"Mistakes"

Each time He said,"My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness."

2 Corinthians 12:9a

Yesterday was one of those days.  And by that, I mean that in a lot of ways it was good, but in a lot of ways, it was bad.  

Yesterday was good because I accomplished a lot of things.  Because of the fact that I have spent so much time feeling unwell or emotionally drained by circumstances I have fallen behind in my household duties.  So it was really good that I have started to be able to get caught up if that ever really happens when you have a family of six.

However, I lost my focus.  I became so focused on the things that I felt I just HAD to get done, that I forgot to focus on my needs, physically and spiritually.  I didn't start the day off with God, I didn't take my medications and to make it worse, I didn't even eat until late afternoon and then I did not quite stick to my eating plan which all led up to me not feeling quite so well last night and when I don't feel well then I tend to be quite cranky and irritable which is not good for my family.  My sugar was higher than it had been for awhile, I started having some nerve pain in my feet and I had a dreadful headache.

So last night I took the time to read my Bible, (youversion is my favorite app) and a couple of devotionals and write in my prayer journal.  I awoke feeling better, with a clearer perspective.  I made a concerted effort to spend time with my Father and focus.  There are things that I need to get done, definitely, but I also need to balance taking care of responsibilities with taking care of myself.  

Some people may not see the need for balancing those two things.  Good for them!! I mean that but I live with a disease that can be and usually is progressive and affects almost every system in the human body, so taking care of myself HAS to be at the top of my priority list.  I want to not just live, I want to LIVE.  I do not want to merely exist struggling to get by on a daily basis fighting to keep my spirits up and stay faithful while I feel horrible when something can be done about it.  

I can be healthy, I can build up my home, in this case, my body, instead of tearing it down.  I took this from The Weight Loss Scriptures Devotional on youversion. It is wise to keep myself healthy because it will affect every aspect of my life.  

I learned from my mistakes yesterday.  I will probably make those same mistakes again, but I will try not to in the future.  

"Indeed, we all make many mistakes.

For if we could control our tongues,

we would be perfect,

and could also control ourselves

IN EVERY OTHER WAY."

James 3:2 (NLT)

The Power of Two Words

My how I am struggling with how to begin this post.  Today has been a remarkable day, yet at the same time "one of those days", if the two can exist together, they certainly are on this day.

It has been such a long time since I have posted a blog, and I never thought that it would be, but on the flip side, I never thought I could keep it up either.  Therein is the subject of my blog.

I was writing in my prayer journal today when I started to understand some things more clearly than I have been able to ever before.  I was writing about a certain issue going on in my life and how it was affecting my thinking.  That is when I had an epiphany about myself.

Those of us who grew up in the church have grown up hearing and learning the verse Philippians 4:13 for most of our lives.  Even those people who are new to the church, will know this verse or at least recognize it. 

"I can do all this through him who gives me strength"....or as I learned it "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength".

We grow up reading this verse, memorizing this verse, repeating it and hearing it over and over again.  But how far does it really reach into our hearts and minds?

This has been the case for me.  As I was writing about how I tend to dwell on my failures and inadequacies, I realized that there are two little words that have become such a huge part of my existence that I don't think I have ever really realized the impact they have had on my life, and this very day, this very hour and this very minute.

What are those words?  "I CAN'T".

I think that so often today those two words are thrown around with so little regard for their power.  As I was writing, this hit me exceptionally hard this morning.  The more I thought about it and wrote about it, the more I realized how often I use these words and how much they define my life.

I CAN'T deal with this situation anymore.

I CAN'T handle all of life's circumstances.

I CAN'T keep up with all the housework.

I CAN'T find balance to meet everyone's needs.

I CAN'T be as faithful or strong as that person, no matter how hard I try.

I CAN'T be the mom I want to be because I don't know how or am frustrated.

The list could go on forever.  Minor things, major things.  And while some things may never be fully achieved, at least the way that WE think that they should, simply thinking those words can have more power over you than you consider possible.  Those words become common.  The more common they become, the more they play like a tape in our mind.

"I CAN.......do all things through him who gives me strength."  In almost every version that I have looked at, the verse begins with those two words.

To me that meant something.  Yes, Christ is going to give me strength when I ask for it, but I also have to believe that with all the strength I am capable of.  I CAN.  I have to allow the words "I CAN'T" to be erased from the tape in my mind and replace them with the words I CAN.

Why?  Because Christ will give me the strength that I need, but I have to actually believe it.  He could give it to me, but I could be my human self and not accept it, or be blinded by circumstance and not see it.

Psalm 28:8 says "The Lord is the strength of his people...",  Isaiah 40:29 states "He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak."  And in Psalm 29:11 it says again, "The Lord gives strength to his people."

I am his people.  He means me.  He gives me strength so that I CAN.  And believe me, there are many things that I need to be doing that I fear I can't.  Being faithful, watching my mouth, controlling my temper, or getting healthy by eating right and exercising and...(confession time) quitting smoking. Then, of course, there is the regular day to day things like laundry, dishes, cleaning, you get the picture. 

Believing Him, believing His words and His truths, day by day.  That is the struggle...

I CAN, because He says I can!

Confessions

"For we are God's masterpiece."

Eph 2:10a (NLT)

I started writing this entry several years ago.  I was re-reading it this morning and I felt that this blog was important because it shares a lot about me and who I am. It also starts talking about my journey to mental and physical health. It reminded me of a place I once was and where I hope to return. So I have decided to go ahead and post it, to give an honest look at who I am.

Last night I was watching Parenthood, and earlier this week I was watching Army Wives...I fell in love with these shows!  Yes, they have interesting storylines, but that's not the reason why.  It's the connections and the relationships these people have with each other.  They fascinate me!

Relationships.  This is just not an area of expertise for me.  Let's face it, I just plain suck at relationships.  In all of my life, the most stable relationship I have ever had, and the one person who has stuck with me through it all has been my husband.  How this broken woman here, who struggles with relationships of all kinds ended up being in a marriage for almost 21 years now is pretty amazing when I think about it.

Oh, but I do struggle.  I just don't connect well with people, I don't trust people, and when I get too close I end up pulling away.  My life has left me scarred and wounded in ways that I am only beginning to understand.  From being abandoned as a baby by my mother, to living with a domineering and sometimes verbally abusive grandmother; to basically raising myself from the age of 15 on up because my grandfather just didn't know what to do with me.

Scarred, yes, very.  Wounded, even more so.  Broken, most definitely.

Every person has a story, and that is just part of mine.  But it is so important in this journey that I am on, this journey that I have chosen to take to spiritual, mental and physical wellness.  This is why I struggle so much in my relationship with Jesus.

Oh, how I have started to fall in love with Him. Oh, how I see how much better life is when I am putting my relationship with Him first...

And how hard life gets when I am not.

I find it so easy to believe IN Jesus, my savior.  But it is so much harder to BELIEVE Him.  It is so easy for me to fall into the trap of listening to the old script of my life, the rejection by my mother, the hurtful, abusive words of my grandmother, and the unintended neglect by my grandfather, who I worshipped and adored...

I have learned so much in this past year about Jesus, and God, and myself that sometimes I am overwhelmed by the beauty of it all and at the same time find myself in places where I struggle to comprehend just what...and why...He did what He did...for me.

It is hard for me to believe that I am loved...because I was abandoned by the one person who should have loved me more than anyone.  It is hard to believe that I am accepted because I spent so much of my life hearing how I was not.

Broken, to the point where I have felt at times I would never be whole.  Calling out to God and clinging to Him when my emotions of reality vs the truth of His Word threaten to overtake everything that I have tried to learn...and ACCEPT.

Kasey Van Norman got it right in Named by God, when she said that it is easy to believe in the God that created the world, and all the majestic things of the earth.  It's not so easy to believe that I am one of those majestic things God created.  That's not an exact quote, but it's close and it is so true.

I am so human, so flawed, so broken!  But I am learning that those things don't define me.  Struggling with that, but learning...I think that that is why Paul was so adamant in Philippians 4 about us dwelling on things that are true...because sometimes it takes tremendous effort to see and believe the truth when we are surrounded by lies.

I wish I were better, at so many things!  I wish I were different.  I find myself wondering what life would have been like....would BE like...if I had ever had a Mom and Dad, a strong family unit to surround me, or even a group of close friends who were always there for each other (Army Wives)...to have had that kind of bond earlier in my life...


Would I be different now?  Would I be stronger as a person?  Would I find it easier to build relationships and not feel so disconnected and alone?  Would it be easier for me to maintain my relationship with Jesus?  Or...is this life, what it took for me to turn to Him? Would I have been lost for eternity if I had had an easier life?

I don't know.  But I am learning, and I am trying to grow, change, forget the past...forget the lies.

So a couple of years have passed since I first started working on this entry, and I feel like I have had a two step forward one step back journey.  I have tried to go out of my way to make new friends and to be a friend.  I have not always been successful in that endeavor.  I have tried to remember that my Jesus always has to come first, I have not always been successful in that either.  However, I do find that the distance between the times when I am away from Him is getting to be less and less and that I do not wander as far.  I may not be in the Word every day like I should be, but somehow, He is usually on my mind in one way or the other.  I hope and I pray that I am older and wiser just from these few years.  For I am His and He is mine and ours is a beautiful love story.

The Lord your God is with you,

the Mighty Warrior who saves.

He will take great delight in you;

In His love,

He will no longer rebuke you,

but will REJOICE over you

with SINGING.

Zeph 3:17 (NIV)

John 16:33b  NLT "Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world."


Trials and sorrows.  Sometimes it doesn't seem fair.  But there it is, and in my Bible, it is written in red because it is what Jesus said. Now, I am definitely NOT a Bible teacher. I state that right now.  But I have been reading over and over about this and about how important it is for us in how we react when trials and sorrows come.  I will be the first to admit, that this used to make me very mad.  But as I have aged and matured in life, I am starting to really see the importance of this. 

So what does this have to do with my health?  Well, for one, it is very hard, if not sometimes entirely impossible to get up and fight the good fight, pick up your cross and follow Him, if you feel like crap.  I believe, in my own view that physical, mental, emotional health all go hand in hand with spiritual health. And since this verse does not say "if" you have trials and sorrows, but basically "when" you have trials and sorrows, that this verse makes it my responsibility to take care of myself and keep myself healthy, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically in order to follow after Him.  I'm not saying that you can't be a good Christian and be sick.  There are plenty of amazing Christians who have persevered through illness. I am saying that for me, personally, I struggle to have a good walk, strong faith when I don't feel well and when I feel that I am fighting against my own body. 

Several months ago, I got sick of myself.  My desire is to be a woman of deep and strong faith, and I just wasn't able to do that because I couldn't function due to my health. Being sick most of the time affected my mind, which then affected my emotions and went on to affect my spirit. So I decided to make a change. 

Because I am diabetic I have been struggling to maintain at least an even blood sugar reading throughout the day.  I would spike and feel drugged, and then I would drop and feel drugged, and I was so fatigued that not only could I not function, I could not even think clearly sometimes.  My vision was messed up, my brain was foggy. I had a hard time remembering words, names or dates. It affected my life in so many negative ways that I was not only sick, I was sick of myself.

One day, I just decided that I was not going to eat any more foods that contained sugar (of course), flour, corn, potatoes or rice.  I started buying veggie trays, frozen veggies and lots of salmon and chicken.  And at that time I was not too picky about the other things, such as dips or dressings.  But I started to feel better, and when I started to feel better and be able to function better, my mind was better and I was able to focus more, and my sugar was not going up and down nearly as much as before.  I was doing pretty good.  Better than I had in years.

Then I got sick again. What I thought was a routine UTI or kidney infection turned out to be diverticulitis.  I was sick for weeks, my sugar was back to spiking and dropping, or just being high. I was struggling to find a balance again. 

So I started researching and I decided to go full on keto.  But with the diverticulitis, I had to start slowly because there are questions about what foods can cause a flair-up, so it continues to be a slow process as I try and add more foods to my diet.  I am not a die-hard extremely strict keto follower, but in my research, I have found that that is okay.  And I am pleased with the results.

When I had diverticulitis, I did drop almost 20 pounds in like a week as I was unable to eat anything at all, and one of my biggest fears was that I would gain that weight back.  However, I have not.  I did gain a little bit back at first, but I am pleased that I have lost that and more.  Not only that, I have the benefit of feeling better, the neuropathy in my feet has gotten so much better I barely notice it anymore.  Much of the time my sugar is in a normal range.  And by normal, I mean that of a non-diabetic. 

One of the other problems I was having was that I was hot, all the time.  I have been having to freeze my family out of house and home because I could never get cool enough.  Within the last week or so, I have actually had to turn the air conditioner up because I have been cold.  So I think, hope and pray, that maybe my body temperature is starting to regulate itself a little better. 

Now, once again, I state that I am not a Dr.  I do not work in the medical field.  I am just telling you my experience and what I am seeing.  And there have been a couple of times where I have not stuck to the plan and I have ended up not feeling well.

I am starting to learn more and more what foods affect me badly, what foods make me feel better, what foods keep my sugar where it should be.  I am reading more labels, which is very, very important, and I have been doing more research. 

For me, this has been and is a positive experience.  One that I intend on keeping.  And I hope and pray that as I start to feel better and better, that it will become even easier to focus on my spiritual life and to pick up my cross and follow after Him with more gusto because He is my saving grace.

So I entitled my blog "A Simple View" because I am a simple person, and I do not think that I have complicated views of the world.  I also do not have just one subject that I am keen on writing about on a regular basis. So it's a struggle.  There are so many times when I have thoughts about something and I think to myself, "Oh, I need to write about this", but then I don't get around to it.  So I am at a point in my life where I think that I can start prioritizing things so that I have more time to organize my thoughts and ideas and start blogging on a more regular basis.  I really do hope this is the case.

Right now, my main issue going on is my health.  I am a stay at home mom, with four kids, three of which are teenagers and are starting to have busy lives with some extra classes and jobs and so forth, so a lot my time is driving people around taking them where they need to go and picking them up.  Unfortunately, due to circumstances I am driving around in a vehicle that does not have air conditioning and only one of the windows rolls all the way down and the Kansas heat is really getting to me. 

I am diabetic.  I am also uninsured.  So this is where my opinions come into play.  I have one very major opinion about diabetes right now and that is that there is not enough education out there that is informative enough to make people care about the fact that type 2 diabetes IS preventable. Which I am sure a lot, if not most, people know that fact, they don't have enough information to care about preventing it.  They don't know unless they live with someone who has it, how devastating living with type 2 diabetes can be. 

So I am going to tell you a little bit of my story and how it has affected my life. 

The first time I had diabetes, it was gestational with my last son.  However, I think that I should have probably have been diagnosed with at least my last three pregnancies with gestational diabetes.  Once you are diagnosed with it, you get thrown into all the classes and are given so much information that it can be very overwhelming, especially when you are pregnant.  Once you have gestational diabetes, you have a much higher chance of developing type 2 diabetes within 5 to 10 years. 

There is all kinds of information out there, but most people don't look at it until it is too late. Diabetes can develop without you knowing and you can actually have it for awhile before it gets diagnosed.

So my experience definitely isn't a worst case, but it hasn't been easy.    At first, I was exhausted all of the time.  We are not just talking tired like a little bit, I am saying that staying awake was almost impossible.  I was so fatigued and sleepy that my body hurt.  I couldn't understand what was wrong with me.  I was unable to really function in life because I was just too tired to do anything half of the time.  It made for being a lousy parent and wife and homemaker. 

After I was diagnosed, I was immediately put on a drug called Metformin.  Metformin is the go-to drug because it is inexpensive and it does work.  However, the side effects can be less than pleasant as it can cause all kinds of gastrointestinal issues, cramping, diarrhea etc. 

So while dealing with the fatigue and trying to get my blood sugar under control with Metformin at first which is still hard, because as much as they stress the importance of diet, you really have to start getting to know what affects your sugar.  And I was, and still am kind of horrible at it.  They recommend that you keep a food journal, which I would try to do, but let's admit it, as busy moms, sometimes keeping up with eating at all is almost too much, let alone writing it all down.

Then the foot stuff started happening.  At first, my feet just seemed to be extra sensitive.  The sheets irritated my toes.  Then my toes started feeling just kind of weird, kind of numb, kind of tingling, or somewhere in between.  After a while, it went from that to pain.  Then it started to spread from my toes to my feet.  There would be days where the pain in my feet would be unbearable.  Or sometimes my feet would feel like they were so cold that they were burning, but if I touched them, they felt fine. This is called neuropathy.  It can start in your feet, it can start in your hands.  This is external neuropathy, but you can also get internal neuropathy that affects other things.

Internal neuropathy can affect how your body regulates its temperature. Me, I can NOT be hot.  I feel so sorry for my family because I have to keep it pretty cool or cold.  I sweat, badly, it is really embarrassing.  When I get hot, my blood sugar goes up and then I get really tired. 

Internal neuropathy can also cause other issues, such as incontinence.  I am not going to go there, but it can happen. 

Your immune system gets compromised and therefore you can be sick a lot.  I catch everything that comes my way, and then it takes a long time to fight it off.  When we were living in the house that ended up having mold and everyone in the family got pneumonia?  I ended up getting septic pneumonia and had to stay in the hospital for 5 days because I was so sick and then it took months to recover, almost 6. 

These are just some of the things that I have dealt with over the last 5 to 6 years.  There are other ways that diabetes can affect you.  It messes with your head, it can cause depression, or make depression worse because if you feel awful all the time and you cannot function like a normal person you can end up berating yourself, feeling guilty, feeling worthless, just to name a few of the emotions it can bring on.  But for those of us who are trying to be Godly women and follow Christ, at least for me, it is extra hard.  Because it is hard to walk a loving and Godly walk when you feel like crap.  I am just being honest.  And there were and still are days when I am on my knees pleading with Him because I feel so miserable physically that I am emotionally drained.  I cling to Him in my mind and my heart.  I cling to my verses. 

So, this is just a little bit of what life is like for me as a diabetic.  I don't want to be the person who has diabetes defining their life.  So I have decided to change that.  I have decided to take control no matter what.  I have decided to put my health first, so that I can be the mom and the wife that I want to be and that my family deserves.  It's going to be a struggle. But at this point in my life, and at this age with new understanding that the 40s bring, I believe that I am ready to do this. 

So here I am.  This is me.  Hopefully, this journey will continue and I can move forward and get healthy!!! I'm looking forward to it.

Wow, I can't believe that it has been so long since I have written on this blog.  I have wanted to be a blogger for quite some time, but there is this thing going on called life and sometimes it gets in the way of things.

LIFE. That's such a big word or a small word. It can mean so many things.  Life is great, life is fun, life is boring, life is too busy...

Life, it happens to all of us and what I am learning is that I can either take it as it is, try to ignore it and move on, take what it hands me and try to make something positive of it, or try to take control of it.  I am still not quite sure what the best option is except that I am learning to respond and not react, although I am not perfect at it by a long shot.  There are just some situations that it is hard not to react to and this year has had quite a few of those situations.

We have had a lot to deal with in the past year or so.  We decided to move out of the apartment that we had been in for 7 years and try to find a bigger place.  That place happened to be a mobile home that had 4 bedrooms instead of 3, which had my oldest son over the moon because for once in his life he did not have to share a room, and at the age of 16, he more or less felt that was a right more than a privilege. No sooner did we get moved in and there were problems, culminating in everyone getting pneumonia and the house being declared toxic.

How did I react to that?  Probably better than I had in the past.  I didn't get really angry, I just decided to do something about it, but that didn't work out so well for me.  Try living in a hotel room with 6 people, 3 of them teenagers for 3 weeks.  Talk about working on patience and trying to respond instead of reacting.

We finally did find a new place to live and although it only has 3 bedrooms it is definitely bigger.  I actually really like it here, but there were still things that happened...such as sitting behind my steering wheel sobbing because of my brakes going out before my husband got to fix them and crashing into my house. I guess I didn't handle that so well.

Then there was my reaction to someone breaking into my van and not only going through it and stealing stuff like normal but actually egging it, on the inside. So there were eggshells and everything all over the interior of the van.  My reaction??? I posted something on Facebook that turned into a major thing, like a MAJOR thing.  I didn't respond to that situation, I reacted, and I reacted badly and I said some things that came back to bite me in the butt.

Not long after that, I was carjacked, in my own driveway none the less.  My husband's great little Chevy Cobalt was taken, and I was threatened with an assault rifle, which I later found out was most likely a BB gun. But I was held at gunpoint, told to turn and kneel in my driveway facing my house, which I wasn't about to do because my boys were sleeping just on the other side of that wall. So when he told me to give him my phone, I threw it at him and ran into the house screaming.  So that turned into a whole ordeal with me ending up in the hospital with a panic attack.  Apparently, I did not handle that situation well either.

A week later, a bullet went through our walls.  Yes, walls. It came through the outside wall over my eldest son's bed, and dropped and went through the next wall, barely missing my second eldest son by inches into the living room and we found the slug between our sofa and piano.  Of course in this situation, the first thing I did was grab my gun. This of course turned into yet another ordeal. 

We have learned lessons.  We have been angry, we have been depressed, we have been overjoyed by people who have loved us through it all.  More of life has happened to us, but that's life.  I guess what I am saying is that in this period of my life, I am learning, not perfectly, but working on and learning that how I respond to any given situation is more important than the situation itself. I am also learning, that I am not perfect, nor will I ever be perfect and it's o.k. when I mess up, because I have a God who loves me in spite of my flaws and my failures, and if I hold on to all of my mistakes then I turn into one miserable person. 

This has been my life for the past year.  I've learned, I've made mistakes, I've made people angry, I've had people stand beside me. It's been a year of lessons and growth and LIFE.  I hope that in the future, I continue to change for the better and can be an example to my family and that hopefully, knock on wood, we don't have another year that is as crazy as this last one has been.