Numbering... resuming numbering... One thousand....

I realized that it is high time I resume a heart of thankfulness, I'm better at snapping pictures of those things I am thankful for than I am at writing them down, so I decided to number (once a day) something my soul is truly thankful for, big and small things by taking an instagram photo of it... 

How am I?

Carried by grace

At moments overcome by raging grief

other moments numb (what a gift from the Lord numbness is)

aching for the achings of my children

focused on the Lord

staying busy

tired, very very tired, sleeping lots

grieving but learning

Thankful, constantly counting things to be thankful for.

Joyful

Tuesday Ten (opening the hands wide)

What can I say, I am REALLY loving this link up! Be sure to visit other people's Tuesday Ten HERE.

Without further delay, My ten...

1. Rain drops, beautiful gorgeous raindrops bringing a fresh breath back to a parched forest.

2. Organizing & Schooling happening once again 

(our lovely break is over and we're back at the books, with a newly reorganized schoolroom and one great big desk for all the kids to work at together!) 

3. The delight I find in watching my children and the pure and gentle love they have for babies. The delight of holding a special new little girl in our extended family.

4. The flood of memories that visiting the hospital can bring back, memories of being there delivering 4 little boys, memories of heartache & loss, and memories of this little face and what a SHEER delight it was to hold her for the first time, to take THIS picture 20months ago and e-mail it to my mom and then call her and tell her to check her e-mail, never letting on that she had a granddaughter. 

Sweet Precious Memories

5. A freshly organized and SUPER slimmed down scrapbooking/sewing storage area.

6. Story time in a bucket

7. Sunrises, all pink orange and blue... The light and the glory of our Lord spilling over the tops of the mountains and the lessons that silent mornings can bring to our hearts.

As the golden light breaks over the horizon, I open my hands wide and they are filled with HIS golden light. The light from the sunrise HE created, planned and orchestrated...  This is His grace pouring into my hands, but I must not cling to it, I must hold the hands open.

8. Birthday boys and the joy of serving them and making them know how perfectly special they are!

9. Boys all Mud...

10. God's beautiful promises displayed for ALL the world to see!

"If eucharisteo (thankfulness)  had led us to let go and open the hand to receive all His shimmering river of gifts, how can we now close the hand?

If I close these fingers, try to hold, hoard the river-dam up the grace-won't the water grow stagnant?"

"If I dam up the grace, hold the blessings tight, joy within dies... waters that have no life.

I turn my hand over, spread my fingers open. I receive grace."

~Quoted from: One Thousand Gifts by: Ann Voskamp~

more appointments, more tests, more questions...

"Opening the hand to receive the moments. Trusting what is received to be grace. Taking it as bread."

"Eucharisteo, remembering with thanks, this is the bread. We take the moments as bread and give thanks and the thanks itself becomes bread. The thanks itself nourishes. Thanks feeds our trust."

"Stress can be an addiction and worry can be our lunge for control and we forget the answer to this moment is always yes because of Christ." 

~Quoted from: 'One Thousand Gifts' By Ann Voskamp 

I called a few days ago (because I'm incredibly impatient) and got the results of the MRI

Thankfully we are currently praising the Lord that there are no tumors or oxygen deprivation spots on Carter J's brain, everything came back looking perfect like a happy healthy little boy brain.  This is a huge blessing and we are very happy for this news, it is a deep breath of relief to know that all is well. 

But this knowledge also creates more questions. So what is causing the seizures, will he have to deal with the epilepsy his entire life or is this a passing thing, what of his asthma and on and on and on...

We found ourselves back at the doctors office again yesterday, this time to bring our concerns about Carter J being on the autism spectrum to our pediatrician.  I found myself becoming nervous and feeling that white knuckled grasp for control as I drove down to the office (45 minutes away)  I kept trying to pray, trying to remember what I wanted to say and what I didn't.  Peace, can't I just have some peace.... 

Thanks, remember the thanks, remember Eucharisteo!!! 

name things, remember, name things

mentally I began taking note of things to be thankful for

the clouds in the sky, the river, the sleeping boy in the back seat at last peaceful...

 As always our doctor was amazing, she listened, she encouraged and most of all she is sending us to get our baby evaluated, I was so afraid of not being validated, or being thought less of on my way down there, afraid that I would be thought a failure or a bad mom.  But she completely validated me and agrees that there is a GOOD possibility that he is on the spectrum but then amazed me and went on to say that even after his testing, he doesn't come back on the spectrum it is very obvious to her that he will still need some therapy, to help him handle things better, to help him grasp and learn concepts, be able to function in public and such. 

 I am SO excited, I feel like we might actually be on a path to real help for our precious boy. 

I don't know when, I don't know where but we will be getting that phone call soon.

Stress CAN be an addiction

It is my first inclination when things are unknown, 

how do you talk to your doctor about problems with your child while your child sits right there?!  My heart is quick to find every single tiny what if and fear it.

It is a war, a war in my own heart and soul to remember and thank God for EVERY thing... 

But when we get there...

That peace we long for arrives.

Stress Confessions

"anxiety about being in places or situations from which escape might be difficult." 

"What if I opened the clenched hands wide to receive all that is? A life that receives all of God in this moment? How do you do that when the terror tears up your throat..." 

"Stress isn't only a joy stealer. The way we respond to it can be sin."

"I've got to get this thing, what it means to trust, to gut-believe it's true: I can't fill with joy until I learn how to trust: May the God of hope fill you with all JOY and peace as you TRUST in him, so that you may overflow ~Romans 15:13" 

"Isn't joy worth the effort of trust? -Because I kid no one: stress brings NO joy." 

"Anything less than gratitude and trust is practical atheism" 

~Quoted from One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp 

picture credit to "the Boss"

Yes, I am still reading this book... This has been a long LONG journey for me, Learning to give thanks in all situations is a daily discipline and sadly sometimes I lay it aside for the chaos that seems to surround me and delve into focus on it instead.  There is nothing like anxiety that eats you alive... NOTHING

It leaves your heart bruised, your soul worn thin and your emotions deeply injured.

It leaves you feeling like you have no worth, like you are a failure.

I have only to open the Psalms and see that David struggled through many of the same emotions in different circumstances. I open this book and discover that even in the last quarter it is still a skill being learned...

Thankfulness Eucharisteo 

"He gave us Jesus. JESUS! Gave Him up for us all.... - If God didn't withhold from us His very own Son, will God withhold anything we need? 

If trust must be earned, hasn't God unequivocally earned our trust with the bark on the raw wounds, the thorns pressed into the brow, your name on the cracked lips?" ~Ann Vosckamp

My thoughts on Photography

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I wanted to share here with you all a lesson I gave on photography a few weeks ago...
This slideshow is made up of my own photography with the words to a hymn that I feel expresses my heart on the subject.

Here are the notes from my lesson as well (and like everything in my life right now, a portion of it has come from the delights I have been reminded of in "One Thousand Gifts" )

Eucharisteo

(thanksgiving) 

Photography is for Praising God

"The aim and final end of all music should be none other than the glory of God and the refreshment of the soul."
~Johann Sebastian Bach

The same always goes for anything we do, it could be said “The aim and final end of all photography should be none other than the glory of God…..

ANYTHING we do we must use it for: “none other than the glory of God”

The Lord gives each of us gifts, special talents and parts of WHO we are that are ways to praise Him, give thanks to Him. Whether that be through music, teaching, writing, leadership, submission or photography we are to use those things to the end of declaring His glory.

Every time I take a picture it is an act of Thanks, (eucaristeo)

With the choice to take a picture of an object or person I am seeing it as something beautiful, something worth capturing on film and it is a way to praise the Lord for the good things He gives us. There is beauty in every tiny detail of everything He has made. Raindrops to mountain tops He has given them as good gifts to us, to declare His glory.

How to do it well:

1.     Good lighting (this is essential to a good picture, if it is to dark, use a flash)

2.     Center your subject (don’t have your person at the bottom of a shot with TONS of sky behind them. Or chop off half their face, ect.)

3.     Develop your style (knowing the “look” you desire)

4.     Steady hands

5.     Gentle and quiet (if you are photographing, birds, bugs or animals this is IMPORTANT!)

6.     Know how your camera works (or you might miss a “GREAT” shot!)

7.     Remember to praise God for your subject (eucaristeo, give thanks)

Glorious JOY!

Have you ever made cloaks for lego guys?? I can now say I have, and nothing could have brought me more joy than the expectant sparkling eyes of two little boys while they waited for their lego men to be adorned in cloaks so that they might be super heros!

Delight... OH purest delight in such simple things. 

Words can't explain the thrill of tiny hands clutching a tattered bunny, or a little arm around my neck...

Not the delight of watching a mighty battle with foam swords take place in my living room.

It's been so long

SO long 

since such simplicity brought such purest delight.

I cannot stop smiling, laughing and enjoying this throb of LIFE in my heart.

God is faithful to carry us through, no matter what the fire we face. He will use it to HIS glory

and 

THAT

Brings more joy than anything

Asthma, Epilepsy and Allergies OH MY

Some days I feel just like that, dancing along the yellow brick road in my ruby slippers 

(okay in reality I ALWAYS wanted a pair as a little girl but never got them, though I did keep a magazine clipping in a shoebox with a picture of ruby slippers. Anyhow now my imaginings include them)

When suddenly I come to a dark place on the path, strange noises touch my ears and fear begins to tickle my heart... Asthma, Epilepsy and Allergies OH MY

Asthma... Epilepsy and allergies OH MY! 

hehe, okay really

Isn't parenthood one of the hardest places to let go of that control?

 (you know, the control you don't really have but cling white knuckled to anyway..) 

Things have NOT been going well around here. Often it feels just like that, skipping along a beautiful path when out of the darkness comes fear. But just like Dorothy slapped the lions hand, so to can we slap fear... We can remember:

  "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything with prayer and petition with thanksgiving present your requests to God. And the peace of God will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." ~Phillipians 4:6-7

I spent my entire day yesterday with my foot propped up and then making a trip to the doctor and from there to get an x-ray done, I made a foolish mistake and have hurt it.  So now I have plenty of time to "try" to rest.

I decided to use my time wisely and spend a day searching for answers and understanding about the things that my children deal with. Asthma, Epilepsy and Allergies.... 

oh my...

I spent the day researching developmental delays & behavioral delays.

Side effects from oral asthma steroids

special diets

I learned a lot, but I also found that I was very frustrated. There is just not a lot of info out there or at least it wasn't coming up on any search I could think of. 

I did however find a GOLD MINE for Epilepsy information.

http://www.epilepsymoms.com/

I want so deeply to help my kids, to be well educated in their various trials so that I can be well equipped to handle info at the doctors, or if we end up having to work with paramedics again. Even on a day to day basis.

There is NOTHING in the world more frustrating to pour medications into a child knowing full well that while it will keep the physical issues at bay it will also change their personality, their behavior and their entire life.

I HATE it.

But last night I realized that I have been striving on my own for a "fix" instead of resting in the Lord, knowing full well that unlike the "wizard" at the end of the yellow brick road God has a real purpose and plan in each of my son's lives. He has an amazing work to do through Carter J with his onslaught of physical ailments. 

God doesn't make fake promises and hand us silly badges at the end of the journey,

He uses each trial to build our faith, our character and our dependence on Him.

It has been my prayer from the moment I knew little Caleb was growing inside of me 10 years ago until now. 

"Lord whatever it takes, make them Yours." 

So will I push His hand away? Will I try to shield them from HIS  plans?

No

I will rest in Him. I will 

in everything with prayer and petition with thanksgiving present MY requests to God

I WILL be educated but I will also view this entirely differently.

I will do everything I can to seek out the RIGHT medications, diets, supplements WHATEVER I can to help my kids. But I will do it surrendered to the Lord's leading.

~The following is quoted from: "One Thousand Gifts" By Ann Voscamp~

It is suffering that has the realest possibility to bear down and deliver grace."

"Darkness transfigures into light, bad transfigures into good, grief transfigures into grace, empty transfigures to full. God wastes NOTHING-"

http://likeabubblingbrook.com/

Telling HIM, facing the anguish

 "Does disaster come to a city unless the LORD has planned it?"

 ~Amos 3:6~

 "A good God plans everything. Everything, So a good God can only... make plans for good? He only gives good gifts? A thing of evil cannot be created by a good God.  - 


 All God makes is good. Can it be that, that which seems to oppose the will of God actually is used of Him to accomplish the will of God? " 


 "I won't shield God from my anguish by claiming He's not involved in the ache of this world and Satan prowls but he's a lion on a leash and the God who governs all can be shouted at when I bruise, and I can cry and I can howl and He embraces the David-hearts who pound hard on His heart with their grief and I can moan deep that He did this- and He did. 


 I feel Him hold me- a flailing child tired in the Father's arms."


"Can you believe that I tenderly, tirelessly work all for the best good of the whole world- because  MY flame of love for you can never, ever be quenched?"

 ~Quoted from "One Thousand Gifts" by: Ann Voscamp~

Reading through this book is taking me FAR longer than I'd anticipated. Mostly because I read this portion of Chapter 5 and I can't seem to move on.

I am trying with all of my might to stop, deal with the things that the Lord raises to my attention as I read... To lay them at His feet. I have read these four pages time and again... Never making much headway, just sitting with a knot in my stomach as I picture the face of baby Catalina. I never really blogged much about her, just that we had lost her and that I would share more later. I couldn't. 

I came home the day we lost her and pulled together a birthday party for Carter J. Life had to move on. Yes there was grief, yes there were tears and pain. But I worked as quickly as I could to brush it all under the rug and move on. I wrote her birthmother a letter, I laid out the gospel and I truly believed that it was closure for me. Our precious Evie came one month and two days later. I am SO in awe of God's timing, Evie is perfect and I know that SHE is our daughter.

Yet. I held Catalina for hours, I sang worship songs to her, I kissed her cheeks and forehead... I called her Evelyn

 (though it felt incredibly awkward.)

I was in love with her story. That her birthmother had intended to have an abortion but just before she could she was arrested and incarcerated. Thus loosing that window of opportunity to end the life of this little girl I was holding in my arms. 

She was beautiful. I quietly unwrapped her in that hospital room, I played with her tiny toes. I studied and learned every feature, every wrinkle on her knees and elbows. I made her mine in my heart.

Somewhere around midnight I was praying for her birthmother when I suddenly knew something was wrong. There is no way to explain it. I just knew. I sat there and fed her and watched the clock ticking, praying in complete distress for the heart of her birthmother to have peace. I remember a nurse coming in with a receiving blanket that was a gift from the hospital and a vase with a rose in it. She told me that birthmom wanted a little time with the baby if it was okay with me. 

I remember answering that of course it was okay, I would finish feeding her the bottle and then she could go to her birthmom for a bit. As the nurse shut the door I knew I was feeding Catalina for the last time. I took my time. I studied her more. I had peace but yet I felt my heart breaking.

I spent almost another hour with her, when finally I wrapped her back up, all fed, burped, loved and treasured. I laid her into the bassinet and I opened the door to the hall. 

The nurse was already coming my way for her. 

Birthmom had asked again.

I stood in the door as I watched my heart being wheeled away down the hall. I felt so alone. I hated that I was at the hospital alone. I went back into the room and shut the door. I paced and prayed and waited.

About an hour later there was a knock at the door, with fear and trepidation I opened it to find our dear precious friend and social worker standing there with utter despair on her face. She didn't have to say a word. I already knew.

I won't even touch the time we spent sitting in that hospital room crying and talking.

It is a time far to sacred to my heart to open to anyone. I can't hardly touch the emotions myself. All I will say is that this amazing woman holds a place in my heart that nobody can imagine.

I share this now because I see now that I never had time to grieve Catalina. I have started to pray about it, or started to ask questions about it and then I have to stuff it back. But really, how do you carry on when you have SO many questions. 

"How is it good for this little girl to grow up with a mommy who is in and out of jail, how is it good for her to be with the mommy who wanted to end her life?" 

I have wrestled for so long with God's plan in it all. WHY did I have to give my heart so fully?

Why did my children have to know and be hurt again?

I DO see good in it, but I see an awful lot of hurt in it too.

I have had people say that now that Evie is here it should erase all the past griefs. But it doesn't, I loved each one of those babies in a special way, each one of them is a loss... Each one is a hole.

Evelyn Renee' was the beautiful gift at the end of all that trial.

But each one of those little girls was a soul, a child, a dream and a desire and each one is growing up without us. I am okay with that in a few situations, but with Victoria and Catalina... that hurts.

"Can you believe that I tenderly, tirelessly work all for the best good of the whole world- because  MY flame of love for you can never, ever be quenched?"

I realize now that what I've needed to do this entire time is just stop and scream and cry and FACE the grief. God is BIG enough to handle my hurt, not only that, He wants to help me do it.

I don't have to be "strong enough"  like I've been striving to be. NO!

~1 Corinthians 1:27-31~

²⁷But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; ²⁸God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, ²⁹so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. ³⁰And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, ³¹so that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord."

a moment of Eucharisteo

Please if you haven't read my prior posts on this journey, go back and catch up HERE

"I know it, even in running down the lane to the barn, the diaphragm rising, bracing; this may be it. The hard eucharisteo. Now I know that I don't want to know it yet... Ever.

How to lay the hand open for this moment's bread- when it will hurt.

~Quoted from "One Thousand Gifts" By Ann Voscamp~

Can you believe it?

I can't...

My heart throbs every time I think about it.

For several days I've been trying to pick my book back up, kids interrupting, the phone ringing, dogs needing out, life. Life simply happening kept getting in the way. Frustration was beginning to rise as I tried to remain patient for a moment to steal away and read again.

Thursday morning I took it with me in hopes of gaining a few moments during piano lessons, I got one and a half pages read and then Evie started crying.

But what I read

it scared me and yet

it comforted me.

The HARD eucharisteo

and then... only a few hours later Carter J had a seizure.

on my way to the doctor thinking it was a massive asthma attack the words kept ringing in my heart.

The HARD eucharisteo

Give thanks

Right here, right now

Give thanks

As the day wore on and I learned all that I did I found many ways that God's mighty hand had been holding me. I wasn't able to read on to see how "Ann" found a way to give thanks, I was left on my own to praise God in the midst of a storm.

And do you know something??!!

I found it

REASONS to give thanks!
eucharisteo

God is Faithful, ever so amazingly faithful.

I was not alone for Carter J's seizure, in fact, the amazing woman who was here with me sadly knows all about asthma and was able to confirm my knowledge of seizures. 

I read just one page of the book that morning, that one page carried me through the entire day, no... two days! 

And on top of those: Look at just a few of my 1,000 gifts:

An amazing oldest son, who has such a gentle heart and yet the heart of a brave leader.

Taye, learning a new skill, the skill of fencing!

My precious little girl, she seems to have music flowing in her veins, she spends LOTS of time "playing" at the piano with big smiles and always turning around to see if we all approve of her playing. 

 okay, I know lots of people will shake their heads at this one. But HONESTLY one wonderful thing in this week has been that nintendo ds... I have seriously HATED this thing since the day we bought it to be played on vacations in the car. However, we have been to a million doctor appointments and FINALLY got to take the big boys to their fencing tournament. With Carter J on steroids (awful awful) it is truly a beautiful thing to have him so occupied in a public setting. 

Caleb and Jaden competed in a fencing tournament last night, Jaden (left) getting suited up for his bout.

Caleb big smiles after a bout won.

Jaden came in first in his group and Caleb came in second in his. GREAT JOB my mighty fencers!

Jaden in the black pants, LOOK at that GREAT form for that lunge! 

(that big guy is toast)

seeds started indoors, prayerfully they will feed my family one day!

My happy seed helper

nice enough weather to be outside

Today

lazy

windy

desire for quiet

chai

warm sweater

cold hands

heart worn thin

arguing children

nap of teething baby cut short

doctor

fear & frustration

weary

"~'Wherever you are, be all there.' I have lived the runner, panting ahead in worry, pounding back regrets, terrified to live in the present, because here- time asks me to do the hardest of all: just open wide and receive."

~Quoted from "one thousand gifts" by Ann Voscamp ~

Please Lord, help me to break through this armor and be thankful for the here and the now. 

Help me to be all here.

A beginning... an awakening?

 Some days I pick up a camera and it's a hammer.
 The lens is my ink, for cameras have sensor eyes, and pixels record. ~


 ~and find another way to chronicle, to force the lids open; another way to receive the moment with thanks reverential. 


I have lived pain, and my life can tell: I only deepen the wound of the world when I neglect to give thanks~


~Quoted from "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voscamp


 My camera... Of course, my dear precious camera. As near and dear as a friend. How had I forgotten?!

 I began my list... In tears I began my list. I was SO afraid words can't even be put to the emotions at the first strokes of the pen.  A stepping away from something old and moving on to something new.  It was strained at first.  A feeble attempt at something to truly thank God for. I wanted it to be certain, with purpose. Not just "some" old thing or even a broad thing. One small purposed thing that I took the time to stop and praise for. To be thankful for.

 One by one they came easier. I found myself looking, watching trying to find something to add to the list.

 I began to feel a swelling within my heart, the beginning of a lightness in my heart.

 Then, my camera.  There the statement stands on my professional website : "Photography for Praise"

  I thought back and remembered my beginnings, it didn't have anything to do with a business or even a skill. I began photography with a passion to capture moments of God's beauty, whether in the face of a child, their tiny toes or the beginnings of buds on a branch, a sunset, a bug. No matter the subject my desire was to bring Glory to God by capturing for that one moment the beauty of His creation.

 A wave of realization sweeps across my heart. I am like the church in revelation, the one who forgot her first love.  Both grief and joy come crashing down on me in one foul swoop.

 But yet delight, there is still time. There is time in this day, this moment to make my list. To re-learn thankfulness... Time to relearn eucharisteo!

 Easy? NO, worth it, YES!

It takes more than just reading the book?!

"How in the world, for the sake of my joy, do I learn to use eucharisto (thankfulness) to overcome my one ugly and self -destructive habit of ingratitude (that habit that causes both my cosmic and daily fall) with the saving habit of gratitude-that would lead me back to deep God-communion.


~from: "One Thousand Gifts" By Ann Voscamp



Carefully tucked into the pages of this book, this wonderful/awful book of one thousand gifts is a love letter from my husband. I carefully chose my bookmark. Really I did. I want DESPERATELY to believe and live the words he rains over me. To BE the wife he wrote to, to reach for a possibility of seeing myself through his eyes and through God's.

 Develop a new habit of thankfulness... How? I'm SO scared to take that step and pick up a pen.  How do I let go of the old? How do I write out a list of things to be thankful for when I've focused for so long on the things to be un-thankful for?

 Though it is NOT comfortable living here, discouraged, scared, full of self-hatred only able to see the failures of each day looming before me, and yet how do I step away from it... How do I believe those things aren't true anymore? Can it be possible?

 I will take the dare. I have a beautiful prayer journal elegant and handmade by a friend that I have only barely written in, I will turn this journal into a daily part of this journey.

 Can I gain the courage to lift the pen? To CHANGE? Yes... eventually.

But How Lord?!

"If I'm ruthlessly honest, I may have said yes to God, yes to Christianity, but really, I have lived the no. I have. Infected by that Eden mouthful, the retina of my soul develops macular holes of blackness"

 "Grace, it means "favor" from the Latin gratia. It connotes a free readiness. A free and ready favor. That's grace. It is one thing to choose to take the grace offered at the cross. But to choose to live as one filling with His grace?  Choosing to fill with all that He freely gives and fully live- with glory and grace and God? 

 I know it but I don't want to: it is a choice. Living with losses, I may choose to still say yes. Choose to say yes to what He freely gives. Could I live that- the choice to open the hands to freely receive whatever God gives? If I don't, I am still making a choice. 

 The choice not to."   

"This constellation in the dark- grace, thanksgiving, joy- it might be like that- reaching for the stars. So hard. So HARD. Is there some easier way to fulfilling life?"

 ~quoted from "One Thousand Gifts" By Ann Voscamp

 Dear friends and readers, this is going to be my blog for a time. I am going to use it to prayerfully journal my healing journey. There is SO much in my heart that I have swept away into hidden closets, slammed the door and desperately run away from, trying not to feel the feelings anymore. My heart much like my home is in need of a good housekeeping, it's time to do the spring cleaning in the closets. Rid myself of the clutter and mess that has accumulated there.

 Much like Taye does when I ask him to clean the living room, there are things crammed under the couches and in any corner where I think I can hide them good enough that they won't be detected.  I'm a runner. 

 I think back, how did I even become a runner? I used to be someone who carefully walked through things, (on purpose) and faced the fire and dealt with the fire. I guess after to much fire and to many blisters I began to skirt the fires, or wrap them up carefully and quickly tuck them away, the problem with fire is that it doesn't go out if you hide it... Eventually the flames will envelope everything from their secret place. 

 I hear often how I've had more than my share of trials and hardships.  How do I even answer that. How do I face it? Especially how do I face it with Thanksgiving??!!  How do I be content with knowing that it's not actually more than my share, it is exactly what God has predestined for me.

 I used to... I used to find the good in everything and smile and point out the goodness to those around me. But I've lost that ability somewhere. Now you will find me crouched in a corner waiting.... Just waiting for the next blow. 

 You'll find me night after night waking from nightmares consumed with past trials and fears of the future.  Somewhere in my journey I choose not to be thankful. I can't tell you how it hurts to write those words, the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and the tears welling up in my eyes. 

 I don't know how anymore. I do still have my faith in God. I logically know that He loves me, that all of this is truly part of a wonderful plan. But how do I be thankful for it? 

 How do I be thankful for watching my oldest son have a seizure, death painted on his face and truly believe we are in his last moments? How do you be thankful for listening to a doctor say in not so many words to prepare yourself for the worst because your new baby boy may not make it through the night? How am I to be thankful for holding a sweet baby girl, loving her, kissing her sweet forehead and singing praise songs to her and then in an instant never seeing her again??

 Yes, all of those things have good about them, but on this side of them. How do I pick up my broken, wounded heart and be thankful that it is almost bled dry? How do I not live every single day in fear of the next big seizure, the next asthma attack or any number of things that may possibly take another child or loved one out of my arms?! 

 I sat in the doctors office a few weeks ago, nervous. Somewhat knowing what to expect but yet not. The loneliness engulfed me. I kept praying under my breath, why Lord couldn't you have worked it out so that I could be holding my husbands hand for this appointment. I swallowed hard, felt dizzy gazing at the floor trying to regain my composure before the Dr. noticed. 

 She leaned in closer to me, holding papers in her hands with lab results on them. "I hesitate to tell you the gravity of your situation, you seem to be a bit of a worrier. But this is serious.  Very serious."  

 She went on... But her statement hung in the air "you seem to be a bit of a worrier"  Most of what she said was a blur from there.  It was a true fact from someone who has only met me a handful of times, and it hurt. Ever since I left her office that day I've been grappling with it. How do you NOT worry when you've just gone through everything I have?  How can I ever have fullness and enjoyment in simple life again and not be waiting for the next big thing.

 That afternoon "one thousand gifts" came to my attention... It was almost like a lightning bolt, first on a blog I read, then on another, then videos on facebook and more and more I couldn't get away from it.  I started getting interested, until finally I landed upon the realization that I need to read this book.

 Her story, her honest candid writing is inspiring. I feel as if I am in the book, though our lives have been different and our hardships different... My heart is in it. 

 This is an account of my heart today, my questions, my fears... My desperate desire to find grace, thanksgiving and joy yet again.