for divorce, despite his claims of remorse about our situation. Upon discovering this, I knew in that moment that every decision I made was right, however contrary it may have been to standard operating procedure.

With regard to the question in the video, it disturbs that the man would believe that his skills are something he may have to put on the back burner because they may not be honoring to the Lord. I believe that there are times when all the confirmation you need to tell you that something is from God, is that the thing is right in front of your face. I honestly believe that God gave us intuition for a reason, and there is something offensive about the belief that there is something intrinsically evil about trusting our God-given awareness.

As long as we're not inhaling demons, I think we'll be alright in trusting ourselves a bit more.

2009-11-30T22:05:00.005-05:00

Jaden has needed a toy box for awhile, but they are expensive. So, the next best thing is to use what I already have and make do with it. Along those lines, I went to my sister's house today and retrieved a plastic tote I had left there, which happened to be full of my old journals. After Jaden went to bed, I got to work emptying the box for Jaden to use.

As I emptied the box,I read bits of my old journals. The earliest journal I have dates back to 1997. The most recent in that particular box was from early 2008. Of course, I did not have the time or the desire to read every page of every journal, but what I did read was very telling.

Much of the content of my journals has to do with love. Dreaming of it, falling into it, embracing it, losing it, regretting it. Pages upon pages of the stuff. As I read these pages, remembering vividly the exhileration and the heartache I experienced in each snippet I read, I realized something: I have been dating the same man for over a decade.

His name changes from time to time. Sometimes he is Kevin. Rich. Harold. Nate. Brian. Sometimes he has a better job, nicer clothes, and a more attractive haircut than he's had at other times. He can be very sweet, or very mean. He is often funny, though his humor has been understated from time to time. He is generally very intelligent. Without fail, he is always kind to me, with the equally predictable bitter aftertaste. He is often needy. He is rarely pleased with me by the time things are over, though he was very pleased with me in the beginning. Inevitably, without exception, he despises me just as much as he once liked me.

Perhaps the most graphic example of that happened with my ex-husband, who went from adoring me to telling me, in no uncertain terms, about the many, many things about me that he hated. "There are a lot of things about you that piss me off, and I want to change them."

Of course, that is not the first time something of that sort has happened. A guy I dated in 2007 claimed to love me enough that he wanted to marry me. Bought me a ring and everything. I was thrilled! Until I found out that his coworkers had a favorite pastime, which was to tell him all the things they perceived as being wrong with me (though they had never met me), all the reasons he should run away from me, and all the times he should have defended me...but didn't. The clincher came when he told me that he liked many things about me, but had a big problem with the fact that I struggled financially. He told me that he was attracted to women who were financially stable and able to meet all their financial obligations. The real kick in the teeth came when he told me that if things didn't work out between us, his world wouldn't fall apart.

I didn't want his world to fall apart. I just wanted him to care a little bit, considering the ring and all.

Then came the guy I was with when I was diagnosed with cancer. As I contemplated what was happening to my life, watching it fall apart piece by piece, his only concern was what would happen with "us", as I seemed preoccupied.

I could go on and on, but I haven't the energy. Looking through the journals was emotionally exhausting. Writing about it in yet another journal afterward was further draining. Now, I am at a point where the only thing I am certain of is that I am certain I have nothing left to give to another relationship. Not now, maybe not ever. I am by no means willing to take another chance like that.

I don't think everyone is meant to know that abiding, lifelong love that we all dream of finding someday. I think I am one of those people who has always longed for that kind of love, thought I'd found it, and been burned by disappointment far too many times. I can't do it again.

For Jaden's sake, I wish this were not so. I wish my heart could be open to at least the possibility of meeting someone and, perhaps, finally finding that love I've longed for all these years. I wish I could be open to that, as it would be lovely if he could have someone in his life to be his dad. I can't do it, though. Not for the foreseeable future. I think I've endured enough pain to last a couple of lifetimes, and I won't be anyone's fool again.

When I was in my early twenties, after enduring those very difficult teen years, I wore a hard shell around my heart. Very few people were allowed in, and I had no interest whatsoever in dating. At this point in my life, I believe that is a good option for me. Perhaps not the most healthy, but it seems the safest.

I don't want to fill anymore journals with tales of heartache.

Thanksgiving 2009

2009-11-27T01:08:00.002-05:00

I have so much to be thankful for this year, I am not sure I can really put it into words. I have been blessed beyond measure, in ways I never could have foreseen a year or two ago. My life took a completely different direction than I anticipated, and while it may have seemed devastating at first, it has become a life that I would not trade for any of the dreams I used to have for myself.

At the risk of stating the obvious, I am most thankful for the gift of my son, Jaden. Before Jaden was born, I thought I knew what love was. I had loved before, and I thought I had loved deeply. When I had Jaden, though, I realized that I had never really known love until he came into my life. From the moment I saw him on the ultrasound, I was captivated. Then, when I gave birth and our eyes finally met for the first time, I loved him completely. I love him so much, I feel like my heart could burst. If it's possible, I love him a little more every day.

I am thankful that Jaden feels safe and secure in his home, and that his sense of security shows in the way he gets a little more independent with each passing day. He is nearly a year old, and while I find myself wishing he could stay a baby just a little bit longer, I realize that his increasing independence means that I am doing things right and my son is becoming a confident little boy.

I am thankful that we are safe. A year ago at this time, I was terrified of what may come. I was very pregnant, anticipating giving birth in exactly one month from today. I had no idea what may come after that, given the situation with my son's father. I was so afraid of what my sweet baby may be subjected to, and I prayed, meditated, planned, and prepared to do whatever I needed to do to keep my baby safe.

A year later, I still see the fruit of those spiritual, legal, and physical investments. We are safe. My son is enjoying a peaceful and happy life, surrounded by people who love him. He is a gift, and everyone in his life sees him as that. My prayer is that he will always know this kind of love, and that those who may harm him would be kept at a distance.

I am thankful for the things I have learned about God's grace and provision, which I have experienced through the grace and provision of other people in my life. While Jaden and I live a very simple life, we lack for nothing. Jaden has been given things and opportunities that I could never afford to give him on my own, yet the generosity of others allows for it. I don't know what we would do if it weren't for the love and support of our friends and spiritual family.

I am thankful for the opportunities we have to help others out. We happily do what we are able to do, and I am thankful that Jaden will grow up with a sense of empathy for others. I am thankful that he will have the understanding that we are all connected, we are all in this together, and when one of us hurts, all of us hurt in some way. I am thankful that he will understand that one of the greatest things we can do is be of service to others in whatever capacity we are able.

I am thankful for the life that I have. It is not the life I dreamed of or hoped for, but it infinitely better than any of those things. I am so very grateful for the things that have happened in my life in the last few years that have derailed everything that I thought I knew, challenging me to rethink and rebuild my life from the very foundation. My days are filled with the laughter of a beautiful baby, the joy of motherhood, the challenge of making a better life for us through educating myself with an eye toward the future, and the grace to embrace it all and whisper the simple prayer, "Thank You."

I have much to be thankful for. Perhaps the greatest things I have to be thankful for are the dreams that didn't come true, the relationships that didn't work out, the paths I had to abandon as life flooded in.

I never imagined myself in this place. I had never dared to dream so big.

The First Year

2009-11-13T15:50:00.003-05:00

As I write this, it is hard for me to wrap my mind around the idea that my baby boy is going to be a year old next month. It seems like I gave birth him to just yesterday! I can still very easily recall the discomforts of pregnancy, the eagerness and anxiety as his due date approached, the exhileration of realizing that I was in labor and I would meet my son very soon, and the pure joy of holding him or the first time. I can easily conjure the feeling of walking around on feet that were severely swollen, post-partum, and the feeling of coming home with my sweet babe and literally asking the air, "What do I do with him now?"

I still remember the hours of prayer and meditation that went into preparing myself for motherhood. There were so many uncertainties during my pregnancy, regarding what would happen with my ex once my son was born. Would he try to take him from me? Would my son be subjected to the same abuse his half-siblings were? Though my ex and I had not seen each other in several months, would he suddenly resurface once I gave birth to the miracle I had safely carried in my womb?

There were so many questions, so many fears for the safety of my son, the only things I could do were read God's word, meditate on its truth, and pray--with firm belief in the affirmative answer--that God would continue to keep my son and me safe after my son was born.

We have been kept very safe and well taken care of, and it has been a pure delight to watch my son grow from a tiny, helpless babe, into a strong, healthy, inquisitive child who wants to taste, touch, feel, and explore everything around him. He has a sweet disposition that is easily recognized by friends and strangers alike, and there is hardly a day that goes by when someone we don't even know comments to me about how cute he is, and how sweet he is. Needless to say, I am proud.

We've come a long way from those fear-laden first days, and we now understand each other pretty well. While he cannot communicate to me with words yet, I read his cues and usually know exactly what he needs or wants. We are working on sign language so we will be able to communicate even better,until he is able to speak words.

This brilliant child makes me laugh with his developing sense of humor, and I am already astounded by his comedic timing. He knows when I am playing around with him just by the way I am looking at him, and he knows how to play little jokes on me, too. I'll never forget his first "joke". It was during dinner, and as I fed him he made himself sit up very tall in his high chair, legs straightened and his bottom off of the seat, and then took a bite of food. After his bite, he sat back down and giggled. So clever!

I watch videos I took of him laying in his crib, watching his mobile, captivated by its motion. He was beginning to discover the world around him, but still confined by a body that was not yet strong enough to move its weight around. Now, he crawls like a champ, he is working on freestanding, he is able to manipulate his environment so his things are where he wants them, and he is capable of exploring his world. When I think of all that has transpired in just the last 10 1/2 months, it is astounding.

He has given me the greatest joy I have ever known. As a single mother, things are difficult at times. Financially, things are very tight, though we get by. There are times when I wish I had someone here to give me a break once in awhile, especially if I'm not feeling particularly well. There are times when I just need a little quiet, and there is no one to play with Jaden so I can go into my bedroom and have that quiet.

Still, there is no way I would trade it for anything. I love my sunny, funny, sweet little man, and it's both astounding and heartbreaking that our first year together is quickly drawing to a close. It's gone by so fast!

Are You Normal?

2009-11-04T23:51:00.002-05:00

I read a very interesting article in Psychology Today, entitled, "What is Normal?" The premise of the article is that psychiatric diagnoses have become so prevelant, it is as though nearly everyone has a disorder of one kind or another. Whenever someone is having a difficult time, happy and acting a little eccentric, wanting some "alone" time, and so on, it seems that the professionals are quick to put a label on them and medicate them.

As I read the article, I thought about all the labels I've worn over the years. It started in high school, where I was given the labels of "withdrawn" and "depressed". Perhaps it was not that I was withdrawn, but that I just didn't know where I fit in and I was intimidated by the task of finding out. I was also painfully shy back then, which was interpreted by the professonals as being withdrawn and depressed. Perhaps I wasn't depressed, so much as I just needed a mentor of some kind to help me navigate the experience of adolesence and all the mixed up emotions thereof. In any case, I was given labels.

As an adult, I was given more labels. I was diagnosed with a few different disorders, not the least of which being bipolar disorder. In my mid-twenties, I was told that my long list of diagnoses were probably enough for me to get disability, and I should try. I chose not to, but that did not erase the labels.

As life went on after being labeled, I began to live my life according to those labels, subconsciously telling myself to live within the confines of the labels. I felt incapable of doing much of anything, so I rarely tried. According to my diagnoses, I was severely depressed and withdrawn most of the time, had trouble understanding relationships, and had difficulty focusing on the tasks at hand.

Perhaps there is some truth in all of those things, but I didn't adopt just "some" of the truth. I bought the whole thing, and lived my life accordingly. I took few risks, accomplished very little, had only a few friends, and lived very safely, lest my many disorders should overtake me.

In the article, the author suggests that there is a new trend occuring in which people who have "disorders" are not living as though there is something wrong with them. Rather, they are living as though their "disorders" are not disorders at all, but are simply a characteristic of who they are. In adopting such an attitude, they have freed themselves from the constraints of their diagnosis. It seems that, more and more, this is becoming a widely accepted way of embracing the imperfections of being human.

We are so quick to label, perhaps forgetting that putting a label on someone automatically puts shackles on their soul, whether we intend to or not. To this day, I feel those constraints. To this day, I feel like the freak show, and it impacts much of what I do. I didn't give much thought to it until I read this article, but I see it now. I still live with minimal risks, and I still keep my distance from people because I want to feel safe, because I still don't know where I fit in. I struggle with depression, and I often wonder if those struggles would be as difficult if I had not been given permission...via my diagnosis...to constantly struggle with depression.

What labels do you wear? How have those labels impacted your life?

One of the women featured in the article says, "I think people confuse normal with average. Who wants to be average?" She is a very successful business woman and author, despite the labels of "dyslexic" and "retarded" being put on her when she was very young. She says she refuses to operate from a platform of inadequacy.

We can embrace the label and all that comes with it, or accept that some of us aren't "average", but that does not mean there is something wrong with us. We are imperfect and do not fit into the place society may have carved out for us, but we do fit into the bigger picure, somewhere. What is normal, anyway? Who fits into the mold of "normal"? Nobody that I know, I'm sure. So, where does that leave us?

Why do we need to label, diagnose, and treat people? Why do the ups and downs that are simply part of life have to become something that needs therapy and medication? Surely, there are conditions that need treatment, but the normal sad and happy and everything in between does not merit the labels that are so freely given out.

I'm not normal. Then again, neither are so many others. I wonder how many others struggle because they were labeled. I also wonder if I will ever live down those labels, or if they are going to follow me for the rest of my life. Living in a small town where everyone knows...and remembers...your entire history, it is difficult to believe that they day will come when these labels will no longer haunt me.

What say you?

Moving On...

2009-10-28T00:59:00.002-04:00

One of the most surprising things about motherhood, as it turns out, is the loneliness. Like most first-time moms, my pregnancy was filled with many hours of dreaming of what life would be like after giving birth to the precious child God had given to me. I imagined days spent in carefree play, snuggling, feeding, (diaper changing), and living in the best Gerber commercial I had ever seen.

For the most part, I was right. I have to say, life with my baby has been better than I ever could have imagined it being, insofar as our relationship goes. I love my son, he loves me, and we have a great life together.

The one thing I did not anticipate, though, was how lonely motherhood would be, particularly since I am a single mom. Having a baby can be a very isolating event. Friendships change. Some friendships disappear altogether. I experienced both of those events, and neither was easy. Many of my days are spent wishing I had someone to talk to other than my beautiful baby, realizing that the days of carefree socializing are over.

There are times when I feel a lot of sadness over the relationships that have been lost or been changed over the last couple of years, particularly since the birth of my son. I feel so desperately lonely at times, and end up doing ridiculous things like checking Twitter or Facebook endlessly (when I have time to do so), hoping that someone will at least leave a comment for me, helping me feel more connected to the world outside of my apartment.

When I think of where my life is right now, and how I ended up here, it's easy for me to think of my life as an unfortunate derailment of what might have been, if only I had never fallen ill a couple of years ago, then struggled with addiction, then met and married my son's father, and so forth. It is easy for me to look at all of that, then look at where I am now, and think to myself that the current state of my life is just...sad.

It only occurred to me just tonight that perhaps this isn't a sad place to be at all. All of our lives have purpose when we choose for them to have purpose. A person who has been given every advantage in life could still be living a life that is utterly devoid of meaning. Then again, someone who has been kicked around a lot by life, yet still hangs on despite the loneliness and loss, could be living a life of purpose that is far beyond what they can see. We're all left with choices to be made about how we will handle whatever comes to us.

I am not a big believer in the idea that God is in His heaven, connecting all the dots in our lives in order to bring about a predestined outcome. I believe that life happens, and in God's grace, He enables us to infuse those happenings with meaning and purpose. I believe we are faced with the choice of how we will handle what happens to us, what we will do with what we have left after the painful losses we will surely face.

As I think about this, I think about the friendships I have lost over the last couple of years, and realized that many of my friendships were friendships of convenience--both mine and theirs. Those friendships began to change when I became ill and could not go to as many functions as I was once able to, and I saw the impact of those changes after my son was born. Of the friends that remained, a few of them gradually dropped off until only a couple of my friends from my pre-baby days remained.

It's painful, and there are times when I find myself wishing that life had not become so complicated and I could have my social life back. I miss hangin' out with friends, going to movies with them, just sitting around talking about this and that. These days, the only time I get to sit around and talk with an adult is when I'm in the hospital for surgery (which I was a couple of weeks ago), or when Jaden's WIC nurse comes for a home visit. Other than that, adult conversation is sorely lacking in my day to day existence.

I have finally accepted that I will need to develop new relationships that are appropriate for this season of my life. It is going to mean venturing out more, getting to know new people, going in to new places, none of which I am comfortable with. The options, though, are to keep living a lonely life, to have Jaden living a lonely life, since he won't be able to make any friends because we don't "belong" anywhere, and to remain dependent on Facebook and Twitter for social interaction.

Motherhood is lonely, but I'm ready to break out of the lonely. Still liking being a mother, though.

30 Staples, 10 Days, and One Big Lesson in Humility

2009-10-22T01:10:00.008-04:00

By this time Friday night/Saturday morning, I will be able to care for my son completely on my own again, and we can settle back into life as we knew it before my surgery. I mean, the good parts of life as we knew it. The parts about chronic pain from the tennis ball in my gut are parts I am glad we no longer have to deal with.

The good stuff, though...I am really looking forward to getting back to that. I have missed our quiet time together, our night time routines, our snuggle time when he wakes up in the middle of the night and needs a bottle. I've even missed being able to do the more mundane things myself. Bathing him, dressing him, changing his diapers...I am eager to get back to doing all of those "mommy" things that I haven't been able to do for over a week.

I know Jaden misses it, too. I think he's been doing very well in letting other people take care of him, but as I get better and I am able to hold him more, play with him more, and so forth, he clearly prefers that I be the one to give him the care that he needs. I can't deny, it feels good to be both needed and wanted. I am sure that he will miss the people who have been coming into our home for the last week, as he enjoys making new friends. However, I think he will also be glad to have his mom back to full-time mommy duties.

I have learned a few things in this week of humble need. I have learned a lot about the amazing kindness of strangers, particularly when that kindness is going to impact the life of a mother and her child. I have learned that some of the assumptions I made about people based on their particular set of beliefs, the church they attend, or their political affiliations. I have experienced kindness from the most unexpected of places, and I have experienced a chilling silence where I thought I may find more warmth and friendship.

I continue to learn, much as I did when the birth of my son was not met with the loving congratulations from many I once considered friends, that people are fickle. For many, it truly is, "out of sight, out of mind". Regardless of what a person's reasons may be for being "out of sight" (mine, for example, was that I found out I had cancer, needed treatments, treatment made me sick and homebound, etc...), my experience has been that if I am not constantly reminding people of my existence, I am forgotten.

It hurt me deeply when my son was born, and many of the people I still counted among my friends at the time did not visit us in the hospital, call to congratulate me, or even acknowledge that my sweet baby had been born. It was humiliating because, thinking these friends of mine would be excited about the birth of my babe, I had one friend do the calling to make the announcement. I am not sure what kind of a response he received, but I quickly learned that I was delusional about the relationships I had, and whatever friendships may have been there at one time, were now gone. This was my first experience with "out of sight, out of mind", and it was brutal.

So, when I learned I would need surgery, and that recovering from surgery would mean that I could not care for my son without help, I did not anticipate that I would receive a lot of help from my home church. My health had, once again, taken a downward turn after the birth of my son, and my church attendance had been scarce. As the date for my surgery approached, I would occasionally see someone from church at the bank, the grocery store, etc...and I would be asked how much help I needed after surgery. Initially, according to my surgeon, I would need help for six weeks. I was very candid in sharing that I did not have nearly enough help lined up to cover the full six weeks. I was assured repeatedly that people would be calling me to schedule time to help out.

I was skeptical. Maybe it showed. I did not receive any phone calls from those who said they would call. Rather, I received several from people I had never met, who attended churches and/or Bible study groups I had never been to, who were not only willing but happy to help my son and me. One of the primary sources of support came from a group of women at a church I visited once in the summer of 2008, and did not go back to because I was offended by the rough tone of the pastor.

Since that visit, I have become better friends with the woman who first invited me to the church. She and I will never see eye to eye on many things, but one fundamental thing we soundly agree on is the need to show kindness and compassion to people, putting Jesus' love in action. Through her efforts, several other women from her church also came in to help us out, and did so without asking anything of us.

Of particular delight was the woman we had with us today. I was not sure what to expect when my friend told me that this woman wanted to come spend the day with us. I did not give it a lot of thought, but when it did cross my mind, I honestly wondered what sort of conversation may take place throughout the day.

You see, this woman not only attended my friends' church. She was the pastor's wife. In the time since I had visited the church, I was able to see her and her husband at various events throughout the community, and come to realize that they were very loving people. Her husband did have a rough way about him, and my friend often shares with me that his rough way of delivering his message did have a way of giving people the wrong idea about the gentle nature of his heart. Over time, I was able to see that I indeed had the wrong idea about this man and his church.

I had planned on perhaps visiting again, someday. After my son was born and my friend was one of the people who really took the time to visit us and get to know him, I thought I may visit her church again one of these days, and give her pastor another chance. He seemed like a good man, a loving man, despite his rough way of speaking, and I thought I had perhaps judged too harshly. However, life got busy, I got lazy, and "one of these days", never came.

Tragically, the man I had so sorely misjudged was killed in a motorcycle accident this past spring. I would never get the chance to give him another chance.

So, when my friend told me that his wife wanted to spend the day with us, I wasn't entirely comfortable with it. Surely, she did not know my guilty secret. Still, it seemed as though something was coming full circle, and I wasn't sure what to expect.

She was to arrive around noon. About mid-morning, I left my baby in the hands of one of our very capable helpers, and lay down for a nap. I felt sure I would be awake in plenty of time to say goodbye to my morning helper, and greet the afternoon helper that I'd been feeling so anxious about. I fell asleep quickly and easily, and slept until nearly 1 o'clock. My plans to make a good first impression were thwarted.

I opened my bedroom door quietly, expecting to hear my son chattering away. Instead, I heard a lot of quiet. I rounded the corner and saw my sweet baby playing on the floor with his new friend, and she was clearly enjoying their time together. When my son noticed me, he smiled and squealed just a bit, then went back to playing with his friend. She quietly introduced herself, and I could immediately see a gentleness in her that was completely disarming.

The rest of our afternoon was spent playing with my son, and talking quietly about everything from Michelle Duggar's...20th?...pregnancy (how does her body handle it??), to our new friend's understanding of how overwhelming it must be for me as a single mom to get myself and my baby up, fed, and ready for church in time to make it every Sunday. No guilt. No shame. Only compassionate understanding.

It was a very pleasant afternoon, and all of my fears were for naught. I did not share with her what my reasons were for not returning to her church after my initial visit, but I did share with her that my son and I would like to visit after I start feeling stronger. The outpouring of love and compassion we have experienced, from a church I had all but completely written off about a year and a half ago, has been without equal.

Love comes from unexpected places. Healing comes gradually, rarely in one fell swoop. In order to experience these miracles to their fullest, a certain level of humility may be required. Humility, and, perhaps, a surgery that leaves you unable to even care for your own offspring without the generous help of loving strangers.

Home sweet...ah, screw it.

2009-10-19T23:41:00.002-04:00

I still have a few days of recovery ahead of me before I can dismiss my nearly 24/7 help, and have my house back. I miss the quiet time that Jaden and I have not been able to have for nearly a week, and I am eager to have our life back. Call me boring, but I like the predictable, business as usual, same-old-same-old kinda life. Jaden and I have our routine, and I like it. I miss it. I want it back.

My mom has been here with us nearly 'round the clock since I got home last Friday evening. It's only been since last Friday, yet it seems so much longer...She and I definitely have different ways of doing things, and there are things that she does that absolutely get under my skin and it is all I can do keep a civil tongue in my head. I am finding that even the small things are getting to me, and Friday (when I will finally be able to pick up my son again) cannot get here soon enough.

For example, as my mom started getting things together for dinner, she says to me, "I'm just gonna throw these out. They're all gunky."

I turned to her just in time to watch her throw away some cubed sweet potatoes I had picked up from the grocery store a couple of days before going into the hospital. On my second day in the hospital, I had called my mother and asked her to eat them or serve them to Jaden, so they didn't go to waste. I didn't think I was making a difficult request, since the potatoes were already cubed and ready to serve, only needing to be heated.

Considering the simplicity of the request, perhaps you can imagine how frustrated I felt as I realized my simple request had been ignored, and the food had spoiled. It's not as though I have a huge grocery budget, either, which made it that much more bothersome.

Then, I recalled that throwing away food...especially fruits and vegetables, which often spoil before being eaten...is a common practice at my parents' house, and I had perhaps asked too much. It served to put a very fine point on the differences between the way she does things, and the way I do things.

Even writing about it now, I'm frustrated.

I also realized tonight that my chair is broken. I can still use the chair to rock Jaden to sleep, but somehow, the footrest on the chair is now broken, so it is pretty useless for reclining and relaxing in. More frustration.

And this is the part where I start getting frustrated about the "big picture" things, like why I had to have all these health issues to begin with, because it if weren't for these things, my life would be dramatically different and perhaps I would not be so dependent on my mother, with my sanity teetering precariously on the edge. I look at my life, and realize that, apart from any major happenings, Jaden and I will always struggle.

And the pisser is that, whatever we do have, my mom will let spoil and then throw it into the garbage as I watch, and when she's finished with that, she'll break my chair.

Pissy night. Pissy mood.

I'm home, but still a patient

2009-10-17T01:40:00.003-04:00

I arrived home from the hospital around 5:30 yesterday evening. I hobbled into my apartment as quickly as I could, so eager to see my sweet baby. When I walked in, he was sleeping, so after a few minutes of talking with my dear friends who watched him for me, I went in to peek at him. I said hello, and as soon as I did, he began to stir. I ached to pick him up, and he reached for me as he woke up and found his bearings.

But...as I still have thirty staples in my belly and strict weight limitations on what I can lift (which he exceeds by about 12 pounds), I called for my mom to come get him. As he woke up, he smiled at me, but did not seem overly excited to see me. It took him a couple of hours to warm up to me again. I think he was upset with me for leaving him for nearly three whole days. I don't blame him.

I am still in a significant amount of pain. This surgery has been considerably more difficult that the last one, perhaps because my body has been through so much since. Radiation therapy, side effects of radiation therapy, pregnancy, childbirth...all of which worked together nicely to weaken my body for this go around with the scalpel. I've had a difficult time staying ahead of the pain, and that became evident quickly while I was in OR recovery. After three doses of IV painkillers, each of which caused my heart rate to drop but did nothing to drop my level of pain, I was put on a pump, allowing me to get the medication myself whenever I needed it (not exceeding a prescribed limit, of course), and only then did my pain level begin to drop.

While in the hospital, I was not able to be nearly as mobile as I was with my last surgery, as each walk hurt terribly. However, I was able to get a lot more rest than I did last time, and that felt wonderful. It was a very pleasant exchange.

My surgery went well, my stay in the hospital was as well as can be expected, and I am glad to be home. I'm counting down the days until I can pick up my little one again...only six to go! I long to snuggle him close and it's all I can do not to pick him up. That is, until I consider the searing pain I would surely experience if I did so, then it becomes easier to wait. Oh, and the possibility of ending up back in the hospital...no thanks!

Pain meds are kicking in, and it will be back to bed soon.

I've been in need...and then healed...and needy again...then healed...and then nee...Nevermind. You get it.

2009-10-12T16:27:00.004-04:00

On Wednesday, I will be having yet another surgery. It's a fairly simple surgery, during which my intestines will be pushed back through a hernia, the hernia will be meshed, and all will be will. Barring any surprise discoveries during surgery, it's really not a big deal. At least, not as far as the procedure itself is concerned.

I have had a lot happen in the last few years...in 2004, I had gastric bypass surgery. In 2007, after going to the ER for a couple of times for some horrible belly pain, a ct scan showed that I had a tumor growing on my left kidney. It had nothing to do with the pain in my belly. That turned out to an internal bowel hernia. A significant one, in fact. Apparently, my entire small bowel had pushed through the hernia, and twisted 180 degrees. The surgeons were impressed!

Okay, so, I had my left kidney taken out, a hernia repaired, and I thought all was well. As it turned out, I had another tumor growing, and this one was causing me quite a lot of pain. So, I needed to go through a round of radiation therapy, which was very difficult to endure. I remember not being able to hold food down, to such a degree that my niece, who was not quite 4 years old at the time, asked me, "Auntie, why do you always throw up after you eat?". How beautifully innocent!

Yes, radiation therapy was tough. I don't know how much it actually helped, because I still have sharp, searing pain where the radiation was done. I also developed colitus as a side effect of the therapy.

I wrapped up radiation therapy in August of 2007, and had several months of recovery ahead of me. In all of this, I had a lot of emotional support, even when I made the most stupid decision of my life, and married a complete asshole of a man (sorry, there just is no other way to say it). I ended up getting pregnant by that man, and leaving him. I have no regrets from making that choice.

I went through my entire pregnancy with the hernia that is being repaired on Wednesday. I had one loop of bowel popped out, easily visible under the surface of my skin, throughout my entire pregnancy. I never had a cute pregnant belly. In fact, when someone touched my belly (why is a pregnant woman's belly considered public property?), they would automatically go for the herniated area, because it was the most apparent. Then they would get an odd expression on their face, recognizing that my belly did not feel like a cute pregnant belly anymore than it looked like one. After the odd expression on their face faded, they would ask ridiculous questions like, "Is the baby kicking? Is that his foot sticking out?" At that point, I would explain in gruesome terms exactly what they had their hand on, and watch as they quickly withdrew their touch. The stranger ones would simply move their hands around on my belly until the found a spot that felt right.

Eventually, I stopped letting people touch me. It's my belly, after all, pregnant or not.

Anyway, despite all of my procedures over the last few years, and many, many trips to the ER, this situation is different. This time, I have a baby.

In addition to preparing myself for Wednesday, I've also had to wonder who is going to take care of my baby for me while I'm in the hospital, and who is going to help me with him when I get home? I won't be able to lift him for six weeks.

Fortunately, a friend of mine is going above and beyond the call of a friend's duty to a friend, and is making sure that I have all the help I need, allowing me to recover in peace. Not only will the women helping me with Jaden be doing all the heavy lifting (Jaden is 22 pounds, and that's a lot to carry around all day), but they will also cook meals to bring with them each time they come over.

I am humbled and amazed as I see the work that is going into making sure everything is taken care of while I am incapacitated. I don't know what I would do without them. My mom and my sister are going to help as much as they can, but they have their own lives to live, too. So, we are all very thankful that these ladies are helping us out.

I am tired of being in a place of need, though. Some people say that God makes things happen in our lives in order to teach us things, and He will keep bringing such situations into our lives until we learn what we need to learn. I don't believe that. We learn from it, or we don't. Perhaps I need to learn to be a good patient, and when I can, be a good caregiver.

I don't know. And now the baby's crying, and I have to go.

Legally Seperated, Divorce Pending

2009-10-11T22:29:00.004-04:00

For the last couple of years, I have felt very uncomfortable in the mainstream Christian church. I grew up in an Assembly of God church, where, "God's Word says it, I believe it, That settles it!" was a mantra of sorts, but nobody bothered to question if God's word was saying what we thought it was saying.

The Christianity I grew up with does not make sense to me anymore. It hasn't for a long time, but I am feeling that now more than ever. Perhaps because of ridiculous debates I've engaged in on Facebook, perhaps because it seems that, two years after my initial departure from the church, nothing has changed. The church-at-large has no more compassion or understanding for the world around it than it did two years ago, when I first began to feel that, perhaps, we were missing something by doing things as they have always been done.

"Missing something" is an understatement. The longer I am out of the mainstream, the more I see that there is some truth in what I recently heard a guest on The Rachel Maddow Show say. He wrote a book called "Crazy for God", describing his fundamental right-wing upbringing, his own actions on behalf of the right-wing agenda, and his eventual departure from it. This man said something along the lines of, "There is a village idiot in America, and it is the fundamental Christian church. They talk about being left behind. They have been left behind, by educational, technology, art, and science. So while they stand at the hillside and wait for the rapture, the rest of us are going to get on with our lives."

Harsh words, to be sure. I would not have phrased it in such terminology myself. Still, it does reflect some of what I am feeling as I try...oh, how I've tried...to get back into the...habit?...of going to church. Habit. Like smoking. Or checking and re-checking to make sure I've definitely got my keys when I leave the house. Or checking Twitter or Facebook a bizillion times a day, looking for conversation outside of what I have with my 9 month old son. Honestly, going to church feels a lot like any one of these habits. I don't smoke anymore, and don't want to take it up again. Sadly, I feel the same way about church.

Why is this? Simply put, it's because my time away from church has allowed me to explore points of view other than what I grew up with, and it has given me reason to question mainstream Christianity to such a degree that I honestly am not sure I can be a part of it anymore.

My points of view on other religions has changed. My points of view on homosexuality has changed. My points of view on how Christians have conducted themselves in the public arena has changed significantly, to the degree that I do not want to be associated with it.

Yet, as I write this with such tremendous conviction, I also write it with a lot of sadness and confusion. My parents are still part of the brand of Christianity I grew up with, and I am not sure where to draw the line with them insofar as what they discuss with my son. I have friends who are still part of that brand of Christianity, and I am not sure how to relate to them in a real and honest way, without offending them or appearing to challenge their heart for people.

Some of the conflict comes from the ridiculous debates regarding some hot button topics, and I see what I consider to be an abundance of ignorance, blatant attempts to twist my words to make me appear as though I support things that I most definitely do not, and so on. I need to stop engaging in such debates, but it is beyond my ability to fathom how people can behave and believe so horridly, and still claim that they are emulating Christ.

Another factor is that I am seeing a tremendous outpouring of love from another group of Christians, and I am humbled. These Christians hold beliefs that certainly are not mine, I do not even go to their church, yet they are doing something amazing for me and my son.

I am getting surgery this Wednesday that is going to require me to stay in the hospital for at least a couple of days, and will leave me unable to lift my son for about six weeks. Obviously, I am going to need some help. A friend of mine, who attends a fundamentalist church, did not hesitate to tell those at her church about my need, and they are making sure that I have the help I need. They are not asking anything of me, in the way of attending their church, asking me what I believe about this or that, etc. They are simply meeting a need, doing so out of love. I see Jesus in that.

So, I am torn. While I do not want to raise my son in an environment that would immerse him in the same toxins I grew up with, I cannot keep us hidden away from everyone else, either. I am kinda thinkin' we should be around other people, yet something in me bristles at the thought of him being indoctrinated as I was. My parents meant well, but I grew up hating church and all it stood for. I don't want that for my son.

What to do...

We Need Each Other

2009-10-08T02:09:00.005-04:00

(I first wrote this two years ago, and it was published in Christian Family Health. Unfortunately, it was published under the wrong name. In the Men's Health section... See blog entry "I Was Published...Sort of". The John Winthrop quote is newly added.)

We must delight in each other, make other's conditions our own, rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, our community as members of the same body.

-John Winthrop, first governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1630

It is amazing how one day can change everything. One day, life seems to be going well. It seems that life could not be any better, and everything you have worked for is in the palm of your hand. One day, you have the life you wanted, the life you hoped for, and it seems that nothing can take that away from you.

Sure, you realize that all sorts of things could potentially alter your reality. Still, you believe those are the things that happen to other people, and your life is safe. You never imagine that it is your life that is about to be turned upside down. You never think that you are the one who is about to go through something that is going to try you to your very core, and you are just going to hope you come out of it on your feet.

In April of 2007, I experienced just such a reality. After experiencing a series of unrelated symptoms, it was learned that I had renal carcinoid cancer. Due to other health problems, I would require surgery very shortly after my diagnosis.

As quickly as the diagnosis came, my world as I knew it fell apart. It was not the diagnosis of cancer that so disturbed me. There is a long history of cancer in my family, so the diagnosis did not come as any surprise to me. The reality that my whole life, the life that I had worked so hard for, was slipping through my fingers was the reality that hit me the hardest.

You see, before all of this...the hospital, the cancer, the surgery, the recovery...I had experienced many other heartaches and losses in my life. These were losses that challenged me over and over again to rise above the despair and live a full life.

It took every ounce of strength and determination I had to build a life for myself, and now, all of that was being swept away. I had no financial means to fall back on to see me through the recovery period. Everything I knew was about to change.

It was through this experience that I began to realize the importance and vitality of community. None of us belong wholly to ourselves. We are made to need God, and we are made to need each other. This became more real to me than ever before as the season of pain began to unfold in my life.

Throughout the months of recovery, I began to receive bills from the wonderful medical professionals who had helped save my life. While I had received donations of cash, gift cards, and so forth along the way, none of it was enough to meet my basic needs and pay my bills at the same time. I appreciated the help I was given, but I knew that more needed to be done.

We hear a lot of talk about community. We are encouraged to get involved in the communities we live in by doing volunteer work, attending high school events, becoming part of Rotary or Lions clubs. There are online communities such as MySpace and Facebook, allowing common bonds to be formed between people who may never actually meet face to face. We are encouraged to be part of this thing called community, but really, what’s the big deal? Why is community important?

As my journey continues, I continue to learn why community is so important.

As the bills started coming in, I realized I had no way to pay these bills. I could not ask my family for money. I had applied for assistance from the government, but was informed that it would take several months to reach a decision on my case, and I could not expect any funds anytime soon. Something had to happen, and fast. The bills were piling up.

I shared all of this with my community at Antioch Church, and no sooner was the need expressed than a plan of action began falling into place. Within two weeks of first mentioning the need to raise funds, the strategy and supplies were in place, along with people to move the operation forward. Coffee cans bearing my picture and a synopsis of my story began appearing in businesses around Elk Rapids, Bellaire, Rapid City, and Eastport.

We were about to be amazed by what God would do through a small community of believers who came together with a purpose. Within a few days of placing the first cans in Elk Rapids, about three hundred dollars had been raised. After placing the coffee cans around Bellaire, about four hundred dollars more would be raised. With the cans in Rapid City and Eastport, nearly $1000 dollars would be raised to put toward my bills.

That may not seem like a lot of money in light of what medical care costs these days. However, the truly amazing part is what God did beyond our efforts. It was as though God was waiting for us to come together as a community with purpose, and then He would move in ways that would surprise us all.

Within a week of placing the cans in Bellaire, I received a phone call from my caseworker at Michigan Department of Human Services, informing me that I would begin receiving Medicaid, and that the Medicaid would be made retroactive to June. This meant that the majority of my medical bills would be taken care of by the state, so the money raised from the coffee cans would be ample to cover whatever bills were left over.

Beyond this, I was also informed that I was deemed disabled, and would be receiving a retroactive check within the next couple of weeks, as well as monthly checks beginning in October. This came as a surprise, because I had been informed at the time of my application that a decision may not be made until October or November. Imagine my relief when the decision came so quickly. I knew it was something only God could do. God had clearly given me favor with the decision makers handling my case, and brought a quick resolution.

Just as my community shared my pain, they also shared my joy at this turn of events. I decided that no further fundraising efforts needed to be done at this time, as God has more than provided for my needs. God took the small effort of our little community, and multiplied it above and beyond what we were expecting.

As this season in my life continues, I continue to understand why God made us to live in community with each other. There are days when my thoughts are dark, my heart is sad, and I do not understand what all the suffering is for. There are days when life seems bleak, and I do not know if I can continue on, or if I even want to. It is in those moments that God reminds me that I do not belong wholly to myself. I belong to Him, and I belong to the community He has placed me in.

It is in this community that I can find hope when I feel that all hope is lost. Through this community, I find strength when my own strength has failed. We are made to need each other. All of life’s ups and downs are a shared experience, and when we cannot see the way clearly, God gives us a brother or a sister who can see for us. God speaks and moves through community in a way that He doesn’t often do when we are trying to fly solo.

I watch my three year old niece, and I see that she has a strong sense of what it means to belong in a community. She could not imagine life without her friends from daycare and preschool, or her family. She knows she does not belong wholly to herself, and she looks at the world around her with eyes that can see the miracle of the everyday.

When we are young, we do that. We can look at the world, and see the miracle of the sunrise every morning, the beauty of the rainfall, and we know with certainty that there is something of the eternal in those we love. We can feel God speaking to us through the world He created for us.
As we get older, we lose that sense of awe and wonder. Instead of being a source of delight, the world we live in becomes something to be analyzed, questioned, evaluated for purpose, etc. We begin to intellectualize even the most miraculous of events, whittling them down to text book cases of the unremarkable. We look at those around us, and cannot see the miracle of who Jesus is in them. We may see their shortcomings, we may see the things about them that irritate us or prevent us from achieving our own goals or desires, but we rarely see the miracle of who God is making them to be.

I am learning that it is in community with others that I can regain that sense of awe. The world seems a little sweeter when I can share it with others. People seem more beautiful, and I can watch in amazement as Jesus reveals more of Himself through my interactions with others. We are all getting through this life the best way we know how, and being in community with each other makes the burden a little lighter to carry. We can see God’s grace in each other as He expresses Himself through us.

In this season of my life, I am learning a lot about God’s grace expressed through others. God never promised us an easy road; He only promised we would never walk that road alone. He has promised to never leave us or forsake us, and part of His presence in my life rests in those in my community. It is through these vessels of grace, in this community of grace, that I see His hand move.

Flashbacks

2009-10-06T20:55:00.005-04:00

So, I was watching Dr. Phil today, and in the beginning of the show, they made a big deal about a family announcement they needed to make. It was determined that this family announcement was so huge that it required the presence of the whole McGraw family (Dr. Phil, Robin, their sons, and daughter-in-law), and I thought perhaps the rumors were true, and they were going to announce that their divorce proceedings had begun.

I was wrong. In one sense, I was relieved. If Dr. Phil and Robin can't make it, nobody can.

No, there was no divorce in store for Dr. Phil and Robin. Rather, his son, Jay, and his son's wife (my apologies, I do not recall her name) are expecting their first baby. This, of course, was cause for pride and celebration within the McGraw family, and it was something they wanted to share with the viewers.

Dr. Phil asked Jay to explain how they found out. I don't recall all of the details, but Jay's wife said that they had been on vacation in France and she had not been feeling well. She had been feeling nauseated, very tired, somewhat bloated, etc. She told her husband they needed to get a pregnancy test, and they both went walking all through town from store to store, desperately searching for what they needed in order to explain her fatigue and nausea.

I felt sad as I watched this, as memories of my own "pregnancy discovery" played in my mind. In the days before my pregnancy test confirmed what I already suspected, my home had been one of tension, and explosive anger on the part of my husband...not the blissful expectation described by the McGraw family.

I had been feeling sick for a long time, not having a day of feeling completely well since cancer treatments, surgery, numerous trips to the ER, and so forth, had been the highlight events during the last two years. However, now I was feeling more sick than usual, so when I received a phone call telling me that the ct scans my oncologist ordered showed there was something small growing in my uterus, I was not aglow with dreamy anticipation of motherhood. Rather, I was a little terrified, and wanted to know what that small thing was.

By the time the phone call came, I had figured out that my marriage was an abysmal failure. I was terrified of my husband, and rarely spoke to him unless I needed to, finding that even the most innocuous of things could set off a verbal tyrade. While my husband never raised a hand to me, the mental and emotional abuse he doled out was brutal, and he never let me forget that he was more than capable of killing me with one hit. Where he was once compassionate regarding my health issues, he made it a habit to verbally tear me apart for having health issues, calling me a drug addict because I needed medication to manage pain. By the time the small something had been found in my uterus, I did not feel safe sleeping in my own bed, and used over the counter medicine to help me sleep. My fear was so great, however, that I rarely slept even with that help. By the time the mass in my uterus showed up on the ct scan, I was afraid to breathe, lest I do it incorrectly. Raising a child with the monster I was married to was the furthest thing from my mind when I thought about our future together.

So, when the mass in my uterus showed up on the ct scan, I closed further and further into myself. Emotionally, I curled into a ball so I could contemplate all the implications of that mass, absorbing the emotional blows he dealt in the least damaging way possible.

As usual, he was angry with me for talking so little. In his anger, he sought to hurt me as deeply as he could, sharing with me many stories about an ex-girlfriend that he wished he could have worked things out with so they could still be together. He even shared with me about stories about his ex-wife, never failing to remind me that she was an excellent cook, had her masters degree, had a high paying job...all of which were the precise opposite of what I had to offer. He told me repeatedly that I am a lazy cook, I should be going to college (even though he didn't, and won't), and I should be making more money (even though I brought more money into the home than he did). In the days before my pregnancy test, I was terrified...terrified of raising a child with this monster I had so foolishly married.

Back to the McGraw's...When Jay's wife took the pregnancy test and it was positive, they took a sweet picture of the two of them smiling with pure exhileration, and holding up the pregnancy test. This was a truly happy moment that they both shared.

When I told my husband I wanted to take a pregnancy test, he laughed a smug laugh and told me I was pregnant. I told him I wanted to take a test, and he told me we couldn't afford to buy one. He came home the next day with beer and whisky, but we still couldn't afford a pregnancy test. My mom told me about a place that would give me a free pregnancy test, and I called my husband at work and told him that we could go on his lunch break. (I had my own car, but he made a habit of making up excuses why he couldn't drive his, and he needed to have mine. He would give it back to me when it was out of gas and I couldn't go anywhere, which was the case on this occasion.)

He told me we couldn't go, because he hadn't been planning on doing it and didn't bring a lunch. Then he said, "What's the rush? It's not like it's going anywhere."

Nice.

A couple of days later, he grudingly gave me money for the test. When I took the test and it came back positive, his response wasn't thrill or even the least bit of excitement. It was simply, "Good. Can I have my wife back now?"

I did go to the pregnancy care center to do another test, and of course, it was positive. I remember feeling devastated. The counselor talked with me a bit, asking me if my husband was happy about the baby. I said he was. Shame on me for lying.

I left him about two weeks later, and never went back.

Since then, it's been difficult for me to watch other couples happily celebrate bringing their child into the world. In fact, a friend of mine announced that he and his wife were expecting a baby, shortly before my son was born. On Facebook, they often posted sweet little things to each other, and it was so difficult for me to watch, I had to block the posts. It was so incredibly painful to see how things should have been, and then remember the hell I lived with.

I wonder if healing will ever come. I wonder if I will ever be able to look at happy couples without feeling jealous of their happiness. I wonder if I will ever be able to see a couple preparing to welcome their child into the world, without wondering why the hell I ended up with a man like my ex-husband, who didn't love me, and surely would not have loved our child. Even as I write about this now, I feel the tears ready to flow. I was not with my ex-husband very long. Our whole relationship, start to finish, was just over three months. I was a foolishly hopeful romantic when I met and, shortly thereafter, married my husband. Our marriage only lasted two months and one day before I left. Not long enough to build a lifetime of memories, thankfully. Still, the pain of broken dreams runs deep, and I wonder if the pain will ever stop.

There are many days when I feel the weight of being a single mother. I do not miss my ex-husband, and wouldn't invite him back into our lives for anything. Still, being a single mother is incredibly difficult, and there are many days when I wish I was not doing this alone. We weren't meant to raise our kids by ourselves. If nothing else, having someone doing this with me would mean that my entire day is not dominated by singing baby songs.

Perhaps I am feeling all of this so keenly because of the other circumstances in my life. With surgery coming up next week, I am working with my mom to coordinate care for Jaden while I am in the hospital, and to coordinate care for both of us after I come home. I won't be able to lift him for several weeks, which means I am going to need help with everything.

I feel angry as I think about it, because none of this would be happening if I had been more selective in my choice of a mate. Then again, had I chosen someone else, I might not have Jaden. Of course, I wouldn't know the difference, so that's a poor argument for justifying my ex's intrusion into my life.

Anyway, since my ex was part of my life, I feel angry that his response to my admission that I am terrified of him was, "Grow the fuck up and deal with it, or leave. I'm not going to change." While I appreciated his honesty, I often feel so angry that he made such a selfish choice.

I don't miss him. I just really hate this single mom gig, sometiemes. If I had someone doing this with me, I wouldn't have to find volunteers to take care of my son for me after surgery. If I wasn't doing this alone, we could probably get away with a couple of people bringing us a casserole now and then. I feel angry and cheated, and I want to stomp my feet like a four year old and yell that it's just not fair!

It is times like this that cause me to feel the depth of the loss that took place, not in losing my abusive husband, but in losing the dreams I used to have of living my life with someone who loved me, who would love our children, and who would work in partnership with me to give our family the best life we could possibly have. As it is, I am exhausted, and sometimes the best I can give my son is just to get the basics done during the day.

I hate days when I have strong flashbacks, like I've had all day today. I was supposed to go to Divorce Care tonight, but I was not feeling well physically, so I stayed home with my baby. I enjoyed the time with him, as I always do. Still, despite the joy, there is always that shadowy spectre of loss that hangs around in the back drop of my life, threatening to make its presence known during my most vulnerable moments.

Funny Jesus Pictures

2009-10-05T23:52:00.005-04:00

Everytime Jesus looks in the mirror, He is reminded that He is watching Himself, so He should always consider what He would do in any given situation. Then, He gets confused and blacks out all the mirrors.

I love a Lord with a sense of humor!

Hey, lookin' good!

Blessed

2009-10-05T23:39:00.002-04:00

This came from Rob Bell, via Twitter:

Blessed are those who don't have it all together.

Blessed are those who have run out of strength, ideas, will power, resolve, or energy.

Blessed are those who ache because of how severely out of whack the world is.

Blessed are those who stumble, trip, and fall in the same place again and again.

Blessed are those who on a regular basis have a dark day in which despair seems to be a step behind them wherever they go.

Blessed are you, for God is with you, God is on your side, God meets you in that place.

The gospel is the counterintuitive, joyous, exuberant news that Jesus brought the unending, limitless, stunning love of God to even us.

Banter

2009-10-03T16:25:00.001-04:00

This is from my Facebook page, but the overall ideas still apply:

As some of you may have noticed, I have some very strong opinions on some things that are happening in our country right now. There are decisions being made that are going to greatly impact all of us, no matter how Congress ultimately decides to proceed. We are dealing with things right now that should have been dealt with a long time ago, and there are strong opinions on both sides of these debates regarding what needs to be done.

I often post things that I know will ignite discussion, because I think we need to have a dialogue about these things and really examine why we think what we think, and if we are thinking for ourselves or letting someone else do our thinking for us.

I have one friend in particular that often debates with me about these subjects. We are each coming at things from very different places. I am decidedly more liberal than I was even one or two years ago, and abandoned portions of my conservative upbringing a long time ago. My friend is more conservative...much more...than I am, and approaches world issues from that perspective.

If you have ever read the "conversations" we have about these issues, each of us is passionate about our opinions of the matter at hand, and each of us presents what we believe are valid reasons for believing as we do. Our convictions are strong, and neither of us wavers much as our conversations go on.

These conversations can become heated, more often than not because it is so hard to judge the intention of someone's words simply by reading them. Also, as the conversations develop and it's clear that neither of us is budging, I think it's easy to pull out all the stops and give the most heavy hitting arguments for our positions, perhaps hoping to punch a gaping hole in the other's rationale.

Sometimes, even after the conversations have wrapped, I feel frustrated just reading the threads!

As I read them, though, I find something else. When each of us had made our case, and had time to simmer down and really attempt to understand the other's point of view, the one thing that becomes clear is that we're both working on reaching the same goal. While we may not agree at all about the methodology, the outcome each of us hopes for is to make the world a better place to be in by showing people love, unconditionally. We are both mothers who love our children and want to make the world the best place it can possibly be for them. We each understand that there is a world of people who are hurting and in need, and while we can't seem to agree on precisely how to handle that, we both understand that something has to be done. People cannot be left to suffer.

I also notice that we don't resort to tactics often used by the political pundits on several media outlets, which is to call names, condescend to those on the other side of the debate, and mock those whose ideas oppose our own. Our conversations remain respectful, with a sincere desire to understand the opposing view, even if we don't agree with it.

(Before anyone says it, yes, I do enjoy watching those pundits. I just think those tactics are best left for television or radio, as a form of entertainment of sorts.)

This makes me wonder what would happen if we, collectively, could put aside our political differences, religious differences, personal differences, and so forth, how much more could we accomplish to alleviate the suffering in the world around us? Whether we are looking at the immediate world around us, in our own home towns, or looking across the ocean to places in Africa, Indonesia, etc...people are hurting. People are dying when they could survive if they could get the help they needed. Women and children are being targeted for assault and exploitation to a degree we've never seen before. If we could put aside all the crap that divides us, what could we accomplish?

Perhaps that's idealistic. Maybe not, though. We don't have to change the whole world, just our own neighborhoods. We can manage that.

Thanks, Maurine, for helping me to see that the answers don't lie in an "us and them" mentality, but in the understanding that we're all in this together. We have to coexist, no matter what our differences are, so we may as well find a way to do it peacefully and productively. Our conversations get fiery and feisty, but have given me a lot of insight. Thanks!

Elizabeth Esther's Saturday Evening Blog Post, Vol. 2

2009-10-03T09:12:00.002-04:00

Elizabeth Esther (http://www.elizabethesther.com) has a great idea to encourage the readers of her blog to share their own blogs: Pick one post from your blog, and post a link to it for other readers. This gives us all an opporutunity to learn more about each other, and to invite others to our blog by picking one of our favorite posts to demonstrate our flash blogging skills. :)

I chose the post "The Success of Failure". This post was written out of a bit of pain, and the struggle to see my life not as a series of failures, but as a series of life saying to me, "No, this isn't where you are supposed to be, so I'm closing this door so you are free to explore other things."

Hmm...Adopting that kind of logic is easier said than done, when we live in a world that doesn't like to admit that the road we traveled turned out to be the wrong road. We don't like to call it an inviitation to try a different road. We like to call it failure.

Which is interesting, because our society has come to value science so highly that we almost refuse to believe anything that doesn't have some sort of scientfic support. In science, if an experiement fails, the scientists don't look at it as an abysmal failure. They see it as an indication that they need to try something else in order to achieve the result they are looking for. Furthermore, they look at the outcome of the "failed" experiment, glean from it what they can in terms of new information, and take another go at things utilizing what they learned from the "failed" experiment.

Yet, in life, in our science-dependent culture, we see our failures as a reason to crumple into a self-loathing heap and sulk for awhile. Could you imagine if the scientists who were working on effective cancer treatments would have done that? "Well, we didn't achieve the results we were hoping for. We're useless. Stupid. Probably too stupid to every get this figured out. We were so foolish to think we could ever do this..."

Seems silly, doesn't it? Yet, this is what I...and many, many others...do when we encounter a failure in our lives.

So, let's stop calling it failure. Let's call it...well, I have no succinct term for it, but let's think of it as an experiment that didn't yield the results we were hoping for, but taught us a lot about where we need to go from here.

Namaste

2009-10-03T01:09:00.003-04:00

My conservative friend and I wrapped up our latest Facebook debate today, concluding that we are each passionate about our own positions, neither one of us is entirely understanding each other's point of view, and we have rehashed it over and over again and it's time to let it go.

By the way, this debate was in regard to the Christians who were "witnessing" to the Muslims who had gathered in Washington D.C. for a day of prayer and unity, with the purpose being to express the beauty and diversity of Islam in the United States. It was a peaceful gathering, which brought approximately 3,000 Muslims to our nation's capitol.

It also brought out several Christians who carried signs that urged th Muslims to repent, turn to Jesus, and so on. At one point, the Christians were praying so loudly that they were asked to quiet down so the Muslim's prayer service could continue without distraction.

You can read the whole story here: Muslims Gather at Capitol for a Day of Prayer and Unity.

I thought the Christians were out of line for being there at all, and "witnessing" at such a gathering was completely inappropriate. In my opinion, it was disrespectful of the Muslim's beliefs and traditions, and was abolutely boorish. I argued that Christians are notorious for such actions, and that is why we have the reputation we do in the media of being disprespectful, pushy with our beliefs, uneducated, lacking in savvy and decorum in how we relate to the world around us...as one guest on the Rachel Maddow Show recently said, in the eyes of the world, "there is a village idiot in the United States, and it is the Christian fundamentalists."

I am not comfortable with Christians having this reputation in the eyes of the world, but I do not buy the opinion of ClusterFox News and its die-hard fans that says there is "an elite liberal media" that is biased against Christians, and intentionally portray us in a bad light. I think the reality is that we portray ourselves that way, and the media just films it.

Her argument was that the Christians were fulfilling Jesus' commandment to preach the gospel, and they were there to show the love of Jesus by telling the Muslims about their need for salvation. She argued that since they had gathered in a public place, it was not an issue that the Christians also chose to be there, with their signs and verbal shouts of "repent!" and so on. She said that the reason it was offensive to people is not because the behavior is wrong, but because they are resisting salvation.

Our dialogue on the issue went back and forth for two days, becoming rather heated at times, and finally ending with an impasse of ideologies.

To be honest, I was upset with the way the conversation ended. We were civil to each other, and mutually concluded that it was time to wrap it up. However, I was upset because I did not understand who someone could completely miss my point, and defend the tactics used by the conservative Christians during the event in D.C., and many other events that also portrayed Christians in such a poor light. I did not see how someone could be so foolish in believing that those tactics had any merit at all.

So, our dialogue ended this morning, and now that I've had some time to simmer down and see the heart of her convictions, I can see that her intentions are pure, and she has a heart that loves the world. Her expression of that doesn't look like mine, not even a little bit, but that doesn't change its sincerity.

We are all so much more alike than we are different. If we could listen to each other and find that common ground, imagine how much more we could accomplish in trying to make the world a better place.

I will never be one to carry a sign reading "REPENT" or anything of the sort, believing that someone reading will see the love of Jesus in my sign, or hear it in my shouts of "YOU'RE ON YOUR WAY TO HELL! TURN OR BURN!", and so on. It will always be difficult for me to be understanding and tolerant of Christians who choose to use that sort of tactic to demonstrate the love of Jesus to the world. I do not see love in it, so I don't understand the logic behind it. The conservative Christian movement that is going on in the United States right now is making all followers of Christ look foolish, and I tend to distance myself from it as much as possible.

That said, I think we are all coming from a place of wanting to make the world around us a better place, and we are each finding our own way of doing that. It won't look the same, nor should it. God created an amazing diversity among people. We each understand God in our own unique way, therefore we each have a different belief on what our expression of him should look like. It is not my place to pass judment on those who do not do things the way I think they need to be done.

In order to maintain peace, the divine in me must recognize and honor the divine in them, trusting that God--the Divine from whom we both seek guidance and whom we both seek to honor--will raise the banner of love and truth, no matter how much we may mess up the delivery of the message.

A little somethin' I wrote...

2009-10-02T19:02:00.001-04:00

I wrote this article, published in the online magazine, MomStyle News. I hope you enjoy it: They Don't Tell You This in the Books

Whosoever, My Transforming Faith, and This Very Long Blog Post

2009-10-02T01:44:00.014-04:00

I was raised in a politically conservative but spiritually charismatic church. Three times a week, my family and I attended an Assembly of God church that dealt harshly with sin, encouraged everyone to pass out tracts to everyone they saw so we could hopefully lead them to Christ through the artistry and imagery of the ubiquitous Chick Tract. The youth of the church participated in events that allowed us to pass out tracts to hundreds of people throughout the day, and attempt to mask our dismay when we found those same tracts in the gutters or in the garbage bins hours later. Our church had a mime team, as every good church did at the time. Our church rallied against the "gay agenda", showing videos of gay pride parades that featured the most lascivious acts displayed in the parade, claiming these things were an example of what every gay person in America wanted the right to do at any place, any time, with anyone--gay or not--and we had to put a stop to it before they corrupted our children, and possibly ourselves.

Our church rallied against abortion, referring to it as murder, calling the women and doctors who did it "murderers" and "killers". Our church passed out little plastic babies that represented an 8 week old unborn baby, along with a fact sheet about the development of that baby. For the record, I am pro-life, but I do not think protesting outside of abortion clinics is the way to give women in difficult situations hope that they have viable options available to them that do not include abortion.

Anyway, my point is that I grew up in a very conservative church, and grew up believing that the only political party that could do anything right was the Republican party, and the only people who knew what was right for the world were Christians, and it was our job to persuade everyone around us to be like us so we could make the world a holier place.

As I grew up, certain parts of my belief system didn't fit well anymore, but I still carried them around with me like they were old clothes I didn't like and never wore anymore, but couldn't get rid of, just in case I wanted to wear them again someday.

Over the last couple of years, my faith has gone through a transformation. Many events in my life lead to this, including cancer, addiction, a horrible marriage, a seperation from my abusive husband. Consequently, I had to go through my pregnancy alone and rather terrified that he would surface in my life when I gave birth to the child he threatened to take from me. I divorced my husband, and he never contested it or my request for sole custody of my son. Our divorce was finalized in March of this year. Now, I am a single mother, learning all the ups and downs of raising a child alone. I have not seen my husband in a year and a half, and he's never met my son.

In all of this, I have had to evaluate the faith I grew up with, and the God I thought I knew. I grew up believing that God really didn't like me all that much, and if I didn't do exactly as He said, when He said it, then I was toast. When I was first diagnosed with cancer, I thought of all the things I had done that more than likely upset God, and this was His way of letting me know. I was further convinced of this when my illness left me unable to work, thus unable to afford my apartment, therefore requiring me to move in with my family. Again.

As bad became worse, I was ever more convinced that there must have been something horrible in my heart that God needed to change, and the only way He could do that was to put me through this bit of hell on earth. I even told people that I believed He had to tear me down so He could rebuild me as He needed me to be. Sadly, people were inspired by this. I'm not sure what they were inspired to do, but they told me they were inspired.

At any rate, during all of this, I began to explore other ideas on faith through writers who were definitely not going to be on the Assembly of God's "required reading" list, but who were decidedly Christian. Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller was the first book I read, after which I thought, "Hmm. So, I am not the only one wondering how faith is relevant and where it fits in this world. Cool."

After that came Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell. After I read this book, I thought that it was a pretty novel idea to tell people that maybe, up to this point, their image of God was all wrong, and God wasn't angry and hateful toward us...He actually loved us. Not the obligatory love that He has to have because He's God and He made us, so He has to love us. No, the kind of love you have for your friends. Your best friends. Your closest, most intimate friends. He loves you like that. And, He likes you, too.

Wow. This was new information.

Somewhere along the line, I started reading Anne Lamott's books. I adored her honesty about her insecurities about herself, her faith, her relationships...I felt as though I was reading my own journals. She had a sense of humor that was, at times, irreverant but still very much on point. She possesses a healthy mix of cynicism and wonder at the world God has given us.

My friend, Craig, often told me that she reminded him of me. It was a sort of foreshadowing, I think. Like Anne, I would give birth to a son, without the benefit of having a partner to raise that son with. She was 35, I believe, when Sam was born. I was 33 when Jaden was born. One of the first books recommended to me after he was born was Anne's book Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year. As I read the book, I once again identified with the sentiments, experiences, feelings, and realities of being a single mom experiencing the amazing joy of my son's first year of life. I laughed and cried, and, for the first time in my life, felt the twin fears of something happening to my son that would leave me alone in the world, or something happening to me that could possibly leave him in his father's custody. Nothing in this world terrifies me more than those two things, particularly the idea of my sweet son being subjected to his father's abuse if I were not here to protect him.

But, I digress.

The common thread among all of these authors is that these people have an undoubtedly strong relationship with Christ, but are not confined to the list of rules, fears, and self-loathing-driven kind of faith I had grown up with. These people had tapped into something that I think had been missing in my faith. They had tapped into one thing that I had never been told as I grew up: Love wins.

Surprisingly, this is an idea that people in the mainstream Christian church seem to fear. There aren't enough rules. There aren't enough threats. It is too permissive and liberal to say that the key ingredient in our relationship with God, and in our relationship with the world around us, is love. Not judgment. Not the arrogant belief that we were right and had to make everyone else believe as we do, and if they didn't agree with us it is because they hate us and want to control us with their own evil agenda. Not rules. Not signs protesting gay marriage, abortion, the use of "happy holidays" instead of "merry Christmas", etc.

Love.

Now, among all of the authors mentioned, their interpretation of it looks a bit different, and their beliefs certainly do not meet at certain points. Still, the one common theme I found in all of their books was that God loves us unconditionally, and we need to love others the same way. No matter what race, creed, religion, gender, or sexual orientation, we needed to show love.

Why is this part of the Bible so easily forgotten, in favor of the more regimental teachings of Paul?

As my faith has morphed, so have my politial beliefs. I have been reading a lot more of what "the elite liberal media" has to say about things, and I have to tell you...the way Christians have chosen to relate to the world is not making a good impression. Now, Christians will say that this is because we talk about Jesus, and for those who do not know Jesus and are rebelling against Him, our message seems foolish and it is going to ruffle feathers.

No. I'm sorry, but no. The truth is that the way Christians have chosen to relate to the world has been very condescending, at times hateful, not very loving, rather judgmental, and, far too often, just stupid looking.

That is why we look like fools in the media. It's not a liberal conspiracy.

Anyway, tonight, I was clicking around through political stories, and I saw something that intrigued me. I don't remember the headline, but it referred to an online community for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered Christians. Always interested in reading different points of view, I visited the site.

It's a beautiful site called Whosoever. The theme throughout the site was that, despite the hate and marginalization these people received, they must always respond with the love that Christ demonstrated to those who persecuted them. No matter what opposition they were met with as they lived their lives, as Christians, they must always respond with love.

I was intrigued, and wanted to read their thoughts on what the Bible says about homosexuality. For a long time, I have had a difficult time reconciling the unconditional love of God with the alleged hate He has reserved for homosexual behavior, so disgusted by it that He would turn them over to a depraved mind and physical destruction through disease. That never made sense to me. I never understood why God would condemn someone for living out a life that they believe they were born into. With as much as homosexuals suffer within our society, I always thought it was silly to say someone "chooses" to be gay. Why would someone choose to be part of the most marginalized, hated, violently opposed, mocked segment of our society? WHO WOULD CHOOSE THAT???

So, I was especially interested in reading some of the letters from readers, particularly one that asked for an explanation of the passages in Leviticus that seemed to condemn homosexuality. The letter was answered by a reverend who had extensive knowledge of Biblical history, context, language, etc. Here is the letter, and the response.

Rev. Turner:

I do not by any means claim to be a scholar when it comes to the Bible. I fell upon this Web site while I was trying to learn more about the Bible.

I come to you to pose a question, not to arouse an argument. I was very curious to understand your point of view on the law of sexual morality that states, "A man should not lie with a man as he lies with a woman. It is an abomination." Leviticus 18:22.

Now, again, I do not claim to understand the true meaning of this, but it sounds pretty clearly to be in regard to homosexuality. This is in the same passage that states man should not sleep with animals or their daughters, not that I am comparing homosexuality to pedophiles, but I am really wondering if I should. The language in the Bible does not become bold or harsh when discussing children or animals, and it does not become meek when discussing homosexuality.

I would really love to have a response back from you. I would really like to have a complete understanding of the Bible and as a pastor, you certainly do have much more knowledge on the subject. Please respond. Again, this email is not to insult, just to understand.

Thanks for your time,
Brandy

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Brandy,

I do not take your questions as an insult, as it seems to me you are trying very hard to understand the issues. My dear child of God, let me give you a several of answers from writings, notes, teachings and my own thoughts over the years of ministry.

In Leviticus 18:22 it is written: "Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable." (NIV) That in face does seem very clear. But look at the surrounding context, and something else comes to light in this verse. Leviticus 18:6-18 deals with having sexual relations with relatives. Verse 19 says a man shall not have sexual relations with a woman during the "uncleanness of her monthly period." (How many of today's Christians actually obey this?) Verse 20 condemns having sexual relations with another man's wife.

Then, verse 21 changes directions and begins a sermon-like discourse on sexual relations that are associated with the worship of Molech. Molech, like many false gods of the day, had temple prostitutes, and Molech's followers believed that having sex of any kind in the temple would please Molech and increase the fertility of themselves, their spouses, their livestock, and their fields. Verse 21 mentions the sacrifice of children to Molech. Verse 22 should more accurately read "Do not have sex with the male temple prostitutes," which would continue the admonition in idolatry. In fact, the entire Chapter is about idolatry. Consider Chapters 17 and 19, which both speak of idolatry. Why would a writing about sex be inserted here out of the blue in between two chapters on idolatry unless it also is meant to address idolatry? If we look at Chapter 18 as a whole, and verse 22 in context to the whole chapter, then this verse must speak of idolatry and false worship in some manner. Therefore, it is not a blanket condemnation of homosexuality, but rather a condemnation of the sexual promiscuity of the many idol-worshipping sects in the land the Israelites were coming into.

If you hold Leviticus' statements as being a blanket condemnation of homosexuality, do you also obey the rest of the old law? It is written: "For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it [all of the law]" (James 2:10). So a person who adheres to the law must adhere to the whole law, which is contained in the whole of Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. Those three books contain the core of God's laws.

So let's look at some of those laws:

If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay at home and bring happiness to the wife he has married. (Deut. 24:5)

Does anyone keep this law? Could you manage a whole year without a paycheck?

The war effort in Iraq might have a problem when a soldier comes up to his commander and says, "Sorry, sir, but my wife is pregnant and the book of Deuteronomy demands that I go home for a whole year now." Any man whose wife becomes pregnant is here told that he must stay home for a year without working or else he is guilty of breaking the law!

Do not hate your brother in your heart. (Lev. 19:17)

Don't hate your siblings, even while growing up, or else you have broken the entirety of the law.

Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard. (Lev 19:27)

Don't shave! Ever!

Rise in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God. I am the LORD. (Lev 19:32)

If you do not stand in the presence of your elders, or get rude or disrespectful with someone older than you, you have broken the law.

No one born of a forbidden marriage nor any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, even down to the tenth generation. (Deut. 23:2)

So no one who has been born out of wedlock or born from a marriage that was not approved of may enter a church, nor may any of his or her descendants for ten whole generations after. Who checks this? Who would know? How could this one ever be kept?

This is where it becomes more interesting:

If anyone curses his father or mother, he must be put to death. He has cursed his father or mother, and his blood will be on his own head. If a man commits adultery with another man's wife -- with the wife of his neighbor -- both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death. (Lev. 20:9-10)

Anyone who talks back to their parents must be killed for it according to the law!

Anyone caught in adultery must be put to death also! It is in the law!

Yet it seems Jesus attempted to change the understanding of the law as he practiced his ministry on earth. In John 8:3-11 we see Jesus show what law we are truly under:

"The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?' They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing Him.

But Jesus bent over and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, 'If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.' Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, 'Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?'

'No one, sir,' she said.

'Then neither do I condemn you,' (my italics to point out she was in fact guilty but...) Jesus declared. 'Go now and leave your life of sin.'"

In this Jesus shows us that the law saves no one; all are guilty of breaking the law of Moses. The fact of the matter is simple: nowhere does Christ Himself say anything against homosexuality. He speaks of the Ten Commandments, lifting the Sabbath commandment, as it had become a yoke upon the people. Consider Matthew 22:36-40:

"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

So while the verse you mention and ask about appears to be devastating to gay folks, it really has nothing to do with gay people as we know them today. Further, to take this one verse or law and ignore all the rest seems just a bit hypocritical don't you think?

Finally I would refer you to this page of the Whosoever website that deal with homosexuality and the Bible.You'll find an abundance of information and links to help you in your further studies and understanding of this issue.

God Bless,

Pastor Paul

I found this a very intelligent and informative response. If we are to condemn people for not following one portion of the Law, must we not also condemn people...ourselves included...for not following all of it? We don't do that, and the reason we don't is because we took it in context and realized it wasn't relevant to our modern life. For whatever reason, the only portion of the Leviticus text that mainstream Christian churches seem to think still applies is the part about the condemnation of homosexuality.

Interesting.

Makes me wonder what else is a little out of whack regarding what I've been taught over the years...

Right On

2009-10-01T10:40:00.001-04:00

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Other than hyperbolic language in his apology, I think he is right on. This is exactly what Americans are being offered, if the health care reform doesn't go through.

Propoganda and Health Care Reform

2009-09-30T02:26:00.004-04:00

I was stunned, and deeply saddened, when I heard that the public option died in the finance commitee today. I was saddened because the driving force behind that decision was not the senators in the room, but the fear-mongering media whores on Fox News who have whipped the gullible sector of America into a frenzy, prompting them to ask their senators to vote against the public option.

I am saddened by this because the primary reason these pundits want to defeat the health care reform bill is not because they do not see the need for reform. It is because they want President Obama to fail, and they will do what they can to make that happen, at all costs. Perhaps the biggest talking head in their camp is Rush Limbaugh, and he made it very clear when President Obama took office that he hopes that Obama fails.

Why?

They will say it's not a race issue. Perhaps Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and many of the other talking heads in the right-wing are not overtly racist (though they come darn close to being so), but they are not unaware that many of their most avid followers are decidedly racist. Their entire campaign against President Obama has been one that plays on the fears of their followers, and one of those fears is certainly about the implications of having an african-american man for our president.

Knowing what I know of the ultra-conservatives, I was deeply concerned for Obama's safety as he took office. I remain concerned, because the hateful, intentionally deceptive, anti-Obama reporting continues to gain steam, and people continue to drink the ClusterFox Kool-Aid. The type of reporting done on Fox News is not about reporting the news at all, but it is about being a political machine for the conservatives, another tool used to achieve their agenda. They are not oblivious to the fact that most of their audience is comprised of people who do not check facts (let's be honest here), and will take what they say as being fact simply because it was Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, or one of the other talking heads that said it.

There are many examples I could use to make this point, but I will use the most recent "outrage" regarding the alleged "indoctrination" of our school children. In classic Fixed News fashion, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Fox and Friends, and all of the news actors on the channel, joined in a conversation that whipped up the fury of their followers.

The clip I am showing here included how ClusterFox reported the "outrage", and the MSNBC commentary from "Countdown With Keith Olberman", which exposes the outrage for what it really is.

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As far as I know, ClusterFox has never issued a retraction of their "news", and they never will. If confronted with the truth, they will likely tell their viewers and listeners that the real story is just being covered up by the elite liberal media, because the media is in love with Obama and don't want you to know that he is indoctrinating your children. Then, in classic form, they will find another scrap of video to prove their point...never telling you the truth about that clip, either.

I am deeply concerned about the future of a nation when a large part of its populace prefers to believe a lie simply because it's told by a charismatic person, rather than accept the facts even if they oppose the charming person who lied to you. In recent conversations with staunch conservatives, regarding everything from health care reform to why the hell Christians felt the need to demonstrate at a sacred gathering of Muslims in Washington D.C., it is very clear that the facts are of little concern to the conservative "movement", and it is far more preferable just to believe the talking heads. What happens to a nation when the facts come to mean nothing? What happens to a nation that has been taught to distrust everyone except for the handful of people who spoon-feed you the only news they tell you that you can believe?

Sadly, it's a trend that is stirring people into fury, and the fury is not dying down regardless of the lies that are exposed. People are following ClusterFox and all the right-wing talking heads without question, and become hostile when the truth is presented to them. It's getting scary.

I think we've seen elements of this media manipulation before. It happened in Germany awhile back. What was that called again? Oh yeah...the Third Reich.

And they want you to believe that Obama is Hitleresque...

Here is something to consider: Part of Nazi Germany's regime was to rid Germany of the "useless eaters"...those who, due to illness, race, handicap, etc...are not deemed worthy of living because they do not contribute anything to society.

Now, if health care reform does not go through, who does that impact the most? It impacts the poor in the United States, who suffer and die due to lack of health care. Being that the "think tanks" that are spinning the lies about why health care reform would be so dangerous to our society, are actually groups of people with corporate interests and get big fat checks from those corporations, is it too big a leap to say that these "think tanks" that are perpetuating the lies about health care reform have little or no concern for the "useless eaters" who die every year due to lack of health care? After all, what does a poor person without health insurance, who possibly suffers from recurring health issues, contribute to our fine nation?

Who is looking more like Hitler here? As the "death panels" that Obama was accused of including in the bill have been shown to be a trumped up lie designed to misinform the public, it would appear that those who are so furiously opposing health care reform are actually the ones who are dictating who lives and who dies in this country, by withholding access to health care from those who do not qualify for programs that already exist, and cannot afford to buy private insurance.

Once again, conservatives...wake up! You are being lied to. Stop being a mouthpiece for the pundits, because when all is said and done, you are just playing into their hand, and they will throw you under the bus, too, if it serves their best interests. Think for yourself. Don't let them play on your fears.

Follow the...logic?....

2009-09-28T11:59:00.003-04:00

There are times when I can't find it within myself to be kind to people whose logic not only does not make sense to me, but actually seems rather idiotic.

Over the last couple of years, I have gradually abandoned my politically conservative upbringing in favor of a decidedly more liberal point of view. I am pro-life, but I understand the need for choice. I am not going to campaign against gay marriage. I am anti-"Blood for Oil"-war. I am a big fan of protecting the environment. I think we should be kind to animals.

I could go on and on, but I think you may get the point. Of late, my most grevious sin against my conservative upbringing is that I am in favor of health care reform. Or, in the conservative camp, the government conspiracy to keep you sick and kill your grandmother through use of the flu vaccine.

Anyway, in discussing this issue with some of my conservative acquaintences, I have suggested that health care reform is a pro-life issue. I have shared my own experiences in working with a non-profit that helps the uninsured gain access to health care, and many of these experiences involve people who would have died if we were not able to get them treatment for their medical conditions. In my own life, I have faced serious illness without the benefit of health insurance that would allow me to get treatment in a timely manner, thus making the treatment I eventually received (once Medicaid kicked in) much more complicated than it needed to be.

So, I presented that the health care reform that is needed is as much a pro-life issue as it is an issue of anything else. As you might expect, this resulted in quite a backlash from the pro-life crowd. The logic is that the gift of life is FREE, therefore worthy of protecting. Health care that the person might need after they are born is not free, therefore it is not a right and it is not owed to anyone, even though it may go a long way in prolonging life.

If I am understanding the reasoning correctly, it can be summed up like this: Being conceived gives a person the right to live. However, once out of the uterus, nobody owes that person health care, even if the lack of health care costs them their life.

This doesn't make sense to me. Is life sacred only when it exists within the confines of the uterus? After a child is born, are they suddenly expendable? Children can often get health insurance through the state, but after they turn 19, they are on their own. So, is it that life IS sacred outside the womb, but only for the first 19 years?

I am trying to understand. Try as I may, though, I can't wrap my mind around the thinking. Health care reform is a pro-life issue, and I don't understand why American Family Association and other groups of the sort are not rallying behind it. Even if they cannot adopt Obama's plan, reform of SOME kind needs to happen.

Every 12 minutes, someone in the U.S. dies due to lack of health care. The conservative fired back that, every 22 seconds, a baby dies at the hand of their mother and a doctor through abortion. I didn't see how either fact validated the other. I think the conservative was saying that we can deal with health care reform once we have dealt with Roe V Wade. I'm not sure, though.

This only further fuels my growing dislike for conservative politics, and it is becoming more and more difficult for me to seperate a person from their politics. When I see someone responding so coldly to the fact that over 100,000 people in the U.S. die every year for lack of health care, it causes me to question their heart entirely.

When supporting an ideology becomes more important than accepting fact as fact, it concerns me. This same acquaintance and I have had several discussions about health care, during which I have presented several statistics about the dire situation in our country. The response is typically something along the lines, "Oh, there we go with the statistics", followed by calling those who gathered the stats "greedy liars". I am deeply concerned about what this means for the future of our country, since this individual and others of the same mindset seem to insist on breeding.

When a large segment of people in a nation blatantly refuse to accept fact, and would rather believe outright lies, such as those told on Fox News...what is the future of that nation? When Glenn Beck becomes the bastion of honor and integrity to a large segment of the voting populace, does our nation have any real hope?

I don't understand the logic of those who are passionately pro-life, and just as passionately (and, ignorantly, in my opinion) anti-reform.

A friend of mine suggested I stop talking about the issue with those who can't see reason and at least consider the other side of the debate. I suppose he is right.

The Rachel Maddow Show had a guest recently who wrote a book called "Crazy for God", about his journey out of the fundamental Christianity he grew up with, and into a relationship with God that did not require him to check his brain at the door. He commented that there is a village idiot in the United States, and it is the fundamental Christians who have been "left behind" by science, education, technology, the arts, etc., and are just waiting to die or to be raptured so life can be good.

I'm paraphrasing, of course, but that's the gist of it. While I would not have been so bold as to use the terms he used, I can't deny that I think he's on to something. The more I see of this health care reform debate, the more I am convinced that I can no longer identify with conservatives, and I have to question their heart, their motives, and at times, their intellect, the more I see them attempt to defend their position.

It's almost that time again...

2009-09-27T00:06:00.003-04:00

This Halloween will be my son's first, and as with all firsts, I want it to be special. Not that he will care, he'll only be 10 months old, but I'll care. As his mother, it is my responsibility to make sure I have at least one photo album full of cute and/or embarrassing childhood photos by the time he is old enough to know that it's not good for mom to have a photo album of embarrassing photos of him. I distinctly remember finding my mom's stash of photos, and hiding many of them so she could not show them to her friends, or, worse, my friends. I want Jaden to have that same privilege.

Anyway, the time is fast approaching when churches that refuse to celebrate Halloween will have "harvest parties", inviting the little children to come to the event dressed up in costumes, get loads of candy, play games, and do a lot of other Halloweenesque activities. I guess it is okay to celebrate in essentially the same way, as long as you don't call it Halloween.

I grew up in an Assembly of God church, and the Halloween alternative at our church was called "Hallelujah Night". I never saw a marked difference between Hallelujah Night and other Halloween events, and it seemed silly to me. My parents, however, thought it was the holiest option, and I remember very clearly one Halloween when my mother held nothing back when I told her I wanted to go trick-or-treating.

"Don't you know that there are people sacrificing babies on this night? Don't you know that going trick-or-treating gives power to Satan, and that Satanists celebrate that power by sacrificing animals and children?"

The tyrade went on and on. You see, prior to rolling out the Hallelujah Night idea, our church had spent several weeks educating us on all of the satanic activity that happens in our area. A police officer, whose stories were always shared second or third hand, stated that there were several hot spots in our neighborhood which became abuzz with activity on Halloween night. During our education, we were told in graphic detail exactly what happens when a child or animal is sacrificed, and we were clued in on what signs to look for if we suspected a satanic group had been performing sacrifices in any of our nearby forests.

One of the signs was diapers. So, every time I saw a diaper that had been tossed out somewhere, I assumed it was somehow linked to satanic activity. That made for a traumatic adolesence, if you know anything about the highways and byways of rural northern Michigan. Dirty diapers that didn't make it to the trash can, can be found just about anywhere.

We were also educated on the many satanic symbols we should be looking for among our peers and coworkers, to tip us off if they were involved in satanic practices. I remember one time I drew all the symbols on a piece of loose leaf paper, and gave them to a substitute teacher. I don't think that's what we were supposed to do with them.

My point is, I was freaked out by the things I was being told about the world around me. The ugly truths I was being told about Halloween paled only in comparison to the shocking documentary-style movie my parents took me to at the tender age of 6, in which all of the horrors of the lifestyles of the heavy metal rock and rollers was shared in gory detail. We went to a Baptist church to see that one, and the images were so violent, I remember my dad had to take me outside for the rest of the film. I asked him why the police didn't stop those men in the film from hurting people, since one of them had just threatened to beat up my dad and rape my mom.

I'm not sure that the film was meant for a 6 year old.

I grew up in an environment that told me that the world around me was one to be feared, and the only way to be safe was to avoid it at all costs. We burned secular music. Many of the people in my church did not watch television. I remember reading "Sybil" when I was in tenth grade, and my youth pastor told me he would pray over me so the spirits in the book didn't start oppressing me.

Years later, when I really did end up in a psychiatric hospital due to major depression, I was asked by this same pastor what sin was in my life that would have caused me to end up there. I'm sure he was thinking back to "Sybil". Meanwhile, I was feeling depressed, and now, very guilty.

After I left my Assembly of God upbringing, the trendy thing became to have a yearly Halloween production of "Heaven's Gates, Hell's Flames", which people were told to invite their unsaved friends to. I have never seen the show live, but from the bits I have seen online, I gather that the idea is to get people to come to Christ by making them scared shitless not to.

I'm not sure that's the approach Christ would prefer we use.

Something about this upcoming time of year causes many of these memories to surface. I grew up believing that God cared about us enough to send Jesus for us, but beyond that, He pretty much couldn't stand us. I grew up believing that God looked for reasons to punish me, and I not only needed to fear screwing up in the world outside -- maybe by inadvertantly participating in satanic activity--but I also needed to fear the world inside my own mind and spirit, lest I fall into a sin as egregious as depression.

As the fall celebrations give way to the big moneymaker, Christmas, claims staked by the church-at-large become even more glaring. If you're going to mention the holiday, it better be by way of a "Merry Christmas". Don't pull me into your "happy holidays", inclusive, ecumenical, Christ-hating greetings. And if your store sells cards that contain any such greetings, I won't shop there.

Actually, I don't really care how you greet me, as long as it's kind. I think I'm "supposed" to care, though, or my salvation may be questionable.

I have a friend that I walk with, and on our walks, we usually end up talking about churchy things. She attends a church very similar to the one I grew up in, and still believes much of what I have abandoned. We were discussing the economy and the bleak job market in northern Michigan, and somehow we moved to the topic of men and women in the work place. She believes that women should not make more money than men, or hold a position that ranks higher than a man's. I wanted to enjoy the walk, and chose not to argue.

We also talked about the plight of being human. Life is hard. Nobody gets through it unscathed. We talked about addiction, and the reality that having Jesus in your life doesn't mean you'll never struggle with it again. We talked about the struggle life can be, and how sometimes it's enough just to get up and face the day when you're going through a hard time. She went on to discuss the sins people struggle with...sex, drugs, rock and roll, and depression. Once again, I decided not to argue with her.

She feels empowered by her beliefs, and while I cannot agree with her even in the slightest degree, I am not going to take those things away from her to attempt to minimize her in any way because she has these beliefs. She believes what she is told to believe, as long as the one telling her is her pastor and he says he can prove it with a Bible verse.

Still, it saddens me that so many of these ideas are still being kicked around in some church circles as though they are biblically based, when they are nothing of the kind and only serve to alienate people from Jesus. It's not enough that you're struggling with substance abuse or mental illness. Now, you have to feel guilty on top of it.

"God doesn't like any of us all that much, but he especially doesn't like YOU." That's the message I walked away with on most Sunday mornings.

These days, I'm not really sure where my place is in the whole church scene. I'm not interested in being churchy. I'm interested in being Jesusy, and raising my son to be Jesusy in his own way, as well. I think we can be Jesusy and still celebrate Jaden's first Halloween, and wish people "happy holidays" during the upcoming holiday season. I think we can be Jesusy without fearing the world around us. I think we can even be Jesusy if we believe that not only does God love us enough to send His only son, but God actually likes us a lot, too.

Having a son to raise has made me re-evaluate many of the beliefs I grew up with, in contrast to the beliefs I have now, and find the best way to teach my son about Jesus. I haven't figured that part out yet, other than knowing that I don't want him to have the same fearful, self-loathing perception of things that I did.

The Success of Failure

2009-09-18T23:46:00.002-04:00

Last night as I began journaling, I could not think of anything "happy" to write about. I try to keep the tone of my journaling positive. I know I am the only one reading it, but I can drag myself down very far, very easily, if I am not careful. So, I do my best to find something...anything...positive to write about. Yesterday, I had no luck.

Yesterday was one of those days when the days I have left on this side of eternity...however few or many they be...seemed interminable. There are days when life seems like such drudgery, I fear that I will live another forty years, and have forty years of struggling to find meaning in the day to day crap of life. Yesterday, there did not seem to be any bright spots...only varying shades of gray.

So, that is what I wrote about. As I was writing, I remembered sharing my "testimony" when I was in my early twenties, sharing with people how God had helped me overcome depression after decades (well, two of them) of struggling. I remember people asked me if I ever struggled with it anymore, looking for the hole in my story, I guess. I told them, fingers crossed behind my back, that I didn't.

As I thought about this yesterday, I wondered what compelled me to lie like that. Why did I think I had to be perfect in order to make my success valid?

I did not have to think about it long before I conjured images of the testimonies I grew up with. Our church often had groups in from Teen Challenge, and we listened to testimony after testimony of how the heroine addict had been "set free", and never experienced another craving for the drug again. Then there was the alcoholic who stopped thirsting for alcohol and the accompanying "blitzed" feeling. Testimony after testimony was about complete, unmitigated freedom.

So, as I started sharing my own story about freedom, I realized that I may not be "free" at all, because I still struggle with occassional depression and despair. Feeling like I failed, I stopped sharing.

It is only recently that I realized that most people...if not all of us...are never totally free from our hang ups. I think there is a reason that people recovering from addiction to drugs or alcohol never consider themselves fully recovered. Recovery is a constant work. Recovering from anything requires that the addict be always wary of their surroundings, their relationships, their self-talk, and anything else that could potentially derail their hard work of recovery.

One of my favorite shows is "The Cleaner". I love this show because it shows that a clean break from addiction...physically and/or psychologically...is not really possible. And that's okay. It means we're human, and we have a constant need for spiritual health, community with supportive friends and family, and the ability to accept our failures without losing ourselves.

On the show, Benjamin Bratt plays William Banks, a recovering drug addict who has made his life's work helping other addicts get clean and stay sober. His methods are unconventional, to say the least. The show is very raw and makes no apologies for depicting addiction realistically, and showing recovery in an equally sobering light. One common theme among all of the recovering addicts, including Banks himself, is that it is not about achieving total freedom in one fell swoop and never facing the temptation again. Recovery is about getting through the day you have, and not worrying about whether or not you can get through the days, weeks, months or years ahead.

Perhaps freedom comes in recognizing that victory sometimes comes in small steps. Maybe the freedom Christ is talking about is not about the big, pivotal moment in life when you can walk away from all your hang ups. Maybe the freedom comes in realizing that, in Christ, you...we...are whole and beautiful and new and loved, just as we are. We are human and flawed and frail...and depressed and hooked and tired...but real victory comes in going forward anyway, remembering that we are part of something bigger.

On days like I had yesterday, thinking about how tired life makes me already and how much more tired I'll be if I think about the next forty years, it is overwhelming. I can't think about it, because it's too much. However, if I think about today, and think about who I am in Christ right now, and realize that all I have to do is embrace the day I've been given, I'll be alright. I can handle that.

When we struggle, or "fail" in our recovery by taking a step back into our hang-ups, it is not a failure at all. It is just a new opportunity to find a different and better way of moving forward from this point on. Sometimes, the most victorious thing we can do is keep going, when we so much may not want to. That takes courage and untold strength, and I believe God smiles upon that...much more than He does upon lying an attempt to make ourselves look good to others who are also too afraid to let their true heart show.

Health Action Now

2009-09-13T02:21:00.001-04:00

Health Action Now

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Health Care Reform and Foolish Arguments

2009-09-12T23:02:00.003-04:00

The issue of health care reform is one I am very passionate about. I think the discussion for health care reform is long overdue. We discussed it for about ten seconds in the early 1990s, and have not heard much about it since then. It has been my opinion for a very long time that a nation with as many resoures as the United States has is without excuse when it comes to the millions who have to live without health insurance. Reforms have been needed for decades, and while Obama's plan may not be perfect, I am thrilled that we are at least talking about it. Again.

Being one of such strong opinions on the subject, I could not resist taking a poll on a social networking site that asked if I believed access to health care is a basic human right. My answer was an emphatic (you should have seen the energy in my font!) YES. I knew this would cause a ripple, but with so much discussion about the topic, I had no way of anticipating the response I would receive from someone I counted as a friend.

The first response to my post was, "Who gave you that right?"

This response shocked me, because it seemed instantly combative, and I was on the defensive at once. I argued that if we are going to claim to be pro-life, as this individual does, then it only stands to reason that we would be in favor of health care for everyone. I aruged that we should not end our pro-life stance simply because the child is now out of the womb, or that child grows into an adult who is no longer covered by state medical. People have the right to health care simply by way of being human. If we are to be pro-life, we need to be pro-life at all points of the spectrum, not simply for the unborn.

I was then corrected. I was told that health care and pro-life issues are not the same. Life is a God-given right, and it is FREE (though to whom it is free, I do not know. Bringing a baby into the world is very expensive, and the costs do not end at birth. It's the gift that keeps on taking.) Health care, on the other hand, is a privilege.

From that point on, the discussion became very heated. While we were only typing our questions and responses to each other, it was clear that it became very personal. I finally bowed out of the "conversation" before I went too far and said something intentionally hurtful, out of anger. The long and the short of it is that we did not see eye to eye, not by a long shot, and I was increasingly stunned by the things this pro-life Christian was saying.

What amazes me about the entire discussion on health care reform is that the loudest voices against it seem to be coming from the Christian conservatives, the most vocal "pro-life" groups out there. It is not as though these groups are offering alternatives to the current proposal. They are simply saying that the government shouldn't take over people's health care, that Obama is another Hitler, that Obama wants a socialist nation,that Obama is a fascist, etc. All the anti-Obama rhetoric, and the Glenn Beck/Republican Party funded march on Washington, has offered up no viable alternatives to what Obama is proposing.

It shocked and sickened me to see this individual, who represents a very wealthy and powerful sect of our society, essentially say that those who do not have health insurance need to fend for themselves, because, after all, life isn't fair and it isn't our job to make it fair. What infuriated me perhaps beyond anything else this person said was the implication...no, the very blatant statement...that life isn't fair, and nothing will be fair until Christ returns to make all things perfect. When I challenged them by asking if this really was the best we had to offer...the response was YES!

It is still upsetting to me. This individual represented every reason why I have distanced myself from the conservative movement and from the mainstream Christian church. In my opinion, the mainstream conservative Christians have become so arrogant, so "fat cat" in their view of the world around them, all compassion and empathy has been lost. If it is still their, it is buried under a lot of bullshit rhetoric. These people say in one breath that they care about the problem of so many people being uninsured, and in the next breath say that health care is a privilege, and life is not fair and it's not our job to make it fair.

Perhaps it is not our job to make life fair. We can't make life fair. But, if we have the means to help lighten the load for someone, we should do it. I believe we are compelled to do it. As human beings, and most definitely as Christians, we cannot turn a blind eye to the suffering of others. Why is it that the U.S. is so quick to send aid to help the poor and oppressed in the Middle East, yet just as quickly ignores the poor and oppressed in our own country? Why do we not feel compelled to help our own citizens?

Every day, people suffer needlessly, even to the point of death, due to conditions that could be easily treated if they had access to quality health care. The uninsured either do not get treatment, succumbing to very treatable illness, or they flood the emergency rooms for conditions that are not emergencies. The uninsured have become very savvy, realizing that the emergency room cannot turn them away. Emergency rooms are overflowing with people who are there for conditions that could easily be treated by a family docto, if the patient had health insurance and/or could afford to see a family doctor.

I am not saying anything here that is not well known, insofar as the need for health care reform is concerned. There is no denying that our health care system needs an overhaul. What baffled me today was the callousness with which my worthy opponent seemed to dismiss the uninsured. It seemed as though the individual had a "I'm covered. Too bad for them, though. Life's not fair." Perhaps that wasn't my imagination.

I wanted so much to say that if the church that the individual was hiding behind would do its job, we would not even be having this conversation. Matthew 25 indicates that the only difference between the sheep and the goats was what they did and didn't do. Jesus spoke specifically, in verse 36, about health care when He said, "I was sick, and you looked after me."

What I am reading there is that if the church was doing what it was supposed to do, there would be no need for government intervention for health care or anything else. Within the body of Christ, we have people of skill, people who have the education, training, and licensing to do everything Jesus mentions in Matthew 25:34-36. Yet, for everything mentioned there, we have a government program that pays people to do those things.

Why?

So, who gave me the right to health care? It looks like Jesus did. I am having a hard time swallowing it when a Christian can truly profess that we do not owe anyone access to health care as a basic right, because life is not fair and it's God's job, not ours, to make it fair.

I feel very passionately about this issue because of my own experiences with needing health care but having no insurance. In April of 2007, I was diagnosed with renal carcinoid cancer, and had surgery to remove my left kidney. At the time of my diagnosis, I had insurance from my job, so everything connected to my care at that time was paid for.

However, I could not work, so, naturally, I lost my insurance. Six weeks after my surgery, when the pain from the surgery would not subside, my doctor ordered a CT scan. The scan showed I had some cancer in my lymph nodes, and it was recommended that I receive radiation therapy.

Radiation therapy costs somewhere in the neighborhood of $30,000. I did not have that kind of money in my sock drawer, and I had been denied Medicaid. The cancer wasn't going away on its own...how unfair!...and I needed treatment. What was I supposed to do?

No one could believe I had been denied Medicaid. I had cancer, for cryin' out loud, and I was denied Medicaid? That was disheartening and infuriating. All of us felt so powerless.

What could be done about it? Who would have the power to get me the help I needed? I had done everything I could, to no avail. What now?

My mom called our state representative's office and explained the situation. A few phone calls and a couple of days later, I had the Medicaid approval I needed, and simultaneously received word that I had been approved for Social Security Disability benefits.

So, I know what I'm talking about when I say we DO need the government to step in and oversee things. Obviously, without my state representatives help, I would have been left to suffer as the tumors grew and made me more sick. I was not destitute enough to qualify for Medicaid on the first try, and I was not wealthy enough to buy private insurance. I know, I know...life isn't fair and access to health care is a privilege, not a right. God will provide, right?

It looks to me like the way He provided was by having the government step in and make sure I received access to health care. I do not understand the notion of God providing, when there is a stubborn unwillingness to be the vessel through which He provides.

The New Patriotism

2009-09-11T22:17:00.002-04:00

I was very glad when January 20,2009 finally rolled around. I had long been disgusted with the Bush administration, and I felt eager to see someone new take the reigns. I did not vote for Obama. I voted for one of the independent candidates. However, since Barack Obama did get the job, I was really looking forward to seeing W. get outta the way so Obama could get to work.

During the Bush administration, many people vocalized concerns about his policies, anger over the war he started under false pretenses, frustrated and suspicious because he offered little in the way of answering for his actions. People who voiced those concerns were considered unpatriotic, reminding people that the war was necessary in order to protect us from the terrorists. Whenever an answer was demanded of the Bush administration, those demanding the answers were generally considered to be people who did not love their country. During the Bush administration, demanding answers of our government...rather forcefully demanding them, if necessary...was considered anything but "American".

Now, we have the Obama administration, and everything has changed. The same people who once made a living by shaming those who demand answers of their government, are demanding answers of their government. The "tea parties" are running rampant. Fox News and conservative radio talk show hosts are generating hefty ratings for their hours upon hours of railing against President Obama. One Fox News pretty boy has even organized a march on Washington, to take place tomorrow.

Why do these Obama naysayers do all of this? Because it is patriotic! It's a grassroots movement to let the Obama administration know that they aren't going to take anything that they deem to be against their freedom as American citizens. So passionate are these conservative folk about the things they believe, they do not even bat an eyelash when one of their own heckles the President during his address to Congress. Not only do they not bat said eyelash, but they seem to applaud the senator for the outburst.

All of the sudden, demanding questions from your government, and calling them out--however inappropriate the place and time--is no longer unpatriotic, but it chic and savvy! All of the sudden, you can flat out call the President a liar...and do so during a joint session of Congress, in the middle of his speech...and nobody accuses anyone of being anti-American.

It seems to me that there is a double standard that is playing itself out right in front of our eyes. I would venture to say that the same people who are so quick to call Obama a liar would still call another person anti-American if they were to call Bush a liar. Even when solid evidence is given to demonstrate that Bush lied, the die-hard conservatives are not willing to call it what it is. Yet, based on hearsay alone, these same people are rallying against our current president, calling him a liar, a fascist, a socialist, a racist, and so forth, and somehow that is okay.

Strange.

I have become increasingly uncomfortable with the conservatism I've seen in the last couple of years. It seems as though being a conservative has come to mean being mean-spirited, even militant, against those who oppose conservative ideas. I've heard conservatives refer to homosexuals as "sickos", Democrats/liberals referred to as "idiots", and grown men who throw temper tantrums in Congress lauded as heroes.

It seems that conservatives have become less willing to discuss different ideologies in a peaceful manner, and continually resort to Hannityesque tactics of calling names, or simply shouting down the opponent. If you talk long and loud enough, an opposing voice will not be heard.

Conservatives, I beg you to take a look at where you are, and ask if that is really where you want to be. If it's not, let the Glenn Becks and Sean Hannitys of the world fight their own battles, and you can be your own voice.

As for me, I've distanced myself from the conservative movement entirely. It just became embarrassing.

In Defense of His Faith

2009-09-06T00:55:00.003-04:00

This is Rob's rebuttal to the criticism of his teachings and his faith.

I think Rob answers the question that converts have after "getting saved"..."Okay, what now?"

Jesus is more than fire insurance for the great beyond. That is how He has been packaged and sold, but a relationship with the personhood of Jesus is infinitely more than that. The kingdom of heaven can be here and now. I believe that is what Jesus taught, in addition to his teachings on the hereafter. He came to give us abundant life RIGHT NOW, and it is so much more than a list of rules. I don't think Jesus did all He did just so we could be obedient little children and finally do what we're told. There is more...so much more...and Rob Bell touches upon that with his books and conversations.

Faith, God, salvation...it is all mysterious. If we could easily pigeon hole and define God, would He still be God? Not in my mind. I think God invites us to delve into the mystery, and to be okay with not having all the answers. Some people fear that, and need to adopt an "I'm right, and if you don't agree with me, you're wrong and not as spiritually mature as I am" attitude. That saddens me. Is this all we have to offer this world? "Agree with me, or go to hell"?

I think when we get to heaven, we're going to find out that a lot of us were wrong about a lot of things, both the fundamentalists and the emergents. I think we'll be surprised by the company Jesus chooses to keep in heaven, and we'll realize that we had God figured all wrong.

There are some things we'll never know on this side of heaven. But one thing I am sure of...Love wins.

A Disturbing Revelation

2009-09-05T22:59:00.003-04:00

A friend of mine directed me to this video after I posted one of Rob Bell's NOOMA videos on Facebook. The point of the video is obvious from the beginning, all but calling out Rob Bell as a heretic.

After watching the video, I remain a "fan" of Rob Bell, and even more uncertain about my spiritual path at this point in my life. I am not the least bit disturbed by the teachings of Rob Bell, but I am very disturbed by the "truth" being peddled by the person who created this video.

If I am to believe what the critic says, I am to believe that the God who supposedly loved me enough to send His only son to die for me is the same God who doesn't even like me. This God dislikes me so much that the only way He can even bear to look at me is if I am drenched in His son's blood. Apart from that, He finds me vile and horrendous to gaze upon.

I am also to believe that this God has no need for me whatsoever. If this is true, then I have to ask why they heck He bothered creating any of us. Life is hard, this world can be cold and cruel. If God has no need for us, then did He create us so He could observe our struggles and enjoy a chuckle at our expense? Are we just pawns that He moves about on a cosmic chess board?

More than that, is this God really so desperate for adoration that He would create something He cannot even bear to look at, with the fervent hope that we will so love Him (despite His intense dislike for us) that we would willingly serve Him and worship Him? To me, that seems weak and desperate. Is that really God?

Let's talk for a minute about the issue of creating our own reality. I like the idea that my thoughts, words, actions, desires, hopes, dreams, etc...can work together to create a specific reality for my life. I have no desire to be God, but I do think God has placed in each of us the ability to decide what reality we want for our lives, and to make choices that create that reality. By our choices, we create our own personal heaven or hell.

Honestly, I think that saying we have no will of our own but simply follow God's will is a way of absolving ourselves from any responsibility for our lives. We can totally screw up and say, "Well, God orchestrated that because it was His will...". To that, I say, "Bullshit."

Excuse the language, but that is the only thing that comes to mind. Did God really create us to be so weak minded that we must rely on Him to facilitate our choices in order to achieve a result that, ultimately, we had nothing to do with? We're just along for the ride? I don't believe that.

I believe God has given us tremendous creative ability. Jesus said that his disciples would do even greater things than He did. How would that happen unless we were living as though such things were actually possible?

"Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not yet seen." How do those things manifest themselves in our lives? I believe they are made manifest as a result of our fervent belief being reflected in our words and actions. We SPEAK what we believe in faith. We LIVE what we believe in faith, all the while trusting that the thing or circumstance that we are believing for is going to become a reality. Do you think that those things would still become a reality if we did not so fervently believe for them? If we were lax or apathetic toward that thing, would the result be the same as though we pursued it passionately? I don't think so.

I have had my own experience with this. When I left my husband last year, fleeing for my own safety and the safety of my unborn child, I knew very well what Michigan's laws were regarding child custody. I knew that Michigan typically splits custody down the middle, and even a man like my ex-husband would have parenting time with their child.

I knew this, and it terrified me. So, I created a vision board. Of the many things I put on that board, I put a picture of a mother holding her baby. I put it inside a circle, which represented peace and safety for me and my baby. I chose to believe that, against all odds, my baby and I would be kept safe, and by the time our divorce was finalized, my ex-husband would be out of our lives completely.

I focused on the words of Jesus, when He said that with man, certain things are not possible...but with God, all things are possible. Those words indicate a joint relationship. WITH God, all things are possible. We do our part, and God does his. We believe, and live what we are believing with every fiber of our who we are.

During the 40 weeks that I carried my child in my womb, I was reminded almost daily that the courts would decide his fate. I would remind myself that Jesus said all things are possible when we are in partnership with God. I would meditate, quieting my mind and my heart, and envisioning a peaceful existence for my baby and me. Day in and day out, I faced my fear, and I stood on my faith. I used the creative ability God gave me to begin creating the reality I wanted for my baby and me.

My divorce was finalized in March. I have sole custody of my son. My ex-husband moved out of the state, and I have not heard from him in over a year. He has shown no interest in my son. We are safe. My son will not be subjected to abuse. He is living in a climate of love, and he is flourishing, just as I envisioned. The impossible became a reality.

All of this is to say that if God is as He is represented by Rob Bell's critic in the video, then I am not sure if I can align myself with Him. It seems that the God represented there is a tyrant, whom people serve out of fear...not out of love, desire, willingness, or respect.

I grew up believing in the God represented in the video. The God who didn't like me, the God who was always angry with us filthy sinners, the God who was never even remotely happy with me even though He created me. That is the God I grew up with, and it made me very literally want to die.

If that is God, then count me out.

I was just thinking...

2009-08-15T00:40:00.001-04:00

I wonder how much we really see, and how much we just assume about the things we are looking at.

Recently, my brother came to visit the family. I took Jaden over to my sister's house, where the family was, so my brother could finally meet him. I told my bro to come over, because I had a lot of baby things to give him and my sister-in-law for their baby-on-the-way.

As I explained where I live, he told me he thought he knew the place, and asked me if it was the greyish apartment building that's the first place on the left after turning down my road. I said that he had the right place, but the building is white.

Now, I have lived here for nearly a year. The entire time, I've described the building as being white. I've told Charter techs to look for the white building. I've told friends the same thing. For nearly a year, I've inaccurately described a building I look at every day. It was never white. I am not sure where I got the idea in my head that it was white, but it never occured to me to question that assumption until I heard my brother describe the building as "greyish". I remember thinking the building must have been a different color when a friend of his lived here years ago.

Imagine my surprise when I realized my landlord had new greyish siding put on the house while I was out visiting with my family!

:)

It begs the question of how many other assumptions I've made in life about things I've only looked at, but never seen.

Moving on...

I heard that NASA is pleading for billions of dollars to continue their asteroid tracking program, which tracks asteroids that are predicted to come dangerously close to the earth.

My question is this...Let's say that NASA gets the money, and they find an asteroid that is going wallop us, and it's only a matter of time before it happens. Then what? Call Ben Affleck and Bruce Willis?

Seriously. I'm not sure what we would expect NASA, the Army, the Marines, the Air Force, the Navy, the National Guard, or the National Honors Society COMBINED to do about an asteroid that is heading for us. The best they could do is say, "We're all doomed, so make peace with God and your loved ones now, because it's curtains, baby, curtains."

Late Night Conversations...With Myself

2009-08-11T00:35:00.003-04:00

Recently, I thought about joining a water aerobics class. My physical therapist recommended this to ease the pain of my fibromyalgia. The class meets at 9 a.m., and I would have to pay for child care. But that wasn't the big issue. The big issue was that the class costs $40 a month.

Forty dollars is a lot of money, I told myself, and I am on such a limited budget. Then I thought about how much money I'd just paid to upgrade my cable package so I could enjoy sitting on my ass just a little bit more, and the aerobics class didn't seem so expensive.

I didn't join the class. On the flip side, though, I do like the cable package I am paying for.

Recently, I was on Facebook looking at all the updates my friends had posted. Most of it was stupid stuff about games they were playing, and that they had achieved "Chief Cowpie Flinger" on Farm Village, or some other such newsworthy events.

One of my Facebook friends posted pictures of a couple of family events. Now, one of my pet peeves is when people take pictures of objects by flipping their camera on its side, so they can get more in the vertical shot, and then posting that picture on Facebook, Twitter, or wherever...unedited. How difficult is it to rotate the photo before you post it? On Facebook, I think you can even do that right there on the website, so there are no valid excuses. So, anyway, she posted the pictures without flipping them first, and I wasn't about to hurt my neck trying to figure them out...so, sorry friend, but I didn't look at your neck-breaking pictures.

I'm kinda sad that "7th Floor West" is over.

And that's all.

Reader, please bear in mind that I have rare occasion for adult conversation in my life, as I am a full-time single mom to a seven month old. While his sweet little chatters are treasured, I crave input from other adults. I was going to say, "from my intellectual equals", but I must maintain reasonable expectations. Even my 5 year old niece has learned how to match wits with me from time to time, and that's not what I'm going for.

What the Fetch?

2009-08-04T23:27:00.007-04:00

One of my favorite shows to watch is Ghost Hunters. Every Wednesday, SyFy shows a marathon of the show from 7 p.m. - 12 a.m., and I keep it on even if it's just for background noise.

Ghost Hunters follows The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS) as it investigates alleged paranormal activity, using everything from EMF gauges to flashlights to determine if paranormal activity is present. It is thrilling for me to watch this and see how the TAPS team works diligently to verify or debunk alleged activity, making no apologies for doing either. They do not hold seances, use mediums, ouija boards, or any other method to conjure spirits. They simply go to a site to see if anything paranormal is there, or if there is another source for the weird happenings.

Recently, my family shared with me that they had concern about my viewing of the show, particularly with having an infant in the household. My father shared with me that one of the local pastors related the following story to him.

The pastor also works as a third grade teacher. Earlier this year, he was approached by a child who urgently needed to speak with him. The child was shaking and frightened. The pastor was puzzled as to why this child sought him out, as this child was not in his class.

The child told the pastor/teacher that he had been awakened at 1:30 a.m. the previous night, and saw a racecar fly off of his shelf and begin going in circles on the floor. The pastor asked the child how long this went on, and the child said the car kept going in circles until about 4:30 in the morning. The pastor asked the child what he did while it was happening, and the child said he was too afraid to do anything.

The pastor, of course, wanted to know more about what was going on in the home. He asked the child if he had recently watched any scary movies or tv shows. The child said he had not, but then mentioned that his parents where a big fan of a show called "Ghost Hunters".

The pastor then said he knew exactly what was going on. He wanted to tell the child to stand against such activity in Jesus' name. However, as he was on the school's time and not the church's, he told the child that if it happens again, he is to go get his parents and tell the spirit that they weren't going to stand for what it is doing.

My family believes that watching shows such as Ghost Hunters invites spirits into the home. I told them that they have no idea what else is going on in that home, and I do not think that simply watching a TV show would invite paranormal activity into someone's home. I explained that I think there are things that only have as much power as you give them, and for all we know, that child's parents sent him to bed and said something like, "Now make sure the ghosts don't get you in your sleep!"

They did not agree, and continually restated their case. Ultimately, we were at a stalemate, and there was no reason for further discussion. I did not change my position, and they did not change theirs.

Here is my question: Did the pastor who made such assumptions about the show's power ever watch the show? If he did, he would know that TAPS routinely debunks claims of paranormal activity by finding other sources for the occurances. The source could be anything from a leak faucet to a faulty light fixture. TAPS has no problem with debunking such activity, and does not invent evidence for paranormal activity in order to please the client or increase the fear factor for television.

Do I think it's suitable viewing for a child? Well, I watch it with my child, so I obviously do. Before you make any assumptions, please continue reading. I think it's suitable viewing because TAPS does utilize a debunking process. They debunk unfounded fears. They debunk superstition. They debunk alleged paranormal activity where there isn't any. I think this is a good thing for my son to become familiar with, because there are a multitude of baseless fears that abound in our culture, particularly if we are people who chose to exist within a community of faith.

It is my experience that people of a religious persuasion, particularly Christians, are swimming in fear. We fear our shadows, lest our shadow be somehow offensive and anger God, or tempt demonic activity. While I was growing up, I feared everything, believing that God practically looked for reasons to pour out His wrath on me, and that demons lurked everywhere.

I know there are some who would disagree, and that's okay. I just do not think it is wise to cultivate fear in my child, and I think the best way to combat that is to show him that not all is as it appears to be. I think it is ignorant to assume that a simple television show could spark demonic activity in a home where the child is well guarded and shielded from the things that could truly harm him.

I have to wonder how many other things that Christians-at-large do out of fear. A good friend and I discussed this today, and I expressed that it is my opinion that obedience without understanding is no better than slavery. Certainly, there are things that we choose not to do because we know it is not in the best interests of becoming the human being God intended for us to be. However, it is my opinion that there are other things we avoid because we attribute power ot them where there isn't any. Some of our aversions are little better than the superstitions that have haunted religious sectors for centuries, leading to such egregious acts as the Salem Witch Trials. Have we truly not progressed at all?

How much of our "obedience" is done out of faith, and how much is done out of fear? I'd be willing to bet that Jesus probably wouldn't mind watching some Ghost Hunters now and then, and seeing how the TAPS team helps people understand how their own minds can be their worst tormentors.

Things

2009-05-24T22:57:00.001-04:00

So, I've been thinking a lot lately about things. Objects. Stuff we have, or want to have.

The seed for these thoughts, particularly in regard to my son and how I want to raise him to view "things", was planted a week or so ago as Jaden and I were driving through downtown Traverse City. I was looking for an office I had never been to before, and so intent was I on finding it that I did not notice a truck trying to merge into the right lane. I also did not notice that the left lane was closed. That makes me a bad driver, but that's not the point. :)

In the lane beside me was a brilliantly shiny, red, brand new Ford F-150, toting two guys who were apparently contractors of one sort or another. As my attention was elsewhere, the young man in the passenger's seat vocalized their need to merge into the left lane. He did this by shouting, very loudly, "Hey rust bucket, you have to let us in!"

This one comment, this one very brief moment in an otherwise wonderful day, really got under my skin. I did not care that they noticed the rust on my car. It has rust, and that is pretty evident. What bothered me was that they said such a demeaning comment in front of my beautiful baby. I know Jaden can't understand it, and is totally oblivious to the words and their meaning. Still, it bothered me.

It bothered me because a deluge of childhood memories came flooding in as the insulting words hit me. When my siblings and I were very young, our folks did not have a lot of money. We wore used clothing, we used food stamps, and I clearly remember standing with my mom in the unemployment line to collect the check, which we would need to have before going to get the few things that check would buy. I am sure things were much worse than we will ever really know, but the sketchy memories I have of those times are simply that we didn't have much of anything.

I remember going to school and often being teased about my clothes. I remember one incident in particular, which happened in second grade. I had brought one of the few dolls I had for show and tell. I was particularly proud of it because it was from Africa, courtesy of my Aunt Nita and Uncle Bill, who were mssionaries in Kenya. Somehow, I was not allowed to show and tell about the doll during regular show and tell time, so the teacher told me I could do so at the end of the day, going from student to student to make my presentation. I can see now that it was a classic "brush off", but as a child, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to share.

Many of the kids thought my doll was pretty special, and then...I approached the class "rich girl", and a couple of her friends. She didn't want to hear about my doll, but did take the opportunity to tell me that my clothes were ugly. Until that moment, I didn't really know that my clothes were that much different than anyone else's, and certainly didn't know they were ugly.

I remember folding clothes with my mom that night, and as I folded one of my shirts, I said, "Mom, a girl at school today told me that my clothes are ugly. Is that true?" I remember how sad she looked. I can only imagine the reasons for her sadness, but I am sure that among them is the fact that someone was needlessly cruel to her daughter, over a set of circumstances that she and my dad were working very hard to overcome. The clothes I wore were only one piece of a very large and difficult puzzle, and I had been targeted for it by a girl whose parents apparently did not have the same struggles.

I don't remember what my mom said. I do remember, though, that the comment made by the rich girl (whose name is Brandi, of course) stole a bit of my innocence, and I never saw myself or the world the same way again.

How does this relate to Jaden? Well, because I don't want him to know that pain. I don't want him to ever be targeted because we do not have a lot of things, or the things we do have are not as nice as others might think they should be. I know the world we live in will be quick enough to rob him of his innocence, but I do not want our financial standing to be the thing that starts the ball rolling.

So, I am left wondering how I can raise Jaden to understand that having things is nice, and having nice things is nice, but it is not the be all and end all of our existence. We were made for more than that. How do I instill this in him to the degree that, should he ever face his own "Brandi", the comments won't sting as much? How do I teach him that being rich or being poor is, in so many ways, about a state of mind more so than a financial statement?

In the last year or so, I have been more financially destitute than I have ever been in my life. Cancer took a lot from me, not the least of which being my ability to support myself as well as I was once able to. Pain and fatigue is now a normal part of my every day life, and it makes working a regular job an unrealistic goal for now. So, I live on what I get from the government every month, and my annual income is several thousands of dollars less than what it used to be.
I remember when I was making more money, I wanted so many things, and was never happy even when I had them. Now, I rarely find anything that I simply "must have", and I find a lot of joy in the very simple things in my life, my beautiful son being first on that list. Financially, I am living well below the poverty line. In all other ways, I am incredibly rich.

How do I teach Jaden about this kind of wealth? I'm not sure. I hope and pray I can be an example to him of what it means to have true, recession-proof wealth, regardless of household income.

It's been awhile, and, wow, have things changed!

2009-03-30T12:12:00.003-04:00

My beautiful baby boy, Jaden Timothy, arrived on December 27, 2008, at 6:03 in the morning. While I am sure the actual labor process was difficult, I have nothing but good memories of the hours leading to my son's arrival, and I would do it all over again in a heartbeat. When people ask me how my labor was, I tell them it was "fun". Really! God is good.

Jaden has absolutely changed my life, and while it is difficult to be a single mom, I am very grateful for the blessing I have in Jaden. He truly is an answer to my prayers, and I cherish every moment with him. I do not believe our children belong to us. They belong to God, and we are just stewards of His handiwork. I feel tremendously privileged to be given the opportunity to guide and nurture this beautiful little being.

God has worked mightily to protect Jaden and me as I divorced Jaden's father. Our divorce was finalized on March 10, and the outcome of custody decisions made by friend of the court are so unusual, many people are amazed when I tell them. A typical situation is to have joint physical and legal custody of the child, with parenting time established for the non-custodial parent. I knew that this would in no way be in Jaden's best interests, and he would not be at all safe with his father. Throughout my entire pregnancy, I prayed for Jaden's protection, trusting God to orchestrate circumstances that would be nothing less than miraculous in protecting this child He had given to me.

As the months passed, I heard nothing from Jaden's father. He did not even ask to be informed of Jaden's birth. When I met with my friend of the court caseworker, she indicated that she had received no response from him in regard to court mailings. He did not show up for hearings. He had moved out of the state, in fact. My caseworker told me that she doesn't usually do it, but given Jaden's father's history, his lack of interest/involvment, his distance from us, and so forth...she was recommending I have SOLE CUSTODY. No shared physical or legal custody! Furthermore, Jaden's father's parenting time is held in reserve. If he wants to see Jaden, he will need to petition the court for time. Additionally, it is stipulated that his parenting time will be supervised.

As Jaden's father did not contest this recommendation, it went into the Judgment of Divorce, and it is permanant now. God has worked amazingly to protect my son, and given us great favor. Jaden is safe and sound, and my heart is at peace.

God has provided for us amazingly in very practical ways, too. In the last several months, we have been given everything from diapers to a car...there is no need that we've had that has gone unmet. I have seen God's handiwork in even the most minute aspects of our lives, and I am endlessly grateful.

My sweet little baby is sleeping in perfect peace right now, and I look at him with awe and wonder, amazed that I have been given such a gift. Life takes a lot of unexpected, and sometimes unpleasant, twists and turns, but I know that God always has a plan...and His plans are always perfect.

In Utero

2008-12-02T01:44:00.002-05:00

"after the storm comes the calm; after crisis sometimes it is as if we've been reborn...the birth of your son will be another BIG change...As you hold him in your womb, perhaps you are realizing how you've been held in God's womb, and as you hold and care for your vulnerable little one, Jesus' words about only being able to enter the Kingdom as a very small child or infant, will have a newer and richer meaning. As you hold him, I pray your knowledge and experience of being held also grows!"

-From Brother Dan, a friend on Beliefnet.com, in response to "Having a Baby Changes Everything"

"As you hold him in your womb, perhaps you are realizing how you've been held in God's womb..."

Those words have stayed with me in the last few days since I first read them. As I've considered the events of the last few months, and looked over the many things that have happened that have far exceeded my hopes, I can say that I have known the warmth, shelter, and protection of being in "God's womb". I can say truly that, as with the child growing in my womb, nothing has come into my life that is not directly from God. Nothing that was devised to harm me or my son in any way has come to fruition, and my son and I have been abundantly blessed.

As I look back at the last few months, I can see that it has indeed been as much a time of growth for me as it has been for Jaden. Like Jaden, my faith was definitely in existence, but in a somewhat embryonic stage when I first left my husband and faced the horizon of the unknown. With time, nurturing, and experience, my faith has grown stronger and more viable, just as my son has.

I remember making a "vision board" a month or so after I left my husband. On this board, I glued a couple of prayers that meant something to me, as well as images that symbolized the life I wanted for my son and me. There were two things that were important to me at the time, and I put them on the board and trusted that if they were meant to be, then they would be.

One, I wanted Jaden and I to have a place of our own. I knew we had a haven with my family, but it was important to me that we have a place that is ours, where we could start our own life together. Part of that was pride...I did not want, at the age of 33, to be living with my parents again. Part of that, though, was also the simple fact that it was important to me. That alone was enough.

I became connected with a few resources in the area, and through them, I learned about the apartment I am now living in. It's a nice apartment, very cozy, perfect for the two of us. It is one I can afford even on my limited budget, and it is one that came to me in the most wonderful of ways. When the security deposit and rent were presenting an initial hurdle, my landlord told me that she believed I "needed to be here", though she couldn't say why. She was more than willing to work with me on the financial issues, and knowing that I had left an abusive marriage and now had a restraining order on my husband did not scare her off. We made arrangements, I signed the lease...and money came through that allowed me to pay both the first month's rent and the security deposit in one fell swoop.

As my pregnancy progressed, it became more and more important to me that my son and I were safe from my now estranged husband. I had heard, and witnessed, many horror stories about abusers who just do not go away, and they live to make the lives of their exes, and the children, difficult. The abuse continues long after the relationship is over. I feared this. I dreaded it. I feared for my safety. I feared for my son's safety, and for the future he would have if his father were part of his life. Day in and day out, I prayed...pleaded...for God's continual protection and intervention on our behalf, and that the day would come when we would not have to deal with my ex at all.

I am happy to say, we have once again been well insulated against the hardship that could have so easily been ours. All threats made against me by my ex came to nothing. He is not part of our lives in any capacity, and I am saying in faith that he never will be. My son has a Father in heaven, and He has been our advocate and defender throughout everything that has happened. Things have transpired in the last six months that I never would have imagined, because I had been told they were next to impossible. Yet, I have seen these things happen...things that not only kept danger at arm's length, but removed it entirely...and I can attest to God's sustaining and miraculous grace.

I can tell you, we have lacked for nothing in these months. Certainly, there have been some obstacles, but none that have been insurmountable. I have been given everything I need to nurture the life growing inside of me, spiritually and physically. From the beginning, my son has thrived, despite my health issues of the last year, and the stress that existed early in my pregnancy. I have had the joy of being immersed in a wonderful community of believers and friends. I have learned to pray for my son, preparing the way for his entry into this world and laying the foundation for his spiritual health.

Another item on my vision board was a car. When I put the picture up there, I had no idea just how badly I would come to need it. A couple of weeks ago, upon taking my car into the shop for an inspection to explain a "weird grinding noise", I learned that my car was essentially a death trap waiting to be sprung. The cost of repairs far exceeded what I could afford, so the car was parked, and I've been driving my mom's car. I needed a vehicle of my own, though. I shared this need with some friends at my home fellowship group, and just waited to see what would happen.

Once again, God came through in ways I would not have foreseen. My friend and pastor, Tim, called me today and told me he had found a car for me. A car was being provided for me, and the only cost I needed to be concerned with was the cost of plates and insurance. Amazing! I spent the better part of the afternoon in awe of how God had once again provided for my son and me, humbled by His grace.

As I consider the idea of being kept safe and secure in God's womb, I can say with certainty that I do feel a sense of being insulated, nourished, protected, and sheltered, all the while given everything I need to grow stronger and become the woman He made me to be. I will be giving birth to my son very soon, and I believe God is birthing something in me as well. These last few months, difficult as they have been, have also been months of exquisite joy as I've been bathed in God's grace and love. I wouldn't trade these times for anything. I needed to grow and prepare for my son, as much as he needed to grow and be prepared for this world. We are both all the better for the time spent in the womb.

Six Months Free

2008-11-12T10:50:00.002-05:00

Today is an important day. Six months ago today, I made a very difficult and frightening choice, packed a few essentials, and left my abusive husband. I remember the night very well, and it is a feeling of terror I hope to never experience again. I felt as though I were literally fleeing for my life, and for the life of my unborn child. I knew I could not stay, but leaving was more difficult than I imagined it would be.

It wasn't difficult because I felt a pull to stay. It was difficult because I did not know what I could expect from him. Would he try to find me? If he found me, what would he do? Would he call me that night? Should I answer? I was having some cramping...was my baby okay? I couldn't breathe. My heart did not return to a normal rate until five hours after I left the house. It was terrible. If it were not for the women at the shelter I went to, I do not know how I would have maintained any perspective on things at all. Those women are both vulnerable, and tough as nails, and I am thankful to have met them.

It did not take long for it to become very, very clear to me that there was no going back. He found every way he could to justify the abuse, blaming me for everything. He reminded me over and over again that he never "knocked me around", but I knew from his actions the night before I left that it was only a matter of time before he would. I knew that if I wanted to be safe, and wanted my baby to be safe, there was no returning.

As I prepared for single life once more, this time with a child in tow, I had no idea what to expect. I was met with threats from the soon-to-be-ex, telling me he would tell the court things about me that would let him take away the baby. I see now that those threats were nothing more than empty, and designed to frighten me into submission. Still, when someone tells you they are going to take your child from you, it is terrifying, particularly when you know that person is very dangerous.

God is faithful, though. I can truly say that He has moved legal, spiritual, personal, and financial mountains in the last six months, and has given my son and me everything we need to thrive in our new life together. My son is being born into circumstances that are safe, healthy, and peaceful. My now estranged husband has done things that people have said he would never do, and left us to live in peace. I pray this will continue, and that my son and I will never have to deal with him again. I have seen God's faithfulness in this so far, and I do not think He is about to abandon us now.

I have been tremendously blessed to have the love and support of friends and family in all of this. Not many women in my situation are so fortunate. Many women return to their abusers because they lack the support they need to remain on their own, and keep themselves and their children safe, fed, and sheltered. I am so blessed that this has not been my experience. I am also blessed that it has helped me become more aware of the issues related to domestic abuse, and why the cycle can be so difficult to break.

Thank you all for your support. You have helped me create an environment for my son's growth and develpment that is healthy and peaceful, because I have not had to live in fear for my safety. Your love and encouragement has helped me build a home for my son that is one of serenity, because I know without a doubt that we are safe. Your strength, even when I have felt so very afraid at times, has helped me make legal, financial, and personal decisions that have worked greatly to ensure that my son and I are well taken care of. Finally, your love has helped create a community into which my son will be welcomed and nurtured, and that is something that warms this mother's heart in big ways.

God is so good...I have seen miracles in the last six months, and I know I will see more!

The Stuff of Legends

2008-11-09T01:04:00.002-05:00

I recently received a "forward"which featured the legendary story of the USC professor who was a dedicated atheist and used his position as a professor to subject his students to his teachings. This professor taught a class that was a requirement for nearly every student, and allegedly took advantage of that fact in order to systematically pick apart belief about God, and attempt to prove to his students that God could not possibly exist. At the end of the semester, the professor would ask if there was anyone in the room who still believed in God. If they did, they were supposed to stand up, at which point, the professor would shout, "You FOOL!!", and proceed to explain that if God existed, He could prove His existence by stopping a piece of chalk from hitting the ground and shattering to pieces. The professor would then drop a piece of chalk, it would be shattered, and he would say that he had just disproven God's existence, because God would not do something so simple as stop the chalk from falling and shattering.

This went on for twenty years, until one day, and no one ever stood and professed a belief in God at the end of the semester, for fear of what the professor would do to humiliate them...until one fateful day, when a student did finally stand up. As one would expect, the professor called him a fool, did the chalk routine, the chalk did not break, and the faith of the young student was strongly validated.

The person who sent this to me was clearly pleased with the results of the student's bravery, and believed it validated our Christian faith. There was only one problem. It never happened. A quick check of Snopes revealed the history of this legend, and that there has never been any evidence that this incident, or many other legends like it, ever occurred. (http://www.snopes.com/religion/chalk.asp)

Why am I writing about this? Well, it's simple. It has been very bothersome to me for quite some time that many Christians will cling to the legend and fantasy presented by fables such as this as a means to validate our faith. Not only do we collectively choose to believe them, despite all logic to the contrary, but we pass them around the internet and present them as fact. How foolish we must look to people who are able to read such a legend, see it has all the earmarks of being fictional, and yet here we are, saying that these fictional stories are perhaps the greatest validation of our faith that we can find.

Not long ago, I also received another forward about the "new" dollar coin that our government was issuing, which would not feature "In God We Trust" anywhere on the coin. This particular forward intimated that this was our government's way of finally getting God out of our country, and we should not stand for it! Not only were we not to accept the coins, but if we did receive one, we were not to spend it.

Once again, this was not true. Not only did the coin feature, "In God We Trust", written on the edge of the coin rather than its face, but this "new" coin had been in circulation for quite some time by the time I received the email Snopes cleared up this rumor, as well. http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/dollarcoin.asp

What is interesting to me is that the rumor itself will spread like wildfire across the internet. Yet, on the many occasions in which I have emailed the originator of the "FW:", and shared with him or her that the story they are sending is not true, even providing links to the information that disproves it, it never gets beyond their inbox. This amazes me, particularly for a group of people who believe that knowing the truth sets you free.

What I am getting at is this...As Christians, we need to be a whole lot smarter about how we are presenting ourselves. I am sometimes amazed at the collective Christian chagrin over being so marginalized in the public eye, being perceived as lemmings who are uneducated and cannot think for themselves. Yet, we collectively circulate bogus stories to bolster our faith and our political points of view, without bothering to check the facts or even remotely consider that maybe....just maybe....the fantastical story that some well-meaning person sent to us is not true, and we should look into its source.

I suppose the belief in urban legends is not exclusive to Christians. In fact, I know its not. However, when we are relying on legend rather than fact and experience to validate our faith to the world, I believe it makes us look foolish. Faith is very much an experiential thing, and it is going to be different for everyone. But is our faith really so shaky, or our shame in that faith really so great, that we need to cling to the ubiquitous "FW:(insert grandiose story about God here)" in order to validate it?

This Mother-to-Be's Heart

2008-11-02T20:34:00.001-05:00

On Friday morning, I got to see amazingly vivid pictures of my son, who I will get to meet in only a few weeks. I got to see 4-D pictures of his sweet little face, and it was breathtaking to realize that this little boy is growing inside of me. Life is a miracle. I was looking in the face of a miracle.
I remember when I first learned I was pregnant. Or, I should say, I first learned of the possibility. My oncologist had ordered a ct scan, which I have about every six months (when I'm not pregnant...). My surgeon also wanted to see the ct scan, as we were wondering about the extent of an umbilical hernia that had developed and would need repair. The nurse from my surgeon's office called me and said that the hernia was not acute, but there did appear to be something in my uterus.

Having had cancer, I was scared. I realized it was possible that the "mass in my uterus" was, in fact, a pregnancy. But, I wanted to know for sure. My (soon to be ex) husband told me we didn't have money for a pregnancy test, as he headed out he door for whisky. It would be three days before I would be able to buy a test. It was three days of wondering, worry, and tension.

I took the test. It was positive. I immediately scheduled an ob-gyn appointment. At my appointment, I was given a few magazines, pamphlets, etc. I eagerly opened them to see exactly what was going on in my uterus, wanting to see this miracle of life and what it looked like. What did it look like at that time? Well....a mass, in my uterus. Tiny. Round. No arms or legs yet. A mass of cells and potential.

I remember seeing my very first ultrasound, which I had at 7 weeks. The doctor wanted to be sure my growing baby was healthy, in light of my health problems in the last year, and the fact that I had been taking pain management medication early on in my pregnancy. By this time, this mass of cells and potential had grown arms and legs, and had a heartbeat that I could see on the ultrasound. This baby was healthy. Miraculously, this baby was healthy.

As the pregnancy progressed, I eagerly awaited the 20th week, when I would get to see another ultrasound. Once again, I was amazed. I was told I was having a boy. For the briefest of moments, I felt somewhat disappointed. I had been hoping for a girl. My disappointment lasted about five seconds, and then I beheld the miracle growing inside of me. The picture I was looking at...this was my son! He had grown so much, and I could begin to imagine what he might look like when I was finally able to meet him. His nose was upturned like mine, and that made me smile. He already had a chubby little belly, and round little cheeks. I watched in amazement as he turned and squirmed and kicked during the ultrasound. Hearing his heartbeat was the most amazing experience I'd had up to that time.

Throughout all of this, I began to make adjustments in my life to prepare for single motherhood. I realized very quickly that, while I did not have a partner for my pregnancy, I was by no means alone. My friends and my family expressed nothing but the most sincere blessings for both me and my son. I knew he was not being born into the greatest of circumstances, but it became very clear, very quickly, that he was being born into a community in which he would be deeply loved and cared for. His arrival is greatly anticipated, and I am confident that he will never know a day without the loving guidance and acceptance of this community that is already so supportive and welcoming.

In 6-8 weeks (depending on who you ask), I will get to meet him, finally. I have been writing him letters for the last few months, telling him a bit about things that have happened along the way as I've waited for his arrival. Tough choices had to be made in order to keep him safe. I have experienced blessings beyond measure in all areas of my life as I've done all I can to prepare a peaceful and safe life for my son. I have had the prayer, encouragement, support, and financial blessings from friends and strangers alike. God has paved the way for my son and me to be protected and provided for, and this has come to us in ways that nearly everyone had told me would most likely never happen...yet, here we are.

I can't wait to meet my son, to hold him, to finally be able to kiss that face, those fingers, those toes, and to tell him the story of how God has truly done exceedingly and abundantly far above all I could ever ask or think, and our life together is a testimony to His goodness.

Beauty for Ashes

2008-10-29T23:31:00.003-04:00

I got an email from a friend a few days ago, asking me if I would mind calling someone she knew through CafeMom. She explained to me that she thought I would be able to relate to some of the woman's experiences, and the woman needed a lot of encouragment right now. She told me that his woman had just given birth to a baby boy about two weeks ago, through a c-section. She also had to have a hysterectomy, due to cancer. Additionally, her husband came to visit her in the hospital, only to inform her that he wanted a divorce, and wanted nothing to do with her or the baby.

She has not been able to hold her baby or see much of her baby, because she cannot sit up or get out of her bed. The hospital released her baby, as the insurance would not pay for him to stay there any longer, and her neighbor is caring for the baby right now. As I anticipate the fast approaching birth of my own son, I cannot imagine how devastating it would be to not be able to hold him, feed him, kiss him...or even see him, for that matter.

Hmm. I couldn't relate to all of this woman's story, and I honestly felt totally inadequate to help this woman at all, but...I said I would call her.

I emailed her first to let her know I had been contacted by a friend of hers, and that I wanted to offer her what encouragment I could. I told her that, while I could not relate to all of her story, I was familiar with pain, heartache, transitons, and, yes, triumph amidst all of it, and I wanted to offer her a listening ear. And, if she wanted, I would share with her a bit of what I learned along the way.

She emailed me back and asked me to please call her, and she gave me her number.

Her voice was weak when she answered. She had been confined to her hospital bed since her surgeries, and was restricted from sitting up or walked due to complications from the hysterectomy. As she talked, her voice cracked as she tried to choke back tears. Her words came slowly. She often repeated herself, and her voice was so soft, it was difficult to understand what she was saying. I listened, though. I may not have understood all of her words, but I could hear her pain.

I did not have a lot to say. I encourage her to reach out to those she had available through the hospital. I told her to ask for a clergy member to visit her. I encouraged her to continue working with her therapist. I encouraged her to ask for a social worker. I encouraged her to remember that this will pass. She will get well. She will be able to care for her son, and she will be a good mother. I told her that I knew what her husband did to her was cruel and devastating, but if that is what was in his heart, it is better that she and her son not have him in the picture for now.

She listened. Her voice calmed. I felt lost. We talked a bit longer. I told her I would pray for her.

She emailed me and thanked me for calling her. She said she wanted to die.

That was last week. I talked with her again tonight, and I am happy to say, she is doing much better. She is encouraged. She is focused on her healing. She is focused on getting well and getting home so she can care for her baby. She is scared. Understandably. None of us who are facing single motherhood ever planned it this way, and the task of raising a child alone is a daunting one. I reminded her that we are not the first women facing raising children without a father, and we won't be the last. We both know single moms who have made it work. It's not easy, but they are doing it. And we can, too.

She was much more hopeful about her future this time, and not once did she say she wanted her life to be over. This is a big improvement.

She said to me that, even though we are miles apart, we have things in common that help us understand each other and create a connection. She told me how much she appreciated the time I give her, and that I help her to stay focused on the things that are important...getting healthy, and getting home to her baby so she can be the great mom that she is.

The whole time, I am thinking, "I am totally taking a shot in the dark every time I open my mouth to say something to you. I am just hoping that, by the grace of God, I am helping you."

We talked for just over an hour. I told her I want us to stay in touch, and I want to know how she is doing when she gets out of the hospital and is finally able to be with her baby.

It is amazing how inadequate we feel when asked to step in on something as monumental as helping another person manage their devastating heartaches. Yet, when we choose to do it, trusting that God will honor the effort, wonderous things seem to happen every time. We may not always get our words right, but God sees the heart, and says, "Now THIS is something I can work with!!"

It is an honor to be part of someone's healing, in any capacity.

I'm back!

2008-10-22T14:10:00.003-04:00

So, I have decided that MySpace stinks, Helium isn't all its cracked up to be, and yet I still love to blog. So, I am back here, where I have been blogging on and off for the last few years.

Much has happened since I last wrote. 2008 has, thus far, been a year of more transitions. Some of those transitions came due to no fault of my own. Others came as the result of incredibly poor choices I made earlier in the year, which altered my life forever.

As those are the most glaring transitions, I'll write about those.

In February of this year, I met someone that I believed was "the guy" I'd been hoping to meet all of my adult life. We seemed to have a very natural connection, with a lot in common. He seemed to understand me like nobody else could, and it seemed that I did the same for him. We had both been through some very difficult times in the months prior to our meeting, and it seemed that we had found a sort of solace in each other.

Six weeks later, we were married. I often chastise myself for rushing in, but I also realize that men like my soon-to-be-ex are masters at manipulating people and situations, and I could have dated him much, much longer without ever knowing the truth about him. As it was, though, everything changed after we got married.

He began drinking very heavily. Now, I had been known to have a few drinks with him now and then, I will admit that. But, at some point, you realize that it's not really that much fun, you don't really feel that great, and there is a lot of life that you miss when all you live for is a drink. So, I stopped. His drinking got much worse. As his drinking worsened, he became very verbally and psychologically abusive. Nothing I did was right. He would get angry with me for the most minor things--things that a normal and rational person would hardly notice, or would just shrug off.

Perhaps the most memorable incident happened when he got angry with me for eating the rest of the black olives. He got red in the face, yelled at me, swore at me, called me names...all because the black olives were gone. That is just one example.

I learned to walk on eggshells around him, being very careful about what I said or didn't say, constantly conscious of my behavior, even down to asking if it was okay if I got up to use the bathroom when he was home, because he wanted me with him at all times. When he was at work, he called me about ten times a day to check on me, asking where I had been, who I had talked to, etc. It quickly became a waking nightmare.

As his behavior moved toward violence, I also found out I was pregnant. He made it very clear to me that I would not have a partner in my pregnancy, and he believed it was my job to raise the baby until he or she was four years old, at which point they would be a "real person", and he would step in. His drinking increased, his temper became more volatile, and I was terrified of him.

About a week after my first ob-gyn appointment, which I went to alone, I decided it was time to leave. This decision came after a particular bad explosion of his temper, during which I was subjected to a two hour verbal assault, and he also demonstrated violent behavior. I knew I was not safe anymore, and neither was my unborn child. I knew that, if we were to have a chance at all, I had to leave.

So, the next day...May 12...I did, and I never went back. I stayed at one of the women's shelters that night. I did not feel safe going to my parents' home, as I thought he may come looking for me there. I did not know what to expect. Fortunately, the night passed without incident.

I saw him two more times after I left. On the day after I left, I met him for lunch, during which time I clearly saw that there was no hope for salvaging our severly broken marriage. I saw him once after that, when I went to the apartment to get a few of my things. He was apologetic and asked me to come home, only to begin blaming me for everything when I told him I wasn't ready. That was the last time I saw him.

I have had a tremendous support system in all of this. I am one of the lucky ones. I met several women in the shelter, and I have seen several women in my own life, who have not had the kind of support I have had when leaving an abuser. For some women, their families are so disappointed with the choices they've made that "got them in that mess", they have disowned them. For others, they have friends and family who will give them a place to go, but never stop blaming them for their abuse. For others, they turn to their church for help, only to be told that they must forgive their husband, pray for him to change, and go home and submit.

Thankfully, I experienced none of that. I knew that my choice to leave meant going through a pregnancy without a partner, and facing single motherhood. I am thankful for those who have stood with me in all of this so that, even though I do not have a partner, I am not alone.

After I left my husband and sought legal advice on what to do next, I was informed by several people who knew of his whole record that he is "very dangerous", but they could not tell me why. This lead to my decision to become a paralegal. I cannot imagine how many women are in my situation, and do not know enough about how to navigate the legal system in order to get the answers they need. So, they live in fear, believing they have no option but to either stay on the run, or go back to their abuser.

I do know enough about the legal system to get the information I need, so I used the Freedom of Information Act to get court records and so forth. Needless to say, I was stunned when I read these documents. I had been lied to about everything. When I was with him, I was in much more danger than I realized, and I believe it was God telling me, "GET OUT NOW!!!" that lead me to leave when I did. I am so thankful, every day, that I listened.

I have settled into a comfortable life on my own. I have a nice little apartment for my baby boy and I, and it is a great place for us to start life together. I have chosen to move forward without pursuing child support, truly wanting to build a life just for me and my son, without his father's involvement. As it looks like there is a good chance of that happening, I am not going to tempt fate by asking him for money. It will be a hard road for my son and me, but we will thrive, and God will meet all of our needs.

While I miss living in Traverse City, I am building a network of friendships here that is not only helping me through this difficult season, but is creating a community of love for my son. As a mother, it warms my heart in ways that I cannot explain to know that my son's arrival is so wonderfully anticipated, and he already has so many people who love him. My prayer for him has been that God would give him men in his life who will show him what it is to be a man of God, who lives with honor and strength, and understands that having strength (of any kind) does not mean you have to use it like a weapon. God is faithfully answering that prayer, and my son will have a community of Godly men to teach him and help him grow into the best person he can possibly be.

School is going well, and I get nearly perfect grades, which never ceases to amaze me...since I was lucky to even graduate from high school. I feel good about the future, confident that I will be able to meet the demands of school, and get a job that will allow me to help others while earning a viable income at the same time. My son and I are going to be more than fine...we will be blessed.

So, yeah, it's been a heck of a year. While I do feel some sadness when I think about my single days, and all I gave up because of a foolish choice I made in marrying someone so quickly, the truth is that I wouldn't change anything. I am having a baby, and he is worth everything I have gone through to get to this place. He is truly my answer to prayer. I have chosen to name my son Jaden. Jaden="Jehovah has heard"...and He has!

It's been awhile...

2007-12-25T21:00:00.000-05:00

I have not written here in quite some time. I've been putting a lot of my posts on my CarePage, and/or MySpace. Since I've only got a few who read here, I have not felt the need to keep up with this page as much. I've only got so much energy...

However, as 2007 is quickly winding to a close, I did want to write a bit about this past year, and why I am THRILLED to see it come to an end!

All was going well in the beginning. I was living in an apartment I adored, and while things were financially rough, I was well on my way to finding stable ground. I was engaged to a man that seemed wonderful to me at the time, and life seemed grand.

As it turned out, the engagement would not last. We had made a whole lot of mistakes in our relationship, and I did not find him to be supportive when I needed him the most. In fact, rather than being my advocate and protector, he tended to throw me in harm's way where my reputation among his cohorts was concerned. Painfully, I gave him back the ring I had so proudly and hopefully worn on my left hand, and proceeded to piece my life back together.

Life still was not so bad. I was soon working in a job that I absolutely loved, and it was certainly adequate for paying my bills. Despite the pain of the broken engagement, I felt that life was on the upswing.

I soon found myself in another relationship, with a man who claimed to be a lot of things that he wasn't. Without going into detail, I will say that he hurt me more than any man who has ever been in my life. The pain I carried out of that relationship was far worse even than the pain of the broken engagement. Forgiving him continues to be a process.

In April of this year, after going to the ER for what turned out to be a herniated bowel, it was discovered that I had a rare type of cancer growing in my kidney. I had to have surgery to fix the hernia, as well as remove the kidney. This would change my life in ways I could never have anticipated at the time.

As I had not short-term disability insurance, I did not have the money to continue paying rent and so forth in my apartment. I had to move out, and lived with my parents for awhile. Everything I had worked so hard for was ripped out of my hands within a matter of moments, and my life was changed dramatically.

I ultimately ended up moving in with my sister. I am living on a monthly disability check now, which is a tremendous blessing. I realize I am very blessed to be where I am, in every respect. Nevertheless, it is hard not to look back at what I had...an apartment I loved, a job I loved, and independence I fought tooth and nail to gain and hold on to...and not feel some sadness over it. It's difficult not to wonder what might have been, if I had been able to stay where I was.

Still, what choice do I have but to pick up the pieces and move on? I cannot live in what used to be. I can only live in what I have right now, in this moment. I can only live where God has planted me for this season of my life, and not hinge everything on a past I cannot reclaim. I have to believe that these losses are not in vain, and God was removing obstacles that were keeping me from the greater blessing He has for me. I do not believe that God derails our lives for no good reason. I believe that He has good things in store for me, that will surpass what I had to leave behind. The choice I make every day is whether or not to look back with regret at what I used to have, or to look forward with hope at what God has waiting for me. I choose...sometimes with difficulty...to look forward.

I will be very glad to see 2007 come to an end. I realize that the line between 2007 and 2008 is just an imaginary line in the sand, but it does bring a sense of closure to painful times in my life. Along with welcoming a new year comes a welcoming of new possibilities and a chance for restoration and renewal. I choose to welcome 2008 with the belief that God has better things in store for me in the new year. I choose to believe that there is a difference that occurs at midnight of December 31, 2007, and that 12:01 AM of January 1, 2008 does welcome in something fresh and new.

I'm being published...sort of!

2007-08-25T19:55:00.000-04:00

I have started publishing my work at www.helium.com, in the Family and Relationships, and Religion and Spirituality sections. If you would, please go there and read and rate my articles and move them up the "Quality" ladder. I can actually get paid for my work from this site, if it ranks high enough!

Plus, I just like to have people read my stuff. :) Thanks!

Oh, and, lest you worry...I will still be writing here, when I am feeling better. The stuff on helium is just this stuff, republished.

CarePage

2007-08-07T21:10:00.000-04:00

All posts for the time being will be at www.carepages.com. The name of my page is StephanieUpdate.

Tomorrow

2007-07-24T23:40:00.001-04:00

We...my mom and I...are leaving to go downstate tomorrow, where we will spend the night with some friends. Then, it is off to Ann Arbor on Thursday, to meet with a doctor who will hopefully be able to offer some answers and a clear direction for where we need to go with treatment. In the research I have done regarding the type of cancer I have, there are more questions than answers. I am praying that God will give the doctor wisdom beyond what is available through the science of medicine.

I cannot say that I am afraid of the treatments that may come. I am in every sense ready for them, because it will ultimately mean an end to the pain I've been experiencing as my body is compromised by the illness trying to take over. I suppose the only thing I fear is that the doctors will decide to do nothing, and I will continue to suffer with this rare and relatively unexplained invader.

Despite that fear, I am generally at peace with all that has happened, and what is yet to come. I know God is in this. I have been praying for clarity of purpose in my life for a long time. My prayers have been fervent, and I've told God that I am willing to go through whatever it takes to fulfill that purpose in my life. And here I am. I believe that clarity is going to come because of these things, not in spite of them. This is part of finding my way home.

God's welcome mat isn't always inviting, but once you've entered in, you never want to leave.

I will let you know what happens...

Awake

2007-07-20T02:10:00.000-04:00

am sitting here playing "Bubble Popper" on Gamesville, blogging, and biding my time until I can take something for the pain that never seems to go away completely these days. I am in so much pain, it's ridiculous. It is always with me. I can't remember the last time I took Vicodin and was able to wipe out the pain completely.

So, today I received news that was somewhat expected but nonetheless shocking. You want to believe it's not true no matter how much you know it very well could be, and then when you are told that it is in fact true, everything changes. Your worst fears become solid realities. Your nightmares become real, and the only thing you can do is face it head on and go forward.

I am not happy to be the home to an extremely rare type of cancer, but I am glad to have some answers to why I have been so sick and in so much pain. I am grateful that I have a doctor who listened to me when I told him I was in pain, took steps to find out what was causing that pain, then went further to put me into the hands of those who may be better skilled in dealing with the type of cancer I have. There is something wonderful to be said for skilled professionals who are not afraid to admit when they are in over their heads. I could hear the remorse in his voice when he said, "I have more questions than answers at this point." I deeply appreciated his candor in that moment. He will forever have my admiration for uttering that simple sentence.

I am grateful for the way God's hand has moved in this since the beginning. He allowed me to experience the intense pain of an internal hernia so I would go to the ER and get a ct scan, allowing the doctors to find the tumor growing on my kidney. At the time I fell ill, I was employed by a non-profit organization that was all too familiar with the struggles people face when they do not have health insurance, so they paid for me to have another month of health insurance after I left my job so I would not have to worry about the cost of follow up visits with my surgeons. As time went on and my recovery did not seem to be going as smoothly as expected, the surgeon God chose for me (and I do believe it was God's choosing, because he has been a remarkably compassionate doctor through all of this) paid attention to my complaints when I told him of the pain I was in, and ordered the ct scan, which found the enlarged lymph nodes, which lead to the biopsy, which lead to the discovery of another carcinoid tumor, which lead to the doctor's conclusion that this is bigger than we first thought and we need the skill and expertise of those who specialize in these things to handle this case. I do not believe God has brought me safe thus far only to let me die a miserable death as cancer eats me alive. I believe He is going to see me safely through this next phase of the journey, and wonderful things are waiting for me on the other side of this.

Still, I have my moments. Painful moments. Moments when I am so very tired. So weary. So sick. Frustrated. Angry. Going crazy because I have pain that just does not go away and interferes with even the most basic elements of living. Yet...I choose to trust God and His plan in this. I have been through a lot, and I have more yet to go through, but I do not walk through this alone.

My precious little niece reminded me this evening of that truth. We were talking about thunder being like the voice of God. Then she said to me, "And there were angels in the fire."

Yes, dear one, there are angels in the fire with us. God never forsakes us, and He gives us "angels in the fire"...our friends, our families, kind strangers who do not realize how their kindness has so blessed us...His holy messengers, sent by Him to allow us to stand in these flames with our souls unscathed. We are never alone. God never leaves us to fight these battles alone.

A radical measure

2007-07-19T01:35:00.000-04:00

Today...well, yesterday, now...was a day of anger and frustration. At very ungaurded moments, I am overwhelmed with these feelings, becoming keenly aware of all I have experienced and lost over the last few months. My life is dramatically different today from what it was on April 21 when I was blissfully unaware of all that was about to begin happening. Sometimes, I feel the pain of those changes, and I have a difficult time finding a healthy outlet. As my primary outlet is writing, you, dear reader, get to be a fly sitting on my mental wall, observing all my thoughts playing out on this blank page.

I was overwhelmed today with a bit of sadness, followed again by anger, when I thought of my ex and how he handled my illness in its early stages. Actually, how he handled it right up until the day when I told him to get out of my life (which I would reiterate forty one days later...). He rarely asked how I was feeling physically, and showed no concern for what my illness was doing to my life. His one and only concern was how my illness effected him, insofar as how it effected my ability to be and to do as he believed a girlfriend should. His sadness came not out of concern for me, my well-being, and the fact that my body had turned against me. No, his sadness came from the fact that I was no longer healthy enough to go on dates with him, I was no longer healthy enough to be affectionate, I was no longer healthy enough to endure more than an hour or so of activity, which limited us to short walks and maybe some time with my family.

During one of the last times we saw each other, he was crying (he cried a lot, rather like a child, and I never understood why) and saying that he thought he lost me. He did not mean that he was afraid he would lose me to cancer, or that my health would fail completely in the hospital and he would never see me again, etc. He only meant that he thought he lost the emotional response he expected to receive from me, despite what I was going through. I was fully aware of his selfish agenda during my time in the hospital, which was why I asked him not to call for a few days after I was admitted. His only concern at that time, and until I broke up with him, was how my illness was going to impact his ideal of how our relationship should be functioning. That was it, plain and simple. He was upset that I let my friends visit anytime, but had asked him to call first. The fact was, my friends did not come to me with an agenda. They came to me with the desire to show love and support, and that was it. As I recall those days, and the weeks that followed, I am mystified by the degree of selfishness in his behavior and attitude toward me. My whole life was derailed, and he somehow made it all about him. I do not understand and cannot relate to that narcisstic tendency.

I am not sure why, but the pure selfishness of his actions and attitude hit me like a ton of bricks today. I guess it's part of the grieving and healing process, and emotions come in waves. I hate that he still has such an impact on my life. I hate that I ever met him.

And yet, I do believe it was part of God's plan. In our last conversation, he said he did not think it was God's perfect will for us to be a couple, but it was God's permissive will. I disagree. I think it was God's plan that we were together for a time, because there were things I needed to learn. There were things I needed to know about myself and my tendencies toward self-destruction via damaging relationships that I may not have learned were it not for Harold. I needed to feel the full impact of dating a man like Harold so I would finally stop and evaluate why I was gravitating toward men like that, and realize that I had some things within myself to work out before I would be ready for the right guy.

I think that there is this idea that if something is not pleasant and does not bring to us what we would consider a "good" result, it is not part of God's perfect will for us. The truth is, we cannot live God's perfect will for us on this side of eternity. God's perfect will for us was compromised when Adam and Eve snacked on an apple. Much of what we are living in today is, at best, the closest thing to His perfect will that we will ever know until we get to heaven. Certainly, there are some areas of life that we can look at and see that it may not have been part of what God would ideally like to see play out in our lives, but that does not mean it is not going to be used as part of God's overall plan for us. If we are sincerely seeking to do God's will, and our hearts are open for God to guide us in our decisions, it seems that we can, by default, trust that our decisions are part of God's plan. Maybe not His ideal plan, but it is not as though we are going to throw Him for a loop.

So, while it may not have been what God ideally had in mind, I think He used the relationship I had with Harold to teach me things I needed to know. He used it to teach me the value of paying attention to warning signs, heeding the red flags I see, and paying attention to what my instincts are telling me about a person. He used the relationship to teach me that what I want and need is important, and if I am not happy in a relationship, I do not have to stay in it. Until the commitment of marriage is made, there is no reason whatsoever to stay with someone who you are not happy with. God used the relationship to teach me that lowering my standards in order to be with someone is to invite trouble. We all want what we want for good reasons, and if we have to compromise those standards in order to make a relationship work, then it is a clear sign that the relationship is one that is only going to bring heartache. God used the relationship to show me that I need to value myself more, respect myself more, and in doing so, to no longer be manipulated by men who see me as vulnerable and approach me with an agenda in mind. I was far too vulnerable to a wolf in sheep's clothing, and I see that now. Now that I have seen it, I can recognize my behavior patterns and see when/if I start venturing down that dangerous road again.

Through the relationship with Harold, I learned that there is nothing wrong with a woman demonstrating strength. It upset Harold that I was not more needy, that I did not cling to him when they told me I had cancer, that I did not act desperate enough and tell him I couldn't make it through without him. It bothered him greatly that I did not need a rescuer. I told him at one point that I did not envision anything happening in my life...ANYTHING...that would ever cause me to need him to rescue me. And I mean that. I have been through some very hard things, and through these things, I have learned how to take care of myself. Yes, I want and need the love and support of my family and friends. But do I need them to rescue me? Harold tried to bring me shame for being a woman who is strong, has her own opinions, is capable of setting her own course without his "leadership", etc. For a very brief time, I did feel some shame for that, as though I was not being a "good" girlfriend. I have concluded, however, that the good girlfriend must die. I am a woman who is strong, intelligent, and capable. I am not ashamed of this, and I guess it just means that I need someone who is strong enough to let me be the strong, intelligent, and capable woman that I am. I am looking for an equal, not a rescuer.

It is through this relationship that I learned that there are some things I will not tolerate anymore. I will not tolerate being manipulated. I will not tolerate being lied to. I will not tolerate being emotionally abused. I will not tolerate being psychologically abused. I will not tolerate a man who claims to be one thing, yet lives his life as something else.

It is through this relationship that I learned that I do not owe my heart to anyone, regardless of what their expectations of me are. I have a right to my own happiness, and if the man I am with is not bringing me happiness, I have the right to tell him so and to end the relationship without being emotionally battered in doing so. He may feel that he made an investment in me, thereby giving him the right to my affections. I disagree, and I have the right to live my life in that light.

I realize that I should expect to be cherished by the one who says he loves me, even if I am in a state of being which does not allow me to give anything back to him except love. Even if I am not able to be affectionate with him, even if I am too sick to spend any real time with him, etc...his love for me should not be based on my performance. I never felt cherished when I was with Harold. I was fully aware that every gift, every token of affection, every touch was merely an investment, and he fully expected his investment to yield a return in the way of a commitment from me. Whether or not I loved him or was with him because I truly wanted to be was not important. He would have been content for me to stay with him to fulfill my obligation to him. It took me awhile to fully accept that this was really happening, but when I realized it, I also realized that I deserved better.

There are so many more things I learned, but this is the crux of it. I know I have written about these things before, and will likely write about them again, but this is all a process. I have never left a relationship feeling so deeply wounded, so brutalized. Maybe he feels the same way. I neither know nor care. All I know is that there are things I needed to learn, and God used this screwed up relationship to teach me these things. It would be foolish of me not to evaluate this relationship, considering the impact it has had on me. There are reasons why this relationship has reached into such deep and foreboding places in my heart, and I want to learn from this experience so I do not repeat it with someone else. There are a lot of "Harolds" out there, waiting for their next victim. I am thankful that God let me see the truth before it was too late, and showed me that I was strong enough to walk away even in the midst of a very difficult season in my life.

I am thankful that I am able to process these things and move forward in a healthier state of being. My body is fighting its own battle, and if I am to win the battle, I need to be free of this sort of baggage that will only hinder my physical healing. My life is too important to me to let something like this take a deep hold on me and fester there.

I suppose the relationship with Harold is kinda like the ct scan that showed my cancer. I did not know the cancer was there, and lived my life blissfully unaware of it. I did not know I had the tendency within myself to gravitate toward and tolerate destructive relationships, and lived my life unaware of such things until Harold came along. Like the ct scan showed the cancer I was not aware of, that would have killed me had it not been found, the relationship with Harold showed me tendencies within myself that had been there all along, and would have killed my soul if I did not recognize them. The cancereous tumor found on the ct scan was removed, and in the same way, I am in the process of treating the soul-cancer that was destroying my life. Harold was just a symptom. I've treated the symptom with drastic and final measures, and now I am going through the process of treating the cause.

Real Men, Part II

2007-07-17T02:30:00.000-04:00

Maybe I should have called my last post "Whatever A Real Man Is, My Ex Wasn't That". haha!

My wonderful friend "Black Heart" sent me this brilliant response to my blog. I loved it so much, I am posting it here. It's his work, not mine. No plagarism here...

Black Heart writes:

Ok, I can't resist. :-) Remember this is all in loving light.

"I referred to my ex as a "neanderthal", and for good reason. I have concluded that he is not a real man."

Actually, a Homo neanderthalensis (Neanderthal Man) is, genetically speaking, a different species of homo genus than that of the homo sapien rendition of a seemingly similar maturity level. So I think that what you would want to refer to him as "bottom of the barrel", "shame of the male gender", "the ruin of the good name of men who actually are worth a damn". When you begin speaking in terms of scientific terminology, I will pop my head up and put in my two cents, mainly because I wouldn't want you to put your foot in your own mouth. It's a very uncomfortable position. Unless of course you are able to do that and have a self admiring foot fetish thing.

anyway (diversions aside) leadership... any man can give orders and take responsibility for their orders. (just look at some of the leaders in our world) but it takes a real man to know when to listen to advice of a real woman and be able to make sound decisions based on all of the information that he is able to ascertain from a given circumstance. A real man must be able to do this without having to ask for the advice. He must be able to intuit what he needs to know to make proper the preparations for the survival of himself and his family at the same time. I say this the way that I did on purpose for the reason that if the man sacrifices himself to save his family then he did not think of all of the options available. My honest opinion.

A real man must be triumphant in all challenges and this includes knowing when to concede. Even in stepping down, he is triumphant provided that he does so learning what lessons he needs to learn from the situation. Much of what you say in this blog is heavily weighed toward the pain that was handed to you by previously mentioned homo sapien dredge of the masculine gender but in this blog, you have yet to describe what a "real man" is. I agree with much of what you say. A man should have his faith with God and not use it as tool for his own gains. That is, having faith that can be taken off outside the bedroom door which is not faith at all. Faith is that which motivates every cell and every neuron in one's body to exist. Faith knows no gender. Personally faith should never be used as a measuring stick because it is not our place in or on this earthly realm to judge another's faith in God. That is between that individual and God alone. (Don't worry, I am not pointing my finger at you...I have viewpoints that were pulled from the depths of my core based on some of the things that you said... in actuality, thank you very much for opening this door within me).

Onward. So... Demands... I think that a real man should know "When" to make demands...

"Bring me my Slippers" is a very bad time to make demands...
"The house is on fire, get out!" is a more appropriate time...

To state that a man should never make demands is binding him to ask for everything which nullifies the point that you made earlier about leadership. At least that's the way that I see the flow of the text.

Communication... well there's a big one. Men communication in one way and women communicate in a completely different style. So I would say that what men need to do is learn how women communicate. Now this is especially tricky because women's communication includes testing men to see if they know what the women are talking about. Real men are sharp of wit and have dexterity of intellect. Many Pseudo Men use big words, oftentimes, in an attempt to appear as though they know about that which they are talking. (hint to you men... If you didn't understand that sentence then you most likely have much to learn... don't give up)

Lastly... If you can't live your life as a happy single woman, how do you expect to attract a real man?

Light begins from within and it is there where you must begin the healing process. Defending against the ghost of previously mentioned homo ignoramous will only waste your energy and keep his hooks attached into your very sensitive spots which you, I am sure, have been protecting most egregiously. (yes I used the word egregiously)

While Black Heart is by NO MEANS asking me to defend my position here, I will say that the blog I wrote was written after a night without sleep of any kind to speak of, so it was rather choppy here and there, and did not do well in expressing my thoughts. He is right in saying that much of what I wrote is deeply attached to the pain handed to me by the aforementioned bottom of the barrel man I was dating a month or so ago, and may not accurately reflect my deepest convictions regarding what I look for in seeking a "real man".

Perhaps my tendency to attract men who are "the ruin of the good name of men who actually are worth a damn" is worth looking into...

Real Men

2007-07-15T06:42:00.000-04:00

Since the relationship I had with the neanderthal ended a month or so ago, I have had a lot of time to think about the relationship, what went wrong, what could have been done better, and the fact that the relationship never should have been in the first place.

As it seems my body is done sleeping for now, I thought I would take a moment to share a few of my conclusions. I have written extensively about what I did wrong, where my mistakes were made in bringing to life this relationship that never should have been. I will not belabor those points.

In my opening sentence, I referred to my ex as a "neanderthal", and for good reason. I have concluded that he is not a real man. Nor are any of the other men I have dated. Rather than tell you all of the things he is, thereby explaining what real men are NOT, I will tell you what I think real men ARE.

Real men are able to be leaders. They do not have to ask permission to lead. I think it is rather like what Margaret Thatcher said about being powerful. She said, " Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell someone you are, then you're not." I see it that way with men and leadership. I do not think having male genitalia automatically makes a man a leader. Leadership is demonstrated through the day to day things of life, not in sweeping gestures of power-tripping when it makes a man look good to step into a leadership role. A real man knows how to lead, and begins first by maintaining balance and control in his own life. Do not expect me to let you lead me if I can clearly see you do not know how to manage your own life. Do you really think I am going to let you take me down with your sinking ship?

Real men take responsibility. Full responsibility. They do not look for ways out, they do not make justifications, they do not make excuses. As a leader, a real man will take responsibility for the road he chose to take, and for leading others down that same road. If things do not turn out as he hoped, he will not turn around and say, "Well, I will not take all the blame here. I am not the only one who messed up. " Perhaps he's not the only one who messed up, but he will be a real man about it and say, "I made the choice to go down this road, and I lead you down this road with me. I messed up, and I'm sorry." End of story. He will not look for ways to make others shoulder the blame, even if he justifiably could. A real man is his own man, through and through, even when things go horribly wrong. I take responsibility for my mistakes, and I expect the man in my life to do the same. We all mess up. I do it all the time. It's what we do after we mess up that tells the whole story.

A real man is able to take care of his responsibilities. For example, managing his finances. Being generous with the finances doesn't amount to much if he is not paying his bills on time. I am not impressed with receiving nice gifts (or gifts of any kind) if I know the one giving the gift has chosen to buy that gift instead of pay a bill. To me, that is repellant, not to mention insincere. So, you want to share your life with me, but you can't even pay your bills? Yeah, that's impressive. Real men don't shirk their responsibilities just to impress the one they care for.

Which brings me to my next point...Real men of God do not compromise that, even if it means perhaps losing the one they say they love. A double-minded man is unstable in ALL his ways. If I see a man compromising his faith in Christ just so he can please me, that is a clear indication to me that he is a man who is not trustworthy or stable in his life, and I need to get as far away from him as I can. He is not a man of God...at least, not as he may be claiming to be...and I have no desire to entertain a fraud.

Real men protect the ones they love. They do not act in selfish ambition, hurting the ones they love simply because it serves their best interests in the end.

Real men know how to put themselves aside, and favor the one they love. They put their needs, wants, hopes, etc...aside when the one they love cannot meet those needs, and they do not make demands on the one they love. The Bible speaks of preferring others above ourselves, and real men (and women) know how to do that. It is supremely selfish to see the one you love having their life turned upside down, and have the audacity to inquire nothing of their well-being except, "Where do I fit into all of this chaos?"

Real men "let their yes be yes and their no be no". This relates to the idea of making excuses and justifications, but also demonstrating integrity in who they say they are, and what they say they are going to do. A real man follows through on his word, and does not make promises he has no intentions or no means of keeping. A real man does not make empty promises or claims, just to impress people.

A real man does not make demands of the one he loves. Rather, when he says he loves her, he means he loves her as she is. That is, after all, what love is supposed to be. It does not mean, " I love you, but I am going to put you through this process (ie, "The Haroldification Process", which I had been made aware of many times during our relationship) in order to make you more acceptable and loveable to me." Or, " I love you, when you are behaving like I think a girlfriend/wife should. However, when you misbehave (for example, are not needy enough, or do not rely on my manly leadership enough), I will be sure to let you know so you can adjust your behavior." Real men do not make such demands. Real men love their wives as Christ loved the church...HE GAVE HIMSELF FOR HER!

Real men understand that respect is earned. They understand that they do not merit respect simply because of their genitalia, but that they need to prove themselves worthy of holding a place of respect and leadership in a woman's life. There is a basic respect given to all human beings that can and should be expected. Beyond that, though, I believe that everyone needs to prove themselves worthy of meriting greater respect. It's not just handed out.

Real men do not throw a spiritual glaze on their lives when it's convenient, and then live a life of immorality the rest of the time. Maybe I am expecting a lot, but I expect my man to be one who seeks Christ for himself, and does not need my prompting to do so. Real men have true accountability, and do not wait until things have gone completely awry before deciding to become spiritual and make a grand gesture to remedy the situation. I know that there are struggles people have. I have them. You have them. But real men are held accountable...truly accountable, not conveniently accountable...for how he is handling those struggles, and do not wait until the eleventh hour to make a grand show of all they are doing to correct the error of their ways.

Real men communicate. I know, "women are the communicators". I understand that, I really do. But real men don't avoid talking about problems, pretending everything is okay just because issues aren't "fun" to talk about. Real men talk about it! Even when things have gone south and a relationship is lost, real men make room for real communication about the matter, not doing things like...Oh, I dunno, declaring "Forty Days of Silence" right after a breakup. (Yes, that was very passive-aggressive of me, but it's my blog, so deal with it). Doing such things not only cuts off all chances of possible reconciliation, but obliterates any possible healthy communication that may have taken place. It may not have changed the outcome, but it at least leaves room for things to be said that need to be said before ways are parted. And phone calls made after said forty days of silence are just downright ridiculous. Real men, take note. Real men do not run and hide when the going gets tough. If it is time to part ways, they do so with maturity, rather than acting like a little girl who is going to take all her dollies and go home and pout because she didn't get her way. (Yes, passive aggressive. Yes, my blog.)

Okay, now I'm just getting pissy, so I'll stop. But you get the idea. Real men are men of integrity, honestly, and truth. They are who they are, through and through, and do not pretend to be someone else just to make an impression and lure someone into their deception.

I am not perfect. FAR from it (obviously, if you read my passive aggressive rants). But I do expect the man in my life to bring good things into my life, to challenge me to be the best person I can be, and to do so in a healthy way. By demonstrating healthy leadership, by protecting me, by taking responsibility for the choices he makes in his own life and in our relationship, by admitting his shortcomings and dealing with them on his own...not waiting until I'm ready to ditch him before he finally faces himself. In short, give me a real man...or let me live my life as a very happy single woman.

Sleepless

2007-07-11T00:19:00.000-04:00

I would like to go to bed. But, I am in a lot of pain. It doesn't take much these days to bring on a world of hurt. I still have two more hours before I can take anymore medication to help kill the pain, or at least knock me out.

I am ready to be done with this. I do not know what will come of the biopsy next Tuesday, but I am to the point where I just want a definitive answer...even if it is cancer, and even if it means enduring painful treatments to "cure" it. I don't care. I am tired of being sick and in pain, unable to find any real relief, and not knowing why.

It is painful these days to sit, stand, lie down, walk...basically, to do anything. If I sit perfectly still all day, I might be able to get through the day without too many complaints. It is so frustrating. I want to be out there living my life. As it is, I can barely walk around my back yard without experiencing nearly unbearable pain. I want to be enjoying the Cherry Festival with my friends, but I know it would be too much and I would end up regretting that I pushed myself so hard. I went to a Bible study tonight, and I have been regretting that decision since I left the Bible study nearly four hours ago. I am in horrible pain, and the Vicodin just barely takes the edge off.

I want some answers. God, I want some answers.

It is finished

2007-07-09T14:26:00.000-04:00

So I've been cleaning house the last couple of days. It started with smashing to bits a few of the gifts he gave me, then today I found his letters and burned them. Everything he gave me has now been either destroyed or given away, and that makes me very happy.

When this process began a few days ago, I did not even realize that it marked the end of the 40 day fast he had asked for until a friend reminded me. I suppose the timeline wasn't that significant to me, because he had requested a fast from our relationship. As we no longer had a relationship to speak of when he asked for the fast (I broke up with him two days prior to the request), I suppose the "fast" he requested was essentially over before it even began. At any rate, I inadvertantly marked the end of the fast by ridding myself of the things that represented the initial impetus for it.

I do not believe in coincidence. Even though I was unaware of the timing, I think God used it to bring an end to an era in my life. It was about so much more than just that one relationship. In destroying those things, not only was I severing soul ties between myself and a man who wounded me more deeply than any other man I've known, but I was symbolically bringing an end to the Stephanie that would ever allow such a man into her life to begin with.

It would be easy for me to point an accusing finger at him and say, "You played me! You schemed me and manipulated me from the beginning!" I also, though, have to look at my own role in this pain. Yes, he did play me. But, I let him. In wanting to believe for better things, I chose to ignore the signs that God was letting me see. If the last 40 days have meant anything to me, it has been a time of reflection on why I allowed the relationship to carry on for as long as it did, and why I was so vulnerable to such a man. Why I have been so vulnerable to men of his caliber throughout my entire life. All it took was sweet words and a sad story, and I was his puppet. Why did it take something this drastic for me to learn that if I have to keep the blinders on to make the relationship work, it is a relationship I need to end sooner rather than later?

God has definitely used this to teach me a thing or two about walking in the way of blessing. Just as I had to pick up the sledgehammer and smash those gifts by the force of my own hand, I can actively choose to embrace or reject the blessings He wants to bring into my life. Just as I could not hold on to those gifts and still expect the ties to be severed, I cannot make bad choices in my life and then wonder why God is not blessing me. I cannot choose to be with a man who is not good for me, who is a player, who is a fraud, etc..and then wonder why God is not blessing me with the "right" guy. I cannot choose to take matters into my own hands, then just hope that...somehow...it will work out into something that is blessed by God.

That's what I've been doing. Not just in relationships, but in a lot of things. I do think there are times...many times...when we do not have a clear indication of how God would have us move, at which point we must simply make a choice and go forward in it. However, there are times, especially in matters of the heart, when I know I am not making the best choice, but I want what I want. Then, when it blows up in my face, I have to deal with the pain I played an active role in allowing into my life. There is no getting around it.

So, looking at my pattern, I finally realize that I have no clue how to find the guy that is right for me. I realize that the right guy will come along when the timing is right. Until then, I am content to be single. I would rather be single and lonely for the rest of my life than be with someone who is not right for me and who I feel miserable with.

These lessons have been hard lessons to learn. This is without a doubt the most painful relationship I've ever gone through, and so much of the pain would have been avoided if I had just heeded the warning signs I was seeing. It is a lesson learned, however, and it is the end of something old and the beginning of something new. In smashing gifts, burning letters, giving things away...purging my life of all things tied to that particular relationship...I am embracing a new perspective, a new approach.

Everyone wants to be loved. Even the most hardcore person feels a yearning to find that perfect other to share their life with. It is a natural yearning, and it is one built within us for a purpose. So, I am not going to deny that I do yearn to find that other, and to share my life with him. However, it is not the be all and end all of my existence, and I understand that. I do not have to be with someone who brings unhappiness and pain into my life just so I will not be alone. There is joy in being single that I am learning to appreciate it more as time goes on. I know that the day will come when I will find that other to share my life with, but until that day comes, I am embracing the joy of this season of my life. I will never again be manipulated into being in or staying in a relationship I am unsure of, simply because I do not want to be alone.

Never again.

Lazy Daze

2007-07-07T21:34:00.000-04:00

So today has been a quiet but wonderful day. I talked with my dear friend Muffy, with whom I have not actually talked in probably about 12 years. We've come to rely heavily on MySpace and the like since we reconnected several months ago. I love technology, but it is sad how it makes actual human interraction almost entirely unnecessary. What happened to the days when the only way to communicate with someone was to actually pick up the phone and talk to them? Or, even more to the point, actually see them face to face? Or perhaps send a handwritten letter?

Anyway, we talked for as long as her signal would hold out in the boondocks of Virginia, and I am now more convinced than ever of the beautiful heart she possesses. If all goes according to our master plan, we will see each other before summer's end.

After I finished talking with Muffy (and ever so briefly talking to her other half), I went out to the garage to sift through some of my belongings that are still packed away since my hastily executed move a few weeks ago. While sifting through them, I found some pictures and gifts from my most recent dysfunctional relationship. I considered burning these items, but opted for the sledgehammer treatment instead. It was very liberating to put all the trinkets of everything I want to forget into a pile, and smash the heck out of them. With every blow of the hammer, the soul ties were fractured a bit more, until they were all but completely obliterated. I have more healing to do, but what took place in my driveway today was symbolic of ending the stranglehold the phantoms of that relationship have had on me.

I am trying to find homes for a few of the items he gave to me that were too costly to smash. I cannot bring myself to take a sledgehammer to a coffee bean grinder, as coffee is sacred. However, I also cannot bring myself to put it to any further use for myself, as it symbolizes a lot of pain for me. I had never before been with a man who worked so hard to make me "acceptable", down to trying to modify the very way I prepared my coffee. I am glad he is not a part of my life anymore, and ridding myself of all the clutter that represents him is a very liberating feeling indeed. I do not need people like that in my life. Love me as I am, or don't love me at all. But do not ask me to change for you.

Here is a novel idea...Rather than trying to modify the person you are dating to make them more to your liking, why not just face that they do not measure up to your standards, and break up with them? That's what I did! And it works like a charm!

Of course, after going through boxes and using the sledgehammer, I am tired and feeling some pain. Okay, significant pain. Well worth it, though, all things considered. Thank God Almighty for Vicadin!! Now it's time to relax, enjoy the evening with the family, and thank God for the tremendous blessings of toxic eras that have come to an end.

Time Out

2007-06-30T23:11:00.000-04:00

Today has been a good day. I am tired, but it's a good tired. The kind of tired that comes from spending a day with people you love, doing things that are fun for their wonderful simplicity. It has been a very long time since I've had day like this...one that is fun, pressure-free, stress-free, and purely enjoyable.

I spent the day with two of the most wonderful guys that I know. We went to Mackinaw City, enjoying the tacky gift shops, followed by pizza at Mama Mia's. We crossed the bridge and went to da U.P., eh, and followed to road until we ended up at a fine arts festival. The festival was artistic, but hardly fine. A drunken singer provided the entertainment. I am fairly certain he was not drunk when they hired him, but he was decidedly inebriated by the time we arrived. His rendition of "American Pie" was nothing less than ugh-inspiring.

We talked of many things..."God Stuff", Jack Kerouac, tacky gifts in the tourist-trap shops, and taking road trips in egg-shaped travel trailers. We talked about Monday, and what news it might bring. I told Craig that if my enlarged lymph nodes mean I have cancer, and I need to get chemo or radiation, I am taking a serious road trip when it is all over. Life is too short and uncertain to wait for "someday" to come.

We stopped at a beach and went wading in the water. Well, Seth went swimming...The day was perfect for enjoying the water in whatever capacity.

We laughed. I have not laughed so hard in months.

We crossed the Mighty Mac again, and had Kilwin's ice cream on this side of the bridge. Excellent ice cream. Craig had to finish mine, because I could only eat about 1/4 of it.

The weather could not have been more ideal for a day such as today. The beauty of the north reminded me of God's eye for every detail, and that my own life does not go beyond His notice. Whatever Monday and everyday thereafter brings, my life is in His hands.

I am blessed. I am tired and in pain. A good tired. And the pain...well, it is there. Monday will bring some answers. I am blessed with wonderful people who will stick with me, no matter what comes.

Today, I experienced a "time out" from the uncertainty of what looms before me. For today, life seemed normal again, and I wasn't burdened (too much) by what I may be facing. For today, I could breathe.

Thank you, Craig and Seth, for a wonderful day.

Things just keep getting better...

2007-06-29T12:35:00.000-04:00

I got a call this morning to confirm a doctor's appointment I did not even know I had. Apparently, the doctor who removed my kidney found something on my ct scan from a week or so ago, and he wants to see me right away. I am going in first thing Monday morning. I asked the receptionist if it was urgent, as I had plans to be out of town until Monday evening. She said it couldn't wait and I needed to come in.

I am scared. I am also worn out. So very tired...

Why???

2007-06-28T06:25:00.000-04:00

It is 6:19 a.m. as I write this. Sleep evaded me throughout the night, and now morning has broken and I have a relatively full day ahead of me. It was about 4:30 a.m. that I finally gave up the ghost and decided that sleep would not come to me. I took a shower, got dressed, fixed my hair and put on makeup, and started the day. I am now waiting for my sister to finish her morning routine so we can go pick up my niece from her dad's house. I am finally tired, but can't go to sleep. This is going to be a heck of a day, I can tell.

Last night was the third night of its kind this week. I am worn out, in every sense.

When you've been broken

2007-06-26T01:34:00.000-04:00

I was reading the profile of one of my friend's, and his expression of pain and frustration seemed very like my own lately. Lately, as in, for the last several years.

I have felt frustrated of late. So much of once was has been lost, and while I do understand that there are reasons for everything, and I will see this unfold into something wonderful beyond what I can imagine right now, this season is not without its frustrations.

I have fallen into the pattern of getting through the day to day of life. Once upon a time, I was inspired. Life was full of possibilities. Life seemed to be simple. I was not concerned with career objectives or lack thereof, I was not concerned with whether or not I would someday be able to be in a home of my own, living this ridiculous notion of "The American Dream". I was not overwhelmingly concerned with paying bills, despite the bills that were coming in. Stress did not rule my life. Necessity did not rule my life. Life was simple, and somehow or other, I kept it simple. My primary concerns were how the ideas for story and poetry and incredibly creative verse would play out on paper. I did not fear the blank page.

And what changed this? I suppose that I always knew this would change eventually, but I thought that day would come after I settled down and had 2.5 children and did not have time for such things as writing and painting and other creative expression anymore. Imagine my surprise when I realized that this stifled creativity came despite my lack of the things I thought would surely kill such expression.

I feel worn out. It seems that I am going through a time of realizing how very much of myself I have given away since those days when each morning brought new vistas of inspiration. Somehow, I became someone who could easily be bent to another's will, sacrificing my inner most self a piece at a time. Rather, I was always someone who could easily be bent to another's will, only such compromises became more sinister as I got older. In all of the efforts to be one who is loving and supportive and always cheering for the underdog, I became someone whose own identity became lost in the chaos. I became someone who would be easily manipulated by men with sad stories and sweet words, easily intimidated by women who were emotionally brutal but shrewdly kind, allowing people to strip my soul away. Each day became a day not filled with inspiration so much as sheer determination to get up one more time and get through. Not entirely unlike the bloody, battle weary soldier who pulls herself up to fight on through just one more battle...then one more...then one more...with a faint but assured belief (or vague hope) that she will eventually come out the victor.

So, here I am. And who am I? It seems that I have been stripped of the things which have always held my identity. I once found my identity in my creativity. I was the writer. A painter, too, but mostly a writer. Then, I was the girl with all the problems. The mental patient. The recovered mental patient. The girl you would never know was once a mental patient unless she told you. The strong girl who overcame adversities most will never know, in order to do things that were fundamentally easy for so many others. The girl who was living the life she wanted, a life that was not glamourous but very fulfilling. The girl whose life was turned upside down by unforeseen circumstances. The girl who is learning to put it back together. The girl who is a shell of a girl. Not a girl at all, but a woman. A shell of a woman at that.

There is a lot of pain in losing yourself. I suppose there is some freedom in that, too. Maybe it's only when you lose yourself...your false self, the self you thought you were but never really were...then you can find yourself as you really are. As you always were, but never realized. Stripping away the contaminents to get to the purity of what lies within. Getting down to the real deal, the "me" that remains constant regardless of the circumstances.

Against all reason, I do maintain a shred of optimism. I look at this season of loss, and loss, and more loss, and realize that this, too, shall pass. Some of the loss has been wonderfully liberating, and not a loss at all. Other elements of loss, though, are very painful. There is no getting around that.

NOOMA - Rich

2007-06-20T19:37:00.000-04:00

This really puts things in perspective. I have a car. I have clean water to drink. I have more than a dollar a day to live on, even though I complain about my money being tight. I spent more than a dollar on ice cream alone yesterday.

Not another day like this...

2007-06-20T10:48:00.001-04:00

So for the last few days, I've been experiencing some pain and pressure on my right side. Specifically, right under my last rib. I was waiting for the ct results from last week before making too big a deal about it, because it didn't hurt that badly. I was going to just ride it out until the doctors had some idea of what my insides looked like.

Then, it happened. Last night, I sneezed. I knew it would hurt, so I did all I could to brace myself. To no avail. I felt things pop and shift inside, and the next thing I knew, I was in significantly more pain. I am happy to say that the pain under my rib is gone, but I have a whole new kinda pain that leaves me unable to walk without tremendous difficulty and very sharp pain. So, I am heading to the ER as soon as my mom can take me.

We'll see what happens. I am packing a bag, just in case.

UPDATE:

Okay, so my surgeon's office finally got back to me, and it would appear that a trip to the ER is not necessary. Apparently this sort of horrible pain is...normal??? Anyway, all is well. Relatively speaking.

So I Stay Near the Door

2007-06-19T14:44:00.000-04:00

One of my instructors from Bible college gave this poem to me, saying it reminded him of me. You see, when I was in Bible college, I was actually rather shy. So, the way I would meet new people was to hold the door open for them as they went into the academics hall. I would stand there, every afternoon, and hold the door for everyone going into the building for the first afternoon classes. It was a fantastic way to meet people, and a very enjoyable act of service.

As I read this poem, I realized it also perfectly stated my own position within the body of Christ. I have never felt like I was part of the religious crowd, and never really wanted to be. Even in Bible college, I felt as though I was very much on the outer fringes of whatever was happening there. And that's okay. :)

SO I STAY NEAR THE DOOR

By the Reverend Canon Samuel Moor Shoemaker, Jr., D.D., S.T.D.

I stay near the door.
I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out,
The door is the most important door in the world–
It is the door through which men walk when they find God.
There’s no use my going way inside, and staying there,
When so many are still outside, and they, as much as I,
Crave to know where the door is.
And all that so many ever find
Is only the wall where a door ought to be.

They creep along the wall like blind men,
With outstretched, groping hands,
Feeling for a door, knowing there must be a door,
Yet they never find it - - -
So I stay near the door.
The most tremendous thing in the world
Is for men to find that door–the door to God.
The most important thing any man can do
Is to take hold of one of those blind, groping hands,
And put it on the latch–the latch that only clicks
And opens to the man’s own touch.

Men die outside that door, as starving beggars die
On cold nights in cruel cities in the dead of winter–
Die for want of what is within their grasp.
They live, on the other side of it–because they have found it.
Nothing else matters compared to helping them find it,
And open it, and walk in, and find Him - - -
So I stay near the door.

Go in, great saints, go all the way in–
Go way down into the cavernous cellars,
And way up into the spacious attics–
It is a vast, roomy house, this house where God is.
Go into the deepest of hidden casements,
Of withdrawal, of silence, or sainthood.
Some must inhabit those inner rooms,
And know the depths and heights of God,
And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.
Sometimes I take a deeper look in,
Sometimes venture a little farther;
But my place seems closer to the opening - - -
So I stay near the door.

There is another reason why I stay there.
Some people get part way in and become afraid
Lest God and the zeal of His house devour them;
For God is so very great, and asks all of us.
And these people feel a cosmic claustrophobia.
And want to get out. "Let me out!" they cry.
And the people way inside only terrify them more.
Somebody must be by the door to tell them that they are spoiled
For the old life, they have seen too much;
Once taste God, and nothing but God will do any more.

Somebody must be watching for the frightened
Who seek to sneak out just where they came in,
To tell them how much better it is inside.
The people too far in do not see how near these are
To leaving–preoccupied with the wonder of it all.
Somebody must watch for those who have entered the door,
But would like to run away. So for them too,
I stay near the door.

I admire the people who go way in.
But I wish they would not forget how it was
Before they got in. Then they would be able to help
The people who have not yet even found the door,
Or the people who want to run away again from God.
You can go in too deeply, and stay too long,
And forget the people outside the door.
As for me, I shall take my old accustomed place,
Near enough to God to hear Him, and know He is there,
But not so far from men as not to hear them,
And remember they are there, too.

Where? Outside the door–
Thousands of them, millions of them.
But–more important for me–
One of them, two of them, ten of them,
Whose hands I am intended to put on the latch.
For those I shall stay by the door and wait
For those who seek it.

"I had rather be a door-keeper . . . "
So I stay near the door

Ah, what might have been...

2007-06-15T22:20:00.000-04:00

If we had lasted, tomorrow would be the four month anniversary for myself and my formerly significant other. If we had lasted. If I had not broken his heart. If I had not had the realization that I wanted something other, something different, something better suited for myself and my life. It is a mercy for both of us that I finally just put an end to the incessant struggling to find reasons for us to be us, when we should never have been to begin with.

I am grateful for all the lousy relationships I have had, really. It is these lousy relationships that have helped me learn the hard lessons that will be such a great help to me when I finally meet the right guy. I am glad that the men in my life, for whom I suffered, were all wrong for me, because it has given me a better idea of what I want and need in the guy who is all right for me.

I know, this sounds so harsh. But is it really? I have come to believe that life is way too short to be skirting around the matters of the heart. Love always comes with its share of trials, simply by virtue of two human beings attempting to mesh their lives together in a way that brings a measure of harmony and happiness to both. Love does not need the further complications of trying to find reasons why a dating couple should continue dating, particularly when both parties have expressed their share of doubts, questions, and a lingering desire to bail out and move on. Life is too short to give yourself to someone who does not love you, respect you, appreciate you, cherish you, keep up with you, encourage you, support you, push you to reach a little further, yet does not try to change who you are as a person...Life is too stinking short to waste time on being with someone you do not love and cannot see yourself spending your life with. I am not sure why we dance around this, and why we consider each other insensitive and uncaring when we speak a truth that is liberating to both parties.

There is greater grace in telling your once beloved (infatuated with) significant other that you do not and will not love them as they desire to be loved, then to string them along by faking an emotion, a state of being, that is not there. It is too taxing on you to do it, and their heartache will ultimately be greater.

My heartache would ultimately have been greater. My physical healing from my surgery did not really begin to happen until I finally spoke the truth, and stopped forcing an emotional and mental state of being that was not there. My physical and emotional recovery is coming right along now, and I know without any doubt that there are better and brighter days ahead. I do not feel the burden of an inevitably doomed future anymore, and that is a tremendous burden lifted.

The truth shall set you free...And so it has.

To know and be known

2007-06-11T17:31:00.000-04:00

I have been in a "deep thoughts" mode all day. Not the Jack Handy kind, though I do love his deep thoughts. Rather, I have been keeping with the mode I have been in for the last week or so, thinking about the human condition, where we all fit into the grander scheme of things, and what God is saying to me in all of it.

A little while ago, I was reading an article about Baby Jessica. As you will likely recall, "Baby Jessica" was an 18 month old baby who fell into a well, and remained there for two and a half days as a team of rescue workers raced against time to pull her safely out of the well. I remember all the media coverage surrounding Baby Jessica's story. I remember there were prayer vigils held, asking God to keep her safe while she was in the well, and to allow for a safe rescue. I remember seeing footage of the many, many supporters who rallied around Baby Jessica's family, keeping watch with them as they waited...sometimes very anxiously...for their baby girl to be pulled from her darkened tomb 22 inches below ground. I remember hearing reports about Baby Jessica's medical condition as the minutes and hours ticked by, and the collective sighs of relief as the reports came back that, despite everything, Baby Jessica seemed to be alright. Baby Jessica belonged to the world. She was everyone's baby.

Baby Jessica is now 21 years old, and a lot has happened in the world since she fell into the well and was subsequently rescued after the heroic efforts of a team of very dedicated people. Still, it seems to be a story that is timeless. It is still moving to hear about a group of people banding together to save the life of one little girl, and there is some wonder in knowing that an entire world watched, keeping vigil for that little one's safety.

You have to wonder...why did we care so much? Why is the life of one person...one person among billions...so important? What makes people take risks to save the life of another, especially when the risks may outweigh the benefits? Why?

If you ask the woman still known as Baby Jessica, she would tell you that it is because we all want to believe that, if we were in that same condition...helpless, frightened, without any hope of rescuing ourselves by our own efforts...then others would rally to help us, just as they did for her. We want to believe that someone would make the valiant effort to do what seems impossible, and pull us out of our respective wells and lead us to safety.

Hmm. I think she is on to something. I think we all have an innate desire to know others, and be known. We all want to believe that, even in this vast, endless universe, we are important. Not in the sense of a collective importance, but we are each uniquely treasured, uniquely valuable, uniquely important to someone. Important enough that someone would risk their life, even lay it down, for us.

As a Christian, I have grown up with the belief that I am important to God just because God loves humans collectively. My church upbringing taught me that if God has something for me to do and I am reluctant to do it, He will just find someone else to do the job, because He can work through anyone. There is some truth in that, but the taste it left in my mouth was bitter. The message was, "You are not really all that important to God's plan. He can just find someone else to fill your shoes. He didn't make you all that special." I grew up with the sense that Christians had a "We are Borg" way of thinking. As soon as one becomes a Christian, they must assimilate to the un-uniqueness of their new found faith, and accept that...despite all their desire for the contrary...they are not unique, specially gifted, or even necessary to God's plan.

I disagree.

As I grow in my faith and in my understanding of God, I am learning that God is so big, so vastly beyond all we can know and understand on this side of eternity, that His expression of Himself through us is equally vast and varying. When God created man, He made us in His image. If God is vast and mysterious and reveals Himself in different ways, small pieces at a time, it would only make sense that the way to do that is through us...Humans made in His image, to reflect Him in all His glory. To reflect such a vast and mysterious God, He would need a vast and multifarious expression.

I am learning a lot about meeting people right where they are, and celebrating all of our humanness. We are all struggling with something. We all have our hang ups and our baggage and our moods and our bad habits and our stuff. We all have stuff, and God uses us even with our stuff. I am learning that to be fully surrendered to Christ does not mean I have to deny my humanness, rather it means I make my humanness available to God, and as I do so, I become more like the human He meant for me to be before all the junk of this world got in the way.
I also believe that we are special, uniquely gifted, and each of us are necessary for God's plan. Sure, God can fulfill His plan in other ways if we refuse to do our part, but it will not be fulfilled in the way He wanted to do it through us. Through me. Through you.

And who am I? Who are you? That is another undercurrent that is coursing through each of us...the desire to know who we are, and then to be known as fully and deeply as we can be. This is one of the beautiful parts about the way God made us...He made us in His image to express Himself through us. He also made us with this desire to know we are important, to know that we matter. He also made us with a desire to be known deeply and completely. And...He also made us utterly incapable of doing those things for each other. In our quest for significance and knowing, we are directed back to the Creator, who is the only one who can fulfill those needs completely. He knows we are significant enough that He would die for us. He knows us deeply and intimately, and wants to reveal Himself to us in that same way.

In celebrating our humanness, we also see how very limited our capacities are for meeting our deepest needs. That in itself is something to celebrate. Through Jesus, we are rescued from the well of purposeless lives, lives that fall short of what we were made for. Lives that leave us empty. Yes, He came to die so we could be forgiven of our sins, reconciled to God, and we will eventually be in heaven and live out the rest of our eternity with Him. But after the forgiveness, then what?

I am learning about the "then what".

Thoughts on the emerging church

2007-06-09T23:17:00.000-04:00

Not long ago, I had a conversation with someone who said they had problems with the idea of the emergent church. They did not really say why they felt this way, but stated they just had a problem with the idea.

Honestly, I wasn't sure what he meant by "emergent church", so I didn't pursue it. I have been curious, though, regarding how exactly this emergent church is defined. So, I did what any sensible person would do, and I Googled it.

Here is how Wikipedia defines the emergent (or emerging) church:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerging_Church

The emerging church is a controversial[1] 21st-century Protestant Christian movement whose participants seek to engage postmodern people, especially the unchurched and post-churched. To accomplish this, "emerging Christians" or "emergents" seek to deconstruct and reconstruct Christian beliefs, standards, and methods to fit in the postmodern mold. Proponents of this movement call it a "conversation" to emphasize its developing and decentralized nature. The predominantly young participants in this movement prefer narrative presentations drawn from their own experiences and biblical narratives over propositional, Bible exposition. Emergent methodology includes frequent use of new technologies such as multimedia and the Internet. Their acceptance of diversity and reliance on open dialogue rather than the dogmatic proclamation found in historic Christianity leads emergents to diverse beliefs and morality.

In reading this definition, I decided that, without realizing it, I was part of the emerging church. I had long ago stopped believing that the church as we've known it up to this point serves any relevant purpose in reaching the unchurched and post-churched in the world we live in. The old formulas do not seem to be very fruitful. In fact, the overall message of the church as I've known it seems to be, "Jesus came to earth to die so He could forgive your sins, and someday you can go to heaven and be with Him for all eternity. In the meantime, keep in mind that you are still a pretty lousy person, but if you do all the things that you need to do since you're a Christian now, you might be able to experience the grace of God in your life once in awhile, and make it into heaven by the skin of your teeth. Doesn't that sound wonderful?"

Certainly, there are variations of this message that offer more appeal, but the crux of the message has been the same. If I'm not mistaken, people over the years have become increasingly more hostile to this message, and it is not because the world is waning and we are in the end times, and this is to be expected. It is because the church as we've known it has stopped being relevant in the world we live in. The church has become the essence of an old, dried up windbag, or a political platform by which those who do not agree with us are assumed to be going to hell if they do not come to the light and align themselves with right wing (or extreme right wing) political views. After all, how can one be a true Christian if they can see the beauty in the soul of a homosexual, and celebrate that beauty??

I have for quite some time considered myself more liberal than conservative in my thinking. Oh yes, once upon a time, I was very conservative. I thought God lived in a very small box, and if we could not fit our thinking, our lifestyles, our very selves into that box, then there was no help for us and we might as well strike a deal with the devil so we might at least get one of the nicer rooms in hell. Over time, though, as I have grown in my faith and experienced God's unmistakable hand moving in my life, I have realized that not only does God not live in a very small box, but He does not live in a box at all. We cannot begin to comprehend the mysteries of the God we serve, and we cannot begin to limit the vast reaches of His love for humanity.

I often think back to my more conservative days, and how many people I may have momentarily soured to Christ and the church because I could not see God beyond the limitations I had put on Him. I think the emerging church is relevant. I think it is an indicator that people are starting to "get it". In living a life of faith, we are dealing with a mystery far beyond our comprhension, and who are we to limit it, or say who may or may not partake of it? People the world over have been severely wounded by the church that asks them to tow the conservative line, to fit into the mold of what a good Christian ought to be, and for being labeled without mercy when they express their humanness.

God does not ask us to deny our humanness to serve Him. He merely asks us to make our humanness available for His use, so He may express His glory through our humanness as He would like to. We are all wonderfully weird, quirky, flawed people, who don't always get things right. And the God I serve says that, despite all of that, I am still holy, blameless, irreproachable, and I have Christ in me, the hope of glory. Right now, just as I am. Flawed, human Stephanie.

I think this is a message that the world we live in is dying to hear.

Emerging Church readings:

"Velvet Elvis" by Rob Bell...phenomenal book, busts the God box wide open

"Blue Like Jazz" by Donald Miller...a book that stretched my beliefs in all the right ways

" The Rest of the Gospel" by Dan Stone and David Gregory...What does it mean to have Christ living in you, through you, and as you?

That's my two cents :)

Love Stinks

2007-06-09T00:24:00.000-04:00

I hate the horrible residual effects of having once known someone to be wonderful, sweet, and so forth, and then to see other things about them that, while not horrible, are not exactly what you thought you would find if you were to dig deeper into the wonderful, sweet, and so forth person you thought you knew. And what stinks is that you sometimes remember the person you thought they were...the person they never were, really...and you wish that you could know that person again. Or, at the very least, not be absolutely consumed with anger and disgust when you think of the person you came to know after the blinders came off.

I hate that I cannot see some people beyond the pain that knowing them brought into my life. Oh, to return to the days of innocence...

When I think of love lost, I never find myself thinking, "I wish that person was part of my life again." Not at all. But I do often find myself thinking, " I wish I could think of that person and remember the good things about them and truly desire good things for their life, and not be consumed with insidious thoughts about them merely at the mention of their name."

I know from experience that, as time goes on, I will be able to remember my love-gone-wrong with some measure of fondness, and distance from the train wreck of our relationship will help me to see the good in who he is. I know it's there. Right now, it's hard to see that, though, and that in itself is a burden.

Why do we do what we do to each other? This whole dating thing is pretty tempestuous, when you think about it. Our hearts were never intended to be bonded then torn away from one person after another, until you finally meet that one person your poor bruised and battered heart was meant for all along. Whose idea was this, anyway?

I think it's kinda funny when people make comments regarding people bringing baggage into relationships, indicating that those who desire to be married have to leave the baggage behind. Give me a break. For the modern single, we have been told since the beginning of time that the way to find the right person is to bond yourself to a bunch of wrong people first, and then...tada!...you will finally meet the right one, and live happily ever after in your baggage-free world, because you will somehow suddenly let go of every hurt, every wound, every mark left on your soul by bonding yourself to all the wrong people on your way to the right one.

You know what? I've got baggage. And sometimes, it seems like I have a lot of it. I am by nature a very intensely emotional person, and I do tend to analyze things to death before I finally lay them down. I'm telling you, there are relationships in my life that ended years ago, which I still think about from time to time, and think, "Wow! I never realized that before...". I suspect that this baggage I have will diminish over time, and rather than moving forward with a five piece luggage set, I will eventually have just an overnight bag or a cosmetics trunk...But baggage free? Come on...

Had a bad day...

2007-06-08T16:12:00.000-04:00

I woke up feeling sad today. I had no reason to wake up feeling so sad. I had no sad dreams just before waking up. I have had nothing horribly sad happen in the last couple of days that would leave me feeling so sad. Still, I woke up sad.

It did not take me long to attach reasons to why I am feeling so sad. I feel sad because my life is nothing like I want it to be. I think I have failed...again. I think that, no matter I do or how hard I try, failure is part of my destiny. My style, if you will.

I feel sad because I cannot seem to do even the most basic things that adults do to live independently. I think about others I know who are my age, or even younger, and they seem to land on their feet every time. Every time I attempt to do what adults do...find a decent job, move out of my parents house, maintain a place of my own, and so forth...I seem to fail, miserably. Whether it is due to my own actions, or circumstances beyond my control, failure seems to find me. Before too long, I am living with my family again, because I could not make it on my own. I am tired of feeling like the perpetually lost sheep.

I feel sad because I want to work, and I am not physically able to do that yet. I want to earn money so I can go out and go to a movie without feeling like I am slowly draining the life out of what little money I have in reserve. I am still in a lot of pain, I still feel very tired most of the time, I still feel nauseated a lot of the time, I still feel like exactly what I am...not healthy enough yet to go back to work. I have been sick for about two months solid now, and it has cost me dearly. I am tired.

I found myself thinking today that if only I was smarter, gifted, more talented, more whatever people need to be in order to be successful or at least not needy and dependent...if only I were more of those things, maybe then I wouldn't feel like such a loser most of the time. If only I were more of those things, my life would be more together, and I would be somebody God could really use to do something that matters.

Of course, I recognize that these are just feelings, and they do not reflect truth or reality. I recognize that, in the only reality that matters, I am complete, I am perfect, I am exactly where God needs me to be right now, exactly as He wants me to be right now. I will not become somebody God can use someday, when I get my act together and can live the life I want. I am somebody God can use right now, living the life I live right now. Even if my life never changed (which it will, someday, but even if it didn't...), God sees me as whole, holy, complete, irreproachable, blameless...right now. I am already all of those things in my spirit, because my spirit is united with Christ's. The experience of my soul, which lives in this temporal world, is in becoming all of those things. I know all of that.

But this still really stinks. To add insult to injury, this is the second time I've written all of this out, as it got erased the first time. Man, today is just a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

In other news...sort of

2007-06-06T13:13:00.000-04:00

I am tired of writing about relationships and forgiveness and other related items. At least for the moment. Such things are part of a larger process, a greater work being done in me, and it all comes in waves. I'm sure I will have more to write about as new waves of understanding wash over me, but at this moment...I just want to be done with it. I am sick to death of talking about it, thinking about it, processing it, and yearning for it to be truly part of my past.

It is all the more aggrevating because these experiences came to me in the midst of other very trying experiences. In every respect, this experience of loving and losing had become peripheral to more important things happening in my life, and the entire thing was just an aggrevation. I think it is a good indicator of where you are with a relationship when it feels more like an obligation or a chore than a joy. I am sure that marriage can feel like that sometimes, but the early dating relationship, the time when you should be feeling awash with love and affection, should never feel like drudgery. If it does...RED FLAG!!

And there I go talking about relationships again. Sheesh. I might as well just run with this for awhile.

I think that, when a breakup happens, it is easy to become consumed with analyzing it. I do think it is wise to look at it, see where you made mistakes, see your own role in the pain you are experiencing, and see where you can do better in your next relationship. I think it is far too easy, though, especially for Christian singles who have been told that their single greatest task in this world is to find a mate, get married, and have babies...I think it's easy to become swallowed by the analysis, consumed with trying to figure out why you didn't end up marrying that person. Sure, there may be some huge things that you chose to ignore along the way, causing you to stay with that person longer than you should have, but the simple fact is that it didn't work out because the two of you just weren't meant for each other. It sounds simple, because it is simple.

I was talking with a friend of mine last night about the daunting task of processing the emotions that come with a breakup. There is sadness as you let go of any dreams you once had with that person. There are the feelings of disappointment in that person as you look at who they turned out to be, as opposed to who you thought they were. There are the feelings of anger that come with those realizations, feelings of being manipulated into harboring such hopes to begin with, and so on. A whole laundry list of emotions that come with the ending of a relationship.

So, as I'm talking this out, my friend presented a novel idea...Rather than putting so much energy into nursing the negative feelings toward the person and the memory of the relationship, why not thank God that you saw those things and were spared a lifetime with someone who was not right for you? Hmmm...Of course, I know this. But to really allow the shift in focus from anger to gratitude is really something. Instead of saying mulling over the things I saw in him that disappointed me, hurt me, left me baffled, I can say, "Thank God I saw them when I did, instead of being with him another three months, six months, ten years, and then seeing them. Thank You, God, for letting me see this now, and sparing me the greater pain that would have come if I had made a greater commitment to him."

I do think that Christian singles, probably more than those who did not grow up in the church or are not so influenced by it, do feel a greater pressure to make our relationships work. In Christian circles, when people see a couple start dating, the wedding bells start to ring. Their chime is faint, but certain. I think there is a slow but certain shift to the understanding that it's okay for relationships not to work out, and that does not have to be a devastating tragedy. I think this is slow in coming, though, and it is such a new idea in Christendom that it is difficult to find support in the, "It didn't work out, that's okay. Learn from it, and move forward" type of thinking.

I am not a 31 year old single Christian woman in 1952, who has been already written off as an old maid well past her prime. I am a 31 year old single Christian woman in 2007 who is learning and growing every day, becoming more fabulous with every life experience, and who is going to be a heck of a catch for the right man. The right man...not the man I just settle for because I do not want to be single anymore. On my wedding day, I want my tears to be tears of joy because I get to spend the rest of my life with the most wonderful man to come into my life, and I know without any doubt that he is for me...not tears of sadness because I am marrying the man I settled for because I did not think I could find anything better, so he'll do.

I think it's awesome that we can grow with all of these experiences. I love the richness and depth that the road of suffering can bring to one's life. As I look back on my life, I can certainly see that my journey has been marked with a lot of pain, a lot of heartache. I used to think, "Why me?". Over the last couple of years, though, I have adopted a, "Why not me?" perspective. I am grateful for the journey I have had, and I would not change any of it. I am grateful that God has used all of it to make me who I am, and that He has used these things in my life to reach other people who go through times of suffering in their lives. That makes it all worth it.

Okay, for the other news...

I have been in significant pain over the last week or so. Much more pain than I should be experiencing this far out from surgery. My doctor is ordering a ct scan to see if there is any fluid buildup where my kidney used to be. We'll see what happens.

Further thoughts on forgiveness

2007-06-05T00:49:00.000-04:00

Okay, so as I consider the relationship, and I think about the things that just absolutely irritated me, and the things that now leave me feeling so angry sometimes, I have to face the reality that, more likely than not, very few if any of those things were done to me with the conscious intent to cause harm to me or to our relationship. Perhaps there were underlying intents, motives veiled even to his own heart...but nothing done with the conscious thought, "I'm going to do this, or say that, because I know it will hurt Stephanie."

I think this is a common thing. Except in situations where the person has clearly gone out of their way to harm you, and their actions or words are clearly marked with malice, I think it is often safe to believe that the injury was not intentional. It does not absolve the injurer of their culpability, but does create an affirmative defense for their actions.

Now, the injurer's tendency to injure without thought is a good indicator that perhaps they are not a safe person for you to be around, but in the matter of forgiveness, that seems to be a totally seperate issue.

As I consider the relationship, and my choice to forgive, I think of this...What am I really forgiving? Was anything done to me that was so injurious that I need to forgive that specific action? Perhaps...but overall, I would have to be honest with myself and say that the thing I really need to forgive is that he did not fulfill my expectations of what I wanted and needed in a man, and that in itself caused more of an offense than an injury. I think this is often the case with couples who breakup. Where no specific act of injury has been committed, and there are just a hundred little injuries caused by each other's essential selfishness, I think the thing we feel the need to "forgive" often comes down to this: "I forgive you for not being the man/woman I expected you to be when I agreed to have this relationship with you. I forgive you for not being molded into all I hoped you would become as time progressed. I forgive you for feeding my infatuation when we first met, allowing me to build you into an ideal, only to have the reality of your true self come in and dash my expectations of you to pieces. I forgive you for trying to sweep me off my feet by acting as my prince/damsel, only for me to find out later that you're just an average person with hang-ups, just like me. I forgive you for not having hang-ups I can deal with."

Those are broad terms, of course, and we can all find flaws with our exes that we can point to and say, "See that! If they were who they pretended to be when I met them, they would not have had that thing hidden in the background! How could they do that to me??" Certainly, some of our relationships were marked with more downs than ups, and some of those we shared our hearts with did not treat them with as much tenderness as we would have liked. Speaking of this relationship specifically, however, the primary injury I am working to get past is that, in essence, he was not what I was looking for, and I had made an emotional investment into something that just did not work out. And to this end, I must also be honest and say, "Get over it and move forward to the guy that God DOES have for you."

I think this is a great argument for giving relationships time to grow on their own steam, not trying to make them into something just because emotions are running high, and, hey, wouldn't it be great if we could run right past this "just friends" thing and get to the good stuff of being a couple? Some relationships naturally grow quickly, and they are solid from the beginning. Many relationships do not grow as quickly, though, and become solidified over time, as the pretense of first impressions falls away and the relationship still stands strong.

And this is what is frustrating to me...I am 31, I want to get married, and I do not want to go through the whole "getting to know each other" process. Man, that stinks. A catch 22, of the most cruel kind.

Learning to Walk

2007-06-04T19:11:00.001-04:00

I think another not so great thing about breaking up is the process of forgiving the other person. It is easy to say, "I have forgiven him." Much harder to walk in that forgiveness. I think about something that he said or that he did, and I feel angry, manipulated, hurt, and I feel a quiet rage rising up in me, demanding a vague something that would make everything in me feel at peace. (Knowing full well that there would be no peace, only a thirst for more "justice".) So, I make the choice, sometimes moment by moment, to say, " I forgive him. I extend to him the same grace and mercy that has been shown to me, and he owes me nothing."

It is so hard when you feel you have been wronged to truly accept that there is nothing you can do to change how the other person perceives what happened between the two of you. If they believe they have done no wrong, there is nothing that you can say or do to change that. I cannot change how he perceives our relationship, his role in it, or my role in it. All I know is what I see with my own eyes, how I interpret it, and the hurts that I carry in my heart because of countless little injuries over the last few months...Nameless things that only became clear to me after I stood at a far enough distance to take in the whole picture. I cannot make him see that, and at this point, I do not care to make him see it. There would be no point in bringing such things to light, as the relationship is over and I am moving on.

Still, the choice to forgive is one that must be walked out, moment by moment, until the experience of the soul matches the knowledge of the spirit. It is through God's grace that I extend grace, and wait for healing.

On loving and losing

2007-06-02T19:12:00.000-04:00

I think one of the worst parts of breaking up is when you start to remember all the things about that person that drew you to them in the first place, and you realize that you have to give up those things, too. Beyond all that, though, you start to realize that while you may be losing someone who perhaps wasn't the greatest boyfriend or girlfriend, you are also losing someone who was a great friend to you, once upon a time. It really stinks how introducing "dating" into the relationship can compromise so many things, and take such a heavy toll.

I have several male friends, and once in awhile, somebody will ask why don't I date this one, or that one. Once in a great while, I will reply with, "We have such a great friendship. Why would we mess it up by dating?" And while I ask the question in jest, the truth is, dating someone changes everything, and when you stop dating them, things are never the same...no matter how much you would like to kid yourself and think that they will be.

And so I consider Harold, and realize that I am blessed to have known him, that he has been a wonderful friend, and that I so much wish we had not tried to hurry past what we had in each other as friends. Because now that we've done that, and I concluded it was not something I wanted...things can never be the same. It's just a reality of living this side of eternity...people hurt people, and in doing so, the dynamics of how we relate to each other changes. We cannot undo the choices that were made, and live as though relationship threshholds were never crossed. Wouldn't life be great if we could just undo every choice that didn't turn out the way we wanted it to??

I suppose it's a learning experience, as all of life is. And I also suppose that, along the path to the one you're supposed to marry, it is to be expected that some relationships will change, and the change may mean that relationship is no longer part of your life at all, once all is said and done. And, I suppose I've been through this before, and survived the hurt and moved on just fine. I will survive this, and move on with my life, and all will eventually be well. Right at this moment, though, I am remembering the friendship that once was there, and all the things that lead to its demise, and I'm just thinking....What the heck was I thinking???

Keep the change

2007-05-30T23:51:00.000-04:00

"The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air. Much that once was is lost..."
- Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring"

I cannot explain what is happening, but I do feel changes happening in me. Changes that have been happening for a long while, and are soon going to bear fruit. What this means, I don't know. But I realized just today that I am in a position that allows me to be moved in any direction, and to go without hesitation. It is an exciting and frightening place to be in, all at once.

Today I realized that all that has been happening over the last few weeks has served as a wonderful means through which God has gained and held my attention. For so long, I have been praying for direction, for clarity of purpose, for the unmistakable voice of God to speak to me and tell me which way to go. I have been seeking this, and I believe I will soon have that answer. I believe it is slowly unfolding for me.

I have been wandering in the desert for some time now. I believe that the events of the last few weeks have been used as a means of bringing me to a place of rest and reflection. As I've wandered through this desert, I have often gone to the right or to the left, not staying the course. In this season, I have had to lay down some things that were very dear to me...some of that, I had no control over. Circumstances would not allow me to hold onto those things. Other things...particularly in the area of relationships...were my choice. A choice between embracing God's purposes in my life, or embracing something other than God's purposes and settling for less than His best for me. The good is always the enemy of the best...and I want the best.

I am learning that, while God does have a plan for us, He has also given us the ability to use wisdom and sound judgement to make choices, and we are responsible to make good choices in our lives. The Word says, "Seek first the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added unto you." The phrase "these things" is often interpreted to mean earthly blessings of one sort or another. I believe that one of "these things" is our gut-instinct that tells us when something is wrong, even if we have no idea what that something. I am learning that my instincts are to be trusted. My feelings matter. My thoughts matter. And if my instincts, thoughts, and feelings are telling me that something in a situation is not right, then I need to pay attention. I have to take responsibility for my life, and make sound choices.

Such a simple concept, so often complicated and convoluted by "seeking God's will" for a situation that you already know isn't right, or seeking direction when the direction is clear. If eternity is written in our hearts, it only makes sense that a good deal of how to live out that eternity is also written there. I realize my tendency to invite pain into my life by not living what I know in my heart is truth.

I am learning more and more about God's grace as I walk through this season of change. I am learning that it is okay to go off course, because if you are truly seeking God, He will be faithful to lead you back to where you should be. Surely, there are consequences to be paid for moving away from the course you were on, but nothing that is beyond the vast expanse of His grace and mercy. I am learning that God loves me enough to take everything this life gives me, whether it is of my own doing or it was beyond my control, and turn it into something beautiful that will draw me closer to Him. I am learning that God is the biggest dreamer of us all, but He fully expects those dreams to be realized...through us.

There are moments when I feel the Giver of Dreams beckoning to me, inviting me to sit with Him, saying "Stephanie, come dream with me awhile."
A change is stirring. I can feel it.

40 Days

2007-05-27T14:26:00.001-04:00

It has been a trying weekend. Letting go is never easy for either the one letting go, or the one being let go. It is infinitely more difficult when you still love the one you are letting go, you still see the beauty of having them in your life, and the reasons for letting go aren't clear to anyone but you.

Harold and I have a deep love for each other. A love that is deep enough to allow for painful honesty with each other, and to do what it takes to protect each other, even when it is the hardest thing to do. After sifting through the pain and finding the beauty in this season of being apart, we have agreed to spend the next 40 days entirely seperate from each other, and seeking Christ independently. Not seeking His will for "us", not seeking healing for the relationship. Simply sitting at His feet. At the end of that forty days, we will see each other again as two friends coming together to share what has been happening in our lives. It is anyone's guess where "we" will be at the end of all of this. Right now, that is not the point.

I have not lost hope for us. I am confident that this relationship will weather the storm, and we will be restored. In what form, I do not know. But I do know that we have been given a gift, that this season is not meant to hurt, but to heal. I see Jesus in this, and I am grateful.

Oy

2007-05-27T00:31:00.000-04:00

I am on Vicadin as I write this, so I am not sure if I will even make any sense. But I will give it a very good effort. I will also keep it very short.

Sometimes love requires much. Sometimes love requires you to hurt and heal at the same time. Sometimes love asks you to let go of the thing you love, acknowledging that letting go is the most loving thing you can do. Letting go is painful. Confusing.

Sometimes I wish my heart was other than it is. I wish I were other than I am. I wish my heart could reciprocate the wonderful love that has been shown it.

There are times when perspective is gained only by stepping out of the moment and looking at it from a distance. And so I'm stepping back. Looking. Gaining perspective.

I don't like it. Not one bit.

My Faithful God

2007-05-23T10:28:00.000-04:00

The last few weeks have been undeniably difficult. Physical pain, emotional turmoil, spiritual challenges...all have taken their toll. As things have progressed with only a few bright moments here and there, I have wondered what lay ahead for me, and when I would find a reprieve from the seemingly incessant struggles.

In addition to trying to rest and get well, trying to give my wonderful Harold the love and affection he deserves even when I feel totally tapped out, trying to give Heidi the attention she craves from her auntie even when I have no energy to give to her, trying to figure out how I am going to stay above water financially when I have had no income for over a month now (and was barely making ends meet before all this happened...), one of my major concerns has been how I will pay my rent. That has been a source of tremendous pressure. I concluded I would need to vacate my apartment so it would be available for a new renter. However, as I still had a lease to fulfill, I would need to continue paying the rent until a new renter was found.

I tried several different resources to get my rent paid for May, and continually encountered obstacles. I did not know how I would pay the rent, and was dreading the conversation I needed to have with my landlord. Then, my mom told me that funds from an anonymous source were coming in, and my rent would be taken care of. Wonderful news, and a great blessing!

It gets better...

My mom called my landlord today to verify who the check should be made out to and where it should be sent. In doing this, she also learned that A NEW RENTER HAD BEEN FOUND! Yaaay!!! The new renter is moving in on June 25, which means....I do not owe any more rent after this month!

In addition to that, the new renter wants to buy some of my furniture. This will be a great way to generate some extra cash, and to save the trouble of moving all the furniture. It is a great blessing, and I'm sure my dad and his back would agree. :)

Through all that has happened over the last few weeks, I have learned a few things...mainly, though, I have been reminded again of God's unfailing faithfulness. He never leaves us hanging, even though it may seem like it at times. His ways are not our ways, but His ways are perfect. His timing is not ours, but He is always on time. What Satan meant for evil in my life, God has used for good. I am the daughter of a King, and He knows my every need, and has an unlimited supply of resources to meet those needs in the most wonderfully surprising ways.

Take that, devil.

Answers

2007-05-19T01:11:00.001-04:00

It was a relief to finally get the pathology report today. I have been waiting for it for a few weeks, and the longer I waited, the more I was bracing myself for bad news. I have learned not to assume that no news is good news. Needless to say, I am glad the wait is over, and that the news was overall very good.

It is funny, I think, that of all the types of cancer to have, I have to have one that is so ridiculously rare that there is very little information available about it. Such is my life, though. I have learned to laugh about these things. I have concluded that my life will always be just a little left of center in one way or another.

I did find one article about renal carcinoid. Or, I should say, one article that said something beyond "Renal carcinoid is extremely rare...". If anyone is interested in reading it... Renal Carcinoid

After my post-op checkup today, I went to my former workplace to catch up with everyone there. I have really missed my coworkers, and it was great to go in and see everyone. It was bittersweet, because I did have to fill out paperwork stating that I would not be returning to my job. It brought some finality to the decision to cut my losses and move forward, and that was a bitter pill to swallow. Nevertheless, it was fun to see everyone, to find some humor in all of this, and just to have a few lighthearted moments with the amazing people I have been working with the last three months. I will miss them.

I could not stay long, because I still get worn out very quickly these days. My doctor said he is not surprised that this recovery has been so rough for me. I was not in the greatest of health as I went into surgery. Severe anemia required me to have to iron infusions, as well as a blood transfusion (two units) before I would even be well enough to have the surgery. Additionally, I had not been able to eat for several days before the surgery due to my twisted bowel, so my strength was very low. Combine those factors with the simple fact that I did have major surgery done, and it makes for a rough recovery period. I am getting a little better, day by day, but there are definitely some days that are better than others.

All in all, while I am looking at some losses and very big changes in my life because of all of this, there is no denying that things could be much, much worse. At the end of it all, I still have my family, my wonderful friends, and a God who loves me unconditionally...and I am learning that the rest of the stuff really doesn't matter a whole lot, and will take care of itself somehow. I am learning the difficult art of letting go of the things I can't control, and embracing with great joy the beauty of the simple truths this life has to offer.

Choices

2007-05-10T01:24:00.001-04:00

So, tomorrow I am going to call my landlords and inform them that I simply cannot keep my apartment, and I will be moving out as soon as possible. I have been out of commission for a few weeks now, and I have still got a couple more weeks before I can even go back to work part-time. It is simple math...I cannot afford to keep the apartment anymore.

On Friday, I am going to talk to my employer and tell them that I will not be returning to my job. Moving out of my apartment and in with my family means that I can no longer commute back and forth to my job. When I move in with my folks, my current job would require nearly an hour commute each way. Again, simple math...gas prices and time spent on the road would not make it worthwhile to maintain my job.

All at once, I am letting to of two things that I worked hard and struggled long to obtain. Letting go of that, and embracing the very thing I worked so hard to move beyond.

This letting go is painful. It is certainly not what I would have chosen for myself, if I had any control over this situation whatsoever. But, I do not, so I am faced with some difficult choices and painful sacrifices.

I am also faced with the choice of how I will respond to all that has happened in my life over the last few weeks. Certainly, I have my moments where I find a quiet place to just cry a bit and process all that has happened. But, moment by moment, I am choosing hope over despair.
I am choosing to place my hope in God's greater plan, and trust that His purposes in this will surpass the pain of the moment. I am choosing to place my hope in the belief that nothing in our lives is wasted, and the outcome of all of this is going to be far more amazing than anything I could ever imagined for myself. I am choosing to believe that God meant it when He said that He knows the plans He has for us, and those plans are meant to propser us and not to harm us, to give us hope and a future.

I do not understand why God has allowed for these things in my life. I may not ever understand. I do know, however, that I can choose how I will respond to this, and in whom or in what I will place my trust. I choose to trust God and His plan for me in all of this.

I have been through many trials over the last few years. Things that have tried my faith to its very core. I look back on all I have been through, and I can see that God was faithful in all of it. I look back on the days of struggling I've endured to this point, and I think to myself, "I got through that, I can get through this." And it is true...if nothing else, I have learned much about God's faithfulness to carry me through things that, without God, surely would have consumed me.

Though You slay me, I will trust You.

I want to believe

2007-05-05T23:50:00.000-04:00

So, as I am going through this process of recovery, I have had a lot of time to think about all that happened, and to think about the things that are yet to come. It is a lot to process. Some of this is happening quickly, and some of the realization is coming slowly and painfully.

In a sense, I am one of the lucky ones. The cancer was found early, and all indications are that the surgery was also the cure. The doctors strongly believe that I will not need to have any further treatment, and the type of cancer I had was not malignant. In that sense, I am very blessed.

In another sense, I am feeling completely overwhelmed by all of this. I am still processing how quickly everything happened...Going into the ER for a belly ache, unable to find the reason for the belly ache, but being told that I may have cancer...then being told that they are almost certain I do have cancer, and I will need to undergo major surgery to have it removed. Going through the surgery, looking at weeks of recovery, gradually watching everything unfold and feeling like life has just run me over.

When I was first admitted into the hospital, I felt as though I still had some sort of control over what was happening in my life. I believed my stay would be short, the procedures quick and painless, and life would go on as usual shortly thereafter. Sure, I would have to do some financial wizardry to make ends meet, but I could do it.

Now, I feel that life is once again beating me up. I have worked so hard to recuperate since leaving my job at CMH, and it has taken every ounce of grit and determination to stay the course and achieve my goal of having my own apartment, finding a job that I liked AND paid the bills, and being able to live a life that was a little closer to "normal" for someone my age. (Being 31 and living with my folks was not normal....). It was a hard road to travel, but I did it, and I have been making it work. Sometimes, just barely getting by...but still, getting by. I was finally feeling like I had achieved the independence I so longed for. Now, I am looking at the very likely possibility of losing all of that, because I do not see how I will financially recuperate from all the weeks of income I will be losing because of the surgery and recovery.

For some people, I'm sure this seems like no big deal. A couple months behind in rent..so what? The overwhelming majority of people I know have jobs and apartments come and go, but they always land on their feet. For me, this feels like just one more struggle, and one more thing I've worked so hard for being slowly ripped away from me.

I want to believe that God will provide, and this will turn out better than I can imagine. I want to believe that. But the struggles I've been through over the last couple of years make it difficult for me to hold on to that. I know...God gives us enough for today. Frankly, I am tired of living with "just enough". Where is the abundance? Where are the blessings that are pressed down, shaken together, and overflowing? Where are the blessings that are exceedingly and abundantly above all we could ever ask or think?

I am grateful for how His hand has moved in this thus far. I can't deny, though, that I am desperately seeking some guidance from His hand for a very uncertain future.

What the flip?

2007-05-03T16:10:00.000-04:00

So, I am finally home (almost...staying at my parents house for a few days) after a 10 day stint in the hospital. It has been a crazy couple of weeks, and I am only just now getting time to process all of it. Everything just happened so fast...

On April 23, I went into the ER for the second time in a week, with severe abdominal pain. None of the things the ER, Urgent Care, of my primary care doctor had told me to do were working to resolve the bowel obstruction they told me I had. So, on April 23, they thought they would do a CT scan to see what might be going on.

By the time they got around to doing the CT scan, I had been in the ER for three or four hours. Harold...my poor, dear Harold...had been enduring my ever-increasing crabbiness and irritability with each moment that passed. We waited in the quasi-room they had put me in, and I tried to sleep while he watched TV. I was just waiting for them to come in and tell me the obstruction was still there, they were going to admit me so they could get it taken care of, and I could go home in a day or two.

We waited. And waited. Finally, the doctor came back in, and without mincing any words said, "We have found a mass on your kidney that is causing us great concern. We are going to admit you tonight. They will do another ct scan in the morning and the urologist will look at it to determine what it might be. This has nothing to do with why you are feeling so much abdominal pain. We just happened to find it because we did this cat scan..."

The news came as a surprise, but I put the fears of the worst out of my head. I called my mom to tell her I was being admitted into the hospital, called my employer to tell them I would not be at work, and just waited to be put into a room. Harold left to get a few things from my apartment, and I'm sure was glad for the reprieve from my "Don't touch me!" attitude. I waited in the ER for another hour or so, until they finally put me into a room.

I slept well the first night, being so exhausted from enduring a week of horrible pain. I was glad that things were finally going to be resolved, and I could get back into life again.

The next morning, after my second CT, the doctor came in and said that the mass on my kidney looked to be cancerous. I don't rememeber all of what was said or what happened over the next few days. I only remember that the doctors determined that the kidney needed to be completely removed. The location of the mass on my kidney would not allow them to simply remove the cancer. The whole kidney would have to come out.

Typically, this is something that would be scheduled into the normal surgical shedule, and I would have to wait about three weeks for the surgery. I did not want to wait. Once you know you've got cancer in your body, you just want it out. Fortunately, the surgeon who did my gastric bypass surgery was very concerned about the symptoms associated with my abdominal pain, and decided he would like to do some exploratory surgery ASAP, and they could take my kidney at the same time. My surgery was scheduled to take place within three days of the decision to take it out.

Friday, I underwent major surgery, and had an internal hernia repaired and my kidney removed. As it turned out, my small bowel had pushed its way through my hernia and twisted itself 180 degrees. If it were not for that, I would never have gone to the ER and had the CT done, and they would have never found the cancer.

The doctor mentioned several times that it was a wonderful irony that I had the abdominal pain. The type of cancer I had is the type that typically goes undetected until it is much too late. Because of the CT scan done to find out why I had such a tummy ache, they found it early. They believe that the surgery was also the cure, and I will not need further treatment for the cancer. The pathology report is not in yet, but I am believing for the best.

That is the bare bones of what happened. As far as the psychological impact goes, I will write about that later. There is too much to write, and I am too tired. It is a lot to take in.

A moment of silence

2007-04-12T23:57:00.000-04:00

Kurt Vonnegut was...is...one of my literary heroes. I deeply admire his ability to challenge me to see from another perspective. A perspective that is not only different from mine, but one that challenges mine to its very core. The first Vonnegut I ever read was "Harrison Bergeron", and I never forgot it. His work provided a wonderful backdrop to my early twenties, and served as inspiration for some of my own feeble works.

Thank you, Kurt.

http://www.charter.net/news/read.php?id=13605890&ps=1016&cat=&cps=0&lang=en

Damage Control

2007-04-11T00:01:00.000-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, Harold and I went to see the movie "Premonition". The movie itself was mediocre at best, although the company was supremely wonderful. However, even with such a mediocre movie, I did gain some insight that I'd like to share.

In the movie, Sandra Bullock's character experiences a premonition of her husband's tragic death. After a strange series of events, she realizes that time is not operating on a continuum, and she is able to alter the events leading to his death. With this empowering realization, she puts into motion a chain of events that will surely thwart the impending death of her husband, and change the outcome of the story.

Frantically, she begins putting together the pieces of the bizarre puzzle, changing what she can, undoing the future she has seen. Finally the moment comes when she believes she holds the power to rescue her husband from the horrific car accident that claims his life. In fact, as the plot unfolds, it is her very actions that place him in harm's way, and ultimately cost him his life. Helplessly, she looks on as she sees the horrific scene play out, and her efforts to prevent it end in terrible tragedy. Her very efforts at damage control were the thing that cost her the thing she loved dearest in all the world.

I wonder how often I do this in my own life. I see a glimpse of a future that is frightening, beyond my control, exploding in all-consuming flames of the unknown. I see this, and I go into a frenzied mode of doing damage control. I begin making decisions, putting plans in motion, doing all I can do to avoid the doomed future I saw as my fears took over. As my plans begin to unfold, and ultimately unravel, I stand helplessly and watch as the very things I try to avoid become my waking nightmare.

I am certain that I am not the only one who does this. I think we are all consumed by our fears now and then, whether it is in the small, day-to-day grind of life, or the bigger things that we are convinced will ultimately derail the course of our lives.

One interesting point was made in the movie...Sandra Bullock's character asked her priest why she was given that premonition. The priest told her that such premonitions often came to those who lacked faith, who had no belief in something greater than themselves who ultimately held their destiny, no hope in what they could not see.

Interesting...

Night and day

2007-04-03T02:54:00.000-04:00

I cannot sleep. I have been trying to sleep for a few hours now, and sleep just will not come to me. So, I thought I would get up and take some time to write about the wonderful man God has given to me.

I love this picture. It is just a random shot, capturing a beautiful moment. Harold and I were taking a walk by the bay in Petoskey, and it was a particularly cold and windy day. As a cold gust of wind swept over us, I snuggled up to Harold for warmth and shelter. He pulled me close, shielding me from the wind, and snapped a picture of the moment. I love this picture, because it shows his heart toward me. He is very nurturing and protective of me, and does so in a way that does not patronize or diminish me as a person. He cares for me in such a way that he lifts me to a place of honor. This is something I have never had in a relationship before.

When I think of Harold and all that our relationship has brought to my life, I cannot help comparing it to relationships I have had in the past. I look at those relationships, and I remember feeling anything but honored and cherished. I remember feeling used. I remember feeling like an object. I remember feeling dispensable. I remember feeling that I was exposed to pain rather than protected from it. I remember feeling cheapened. I do not remember feeling loved for who I was, but rather loved for who it was the man I was with thought I could become if only I would try hard enough. And if I became that person, perhaps then I would be deemed worthy of his love, and he would then keep his promises to me.

With Harold, I am loved just as I am. He asks me to be nothing but what I am, and the growth I have experienced as a person since being with him has been born out of the natural progression of things. Iron sharpening iron. We both challenge each other in all the right ways. We love each other just as we are, yet we cannot help but grow together as our relationship grows. Harold not only loves me as I am, but celebrates me, as I also celebrate him. All of this is difficult to put into words at 3 a.m., but believe me when I tell you that there is a night and day difference between what I have with Harold, and anything I have ever had before.

Harold and I first "met" last November, and our seperate paths took us in different directions. Eventually, our paths converged once more, and we knew that we were not going to veer off course again. I let the gift of Harold slip through my fingers once, and I am so incredibly thankful that God saw to it that we had another chance. We have been given an amazing gift, and we realize this ever more so with each moment we have together. Whether those moments are filled with deep discussions of spiritual matters, or discussion of the merits of pork rinds while watching a muted WWE Raw, our moments together are nothing less than wonderful. Mutual adoration and celebration of all that God has made us to be, and all we have together.

I have been through some pretty bad relationships. I am thankful for them, though, because they have taught me to appreciate what I have with Harold. I am thankful for the broken roads that lead me to him. I see God's grace in this, and I am exceedingly thankful.

Okay, now I'm just getting gushy....

Mad about Harold

2007-03-19T20:57:00.000-04:00

I just really dig this guy, and I love "us"!

One month

2007-03-16T22:48:00.000-04:00

So one month ago today, I experienced the most wonderful first date with the most wonderful man I have ever met. It was the most perfect first date, better than I ever imagined a first date could be.

Harold and I met last fall, through a website called Plenty of Fish. It was a free dating site that a friend of mine told me about, and I figured...what the heck? I had no high expectations, as I had been on many an online dating service, and never met anyone there that I actually wanted to pursue anything with in real life. However, I figured I might catch a fish worth keeping at Plenty of Fish, so I gave it a shot.

Harold and I started emailing shortly after I joined. However, I had stipulated in my email that I only wanted to meet men within 75 miles of my zip code (a stipulation I would later learn Harold had to work hard to get around in order to communicate with me...), so while I was interested in Harold, I concluded he just lived too far away from me. So, he went his way and I went mine. We kept in touch, but pursuing anything more than what we already had was not a thought in our minds at the time.

After a few months, our roads lead us back to each other. We started emailing each other on a regular basis, then we started talking online. We soon began talking on the phone, and we would talk for hours. It is still not at all unusual for our phone calls to last anywhere from 2 to 4 hours. Anyway, the more we wrote and talked and learned about each other, the more it was clear that there was so much more there than we saw before.

We wanted to meet. We talked about a few ideas for when and where to meet, and then the most wonderful thing happened. Bob came out to play! Bob, who only comes out to play every couple of years, was going to be playing at Short's Brewery. It seemed like the perfect place for Harold and I to meet for the first time. If nothing else, we would at least have good music, right?

I remember feeling so incredibly excited and nervous as the day approached. I knew what to expect from him up to that point, but there were so many variables that would come into play once we met in person. What if there was no chemistry? What if we just didn't gel as well face to face? With nervous anticipation, I finally met him.

It was amazing. It absolutely could not have been more perfect. Once I realized Harold was not "slow" (there is a funny story behind that, which I will share someday), we had a wonderful night. The ambience was perfect, the conversation was captivating, and we shared incredibly intimate moments as we wrote our thoughts down in my journal. Now our first date is immortalized in writing...I read those words now, and we were both so beautifully shy yet raw in our expressions. It was, and is, a wonderful thing.

We said goodbye that night, knowing that something very important had just begun between us. In the month that has passed since, we've been on more dates, spent more time talking on the phone, emailing, text messaging, and learning each other. It has been an inexpressibly wonderful month, and I look forward to many, many more months...all of which will be inexpressibly wonderful in their own ways as our relationship grows and changes over time. Right now, we are in that sunshine-and-lollipops, "getting to know you" stage, with an ever-deepening appreciation for each other, growing to cherish each other more deeply with each passing day. We are savoring every beautiful moment of this journey.

I am thankful for every heartache I've had before meeting Harold, because it has made me able to love him better and truly appreciate him for who he is and all that he means to me. He is the man that I never knew how much I missed until I found him, and now I can't imagine being without him.

Happy anniversary, sweetie

The New Guy

2007-03-10T01:42:00.000-05:00

Way too tired to write too much...but this photo is too good not to share. We call it "Sushi Drunk Love". He introduced me to sushi, and I introduced him to my camera phone, and I do not think I've ever seen a picture of two people more happy to be with each other and sushi.

Baptism Sunday

2007-03-04T23:41:00.000-05:00

I love "baptism Sunday". I've grown up observing baptism Sundays, and they are always a unique experience. Once upon a time, I didn't so much enjoy them, but once I walked in obedience and finally was baptized myself, observing them wasn't nearly so convicting. Now I can enjoy them.

I love baptism Sunday, because it is a chance to meet the family. God's family is so varied and colorful. It is always exciting for me to listen to the varying testimonies about where people were before they knew Christ, and where they are now, and why they finally decided to be baptized. Some folks had been Christians only a short time before they were baptized. Others had been Christians for years, nearly an entire lifetime, before they decided to be baptized. Some made the decision to be baptized out of their zeal for their new found faith. Other decided to be baptized out of that same zeal, tempered by a season of struggling followed by a season of humble obedience.

Some of God's family come from a fairly pristine background, in which their biggest problem was deciding whether or not they could smoke a cigarette and still be a Christian. Others come from a history of deep drug addiction, imprisonment, sex addiction, alcoholism, etc...and yet, there they stand, made new in Christ. One thing is clear...regardless of where we came from, we all came from "stuff". The stuff we came from may have been different, and some war stories are more thrilling to hear than others (if we're being honest about it), but whatever the stuff was, it was significant enough that it once stood between us and God. God had to help us reach through our stuff and take His hand before He could pull us out of the stuff we were stuck in.

I am consistently amazed by the grace of God. Sometimes, we don't make a clean break from our stuff. We cling to it, not necessarily out of stubborn disobedience, but because it is familiar and comforting and we don't even realize that it's stuff that is keeping us from deeper union with God. Certainly, people will point an accusing finger and call us evil, backslidden, deceived, and so forth...but God's grace is even bigger than the opinions of His children. God's love and grace are big enough to swallow our stuff whole, and still use our flawed and fumbling selves for His purposes.

A couple of nights ago, during a conversation about something entirely other than stuff, I learned of an impact I had one someone's life that was quite unintentional. I learned that my life, flawed and fumbling though it was, had an impact on someone else's life in a way that helped that person see the love of Jesus in spite of the judgement and accusation they so often received from Christendom. That person is so wonderfully and gloriously unashamed of who they are, and they still have the audacity to proclaim a love for Jesus and Truth. Such stuff, which is not stuff, is not well accepted by those are dealing with their own stuff. At any rate, the time in my life when my relationshp with this person was most thriving was a time in my life when I had a lot of stuff. I was not the kind of person I thought a person had to be to be used by Jesus. As it turns out, Jesus even uses people with stuff...big and small...to impact people for Him. Isn't that something?

Abundance

2007-03-01T00:36:00.001-05:00

"The wise mentor knows that being aware of what is not known is important in order to begin to learn. To attain true knowledge and wisdom, we must remain open and empty, allowing ideas from other people to rush in. To be empty, to recognize how little we know, is to be abundant."

-Chungliang Al Huang and Jerry Lynch "Mentoring: The TAO of Giving and Receiving"

I am currently reading a book called "Bridges Out of Poverty" by Ruby Payne. There has been some down time at work, so a coworker recommended I read that book in order to have a better understanding of where most of our clients are coming from when they walk through our doors. The book has been very insightful, and I recognize so many of the stories in the case studies presented. With each story I read, I see the face of someone I know, someone I am only just now beginning to understand
.
In 1986, my family moved up here from the Detroit area. It was quite a culture shock when I began to realize that the way people lived up here was far different from what I was used to. The lifestyles people lived, the choices they made, the always-open invitation for trouble in their lives was always so baffling to me. I never understood how people could live this way.

Today, I read the quote above, and it moved me very deeply. It reminded me that, though I have learned much, I still have much to learn. It reminded me never to become so confident in what I know that I think I know it all. It reminded me that a man I knew, who had just served 25 years for murder, taught me of my own ignorance after he found a home for a kitten. He thanked me for trusting him with the kitten. I never told him how unsure I had been of his intentions or ability. His heart was far more trusting and gentle than mine.

I'm not sure he ever killed anyone. I'm not sure it even matters. I only remember him for the gift he gave me, of showing me all that I do not know.

Why I Hate Northern Michigan

2007-02-26T15:54:00.000-05:00

So I was in a little accident yesterday. Despite my intuition telling me to do otherwise, I decided to venture out on the crazy icy roads. For the first little while, things really weren't so bad. Then, quite unexpectedly, the roads became very icy, and visibility was signifantly diminished. However, I could see well enough to see the person in front of me very quickly reduce speed. I attempted to do the same and lost control of my vehicle. I soon realized that my only option was to continue forward, and rear-end the person in front of me, who had come to a nearly complete stop. Or, I could attempt to avoid them by veering toward the shoulder, and hopefully hit a snowbank.

I did neither. My vehicle veered to the right all on its own, thanks to the blessed ice beneath my wheels. I avoided the driver in front of me, but ended up hitting the parked county cop's car. Yes, I know...of all the vehicles to hit, it had to be a police car. All in all, that may have been the better option. Had I hit a citizen's car, I not only would have been given the civil infraction for VBSL, but would have possibly been facing a civil complaint from a disgruntled citizen. As it was, the officer was very nice, very understanding, and nearly apologetic as he wrote out my ticket. It could have been much worse.

My vehicle sustained very minimal damage, and is still driveable. The damage to the car was so minimal, I'm not even sure I'm going to pay the deductible to have it fixed. It's already a hoopty car, and now more than ever. It is quickly becoming a redneck cadillac.

My body, however, is feeling every bit of the 40 mph impact. My neck and back are wrenched out of place, and I am in significant pain. I missed one day of work already, and it looks like more time off will be required so I can get the treatment I will need.

While everything has turned out fairly well, I am feeling a little frustrated. I was finally in a place where I didn't feel I was treading water financially, and was even ahead of the game. Now, between paying for my ticket and missing work, I am once again behind. I am trying not to feel too discouraged by this. I know that God has a plan, and I will see it unfold beautifully as time goes on.

Right now, though, I am going to take some ibuprofen and hope for the best.

Slightly Overweight Tuesday

2007-02-20T22:21:00.000-05:00

So, starting tomorrow, we're all supposed to give up our vices. Everything in our lives that proves to be a detriment must go on the chopping block, and one of them will not come out alive. But who am I kidding? Not being Catholic, I do not observe lent. So today is just a day with a built-in excuse to eat high-fat, high-calorie pastries.

I suppose that if I were serious about giving up a vice that was difficult to surrender, it would be the vice of selfishness, or the entitlement, or self-righteous faux-virtue. My paramasturbatory tendency to lick my injuries and mentally rehearse all the things I would like to say to those who have hurt me is far more damaging to my spiritual nature than the tendency to enjoy too many desserts or drink too much coffee. I look at people who are overtly sinning and think, "Well, at last I am not like THAT!", all the while nurturing my entitlement to be angry and thirst for revenge, which I have labeled justice. I have stopped smoking cigarettes, choosing rather to poison my soul with a steady flow of justifications, arrogance, and selfishness.

It is funny, really, when I have to face the reality of who I am as a person. I talk about wanting to get involved in a ministry someday. The truth is, though, that I jealously guard my time and space. I do not hesitate to tell anyone how important it is to me to have time to do the things I want to do, and that I do not easily sacrifice that time for anyone or anything. Ministry is about giving, about dying to self, about being poured out and spent. Sacrificing the temporal for the eternal. I say this is what I feel called to. And I do. Yet I also realize that such a calling does not come without a price, and that I will need to pay that price if I am to be faithful to what God has put in my heart to do.

The fact is, living alone, I have a lot of time for me. Tons of it. Too much. I have become very selfish with it, in fact. My desire for independence has become a tendency toward anti-socialism, and it seems to be ever more so the longer I am alone. I see the value of community now. The question is what is to be done with this new understanding?

Stop the bleeding

2007-02-17T23:19:00.001-05:00

I am a strong supporter of TWLOHA. I encourage anyone who reads my blog to check out this ministry. You may do so at www.myspace.com/towriteloveonherarms, or you may visit their official site at http://www.twloha.com/ .