Escape

A friend just recommended a blog to me because according to her facebook post it “really made me think of you".  From a first glance, I can see why she said that.  The second post on this page by Sarah Mae addresses a criticism of her latest book 31 Days to Clean:  Having a Martha House the Mary Way.  If my friend (who was a university roommate) didn’t know back then that I need help in the cleaning department, then she knows now if she’s read the blogs I’ve written about it.  By the way, I’ve also blogged briefly about Mary and Martha.

The third post on Sarah Mae’s page is titled “For the lemon pound cake nights…”  The author delves into the different ways we cope when need a break from the stress or disappointment or any other array of negative feelings we may have at time to time about our lives.  She “escapes” with pound cake and latte at Starbucks.  Ironically, my “escape” lately has been a warm or rather hot cup of coffee which is the name of this chick’s blog: likeawarmcupofcoffee.com.  I made coffee earlier planning to sit and enjoy a cup while my husband finished making our late supper but I sat down instead to another of my rarely visited escapes:  writing this blog.  It is now nearly bedtime and I still haven’t had time to sit down to drink it.  Once I’m done feeding my little baby and putting her, the last of my four darlings to bed, I’m certainly going to enjoy my escape to cafe latte land.

As I now sip satisfactorily on my roasted bean bliss, I’m feeling particularly thoughtful because Sarah Mae’s words from her lemon pound cake post have brought back memories of when I too was “coming undone for days because of how overwhelmed with life I was. I pretty much had everything I ever wanted (husband, babies, the ability to stay home, etc.), but I was drowning.”  And memories of when God’s word breathed life straight into my heart.  When chayah, Hebrew for “live”, became a life motto for me.

After having dealt for years with overwhelming feelings of unwarranted guilt and inadequacy I was losing my faith, not so much in God, but in my ability to ever allow God to make changes in me that would make life worth living.  In the months before, God had shown me His unfailing love for me (I’ve written about that here).  Despite the ways God was revealing Himself to me I still struggled with a lack of joy and purpose for living.  I wasn’t suicidal per se, but I was really questioning the relevance of my existence.  I was a Christian, yet I was extremely unhappy, and I couldn’t understand why God would put me on this earth to live in such misery.  Since as long as I could remember I wondered why I was born, and as Job did, I cursed the day I was.  One particularly frustrating day I was in my bathroom freaking out.  I don’t know why the bathroom but that’s where I was.  Crying out to God for help and asking Him to reveal His word to me I began to read my Bible.  I simply opened up to Ezekiel where I had previously left off reading.*  I began to read Ezekiel 16 and the words echoed the wretchedness that I felt:

On the day you were born your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you rubbed with salt or wrapped in cloths.  No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you.  Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised. (vs 4, 5)

Reading this now I realize how awful that sounds but that was how I felt.  I felt like that little baby, alone, uncared for and unloved; despised and helpless; abandoned and hopeless.  I kept reading . . .

Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, “Live!”  (vs 6)

Imagine that one word Live coming off the page and becoming larger and larger.  That is what I saw.  Live left that precious book and became imprinted on my mind.  In that one word I felt God saying to me “Live!  I want you on this earth.  I put you on this earth.  I want you alive and not just to breathe and exist but to be content and to be fulfilled.  Don’t just survive, live in wholeness, in the completeness that I’ve planned for you.”  He then promised me in His word:

I made you grow like a plant of the field.  You grew and developed and became the most beautiful of jewels. (vs 7)

What else can I say?  That moment, that “Chayah!” moment was the most impactful moment of my life.  It’s why I chose to name my 3rd daughter Chayah.  At 5 months pregnant we had yet to choose a girl’s name.  After watching the movie Defiance, I was enthralled by the name of one of the characters, Chaya, which in it’s Hebrew guttural pronunciation sounds like “kHy-yah”.  Out of curiosity I looked up the word in my Hebrew-English dictionary and was amazed that it meant “live".”  I told my husband I didn’t care how we pronounced it but if she were a girl her name had to be some variation of Chayah (we later chose to soften the kh sound to sh).  The next day I was scheduled for an ultrasound at the children’s hospital to confirm whether or not the first ultrasound at my local hospital was correct in a diagnosis of fluid around her heart.  Thankfully it was incorrect and we were able to find out that we were having a little girl.  That evening, once again out of “curiosity” I looked up the Hebrew word that was used in that passage from Ezekiel.  Sure enough it was chayah.  The one word that God spoke in a book filled with lengthy monologues was “Chayah!”  I believe God gave me the name for my little girl as a reminder of the way He wants me to Live!
Obviously, life isn’t always peaches and cream (or coffee and cream), but I’ve never sunk to the lows I felt then.  I still need to escape to the quiet place with my Savior sometimes to maintain my sanity but He’s taught me that I’m worth it, life is worth it and to work harder to truly Live.  Now that my cuppa Joe is done and it’s way past my bed time, I look ahead to my next chance to escape.  Maybe next time with a good book.  Say, 31 Days to Clean?

* In my quest to read the Bible from cover to cover I placed a stroke beside each verse as I read it.  Ezekiel 16 had not been stroked so I assumed that was where I had been reading in the days before.  I later realized that I had not left off reading at Ezekiel 16 but actually had been reading about 5 chapters ahead according to the strokes I had made.  I believe God allowed me to skip those chapters in the past because He knew that I would need to go back to read them precisely when I did.

Where it went

So I’ve been hemming and hawing about what to write for a few weeks now:  “March Break on the Cheap”?  “Our New Life with Baby #4”?  “Battling Chronic Disorganization”?  In short, I’ve had alot of things on my mind.  I think I’ll just start and see where it goes.

Tonight I sit with a little rascal sprawled on her belly across my lap.  My newest little one has been a great sleeper this past week.  She’ll usually take 4-5 hour stretches of sleep at night but the problem is if she’s had a late nap, she’s wide awake until midnight or so, like she is tonight.  Once she settles, I head to bed too ‘cause I can be assured she’ll let me have a good stretch of sleep.  My first two children slept through the night at around two months old so I’m crossing my fingers for this one.

Things are busy here at this house, and mostly very noisy.  It’s a close competition between the fighting and screaming of a seven and five year old, and the dual-crying fits of the babies.  My big baby as I call her, is soon to be two but she still has a lot of baby tendencies of course.  She is also so busy it never ceases to amaze me.  There’s a saying I’ve coined:  “When you have a toddler and you feel like you’re losing your mind, you are not losing your mind, you just have a toddler.”  I realized this when my second child hit the toddler age.  I had thought I was just going through a particularly rough time emotionally when my first child was a toddler (which was the problem in part) but much of it was just the fact that that age is a really rough age on Mama and baby.  Toddler’s can be so emotionally labile, disobedient, and absolutely into EVERYTHING.  It’s kind of deceiving in that they are little older so you tend to let them have a little more freedom because you aren’t worried about them as much.  However, that backfires because before you know it the toilet is clogged with a children’s board book (my son) or the Vaseline you didn’t put away after the last living room diaper change is all over their face (my first daughter) or the make-up concealor that was neatly tucked away in your drawer is suddenly all over your bathroom sink (my current mess maker).  My toddling terror of late is a big climber which makes things twice as difficult.  She doesn’t just find some mess to get into, she goes looking for it.  Such as going through our vanity drawer to find my make-up, getting a stool to climb up onto the vanity, proceeding to color her face and the sink with a full tube of concealor, and at sometime during her make-up coloring, using a bar of soap to decorate the vanity mirror.  Where were Dad and I you ask?  Obviously relaxing a little too much.  Then again these shenanigans can happen in a matter of minutes, and just when it clicks with you that your little one is just a little too quiet, you smack yourself in the head because you know that just means trouble.

So that really kinda covers life with our new baby.  She isn’t much work at all.  Well she’s work of course, nursing every two or three hours, diaper changes and occasional fussiness is work enough but it’s easy work.  It’s trying to take care of everything else around caring for her too that’s the hard part.  Just when I get to work at one task, someone is hungry or ready for a nap or needs a diaper change or wants to play a game and believe me once I’ve been distracted it is so hard for me to get back on track.  I mentioned last time that my Mom came to stay with us during the last couple of months of my pregnancy.  It was an answer to a prayer for me really that I’m not sure I really prayed for.  I had often said to myself, “I just wish I had Mom or somebody come to stay with me and show me how to keep things organized.”  I don't know if I ever really put that wish God-ward but having Mom here gave me a reality check of what I need to do to keep my home and ultimately my life in order.  Don’t get me wrong, I will never be the domestic goddess my Mom is; I don’t where she gets her energy!  But the experience has given me the motivation to do better.  Those of you out there who aren’t messies may not understand why these seemingly common sense tasks are so overwhelmingly brain boggling for me but I dunno, you just have to be in my shoes.  I don’t think time and time management computes with me the way it does to most people.  My Dad’s nicknames for me since childhood have been “Speedy Gonsalez,” a sarcastic moniker from some 50’s tv show I suppose (I should ask him about that) and the more literal “Slow Poke”.  So has tardiness and disorganization been something that has slowly crept up on me as I added more people to my family like it has for many busy moms?  Nope, not at all.  I’m glad to say that it hasn’t really gotten worse, but I always seem to lose 10 minutes somewhere along the way that makes me late, as a single person and now as mom of four.

Speaking of the angel who gave me that wonderful title, I think she is finally settling for sleep and it’s time for me too.  Keep stailing.

Words of Encouragement

Some days you just need to hear, or in this case, read some words of encouragement. The other day was one of those days for me. On another one of these days in the past, I took it upon myself (I make it sound like a monumental task, huh?) to write out some words of encouragement for myself when I need it. Usually these days are when I’m overwhelmed with housework and I need some motivation. Some days, like a couple of days ago, it’s just “One of dem days that a girl goes through” (shout out to Monica) when I’m just not feeling top notch about anything. Days like this I’m thinking “Why on earth have I ever thought that I can mother and nurture four children?” It’s not even that the kids are the problem, it’s just my frame of mind and my own negative outlook. I admit, my son tried my patience today and I just deleted 16 lines explaining why because that’s not the focus of this blog.

There was a time when I would have those kinds of days nearly constantly, until God freed me from an existence of anxiety and depression. And yet, that too is a topic for another blog. Right now I would like to list those words of encouragement. Mostly it’s just feel-good-about-yourself stuff (psychobabble I call it:) but some are scripture inspired or words of my favorite worship songs or quotes I’ve read. I hope that you too will find encouragement in these words if you ever need it. I’ve put it in table format so if you like, you can print and cut the phrases out, place them in a box or jar and pick one (or ten) at random. That was my original intention for this list, as I’ve done it before with favorite Bible verses and find it comforting. I urge you to add to this list or even create your own words of encouragement, perhaps also adding Bible verses that give you hope.

Quit feeling sorry for yourself.	Play the pumpin’ music. Get your body moving.
Holy Spirit - help me, help me, help me.	God has created you to do more and be more.
You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you.	You are worth more. Your children deserve more.
I am who God says I am: Beloved!	Your children deserve the best you can give them.
Do one thing that’s more positive than what you’re doing right now.	Other people may not struggle like you do - but they fail in other ways.
It just takes one step - do one thing differently.	You’ve been blessed! Count them right now.
I am loved, therefore I am.	Live! God spoke it, now do it!
Sing! Sing! Sing like you used to.	You were meant to live for so much more. Don’t lose yourself.
I know I’m better than this.	I can find the strength to beat this.
Read as long as you have to, to know you deserve better.	Stop blaming others - you are responsible for your actions.
Kiss and hug your children – then pray with each of them.	Kiss and hug your husband/wife – then pray with them.
You can be that strong mom/dad for your kids.	You can be the wife/husband your spouse is proud of.
Do, do, do- just do one more thing.	Sing a love song to Jesus.
You are not your mess. The Father sees His lovely child.	Stop, and sing “If you’re happy and you know it” with your kids.
Happiness is being blessed, and you are so blessed.	Read one more line; read one more reason why you’re worth it.
He sees how lovely you are – a beautiful mess.	Your mess does not define you. Step out of it.
Be your Father’s child.	You are safe in His arms.
Gather your children together to pray for you. Benefit from their unwavering faith.	You may not always be shown, but your family loves you and cannot live without you.
Create quietness. Calm yourself and your children.	Kneel before Him now. Relax and breathe in His presence.
Clear your mind and listen for God’s voice.	I am MORE than a conqueror through Christ Jesus who loves me.
Slow to anger. Abounding in love.	I am better than this. I can do it!
Calm mother. Calm baby.	Save me Jesus, once more.
I can rise above. God created me to conquer.	How blessed I am to have found my Savior.
He is mighty to save!	Oh how He loves us so.

You’ll notice above the inspiration for stailing; slow to anger, abounding in love. It’s my mantra some days. Peace!

The Unsubject

Don’t really have anything in particular to blog about but thought I might because it’s been a few days. My hubby was away for week and came back this morning. Very happy about that although I must admit I had a good week without him. It was one of those weeks that my temperament was on an even keel. In other more pertinent words, I was slow to anger and abounding in love this week. Stailing came easier for me than other times. As I mentioned here, there are some days when I just can’t get a grip on my patience level at all and I am glad that even though I didn’t have my husband to rely on this week, I was able to keep it cool (mostly:). I swear it’s hormones, it drives me crazy!!! Literally, haha. I also believe that headaches I’m prone to suffer from are hormone triggered as well. Cross my fingers I’ve had a fewer headaches for about 6 months now.

Well, here’s a recap of my weekend (which have been crazy busy now that summer is here):

• Thursday I cleaned the whole day and my son had a friend to visit.
• Friday I went to my son’s field day trip to the beach, and then he had some of his friends over to have fun in the pool, and slip-n-side. We don’t have a real pool (boo) just a wading one. I don’t usually have friends to visit because well, the house is always too messy, but it’s getting summer soon and I wanted him to spend time with his school friends.
• Saturday I had one of the craziest mornings I’ve had in months but in a nutshell, my big kids raced in the annual marathon (they did the 100m run, not the marathon :). Here’s an equation for ya, 1 parent + 3 children + 2 races = no fun. I even had a friend help and it was still craziness.
• Sunday my hubby came home early enough for church in the morning and the two of us went out for supper sans kids to celebrate Father’s day and our 7th anniversary (which he missed last week because he went on a canoe trip/bachelor party, but I’m not bitter).

We’ve left our baby with a babysitter before but she’s always been in bed before we left so it was kinda nil. Today she napped for 20 minutes-ish on the way to and fro church so of course she wouldn’t go down for her real nap until probably 5:30pm. I thought she would sleep for an hour or so but she stayed down until we got home at 8:30pm, so she still hasn’t been left with a babysitter really. I’m sure she would be fine anyways, my kid’s are seriously some of the most easygoing kids you would ever come across. It’s true!!! She was puttering around here until just a while ago when she finally tuckered out.

So, I am still waiting to find my blog on google, yahoo etc. I’ve been doing all the tips I found to get the site listed although it can take a month or so I guess. There’s just one tip that I’ve shied away from: tell your friends. I don’t want to tell my friends I’ve started a blog. I don’t want them to know the real me!!! Isn’t that awful? Maybe someday. I just don’t know if I want all my friends to know my faults, my real opinions etc. Ahh well someday, someday.

Oh, one more thing, I posted here that I kinda made up the term stailing. Well I was wrong, there was already a definition on urbandictionary.com. A rather dumb definition I might add but it was there just the same. I added my definition and it was accepted. You can read them both at this link. I’m out.

Journal entry, June 7, 2010

“Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to me made. She came to him and asked, ‘Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself. Tell her to help me!’” (Luke 10:40)

Oh how I hear myself in Martha’s plea. “Oh, I have so much to do, on my I’ll never get it done. Why isn’t [my husband] helping me? Kids, do this! Kids, do that! Lord, speak to [my husband’s] heart. Get him in here and help me make supper.”

“ ‘Martha, Martha,’ the Lord answered, ‘you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.’” (Luke 10:41, 42)

“Charlotte, Charlotte, you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Choose what Mary did. It’s better. Then all the other things will come into place. Be with me. Listen to me. Sit at my feet as Mary did.”

“Jesus, I’m tired of being too worried and upset about many things. I just want to sit with You. Listen and learn from You. I’ve heard this story dozens of times but You’ve opened my heart to know that I’m not a lazy Mary (as I’ve always seen her) but a worrisome Martha. Help me to balance the two Lord. Help me to begin my day with You so my other tasks go more smoothly. I love you Jesus. Thank you for your Word . Thank you for your love.

Oh what a day . . . This is a long one.

One of the reasons I started this blog was to use it as sort of a confessional, a way to be held accountable maybe. I'll start with this: I am a life-long procrastinator and suffer from chronic disorganization. I should be clear that this is self-diagnosed. I've never been told by a professional that I suffer from chronic disorganization but one look into my house and my habits and you'll see that it isn't that hard to pinpoint. Also, I don't think that most mental health professionals would even consider chronic disorganization as a diagnosis, but there's something definitely abnormal about my behaviour (yes, I've been watching too much Hoarders).

Today my procrastination has caused the suffering of another member of God's great animal kingdom and very much emotional pain for me. If I'm honest, I am procrastinating right now by writing this instead of cleaning up my house but my mind is racing so much that I just have to write and get it off my chest.
 

 

 

The day after we found her at about 6 days old.

 

 

 

 

 

The story began last Saturday night when I went into the shed to get my kid's bikes out for them. Lying on the floor apparently abandoned was a tiny baby mouse only about 5 or 6 days old, as I later learned. She was squeaking so loudly as if begging someone to help her. She couldn't even really walk. I also later learned that she appeared to be female.

 

I left her alone for a little while but her mother never came back. We took her inside knowing she might not make it but thought it would be worth the try to save her. As I found out this was a very risky thing to do and I would not recommend anyone to adopt abandoned mice. Deer mice carry a virus called hantavirus that is extremely toxic to humans causing serious illness and very often death. I didn't know this at first but chose to continue caring for her after learning that the area I live in an area that has not had any human cases of hantavirus and has not even documented any cases of hantavirus in mice. I figured if myself or my family came down with symptoms of hantavirus that I would seek medical attention immediately and pray for the best.

In my daughter's hand at about 8 days old.

 

 

 

 

 

I found instructions on how to care for her on the Internet. I read that until her eyes opened up it was very unlikely that she would live but she seemed to be doing very well. She was eating great, and all her bodily functions were doing what they should. I was so happy last night when I noticed that her eyes were starting to open into little slits. I knew she was probably hitting the 2 week old mark soon and that she was well on her way. In the last couple of days she had started to nibble on things when she was hungry which I thought maybe indicated she was getting ready to start solid foods in a few days.

 

Feeding her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That all changed today. I didn't get up and feed her first thing in the morning like I usually did. I went straight to my netbook and sat there for at least an hour. Then I got my son ready to go to a friend's house. When I got back, I put the baby down for a nap and got busy figuring out how to plug coordinates into the GPS. At around 1:30pm I finally remembered that I hadn't fed the mouse or changed the water in her hot water bottle. I went to pick her up and she was pretty lifeless but I thought once I started to feed her she would perk up. It took me a few minutes to realize that she wasn't opening her mouth to feed; she was air hungry, a phenomenon that can occur I guess when all mammals are dying. I had witnessed it before in humans at my job so I knew she was passing away. Watching that poor little thing breathe her last breaths was heartbreaking, and here I had been trying to feed her.

I bawled all afternoon. Alot for the mouse to which I had become more attached to than I realized, and even more for the fact that I really believe she died because of my negligence. If I had cared for her first thing in the morning like I should have and she had still died, then I think I would feel less guilt. But now I have to live with the shame of allowing my sin to once more rule me and this time with great consequence. Oh I am sure some of you are thinking "But it was only a mouse." Yes, it was just a mouse, but it was a mouse that was totally dependent on me and I failed her. I sought recluse for a few minutes, bawling my eyes out, and asking God for forgiveness for letting my sin stand in the way of my responsibility. The tears fell from the realization of the permanence of my actions. Actions that not just affect a poor little mouse, but my children, my husband, my friendships and most importantly, my relationship with my heavenly Father.

 

 

 

3 days before she passed away at about 10 days old.

 

 

 

 

Rest in Peace Li'l Squeaky.