Jesus will meet you there...

You know, it is funny...all mu life I have seen (and even been annoyed by) people of faith.  You know the people, the ones who can see and speak of God's love in the most violent and devastating tragedy...I always thought they were not real.  Maybe if I touched them they would be a hologram...a person could not possibly be that insane to be able to forgo the pain and see the "Light". 

Somehow, someway I became that insane...according to some of you who have spoken to me since my post about Eli possibly being autistic.  When I spat out how I felt numb in the last blog...I was waiting on God.  I was waiting for just something.  The journey we have been on in the last year with Eli has made it next to impossible for me to believe I could control what happens to my son.  I gave Eli back to God long ago.  My son struggles in this life but is not alone.  I came to this blog like I always do...I come here to spill out the depths so that I can fill it back up with the truth that follows.  Jesus met me there.  I saw why Eli's mother was beaten...I saw why I was abused and left to crawl on the path to healing.  Hasn't this journey made me wiser than my years?  Don't I have a lifetime of pain and the soothing needed from God above?  I have not been where Eli is going...I don't know what his path will look like.  I am honored to be given such a very special child...a child chosen to "suffer" but hopefully overcome.  I wonder, God, did you mean for Eli to have a stronger mother...a wiser one...but I to have been given pain and hindrances I would never ask for.  I have learned I can't change the past but can use my lessons for the future.  I know everything happens for a reason...a Higher reason.  Eli still cannot speak...maybe autism is to blame.  A specific diagnosis, however devastating, would give Eli more specific help.  Maybe this is the key to unlocking the Eli we know is there.  God knows the way...if this is the valley we must walk through I will go.  Let me carry my son until he can walk for himself...god carry me and let me be the mother...the strength my son needs to overcome and learn to praise you with every breath he breaths no matter what he faces.  God make me the haven a boy like Eli will need to protect him or at least soothe him from the cruelty he might face...from the frustration and exhaustion his trials will bring him...always bringing the right words to teach Eli to thank you and not blame you.  I am not alone...Eli is not alone, he walks hand in hand with his Father.  You gave him to me, to bless me, and I give him back to You.

Eli's surgery is tomorrow at approx 7:30.  We don't have any way to really verbally prepare him for what is to come.  Thankfully this is a pretty simple surgery with only about a 4 day recovery.  Thank you to all of you who have prayed and even donated money in our time of great need.  We were able to make the payment to Eli's doctor because of your kindness.  I hope you have already reaped the blessings you deserve from giving.

The "A" word...

The kids both had their yearly check-ups today.  I scheduled them back to back so I could take them both in at the same time...NEVER AGAIN!!  Maddie had to get her finger pricked and had a little trouble clotting from the stick.  She was bleeding everywhere and Eli took advantage of my being distracted to take his turn on the elevator.  Anyway, we went through the usual and short list of Eli's achievements.  No surprise to anyone there...or so I thought.  Eli's doctor asked if he and I had ever discussed more serious implications of Eli's condition...specifically his odd behaviors.  I really thought he was leading into telling me he thought Eli had ADHD.  I was ready for that...I thought he would suggest medication, etc.  I was ready to refuse on principle and faith that we can handle Eli's behavior and outbursts.  He didn't say a word about ADHD.  He told me he was concerned Eli was showing signs of Autism Spectrum Disorder.  I am sure my mouth dropped.  We discussed it a little more and his doctor is referring us to a place in Atlanta that can do the official observation and make a diagnosis. 

I am numb.  It has been a long while since I have not been able to feel in a situation that should invoke a strong feeling.  I expected ADHD...and I got Autism.  This was supposed to be a routine visit and I get the shock of a lifetime...words a parent prays they never hear, "I think your son has Autism".  God, when is enough enough.  How much is one little boy supposed to handle?  How much heartbreak is this mother and father going to be given?  I feel so alone.  I feel like God has forgotten about us.  I don't know where to go or what to do.  I just feel alone and forgotten.  I feel that if I cried out to God all I would hear would be an echo.  The sorrow and stress has rained down on our family today.  Give me some peace...give me some hope...

Weeping in worship

Been a while, I know.  I decided to have a "handmade Christmas" this year.  I grossly underestimated how many man hours such a task would require!  My sewing machine has been working as hard as I have.

Some good things have been happening.  I promised a friend I would make a gift for her to give a mutual friend about to have a little boy.  I sat at my sewing machine making a little pair of baby shoes.  I held this small project in my hands and I was overcome.  I was overcome with joy...joy in having this ability to create.  I was so thankful for the way my mind can work out and put together such a project.  I was so grateful to God for giving me a talent.  I know everyone is good at something but I seriously believed that applied to everyone else.  I was set aside...undeserving of a talent or a gift.  I was simply the leftovers.  Like the fabric I throw away after a project...to small a piece to create a thing it is no good to anyone and would just take up space or create a mess. I was the cast aside and I had accepted my fate.  I should not inquire or ask for more from anyone.  Yet there I was...the seamstress!  I was so proud of myself and so thankful to God all in one instant.  I even took a risk by putting my handmade goods online to sell.  A few friends bought what I had made but that still gave me the confidence to say I was "good"...that I was good at something not everyone else can do.  What an amazing feeling...to have the feeling of being touched and woven together with a specific set of qualifications!!  I wept in worship.

Then...there came a hard blow.  My sweet Eli will need another surgery.  His infections has returned and his ears are filled with fluid.  A simple surgery so he won't be phased much at all.  The blow came when I was told we needed to pay his doc $150 and the hospital $500 before the day of the surgery, December 30th.  The total cost for his surgery to us is $1,471.  I think I lost a year of my life when the nurse told me this news.  HOW?  How can we pay this and still feed our children?  Where will the initial $650 ever come from?  To be able to incorporate my faith here would be very calming, but I am a worrier.  I can remember my faith when problems seem smaller.  I asked myself why do I freak out and feel alone and solely responsible when it comes to financial things like this.  I didn't wait long for an answer.  Growing up we were poor.  My mom stressed about the bills and included me in on her worries.  "If we don't get money from somewhere we are going to be on the street next month."  Things like this would haunt me.  To this day my biggest fear is being homeless.  When we come up short I resort to trying to "fix" it.  I scramble and panic...I run away from faith (which in my mind means doing nothing).  I think I incorporate having so little money with being forgotten.  My mother told us God wasn't taking care of us.  God was punishing us, etc when there was no money.  I feel that now.  I feel like I am on my own.  I feel like I am being punished for something.  To have faith in this situation...what in the world does that look like?  To believe God will pay this bill seems so absurd and irresponsible.  I feel like I am on my own.  I am scared.  I am scared to live paycheck to paycheck.  I am afraid I won't be able to feed my children.  I am afraid others think I am bad because we struggle with money.  I don't know how to have faith here.  I want the calm and the peace faith would bring me now.  I need to see a way...I need to know how God will take care of us.  I need to know so that if His way isn't what I want I can complain and find another way.  It sounds so ridiculous when I say that out loud but my fear drives me here.  Eli needs this...that is all that keeps me from picking up the phone and cancelling the surgery.  Love keeps me doing the right thing.  God that is all that I have right now...I love my son and I move forward in giving him the best I can.  Take care of him, take care of me.  Please provide so we are never without a roof and beds to sleep in...

In response...you should know

I thought a little more on my post the other day.  Once I release the words onto this blog screen I am filled with peace...always!  No matter if I write to lament or to question...or to praise.  God asked me more than a year ago to just write.  I didn't know His voice then or that He moves me in desire that way...but God was the one who named this blog.  God was the one who made me look down at my sweet Madeline and just pour out!  Some of you have written me or even called me to say thank you or voice the own cry of your hearts...a cry that this blog put into words.  Ladies, thank you.  I don't always know who is "listening" and when you respond, in agreement or not, I am affirmed...no matter what is said.  I have even been blessed enough to have my writing compared to David's...what a treasured blessing.  One that allows my ego to float up to heaven and thank God again for the healing in me...the healing I can feel, that I can see, that I can believe.

In response to what I wrote the other day.  I am afraid I left some people thinking I didn't believe in God's power.  I thank those who let me know and allow me to clarify now.  I know these blogs are my thoughts and they are not always fact...as in this is one side of "the story".  I think of it this way...there are billions of us.  I believe God fashioned each millimeter of each of the billions.  I believe God is mighty...He is so mighty that my meager words could never contain what God has done, what He is doing, and what He will do.  Why would I ever want to or try to contain God.  I believe in miracles.  Two of them have come from my own body.  With their first kicks inside of me and their first cries of life I have been in awe of the treasures we receive in this life.  I just cannot imagine the life I will live in Eternity if my life on earth can be this...FULL.  I believe God can move mountains.  I believe that if God felt Mount Kilimanjaro belonged in my backyard He could pick it up and place it here...I believe.  God obviously feels otherwise.  I believe God can sew up the gaping wounds of every woman I see in pain.  He'd thread the needle of ultimate healing and He would tenderly sew up those wounds and they would hurt no more.  I believe He does that for some people...He does.  Praise the Sewers Hand!  I believe He leads others on a different path.  Make no mistake, I have BEGGED, PLEADED, and BARGAINED with God to sew up my wounds so that I would bleed no more.  I wanted healing and I wanted to see HIS face.  I wanted to see God when I begged Him to show me Himself.  God did not sew up my wounds at once.  I bleed still.  Why?  Why would God not answer me when I was so so so ready to receive?  He tells me now, "Ashley, my sweet, you did not know me."  I didn't know Him.  I had been saved, no doubt about that, but I still had lies in my head.  My mother had to stop beating my body when people started to notice.  It was at that time she would beat my soul.  She told me God would "get me".  She told me God hated me...she told me God thought I was lazy.  She told me that if she found something I had done wrong it was because God had told her...I would then be slapped, kicked, spit on, ridiculed, etc...because God had told on me.  Is that God?  Is that the kind of Father I am meant to worship...to serve?  NO, ladies, that was not God.  God never laid a wrathful hand on me.  God never beat me.  That was my mother...my clinically insane mother.  Her hand broke my skin and made me bleed.  Her words cut my soul.  She blamed God so she could sleep at night.  All I had ever been told of God was lies.  Lies I had no other choice but to believe.  Why would I WANT to believe my mother could hate me so much...it was easier to believe someone I could not see was the one destroying me.  I thought there might be hope...that my mother might love me.  She did not!  God was crucified so that I might live.  God took the blame because He knew that if I knew the truth, that my mother hated me, that I might be lost.  Isn't that love?  God takes on all the burden knowing in the end He wins the prize...and to think the prize was me.  I have wrestled with God...I have screamed at Him...I have turned away...I have questioned...and I have believed the lies.  Ladies, God was never fed up.  God never let an inch between us.  He wants the prize!  He prepares my home in Heaven..."this is my Ashley's place".  God's love leaps over the stains our earthly lives leave.  I think of the strangers I pass at the store...God prepares their homes.  He cleans it out and calls it their own.  God can do all that but is never distracted from me.  We cannot understand why some things happen.  We cannot understand why some of us take longer and some of us heal sooner.  It is the journey that MAKES GOD REAL TO EACH ONE!!!  I don't want your journey...I want God.  Tell me it is taking too long and you tell me I am not good enough...you put more truth to the lies my mother told me than to the love of God you preach.  "Love me like Jesus"!  We all fall short of what God wanted us to always be.  We all make mistakes and yet we can all come back.  It takes just as much of God's patience to let us keep coming back as it does for me to walk at my pace so that He becomes my TRUTH.  I am worth it...you are worth it.  Don't steal her value because you cannot contain patience.  None of us can ever save an other's soul...we don't have what it takes...and that is okay! 

I fell in love!

I hope that I can wrap my head around all the thoughts swimming in my head. 

My sister called me last night in a panic!  It seems my mother was sitting outside Rebecca's workplace...just sitting in the car.  I asked Becca why she was so afraid.  I told her that mom couldn't do anything to her!  Rebecca replied, "But she can threaten!".  I stopped myself from discounting this as a legitimate fear.  To Rebecca, that is total and complete fear.  How did my mother control her...well all of us...FEAR!  How did she keep us quiet?  FEAR!  How did she get us to do any ridiculous thing?  FEAR!!  Fear was my mother's weapon and the last and lasting strong hold!  It can seem so silly to someone on the other side of this healing journey and especially to someone never beaten with fear.  For those of us who have experienced it (and care to recall), fear is so very real.  So real you could almost touch it!  It is usually irrational but not to the one who cannot understand and dissect her fear.  It is her way of life.  Her fear may have kept her safe in her childhood home...fear keeps us on our toes, it makes us ready for the beating, it alerts us to the mood our abuser may be in, it keeps us out of harms way if even once.  Fear is a skill any abused child NEEDS to survive.  When we leave our childhood home, the fear skill isn't as much of a need but how can we dump something that is indeed a part of our person?  You wouldn't ask an adult to forget what 2+2 is, would you?  No!  We are drilled in math skills until they become second nature...the abused child is drilled in fear and cannot easily lose this skill as it has served her so well.

I find myself wishing Rebecca would just LISTEN TO ME!!!  I feel this in frustration over having to have patience with her.  I know many people in my life have felt this over me.  My in-laws come screaming to mind.  Our relationship just is what it is.  They don't live in my body and in my past and I don't live in theirs.  Expecting them to "get it" is unreal and just evokes pain on both sides.  The same goes for them.  There is peace in a long journey.  You wouldn't expect an 8 year old to have the knowledge and skills of a 12 year old...that is absurd!  It takes time to mature, it takes time to learn, it takes time to grow.  God gives us childhood as a sort of shelter...a shelter to mature, learn, and grow and fail and succeed in these things along the way.  He expects children to be loved and protected...hugged and kissed by two loving parents.  Well, for a large number of people that never happens.  In childhood we are broken...raped...beaten...violated...hated!  In our small bodies we lack the capacity to contain these things and we react in many ways...all those reactions steal us away from peace...even if we comply to keep the "peace" we still never get to be a CHILD!  I believe that some people CAN just get over it...although these people puzzle me, who am I to say their recovery isn't genuine?  I don't know how God works in you.  Then there are those of us that need time.  Just like the child needs years an years to be labeled "mature" and "of age", I need time to tear apart my past and fill the holes with GOD!  I believe my personality (my tendencies to be analytical, obsessive, and thorough) plays a part in the length of this journey.  God did indeed create me this way and therefore, He is prepared to be patient with me.  God makes me fall in love with Him on this long path.  When I relive being molested, for example, each time it loses more and more fear...God finds me there.  GOD FINDS ME...who are you to think or say I should have arrived sooner?  I could certainly skip over all the ugly and painful parts...but they would find me again.  God finds me where I am which means I am exactly where I am supposed to be and when!  Who could ever convince me otherwise?  As with Rebecca...when has she ever had someone to call when she is afraid?  How thrilled do you think God was when she reached out instead of hiding in her fear.  A VICTORY!!!  God knows one day she will reach for Him...she will fall in love with Him along this path.  God never crams love into us so that we are forced to worship in "love".  That isn't real and God has no use for robots.  God wants us to make a choice to love Him.  Some can make a choice to "get over it" and that is a love response to God.  I chose to process and that is my love response to God.  He doesn't hold another's love any higher than mine...God IS NOT abusive.  God's patience makes me love Him in a most peaceful way! 

...At your feet

I drained every second out of the snooze button this morning.  I couldn't seem to wake up.  I splashed cold water on my face...a few times.  I got dressed and prepared to walk across the hall into a battle to get my son dressed.  After he finally surrendered I crammed my children into a borrowed car.  Don't get me wrong, I am thankful fro good friends to loan us a working car...I just want things back to normal.  We bought an SUV for a reason!!!  I am too OCD to have things so askew for so long!  I dragged my son into his class kicking and screaming.  Drove home and walked into my messy house...I was just so tired.  I fed Maddie and finally sat down.  I looked out my living room window and I couldn't help but wish I was looking out from somewhere in Pennsylvania.  I get so very homesick this time of year.  I just want to be home!  I truly want healing in my family.  I want the perfect "Quinn family Christmas".  I want my kids to be safe near my mother.  I want what was taken from me.  I want my mother to suck it up...admit what she did...heal...and put things back together!!!  I don't want to feel loneliness surrounded by people anymore.

I spoke to my sister, Rebecca, yesterday.  I hung up the phone feeling about 30 pounds heavier with the weight of worry over decisions she is making.  I felt sorrow and so out of control.  I can see clearly the dangerous path she has chosen...and there in nothing I can do to stop her.  She is compromising and turning away.  Life, I know, could be a lot worse.  I know that worry can blind me from the blessings I have.  Sometimes I would just like a break...I want a life that is totally and completely carefree...a life where bills pay themselves, where I always feel at home, bank accounts don't bounce, cars always start, dirt and clutter just float away, exhaustion is a fairytale, children are always obedient and they have 2 sets of grandparents....scars disappear and people recognize and embrace true love when it is offered...well I guess that would be Heaven, huh? 

So it was just me and my sweet Madeline at home together this morning.  I know how I usually behave when I am that tired.  I just couldn't stand the thought of overreacting or yelling at her...her crying and my adding guilt to my day.  I remembered the Casting Crowns song "At Your Feet":

Here at Your feet, I lay my past down
My wanderings, all my mistakes down
And I am free


Here at Your feet, I lay this day down
Not in my strength, but in Yours I’ve found
All I need, You’re all I need

Jesus, Jesus, at Your feet
Oh, to dwell and never leave
Jesus, Jesus, at Your feet
There is nowhere else for me
There is nowhere else for me

Here at Your feet, I lay my future down
All of my dreams, I give to You now
And I find peace, I find peace
Here at Your feet, I lay my life down
For You my King, You’re all I want now
And my soul sings…

‘Cause I am free (here at Your feet)
All I need (is at Your feet)
I find peace
We’re at Your feet
We’re at Your feet

And I am free (here at Your feet)
All I need (is at Your feet)
I find peace
We’re at Your feet
We’re at Your feet
We’re at Your feet
We’re at Your feet

Here at Your feet
I lay my life down

I can't pray yet...but I know I get closer the more real God becomes to me.  My heart cries out for the people around me and for my family.  God just hears me in words I cannot speak.  He reciprocates with Peace.  My past will never be forgotten...my body will always carry scars.  I will make more mistakes...I will have to make more apologies to my children and my husband when I don't control my anger.  My future is unknown and I HATE that...I like to have control.  I know where I WANT to be but God says "No" for now.  It is impossible for me, in my sinful nature, to never turn away from the feet of God.  I'd love to say that it is possible but lets get real!  But I believe it is the place God wants me...where He likes to see me.  He welcomes me back each and every time.  When I turn my back on my worries, my past, my stress, my obsessions I am at Jesus' feet...soon life interrupts me...but I was there and my energy was renewed by that Peace...peace when everything was still especially my mind...peace where it is quiet and my heart flutters because Jesus has my attention.  My kitchen is still dirty, my address is still the same, my car still won't work, my family is still a mess, and there are bills that won't go away but I face them one day at a time...in peace!

So...I totally freaked out!!

I am writing today in total frustration...for no one but myself.  I thought I was farther...or closer to an "end".  I found out, over the last few days, that that is not the truth.  I had been doing so well and then the ball dropped.  Thursday was the one of the worst days I have had in a long while.  Madeline woke up several times in the night so I could barely drag myself out of bed at 7am to get Eli ready for school.  After I dropped him off we came back to the house for breakfast during which Maddie threw a fit and yogurt went flying.  I threw a load of clothes in the wash, cleaned her mess and vacuumed the floor.  I remembered Eli had "missed" the toilet that morning just like the morning before...and the morning before that.  I clean the whole bathroom!!  I tried sitting down and playing with Madeline but her crying made it impossible to enjoy.  I put her down for a nap.  She was awake an hour later with a poopy diaper.  I changed her...tried to play again...the screaming was worse than before.  I decided it would do us both good if I put her back in bed.  It came time to go pick up Eli.  On the way home from school I noticed the engine lights coming on and off in my car.  When Evan got home he tried to turn the car on....nothing happened.  The car was dead...in our driveway!  Evan suggested we leave the house if only for our sanity.  We put the car seats in my brother-in-laws car (the car has out of date car tags!!!) and went inside to get the kids shoes.  I sat on Eli's bed and looked up to see a shocked look on my husband's face.  He was staring at the giant hole in the window next to the bed!  INCREDIBLE!!!  Within 20 minutes our car breaks down and we find a broken window in the house.  I was about to lose it.  Later, we came to a conclusion that our planned vacation to Disney World was a little irresponsible.  Less than a month ago we had to have a new drainage field dug in our backyard after the toilets were overflowing and the sinks wouldn't drain.  That set us back a great deal.  That was it!  I just shut down.  I got quiet and wouldn't/couldn't eat.  I think I got more aggressive as the night wore on.  I get loud when I feel that "depressed"...I just cried.  I couldn't even figure out what I was really crying about.  I went off to bed at 9:30 last night....but I just laid there, worrying.  This morning began just like yesterday.  Feeling exhausted and having to clean something that would only need cleaning again tomorrow.  My patience was non-existent with Madeline.  When she whined I felt a tightness in my chest.  Thankfully she was ready for her nap soon after breakfast.  I thought it best to put her down early...if only to save her from her own mother.

Now I feel like a fool.  I overreacted to a situation that could happen to anyone.  I feel like the world was ending...well at least in the same dramatic sense...and I still have my health, and my kids.  My husband still has a job and there is food in my fridge.  Why does my world still fall apart?  I thought I was farther than this!  I thought I was more mature!  I don't even feel I am safe enough to be around my kids.  I can't keep telling myself, "They won't remember this.".  It isn't the truth and that is an abusive mother's favorite lie!!!  

Numb is good

I know I have mentioned on and off for about a year now (BTW Happy Anniversary to "In a Tutu"!!!!) my troubles with my husbands family, particularly my mother in law.  For those of you who are new to the blog let me give a brief history to catch you up.  My husbands parents are Missionaries to Brasil.  My husband grew up in Brasil.  His parents are only home in the States for small chunks at a time.  His mother, Diane, actually attended the first few meetings of "Wounded Heart" with me.  She was there as support and has not experienced abuse of any kind in her past.  I can easily say I wouldn't have ever attended the first meeting if she hadn't gone with me.  Diane was the one who led me to the Lord October 18, 2005.  She flew home from Brasil when I had to go to Pennsylvania to testify against my mother in court.  I was pregnant for the third time and the family feared I would have a third miscarriage because of the stress.  She has come home to help Evan and I after the births of both of our children.  My second child, Madeline (in the tutu) is named for her grandmother, Madeline Diane.  I can't really tell you when we started to drift apart.  I know their being so far away certainly doesn't help me...someone who needs to "see" you love me.  It has to be something deeper than that but I can't put my finger on it.  Anyway, last May we had sort of a falling out.  I confided something in her and asked her not to share it with Evan's sister.  It had something to do with the sister so Diane told her anyway.  I found out and I think the bottom of my world just fell apart.  The secret she shared was really insignificant but it was the fact that she told.  I wondered had I been lying to myself all the years before when I felt Evan's sister and I were equal.  Here Diane had chosen her over me and that must be the truth.  A few months later I tried to tell Diane how hurt I had been by what she had done.  I was also scared to death that she had shared my past with Evan's sister.  I didn't feel anyone else in the family needed to know.  When I tried to bring up what had happened Diane wouldn't hear me.  There were other things going on between us (she felt I wasn't 'getting it' like I should) and we needed to deal with those things.  We dealt with them and decided to take our relationship in a new direction.  She would just be grandma and I would no longer share my "process" with her as she had lost patience.  It was better than it sounds.  Over the next 6 months I received several reports from other family members that dealt with people discussing my son's lack of speech and Evan and I not doing anything about it.  This, of course, was not truth.  In stead of Evan and I addressing the rumors we kept silent.  In February we learned our son, then three years old, had a hearing problem which explained his lack of speech.  Evan and I felt an enormous amount of guilt over Eli's hearing problem that had gone undetected.  Eli had a surgery and we discovered he had permanent hearing loss but thankfully not severe enough for him to need any hearing aids.  We still had not shared this with most of Evan's family.  The thought of sharing Eli with them made me go into convulsions almost.  It felt as if we would dangle him in front of danger and not protect him as we should.  The rumors continued but it was just not a priority.  Our son's needs were more important.  Dealing with a family drama would have distracted me.  I would have tried to measure up to "how my mother-in-law would handle this" and not be 100% for my child.  After things settled down with Eli, Evan and I often discussed when to tell the family.  I was VERY reluctant and scared.  I often wept over the thought of anyone thinking my son was "stupid".  I finally told Evan that they would not here this information from me.  He would have to decide when to tell them.  My husband is not a great communicator so they never did find out which was fine by me.  We told a few family members over the last few months.  If someone asked about Eli we shared.  No one had asked us and assumptions were just made.  I had to speak with Evan's Aunt (Diane's sister) about our investments ans she asked about Eli's school.  I was so fed up with the rumors and my being suspicious that I spilled it out.  She got a little defensive and said she was only asking how he was doing.  I apologized but seeing that she was a small part of the rumor mill I am not too sure I meant it.  I knew all during the conversation that if I was telling her I had to be ready for EVERYONE to find out.  During the conversation I told her that I knew I overreacted to some things and that seemed to be all she could commend me for admitting to her.  Overall it was a good conversation.  I know I can never make my in-laws understand what it is like to be me and live inside my body and think with my "damaged" brain.  As frustrating as that is I remember that there are many of you who "get it" and can validate me!  The next day I was chatting (the typing kind of talking!!)with my mother-in-law about their bills and she asked how Eli liked his school.  I talked about Eli a little bit and about my new responsibilities there.  She told me she and my father-in-law were proud of my embracing motherhood so well.  I thanked her and told her after a long year it was nice to hear something like that (of course knowingly opening up the lines of communication).  She asked what had happened in the last year...here we go.  I told her I didn't want to cross our boundary into the "personal" stuff.  She asked me if it was something I could sum up.  I said:

 "I think (after the ugliness between us last May-July) I learned to give myself time to grieve, time to process...just time.  I wasn't on any ones time schedule for how long this "process" should take. I think, between the both of us, we were expecting there to be an end or for me to "get it'...right?  I have been through some horrific things and some of the worst has just recently been remembered. Expecting myself to live like someone who has never lived like me is so so so so so stupid and discouraging. There is no possible way I could think like you or dad or whomever. I just can't do it.  That isn't a bad thing. I actually think it is a good thing. There are a lot of people like me. People still stuck on the "other side". They need someone who thinks like they do to show them the way. You couldn't do that but I can. (That isn't meant to hurt you...sorry).  I will never be able to forget the things my parents did to me...they will never be erased...they are a part of who I was and still a part of who I am...and that is okay.  Cindy had me take a personality test...WOW did that open my eyes. There are a lot of things in me that have been critiqued over these last few years, by me and you too, that are not damage but actually parts of the person God created me to be. Of course the damage has made some of those things a little "intensified" and I have to deal with that...but I am more comfortable in my flaws because I know where I am strong too."

She then thanked me for sharing and said, "The one thing I truly want is to be in this position of not being responsible for what you're going through.  But, when you want to share something, I want to listen and sympathize as someone who loves and cares about you, but not as Cindy. I didn't know how to get out of that role with you."  I didn't really know what to say to her here.  I just told her about the women I have in my life who can understand and just "get it" and how that has literally rehabilitated me.  I told her that I feel things deeply and when I would share those things her she didn't react the way I "needed"...it just held me back from a lot of growth. That wasn't any one's fault...just a clash in personality, I think.  Also that I think there will always be a trigger there between the both of us. I don't know (still) how to fit into a family like the Warden's but there is the expectation there because it has been "so long".

She then asked me the strangest question, "Do I remind you of your mother at all"?  I thought dear God is that another sin I will have to deal with...making this women feel like the same woman who wanted and tried to break every bone in my body???  I told her NO and asked if she was kidding! But she inquired further, "But are there things I say or attitudes I have that remind you of her? I don't want to be that kind of person, but I'm not sure that some of my strong personality could possibly intimidate you...".  I paused a while.  I knew it had been hard to get this far in the conversation.  I didn't want to have to cross that same "bridge" again any time soon so I might as well spill it all out now!  i replied, "What hurt the most was when I expressed feelings whatever they might be (sorrow, frustration, etc.) over things of the past that you must have thought had already been dealt with and you reciprocated in frustration was like you saying "Just get over it." Granted, you and I deal with things in different ways but I now know that I needed to feel those things for however long it took."  There was one more thing that needed to be discussed.  I didn't want to ever go there with her...but I didn't want to have to repeat this conversation either.  I brought her back to last year when she had told Evan's sister something I had asked her not to and the time I had come to her asking for the truth. 

"When I kept asking you last year if you had told Angie something I had specifically asked you not too...you got annoyed (am I right) and gave me a broad answer and didn't want to discuss it anymore...do you even remember that? (she remembered)  I am not bringing up the specific thing event...that is done...but it was what was communicated to me by the exchange we had when I tried to let you know that it hurt me that you would do that and essentially choose one daughter over another.  If you had felt I should not have asked you not to share with Angie it would have been better you had said that to me and ended it there.  What I learned from that was that when I felt hurt by you that I was wrong. It must have been my fault or my damage that made me feel hurt and that it wasn't right to tell anyone...it must be my fault somehow.  That lead into the whole MESS with what Grandma said about Eli...I kept my mouth shut because I had "learned" it was not safe to feel hurt. That I could not possibly be the hurt one...I was wrong and you all were right.  I really felt like I had lost my mother all over again."

She apologized but added, "and I can be honest when I say, that's something I can't understand totally, Ashley. Not that I can't see it...but that it didn't hit me like that..." I told her that I know it didn't. I really didn't understand what it had meant to me until a few months ago. I know she and I don't "speak" the same language and I don't expect that from her anymore.  (or I try not to)  She said that she didn't understand that my pulling back and not wanting to share was feeling hurt and not rejecting them as a family.  DING, DING, DING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I added that I could see how it would have been a lot easier if I were able to figure out what I was feeling and why back them but I was not as mature as I am now. And Evan, in his love for me and his desire to allow me to feel/be a good mother, let me process all of this with patience. Evan has a unique ability to speak your language and mine! Love that man!  That brought us to the most sensitive subject, Eli!  I admitted the more I was told what people were saying about Eli and us as his parents the deeper the wound got. It felt so so so unsafe to share him with all of the family. That is my sweet sweet baby and they felt unsafe.  She said, "You know, I've always had problems with my mouth and probably more so with my writing...but, I don't want you to feel unsafe with me/us. If I'd thought about that (duh!) last year when that stuff happened, I would've handled it differently....I would like to think!"  Then she asked for forgiveness.  I told her that her being open minded and willing to listen allows me to forgive her.  I felt it safe to round myself out and make a bold statement:

"I think a good rule to remember is that I am not Angie. She likes to share everything and why would she not! She is a Warden by birth and there is nothing wrong with how she communicates. The problem comes when I am expected to behave like her or the same rules apply to me. I think this goes with any in-law...even Bere! I need time. I have learned enough about myself as a woman, a wife, and a mother that for me to be the best I can in all of my roles is to process whatever comes and be where I need to be. When things sunk in I am ready to share. I need to have a handle on my emotions and what God might be trying to teach me before I pass it around the family."

She replied:

"I appreciate that, Ashley. And, I agree that my relationship with Angie is different than ours, because she's got the 'warden' gene...and even my relationship with Bere (my other sister-in-law), is very different, because she is super timid about opening up and that's fine! If you remember at the beginning of our relationship (you and me) I really had a hard time with not wanting to step over the boundary between us...and then when I did and it was helpful (I would like to think it was..) I didn't know how to back up and cross over the boundary when I didn't need to 'be' in your life all the time."

I told her that I have learned as a mother, it is hard to know when it is best to let them go because each one is different. I told her that I respected her relationship with Angie but that it was rough for me last year because I had to FORCE myself to believe she hadn't told the secrets in my past with Angie even though she had shared that other stuff with her...that accompanied with mourning our relationship.

So the scoop with Eli was out.  She was glad and said they have been concerned for him and not knowing has been very hard on them and of course, knowing that we were also suffering with this without their support.  I told her,

"I know it must have been hard. We are sorry it had to go the way it did.  We just couldn't figure out another way that wouldn't take our minds off of what Eli needed. He needed a lot from us, me esp, and my mind just goes crazy when there is open tension in the family. It was the only way to give Eli all of his mommy!  Also, We were grieving a lot. The last thing we needed were people making suggestions as to his diagnosis, etc. BOTH Evan and I were on the verge. We found a group of parents and professionals that would be honest and empathetic.  I know you all were hurt by this and I know I can speak for Evan, we are sorry. I can say it wasn't done to be painful to anyone. There were so so so many nights we just wept over that little boy...we learned to count more on each other too."

She mentioned their upcoming six months to be spent here in the states.  I decided it was a good time to ask her if they had been avoiding spending time with us during their last two vacations.  She said they had been avoiding us because of the tension and because she is not a confronter.  I told her we could take some responsibility for the tension (without taking responsibility for how they behaved)  I just told her feelings get hurt and the word favoritism has come into play. We know that isn't the truth but you know how your feelings can lie to you.  She said how hurt they had been feeling but certainly never wanted that to affect people the way it had.  I understood her hurt feelings...without feeling too much guilt.

Our conversation ended with my telling her that we just need there to be an understanding...and really a trust...that what we discuss with them stays right there...even if you they don't think we will find out they "told"...it always seems to come back to me and just opens the wound again. We have had a lot of trust lost in the last year...

Well, there you have it.  Here we are all exposed.  I expected to feel...I don't know, I thought I'd feel really good.  Turns out my "exposing" myself is really no fun.  I kind of feel numb...because now I have to trust them again.  I HATE HAVING TO TRUST PEOPLE!!!!  It sucks!  It sucks because I can't control those people!  Wouldn't it be so nice if I could control their brains and make them say and do whatever I needed so that I could always feel safe and validated.  I know that wouldn't be best....but it would sure be nice...like a little vacation from the drama!!!

Precious

I don't know if any of you have watched the movie "Precious".  I have to admit it is a ROUGH movie to watch.  At times it is like watching my childhood lived out by another girl.  I actually like movies like this.  It helps me remember what I was feeling during different episodes of abuse in my home.  It is hard to recall my feelings when, at the time, I wasn't able to feel much of anything.  No emotion was safe in front of my mother.  If I ever were to dare show a part of who I was I opened myself to certain ridicule or punishment.  In one scene of the movie the young girl, Precious, was being yelled at by her very abusive mother.  Precious stood at the top of the steps as her mother stood at the foot of the steps yelling profanities.  This situation is all too familiar to me.  When my mother was going to explode it was wise to get as far away from her as possible.  If I could sense her rage coming on (hear her yelling from another room) I would often run up stairs or down the stairs...basically separate myself from my mother.  It didn't stop her from raging at me.  The same things Precious' mother yelled to her were yelled to me.  "You bitch...you are stupid...you will never be anything...I should have never had children...I hate you...I am going to kill you...I will bust your head open...".  I couldn't move.  I remember my knees would lock up because I was scared to literally move a muscle.  Often I would be yelled at long enough that my vision would go white and I was close to passing out from standing still.  I can remember cursing her out in my head...the words I called her, whew, she would have killed me if I had said them aloud.  I can remember having a feeling of bricks on my chest from the anger I felt inside...maybe the sorrow over what she was saying to me.  Either way I wanted to burst open...I wanted to disappear...I wanted to lash out.  I couldn't though...that would have meant her lashing back at me. 

In the movie Precious' mother allowed her father to sexually abuse Precious.  A social worker questions the mother about this.  The mother tells this horrendous story that her baby's father first touched Precious as a little girl.  Instead of stopping him she grew to resent her daughter.  She didn't stop him because she feared there was no one else to love her.  If she said something or put a stop to it her man would leave.  She hated her daughter because the father "loved" Precious more.  Precious ended up getting pregnant twice by her own father.  Precious' mother resented her even more because the father gave Precious more children than he had given the mother.  The hatred the mother felt allowed her to treat her daughter like a slave...like an animal.  Precious was made to cook for her mother every night.  The mother forced Precious to lie to social services so that the family could continue to receive welfare.  Precious had something inside of her...something that made her keep going.  She had a teacher who encouraged her to write it out. 

The movie is based on a novel.  The actual people and events are made up...but certainly possible in this world.  My mother had to hate me in order to do the things she did to me.  There is no other explanation.  She put me in harms way to entice her husband to stay.  She called me names and made me feel like I was nothing.  She was selfish.  I was always doing whatever I could to keep her from her rage.  Whatever I did was never enough.  She always found something to rage about.  Meanwhile I never got the chance to learn who I was.  I never had time to find out what I was good at or what I liked because my time and energy had to be spent on figuring out what would prevent her from beating me.  She didn't direct me to discover these things either, like a mother is supposed to do for her children.  I never learned that life could be about me.  I never learned that I am allowed to have time to myself just doing nothing.  I was always desperate to be one step ahead of my mother just to save myself the bruises.  All the sudden I stepped into the real world when I left for college and was expected to delegate time to study to keep up my grades.  I never learned to study.  I never had time to do those things in a house where I was responsible for so many things and so many people.  I was lost.  I could survive in my mothers home.  I had the skills to keep people from getting angry...I had the ability to numb myself from the hatred yelled at me...I lived every day just to be able to lay my head down on my own pillow at night.  I didn't need those highly refined skills in the world that college offered.  I was never taught to communicate or have a simple conversation.  I was never taught to trust people.  I knew how to keep my head down and just make it through a day.  I found it impossible to function where the only skills I had were out of place.  It tricked me many times into thinking I needed to go back home and stay there...that I just wasn't cut out to live and be happy like the other people I saw.  When I got married (still don't know how that one happened!) it was made 1000 times worse!  I felt like I was going to suffocate from the unconditional love my husband gave.  What was his problem?  Why didn't he call me names and hate me when I let him down? 

My mother set me up.  She just didn't know how to be a mother.  Mother's are supposed to mold their children.  Mother's are supposed to draw out their child's abilities and talents...even if it means their child decides to go away to college.  A mother,  in her true love for her children, gives them a safe place to come and go.  A mother knows better than to expect her child to fill the wholes in her life.  Talk about being born with a job!  I never believed I was good at a thing.  I didn't shine at all.  I just turned 30 and it has only been in the last 6 months to a year that I have discovered there are things I enjoy.  I can sew and I can write.  I am not the best at either but I enjoy both equally.  I love the release I get from writing to you all...I get out the filth and can take another step forward.  I am in love with creating things with my sewing machine!  My lifelong search for the perfect bag is coming close to an end!!  I know I have always had these abilities but without someone to point them out...I never knew they were unique to me.  I thought everyone could write.  I thought everyone could sew.  I took a Home Economics class in middle school and learned to sew there.  I figured everyone had the same ability and there was nothing that made me stand out.  I had a blue sundress as a kid.  My grandmother gave it to me.  When I grew out of the dress I knew I couldn't stand to see it passed down so I cut it up and made it into a purse.  Now, this was not a functional purse at all but I made it all by myself.  I think I would frame something like that if my Madeline ever did the same.  I didn't take that purse to my mother.  I was afraid she would get angry with me.  I actually had hid up in our attic while I sewed it.  I wanted to take a few sewing courses in high school but I didn't know I was allowed to ask.  I was actually afraid to bring up the subject with my mother.  I knew opening up a conversation about school would only end up in me being reminded what a failure I was. 

I watched "The Little Mermaid" with Madeline the other day.  (She knows all the Disney Princess' by the way;))  That movie means so much to me.  Before you laugh let me explain.  I saw that movie as a kid.  I used to wish on the many things children think they can "wish" on that I would be turned into a mermaid.  I am TOTALLY serious!  I wanted this desperately...so much that I cried over this!  I wanted to escape.  I wanted to go away where no one could find me.  Maybe the movie reminds me of how I made it through.  I found ways to day dream and escape.  We are planning a trip to Disney World in March.  I can't tell you what this means to me...well, I can!  I can't wait to introduce Maddie to Cinderella (or "Rella" as she calls her).  I can't wait to take her to dinner where Rella will come and spend a few minutes with her.  I WILL dress my daughter and son as their favorite Disney characters when we visit the Castle for that dinner.  I want it to be a time of freedom and fun...for all of us.  I think of what Disney movies mean to us and Eli.  He is not able to communicate to us.  We long to "know" him deeper.  The only way we have really been able to connect to him is through watching movies and reading books about his favorite Disney characters.  We connect there in his imagination.  It is then that we all speak the same language.  Eli will meet his favorite characters too.  Our goal by then is to be able to communicate with him but still enjoy watching him squeal over seeing Buzz Lightyear and Woody.  Maddie is really too young to remember this trip.  I am not ashamed to say that I need this trip.  I need to dress my daughter as a princess because all my life I have wanted to feel like a princess.  I have been to Disney World before but always under the shadow of my mother.  Now I go as the mother but allowing the little girl in me to run around that park unchained!!     

Strength

Eli started school last Monday.  Evan and I had a rough time letting him go.  We knew this was the first day of a long school career and Eli wasn't a baby any longer.  We've known for months the long journey Eli had ahead of him and now it was beginning. 

As Madeline has continued to reach milestones in her life it has revealed to us just how much Eli has to overcome.  It is so painful, as his mother, to not have any way to just pour the knowledge and ability into him.  Why can't I hand him something so important?  Why can't my hugs and kisses make this better? 

He cried the first day.  He didn't know where he was and I had no way to help him understand where we were going and that mommy would come back to get him.  He cried the second day too.  The third day I saw something amazing in my son.  I walked him into the room.  He looked up at me with his lip quivering.  My heart just broke.  I gave him a kiss and a hug and a high five (of course!) and Maddie and I walked out of the room.  What strength my little boy has inside of him.  He has a character just like his father.  He is quiet but just solid as a rock.  He figures it out in his head and just does what he needs to do.  Yesterday both of his teachers told me how mature Eli is compared to the other children.  They were impressed how well he uses the bathroom on his own and does what they ask him to do.  I almost cried.  Hearing Eli's diagnosis devastated us.  It ripped the rug out from under our little family.  For over a year we've just been...down.  Down and sad and mourning over the challenges Eli would face.  Finally...FINALLY...he measured up.  I know the word "measure" sounds a little cold.  I have been looking at charts and statistics of where my son should be and where he was...I have been staring at the gaps and begging to be able to just carry him across the gap and bring him to a place he deserved to be.  Here he was shining bright in every place he was able.  What strength to overcome.  I'd like to take credit but Eli gets it all.  He has a long and challenging road ahead.  Honestly, right now, I am afraid.  I am afraid he won't be able to catch up.  But in spite of my fears for his future I still hope and I trust.  I trust his teachers.  I trust the people who tell me they have seen miracles in kids like him.  I trust God to build a character of endurance in my son.  It seems impossible here at the beginning.  I don't like waiting and I don't necessarily like trusting because it takes so freaking long sometimes...but I will so my very best to do these things because my Eli can do it!

Redeeming Love Center OPENS!!!!

Hey Ladies!!  This past Saturday the Redeeming Love Center for Women opened/was dedicated in Toccoa.  I was allowed to photograph the WHOLE event.  I put the pictures online.  Here is the link:
Redeeming Love Center photos

Please take a look when you can.  It was a beautiful day!  Our theme was butterflies which symbolize new beginnings.  A special blessing came as the assistant director was singing "Better than a hallelujah" a yellow butterfly flew through the crowd then up and over the building.  The little butterfly returned throughout the day.  As I walked to me car I saw him again!  A perfect way to end an amazing day!!

I know it in my head!

I was reminded tonight that I usually need a "slap in the face" before I realize something as truth.  For example, someone said to me tonight that I have an attitude about father's, fatherhood, and anything having to do with father's in my life!  This was said to me in a loving but matter of fact way...just like I usually need.  I DO have an attitude...an angry, pissed off attitude.

God presents Himself to us as a Father.  Well, He should.  He created us and watches over us and loves us in a similar way to an earthly Father.  Jesus used parables the way publishers use pictures in books and manuals.  Pictures quite literally show or explain the truth, the process being presented in a manual.  Parables were used as mental pictures.  God bringing himself to his people in a way they could relate to and understand.  He loved them and wanted to be real to them.  Imagine then, if you will, the ones who have had no father.  There I am.  No earthly father.  I have never seen his face...not even a picture.  He held me once as a baby but I have never felt his touch to my memory.  He is a void.  An emptiness...a nothing.  He is a fantasy.  In my dreams I "see" him but I always wake up right before he would reveal his face.  All my life I have wanted with a desperation that I could sometimes feel in my chest to see my father.  I still want my father.  I still want him to come walking up my driveway...I feel so foolish but it is the truth.  I am holding out.  I am in a sort of waiting room.  I wait for this man that I don't even know to come and make it all better.  I have some sort of twisted hope that he will just come back and life will go on.  It sounds so ridiculous, I know.  I want him, I want him, I want him.  I want to be the daughter!  I want to belong to a man on this earth the way my Maddie belongs to her daddy.  I want to be my dad's little girl.  I want someone to look at me that way.  I WANT IT!!!  I can hear you all saying, "But God...".  I know I am all this to God and more.  I know what the Bible says...but the my heart doesn't speak Bible sometimes.  Father is such a stupid, dirty, ugly word to me!  Why me?  In a room full of women weeping over things their father's did to them I can still feel lower than them all because I can sit and remember that mine just walked away.  He never had a second thought.  I was waste to him...a mistake, a burden, TRASH!  He discarded me and left me for dead.  I wonder if he even knows my name.  How can I want him this much and he want me so little?  It feels like a scarlet letter.  All of you have a father but I am the bastard.  I wasn't worth a second look.  He might as well have wrapped me up in a trash bag and dumped me in the land fill. 

I can tell you that my heart knows God never left me.  I can tell you it was my father's choice to abandon me.  Somehow the latter has more weight on how much I value myself!  What a shame.  The scars my father left on me cover me entirely.  I know my wounds and my scars make up my story.  I know my life has a purpose.  I know God allows bad things to happen but He never authors it.  (Someone said that to me tonight too...what a pleasant reminder!)  Why is it so hard for me to say that God never meant for me to be fatherless.  When I think of me it is automatic to think that I am fatherless.  I have an easier time believing it was never meant to be...but it was, wasn't it?  God intends for everyone to have two parents...hence the reproductive differences of the male and female!!  He designed it this way for a purpose.  A mother cannot fulfill the role of a father and a father cannot fulfill the role of a mother.  We as human beings need both to become well rounded people.  What happens when the family is not a complete circle...DAMAGE!!  I know the damage exists in two parent families as well.  But I can only speak to what I know.  Sometimes I feel like a nomad.  Where do I belong and from where (or whom) did I come?  Man this really sucks!!  I will probably never lay eyes on my father in this life or the next.  I will never know who he is or what he looks like.  That breaks my heart.  I feel like everything has been taken from me...my mother and my father.  I feel blind sometimes at the hand of these two people.  I am a product of sin and I am lost.  I am branded the bastard and all that comes with it. 

I know I have purpose.  I know the wrongs of the past will stay in the past. My children are the first in at least 2 generations to be held by their fathers.  They will never be fatherless.  That is a victory.  I don't know what purpose my being fatherless will serve.  I don't know why God can't pick up my father where he stands now and bring him to me.  Well I guess I do know why He doesn't do that...my father would most likely walk away again.  I just don't understand.  I know that if my father were to come back I wouldn't know what to do with him.  It wouldn't make all this pain just float away.  He would be just as much a stranger to me as he is now.  Fatherhood would still be blank to me. 

I have left the spot vacant in my life.  It doesn't feel right to let another man father me.  It would feel like betrayal.  I don't want another man there...maybe I don't want anyone there at all.  Who knows??!!  I know I am afraid of what I would face if I pulled apart the strings of that "area" of my life.  It scares me to death.  It would be like crossing the desert without a map...a road to certain death!!  I don't think I have enough faith to face it all.  How can I help other people when I am such a coward??      

PMS...I hate you!!!

Women...we are made in a special way.  Passion, love, anger, laughter, etc all wrapped into a pretty "package".  The weaker sex...are not so weak!  We may not lift cars over our heads but strength comes with many disguises.  Most days of the month I would tell you I am proud I was made a woman.  I'd tell you that we get the better role because we get to carry babies and go shopping for nice things (of course those are not of equal value to me).  With the former comes a down side...one we can ungratefully thank Eve...PMS and "Aunt Flo"!  I feel that the older I get the more uncontrollable these premenstrual symptoms get.  So out of control that last month I was diagnosed with PMDD or Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder and prescribed Prozac.  PMDD is basically symptoms of PMS only much much stronger.  I described a span of about 5 days when I felt totally out of control over my emotions.  I couldn't sleep and my body was tight with tension.  When I woke up on the 6th day it was like I had slept for 24 hours.  I felt lighter, enthusiastic, and happy.  A total turn around.

A few times I have been "offered" medication for depression.  In the years after my marriage but before I began my healing process I confessed to my husband that I thought I was depressed.  After beginning the healing process I became determined to handle things on my own.  I admired people who didn't have a "hang up" about medicating themselves...or didn't let it bother them.  I couldn't admit my weakness was sometimes more that I could handle.  This is a touchy subject especially in the church.  I have heard interviews and read articles saying taking medication is ripping away trust in God and believing in God's healing power.  I have to admit, I believed that to a point.  I believe that many people suffering from psychiatric problems were once victims as children.  I am no doctor so I can only speak from my own experience.  I was functional as long as I was at home.  Once I moved out the skills I'd used to survive my mother were no longer valid.  I was lost.  Actually, the word "lost" doesn't seem to weigh enough to cover what I was going through.  I had absolutely no social skills.  I was suspicious of everyone.  I couldn't fit in anywhere.  I might get close to someone but I would run away in fear.  I was so awkward and weird.  Not being able to fit in took a toll on my already minimal self esteem.  Meanwhile I was trying to function on the outside with the leftovers of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse on the inside.  I often couldn't contain my pain and resorted to cutting myself to get some kind of relief.  I stopped after another girl was caught cutting herself.  Her parents were called and everyone knew what she had done.  My mind filled with the things that would happen to me if my mother found out I was doing the same.  I cried myself to sleep most nights...even into my marriage.  I was in a constant state of anger or rage.  I rarely laughed or smiled.  I fought with my husband constantly.  Things had to be my way or no way.  If something went wrong I lost my mind!  I'd retreat and become reclusive.  I certainly couldn't concentrate or perform in college and of course my grades suffered.  As I have said before, I felt like the Antichrist.  I am serious!  I really felt like I was going to fulfill the role of the Antichrist...I felt evil.  All of this lead me to feel like I was fooling everyone.  No one knew how truly bad I was.  It was only a matter of time.  I literally felt that at some point in my life I would end up in a psychiatric hospital...no lie!  I would hold it together as long as I possibly could but it would all end in psychosis!  I just had to hide it as long as possible.

I do believe that God can heal in an instant.  I have begged Him for healing hundreds of times but it has never come in an instant.  I was begging God for the easy way out.  If God had given me the easy way out I would no doubt find myself in trouble again lacking the wisdom I would have learned from overcoming the past.  Like a good parent, God wanted what was best for me now so I can thrive in the future.  I have been in this journey for 6 years now.  I have come a long long way in 6 years but as most of us know this is a life long process.  Scars fade but they never really disappear.  I will fight this until I die...but that is okay.  I wonder if my next battle is again with the emotional scars.  I have never taken up the offers for depression medication.  I think it was fear that kept me away from the help they might offer.  I was afraid of addiction...I was afraid of not being myself...I was afraid my husband would love the wife on medication more than the wife I really was.  Who could blame him?

Then, a few months ago, I was overcome with the symptoms I described above.  I thank the Lord I never got physical with my kids, but I raised my voice (okay, I YELLED a lot!).  I wasn't able to enjoy them or anything really.  I found myself in tears at not being in control over my own emotions...my own body.  I never wanted to take medication.  I never wanted to admit it had all become to much to bare.  I know the things that were done to me so I know that it is in me to do the same to my children.  That I CANNOT bare.  It takes a lot out of me to admit I can't control "it" on my own.  I look 20 years down the road.  What will matter more; that my children are happy and functioning adults or that I had to take a few pills every month to help things not get out of hand?  Ugh, it is a daily choice sometimes.  If I know that I am feeling the "symptoms" do I choose something I think shows weakness in me (a pill) or do I forsake all stigma and choose my children over it all?  I choose my children.  I will always ultimately choose my children.               

The best advice

I read this in a story about billionaire, Warren Buffett, today.  No doubt the journalist was hoping for some stock market key to a quick fortune when she asked him what was the best advice he ever received...but that isn't what she was given.   Buffet recounts the best advice he's ever received, "The power of unconditional love. I mean, there is no power on earth like unconditional love. And I think that if you offered that to your child, I mean you’re 90 percent of the way home. There may be days when you don’t feel like it, it’s not uncritical love, that’s a different animal, but to know you can always come back, that is huge in life. That takes you a long, long way. And I would say that every parent out there that can extend that to their child at an early age, it’s going to make for a better human being."  WOW!!!  This from a man who can give his kids ANYTHING they ever had a small want for but he would rather enrich them with love.  he would rather build their character than their collection of toys. 

Buffet comments that his own father loved him unconditionally.  I understand (I mean a seriously bitter understanding) that being shown a love like this makes it a HELL of a lot easier to give it away.  We know that Jesus allowed Himself to be beaten and nailed to a cross because He would rather Himself die than any of us...we can know that but do you ever wish you could have seen Jesus?  I do!!  I WISH I could have been one of those children running to sit as close as I could to Jesus.  I WISH I could have felt His Fatherly touch on my face.  I know, I know I can return to be "like a child" but don't say it to me!  I can NEVER get a second chance to be a little girl!  I can never go back and live a safe childhood.  It just wasn't meant to be.  Some would call me a "doubting Thomas" because I want to SEE Jesus.  Don't worry, I'd rather speak my own truth than stand behind what I am "supposed" to do.  I want to see Jesus.  I want him to sit next to me and tell me what the truth is..I want him to be visible to my eyes...I want a picture to put in a frame to remind me of my good friend J.C.!!!  But do I really want that?  *sigh*No, not really.  I mean, wouldn't putting Jesus in a frame somehow put a limit on Him?  If I could touch him...wouldn't I eventually forget?  If I could sit with him...wouldn't I eventually have to look away or say goodbye?  Wouldn't that put an end to my faith?  I mean isn't it my drive in life to do the best I possibly can so that I can die (in God's time...I am not suicidal!!) and LOOK out and see JESUS??? 

My past is what it is.  As I have said before I wouldn't change it (I couldn't anyway...even though I've tried!).  Would I be sitting here right now typing out these words if I was loved as a child?  Nope!  Would I even be able to hold company with those of you that read this?  I could but it would not be the intimacy we share.  So, I am good.  I will take what I have and keep pressing on...bound to fail again and again...but get up, brush myself off and hope no one saw!!  But seriously, I too wish I could pave the way in life for my children.  I wish I could be perfection for them.  I wish I was a billionaire so they would want for nothing.  I KNOW I try to make up for my low self esteem as a mother when I buy my kids things they don't really need.  Truth is, they forget about those things within a millisecond of receiving them...and then I am left to "prove" my worth again.  Prove it to whom?  They don't understand what I am doing!  Will a pretty doll make Maddies "owie" go away next time?  Not at all...but mommy's kiss will.  Will Eli's new Buzz Lightyear shirt comfort him when he wakes up in the middle of the night?  Nope, but mommy's hugs will.  Bottom line, my kids know where to run when they are hurt or scared.  They can't run to me when they are 30 and fall off of something (Eli will most likely still be climbing things when he is that age!)!  But they will know it is safe to cry, it is safe to be angry, it is safe to go to someone you love...and a whole bunch of other things I cannot understand as the messed up person I am (lol!).  Love will fill the holes.  God promises us this...I don't often see how love can bypass my craziness but...I have to believe the God who let his own son leave home knowing the only way he'd see him again was after his son had died a gruesome death JUST so God could usher me into heaven someday.  I can't wake up in the morning and think if I hug and kiss my kids that I no longer have to sort through the crap I wade in from the past.  THAT would not be love.  I am saying that I will fail.  I will lose my temper.  I will (and do) raise my voice.  If I have laid a foundation of love...and prove it again and again, love will cover the mistakes and my kids will be whole human beings.  On that day mom will take a looooooong nap!  Unconditional love is exhausting and a little messy!!

High treason

We had an interesting discussion in small groups today at church.  Someone remarked how they thought it odd or uncomfortable that people would stand up (unprovoked) during a patriotic song but might not do the same during a song that spoke about our heavenly citizenship.  Where or how do we separate patriotism from being "of the world"?  Someone even mentioned that they believed the country was indeed NOT founded on biblical principles.  Which sparked a debate.  Not to mention one man's feeling awkward at saying the pledge of allegiance in church.  I thought about this to myself (although the history teacher in me was SCREAMING to be heard!!).  I thought of the very fact of our debating over such things about our country INSIDE of a church...the irony was too much.  You have to take all this in from a historical perspective.  We get hot under the collar and yell at each other over religion and patriotism because we are spoiled.  Very few places in the world will allow such outspokenness...often speaking out will land you in jail or worse.  Opinions are not as tolerated as they are on our soil.  Two hundred and thirty five years ago our country was born.  It was not a joyous occasion for all.  We didn't get swaddled and kissed by "mommy".  We were born out of rebellion...we could be considered a "bastard child" if you will.  Meeting in Independence Hall (as it is now known) was treason...not to mention drafting and then SIGNING the Declaration of Independence!  Imagine if your own child wrote you a letter basically saying they were moving out and emancipating themselves because they didn't like the way you and dad spent the income!  Yes, the colonies were the epitome of the unruly child.  But there is a beauty in that.  I myself am the mother of a strong willed child.  It is a rough place to be but I can see past the tantrums and high pitched screams...her spirit.  As a child, Madeline cannot control her desire for what she wants...she has no boundaries or self control.  She doesn't give up easily...hence the 7 minute screaming fits!!  What passion that will turn into!!  How safe those whom she will love will be in her arms.  She will fight for what she knows is right...stubbornness isn't always bad.  My girl is just like me!  The colonists had their reasons for their "rebellious streak".  The men who signed the declaration faced torture and death if they had lost the war.  They had passion and they were stubborn!  What if they had not been this way?  We'd be sitting in a Catholic Church guarding what we said against the Queen!  This was one tantrum I am thankful for.  Is not the woman (or man) who seeks healing from his past not in rebellion too?  She dares to question the "way it has always been".  She dares face pain and past in the face...not always winning the battle but winning the war.  Is she not brave and courageous??  Does she not face a giant demanding it release her?

I had to laugh when the comment was made that our country was not founded on biblical principles.  Not all the framers of the constitution were considered (or considered themselves) Christians.  A large majority of they didn't live the lives of what we would consider "Christian".  George Washington himself had slaves and even "bought" (sure he did) these slaves teeth to create on of his infamous dentures.  He did not value all life as equal.  He did believe that God had saved him from death many times throughout his lifetime so that he could lead this newly formed nation.  Otherwise, he would have turned down the Presidency.  Bottom line, our founding fathers were just as flawed as we are today.  Society was more accepting of the bible and the state (government) being intermingled or unseperated from religion.  It was all that any man had known.  To question that...well, there wasn't much of a question.  Besides, even the non-christian could see the value in "biblical" principles.  Do not steal, do not murder, etc.  We also have to remember the "attitude" on slavery.  White men believed that God had nothing against slavery.  Although, the doubt was already present with some.  White men simply believed the African was below him.  He had been taught this by his father and he would teach this to his son.  Women were also inferior because that is just the way it was.  We know that this is NOT the way God felt.  We KNOW God created us all and we are all equal in his sight.  We also know the horrendous events that transpired because of this "belief" among early Americans.  I don't excuse slavery.  To lord over another human being is evil.  But to say that our country was not founded on Biblical principles is not true.  We cannot blame John Adams for abortion laws of today.  Get real people!  There wouldn't be so many amendments to the constitution if the men who wrote it were without sin or sinful attitudes.  Our country grows and it changes.  The Constitution is a foundation.  I admire the rebellious people who stood up to King George!  These men were not perfect.  Some made HUGE mistakes.  But why would I expect them to be perfect.  Only Jesus was without sin.  Jesus is set apart.  I am an American.  I am proud to live here and (most of the time) there is no where else I would rather be.  I will not be here forever.  Someday I will die and go to my real home.  I do not worship or have a worship attitude when I sing "America the Beautiful".  I know that the pledge of allegiance was originally propaganda meant to drill "allegiance" into the children of a new nation.  If I keep an attitude of Heaven as my HOME this does not bother me.  There is history all around me.  To forget the past condemns us to repeat it's mistakes.  We ALL know that all too well.  I remember the times my mother beat me, spat on me, or said she hated me...I remember them clear as day.  Do they spark me into hate, sometimes.  Do they make me mad, sometimes.  Do they keep me in sadness, NO!  I see how far I have come.  I see the future when I watch my daughter walk down the isle knowing I did the very best I could and she is a whole woman!  I get courage from the past.  I face my daily healing and my future with bravery.  I fail.  I fail BIG TIME!  But the war will be won.  Every battle gives me strength and wisdom for the next.  I am in rebellion too.  I rebel against the cycle of abuse for generations past.  I rebel against beating and hating my own children as I was taught to do.  I rebel against my mother and have lost because of it.  Rebellion is not beautiful...often painful and bloody but I will not give up.  Founding fathers, however flawed, had a GREAT idea!  Happy 4th of July everyone.  See you around our this land till we all go HOME!!! 

Swallow hard

I often have times where I wish life were like a fairytale. I mean a serious fairytale. The princess is born the most beautiful little girl in all the land. Her mother is kind and her father is strong but wrapped around the heart of his little princess. He watches her grow and fights the pain of letting her go when the handsome prince comes and asks her to marry him. She (of course) makes an amazing bride with a killer sparkling gown. She is strong and confident like her mother and kind hearted like her father. She marries and has beautiful and perfect children. She never gets fat and wrinkles are reserved for the witch. Her husband adores her and her children seem to see a halo whenever they look at her. Other women in the land see her as something to become. Her humility and kindness keep her ego in check. She instructs her children in the lessons of love and good character, just like her mother did. She grows old gracefully and dies in her sleep.

I "wake" up to the sounds of my kids fighting or the television with a rush of guilt that overwhelms me because they know more about Elmo than any other subject! Life is no fairytale...it isn't even a sitcom. People get stretch marks, wrinkles corrupt the youth you can hardly remember...mommy's and daddy's don't always love their children and sometimes they don't even stay around. The "princess" is not always the center of her family always encouraging the right thing or what is honorable.

I always wonder how someone becomes one of those women...or better yet one of those moms. You know the ones. The moms that believe in their children when they want to become a rock star...an astronaut...or the first monkey to swim across the Atlantic. The moms who inspire their kids as if they and June Clever were directly related. Who's knowledge of wisdom and truth seems to be whispered in her ear directly from the lips of god...she always has the right answer. The moms who work 40+ hours a week and still manage to go to the gym, make dinner, and read to their kids...what space-time continuum have they plugged into??? The ones who's kids grow into loving human beings that feed the poor and give back to God. There is your fairytale!! How does a mother love her children just right and keep the extended family happy...how does she keep everything existing in harmony so that even she is content and at peace???

I know all of you are hitting your reply button right about now but let me continue.

First of all, a woman in a fairytale never seems to face a challenge. I can imagine her mind would be goo by the time she has raised her children after having everything handed to her her whole life. She would never struggle and she would never be wrong...sounds good some days but in the end she'd be a mindless and bored woman. She would not have many chances to call on God either.

Still, I wonder what my life would look like if I had been raised like a princess. I often see ad's with children dressed in bright clothes playing in fields of flowers. The sun is out and the weather is perfect. They are smiling and laughing. Mom and dad hold hands nearby. I guess that is what I envision when I picture a safe and loving childhood. Then there is me...I had a field too. I am surrounded by garbage, naked...and it is dark. I hardly notice I am missing my shoes as my face is expressionless. I am alone. I know it sounds like I have hit the bottom again...not so. I just get overwhelmed sometimes at having to learn how to be human because no one taught me how. This Sunday was father's day (you all knew this was coming, didn't you, lol!). It wasn't my worst one, so that was good. I can never seem to let a Father's Day go by without trying to picture my father's face. I can't seem to help it. I will always wonder I guess. My mother could always picture him when something I did or had resembled his...damn how I wished I could rip that picture from her brain!!! It seemed like she stole even his appearance from me. How can one day on the calender make me feel such bitterness and loss...loss as wide as North America. One day of remembrance can reduce me to a nothing again. I might as well be missing the right side of my body if I am expected to maneuver this world without instruction or a physical father. I go to bed and wake up the next day and life goes on. The loss is milder and even put off for another year. I fought back tears more than once Sunday...I just didn't feel like feeling like a fool spending time in this AGAIN!!!

That is not where my father's day ended. In response to my last blog, the lady who I affectionately call my "therapist" asked to meet with me. Oy, do I shutter when she asks me to "meet with her". I know there is something I have done that speaks my damage and there is a way (a way that is often more painful than just keeping going in my damage) to correct it. I know it is best to listen but it just seems easier not to. Long story short (because the details are not quite clear to me just yet...another book to read and study) it is actually unhealthy to keep Eli's grandparents out of what is going on in his life. I HATE WRITING THAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Eli will never get a chance to bond with his family and will at some point in his life feel that he is the reason he has no relationship with these people (followed by a gulp and guilty feelings). My reaction to what has been said about me/Eli is to react in anger and suspicion towards the family. (I AM STILL VERY ANGRY AND VERY SUSPICIOUS!!) Thinking I know what will happen or what will be said if we communicate Eli's issues is a bit ridiculous. Honestly it makes me feel out of control! I don't trust them! How can I offer up one of the people most precious to me....without knowing how to keep him safe?? I am scared. What if they judge me as harshly as I judge myself? What if they find out I am as bad a mom as I think I am? Will they keep comparing Eli to the other kids? What if they think our finally telling all of this excuses them from our reasons not to tell? Evan promised to speak up if anyone treats Eli as if her were retarded. Ugh, now I have to trust my husband!!

I also realized I had probably isolated Evan from his parents. I had asked him not to disclose some things which hurt their communication. Seems as if I have taken on the role of the evil witch in the fairytale. How does this happen? How do the decisions I make feel like the best and turn out to cause trouble? How can my heart be so warped from the truth?

PLUS, turns out I may have suffocated and killed my need for mothering when Diane chose Angie over me. Don't you just love a heaping helping of another problem on top of the huge plate of crap you have already served yourself??? BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! Boo to having to be in relationships! Boo to the possibility of getting hurt again! Boo to the chance I will be overlooked again! Boo to my mother (followed by a punch in the face and a kick to the knee) who should have done all the good mothering in the first place...may you and I never meet in a dark alley!!

Deception and Humiliation

I was able to teach the fifth grade girls during VBS last week. It was a really great week with an age group that I enjoy. A few people asked me why I would volunteer to teach the fifth graders...I was just glad they weren't the second graders!

On the fourth day the girls and boys groups met for a relay game. The girls won by a landslide. We left the gym to walk around the building and wait in line to go inside for a snack. The boys group met up behind the girls. Their leader (a man) told them they should hold the door for the girls...the boys did so and then I saw and heard something that felt like the equivalent of shattering glass! The girls started putting the boys down and saying "Nah nah nah we won!" My mouth must have dropped and I told them to stop and we don't treat people like that! I wondered (but not for long) where they would be taught to react to respect by passing on humiliation. I know it takes a lot to motivate boys and girls of a certain age. For lack of better techniques we put boys against girls and drive them to "beat" the other. Whichever team wins is the better sex. YIKES!!! Then we expect boys to graciously hold open doors and girls to know how to receive such a gesture...HOW??? We set them up...we deceive them (even if we don't realize it) and then get "ashamed" or even impatient when they can't act t he way we'd want.

The next day in VBS we were listing ways we can honor God. In Philippians 4:4-9 we even find a sort of checklist on how to double check if what we are doing honors God. We came to "whatever is lovely" and I asked them what "lovely" meant. No one knew and I reminded them of what I had witnessed the day before. I told them that was not lovely! Lovely isn't putting on a new dress or pretty shoes...it isn't a good hair day or the right shade of eye shadow. Lovely was how they should have received the boys sign of respect. No law tells a man he should hold a door open. Men don't do that because they think women are weak. They do it simply because they respect women...they admire women. Their mothers are women...mother's who changed their dirty diapers, who held them when they cried (a man's most vulnerable state) and didn't bring him shame, men have many reasons to respect a woman. He admires the tenderness in her and wishes to bring it out as he holds the door for her or helps her with her heavy bags. Men don't always know how to be tender in an emotional way...they work with their hands (as God intended) and thus show tenderness, love, appreciation, etc with their hands or their actions. A women who sees this or understands this when a man holds the door for her feels appreciated and her head may swell with something similar to self esteem. She feels lovely and thanks him out of being lovely... I cannot pass by a man or boy of any age who holds a door for me...I want to thank him for seeing me as lovely. My Eli has even picked up on this from his daddy. He often holds the door open for Maddie and I and shuts it when we are out...he may just like to slam the door but we focus on the act, lol! I don't know if all this registered with fifth grade girls but you never know.

I read a very interesting article today. Jessica Stern interviews violent men/terrorists worldwide. Her fearlessness stems from a childhood rape when a man broke into her home and repeatedly raped she and her sister while the other watched. She says in the article that, "something got cut out of me...my capacity for pain and fear was removed". She says she remained "comfortably numb" which allowed her to confront dangerous men without feeling afraid. Her rapist ended up committing suicide after serving in prison for other rapes. She spoke with people who had known him, in her own search for closure, and learned of the possibility of her rapist having been sexually molested as a child. She states the belief that humiliation might play a role in a man/boy becoming a terrorist (we all know terrorist here can mean real terrorists and the men who sneak into young children's bedrooms at night). In her interviews the word "humiliation" comes up all the time. She reports that in Afghanistan there is something called "man loving day" every Thursday. On these days warlords rape boys and spend Friday in prayer that forgives them of these sins. Can you imagine the anger, the HUMILIATION suffered by those young boys. It is safe to assume these boys grow up to replace the men who rape them and the cycle continues meanwhile millions die as a result of terrorism. I was shocked and horrified. There is still the element of "choice" to terrorize another person or persons...but what a huge thing to overcome when it is part of your culture...unbelievable. Certainly answers many questions as to why this world is so messed up. Broken people outnumber the loving ones...and the cycle continues!!

A long time...

Yikes, I thought the summer months would bring more time/chances to blog but that hasn't happened.

I realized that I hadn't updated you all on Eli and this journey we find ourselves on with him. After his ear tube surgery he was evaluated again by a special education teacher that I was referred to by one of the speech teachers in the school district. it took about 2 hours but this teacher and about 3 other assistants did numerous "tests' on Eli. For example, they asked him to stack blocks and jump up and down. They asked me pages and pages of questions for information all the way back to my labor and delivery of Eli! I went back a week later to hear the results of their findings. Eli is severely developmentally delayed and speech impaired due to hearing loss. Because of these things they were able to develop an IEP (Individualized Education Plan). What this is is a "list" of specific needs and adaptions Eli will need to be able to learn in a classroom and to catch up to other kids his age. They determined that Eli's communication skills are equivalent to an 18-24 month old. A child's communication skills are directly related to their emotional abilities and problem solving skills, etc. Not only was Eli underachieving in the area of communication but his delay has effected his ability to interact with his peers and "solve problems". He never had the chance to "learn" what things mean or what they do because he could not hear us communicating to him...well, actually, Eli has never hit the "Why mommy" and "What is that?" stage. Starting the end of August Eli will attend the special education preschool held in the Head Start building in town. He will have a regular or special ed teacher and also a speech therapist. He enjoyed being in the classroom during the two visits we made. I have no doubts he will adjust well. I fear the road ahead for him. I fear the long term effects of his hearing loss. I fear the struggle he will face to learn simple things. Thank the Lord Eli and I are separate people.

We all know the dangerous stigma attached to "special education" or "special needs" labels. I am REALLY struggling with this! We are yet again faced with the decision of how much information to tell Evan's family. In light of things that have happened in the last year there is a real trust issue...mostly from me. My fear is that people will lower the "bar of expectation" or even hope for Eli and his future. Evan is concerned that people in the family will begin to "talk down" to Eli after they are told he has "special needs". Evan wants to tell the family because of a recent conversation with Evan's mom and dad. Evan's dad started talking down to Eli as if he and Madeline were the same age. He'd ask, "Eli where is your nose?". Evan later asked me if I noticed that and if it bothered me. I really hadn't noticed. Eli is not a person who will sit and chatter with you (speech delay or not) like Madeline will. Eli is a touchy-feely kid and he wants to relate with you by playing on the floor with you or having you read him a book. Eli's grandparents see him once maybe twice a year so they don't know him in that way. I dismissed Evan's dad's ridiculous questions to Eli because Eli was ignoring him anyway. It bothered Evan though. He wanted to tell his father that he could talk to Eli like a normal kid. I reminded Evan that his father did not know the whole situation so we couldn't judge him too harshly. This sparked a 2 hour discussion on should we/shouldn't we tell them.

Again the trust issue comes up with me. I can handle or process the things the Warden's say or do to me. I know I can be unreasonable at times so I deal with it! I just don't know if I can "hold back" when it comes to things being said or done to my children. There was a suggestion last Christmas that Evan and I were not doing anything to help Eli along with his speech...this sparked a TOTAL pulling away by me! I just felt like "you get one chance and one chance only with guarding the hearts of my babies" and that was it...enter mama bear!! This was before we learned of Eli's hearing loss. I was SO thankful we had taken the road of silence concerning Eli. I had and still have a whole load of guilt over that. Mom's are just supposed to know when something is wrong...and I didn't catch it...I didn't save my baby. I was able to separate my guilt from what Eli needed from me at each interval of his journey...thank the Lord for that! My feeling guilty is mine...it is even moved into grieving in a way. All summed up it is a process. A small scale process in the shadow of other things in my life, but a learning and growing process just the same. I hope to come out on the other side a wiser, less self critical mom! I have learned that grieving in public is a painful mistake no matter what family you were born or married into. The ladies reading these words are my grieving party. A soft place to land and to be patched up. Women who can look at my grief with wisdom and know there are infinite paths to arrive at God's feet and receive His Truth in Love!! You also know this process takes TIME! When I say public grief is a mistake I am reminded of the lack of patience we find with people who can't seem to remember love or compassion when they see someone in pain. I don't always remember these things when I come face to face with someone still in the "shoes I used to wear". I think I know what they need because it worked for me...stop there!!!...just LOVE!!! Love lays the bricks in the path to healing!!

Anyway, Evan and I have not come to a mutual decision concerning Eli and whether we should tell family. I feel like I am throwing him in the deep end...by having to trust that he won't be hurt by words or action of people who aren't always sensitive. We don't know if this problem will have long term effects on Eli. If we tell them now aren't we obligated to continue to inform them on his progress...even when he fails? In me aggressive need for control I know that I will not be able to control what is said about Eli and even who hears. I feel like Eli will stick out like a sore thumb in a family where no one else has "special needs". Evan and I succeed in treating Eli equally at home...but will he find this thoughtfulness everywhere else? Will some people choose to ignore him because "he doesn't understand anyway"? Will Eli's parents be able to control their anger when they see him being treated like he was "stupid"????? What would you all do?