As my husband and I face the fact that we need a serious budget and we have decided to use Dave Ramsey's material I am faced with some hidden scars. Scars that I have let control our finances and my spending. We are certainly not living in poverty but are not well-to-do. We find ourselves somewhere on the far side of comfortable. As my husband has been pushing this whole budget stuff I have begun to realize the deep hole I have dug. I am one of those emotional spenders. Much like a person who eats their emotions...I am one who enjoys "retail therapy". In the 7 years now that I have had to face my past and cut my mother out, etc. I must have been filling the loss up with what was taken...mainly just things most people enjoy. "Take that you evil, greedy B**CH!". But to make up for "lost time" I went overboard!! My mother didn't spend money on me. If she did HAVE to she did it begrudgingly and poured out guilt all over what was purchased. To this day, when I purchase something for myself it has guilt woven into it. I wear it (or use it) with this guilt "defect" running through it because it is all that I deserve. It almost feels like a lie. "You think I look nice but you don't know the truth...I don't deserve to look nice or have nice things." In these 3 years or so we have been in our struggle with Eli I have been so angry that I cannot control what is happening to my son. How does a mommy out of control ease her child's pain? She buys him a toy after every doctors appointment...and there have been so many. I couldn't face the truth so I soothed both of us with a toy. I fought the invisable foe with my credit card and it felt good!!! "Take that you friggin autism, speech delay, severe developmental delay...or whatever you are!!!". I needed to see some joy on my son's face after his turmoil. That in itself isn't always so bad, I know, but there is just a point when it is literally too much. Now, I have to fess up and come clean about the mess I have made. I have to stand in front of my husband one more time and make a painful confession. That man deserves many mansions, I am telling you!!! As I prepare for a very pain filled confession I am reminded of the many times I have felt the weight of facing truth throughout this journey. Right now I feel that familiar weight in my chest as if this time it will kill me. This time it is too much. I remember standing outside the home where we had our group counseling sessions (Cindy's) and begging myself to just get back in the car and drive away. What waited in that house was sure pain...it was as if I were going to be stripped naked in a room full of people. It was as if the tears would sting and all the bruises from my mother would be felt all at the same time. But I always went back. Of course I drove away a few times...but I went back. I believed that the battle was the gateway to being rid of all that S**T!!! I was promised that this journey was the way. I was promised that there was a different Ashley on the other side of the dark swamp. It was the hardest time in my life. Facing the truth made the time being my mother's victim seem easy. Continuing to live as a victim even after she was long gone would have been easier than walking through the threshold of that house. The times I went were out of obedience...simply knowing that was the right thing to do. I didn't like it but it was better than feeling guilt over not going. It took so long but each time I went...each time I faced even small truth, I chipped away the crusty shell my mother, my father, and any other person had poured out over me. I "kicked it in the crotch", if you will. And here I am! This debt crap is certainly not the highest mountain I have ever climbed. If my husband can find forgiveness (and it may take some time), the sting of the truth will soon fade.
After my last post I got so many emails from you all. Ha ha, it is as if you all know that I obsessively check email to see your validation which always comes from my faithful! Anyway, I knew it would touch you as women because AS women we all seem to deal with the weight issue. Some of us it is a choice...some of us it was not so much. For some of us weight is our dark swamp...a journey through "fire" to clean up the mess someone else made for us. And in every swamp there are hidden dangers. As we tackle the surface the hidden dangers (the forgotten memories...the painful triggers) threaten us...to the very core. We feel the threats, the pain, the truth in our bones. To those of you in that very swamp...I love you. It isn't fair...but it still is... If only my soul could be as beautiful as yours. Your body is only temporary in this life...(or maybe not;-)) For you my heart is tender and my soul cries out for you as you tackle your swampy future. I don't care what that person looks like on the outside because on the inside she is healed...she is clean...she is redeemed!!! There IS a promise of a different you at the other end...take that to the bank. And as for those that have or will threaten your life...give them a good kick in the "you know what's". It will sting and you will cry, curse, etc. but it is now you and God...those other jerks are just dust. You know what threshold you need to walk through...sweetie, that is half the battle!!
I am so thankful for music, once again. I am refreshed whenever an artist can produce a song that can remind me of where I have come and make me thankful I am not there any longer. I was telling a friend a few weeks ago that I feel like there are two kinds of faith. Faith that some have breeded into them. Faith that is as much a part of them as their arms or legs. They think faith and cannot part from it...it is their firm foundation. There are those of us who have to break down the lies and build up a firm foundation often through some kind of recovery. Things in this life threaten us and we have a choice...we may not have Truth as our first reaction. We can fall back to the lies (easy) or we can choose (sometimes painfully) to "have faith" and remember what happened the last time we had to make such a choice. No faith is better than the other...no faith is rewarded more. Both carry us to an eternity with our Father. An eternity without being fatherless...oh, God, yes please!!! Anyway, I always sort of resented when people said that Jesus cried with me all those years. It kind of pissed me off to think of Jesus crying when I was being molested...um, INTERVENE!!!! As a parent I can understand a little more. There are things that happen to our children that cannot be helped. Sometimes it was our choice or even an other's choice and to intervene would make a mess. I wonder what makes God weep more...when we are being molested or knowing this is what will bring us to His arms eventually? Or which tears at Him more...love for the victim or love for the perpetrator? God loved my mother and still does. God loved my step father and still does. That is okay with me...today anyway;-) ...Oh, the song, right! I heard this song and it made me realize that thinking of Jesus crying isn't that He isn't intervening...love, true love, opens us to pain and joy...often at the same time. Maybe Jesus cries because he cannot send lightening bolts!!! Maybe Jesus cries about the day we will lay that very moment at His feet.
Weeps For You by Jonny Diaz
She's sitting in the pew on Sunday morning
Praying what the pastor says can change her broken life
And the rain outside has really started pouring
But the darkest clouds of all are the ones she feels inside
She looks up at Jesus carved in stained glass
And her heart feels as heavy as the sky
She wonders if he hears her desperate prayers
And is that rain or are those tears he's crying
Did you know that He weeps for you
Cause he knows what you're going through
Even when you feel lost and scared
He promises that he'll still be there
Did you know his heart breaks for you
and there is one thing that's always true
that in your worst of times you'll never cry alone
Did you know he weeps for you
He's sitting in the waiting room at St. Jude's
Holding his wife's hand and what little hope that's left
But when the doctor enters in his head is shaking
He says I am so sorry... but we tried our very best
Out of the corner of his eye he sees a painting
Of Jesus cradling a baby lamb
And he can see as he looks through his own tears
That the savior is now crying along with him
Did you know that He weeps for you
Cause he knows what you're going through
Even when you feel lost and scared
He promises that he'll still be there
Did you know his heart breaks for you
and there is one thing that's always true
that in your worst of times you'll never cry alone
Did you know he weeps for you
He never did promise that it would be easy
There are bumps in the road, no matter where you go
But he went before us..so we don't have to go alone
Did you know that He weeps for you
Cause he knows what you're going through
Even when you feel lost and scared
He promises that he'll still be there
Did you know his heart breaks for you
and there is one thing that's always true
that in your worst of times you'll never cry alone
Did you know he weeps for you
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