Happy 2007

I wish I had something profound or moving or life changing to write two and half hours before the end of 2006. I don't though. Instead I just sit here, customarily alone, watching t.v. and wondering why I still find myself without anyone to 'ring in the new year' with. I don't know that it is loneliness, per se, just a little sadness, I guess.

As I think about the possible resolutions I could make, I can think of nothing that I would actually stick with. So, in order to avoid inevitable failure, I choose to set no goals. Healthy, huh? You would think that since I shopped all freaking day today that I would be in a better mood, but I find myself feeling quite melancholy instead.

Really, I think there is probably a lot about this past year that I can feel good about. However, there is a substantial amount of not so good which is what I am so amazingly gifted at focusing on. GRRR. Maybe I should just go to bed.

Happy New Year, and sorry this post sucked.

All Done

BryAnn & BretLynn in their new jammies!


Merry Christmas everyone. I won't lie, I am oh so grateful it's over now but it was a great night. The kids, of course, had a blast. I am exhausted and dreading cleaning this place back up tomorrow, but it was all worth it. Have a blessed Christmas!

Present Overload

It's possible that I have gone a little overboard this Christmas. But it is just so darn fun, how am I supposed to stop?

Here is a new riddle. If we are to forgive others just as God forgives us (Matt. 6:12), but if we don't forgive than God won't forgive us (John 20:23)......isn't that a catch 22? Maybe it isn't a new riddle, but a confusing issue for me just the same.

Lack of Control and the Sadness it Creates

It is only two in the afternoon, and already it has been a hard day. I spent most of the morning at the hospital waiting for my mother's case manager. After three hours, no questions were answered and I so feel like we are just walking aimlessly in the dark here. She has yet to be retested to see if the chemo and radiation did their jobs. She can't walk, stand, sit up, or anything else that would provide any sort of quality of life. At least not on her own. So, I find myself wondering, if she still has cancer and will have to go through all the treatment again, are we just wasting our time and her energy on this rehab. Also, if all she is going to be able to do is stand up out of a wheelchair, so long as someone is pulling her up, how is that improving her quality of life. I'm frustrated and confused and perhaps a little scared and I don't know what to do or who to talk to in order to get any of the answers we need.

A man who goes to my church hung himself in his garage yesterday. I find myself both saddened and relieved that I did not know him personally. Relieved because the heaviness I feel in my heart for him and his family would be so much more piercing had we known one another. Yet, I am broken hearted that I did not know him because maybe, just maybe, we could have talked. He could have talked, I could have listened. I don't have a God complex and I don't necessarily think I would have done anything better or different than any of his loved ones did. Still, I feel a sadness that I couldn't be there, in some way, any way, to ease his despair and suffering. I ache for what his family must be experiencing. I hurt for my pastor who must somehow instill hope in such overwhelmingly hopeless circumstances. I think more than anything, I imagine that man arriving, finally, at that decision yesterday. I know the hopelessness, the agony, the fear, the anger and the belief that this really is the only option and everyone who loves you really will be better off without you. Oh, how my heart is pierced with his pain. Pray for his family, please.

Cognitive Dissonance, Again

I am beginning to think it is just as easy to walk through life in complete denial in happy land as it is in the black hole. Perhaps easier. Since I am not in a consistent state of depression it is even simpler to deny the turmoil wracking my spirit. Or, maybe I am wrong. Maybe I am dealing with things and I am growing and that is why I am typically in better spirits. Oddly, I am really not sure. Is it normal to not know what is going on inside your own heart and mind?

For instance, this morning in my support group I was in a pretty chipper mood. I shared insights and laughed, completely opposite of my original arms crossed silence. So, the other members commented on my growth and how far I've come, while inside I'm thinking, I'm not so sure about that. However, I am typically my strongest critic, so maybe I am just being too hard on myself. Then an hour into the group I was asked a question that I totally couldn't answer. Not even that hard of a question. 'What have I survived in my life that others could not?' Well, my first answer is nothing, pain is relative, whomever God placed in my position could have survived it. So, they changed the question. 'What have I survived that I wouldn't want anyone else to experience?' Where do I start? The problem is, I couldn't. I have said all those things before. An extremely dysfunctional family. Physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse. Parents I couldn't trust, a complete lack of affection, what felt like a complete lack of love. A spiritual upbringing that so damaged my view of God that I am not sure I will ever be able to truly know His love and forgiveness.....Nothing I haven't, at some point, said before. And yet, when faced head on with that question, I couldn't make the words come out.

Why can't I escape from this prison, I created it, right? Why am I so very terrified of being known, of being exposed, of being vulnerable. What can anyone really do to me? So they hate me, if I can't be real with them than who cares if they don't hate me, there's no real relationship there anyway. I don't even know what I am trying to say, I am just frustrated. Frustrated and confused. Am I really doing anything at all here. Am I really moving, changing, growing, anything. Or am I just walking through motions hoping somehow my life changes itself?


Even as I type, my inclination is just to curl into a ball and cry. But I don't. It's easier just to push the feelings aside. To pretend that all is well, or at the very least, moving in that direction. And maybe it is. Perhaps this is just my addiction to crises. I've learned in my support group that people like me, when things are going well, get spooked. We know the bottom is going to drop out eventually, so sometimes rather than just waiting for it, we create our own crises to go ahead and get it over with. Crap, I'm rambling now. I don't even know where I was going with this. Or maybe I do and I don't want to go there. I am such a freak.

Lift My Eyes

Let me start by saying that I find myself being astoundingly grateful for people who won't let me run and hide, even when I desperately feel the need to.

With that said, I have been feeling the need to run and hide. I have been sad. I have been frustrated. I have had no idea why. Through this I am learning how very out of touch with my own feelings I really am. I have all this craziness going on inside me and I have no idea where it is coming from. I realize that I still have issues, I get that. However, my life is no different this week than it was last week, so why the deep, dark, ominous feelings now? I don't know.

I have been praying for God to search me. Not that He needs to search, but that is what the Psalm says. I want to know what is going on, why I am feeling so dark. I can't pinpoint even exactly what I feel, much less where the feelings are coming from. Tonight, as I drove to Life Group, I was listening to a song called "I Will Lift My Eyes." I like the song, I love to sing it. Tonight I couldn't sing it because each time it would get to this one line I would reach the verge of tears and have to stop. By the time I got where I was going I couldn't even stop the tears, they were just falling out of my eyes. WHY? I don't know. The line says 'I will lift my eyes to the healer of the hurt I hold inside.' Was I crying because I hurt, because I want to be healed, because I feel unhealable. I don't know.

Here are the two issues that I think are perhaps causing the chaos, though I am not positive. First, my brother and the child he is expecting. Originally, my plan was just to have no part of this child's life. I don't see my brother, ever, if at all possible. So, not seeing the child would go hand and hand. My brother isn't allowed to holidays and such because we believe the children's safety to be most important. Plus, we don't like him. Here is where my issue with that scenario begins. Even if my brother never lays a hand on his child, I will have hurt and rejected and abused that child. It will be impossible for the kid to not know that he/she has twelve cousins. Cousins who get together at every birthday and holiday and typically many times in between. What am I doing to that child by not allowing him/her. What overwhelming rejection that child will feel if he/she is never included. Just as I feel it from the abuse I experienced, that child, too, will wonder, 'what is wrong with me?' If we do allow him/her to come and take part, how do I live with wondering each time I look at them what could possibly be going on at home. Mucho stress. I feel conflicted, confused, and quite frankly, afraid.

Secondly, my mother. She has been in a rehabilitation hospital here in Fort Worth for a little over a week now. I have gone to see her once. We're talking a ten minute drive here. I am not purposely not seeing her. I keep meaning to and something, however insignificant, keeps coming up. I don't know why. I don't know why I can't just make myself go. I don't feel anger toward her really, at least not consuming amounts. I want to go see her even, but I don't. So, I have tried analyzing why that is. I'm not sure. I think part of it is that I am afraid. I am afraid of one of two things happening. Either she will do something, say something, whatever, that hurts me, thus hurdling me back to square one with her. Or, and probably more likely, our relationship will begin to grow. I think the 'what if' is what is really hindering me. What if we begin to develop a relationship like I never dreamed my mother and I could have. You know, that of a mother and her daughter. And then, she's dead. How do I get over that. How do I get past the fear of what may be and decide that it would be worth it, however short a time we get to share it. I don't know.

So, I guess that is where I am. Sad and confused.

"I Will Lift My Eyes"
By Bebo Norman

Oh God my God, I cry out,
Your beloved needs you now.
God be near and calm my fear,
And take my doubt.

Your kindness is what pulls me up,
Your love is all that draws me in.

I will lift my eyes to the Maker
Of the mountains I can't climb.
I will lift my eyes to the Calmer
Of the oceans raging wild.
I will lift my eyes to the Healer
Of the hurt I hold inside.
I will lift my eyes, lift my eyes to You.

God, my God let mercy sing
A melody over me.
God right here all I bring
Is all of me.

Cause you are and you were and you will be forever,
The Lover I need to save me.
Cause you fashioned the earth and you hold it together, God,
So hold me now.

I will lift my eyes to the Maker
Of the mountains I can't climb.
I will lift my eyes to the Calmer
Of the oceans raging wild.
I will lift my eyes to the Healer
Of the hurt I hold inside.
I will lift my eyes, lift my eyes to You.

Sweet Girls

Hectic Lives Breed Fatigue

I remember a time, not so very long ago, when I would wake up, go to work, come home to my t.v., go to sleep, then press repeat. What ever happened to those days? Honestly, I am glad that I have so much more to do these days, however, sometimes I just feel completely worn down. My sister and her four children stayed the weekend with me during which we had to plan outfits for pictures and then actually go have the pictures made. Picture taking with small children is absolutely exhausting. But man oh man are they cute pics. I will post them as soon as Jennifer gets them uploaded. The twins are huge. By huge I mean they weigh like ten pounds or so, but in comparison to four pounds, they seem like they have grown by leaps and bounds. They are far too precious. One of them will mimic you if you "blow bubbles" at her, it is so so so sweet. My sister, currently a single mom, is doing a great job. Her husband is deployed in Iraq for his second tour. He left in October and won't be home for a visit until February. So, if you have a second, say a little prayer for that family, for Josh's protection and for Jennifer's patience.

I am not in a great state of mind at the moment but I will blame it on fatigue and hormones. All in all, life is swell. I'm not even being sarcastic. ;) Church is good, work is fine, and 90% of my Christmas presents are already wrapped beautifully and nestled under the tree. What do I have to complain about.