Fireflies, Illusions of Control, Heart Doctors & Adoption....

Summer is in full swing in Alabama, Independence Day has come and gone and with it the realization that fall is around the corner.  This year is already 7 months in. Time, by far, is the most elusive element & I’m not clinging to the days or asking them to slow down, but I am working to enjoy them more. The Fourth was full of Fireflies & Fireworks, bare feet and pool fun. It was a wonderful time with the family celebrating our independence & a birthday or two...I'm so grateful to have the family I have, their support means more than I ever imagined. Every time I see them I'm reminded of various things: our differences, our loves, our sense of togetherness and our deep connection that no matter the argument or difference of opinion we still choose to come together & enjoy each other. We are each just a phone call away and that is something we learn to treasure as this time quickly passes...

This summer has already been full of twist, turns, diagonals and straight lines; all those fabulous directionals that take us headlong into understanding that human control is sincerely an optical illusion.

Recently I had a strange and startling encounter with stress. Yep, stress. Who stresses? I’m sure NONE of us has stress…I mean come on, everyone is polite on the highway, no one ever gets aggravated with electronics and every single day my hair does exactly what I want it to…yeah…that’s not true. BUT I did have an encounter. One scary enough that for about 48 hours of intense testing/doctor/ER visits I discovered that breakdowns, heart attacks, strokes, blood clots and migraines can sometimes be just a speeding-through-downtown-red-light-running-gotta-get-there-fast nano second away. So yep, I have another doc that will be seeing me and helping me learn how to deal with stress. I always thought I dealt pretty well, I mean in our household I am the least “appearing” stressed and I rarely “lose it”. Guess what? Sometimes we think we process stress when in reality we hold it in. If you are like me, you don’t always even realize that something is stressing you out. So yeah, I’m over here trying not only to process stress better but also recognize it when it happens. I was jokingly told this is to keep me from going ‘postal’ or from just becoming a truly “hot mess”.  Either way, I want to be able to seek joy in all things and stress keeps me from doing so. I was under the impression that I could control it all and still be just fantastic….forgive me while I step away to laugh so hard my sides hurt….

On the topic of stress, here is our adoption update: we were asked to turn in a couple more documents this week that will help in making everything match up in case we are selected by someone from another state. It was a lot of letters written by highly influential people who state our well-being is under their observation or under their care…so when I do stress I can blame them right? Eh, it was worth a try. Seriously, we got everything turned in and are now… WAITING.  Join  us, won’t you? Sing the song of our people “We are waiting, we are waiting, we are waiiiiiiiting for some news! It seems forever and forever, forever we wait here. We are qui-et-ly waiting for some news. Please tell us, please tell us, please telllll us what you know. We are waiting, we are waiting, paaaa-tiently we know.” (kind of to the tune to “Oh My Darl’n Clementine – Side note: anyone ever read the entire lyrics to that song? Morbid…yikes)  Well you get the idea. I should add a long verse on the praying too…”we are prayyyy-ing every day!” There is truth in these words. Prayer would be an important verse. 

We do please ask that you keep us in your prayers, our birthmother and our future child(ren). We all need your support and are already so grateful for everyone sending us such love. Right now we hope that someone will love our profile book.  What is a profile book, you ask? Well it is a book that answers a ton of questions for these women who are selecting which family to give the ultimate gift. It has photos, stories about our past, plans we have for the future, uplifting areas to make sure she knows how much we already love her, pictures of our furbabies and of course stories about all of you! Yep, you are in there, our village, our family, our friends all get a part of this book. It’s a very pretty, colorful, thick, bound book that she will flip through; hopefully she loves us and seeks to share a life. If not it’s okay too, really it is - if we can just send her any love, any support, any example of God’s grace then we have done something good. Again, this is out of our hands now...we have no control and we accept that He will know best.

So the theme of today....control. We all believe that on our own we can take charge, we can make all the choices, and we can face everything on our own merit. We may not think it all the time, but for sure we think it more than we should. We get complacent, we feel like everything is working out great, that we are the ones who got us where we are and for those of us that do this I’m wagging my finger at you and most assuredly at me! I do it. Everything gets going well and I fail to be grateful, I fail to stop and just give thanks or stop and just enjoy the blessings for a moment. He wants us to draw near always – the good, the bad, the in between – to seek His guidance and to acknowledge Him in ALL things. I stopped and spoke to Him when everything went a little haywire a couple weeks back. I went in for an ear infection – came out with Pleurisy and a little heart issue…it was sombering to just tell Him I love Him, to thank Him that there was no embolism, to thank Him for the doctors who quickly saw to my care and to be grateful that breathing wasn’t a chore. Yes, it scared me. Yes, it took my breath away (literally). But it found something we didn’t know was there, it has since forced me to process life differently and in those moments of fear, where control is most fleeting, I leaned…I leaned on His word and I remembered that I don’t have to understand, I just have to trust, to believe and to love. Peace is something that often comes at the strangest moments and mine came after a Contrast CT, as they removed the IV from my arm I felt it…He was there, I wasn’t alone and no matter what everything will be as it should…patience, I heard…timing is important, I remembered…promises are true, I accepted…He knows me…I am Fearfully and Wonderfully made…in my relationship with Christ I can release control and know that the outcome will be way better than what I ever could imagine…

Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. Proverbs 19:21

Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Matthew 6:34

But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”Matthew 19:26