Guys, I'm so excited for this new year! 2013 has been amazing. God has done some deep, deep healing in me; I've faced lots of my fears; I've met and gotten to know wonderful people; I found chocolate ice cream I can eat; not only am I still able to dance ballroom/WCS, but I've improved in it dramatically - especially WCS; I've grown closer to God; I don't think I've stepped on a Lego once this year; and just all sorts of other growth and opportunities have been had. Though the only thing that really changes come a new year is the way we sign the date, it just seems like a new beginning in a way. A chance to grow and accomplish new things. While I've never been one to make "resolutions" because they remind me of weight loss and strawberries & chocolate, and make me feel like I'm setting myself up for failure, I do have things that God has set on my heart to work on and strive for. And with that, I give you this : My desire for this year is simple: I want to step out in boldness, facing more of my fears with every bit of confidence in Christ. And in that boldness, be more real and vulnerable with people. Along with that, my desire for this year is also to grow in selflessness, taking on the phrase that God has placed on my heart earlier this past year: It's not about you. I want to better take on these characteristics of Christ that God has been growing me in. I'm excited for the adventures that lay ahead this year. Bring it, 2014! I want to hit on being real for a second.
This past year I've gotten a lot of comments and encouraging words about how real I am. It's so encouraging when someone tells me that, cause it's something that God has really put on my heart - this past year especially. Let me tell you why : I want to be an encouragement to others. I want people to see that they're not alone in their struggles. I want people to see that it's okay to not have everything together. I want people to see that Christians (with some exceptions, I'm sure) don't think they're better than anyone else, and certainly not perfect. I want to reflect Christ as best I can, and I can't do that very well if I'm hiding away in myself. I want people to see me as I am, not anything else. I want to be bold. This is something that God has been working on in me quite a bit over the past year. I have a lot of fears and lies surrounding it, and that's kind of how it started. Being real and vulnerable with people is something that kills two birds with one stone for me : facing fears and allowing God to use me. "It's not about me". I want to be more open and vulnerable with people. One of my gifts is creativity, and it's something that I find very helpful and therapeutic when it comes to expressing what's on my mind or heart. There are these things called *SMASH books by K&Company. They're kind of fantastic. God really laid it on my heart to have one specifically dedicated to the desires of my heart, so that's what I'm going to do this year. Why is that relevant to this post? I've been talking about being real and vulnerable : I'm going to share them with you as I go. May not seem like much, but it's kind of a big deal for me. So yes, there you have it. Here's to a new year full of adventures, growth, and getting over myself. Let's go!
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Tomorrow is our family's Christmas, so I'mma switch things up this Thursday. Something about myself for you to know is that my environment is rather important to me. I'm not anal about it, but it is important to me. If I'm in an unfamiliar place and I'm overwhelmed or tired, I curl up and hide away (preferably into my sweatshirt), because it's more familiar to me. Like an armadillo. Or a turtle. I'm totes turtley enough for the Turtle Club. How does that relate to Christmas? Christmas is the time of year when my home environment changes in a most pleasant way. Not that it wasn't pleasant to begin with, but it's just . . . Christmas. It has a way of turning already great spaces into magical, cozy spaces. And that's one of my favorite things about Christmas. And my house is my favorite place to be this time of the year. So with that, let me share with you my home during the holidays ^.^ And then there are all of the little snapshots that take place in these wonderful spaces . . . I always count down the days until Christmas gets here and then realize that that means shortly after, all of the Christmas decorations will come down and I'll have to wait 335 days until I see them again. It's a bittersweet day, Christmas. Christmas is my favorite time of the year, and I'mma tell you why. 1) There's just something magical about it 2) I love, love, love Christmas lights 3) Gift giving is one of my Love Languages, and it's one of the only times when you can give people things and they won't think it's that weird 4) Where I live it's grey and gloomy outside, which is a lovely contrast to being inside by the fireplace, right next to a Christmas tree 5) It's characterized as a time to be joyful, which I already am in abundance, but it just seems to increase 6) It's when I get bacon 7) It's the celebration of the birth of Christ You've heard the Christmas story? Let's not keep Jesus as a baby in a manger; He came here for far greater things than that. I'll be honest, I've heard that same story so many times that I've become kinda numb to it. I've disconnected the Jesus in the story from the Jesus I have a relationship with now - but they are one in the same. I have to stop and remind myself of that, and every time that I do I'm overwhelmed by what He has done in my life. I'm reminded of the reason we celebrate the birth of Christ and why He came to earth in the first place, to offer us the gift of salvation. I'm reminded that by that, God broke the rules & restrictions of religion and brought instead a personal relationship. And by that, I'm reminded of what He did for me 8 years ago and beyond (don't know my story? http://lifewithlew.weebly.com/1/post/2013/02/a-testimony-of-gods-love.html). I found a note that I wrote two Christmas' ago, when I was 18. It was the first time celebrating the season since remembering all that had happened. The handwriting and grammar you can ignore entirely, but it pretty accurately captures my heart for this season - though there's so much more that I could add now. Can you imagine? A 13 or so year old girl who becomes pregnant by the Holy Spirit (try explaining that one to people), is rejected, judged, and nearly killed because of it, then travels with her fiance (who also almost dumped her, before an angel intervened) across a desert on a freaking donkey (while pregnant. Imagine morning sickness . . .) to give birth in a town where she doesn't know anyone, only to find that every hotel room is full, so she has to give birth in a stable - which, historically, was not a lovely, glowing golden hay filled barn. It was usually a cave. A dark, gloomy, cave. And those animals that were gathered around her? They poop. And it's not pleasant. And that's where Christ was born. The King of Kings, born in the humblest of conditions. After hearing it so many times I have to remind myself that the Christmas story isn't a fairytale - it's history. It was hard. It was painful. It was brutal. It was real. And through that, we have our salvation. Happy Christmas, everyone ^.^ So I'm in the hospital for emergency surgery, right? The next morning I awoke to the sunshine streaming through my window and my dad up and about, reading his book. After a few minutes I had to pee. Nothing urgent or anything, but you know those moments where you're just kinda like, "Oh, I kinda have to pee, and now is a convenient time to do so, so I might as well"? It was like that. So I got up, wobbled to the bathroom that was in my room, and took care of business. Because I was in the hospital, there was one of those measuring bowl things in the toilet that you pee in whether you need to or not. As I came out and was about to get situated in bed again, I noticed my dad heading into the bathroom with an odd look on his face, so I asked him what he was doing. He replied, "I want to see how big your bladder is, cause you can go an unfair amount of time without having to pee". ". . . Okay. Go for it. I didn't have to pee that badly though, keep that in mind".
Not 5 seconds after saying that there was an exuberant "what?!" from the bathroom. The measuring bowl was filled 800 cc's with only a partially full bladder. Apparently that's unheard of due to my fathers reaction. Which wouldn't be that big of a deal, except my daddy's a nurse, so he knows this stuff. He couldn't figure out how a bladder that size fit into such a tiny body. He's an average size adult man and his bladder is 300 cc's. We ended up going to my grandparents house sometime after that and my dad felt it necessary to talk about how big my bladder was to my grandpa (his dad). The conversation escalated into them figuring out mathematically just how big my bladder is. That day we discovered that my bladder can hold around 1000 cc's - which is about a liter - and I can lose 2-3 pounds just by peeing. Welcome to my family. So there you have it. Probably the most fascinating thing about me you will ever know. If you're squeamish or just don't like blood, you probably shouldn't read this.
It was 2008. March, I believe. I had gone in for surgery to get my turbinates reduced and adenoids & tonsils removed. Don't know what those are? Google them. I had to have these procedures done because I stopped breathing when I slept, which, thankfully, would wake me up - therefore, I just didn't really sleep. That needed to change. The doctor said that it's not uncommon for tonsils to rebleed around 10 days after the procedure, and if they do all we need to do is gargle ice water and it'll stop after a little while. 10 days later, my mum & I were saying to goodnight to each other after watching What Not To Wear together (don't judge). It was about 10:00pm (which was unheard of for her to be up that late back then) when the show ended, and we said goodnight as she headed into her room to go to bed (my dad was already asleep) and I headed into mine to do the same. I got a funny taste in my mouth and felt the urge to spit, which wasn't an uncommon thing post-surgery. So I went into the bathroom and spit in the sink. Blood. Again, not an uncommon thing post-surgery. I started heading back to my room, when the feeling reemerged. So I went to the sink and spit again. And again. And again. Each time solid blood. It came quicker & quicker each time. I finally realized, "Oh hey, I'm probably rebleeding". So I grabbed a Dixie cup to spit into as I went to get my mum. Thankfully, we had just said goodnight 10-15 minutes earlier due to watching TV together, so she was still awake. She came into the bathroom with me as I continued to cough up more and more blood - by this time it wasn't just straight blood, they were blood clots. I can't remember if the gargling ice water happened before or after my mum decided to wake my dad up. The poor guy had just gone to bed a little earlier and took a Lunesta right beforehand cause he had to work the next day, so he was a little out of it. Just a little. Either way, the gargling of ice water commenced. Doesn't sound that bad, right? Let's talk about this : I was on drugs (pain killers), I was exhausted and wanted nothing more than to go to sleep, I was in pain, I was coughing up blood clots, and I was enduring stupid cold water in my mouth that was diluted with blood. And I had a really cheesy kids song stuck in my head - though that wasn't as bad. Though the tune was annoying, it was Joshua 1:9 (kids church song version) "Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." Which, let me tell you, helped a LOT. By this time I had been gargling for around an hour, and I was done. I was so ready to be done. And thankfully, I guess my body was ready to be done as well, because the bleeding had stopped. I laid on the bathroom floor, exhausted, with my parents sitting on both sides of me. I remained this way for about 20 minutes, and then it happened. I started coughing up blood clots again - BIG ones. My dad called the hospital and explained the situation, and they told us to come in to do emergency surgery. Now, here's where things get entertaining (for me at least). As we were getting ready to go, my sisters, Abi and Dewie, came home. They had no idea what was happening, all they saw was mum & ada rushing around the house, dad still loopy from his Lunesta, and mum in task mode trying to get us out the door, and me, laying in the bathroom coughing up blood clots. Poor girls. Ada was trying to get a coat on me as I spat up more blood, but couldn't really manage because he was so loopy, he couldn't figure out how haha. We finally managed to get a coat on me (with my mothers assistance), grab a tub, another supply of ice water, and head out to the hospital. Ada sat in the backseat with me, holding a tub so I could spit my blood clots and gargled ice water into it, as my mum drove as fast as she legally could to the hospital. There's this train trestle on the way there, where the road goes into a good sized dip as you go underneath it . . . that was interesting with one drugged up and one very loopy person in the backseat holding a tub of water/blood. Somehow we managed not to spill, somehow. We finally go to the hospital. My mum swung the car into the emergency room drive up, and ada took me inside. He tripped, however, on one of the tubs full of blood and ice water on the way out, and it managed to spill all over the van floor. Got to the desk where the lady wanted us to fill out paperwork before heading into the emergency room. I remember feeling very impatient and miserable, thinking, "Really? There's a little girl coughing up blood clots and you're having us fill out PAPERWORK?!" It's understandable though. Let's be real, the people at that desk probably get a lot of crap, and really, they're just doing their jobs. I applaud them. Anyways, we finally make it into the emergency room. This is what I remember : It was about 1:15am; there was an old dude in the "room" next to me (divided by a curtain) vomiting violently; they couldn't get my IV in because my veins roll, so they tried my left arm 2-3 times, then my right arm, then, without warning, just stuck it in my left hand (did I mention I'm afraid of needles?); the surgeons eyebrows were really weird; the hospital gown I was wearing didn't inflate; and I was nauseous. Ohhhhh, I was nauseous. They came in to get painkillers and anti-nausea medication into my IV, but it was too late. I had accidentally swallowed a whole bunch of blood and ice water, and that's what I vomited up - a whole lotta blood/clots. Did I mention that I was also afraid of vomiting? I finally got into surgery and it was about 4:00am when I came to. A super cool thing that happened afterwards is that I got to spend the night at the hospital in the department that my daddy works - he's an ICU nurse. I didn't NEED the ICU, mind you. I was fine. But they had an extra room available and my daddy works there, so I got to stay where he works ^.^ I fell asleep that morning laying in a hospital bed, watching Animal Planet, with my dad on the couch beside me (mum had gone home by that point to get a little sleep). The next morning one of my dads favorite coworkers was assigned to my room, so I ended up making a new friend that day. And my daddy was the one who took my IV out and did some other stuffs. That's also the infamous morning in my household when we discovered something about me, but I'll save that story for next week. And that's my story. I didn't gargle anything for years after that. And during all of that, my sisters were at home, cleaning out and trying to de-clog the blood clots from the bathroom sink. They also cleaned out the blood from the carpet in the van, and had very interesting conversations about poop and Playdoh. I'll let them tell you that one though ;] I love my family <3 This blog is about being real, so here's this :
I struggle with the lie that I'm not worth it. It's probably the biggest lie that I deal with, and quite honestly, it irritates me, because I know that it's a lie, but for some reason it just keeps coming back. There are a few reasons that I've uncovered as to why I struggle with it, but the one that hit me tonight was because of the little things that I deal with. I'll be the first to tell you that I'm very blessed and have it much, much better than most people. But I have my issues. Tale as old as time, I have Celiac Disease and am intolerant to gluten, casein, and soy; because of the damage that was caused in my gut I'm also unable to eat nightshades, sugar, sugar substitutes, caffeine, beef, pork, nuts, eggs, and rice; I have low blood sugar; I have rotational scoliosis in my lower back (my spine twists); my pelvis, sacrum, and hips are misaligned; I'm not supposed to do any physical activities because of my skeletal issues; I have very poor circulation in my hands and feet; sleep apnea; bad pollen allergies; fatigue; the list continues, but it really doesn't matter. You get the idea. How do those little things equal up to not being worth it? They shouldn't. They really shouldn't. But they do at times, because here's what I hear in my head : You can't do anything, who would want that? Who is going to want to put up with that? They'll think it's all in your head. You're not worth giving up food for - it's been implied multiple times. You're a burden because of it all. It's a darn good thing I'm so content in my singleness, or else I'd be a hot mess. All of those little white lies add up to the big lie that I'm not worth it. It's an underlying lie on most days, but sometimes, it gets provoked, and it just kinda smacks me in the face. But then there's this : Through the shouts of the enemy feeding me these lies of worthlessness, I'm quietly reminded of God's truths : I don't need to be able to eat or be around "regular" food in order to encourage someone. I don't need good circulation in my hands or feet to bless someone. I don't need to be rid of anxiety to make someone smile. I don't need an aligned skeleton to lift someone up. I don't need to be pain free to be there for someone. I don't need to be physically active in order to speak truth. I have everything I need and so much more to be able to reach out to & love on people. There's so much value & worth in that. Worth doesn't come from other people. Let's be real, not everyone is going to see your worth. That doesn't mean it's not there. Seriously, if we based our worth on others and what they thought, we'd be screwed. As I laid curled up on my bed, face full of blankies and stuffed mouse in hand, I released it over to God and asked Him to take care of it cause I was too tired to deal with it anymore. And as always, He delivered : 1) I was covered with peace & comfort 2) The lies were silenced 3) (I love it when He does this!) He spoke His truth over me "Others may see you as unable to do things, but the man I have for you will not. He will take care of you and provide for you as needed, as you will do for him. Others may see you as weak, but the man I have for you will see the strength that you have - the strength that matters. You're worth something special" Love it! He knows what He is doing, and my confidence is firmly rooted in Him and whatever crazy adventure He has planned. Didn't think that sort of thing would ever get shared on here, but what the heck. This Christmas break is all about deep healing and fear facing for me. Being vulnerable? Think I sound crazy? I don't really care, bro ^.^ On November 28th of 2011, my dear big sister got engaged to a wonderful man named Micah. On June 23rd of 2012 they were married. Years earlier when house sitting for someone, my sister was going through the homeowners wedding scrapbook that a friend had made for them. She was in awe of it, and wanted one of her own. So I told her that when the time came for her to get married, that would be my gift to her & her husband.
Well, their wedding date has come and gone, and on November 28th of this year (the 2 year anniversary of their engagement) I FINALLY finished their gift! After 1 1/2 years of sorting through photos, replacing 2-3 printers, deciding on & visualizing layouts, and finding time between work, church, and other recreational activities, it's finally finished. I was too lazy to take the pages out of their sleeves (also, though I absolutely loved making it, I'm quite done handling those pages), but I wanted to share at least some snapshots of it with ya'll. So, though the pictures aren't the best, here they are! 12/5/2013 TBT: I Can't Think Of A Good Title Right Now. But It's Not That Funny, So It's Okay.Read NowSo it was about one or two years ago, almost exactly. A friend and I were on a top secret mission involving tin foil (at least, I think it was the time of that particular mission). It was a cold winters night. Like, really cold. Like in the 20's-early 30's. It was cold. We ran out from the building we were in, straight to my car, where we frantically tried to deice my windows - apparently we hadn't taken that into consideration. We had to rush to my house before we could carry out our grand mission, and there wasn't any time to spare. The front and back windows took priority, so as soon as they were done we scrambled into the car and headed off. Now, there are turns you have to take in order to get to my house from the current destination we were in, and in order to turn safely, you need to see out of your side windows. We didn't, however, have time to defrost them. So I rolled my windows down for the first turn (they're automated), planning to just roll them up until the next turn.
They wouldn't roll up. I pressed the button numerous times, with various amounts of pressure - nothing worked. They were stuck. Did I mention it was FREEZING? So we drove the whole way home with the windows down, in fancy dresses, freezing our little britches off, and laughing at how ridiculous we were being. Why is that story funny? Turns out the windows weren't stuck, I was just pressing the wrong buttons the whole time. So we kinda suffered for nothing, cause I get my back windows and front windows mixed up. |
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