Feeling Thankful and Thoughtful

The boys and I had a picnic this week with another lovely family, a mom with two boys (unrelated note to our school system: the early dismissal days in the middle of the week are the dumbest of a long line of dumb ideas that anyone has ever generated. End of rant). The mom helped with Big Boy's den during day camp, and her son and Big Boy really enjoyed each other's company. This other family homeschools, and it's been a couple of months before we could get our schedules together.

I tend to focus on my boys' faults - the ways I wish they were different. I get overly concerned about their ability to focus, listen, and obey all the time. It can really lead to a critical spirit and I'm sure makes me not a lot of fun to live with at times. I think it's because I tend to turn the same magnifying glass on myself, and find many of the same faults. So, what drives me crazy about myself drives me crazier when I see it in them. I don't appreciate enough who they are - the neat gifts God has given them, how much fun they are, how loving and kind. Sometimes I spend too much time worrying about what they do instead.

What about the picnic made me think about these things? This lovely mother has two sons, and they are both autistic, and at different places on the autism spectrum. I can't even imagine how difficult daily life must be for her, much less managing homeschooling and her own needs and those of her husband. They are great kids with sweet spirits. But what I have thought a lot about in the days since our picnic is how positive and accepting she was of those boys. How patient, and kind. She did such a great job of redirecting her sons when they were out of bounds and adapting to their needs. In a couple of hours, she showed me where I fall short. Not intentionally, and I doubt if she even noticed any of the things that impressed me, but they did.

I've wondered what makes us able to extend patience to others, with greater or lesser degrees of success. Really, I think it's about appreciating grace more. It's amazing that God is so accepting of us. He loves us completely no matter how atrocious our behavior (and mine is, sometimes). He forgives us completely when we mess up and ask for another chance (and sometimes I really stink at that). I imagine he'd like me to conform a lot more closely to his standard, but he appreciates and understands that growth is a slow and steady process. I think if I can truly appreciate that grace, maybe I can extend it more freely to others, particularly those who live in this house with me. Maybe it will help me remember my life is not nearly as hard as I sometimes make it out to be.

Maybe it will help me see how full of good things my life really is.

So, That's How I Learned I'm Not in Control. The End.

The big boy had a rough 3-4 months, but left the hospital healthy and hasn't looked back since.

So, for anyone who is uncertain of God's care and His mercy, I can tell you -- your child is so safe in His hands. The one who created that child and knew him before you did (see Psalm 139) loves him more than you are even capable of loving.

I find that so comforting. Especially when I am looking at a completely normal, wonderful 10-year-old boy who survived and has thrived, without any long-term disabilities from his prematurity. That's God's hand. I don't know why, or what God has planned for his future, but I know that He's the one who has gotten us this far, and He doesn't change.

That makes it easier to give Him control of our direction. I know, now, that He is who He says He is, and that He is so much more capable than I am. And I am being reminded by our new Bible study of Philippians that my purpose is to glorify Him in everything. So I will, today, choose to remember what He has done, and look forward to what He is doing and will do in the future.

He's 10 Today!

Ten years today, I was waking up in the hospital. About four days prior, I had been awakened from a deep sleep (all my sleep is deep, a family trait, I guess) by labor pains. I was 23 1/2 weeks pregnant, and scared to death. I woke up my husband, called my doctor, and we raced to the hospital (no mean feat in Atlanta when the hospital is 40 minutes away and involves travel on two different interstates).

When we got to the hospital, a nurse examined me. She must have the best poker face in all the world, because I had no idea anything was really wrong. She said she would get the doctor and left. Later, she said that she had felt a foot. Obviously that wasn't right, but again, I didn't know that yet. The doctor came in (not my doctor), examined me, and brutally informed us of a string of facts: 1. I would not be leaving the hospital until my baby was born, as the amniotic sac was bulging out and that was why I was having labor pains; 2. She was ordering a steroid shot (for the baby's lungs) and for me to be put on a negative incline (called Trendellenburg) in the bed to hopefully allow gravity to work with us; 3. She didn't have a lot of hope in all of this.

We were frantic. I cried a lot, my mom cried a lot, the Hawkeye just looked very stunned and tried to deal with the crying women.

So, this was how I found myself waking up in the hospital the morning of May 5. Just like every other morning up until then. I had no idea that Big Boy would be born that day. But God did. Nothing surprises him.

The Big Boy Turns Ten in a Week

Ten years ago today, I was a clueless woman. I was ecstatically, finally pregnant (not quite six months), my job was moderately stressful but involved lots of fun things, and I was planning. The nursery, staying home with my child, dinner, all of those important things. I really thought I had the world by the tail.

It's a funny thing. I can see now that it was a process, of God teaching me that I'm not in control and my life is more than safe in His hands, but at the time, I just didn't get it.

We had a hard time conceiving a child. As in, it just wasn't working for us, and we were going through all of the lovely, humiliating, letting-people-in-your-private-business stuff that is infertility testing and treatment. A process that, I'm well aware, can take even longer for some people, but for us it took about two years.

I struggled. Life had always happened on my timetable, and this just wasn't working out that way. I pleaded with God, I begged for direction, I tried to make bargains, and then. Finally. After much struggling and trying to do it my way. I really gave it to Him. I got on my face and told Him that I could even live with a 'no', if that was His answer. I just was at the end of my rope, unable to live with the uncertainty and living month-to-month that we were doing.

And then it happened. I took the eleven millionth pregnancy test of my life (I have a condition that makes the normal, oh-I'm-late indicators happen on a regular basis), and it was actually positive. So I made the Hawkeye go to the store with me to get another. Also positive. I was really sure that it was a mistake. But it wasn't. God had said yes. He had been waiting for me to learn my lesson and finally give Him total control over the whole thing.

So. I was pregnant. I went into full-control-freak mode on the pregnancy. The doctor says no caffeine? Okay. More fruits and vegetables? Check. Lots of milk? Got it. I think if the doctor had said I couldn't breathe the air, I would have found a way to have done that, too. I never really had morning sickness (made up for that with younger son), and I really felt pretty good. All systems go. I had it all handled.

And then God got my attention again. To be continued . . .

Sweet hearts

The Volunteer family has finally caught the flu this year. First, the Hawkeye had it (and was miserable and out of work for three days which should have been five). Then, older son has caught it, as I have. Younger son is incredibly proud that he is the only one in the family who hasn't been sick.

Younger son also has such a sweet heart and boundless energy. We don't do Easter bunnies and baskets and such, but we do let them participate in the egg hunts at school, since they aren't competing with our worship and appreciation of what Easter is. So, he had some plastic eggs. When I dragged myself out of bed on Easter morning, I found the sweetest surprise! Younger son had put together an egg for each of us and put them at our places at the table. They each were full of his candy and a note that said "Happy Easter!" That is so typical of his heart.

Usually, we make resurrection cookies on Easter. The recipe includes a Bible study to go with the cookie ingredients. You pound nuts and read about how Jesus was flogged, smell and measure vinegar and read about how Jesus was given it to drink on the cross, taste salt and read about the tears of the women as he was crucified. Then, when adding egg whites and beating them, you read about how His sacrifice has made us whiter than snow. They're meringue cookies, so you seal the oven (like sealing the tomb) and turn it off. The next morning, the cookies are ready and are hollow inside like the empty tomb. This has really been a meaningful tradition for our family. So, we made them last night instead. Which is typical of us -- a day late and a dollar short most of the time!

Bible study

My church's women's group finished our study last night. It was this one, and was a great choice for this group. The workbook was frustrating because of some highly annoying graphic design and editing goofs, but the study was wonderful, and Liz is a phenomenally gifted speaker. So, now we're looking for another one. Although I love Beth Moore and have participated in three of her studies, the group just isn't ready for that yet. We're looking for 6 weeks, and some homework. Anyone have suggestions you've tried?

Fragility

I received an email yesterday from a dear friend at church. Her children are the same age as mine. Her mother has cancer and is hospitalized, and she is overwhelmed with the burden. It brought me to tears when praying for them -- that was our family, four years ago.

My father was terminally ill, four hours away, and we were overwhelmed. Physically, emotionally, and sometimes spiritually. It's the little things that sometimes send you over the edge - the grocery store trip that didn't happen, the homework that was forgotten, the laundry that needs to be washed. The children's questions that you can't answer. The situation you never thought you'd be in - my dad wasn't yet sixty when he died.

I've thought a lot since that time about how fragile life is. We all live like we're promised forever, like every day will go on just like the day before. We cling to life desperately, trying to wring every happiness we can out of our days. However, God didn't promise us forever here on earth, and I don't think He means for us to be that frantically attached to our life here. Forever is a promise to our souls, and unless we believe in his Son's sacrifice on the cross for our sins, that forever isn't pleasant at all. If we do, however, accept His invitation to believe, confess our sins, and follow Him, then, in His graciousness and mercy, He gives us forever, in heaven, with Him. Perfection for eternity. So why do we still long so much to stay here, where sickness, cruelty and sin rob us of so much joy?

My dad is healed in heaven. He will never again struggle for breath, never cry a tear, never have another panic attack. Do I miss him any less? (Of course not -- I'm in tears just thinking about it). Am I comforted knowing I will see him again someday? Absolutely. But I still hug my boys tighter, cherish my husband and my mom more, and look at life differently because I know, now, that it is short. That I can't control its duration, any more than I can control the weather.

Thinking of my friend, I longed to tell her of the good things God redeemed from that time. Both of my boys have made salvation decisions (because we prayed and talked about heaven so much, I think.) One of my friends selflessly poured her time and energy into our lives, taking care of so much for me and teaching me so much about joyful service. But that's so hard for my friend to think about right now. So I told her, instead, the truth: we're praying for her, as her church family, we're here for her, and I will do anything she will let me do to help her.

Because I know what fragile is. And I know what my Savior would have me do. And I long to be the woman, someday, that he wants me to be.