Bring It

Facebook has the 'memories' feature where it shows you things posted on this same day throughout the years. Sometimes this is a fun app, other days it can be a bit painful, and on days like today, some memories prove powerful.
One of the photos that showed in my memories feed was this one from 7 years ago.

When I saw it, I gasped. I don't know this person. Obviously, it's me, however I don't recognize me in her at all. It's a hard photo to look at- So much was gong on under the surface- and a lot of it I only felt the negative energy from- but I had no idea what was truly happening in my life. No tangible evidence had been uncovered to release me into the awareness that the crazy I was feeling wasn't me at all... That would come a couple of years later. If you had asked me how I was at this time, I would have told you that life was challenging, but I was happy. I'm not sure that I believed that, or wanted so badly for it to be true that it became my mantra. And when life was painful- I bowed to my conditioning and believed I was the problem.

I believe I was depressed, and broken, and completely lost. I felt like a total failure as a mother, and my marriage simply existed; it didn't have the beauty, safety, fulfillment or growth I'd always assumed I'd experience. I had no idea who I was, how strong I could be, nor how wildly capable. I'd bought into the lie that I was crazy, incompetent, 'too much', inadequate, and a nuisance. What kills me the most though, is that I absorbed all of that- and began to believe it. And it shows. My eyes are tired and sad, I'm heavy, I look timid, and I only remember many weeks and months of survival and simply getting through one grey day after another.

This weekend is my 40th birthday. It's a strange thought, as I don't feel what I thought 40 would feel like- and yet, I'm also aware that in more recent years, 40 has become a poster child of renewal, rebirth, authenticity, and health- and if that is what 40 means now, then I welcome it with arms open wide. Some friends and I talked about turning 40 when we were in our late 20s and early 30s. We would talk about how we wanted to be better at 40 than we were at 25- and I can honestly say..... I did it. When I look at this recent photo- I see peace.

 Acceptance. A woman who knows her worth and just how incredibly strong and competent she truly is. I see a woman who recognizes places in her that need growth, and yet celebrates places where she has busted out of cages of expectations to prove to herself and her children that she can do anything she puts her mind to. I see freedom. A warrior who has taken the stones life threw at her face and instead stacked them under her feet. I see someone who no longer fears what others say because she knows her heart and her value and what she has to offer the world. I see a woman who rests knowing she is truly, fully loved by her God... no longer shrouded in shame from self-inflicted condemnation. I see life. I'm proud of this girl. I'm amazed by her. Sometimes I sit back and marvel at how far I've come and the ways in which I've grown and risen to each occasion. So I've decided not to fear this culturally labeled 'milestone birthday', instead, I'm going to grab 40 by the horns and make 25 look on with jealousy.

To all the girls I've loved before....

To all the women I love and have loved. To all of the women who have loved and still love me... I wasn't leading you on. I never meant to hurt you. I wasn't being fake in the moment, or tolerating your presence. I truly love you, and the heart connection you felt is real.
It's not you, it's me, and I can explain. 

I love people. I love women. I love hearing their stories, and standing in wonder at the trauma and hurt women suffer through and yet pull themselves up to march on.. maintaining a strong softness that often belies the intimate stories of disappointment they work at healing. I find it easy to connect with people. I often find myself listening to women pour out their hearts in the grocery store line, waiting outside kids' classrooms before conferences, and sitting on the beach during family vacations. I love to talk and to listen. I love sharing ideas and experiences. I have had multiple connections with women that lasted only for a weekend retreat, or three month bible study. Women with whom I feel deep chemistry with; a sisterhood and joint heart understanding. Women who, given different circumstances, would imprint themselves upon my daily life and bring new ideas and adventure. I have experienced the feeling of finding a soul sister only to know the timing was off, or the gift was meant for that moment only.

Collages are small representation of women I love!!

I've been more than blessed with women who have loved me well. I've had good friends since as far back as I can remember and have been mostly protected from the wounding that comes from actions of a girl I considered a friend. I can recall the feelings of awe I had sitting on the front row of church holding my mom's slender, manicured fingers in my own childish hands. I watched my grandma snap peas and laugh over the pitcher of her too-sweet southern tea. I can still hear her raspy soprano melt into my grandpa's bass as they sang Bringing in the Sheaves inside the musty, brick church. I've stood in the mirrored paneled living room of my aunt's house and watched her and her sisters argue with great passion. I've giggled until my stomach hurt in the dark bedrooms of friends when I spent the night. I've crouched at the top of the stairs straining to make out the hushed, somber voices after a woman in our community had miscarried the baby she had longed for for so many years. I've cried on early morning walks when my sister friend told me she knew something was wrong with my son. Women have impacted every facet of my life and I have breathed it in with full, deep draws.

But as well as I have been loved, as intensely as I have been protected and cared for, I have struggled to be a good friend in return.

In my adult life, I have lived in a place of chaos and need. When I became a mother, I was thrust into a world of violence and fear and struggle I hadn't known existed. I went to doctor after doctor trying in vain to get my son help for his raging tantrums and violent behavior. I lived on a military base and was surrounded with women who loved me. I had a friend who lived down the street who would run to my house and take my baby for hours while I turned my attention to my screaming toddler. She would keep my second born safe along with her own growing family while I struggled to survive the terrifying life I had found myself in. For the years we were neighbors, she served my family in ways I've never been able to repay.
Years later when my marriage imploded, I was left with the immediate need for housing, as we had to leave the military base we had called home. I had no job, precious little savings, and no renting history to help me secure housing for my family. I was given the chance to rent a tiny bungalow owned by a woman and her husband I was connected to in my church. When the time came to move on from the cozy dwelling, I was offered the basement of another woman and her family. She only asked me to watch her lively toddler as she pursued her career. We settled in and began to live the reality of being a severed family on that beautiful property. When they moved on a year later, I was permitted to rent the entire house and I began to feel some semblance of normalcy. In the years since I was thrust into single motherhood, I have hustled in every way possible to provide for four kids. I have cleaned houses, mowed yards, babysat, used my photography skills, bartered, sold things I never dreamed I'd have to sell, written articles, applied for more than 60 jobs, worked multiple part time jobs at a time, and walked into the social services office to ask for help. I've been on welfare, cashed out CDs my grandmother had given me as a child and humbly been helped by my parents and various friends. I've spent nights lying awake in bed wondering how I was going to pay my rent, afford the kids medications, and watched several medical bills go into collections. I've prayed and cried, and experienced the miraculous when a check or package appeared unexpectedly just when I thought we would never make it.

I'm proud of how far I've come. I was given a wonderful job by a woman who has lived her own pain. She looked into my eyes and saw me as more than a liability. She saw who I could be, and took a risk in hiring me to assist her. Because of her belief in me, I've been able to work myself off of welfare, pay off the bills that were held captive by bill collectors, and now sleep soundly knowing I am able to take care of my family.

But while things are so much better than they've been, I still hustle. I work full time and part time - 7 days a week. I have four kids who all need specialists and three of them have some level of special education. My time is spent juggling work, and kids and doctor appointments, teacher conferences, my house and trying to hold it all together. There is no down time, rarely time for fun or evenings out or phone calls, and always a fire needing my attention. What that means is my friends still don't get my friendship in the way they deserve. Calls go unanswered, texts flash across my phone waiting for my response, and plans get cancelled. I know I've hurt women. I know I've let down my friends. I know there are women who think I lead them on and think only of myself. I know there are women who mistook my silence for ambivalence. I have seen hurt in the eyes of women who think that my scarcity in their lives is a reflection of my feelings towards them. To those women I want to say- it's not you. It's me.
I don't often share the struggle of my everyday life- not because I'm ashamed of it but because it's not necessary. I don't want pity, I don't like to linger in the hard places, and I would rather spend the precious little time I have with friends talking about other things. But I need you to hear me- if you have felt my love- please don't doubt it. Please don't take my silence personally. I used to talk to my mom almost daily, and now it's a good week if we manage one phone call. I am trying hard to figure out how to do it all, but the truth is, I can't. And what often falls is my active engagement with my relationships. I have days when my energy level soars, and the stars seem to align and I am able to reach out to let you know I think about you always, but there are also times where the chaos in my home reaches insane levels, and the only thing I manage to do is keep everyone safe. I desperately love and need the women in my life- and am so grateful for your presence, and I know that I haven't been the friend to you that you deserve. If I had it to give, I would in a heartbeat. I don't have answers and I don't know how to make it better in this moment, but I want you to know that I am not unaware. And while you may feel it, I don't take you for granted.

On Facebook and Healing

Facebook gets a bad rap. It's been around long enough to get a reputation for being a catalyst for cheating, lying, hiding things from loved ones and as a tool to bully and slander. Social media can be a sticky place where truth fades into the reality we want to portray and we have the ability to censor ourselves to allow fringe people in our lives to see only what we wish them to see.
There have been studies done showing FB can provoke anxiety and depression. We look at other people's posts and photos and compare the smiling faces in their photos to our bickering family not captured on film.
Despite all of this, I love social media. I love connecting with people I don't get to see anymore. People I love who would have fallen into the recesses of memory and out of my current life. People I haven't heard from for years show up as a friend request and in moments I get caught up a bit on where they've been and what they're doing now. I've enjoyed the immediate connection to my community that spans continents, socioeconomic class, and age. I've managed to avoid social media drama and instead feel it to be a gift in my life.

Grief has a way of leveling the life you knew, and in the healing there is great opportunity to inventory the life you've known and rebuild the life you were meant to have. Familiarity breeds contempt and in my life, the familiar struggle numbed me against pressing into authenticity and the hard work of looking inward at the broken places needing mending. One of my biggest struggles in my adult years has been the mistaken belief that I was not enough as a mother. I believe this to be a universal struggle for many women and one that can hold us hostage, preventing us from being the mothers we truly are. I've shared before how my first born has had struggles since toddlerhood. At the prompting of a dear friend, I started seeking answers and support when he was just two years old. Sadly, as happens to many mothers, I was brushed off with disdain and told that stricter parenting and the awareness of him 'being a boy' would solve all of the terrifying behavior that I knew at a soul level to be abnormal and dangerous. However, in my vulnerable state, and tender age, I allowed those words to take root and begin growing into a powerfully strong vine that snaked itself around my heart and squeezed the vibrancy out of motherhood. When he was a few short weeks from marking his fourth birthday, well meaning extended ex-family told me the problem was me. If I would change my behavior, and admit my shortcomings then my son would no longer be punished or tormented by the myriad of horrible things he was experiencing. As I had already given space to the other statements by doctors regarding his challenges being a direct result of my parenting inadequacy, the soil of my heart was tilled and ready to receive this final fatal blow to my fragile seed of hope. The story spreads a decade since then and the abbreviated version has me retreating into hurt, anger and sadness. I've since learned none of those things were based in truth. I've since come to realize that God doesn't make mistakes and just as He designed me with purpose, he also gave me the children He gifted me with on purpose. Within me is everything I need to best raise and love the ones I've been honored to birth, and I've worked through the lies of inadequacy and sliced through the poisonous vine that had embedded itself into my heart. I hate that I have spent ten years parenting out of shame and guilt and sadness, but I'm grateful I was able to escape the prison of deception while I still have time to reverse my approach to motherhood.

This is where FB enters the scene. The photos and posts about my children that now forever reside in the interwebs aren't pretend. They aren't staged or prompted. They really happened. The truth is, nothing in life is perfect. No birthday party, no playdate, vacation or outing. There will always be sand in the bathing suit, ants at the picnic, siblings who bicker more than they smile and hug one another, and dirty dishes in the sink after a beautiful birthday supper. But the good stuff is there too. Life then becomes where we put our focus. The photos of my kids playing cards together was real. There may have been arguing three minutes after I snapped it, but that doesn't negate the reality that for a moment, peace hovered like a bird, spreading calm with each thrust of its wings. For me, FB has reminded me I've done something right. It shines bright on a screen and belies my inadequacy. Living with the belief that I'm not enough is a lie that only ties me to being less than I am capable of. My treasure of photos and posts that span years speak to the beauty that really happens when I least expect it. Mothering for me has been messy and hard and at times discouraging, but there is a tangible reminder on my FB page that it's also beautiful and funny and sweet and powerful. I'm grateful for FB. It's helped me stay the course in recovery from drinking in lies never meant for my soul. It's been the antidote for my weary mother's heart and brought a smile where a furrowed brow once was. It's revived the passion I once carried in my chest that was aflame with hope and dreams and expectation. Now those gifts are tempered by age and experience and I'm learning to look to the mundane to find the extraordinary. Facebook is one of the tools that has led me out of that darkness, and I'm forever grateful for its gift.

Plate-Full

I truly believe God speaks to us, we just have to pay attention and listen. I believe He speaks in ways that are unique to each of us. Just as my relationships with my friends are different, His relationships with each of us are too.
I love words. I love writing, and reading, and enjoy the power of language. It's not surprising that for me, one of the ways I connect with God is through words.
For years now, I have felt as though I've been on an adventure with God. My time with Him has increased and my awareness of the incredible love He has for me has grown and I now finally understand that I am deeply loved and celebrated.
For me, I hear from God regularly through words on license plates. It might sound silly or weird, but I promise you that the encouragement, confirmation, love and smiles that I have been given through license plates is nothing short of miraculous.
I have many stories that would make your jaw drop, and have started an Instagram account purely for this amazing experience in my life, (more on that at the end of the post!) but for today- I'll share just one with you.
A couple of months ago I was searching for a job and anxious and preoccupied with needing work to provide for my family. I hate debt and started my life as a single woman in debt with no real work experience. This summer when my writing contract ended and I was left with part time work and odd jobs here and there my debt began to mount. I was in church one Sunday morning by myself and our pastor started a series that was only two weeks long. It was called "Perhaps". He talked about Jesus' first miracle- turning the water into wine at a wedding celebration. The message was very good and full of chunks of truth throughout that sat with me. I hadn't previously thought about the fact that Jesus didn't yet have a reputation as a miracle worker when he told the servants to take the water jugs and fill them up with water after his mother had specifically told him the family was out of wine. He must have looked like a crazy person- and yet they did what they were told. My pastor pointed out that when Jesus does the miraculous, he always asks us to do something in our natural strength first. He then posed a question to each of us: What 'water' did we need to put into our jug? What crazy, bizarre, hard thing did we need to do in order to allow God to move in our lives and do His part? Immediately I knew. I knew I needed to go home and itemize the list of everything I owed. The debt, the medical bills, people I would love to pay back one day. I had an internal argument with God. I didn't want to look at it. I had no job yet, and knew it was bad, so why in the world would I want to see just how awful it had gotten?! I've watched my credit dip lower, and have sold things and done any work I could find to stay on my feet, but I had come to the end of myself. I was begging Him for a good job, and my act before the miraculous move in my life was going to have to be this task. I had to really look at the mess I had fallen into.
I was sobered and quiet. When the service ended I walked into the parking lot without speaking to anyone. I knew it was a sacred moment and I had work I needed to do. I walked towards my car and got turned around for a moment. I changed directions and in front of me was this license plate:

Can you read it? It says: ADDEMUP. I chuckled and said out loud 'Ok God, I get it. I'll do what you've asked me to do'. THAT plate just happened to be by my car, in a parking lot of hundreds of vehicles, and a church that has three services- and it was there for me. I went home and did it. I looked at how ugly it was and absorbed the weight of that reality. Then I cried and prayed and spent the rest of the day in silence. After three months looking for a job, I was connected to the person who would hire me less than two weeks later. 

For me, the incredible ways I hear Him through the vehicle of license plates is how I know that He sees me. I know He sees each of us, and I'm willing to bet that many of you have your own stories of being seen by God that are unique to you. I keep a small notebook in my car and have been writing them down along with a few notes for several years. I've gone through three notebooks already. 

I've started a new instagram account where I can document and share with others. Feel free to come follow me there! I'd also love to hear your stories if you're willing to tell them. 

What Is Normal Anyhow?

In the wake of the collapse of my marriage, there have been many more lessons to experience than just ones that originate within our family.
I've been stretched and pulled and taught and humbled in more ways than I can recount through the last two and half years, and more recently, as the fog has cleared, have begun to see some of the stigma and judgement that presses in around us in subtle, but sometimes hurtful ways.

I have become aware as a woman inside of christian culture, I had judgement deep seated in my heart about divorce.  I certainly never thought it would come knocking at my own door, and am ashamed to admit now that most of the time I heard word of a family divorcing, or a woman on her second marriage, my thoughts towards them weren't filled with grace and compassion. While I'd love to title myself as a woman who believes in equal rights, I had fallen into the culture of thinking that women were often to blame and had they prayed harder, gone to counseling, or just worked harder and longer at their marriages, they often could have prevented the breakup of their families.  And then the most awful information poured from the mouth of my husband and as time passed beyond that day, it became quite clear that no prayer from me, no pleading for counseling and no extra-submissive behavior would right the wrongs that had been done nor illicit remorse and change from the heart of another human being.  I was faced with a reality I never anticipated, and now, have joined the ranks of divorced women.

I have been treated with incredible grace by my friends and family and my church has been loving in ways I didn't expect… but there have been others in the shadows who watch and judge and attach presuppositions onto our family.  Sometimes I can see it in their eyes.. the way that other mothers know I am alone with four children and that my level of strictness might be softer than theirs. I know that when you add an ex to the circumstance, others wonder what awful thing happened to make him an ex, and concerns about safety for their own children playing with mine arise.
The truth is, I have discovered some of the stereotypes about single mothers do apply to me, and for good reason.  I am parenting alone. Parenting is a challenging job even for two people working together.  I get some (not much) support from their father and he sees them every other weekend during the day on Saturday and during the day on Sunday. I am never without my kids for more than a few hours at a time. To provide for them, I work multiple jobs and my schedule is jagged and busy. I also clean the house, pay the bills, drive my kids to activities, and run this household alone.  I am often tired.  I make it a point to go to bed at a decent hour whenever I can because I need sleep and know I am better when I get enough.  But many things fall through the cracks.  Things that would be part of shared work if I were married.  Homework, chores, cracking down on the computer and television and video games.  Discipline.  I don't get to tap out when I have a standoff with a child.  Sometimes they wear me down, and I give up out of sheer exhaustion.  I know too, that in the divorce, my children have been around other adults who live differently than we do. While all of these things are things I would have worked hard to protect my kids against being exposed to pre-divorce, there are things now that simply just are because of the ways our lives have changed.  I know my kids have said curse words, and, gasp! have heard me say a couple myself.  Grief and anger can do that to a person. While my kids might not be as innocent as they once were, they are growing in compassion and character. We have heavy conversations in ways we would have been buffered from had divorce never entered our  lives.

I understand that desperate desire to protect our children.  I am still a concerned mother. I can appreciate that some families see ours as a potential bad influence based on ideas they have concerning what happens inside of a family through divorce.  But I can tell you, we are so normal. We aren't a broken family, we're a family who has walked through brokenness.  It doesn't feel weird any longer to be here with my children without a man. There is a great deal of peace in my house and also the normal struggles of parenting younger children. We love loud, we fight loud, and we are growing and learning and changing. I wish I had had the gift of this awareness before I went through a divorce in order to offer greater compassion to families I had seen as 'broken'. But usually, life doesn't offer you the wisdom without the experience.  I'm grateful for the families who trust us. Who can overlook the fact that my sons might say something dumb or inappropriate or rude out of anger and keep it moving. For other adults and children who love us right where we are- knowing all of us on this earth are in the process of growing and changing. I'm grateful for grace.  We have definitely been scarred and bruised and stripped of innocence through our journey, but I still think we have much to offer and am learning to smile into the eyes of cautious parents knowing that pain comes to each of us in time… and we're all doing the very best we can.

This Little Light of Mine, I'm Gonna Let it Shine

In the two-plus years since my ex-husband left, I have been through a myriad of lessons, layers of healing, moments of panic and, seasons of hopelessness.  I have felt most every emotion I can think of and some I have no descriptive words for.  I've screamed and cursed at God, and wept into my pillow at the overwhelming realization that my dream had crumbled.
As I pressed through the painful places, I began to rise into new areas of brokenness in me that needed attention.  I had lived inside of an unhealthy marriage for fourteen years, and somewhere in that relationship I laid down who I was and walked away from her.  I worked hard, in the sick, codependent way that we sometimes do, to ensure everyone around me was ok.  I scanned faces and body language, held my breath to listen for subtle vocal nuances, and then would adjust myself accordingly so those around me would be ok. I was dying for everyone around me to be ok. But I have realized that I was never ok.

The earlier years of raising my children were filled with chaos and fear.  My oldest son was aggressive and unpredictable and I lived in a precarious place of fight or flight for multiple years.  I was hyper aware of his moods, and worked hard to try and make him ok.  As more years passed, and more children joined our brood; resentment, irritability, and frustration became my go-to emotions, and as guilty as I felt living in that skin, there was nothing lasting I could do to soften those edges and give me the deep exhale that my entire being was screaming for.  I was suffocating under the dirt that had been piled on top of my heart in a powerful effort to snuff out the light I had been given to share.

This year, as I've moved past the hurt of losing my marriage, and walked away from that initial wounding, I've headed into the deep work of finding my voice, looking for who I am, who I want to be, and learning to love her.

I am rediscovering things I enjoy, and finding that I can be a lot of fun. I have intense emotions both high and low and feel everything deeply.  I like to laugh, and be silly, but I enjoy nothing more than deep conversations that fly down low into depths of struggle and flit back high into laughter together.  My friends and family have been heroes in my personal revolution as I scrape harshly with my words and moods while I learn to uncover the authentic self.   I am learning how to say no to people, how to stand up for my opinions at the risk of rejection by others but incredible peace with myself.  I'm finding out how to look people in the eyes and tell them I disagree while lacing it with all of the love and grace I can muster.  I am discovering that my voice matters, and that the things I feel and love to do are worthy simply because they live inside of the woman I have been created to be.  I am embracing my oddities and finding joy in activities that others might find worthless.  I sing and dance around my kitchen, make silly jokes with my kids and have relearned that I am not quiet or calm.  The energy and passion I worked so hard to cover up for so many years is spilling out into my life again and I'm finding the light in my children's faces as they see my heart thawing and shining.
I have made mistakes and thrown heavy burdens on friends and family as I learn boundaries and relational honesty, but when I see the scrapes I've caused, I go back to acknowledge them.  I am so very flawed and yet so very beautifully made, and even in those places I hope to grow and change, I am finding I enjoy my own company.  I never dreamed I would be one of the statistical women who would lose herself inside of a relationship, but I did.  I consider it an incredible gift to get the chance to learn who I am and to get to learn to love myself away from the toxic confines of that place.  I'm finally growing up and into who I was made to be, and learning that I have a path created just for me and all I can give.

Girlfriend Intervention

My life can feel heavy and full of stress these days, so I've found myself often craving something to watch that is fairly mindless.  When Downton Abbey isn't current, (which, isn't mindless but is flipping amazing!) I have sought out other shows to keep me occupied and entertain me during what can feel like endless, tiring work.

I have gone through Suits, 2 Broke Girls, episodes of Hoarders, and Mike and Molly, among others.  In the last couple of weeks I've discovered a new show and I'm loving it.  It's called Girlfriend Intervention.  

I adore women. I lead several groups that focus on healing for women.  I think women are powerful, lovely, strong, creative, beautiful and passionate. I love nothing more than to see women celebrate one another and rejoice in the successes they see in their sisters.  I am humbled to be in groups where women share some of their private struggles and work through their healing in a group where they feel heard and supported and celebrated. 

Girlfriend intervention is a show that celebrates women… with a unique twist. 

Four black women (who are all different styles and sizes and personalities) go and help a 'Basic Woman' (Their terminology for a woman who is 'busted, broken, and has let herself go) and help remind her, or sometimes even teach her, about how incredibly beautiful and amazing she is. Through different exercises, some brazen truth, and lots of energy and love, they take these Basic women (who are all white women by the way) and make over her mindset, her physical body and a room or two of her home.  The energy of the four beautiful, fabulous, self assured women is infectious and while the beginning of the show finds the white girl overwhelmed, defensive and sometimes hurt, by the end of the process, that same woman, is cheering in delight at how amazing she is, and thanking the sisterhood for showing her the way to herself.  

I have watched at least 6 episodes so far, and what I'm learning is nothing deep or new or revolutionary, and yet this simple truth is life changing and powerful.  Women who give other women permission to be who they are, in their own wonderful, beautiful, powerful way, are life givers.  If we could all learn to celebrate other women, and also to celebrate ourselves, we could change the world. 

Each time these girls are made over and are looking at themselves in the mirror post-change… I start to cry.  Each woman is able to say (sometimes for the first time ever) … 'I'm beautiful'.  

The black women tell it like it is, and have shared some powerful truths in their show.  They point out that in the black culture, being fabulous and beautiful and taking time to take care of themselves is the norm.  And many white women (especially post-motherhood) are left serving everyone else and don't make time for themselves… letting the fabulous woman they may have been fade into the backdrop of sippy cups and soccer games.  They also point out that many white women aren't honest with one another, and we're quick to affirm one another when gentle truth would be better.  When a white girl asks another white girl- 'does this look ok?' Most white women will respond enthusiastically with a resounding 'Oh yes, you look great!' Even when that might not be true at all. We don't give one another the gift of truth.  And in doing so, we miss part of the richness of the relationship. 

The sisterhood also discusses how female white culture is afraid to celebrate our bodies.  We see differences and curves as liabilities and often find ways to hide those places that make us uniquely ourselves. Black women are taught to celebrate their curves, and their differences, and give one another permission to be who they are, without holding one another to a standard of a size 2 barbie doll. 

It's so encouraging and inspiring to see women learn to love who they are- without losing weight, or changing the unique things about themselves. The sisterhood comes in to enhance and celebrate and draw out the amazingness that was there all along, and in doing so, they are changing lives.  Each woman who is shown how powerful and beautiful she is takes that new information and it seeps into her family. Her interactions with other people change, she is suddenly aware that she is powerful and that her dreams and desires matter.  She has the gusto to go after the job she wants, to start exercising more, to romance her husband with confidence, to make time for herself. It's a fun show that has a powerful message… women supporting and encouraging women to love who they are created to be is one of the best gifts we can give to this world. When women are aware of how amazing they are, and how powerful they are, there is nothing that can hold them back, and we take that power into our families and communities and light a fire that can bring lasting change. 

If you have time to watch it- do it. (It's on lifetime, but I've watched on demand)  It's an odd, sometimes offbeat show with a powerful message: We are created to be amazing.  You'll cheer, you'll cry, and you'll be inspired to look at yourself and see that you are perfectly and powerfully you.  I'm learning much about how I need to take care of myself better, and that in doing so, I can take care of my family better! 

We need you to be who you are. Everyone on this earth is waiting for your dreams and hopes to come to pass.  We celebrate you, and we honor you.  Women are phenomenal. 

Living in the Tension

Yesterday a few guys came to the house to help me truly move in.  The other family moved out in the middle of July, but I wanted to paint some, and needed some muscles to move around our furniture and to bring in some large pieces that I had in the garage.  Until yesterday, we were all still living downstairs for the most part. 
 I scribbled their names onto a box in my calendar for August 6th. They came to serve me with kindness and skill and in a few short hours, the house was looking like home. 

After they left, I sat at my antique farm table and stared out through the big front window.  The amazing reality of giving my children their own space again and moving into my own bedroom for the first time in 20 months was settling in.  I breathed deeply with the realization that we are truly on our own, and sat in the serenity for about 3.6 seconds before anxiety tried to barrel in with guns blazing. 

Nothing about my life makes sense on paper right now. Financially, my life is a mystery. I do the best each month with what I have, I do the work I'm given to do, and somehow, by some incredible miracle, each month everything is taken care of that we truly need. I have yet to get to the end of my resources and I haven't yet had to ask for help. We've been without my ex-husband now for 22 months. Some months have brought surprise money in the mail from friends who felt like sending me a bit extra. Other times, I've received food, or gift cards, hand me down clothing, or toys. Several times, I have even opened the mail box to find a care package filled with treats and surprises for me to encourage my weary heart.  Somehow, God takes the little I have and stretches it in such a way that there haven't been any cracks. But our minds can be a scary place to linger, and in that moment after the guys had left, and my kids had scattered to their own spaces, I began to rehearse how utterly ridiculous I must be to think that I could do this alone.  The joy of being in my own space was robbed by the anxiety that lurked, ready to pounce into massive disastrous thinking.  In the span of a few seconds, the track record God has in my life of providing for us was smashed under the weight of the fear I let descend upon my heart.  

I talked with a dear friend later in the day. She has been a single mother for several years now after a 25 year marriage dissolved when he chose to walk out.  She has been an example to me of learning to do with less than she ever dreamed and yet seeing her needs be met as she goes.  I told her that the fear of knowing tomorrow could hold complete financial disaster was a heavy burden to bear.  But as I spoke the words aloud, I finished the thought by saying, the reality is all of us are one moment away from disaster or destruction. None of us are immune to difficulty or struggle, it is just that living the lives that we have, we are more acutely aware of it on a daily basis.  We live in the tension of the now.  We don't have the luxury of planning for much, or banking the excess for future calamity.  We have the responsibility of weighing this day's choices and needs against the near future that we know will bring more want.  Just today I was faced with the decision of whether or not to buy the epipen I now need to carry as this year has revealed a bee allergy.  It was hundreds of dollars, and I've put off picking it up because the amount made me anxious. Today I had the money. So today I chose to get it.  I know that in one month I might wish for the money I spent today, but knowing the power in that life saving medication, and having the money for this day, I made the best choice I could make for today. I'm slowly learning the lesson of doing the best I can with what I have and trusting that I will get enough grace, enough mercy, enough provision for the next day, and the next, and the next.  

My Dad sent me this quote today, and it's an eloquent statement about living in the now, in that tension of living as we go:

"The heart of spirituality isn't safety and security. Instead, it is what Dorothy Day called 'precarity.' In the mind of most, precarity (or precariousness) is a bleak state of uncertainty and danger. The word connotes instability, poverty, marginalization, and the absence of a safety net....It also suggests radical dependence: the Latin 'precarious' is the state of being dependent on another's will, being upheld or sustained by another's force. So a spirituality centered on precarity acknowledges the radical uncertainty or contingency of human existence and our utter dependence on God." — Kerry Walters in Jacob's Hip: Finding God in an Anxious Age

The beauty of living in precarity is that I am faced with a simple choice. Either I trust that God is who He says He is, and He will provide for me and my family, or I fight it and try to conjure up miracles for myself. I don't have a good track record of creating something out of nothing. I haven't yet figured out how to open doors for work and influence when there seems to be no knob on the door. I do have almost 2 years and a notebook filled with line after line where I've documented the incredible ways my family has been seen, cared for, loved, and provided for. I still don't know how this will work. My rent is up now in this house, and I'm truly on my own. But each day brings what I need for that day. Each job I'm offered, each bit of mana I'm showered with has been enough. My Mother's heart longs to race ourselves out of this place of precarity, and yet the beautiful, miraculous story that is being written is one I would never have experienced otherwise. I'm learning to sit in that tension of precarity, and choosing daily to fling my hope and faith on the one who has seen me.

Slipping Sand

Parenting is one of the most challenging jobs in the world.  Part of the design is that usually you don't fully grasp the gravity of how challenging it is until you've already added another one or two or three to the brood.  Baby land and newborn land is a hazy place that is physically draining and punctuated by moments of incredible bliss, discovery and joy.
I've learned that parenting gets harder, not easier, but by the time you learn that, you're in deep, and head over heels in love with the multitude of small people who have joined your life.

Being a single parent makes everything that much harder.  It's a lot like scooping up large handfuls of sand and trying to hold on to as much as possible as some inevitably slips through the cracks between your fingers. The larger chunks stay, as do the shells, and rocks, but the silky smooth sand that can't be grasped falls steadily no matter how hard you clench your hands together and will it to stay put.  Working with your spouse is like having his hands under yours, to catch much of what you're spilling, and while he too will lose some, there is protection in knowing that where you are weak, he can cover you.  Single parenting means that those places you know you should be able to work on, change, address, those places you can see slipping through your fingers get dropped and so you desperately pray for grace to cover your weaknesses.

I have the awareness that chore charts, allowances, and nightly reading is important, but many times keeping peace, getting everyone fed, bathed and tucked in with prayers is a monumental task when I've already mowed someone else's lawn, cleaned someone else's house, edited photographs and tended to our own home.  I feel like a sponge that is needed for cleanup and yet cannot wipe up the spill because it is already completely saturated.
I can see how many single mothers completely fall apart.  Staying in bed, or turning to less than desirable activities with less than desirable companions.  Women who have little support, even less self confidence, and no good places to draw from can create the perfect storm for not just lost sand, but total annihilation of the handfuls they have tried to hold on to.  I have moments of anger, I have moments of self pity and frustration and even moments where I let my mind wander into the homes of friends where money is assumed, furniture came new from a store and not handed down or picked from a curb, homes where women feel safe, and children feel adored by both parents and wonder what that feels like… but I don't stay there long.  Wishing and dreaming and spending time wondering what might have been brings nothing but grief and sadness, and won't get me where I want to be.  I can see many places where my sand is sliding through my fingers, out of my control, but I take heart knowing my children are well loved, we are knit tightly into a community who long to see us succeed. I am doing the best I can and God's grace makes a way where there seems to be no way.  While I never would have written this story for myself or my children, I'm so proud of how we are adjusting, growing, and learning how to embrace the life we've been given. The sand that slips through is minimal in light of the beautiful shells that are staying behind.

How Memorial Day is Dawning for Me

I'm struggling today.  I will be cleanly honest and tell you that I am aware that my feelings are most certainly being led by my hormones and probably even the state of my thyroid- however, knowing what is driving the emotions do nothing to lessen them.  What is left is to sift through what is there, pull out the lesson and the truth and try to move past it.  

What you don't know is I've lived in the basement of another family for almost a year now.  It wasn't a secret, but I get so weary of pity that I keep much close to my chest.  This is my reality right now and I trust that it is temporary. I refuse to believe we will be statistics who slip into poverty unseen and work to claw our way out.  While there are challenges in still sharing a room with my daughter, and being in smaller quarters than we had been used to, and not having a real kitchen to feed my family from- there have been so many wonderful things.  The yard here is incredible.  Two acres of fenced in beauty that is not just safe, but nourishing.  The kids are in good schools where they are doing well, we are close to our beloved church, and I have friends tucked into the county far and wide.  The family we live with are both veterans from my adored Marine Corps and they have one sweet and lively toddler whom my children have adopted as one of their own.  They have been incredible to give us space and always make us feel that this is our home.  They've never made us feel anything but welcomed and appreciated; but. On days like today?  My heart swings hard and falls and my brain tosses around all the anxiety that I've worked hard to avoid for so very long.  The heavy weight of knowing that my large and loud family is in their intimate space while they traverse their own struggles and rolling hills of family has been hard.  I sometimes feel guilty that we have kept them from half of their home for a year, and that we've been here through several deployments and sweet, private homecomings.  I cringe when the kids yell, I feel guilty after I do, and I often feel the desperation to pay back all I feel I've taken.  They have never given me anything but grace, and have never once disrespected us, made me feel less-than, or made me feel guilt.  All that I'm feeling is self inflicted.  As I cried in the shower, acutely aware of my loud and hyper children on this calm and peaceful holiday from work, I scanned my heart to discover why I was spiraling into this pit of self deprecation and guilt... and the word whispered softly in my heart: grace. 

We all need grace, we all want grace, and yet many times when it is offered we fear it's being offered with judgement or expectation and we rise up quickly to atone for what we cannot pay. Grace as I understand it to be is unmerited, meaning by its very existence it cannot be earned or paid for.  It just is.  It is pure, beautiful, healing and safe.  It is the biggest gift we can offer and yet often the hardest to accept.  It is the sanctuary of blessing and space that allows the weary to pause and heal and repair what needs attention.  For my family, this gifting of grace in the form of a literal home it has been the exact remedy we have needed to get through the immediate slashing of our hearts and souls and space to rest unjudged while we have worked to wade through the muddy waters that rise in divorce. It has been more beautiful and protected than I could have ever provided on my own, it has been a place where I could fall back into a more vulnerable position and breathe my way through the labor pains of moving into, through and past the pain of a ravaged family.  Grace has given my children more normalcy and stability than we've had in a long time, and grace has allowed me time to grieve, wake up to life again and work towards the very real role of provider and protector.  The guilt and shame that is trying to creep in and tarnish the shine that grace is leaving on my story would be an insult to the ones who have poured it out so freely.  To sit in fear and guilt would be to deny the gift that has been powerfully given.  To stay in that place of anguish and worry and anxiety would be to turn inward to myself and wound the ones I so desperately want to honor.  The reality is that there isn't much I can do to return payment for all that has been done for me through this family. A family who hardly knew us but knew that our hearts and bodies needed a soft place to fall. A family who loved us more than their own comfort, and welcomed us in in order to meet a need I could not meet on my own.  On this Memorial Day, as we honor servicemen and women and remember those who have given all, I am keenly aware that these two veterans have continued to pour out their lives in service long after the ink on their discharge papers have dried.  They've served when no one knew, never announcing to the world their act of charity and grace.  They did it expecting nothing in return, rather choosing to reach down into the sticky mess and help to pull me out.  They did it with hearts of service and grace, and on this Memorial Day, I'm slain with that truth.

Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.  -John 15:13

The Knife's Healing Work

Healing is a process and I'm at a weary place in mine.  My heart has hung ragged, bloodied and slashed, and I have taken the time to carefully pick up the flesh and hand it over to God and allow Him to begin to sew it back together.
But being open, being vulnerable, being ready to receive revelation of places of hurt and wounding, being honest and transparent .... is sometimes tiring work.
I lived a very long time in happy land.  I am, by nature, a happy, hyper and energetic person.  I like to have fun, I like to do, and I like to be moving and busy. Healing is slow work. Often still work.  Many times healing can look like nothing at all, and the desire and urge to jump up and move on to the next shiny thing can take over my head space and try to divert me from the healing path that I'm walking.

I have likened my journey to a car crash.  The day that everything came crashing down was the impact of the crash. I then had to be cut out of the wreckage, life flighted to help, triaged through the hospital, then stabilized.  Once I was stablized I had to be prepped for surgery and then endure a long surgical procedure.  I now see myself as being in post-op.  If you've ever had a lingering illness, or a surgery, you understand that during the healing process there are moments where you feel more energetic or stronger than you really are.  You are tempted to push yourself as you long to stretch your body and legs back into routines they have been used to. Often, you are forced back to bed where you concede that you might have rushed into activity too soon and more rest is necessary.  I am finding myself dipping my toes back into leadership roles, and into the primary parent role,  and while I feel I am moving carefully and slowly, there are times where my heart feels that it isn't strong enough yet, not healed up enough to endure the pressure of the job at hand.  Healing takes intention, attention, and effort.  I have to make the time to feed my physical body as well as my heart.  I have to be still... and with four needy, hurting children, that can often feel unattainable.

My knee-jerk reaction is to do more than I should, with frustration, and then numb the pain;  with food, or noise, or reading, or any of a million other things I can do other than sit with the struggle that swirls and swishes around me.  The hard thing to do is to be still. To asess how I am feeling, how I can respond, and to take my time in reacting.  To allow the new behavior I'm learning to take effect, to slowly stretch and build those muscles that have sat unused for so long.
I have discovered that I tend towards codependency and in that new realization, I'm having to learn to respond to people in new ways, and stop and think before I respond. It's all too easy for me to try and rescue people, or 'save' them from discomfort, and sacrifice chunks of myself all along the journey.
For now, as I do the still work of healing, I am giving myself permission to move slowly. To stop and rest. To make mistakes with the ever-present desire of forward motion. To refuse to punish myself for detours.  Maya Angelou says "When you know better, you do better."  I'm taking that to heart and running with it.  Each day I learn more... about myself, about how I operate with other people, where some of my weaknesses are, and how I tend to worry more about the feelings of others than my own.

Healing isn't sedentary. It's a slow, careful walk out of hurt and wounding.  It's intentional choice that can go against what your brain is telling you to do. It's the cautious tending to raw wounds that can be pulled open again and gently covering them with prayer, rest, and love so that instead of a long lasting slashed festering of flesh, the scar can begin to form.  It is grace and change and growing pains and doctor visits and time and rest and work.  As I continue to heal, I will next move into physical therapy; where what I'm learning about myself can begin to be put to work in a controlled environment.  I'm determined to do my work. I trust that as I keep growing and aging and moving through this earth journey that there will be more work to do, and I pray I can stay focused and close to the surgeon for any other procedures I need to have done.