Persepective

Its been more than 3 months. My poor neglected blog has sure gotten backseat these days to well…LIFE. I sincerely hope that someday I’ll get back to writing about the hilarious things KJ says or tell stories about our “bull-in-the-china-closet” of a middle child, or maybe fill you in on our diva of a daughter. I really do want to get some of their current goings on down on cyber-paper soon so that I can remember details of these days. I know if I don’t try to document some of it, I’ll remember it only for what it seems at a glance…a BLUR.

Today, though, I just needed to stop and take a moment to use this blog as a spot for perspective. When things are crazy and time-consuming and just plain BUSY (like life is when the oldest of your three kids is 3) sometimes I feel like…in the words of my wise friend Tara…I WANT OFF THE CRAZY TRAIN! But as soon as those words are out of my mouth, I also feel a strong pull to live in the moment, remember details, absorb the joy of my children and remember to stop and Praise the Maker of the Universe!

Today, my heart is turning easily to PRAISE. I’m particularly praising Him as healer. He’s been reminding me this week that He is the one who holds our health in his hands. As of this week, I have been blessed with 5 years (and 3 babies) of living pain-free and medication-free. WOW! When I had surgery for Crohn’s disease during this week in 2004, the doctors HOPED for a few years of relief. But God has been so good to not only provide relief, but to provide COMPLETE relief even without medication and even through 3 pregnancies. I just didn’t want this week to pass without taking time to thank HIM for that. CAN I GET AN AMEN?

But, it seems when the Lord is showing me something he sometimes has to emphasize it over and over to get me on my knees. As another reminder of His faithfulness in healing, He has been so good to our Cbug this week. What started as a “cold” took a scary turn on Tuesday night when Cbug woke up unable to get a breath. RRL and I heard a gasping sound from the boys room and ran to him. He was panicking and in respiratory distress. Thankfully, we still had an inhaler from when he had RSV nearly a year ago and thankfully RRL had the strength of mind to find it and administer it while I called 911. RRL was able to get him breathing better before the ambulance arrived so we took him in ourselves. A shot of steroids, some antibiotics, tamaflu and several days of rest later he’s running around like his crazy self again today. As a mom, it doesn’t take much to send me down the “what if” path. What if we hadn’t been sitting in the living room so close to his room to hear him, what if we hadn’t had the inhaler, what if, what if, what if. But praise HIM who is able to take care of all of the “what ifs” and the ones we can’t even imagine. I’m so thankful that it wasn’t any worse. As I lay beside him everynight this week, just watching him breathe, I’ve definitely been mindful of so many others who are struggling through health issues with their babies. PERSECTIVE.

I typed the above earier today. At the time, I was pretty proud of myself for the “perspective” lesson that I had gleaned from this. Oh silly pride of mine. Here are tonight’s thoughts…

I spent a couple of hours visiting this afternoon with one of my dearest friends and I realized that the Lord has indeed being speaking to me this week about healing. But maybe that wasn’t the only lesson. It is about so much more. He’s been showing me about relinquishing control. As Mel and I talked this afternoon, it was one of those “AH HAH” moments…OH NOW I GET IT…or at least I’m beginning to. You actually want me to LET GO of EVERYTHING? Oh. EVERYTHING- right down to even the things that are most precious- the health and well-being of myself, my husband, my children. Oh. And not just in a big way, but in all the little ways, too. In every moment, every decision, ever life-stressor (and there’s been a lot of them lately)…EVERYTHING. Oh. Gonna have to go ahead and admit, this is tough for me. These days I’m pretty much drowning in my own need to control things and inability to do so. So while this is a very freeing thought for me, I’m gonna have to update you later on how its going in reality!

Boy, I sure liked it earlier this afternoon when I could tie this post up with a pretty bow and move on with a warm and cozy vibe. Should have known better. In the meantime, on that topic of healing, lots of others have been on my heart for prayers for healing (maritally, physically, emotionally, spiritually). Some close to my heart, some complete strangers. I’d love to make a list of the stories, but they are not really my stories to tell. Just wanted to throw out there that its interesting to me that when I started thinking and praying about relinquishing control my first thoughts were of others. Perspective.