My "Ugly"

I’ve officially entered into my “Ugly" phase again… No matter what I do, I’m left feeling I’m an ugly parent, an ugly spouse, an ugly person (inside and out)… Every year around this time I slip into this “Ugly" phase as I refer to it (probably originally labeled from my husband or children who end up getting the brunt of it because they’re stuck living with me). March is looming - my birthday month, another year older staring me in the face. Another year of unmet dreams and goals ready to pat me on the back with it’s disappointing hurrah. It’s that agitating time of year when spring fever and winter weight gain are at their height. The littlest things set me off ~ from laundry to meal making and everything in between (and I pretty much mean everything in between). I’m left stewing under that umbrella of feeling completely overlooked, under-appreciated, and unloved. I feel completely alone, yet I can’t help but surmise that it’s probably not just me this is happening to… Satan is having a hayday with me and my family.

It happens every year.

This year I’m also traveling parallel to a journey I was silently on a year ago. An intense journey of loss I never imagined would happen to me, to us… A year ago I was nearing my 40th birthday, and after seventeen years of dealing with infertility, I found out I was twelve weeks pregnant. We would also nearly immediately find out our little baby carried a rare genetic disease, Trisomy 18, and would never get to come home with us. We were left to wait for her to pass away either before or during childbirth. Our biggest hope and dream finally answered, only to be immediately shattered.

I’m one that feels and experiences life with every ounce of me - I’m over-emotional about everything and deeply affected by even the littlest of things. I honestly hate that about myself. I hate always feeling an intensity inside that probably borders on insanity, always battling some extreme emotional rollercoaster. I long to just be calm, cool, quiet, and collected all the time. But, I’m not. I’m a loud, fly-off-the-handle, crazed lunatic most of the time (at least that’s how I feel on the inside). It’s an exhausting battle I never win.

I’m trying hard to intentionally not “numb” right now. "Numbing" as Brene Brown puts it in her book "The Gifts Of Perfection" is something everyone does that takes the sharp edge off of feelings that cause vulnerability, discomfort, and pain in order to avoid experiencing it. It's whatever provides a quick relief to take the edge off life's hurts, or life's anticipated hurts - alcohol, drugs, food, sex, relationships, money, work, gambling, staying busy, perfectionism, mindless time on the internet, hours of television watching, ect ect ect... So I’m left attempting to just feel the feelings and lean into the discomfort of the hard emotions and face it all head on. It's hard, and it’s causing the "Ugly" to rear it’s ugly head with a vengeance, and I’m left gulping for air and desperately trying to grapple for grace.

I’m not the only one in my household traveling this parallel journey of loss… this Journey of Faith… my husband and my children are as well. We are all handling and navigating this road differently. I watch my husband as he tends to keep it all in while “numbing” in front of the tv while on his phone all night. My youngest acts out in anger, whining, and defiance.

I thought I was maybe ready to start sharing a bit of our story in effort to find closure and healing, in hopes to get past all this "Ugly"… so I went back to the journal I kept last year… and I opened the first entry. I made it about one third of the way through, and couldn’t go any further. The tears, the intensity… reliving the reality was too overwhelming. I closed it. An hour later, I reopened it and tried again. For now, this is all the further I can get…

{Continue to journal entry #1 HERE - Forty and Falling Apart (Part 1)}

Bible Verses

Have you ever taken time to identify your top favorite Bible Verses?
If you haven't... may I encourage you to take some time and let God speak to you...

Here are my top four life verses, my go-to core verses for the journey.

Matthew 11:28-30

"Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

John 15: 5-8

"I am the vine; you are the branches.  If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.  If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.  If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.  This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples."

Psalm 23

"The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside still waters.  He restores my soul, he leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.  Even through I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me.  You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies, you anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the day of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.

Hebrews 11:1

"Now faith is confidence in what we hope for, and assurance about what we do not see."

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Tattoo Time

So the last few months I’ve been back to the tattoo shop a few times.  Four times since mid December to be exact.  It had been an eight year hiatus since I’d last sat in that chair.

My husband and I initially went in together to each get a tattoo in memory of our little Faith MaryJo, the daughter we lost last March. I’d spent hours online trying to figure out just want I wanted (I’m one of those “planners” you know, there's no "fly by the seat of my pants" with me!).  I had settled on something small on my foot.  A dragonfly with a shadow, little baby feet incorporated into the shadow, and “Walk By Faith” in script under it. Small, neat, easy, meaningful. I’d also come across a great graphic I’d fallen in love with that I could put in the unfinished middle area of my back (Ummmm yes, there is quite a bit of other ink already on my back!), and I thought it would be neat to incorporate the names of my kids amid the roses and vines. I filed that away for later. But everything was crystal clear how it was going to look in my prepared and creative mind.

Tattoo shops run at a very different pace than I do. Just a forewarning for those of you still to make your first appointment at one... No matter how prepared you are in what you want, it always takes forever before you’re actually designed, in the chair, stencil on, and actually getting inked.

The hubby went first and got a set of footprints and angel wings on his arm.  It came out amazing! We cried together as we looked at it.

Hours later, it was finally my turn.  And somehow – I ended up getting the start of roses, vines, and names on my back. (Seriously, how did that even happen?)  And then he only did phase one ~ the outline.  AND it wasn’t exactly what I had envisioned. It was all the elements I’d requested – roses, vines, my children’s name in a legible script, and he'd shown it to me before getting started, and it really was beautiful... But I went home feeling… off.  I’ve had it before that I’d gone home with new ink and it took time for it to heal and for my mind to come to love it.

I took care of the healing process, but I wouldn't even look the actual art itself.  I went back a few weeks later and had the shading done.  I got home, the shading was beautiful, but I still spent very little time looking at it. I went back a third and fourth time, each time getting a few more areas done and filled in and finished, each time wondering if I was just making it worse by trying to make it better... Each time I left in a swirl of uncertainty and over and over uttered… “Why didn’t I just get the stupid dragonfly on my foot instead of working more on my back?!”  I also found myself falling in love with it all more and more each time.

As I’ve mulled over this whole process, trying to avoid the quiet whisper of disappointment,  I can’t help but smile.  My whole back tattoo is such a parallel to many areas of my life. Big, messy, but ultimately beautiful. How often in my life do I have this perfect idea in my head.  This ultimate dream or hope, something I plan and think I will control.  Something big, something grand, something beautiful, something special. (You know…like those dreams of pregnancies and healthy babies...)  After time, while it maybe isn’t something horrible, it surely isn’t what I envisioned. It takes time for my mind to wrap itself around a new reality, a new norm, which I did not get to choose and did not have control over.  I try avoid it as long as I can, but in time I finally come to terms and just embrace the ugly (which rarely is as ugly as I initially perceive it to be).  Time continues and soon I hardly remember what the original plan or hope had even been.  As more time passes, sometimes I even come to love that once unhappy messed up wrinkle-in-time. All the individual moments and areas, somehow begin to just blend together into one collective story, one large canvas of the art and beauty of my journey.

I can have a thought, design, vision of what I think I want.  But ultimately the artist is the one who creates and has the control.  It’s no different than my life with my Creator.  He allows me to think, plan, hope, and design my life, but ultimately – He’s the master artist who chooses the lines, strokes, shading, and intricacies woven within my journey.  There is pain in the process, there needs to be time for healing, there needs to be openness to accept a new reality.  There are times I look in the mirror and I don’t like the life I see and feel that twinge of disappointment laced in fear.  There’s no turning back, there’s no erasing what’s already been done. The reality is left looking slightly similar to what I originally envisioned, yet completely different.  In the end, I need to trust the artist, the Creator… I need to live in the comfort of knowing it’s going to somehow come out breathtaking in the end, even when it initially isn’t quite so glamorous, evident, or easy in the process.

The unique story of my life is ultimately not mine to control. Life will leave its mark, its permanent scars upon my body, covered and worn... but intricately woven with the beautiful shades of God's grace and beauty.

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Book Club 1

 What are you reading??  If you aren't currently reading anything ~ might I encourage you to find something great to dive into...

Here are four of the last books I have read, or am in the process of reading...

Title: When God Doesn’t Fix It – Laura Story

Is It possible that good things can come out of our broken dreams?

I ordered this book off Amazon because of the title alone.  I’m not going to lie that I was disappointed to realize it was written by Laura Story once I got it and actually started it.  I’m not a Laura Story fan – her song "Blessings" is like nails on a chalkboard to me because it was so overplayed when it first came out.  The words to the song are great, don’t get me wrong, but I cannot change the radio station fast enough when those first chords start.  It took me a little bit to get beyond that this was Laura Story’s story – and the ending I personally found really hard to chew through, because God has chosen to bless her greatly in the area I feel God chose to not fix in me.  But aside from all that ~ this is a great read.

Book quote: “Life is an abundantly beautiful, blessed mess.  Share your story.  Give God the glory.  And live a better broken.”

Title: The Gifts of Imperfection – Brene Brown

Let go of who you think you’re supposed to be and embrace who you are.

I am currently leading this book in a Bible Study.  Again, I ordered this book because of the title alone.  I struggle with perfectionism.  I long to live a wholehearted life, and I’m a huge Brene Brown fan. After the book arrived I felt called to lead this study, and I think that nudge meant I am to take this book slow, really soaking it in, going over each chapter more than just once.  The book is broken up into well outlined and detailed chapters (called Guideposts) to help cultivate different areas of wholehearted living.  She does a great job sharing personal stories mixed with her faith, her collection of data, and her definitions.  It covers anxiety, self worth, self-doubt, control, fear, authenticity, security, belonging, perfectionism…  And by doing it as a Bible study with a group of close friends, the conversations we have been able to share has been such a great avenue to go even deeper with.

Book quote:  “When we can let go of what other people think and own our story, we gain access to our worthiness – the feeling that we are enough just as we are and that we are worthy of love and belonging.  When we spend a lifetime trying to distance ourselves from the parts of our lives that don’t fit with who we think we’re supposed to be, we stand outside our story and hustle for our worthiness by constantly performing, perfecting, pleasing, and proving…”

Title: 40 Days of Decrease - Alicia Britt Chole

A different kind of Hunger.  A different kind of fast.

This is the book I am reading daily through the season of Lent.  Lent is the days between Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday.  A time Christians often practice the giving up of something  (a pleasure or habit) as an act of devotion and self-discipline.  I grew up in a Christian home but we rarely did much for Ash Wednesday or through the season of Lent.  This year I wanted to do something with depth for Lent, but I didn’t want to just do something like “completely give up chocolate or sugar or coffee” that is just a sure fire ticket to failure in my opinion, but I did want to do something.  In conversation with some friends, we talked about the desire to go through a season of intentional “less” in our lives.  A friend gave me this book.  It’s been exactly what I am needing as I journey through this years tough season.

Book quote: “40 Days of Decrease guides readers through a study of Jesus’ uncommon and uncomfortable call to abandon the world’s illusions, embrace His kingdoms realities, and journey cross-ward and beyond… A life-engaging guide to prepare our hearts for Easter that features a daily devotional based upon Jesus’ life, guidance for reflections, suggested daily fasts, suggested Scripture reading, and journaling space... As we experience this sacred season and the holiness of loss and less in Jesus' journey, may our hearts open vulnerably to a great commitment to love and be loved by the Savior.”

Title: For the Love - Jen Hatmaker

Fighting for Grace in a world of impossible standards.

Oh me oh my, where to even begin... other than ~ for the love of all things awesome, just read it! This is one of those great books that you pick up that is an easy and engaging read, filled with laughter, tears, and deep spiritual nuggets of truth - oh and there's a fabulous chapter on fashion I guarantee you won't want to skip.  She brings you through the very questions many of us are struggling with as women on a daily basis as we try do all... be all... juggle all... and have it all...

Book quote: "You are too vital to lose years to regret or shame or insecurity or fear.  We are not slaves to those matters... Face your issues with courage, sister, because truth and love win... Don't shove it down; lay your junk on the table and deal with it.  Address the stuff.  Forgive, release, acknowledge, confront, feel the feelings, let something go, believe the truth, do whatever you need to do.  Then dust your hands off and get ready to go."

What's up next in my book stack you ask...
Twist of Faith by Ridley Barron and Rising Strong by Brene Brown.

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Who I Am... In A Nutshell...

Who I Am… In A Nutshell…

Well – let’s get this party started.  Here’s a sneak peek at who I am, in one hundred words or less…

I am a forty-something, audaciously authentic, Jesus loving, modestly pierced, heavily tattooed, arrow shooting, daughter of Christ who carries a colorful past full of mistakes and second chances.  I’m a part-time cupcake making powerhouse, a full-time church staff employee, adoption advocate, invisalign wearing, camping obsessed, sunset chasing, avid photographer who’s completely addicted to scrapbooking.  Standing beside me is my main man, my thirty-something husband of nearly thirteen years (who’s also moderately tattooed with a colorful past), my three children ages eighteen, seven, and stillborn a year ago… and of course my adorable little yorkie.

So… where to begin...
I’d been faithfully blogging for years… on this little known private blog that I was too scared to make public, due to the nature of our family.  I blogged about all kinds of stuff… photos, frustrations, theme suppers, recipes, cake creations, infertility… See, we have an adopted child, and in this all-out-there world of crazy instant technology, I just wanted to try protect some of our moments and memories… so I wrote, and I published, but I was selective who had access to this special window into our family.

And then one day a year ago, the unthinkable happened to us.  You know, those total life-changing moments that can happen in the blink of an eye, and I stopped hitting publish.  It’s not that I didn’t want to continue to write (I actually probably produced some of my best posts during that time) but I just couldn’t share it, even with that tiny little crowd I trusted.  And then so much time passed, and I didn't know how or where to start...  That “unthinkable” thing, it’s a long story really, briefly mentioned above, and it's something I do someday hope to begin sharing about a little more publicly… but for now, I’m just not ready to delve back into all those hurts and really big emotions. Those wounds are still too large and too raw.  But God granted me… granted us… this crazy journey for a reason, and someday the time will be right to share.  So bare with me, we’ll get there in time ;-)

In the meantime, I’ve decided to try tame that incessant blog chatter continually milling around in my head, and I think I’ll get my feet wet again with a tiny tidbit of writing.  A little light-hearted banter between myself and my keyboard, and who knows, maybe even hit the “publish” button a time or two.  I’m honestly not sure I have anything great to say, or a story anyone will want to really know about, but hay – neither did Moses, and God chose to use him to take an entire nation out of slavery, across the Red Sea, and to the Promised Land of milk and honey. He faithfully obeyed a tiny whisper within, and look at the number of lives he has touched, and what great and mighty things he accomplished.   God's whispered.  It's time to just faithfully obey.

And so with that… let’s let this blog begin...

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