The sun will shine again

EVEN THE DARKEST NIGHT WILL END AND THE SUN WILL RISE.’- VICTOR HUGO, Les Miserables

Hey friends! Wow what a different place we are in since the last time I logged in here. My last blog post was written on January 1st the start of the new year. I recapped the last decade…lots of gratefulness, wisdom and hope for the year come. And well things feel a little hopeless right now…I’m sure we can all relate….or maybe your heart is overwhelmed with worry or fear of the unknown. I have definitely struggled with this…I’m maybe even feeling a little anger. After reading through my last blog and seeing how happy I was for the year to come….to finally be able to do all of the things I had been putting off. Now I am confined to my home feeling like I am accomplishing nothing. I had excitement for new adventures, crossing things off the to-do list one by one and now I sit here with so many emotions and sometimes feel crippled by fear. I just told someone today that this feeling is so familiar for me . This is the feeling I felt when our last son was born. We were so happy and excited for the future that was ahead. We had so many plans and wishes. Then that same day all of our dreams were ripped out of our arms…stolen from our hearts. We were suddenly plunged into the limbo. First and foremost we worried… would he live? Would he eat, walk, talk, run? Would he be able to live with the same quality of life as our other boys? I felt this moment of shock …then overwhelming sadness..topped off with fear. I instantly began to research binge! Any mom who has been in my situation knows exactly what I am talking about. I had to find out every single thing I could to know if my son would live or die?…what kind of life would he have? Where were the best hospitals for him to be treated? I already have a mega investigative personality so I can really consume myself with this information and it can be very heavy sometimes…always trying to find answers…and be in control of the situation. I would worry each day then go to bed with hope that god would calm my heart and he always did. I would dream and forget our circumstance in restful sleep only to wake to the same realization that things were not how I hoped they would be and very uncertain. Then repeat these steps over and over again. I have definitely had these exact thoughts and feelings on this current pandemic situation. Feeling I need to have all the facts, find out everything I can about it and be as diligent as possible to keep my family safe. We started off the year with so much joy… how could this be that we are now living in fear of what our lives may be in a few weeks or months. We had really started off to a bounding start…crossing some of those goals off the 2020 list…trying to prepare financially for my sons next surgery( and I must add in here for anyone who hasn’t met him…he is a miracle!! He eats, runs, talks…he does everything like his brothers just as we had hoped) . So during this time I have went through a few phases..first there was non worry( this isn’t any worse than the flu) , then to shock( wow this made it to the us and it is more significant than the seasonal flu and actually quite serious) , to fear( how will this effect my families health, our fate, our finances, our plans) ….to getting every tiny bit of info I could possibly gather( research , research, research)…to extreme fear, worry, anxiety…sadness…to where I am right now which is acceptance and hope. It has taken me a couple weeks to get here but this has usually been my sequence of thoughts and actions for every single crisis in my life. It sometimes takes a bit to get there but in the end I finally accept that I am not in control. I am not in control. The only thing I can control is my acceptance of the things i can not change, my faith, and my hope in jesus. Every time i try to make my own sense of things, my own plans, my own course of action… in the end the only thing that ever brings comfort is my personal relationship with god and knowing that he is in control.

I have told this story to a few of you but right before our third son was born so many things were in limbo..we were actually living with my parents and had all of our belongings in storage trying to buy our first home. A few things fell through and here we still were living with my parents… with two children and one on the way … a cat and a dog. I remember telling Cody I don’t feel like this is where god wants us to live and that is why things aren’t falling into place …i feel like he has other plans for us. I felt this tugging at my heart but I could'nt hear what God wanted me to do. I said I am just going to pray about it. I prayed and I said , “Ok god.. I feel like you have a plan for us but i’m not sure what it is. I feel this unsettling in my heart and want you to direct us where you want us to be. I want you to use me for your glory. “ Then god answered us on the day of our sons birth. And boy he did not answer in the way I expected him to answer. Honestly I have been almost afraid to pray that prayer again…but I did recently and here we are. Have you ever prayed to god about something and he definitely answered but not in the way you were hoping for? I think this happens often ….and at the time we think the answer is the worst possible answer and only later can we see why god answered how he did. When his plan is revealed. Sometimes it turns out to be even better than we ever imagined. While I still would have preferred god have spared my son from all adversity and the pain he has experienced…I cant help but realize all of the blessings we encountered from our hardship and struggle. How this has molded his character and how God really opened out hearts in ways that would never have been possible without this mountain. And so many days I feel I am failing God…that he gave me this gift of wisdom through hardship and I am not using it to its full potential…but I now only choose to see the good in our situation and the blessings that came from it and not to dwell on our past heartache or how we got here. In so many ways a million times during that difficult ordeal god answered our prayers . Over and over he answered us…he drew us near and we laid our worries onto him and it brought peace to our hearts…a peace that we could never achieve ourselves alone.

So here we are again..confused and worried. ….and I am choosing to reflect on our sons story to help me through this time as well. We dont know what tomorrow will hold we are unsure of Gods plans… this is definitely a rough way to get there… but I am choosing to believe in my heart that he has a plan for us …for good. To protect us and to keep us safe. For four whole months my son was in the hospital before we brought him home for the first time…It was battle..a labor of love…a marathon…. it seemed that there was no light in the tunnel at times… or we would get a glimpse only for things to go dark again….(in those days i learned the true meaning of patience …so spending few weeks in my comfy home with my entire family and many amenities …and all of us healthy should be a breeze !! We have it so easy then become privileged and forget …I must not forget ) but then without even realizing it we had become closer and closer to the end of our tunnel…the light was strong and bright. In my last post I referenced a moment from our trip to Martha’s Vineyard last summer. I described a picture of this beautiful walk in the woods we took to get to the beach when arriving to it for the first time. The walk was filled with so much nature and so many things to discover. At the end we arrived closer…reaching these beautiful wooden slats in the sand creating a path. As we neared closer the sun was so brilliant it was blinding our eyes….then when we arrived to the top we had the most glorious view…with the sun still so magnificent and a single sailboat in the water. ( Let’s use the sailboat to symbolize god here) It was as if the sailboat was waiting just for us ..saying “ here I am ….you made it…I knew you would…I have been here waiting for you all this time”. That moment was just so reminiscent of our time in the hospital and the freedom we felt when we finally finished the marathon and made it out of the tunnel. It was so long and winding and at times we wondered if god would hear our prayers and he was there at the end waiting for us when we stepped out into the sun with our son for the first time. It also reminds me of what it may be like one day when we arrive in heaven( I have always referred to that walk as the stairway to heaven) In times like these I hope for and pray that God has plans for us to live in his glory for many more years to come. But in times like this I am also reminded that our time here is so temporary. We are just passing through this world which is such a marvelous place filled with so many people we love and that is really why I feel not ready to go …..but this world is also a difficult one at times with much opposition and brokeness …I believe that the bad things in this world are just reminders from God that this home is nothing in comparison to the home we will share with him when we leave this world.

Galations 6:9 Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary.

Let’s choose to use our energy not for fear or worry but to be the good in this dark situation. I see so much good all around us from this devastating news…reminders from strangers that we are all in this together. People connecting for the first time in a long time…not just moving so quickly immersed in themselves. It is really refreshing in the middle of all this uncertainty. Do not let your heart grow weary….have hope in God… and trust that he will guide us to the end of the tunnel…we will see the sun again….we are almost there.

A Decade of reflection....

Its never too late…..

Its never to late to learn something new.. to change…to be….to grow. I keep saying i’m going to write…I have always wanted to be a writer and have a place to put my thoughts for later reflection…for someone else to resonate with…to bring hope or inspiration. I said that a good place to start would be a blog but as my days are hectic and noisy I forget my thoughts before I can even write them down. I have so many thoughts and topics I cant even narrow to just one…spaghetti stories as my husband calls them. I hope to grow my vocabulary immensely…to make more time to read the books I have collected in our growing family library…gain more wisdom and knowledge each year by discipline and investigation. The last decade has brought so many changes in my life and personal growth…. career changes …marriage …births….. faith growth. As a family the last few years have been tough( a blog I will save for later in a moment of deep reflection on my son’s birth) . A few years ago we moved our family from the only home we have ever known to two new cities…in search of world renowned medical treatment for our son…four trips to Boston in two years and basically re-building our lives. In the last few years I learned how to perservere ….my patience grew beyond bounds… I learned how to let go of control (some..if I'm being honest) I forgave myself.. I quite worrying about what others think about me or my choices, i embraced and accepted my aging as a natural process and a gift denied to many(But I do miss many things about my youth and overall the regret that I never embraced my youthfulness when I had it…the sadness that we can not freeze those precious moments no matter how hard we try). This year I have loved every minute of our homeschooling journey. No matter how many times i explore other avenues God draws me back to homeschool and I am finally solidified in my decision. I am no longer tip toeing around it with others who disagree. Homeschool is not approved by every one but that doesn’t matter. Homeschooling has been done for over a century and the majority of those kids have turned out beautifully. This is a true gift we are able to give to our children. The ability to learn at their own pace to explore and be in tune with nature…to go on adventures and travel…to not disconnect family and learning as a two separate things but to incorporate them as a way of living….something that should go hand in hand and be very natural unlike this crazy disconnected world we live in. I believe that children naturally learn if given the chance…there is this innate sense of wonder and curiosity inside of them but its so often pushed down in structured education…instead of learning on topics of interest, children are taught certain subjects and interest is often times lost…leaving without a retention of knowledge when homeschooling allows room for much knowledge. I think of this so often…if only parents were not to busy to answer these tiny questions from our small people…. for example “mommy…why do leaves change and fall off?”…or “why is the sky blue?”…if only we answered those questions…as large and complex as the answers seem for a tiny ear….they are always listening and retaining …nothing is too complex for them. We are our children’s first teachers. We must take this role seriously..god has entrusted us with them…to be their educators and to cultivate their faith and their relationship with him. This year I am thankful for the community of mothers I have met through our Charlotte Mason Homeschool co-op( which is one of the many blessings Cincinnati has given to us). I have been reconnected with my soul’s consistent yearning for nature and all that it encompasses. I am thankful I have been able to share this love with my children…that time, life, and health has allowed me to. I am thankful for my husband who besides being a talented potter works a typical job as well to provide for our family and our children with our much needed medical insurance( the politics of the society we live in…some having to work jobs where our hearts are not present to survive this broken world we live in) I am so thankful for our family and friends …our new friends we have made while starting over. I am thankful for GOD …for all that he has done for us. For never leaving us and always being there.

We have so many things to be thankful for …really we are thankful for an easier last year….it was less eventful but leaving time for so much growth and time with each other. Our son Keller’s medical demands were much less… allowing us to live a fairly normal life this year. We ask for prayers and blessings of good health and good news. We head back to Boston soon for another surgery…A touch up you would say. There will be a lot of big moments and turning points in the next year which will determine alot for Keller and we hold onto hope for total healing from God our father. We know he is good and he loves Keller and we are so grateful he has brought us so far.

It was hard choosing just a few photos for this blog but these two make me so so happy. When we left for Boston this last August we were fortunate enough to make a trip to Martha’s Vineyard quickly before we returned home. We wish financially my husband would have been able to join us as well but he was home working , providing, watching Marley( Our St bernard) and holding down the fort. It has always been really important for me to keep the boys together during these times…after Kelly was born we had to leave the other two way more than we would like …living at the hospital for four months and then some more after. They are Kellers support… his constant…he looks up to them so much. I have always believed that he is stronger with them there …he feels safe knowing that they are together…it seems less foreign and less wrong since the bravery that he is asked of is definitely not normal for any child. I love to be able to give him the gift of happy memories to wash out the bad ones. When we stepped foot on the ferry after the long week of difficult and uncomfortable tests for him and many tears shed….it was a feeling of freedom…the wind at our face and the possibilities of adventure and happy memories awaiting for us. I love the nature and beauty of the ocean …especially the Northeast coast where it seems so much more relaxed and behind the times…so nostalgic. Whenever I am at the ocean I feel this deep peace…like everything is still around us…and memories are frozen in time. We are disconnected from the rest of the world and at peace with god and nature. My heart has been longing and aching to go back. The photo with the sailboat was this magical moment where were walked a long wooded path of nature( my favorite walk…the best part of the adventure…and the one in the photo with Keller) and then we reached the hill and horizon to this bold gleaming sun of what I fondly referred to as the stairway to heaven…and beyond the hill was this single sailboat just off in the water as if it were welcoming us. My boys danced in the sand and the joy in this photo was very illustrative of the wonder and bliss we felt in our hearts …after a long tough week but blessed with much good news. I will never forget this moment .

I have shared this poem many times as it is my favorite but it specifically describes exactly what my heart feels in those moments…

Peace of Wild Things

by Wendell Berry

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

2019 has been very good to us. We pray to cultivate our beautiful new and old relationships with friends and family …to learn to make time for and feed our dreams while staying above water in this overgrowing society… may god continue to bless our family….mold our souls…and grace us with this beautiful gift of life.