Do Not Disturb

A few months ago while visiting a friend and her baby girl, I was talking to her about how hard it is to be a "mom" on my days when I am at home.  I told her how the phone was constantly ringing or dinging and a slew of emails trickled in while texts and calls were almost always coming through on the day my clients knew I was supposed to be at home.  I was discussing that being "part time" is not really part time, it's full time, in part time hours while trying to play mommy.  It was making lunches and returning phone calls, and playing at the park while rescheduling a late cancellation.  And very simply she looked at me and said, "every since I had her, I just started leaving my phone on do not disturb, then I answer any call I have whenever it works for us"....  My friend wasn't back to work yet, but discussed how the struggle to nurse and get a stream of text messages was a barrier to relaxing and just enjoying time with her daughter.  DO NOT DISTURB... I thought about it... I never set that boundary... except maybe while I sleep.

It took me awhile to adopt this concept.  Giving permission for myself and my daughter to go on do not disturb was a harder concept than I thought.  "Unplugging" so to speak is not necessarily a new concept, but one that I struggle with.  I feel a responsibility to be "on call", yet it's not a service I advertise as an out-patient therapist nor ones I think my clients expect.  The stream of emails that come throughout the day usually went to the trash folder and rarely did they need an immediate response. 

I had gotten used to my life interrupted.  Constantly.  And each ding or ring was becoming a slew of stressors so that I never was really "off" work.  I sat in session with my phone on silent but vibrate and could feel the texts and calls and emails.  I had some sessions where strands of things were happening and my mind felt pulled in two directions.  Oh no, is something wrong?  Someone at home need me?  Usually, it was nothing.  A random couple texts with no immediate response required, but I was racing to find out what was going on.  And my heart was racing, my mind, and energy.

Part of my summer has been trying to redefine balance.  I have started to put myself back on do not disturb for a period of time.  Sometimes a whole afternoon.  It's so freeing to just think and finish thoughts and activities.  I am more alert, less distracted and more willing to respond in an appropriate way when I choose to read the messages rather than have them thrown at me.  I find I miss less texts and am better and responding and not just reading them. 

But there's those days I think I can do it all.  Last Wednesday while trying to enjoy my day at home with little nugget, a lot was going on in the office, and I didn't choose "do not disturb".  I took every text and checked my email about 20 times before work.  I kept feeling stressed that this client kept saying more and more and more.  I felt obligated to respond to everything.  By the time it was time to go to work, I was burnt out, tired, and stressed.  I was irritable and had no energy.  I had skipped my workout for the day and tried to take a nap which was, you guessed it, interrupted by more alerts.  And I walked out the door after a bad exchange and I thought to myself, "why did I do this to myself?" 

Today, the dentist told me I will need to come back in to have a mouth guard fitted for sleep.  I am so stressed at night I am clinching my jaw shut and now my teeth are being damaged.  She looked me in the eyes and said, "you know what causes this right? It's stress."  I laughed it off blaming that who isn't stressed with a two year old, but I knew what she meant.  I catch myself doing it.  All the muscles in my body have times where I hold them, lock them, tense them and then I realize I am so sore.  So I put my phone back on do not disturb once I got into the car.  I turned off the noise today, made sure I worked out, ate right, logged my food.  I have lost a good chunk of weight in last 6 weeks, but I stop working the plan when stress hits me.  It consumes my energy and then I have nothing left to give.  My email and unread texts are clear but so is my gas tank. 

It's hard to be a mom, a house keeper, a wife, a therapist, a business owner, a chef, and a secretary, but I am finding the more I selfishly protect my time that's meant for rest and care, my self care time, the more I give a better me when I "go to work".  My client's still get a same day response, just not a same minute response.  My emails still get cleared out to 0 every day, just not 30x's a day.  It's a discipline to close the door and retreat.  It's a discipline to simplify and say no, but the energy I save in return is so worth it.  I am reading "Simplify" by Bill Hybels, and I hope to continue to find more moments where I can take good advice and integrate it into my soul.  I think it will make me better when I chose to be on.  I think I needed to process this concept, silently, as not doing it is causing me damage.  You don't get new teeth...  So I guess if you don't hear from me, I am probably playing, cooking, mothering, or working.  Don't worry, I will get back to you, just give me some space... do not disturb...

The 21 Day Fix?

Two weeks ago, I got a large box in the mail that I ordered myself for my 30th birthday.  I bought myself a weight loss program called the 21 Day Fix.  Thanks to my friend (and now Beach Body Coach), I admitted to myself that I wasn't at the weight I wanted.  Still carrying 10 pounds from last years miscarriage, I decided to invest my birthday money into this plan.  It seems simple, several tupperwares with cute color coding, a chocolate shake with pretty much every vitamin under the sun (several fruits and veggies from foreign countries that who knows if they are real or not), and a pack of crazy DVD's for workout with super ripped people on the cover.  I read the 50 page manual, watched some videos, subscribed to the online group doing "THE CHALLENGE" and was psyched.  A plan for me to commit to so that I could start new habits and lose those pesky pounds I gained grieving last year. 

That is until a week later, I realized my period was late.  I  bought a pregnancy test on my lunch break and then next thing I know, a positive symbol shows up in the window.  OMG... I'm Pregnant...  After a year of trying to get pregnant, I was in bliss, and that stupid package I ordered for my birthday was just going to become a cute pile of color coded tupperwares on my counter top that would remind me what I "should" be eating.  Pregnancy for me last time was 14 weeks of nausea followed by 23 weeks of binge eating until I met our daughter.  58 pounds later, I was a different woman in many ways.  And while I didn't want to repeat my pregnancy with baby K, I was just so happy that I almost unsubscribed myself to the challenge.  I was going to "do it" but I was just going to skate through it and see if I could just maintain weight and eat better.  I felt like after over a year of trying and a miscarriage, I deserved a little bit of celebration in between the bouts of nausea. 

Then on our way to fourth of July plans, I realized something was wrong.  I called the doctor to explain some unforeseen bleeding.  She sent me to the ER.  Besides my endometriosis, I have a negative blood type and my husband's is positive, so we combined have a conditioned called RH Factor.  After the first pregnancy, every pregnancy after could be subjected to these antibodies that see the fetus as a bad thing, try to attack it, starve it out, etc.  You can get an injection that lasts for 12 weeks that protect the baby using synthetic antibodies (or something like that).  Three hours at the ER, I walked home with lab work stating that my HCG levels plummeted back down to 6.  What was a positive blue line four days prior, was almost baseline and no longer a viable pregnancy.  Another miscarriage right after my 30th birthday.  Follow up?  I can barely find the energy to go back into the doctor's office to talk about my incompetent uterus and other lady parts.  It all happened so fast, here one day and literally gone the next.  Now I am 1 for 2 and the reality that my body is broken is once again in the forethought of my mind. 

Thing was, this pregnancy was almost a complete shock.  Sure, I knew it was possible, but according to the doctor not all that likely.  How do you hold a treasure in your hand for 4 days, just to have it slip away?  How do you continue to have a positive outlook after 13 months of failed attempts, no's, and "I'm so sorry for your loss"? Everyone says, "I know you will have another baby, it's just not your time this time", to which I say, "yeah... thanks" which really means, "screw you, unless you're God or your have some gift of prophesy, please do not assume I will have another baby.  My heart hurts, my body really hurts, and my peace and hope and frame of my mind is not one where I come out a winner".  Bad luck? Bad ju ju? Bad karma from something I did in third grade?  or just Bad genes?  Who knows...  But this has been my reality for so long now that I waiver between a pit of despair and trying to try again. 

Stupid but cute containers sitting on my counter top yesterday, and I realize that maybe, just maybe, I won't give up on myself and our future this time.  I won't spend 6 months grieving with Panera Bread and Little Caesar's.  So last night, I look at those stupid containers.  I looked at my body, my broken and humbled body, and I made myself a little promise:  This time, we aren't giving up... This time, we aren't allowing a no to let us fall apart.  This time, we are going to pull ourselves out of bed and find joy, peace, and happiness... hope... faith.. and love in a decision not to just sit back and feel sorry for ourselves...  It's like I want to lay in bed and sob myself to sleep, but I know the hurt will still be there anyway... 

So I woke up, weighed myself, took a before picture of my broken body, and measured every limb and curve from head to toe.  (All cute requirements to this program however I haven't mustered up the courage to post those broken pictures on the group site).  Maybe some day I will post them on facebook so people can tell me how good I look after I lose all my weight... (and secretly think, "oh woah, she's really came a long way.....").  It was hard to look at that picture.  I am smiling in it, but it is so fake, so pressured, so fragile.  Because I woke up broken.  I woke up still processing mentally and physically that I've lost another chance at being a momma.  But I made a choice today, I opened up the app for the 21 Day Fix, and I logged in my weight, and I said to myself that this time, I won't let this loss consume me.  God will provide all the strength I need to not only survive, but to thrive.

I just finished a 30 minute workout DVD.  At first, I was going to give myself a pass but decided to try it out.  Not harder than anything I have done in recent history, but symbolic that I had a great excuse to not try.  I had a great excuse to go back to bed during nap time, but I know that isn't my goal.  I wrote down 10 goals for myself.  One of them was "to stop making excuses".  While having a miscarriage 24 hours ago is a great excuse to just lay in bed and rest and eat pizza today, I also have a better excuse to stick to my plan and do this 21 day fix; I deserve to heal.  I deserve better.  I will have better. 

And I guess, just admitting that and pushing through for 1 day of 21 feels pretty amazing.  My body will heal.  My heart will heal, too.  I come closer and closer to accepting that God has a plan for our family, and I am sad, upset, discouraged, enraged that now wasn't our time, but I have also realized that I can't spend the rest of my life waiting for things to happen.  I can't spend the rest of my life waiting for a baby.  (I say that with a grain a salt because as I move my heart forward, a little piece stays behind with my dreams... a little piece stays behind with this loss, the last loss and each month in between.)  It's like the death of a loved one, you're left to carry on without them, and you have to decide if you are going to secretly let yourself die, too, or if you are going to live...

Two weeks ago, I packed up the baby room and put away blankets, bottles and odds and ends.  And I was in the mental space to move forward.  Then I almost got ready to pull it all back out again.  I realize just how much of my life and my heart is centered around something that I am not even sure is God's plan.  Maybe I am not made to be a mom again.  Maybe I have other things to do before then.  Maybe I am meant to care for myself first.  Maybe I am meant to do something else in this world.  I don't have the clarity or discernment to know that right now, but I made a choice today.  To keep walking when I wanted to quit.  To push harder, when I wanted to give up.  To think about my long-term goals and dreams instead of this temporary pain. I made a choice to LIVE... to really live and not just survive anymore wishing for something that I cannot have. 

In 21 days, I am still going to mourn losing another pregnancy.  In 21 days, I still won't be my goal weight.  In 21 days, I will still very much desire to be a mommy again for the second time.  In 21 days, I will be able to say that I didn't let sadness take my drive.  In 21 days, I will say I trusted God to honor our dreams.  In 21 days, I will have finished this "fix" and will just keep living.  For me its the change in my heart to stop feeling sorry for myself and to try to Fix what I can... my body, my eating, my activity level, and my routine.  It's the choice to say that I will let this dream and this baby die, but I won't die with it.  Because the reality is that I could lose a half a dozen more pregnancies, but I will only lose myself if I chose to allow it to happen.  Last year, I lost myself for a good long while.  I went through the motions, but I ate my feelings away and I laid around like a tired slug waiting for things to happen. 

The creator of this program said she created this to help people create a new habit.  3 weeks people tend to learn new habits.  So it's a big challenge to her and myself, but maybe 21 days will teach me how to not give up on me when life seems to have handed me lemons (rotten ones at that).  It's bittersweet, for my broken body to feel energy and strength from a workout but for my heart to still feel so broken today.  This is my before, day 1, and I guess I will just have to see what it feels like 21 days later....

Wholly Broken...

"We're going to call off this round, I'm really sorry", the nurse said yesterday as I stood with two minutes between my appointments to return the call to the doctor.  "Take one more shot, the Ovidrel, and you should pass all those follicles".  I said ok and thank you and stared up at the ceiling to hold the tears back.  11 months of trying, another failed attempt.  Close to $1000 gone that could have paid for a week away on a cruise to Mexico but instead went to pay for injections, blood draws, pregnancy tests, and infertility consults.  And I finished my work day, but I feel like I got sucker punched in the gut, like my throat was on fire, like I could vomit, like I could scream or hit something or just fall apart.  I have been faithful, willing to try the suggested plan, and to not even get to a point where there were good enough eggs were we could try to conceive, well, I just felt broken.

 

The long and short of it is that my body is broken, not responding to meds and unless I want to try another round, pay more money, and spend another month focusing my life around conception, I am SOL.  And I think, at this point in the journey, I just need to sit down and take a break.  The last 6 months, every day I am thinking about everything I do, eat, feel, and experience and I am tired of micromanaging every decision to try and conceive.  I am tired of month after month hearing "no, I am sorry, not now, not this time".  

I have friends who have been on this journey far long than I have been.  Four years, five years, and have spent tens of thousands for just one child.  Usually, their first child.  But I guess I am just not that strong or determined or maybe I should have let myself heal my heart and body well from the miscarriage that came out of no where.  In my heart of hearts I want to spend these fun years playing, laughing and loving on the blessing that I have.  I don't want to be tired, emotional, and stimming and unable to lift our baby.  Second term infertility is a bitch.  You know you can do it if your body is right, but you also feel so much more frustrated every time you find out, it's not this time. 

After our miscarriage, I was on a mission to just try again and fix it, but now my body is so out of whack and so unbalanced that I just don't even feel like me.  And the grief, when I actually sit and type about it, it's suffocating.  I just want to let it go, not focus on it, not dwell in it.  I had dreams of being a mom to a big family, but I can't keep forcing my body to do something it's is too broken to do.  I am too broken.  

Have you ever just had to put something down that your wanted so badly,  not knowing if you will pick up again?  Not knowing if it will ever happen?  I am not that person.  I am not good at telling myself no.  I am not a quitter.  I have fought to complete some things that I wanted to give up on, and I have pushed through discomfort, but I rarely stop myself in the middle of a process and just give up.  But I feel like after this, I just feel like there is no fight left in the dog.  I feel like my body is just shot.  I feel like my hormone levels, my digestion, my heart, and my energy are just at a low, and I need to find myself again.

But in doing that, I let go of a pursuit for a dream.  In that I tell God that He is the only one who can make a miracle.  I want to enjoy my summer.  I want to turn 30 and not be stuck in what I don't have or what's not working.  I want to get well, really well, and stop getting sick all the time.  I want my business to thrive and to have deep meaningful friendships instead of hiding at home sick, broken, and alone.  I want to get back to a place that I was at before I left for Turks and Caicos last year where I feel healthy, look healthy, and am focused holistically on all the blessings of my life, not just the ONE thing I don't have.  

 

This whole journey has given me such a deeper understanding of the world, of our heart, of our emotions, and about how easily it is to get lost in the brokenness of this world.  In the last three weeks, each of the three partners in my practice have experienced a major loss, trauma, blow to their spirit.  We are all picking ourselves off the floor.  It's amazing that the three women who set out to help others heal and see light are finding ourselves in incredible darkness.  Some days it feels like we did something wrong like built a building over an Indian burial ground or something like that.  The energy of our hearts feels like all three of us are fighting just to be present and able to be in the office.  It feels like we are losing love, pieces of ourselves, and some how having to put them back together.  It is such a place of brokenness that we are trying to figure out where to step next, not wanting to fall any further.

Sometimes the seasons of darkness come, and there isn't a reason why.  There isn't a reason why at this time my body is as bad as it is, but I can't keep walking around like nothing is wrong.  I can't keep fighting.  I have to stop, step back, accept the broken pieces of myself, and start to heal them.  I have to give up for awhile.  I have to let go of my dreams for awhile.  I have to find wholeness again, as much as I can, so I can maintain the life I have already been given.  Sometimes it's not about having more, but enjoying what you already have.  And accepting that, loving that, and finding joy in that is what will be far greater than any dream coming true.  

So... I guess it's time to let go.  I guess this is me letting go.  This is my surrender.  My cancellation.   It can only go up from here because now I just have to heal.  Get balanced again, and just enjoy the sun, this cute little kid I made, and regrow.  And who knows, maybe when I finally do that, God will bless us, use us, or reveal to us why he said "I'm sorry, no, not now..."

 

Endometriosis is a very hard disease to have.   The more I read about how it affects a woman's life, the more I grieve over my body's brokenness that will never heal.  There are treatments, but I will always carry a broken body.  I hold such joy, gratitude and reverence for my sweet baby girl, but I grieve, feel lost and broken that I will never be healed in my life time.  Like all auto-immune diseases, it's just a part of me.  So I just have to admit, I am broken, and I need to take care of myself.  I need to fill myself.  I need sunshine and joy and hope.  And today, I need to surrender my dreams of being a tough girl and going another round.  I need to build myself back up.  I need to physically, mentally and spiritually let myself heal.  And somewhere in there, I hope I learn how I am suppose to move forward.  Family of three, adoption, or unexpected miracles....  But for now, I just need to breathe again...

I think I will look back on this post some day in my life, and know it was all for.  I will know what God had me wait for.  And I have to hold on to that Truth that He has said "yes" in my life and He has said, "no", but everything I need, I already have.  And I have to let go, let Him be the artist of my life, and faithfully follow rather than seeing every "no" as another broken place.  Even this disease in another way helps me.  It help me grow in my compassion.  It helps me love more deeply.  By saying "no", I need to find the places where I am better for it.  By saying "no" I have to see where He has said "yes".  And as painful as it is to hear "no", yet again, it isn't going to change.  So I have to find the best yes in myself to keep going, accept this broken piece of my life, and continue to hold all of the other parts with some kind of peace, joy and strength. 

Here Comes the Sun...

It's a beautiful day outside.  I am in bed for a moment of calm during nap time.  The sun is shinning, the birds are singing, the waters and sparkling across the water of the pond.  The trees are starting to bud and the air is pleasant enough to open the windows up and take it all in.  This is the kind of weather I was created for.  This is my element.  70 degrees plus and sun.  Despite being flat on my face yesterday and down on my knees for what seems to be like an eternity, I have found the sun is my constant reminder of hope, renewal, new beginnings.  Sometimes just the sunshine on a warm day is enough to make all of the despair of anything feel measurably smaller. 

I am not sure why there needs to be darkness in the world.  Sometimes I think, "God, you made all this.. why have a world with sin or pain or love and loss?  Why have a world with cancer?  Why have a world with infertility, drug addiction, mental illness, sexual abuse, hunger, poverty, sex trafficking, pollution, greed?  Why do we have to even experience this cruel world?"  I feel like as a parent I fight every day to keep my child from things that would make her feel bad.  I watch for sharp objects, I feed her yummy food, and I cloth her in warm and comfy clothes, but then I wonder, why doesn't God do that for us?  What's the point of this little rat race and why does it have to be so hard some times?  If he could give us a life of sunshine and spring and warmth, why wouldn't he?

Most of the people I see in therapy are wrestling with that, too.  Someone young dies or a child has severe autism.  My response is never, well, if God really loved you he would give you all sunshine and flowers... The way I respond is empathy, it's sadness because I know all to well and have never quite understood why the God of the world would let people go for sometimes even their whole life time smothered by brokenness.  Some people never see the sun.  Some people only know pain from birth until death.  Why is that?  This dichotomy when you look at human lives can span infinitely but no one is exempt from any pain, loss, or brokenness.  No one human being gets the peace of only having sunny days... no matter how bright their world is...

I admitted to myself recently that I might not have another child.  Because in the big scheme of life, having one child is not a loss, its just not getting everything I want.  The sun will still shine in my life.  There will be countless spring days until my life is over and I can hide away and ignore that sunshine and the joy it brings, or I choose joy.  It's amazing how much joy (and sorrow) children bring to your life as a parent.  She can be a sunny day or a tsunami.  She can be sweet and loving and do cute stuff or she can come in like a Tasmanian Devil and turn our world upside down.  She, too, is so much sunshine and yet seasons of drought, but I could never ever trade a day, even the bad ones, and give her away.  And I like her, am probably not always a peach to have as a parent.  Several months of having a mother on hormone therapy is surely going to scar this child in some way :)

I get hit with waves and emotion... sadness, hopelessness, fear, anxiety, pain... and sometimes it's breathless and lonely but sometimes I choose to sit in it.  Sometimes I choose to be in pain because I want to grieve what I don't have.  Sometimes I eat.  Sometimes I sleep.  Sometimes I isolate.  But I keep realizing that grief day in and day out doesn't lead to acceptance until I am ready.  Until, I choose to open up the curtains in my life and see the sun, it exists, but I choose not to see it.  And sometimes the sun is hidden by clouds, but it is still there if I choose to see it.  And sometimes in the middle of the night, when it's hours until sunrise, it can feel like it will never shine again, but it always does.  No matter hold cold the winter, no matter how rainy a season, the sun always returns.  Eventually, joy and peace and love is restored by our Creator, always...  always...

I read over the last year of struggle in the midst of the four seasons, and today, I am still sick with a cold and still grieving loss of no pregnancy, but I still notice the sun.  And for today, I pick myself up off the ground and I choose to see the sun.  I choose today to push past as much of the stuffy nose and cough as I can and just embrace the day as beautiful as it is.  I am going to try and forget the losses, the sickness, the yuckiness of this world, and just be embraced by the sun.  Not because sitting in the sun with make me pregnant or heal my heart or give me the desire of my heart, but because I don't want to sit in the darkness while I await for my heart's desire.  I don't want to keep feeling unloved by God.  I want to seek His face.  I want to know His presence.  He is here, He is alive, and He is so desperately wanting me to run to Him for His love.  Like the sun, His love is always there even when we don't feel it or choose not to see it, or instead it appears like darkness, but it is there.  It's always there, always.

God is not a father who only springs wells of happiness upon us.  How would we truly depend and love him if he just showered us with joy? We would blissfully dance in the rain and only think about ourselves if that were the case.  We would selfishly want more and forget what we have.  We would be like fat, lazy kids who never want to move out and get a job to feel the pride of our days work.  We would take for granted the people He has given in our lives.  It would be sunny but there would be no joy after awhile because we wouldn't know how wonderful we have it.  After being through such a long winter, it feels so good to see the sun again.  And overwhelming how just these quiet moments remind me how broken I choose to let myself feel. It's hard to admit but I recognize that so much of my brokenness is of my own doing.  Even if I never get the desires of my heart, even when He says "no" in big large letters, He still loves me.  He still pours on the sun, and I have to choose to see His provision and His plan even though I so desperately want mine.  Like KK wanting M and M's for breakfast, and when I say "no", it's for her provision.  It's because I love her that I say "no", but I still provide her breakfast.  I still make those pancakes and bananas with love.  And if she wants to choose to sit on the floor mad because she can't eat candy and miss out on the banquet I prepared for her, I can't force feed her those little cakes... I just have to sit by and try to remind her that I love her so very much.  I love her so much that I know down the road she will thank me for not giving her candy every day for breakfast.  And God is doing that for me... Maybe I just have to remember that when I only lay on the floor in sadness, I can't see the breakfast He is preparing for me.  

I am thankful that I have a choice, that I have seen the sun, that I know joy and love and peace.  Because I, too, know what it is like to be lost and in pain and unable to see any sun.  So today, I lift my head, my eyes and my weary heart to the Lord.  For in my brokenness, I am only made whole through him.  No matter how dark this seems to be, I lean on the understanding that some day, maybe even after this life, I will be filled, full, and know what it's like to be in true Paradise where the sun always shines and there is no more pain.  Today, I cling to this sun as it reminds me of all of the goodness, all of the joy, and all of the hope that comes in Christ. 

Celebrate God all day, every day. I mean, revel in him! Make it as clear as you can to all you meet that you’re on their side, working with them and not against them. Help them see that the Master is about to arrive. He could show up any minute!

 

^6-7 Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.

^8-9 Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

^12-14 I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am.  -Phillipeans 4:4-14

Facedown in the Sand...

The Lent season is almost ending.  40 days is a really long time when you're in the midst of it.  I had no idea just how much effort it would take to change our eating habits and our lifestyle back to being "clean".  I feel like an Old Testament Hebrew elder talking about being clean and unclean sometimes :).  We failed a few times lately.  Like nose dived off a cliff into fries and lots of bad greasy foods.  I got a cold and relapsed on a trip. I say relapsed because I swear to anyone who tries to cut out carbs and sugar, you will relapse in moments where you're mindless and hopeless back into a world of terrible food choices.  I didn't just eat a sandwich, I had so many terrible treats that I am embarrassed to mention them all.  I'll admit that some of my vices have made it back into my life like coffee creamer (I am having much less though...).  We have had good days and bad.  We have made progress and lost it, but at the end of the day we're still making way better choices... I think...

The biggest factor that changed it all was sort of a slippery slope.  Another month without a pregnancy was pretty depressing to walk through last week.  The ovarian cysts dissolved on their own and we were cleared to start fertility treatments, but there was this sad few days where I had to accept that it's not happening on our own will.  We timed conception and I followed all the rules, but to get to last Monday and find out that we were still not pregnant, well, the wind just kind of stopped.  I had a busy week, so I just kept working, moving, being, but then I got a cold the next morning and it grew in intensity all weekend.  And now, here I am a week later and I am thinking about how I got so far off track with only a few days left of Lent and I realize, it was that other blow.... that other "almost this time" that brought me back to my knees.  I let myself get hopeful, and then it blew away again...

I have gotten to a place in this dessert where my face is to the sand in defeat.  I can't seem to make anything happen right.  This weekend was supposed to be a four day family getaway, and instead, it was a mess.  I was sick, forgot my make up and all of my important things, got my period, was probably the sickest I have been, KK was sick, the two things we wanted to do were too full for us to get in, we picked bad places to eat, were late to events, and just a slew of unforeseen issues came up on our "getaway".  I was so sick Sunday, that my face was swollen, my eyes were almost swollen shut when I woke up.  I was up all night at 3am with plugged sinuses ruminating over when I would fall asleep.  I just started praying...

Seriously God??  I can't get away from this suffering.  When I commit to doing well, you allow me to be shown I am still weak.  I can't breathe, I can't live, and I can't follow my dreams.  I am stuck.  I feel alone.  I feel like you're not even with me.  I am trying so far to stay faithful, but all I feel is a naive wanderer.  A boat with no harbor.  A homeless, lonely, soul trying to find shelter and it's just not happening...

 

My immune system is tanked and despite vitamins and healthy diet, I am still getting sick about every other month with a two week long cold.  We are almost at a year of trying to have another baby.  I am still struggling with my weight.  The blood panels all say I am healthy but I feel terrible.  I have the security of the last of my treasures but so much feels insecure.  I couldn't make it through the desert without giving into those old comforts.  And at this point, I am yet again feeling far from God, not because I am not pregnant, but because I just feel alone.  I show up and I feel nothing.  I care for others, yet I feel no one caring for me.  And I don't even know if I am in a place to receive it.  Don't even know if or how or what I am doing because every time I feel like I am moving forward, I find out it was no progress or back tracking...

In two days, I start fertility treatments.  I have surrendered my body over to drugs because it's so out of whack.  I feel like these days I know more people taking fertility meds to get pregnant than I do those who are just lucky to get pregnant on their own, but it doesn't make it much easier.  There is nothing normal or joyful about shooting yourself in the stomach with needles for a week to try and help your body along.  There is nothing more humiliating then taking your pants off every week to have people invade your body.  I have come accustomed to dropping my yoga pants and moving down another inch or two....  I have had more blood draws this year than I can count.  Hundreds in wasted pregnancy tests.  And it's literally led us no where.  Just as this next phase could lead us no where.  And I can't help in the midst of all of this to occasionally want to just drive into Panera and eat an arm's length french baguette (with a side of one of the creamy soups).  But I can't keep gaining weight either....

Today, I am in bed.  I have acne all over my face from the hormones from last week.  I am day 3 on my cycle.  I gained five pounds over the weekend as of yesterdays measurement, so I really have no desire to take on the world.  I have a pen of meds I am about to shoot myself up with in about 48 hours.  I have a cold... a cough like an old lady with emphazema.. and the last thing that I feel is loved by God.  And that's a hard reality to swallow but it's how I feel.  Logically, I know that's not true and I can read the Word to challenge myself, but today, I don't FEEL it.  Today, I will put myself together for the other people in my life who need support, but at this point I am at a low in my Lent journey.  I am face down in the sand.  I am waving my white flag.  I have given up so much, lost so many things, and each step is getting harder.  That along with several rounds of progesterone are enough to make anyone feel crazy but I think after the year I have had, I get to have a few moments face down in the dust crazy.  I think after so many weeks of trying to hold it all together, I get an hour to fall apart...

I am sure in the next few weeks I will heal from this cold and become accustomed to shooting myself up with Gonal F and Ovadril, but today, I feel like I just walked for miles in the desert up a hill to see there are probably several more miles of mountains before I get to a place of rest... but none of that rest is certain, none of the safety has a concrete end in sight.  And to me, I am not willing to lay here forever and give up on myself and my family, so I will rise, but right now... I am going to just be here and alone... and quiet... and surrendered... because I need to figure out how to rise and continue on...

The Necessary Detox

It's a 11pm, and I'm up late"r" than my family by a good hour plus now.  This detox is a blessing because I have a ton of energy.  I started running again this past week.  Bad news is that combine it with anxiety and stress from work and I am WIDE AWAKE with no real desire to go bed.  Started emails and notes for work and now I am more alive.  I guess I love what I do.

Our weight is starting to plateau on the detox.  We have 3 days left and I am down 8 pounds but 2.5 inches off my bust and hips and 3 inches off my waist.  I feel better, skinnier, healthier and most of the time happier.  I realize now I was fat, bloated, and drunk on sugar.  MMMMmmm sugar.   Can't say I don't miss my carby diet.  I thought it would disgust me after almost 2 weeks of detox and 3 weeks of eating clean, but not so much.  I guess carbs will always be in my heart.

I am starting to fear what's next.  How do I keep moving forward with all of this?  Part of me wants to just cave in, but more of me wants to add a few foods back in to make our lives more manageable.  I definitely want to keep being active.  I realized how much I missed the feeling of being physically sore.  I missed the sense of accomplishment from pushing myself.  I missed praying God to help me make it farther, faster, easier...

I read a facebook post from five years ago about wanting to live more simply.  At church, we are talking about in my mom's group about our "best yes" which is only committing to the things God's calling us to.  And my heart is desiring to scale back, reflect and enjoy all we have been given as a way to refocus on what we have.

I've been donating extra stuff, decluttering, and cleaning.  I am losing extra weight and trying to simplify our busy life by saying no to more things.  It's been really hard.  It's been kind of lonely.  The practice of self-denial eliminates more than excess, it opens up space.  In that empty space, I have started to see just how busy I make myself so I don't have to deal with certain things.  When I stopped the swim lessons, the extra library trips, the guilty lunches out with grandma, and the extra fast food runs, what I found is that life got pretty quiet.  I started to realize how much extra noise I put in my life, so I don't have to talk to God or even be real with myself.  I "coast" and cruise control...

Lately, my faith has been growing because as we are stripping our diets, lifestyle and budget to a more minimum place, I feel like God is blessing that slowly.  I feel like we keep getting little moments of peace and security in those quiet moments.  I feel like we realize just how excessive our lives were becoming.  I started to realize that this was more than a excessive eating problem, it was excessive spending, collecting and busying my life so I felt less pain problem.

I believe we're all addicts.  We all have a vice.  My child is addicted to her blanket and paci, but it makes her feel safe and calm.  Once I started taking away my security, I realized that I wasn't secure, I was just pacified.  Every burger, every little shopping item, even Starbucks was a "pick me up" to a greater sense that I wasn't fulfilled.  And the more naked I become in this process, the more I find a strength.  The easier it gets to just say no and the more peace I am getting to be able to say no.  I'm finding it easier to protect my heart and embrace my own value system.  I find it easier to speak my mind but let people go at the same time.  And while my anxiety is still present, it more of just busy thoughts of the day, of what else I can do or be for God's kingdom rather than what I "should have done" or "could be doing if I tried harder". 

A lot could change in the next couple weeks for our family.  I find myself growing quiet in prayer that it's God's will.  That's all I can do.  I have to let it go.  I have to lay down my cross, my dreams, my selffish wishes.  I want so many things, but each day I am finding moments of surrender where I just have to stop fighting this need to have it together and truly let it go.  It's a controlled surrender, not reckless and mindless.  My quiet surrender is becoming more and more intentional as I crave to live and more simple and God centered life.  I feel like a blooming tree with buds of potential but I need more time.  Lent is a little over half over and I feel so small and humble. 

I suppose my prayers and my heart for Lent are coming true.  I am finding out so much by giving all my treasures away.  I have given up the excess spending and food and laziness for intentional spending, living, and eating.  I am a better parent, partner and provider.  I have so much more energy.  I guess I am turning inward and selfishly holding onto that energy though.  I am healing from my inside out.  Self-denial isn't all dreaded doom and gloom.  It's elegant, quiet and simple.  It's uplifting and freeing.  It's hope.  It's change.  It's so necessary. 

What do you need to let go of in your life?  What are you addicted to?  DVR of your favorite line up?  Your phone? Food?  Idolizing your kids?  A relationship?  A designer? A Job? Running stupid road races?  What if that thing disappeared?  Who would you be and what would you do?  At the end of the day, all of our vices could be removed from our life and we are left with our soul.  And if we aren't truly at peace, how will we be able to handle those losses?

Sometimes self-care is actually a need to remove things from one's life and realign to what's really important.  The food was a barrier, the spending, the sugar, and clothes.  And I'm not quite there yet, but I see the benefits coming in.  I have Hope... I have peace... So I will just keep walking...

The Dreaded Detox

I got a few days into Lent, still addicted to sugar and craving it bad.  The simple carbs that I could have I had little self control over.  Chris and I decided to do this detox for clean eating that our friends successfully did.  Saturday went spent about 5 hours grocery shopping and prep cooking.  And today is Day 3. 

"Why in the world would you want to do this?" my mother and father asked me.  "Anything to an extreme is bad" my father chirped in.   I say chirped because I think sometimes my parents want to be this discerning force of protection to keep me from pain or discomfort, but they know I am probably going to do it anyway at this stage in my life, so they don't push too hard.  I think our decision to do the detox was fast, overnight really, which is usually our policy if we do anything as a couple.  Discuss, pray, discern, and then text it to each other at work :)

But what my husband reluctantly agreed to was probably one of the best decisions he has made for us as a couple in a long time because little did we know how much closer it would bring us, how much hope we would gain from it, and how much better we both would feel.  When you are trying to conceive a baby for several months at a time, you get very focused on trying to "make a baby".  It can weigh your thoughts and mind down and be quite depressing.  Want to or not, you start to dwell on what you don't have, why you don't have it and what you might be doing wrong in life.  That was me before Lent.  A sorrowful case of the "poor me's" that pervasively made it through my days, nights and weekends.  And when I got sad or had a bad day, I treated myself to a coffee with fancy creamer or all you can eat pizza for dinner (and cheesy bread sticks... which are pretty much my heaven in my mouth).  As much as I tried to stop focusing on getting pregnant, I couldn't. 

Then Lent came around.  Our church isn't really formal in its process of Lent.  Right now, they are planning to expand our church into several other campuses and going global, so while they are doing that, I feel like I have been on my little sojourn to find myself.  I wanted this period of time of the year to be changing.  I wanted to stop, think and really make a change because grieving loss is not something that was helping myself or my family.  I was slow and tired and sluggish and not motivated.  I was taking naps instead of working out.  I was buying crap at the grocery store again.  Food that two years ago we decided to stop eating was making it's way back onto our shelves.  And not just an occasional taquito, but a slew of frozen pizzas, mac and cheese, chicken nuggets, hot dogs, pre-made mixes for rice or noodles, lots of pasta, BOSCO sticks (if you have never had them you really should), and my beloved breakfast pizzas.  These were not items we should have had every meal.  We were also dinning out a lot.  Spending half our mortgage in dinning out money and another half mortgage in groceries.  I was self-soothing.  I was escaping.  I am a sugar addict.

The Detox
That brings me today.  "Hi I am Kerrie.  I am a recovering sugar addict.  I have 3 days clean".   I have lost 2 pounds so far in addition to the 3lbs I had been losing since lent started.  Only about 30 more or 40 to go to get where a BMI chart would have me be to not be considered "overweight".  Like most addictions, I had to get to a "rock bottom" of my post pregnancy weight to realize that I was out of control.  It makes me sick to know that I let myself gain back nearly 30 pounds.  It's actually crushing to me, but I try not to focus on that part.

What I have felt in the last 3 days (besides the incessant cry of hunger), is energy.  All of these foods I am eating are SUPER green and SUPER healthy.  Some I can live without, but some are tolerable and I have even liked a couple.  Not Crazy Bread, but it's good food.  I am spending a ton of time in the kitchen, a ton of time with my husband, and a lot of time being active with the little squirt. 

These two weeks are a sacrifice for me because I am having to let go of my comfort.  It's just FOOD, but it's food to me.  Unless you truly struggle with sugar addictions, I don't think you can understand this.  I used to CRAVE sugar.  And I used to give in.  Now with this plan, I have my items to eat and that's it.  There are tons of food.  The volume of vegetables I eat is making my jaw hurt.  I realize now I was probably nutritionally bankrupt and yet calorically overindulged.  4 oz of protein is my new size of meat and it's much smaller.  1/2 cup of quinoa is my serving of carbs in a meal, and that's WAY smaller.  But at the end of the day, I am not hurting or suffering, I feel good. 

I actually feel better in this desert than I did in the land of plenty.  I have done a lot more praying.  A lot more thinking.  A lot more hopeful thoughts about the future.  This is two weeks for the detox, and lent is forty days, but I am changing day by day.  I feel my body shrinking, the bloating going down.  I feel my energy pick up and I, best of all, have stopped craving sugar.  I could have kept down that path of self destruction, but I stopped and asked God to help me change.  Each day we pray as a family for that change because neither of us want to live and create a legacy of self-loathing in what we don't have.  We are a very blessed family.  Sometimes I think we are too blessed and maybe that's why we got put in this desert in the first place.

We are faithful that God will allow us to have another child.  We are hopeful we will be obedient and deny ourselves our comfort foods, and we will continue to strive to take care of these vessels that He has blessed us with.  And some day when we get the weight off, we might go back a little and have an occasional treat, but we hope this reset continues to make us better and better at living a life style that uses food for fuel and God for our comfort.