I Need Help to Feel Grateful

On Facebook there is a campaign to write something you are grateful for every day in the month of November. I wrote something on November 1st and then I have stayed away from Facebook because I didn't want to get into everyone's political statuses, etc. I don't consider myself a political person, but I am patriotic. I love my country and I feel it a privilege and a blessing that I live in America. I am a women and I get to vote. I have freedoms that others only dream of.

So why am I not feeling very grateful? I guess I am feeling so discouraged about my current situation and was really hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel. Now that tunnel has been blocked off and I sit here, another day going by, wondering how I am going to make my life better for me and my children. Yes, I believe it is ultimately my responsibility to make my life better, but again, that is a Republican notion and my country voted to let the Democratic government be responsible for me. So, tomorrow I have an appointment with the Medicaid office where I get to "choose" a health plan for me and my children. My food stamp EBT card should be arriving in the mail soon. I am grateful that these programs are in place to help me. I just wanted them to be a temporary stopping ground on my way to a better way of life for me and my children. Now I don't know how long I will be here using up tax money to care for my family. Some may say this is the easy way - food and healthcare for nothing. If it is so easy, why is it the hardest thing I've ever done? Why is it that I am crying while I am writing this blog? Because it's not the easy way. I cry wondering if I will ever be able to get a good enough job to support myself, let alone my children (and then of course, be able to afford child care while I am out working trying to support my family). I cry wondering how long I can keep my health under control with the amount of stress I feel. I cry wondering if there is any Balm in Gilead. I cry and have to answer my children the reason why.

Because I am a white, 43-year-old, divorced, single mother who has 2 children who both have long-term medical needs and has long-term medical needs of her own. Because I wanted to improve my standard of living and theirs. Because now I really don't know how I am going to do that on my own.

I need help, especially from my Democrat friends, to know what I have to look forward to. You voted for 4 more years of bigger government. Tell me why you haven't let me down. I don't want personal attacks. I don't want political party loyalty crap. I want real, intelligent, concrete reasons for why you voted the way you did and how I can have a reason to wake up tomorrow morning.

Because tomorrow morning I am waking up to take your tax dollars - apparently for a very long time.

I Was Out of Focus

I should have written this post sometime last week, but I kept putting it off. I'm hoping that my procrastination will help me today to remember the good I have learned.

I have been struggling with having faith that things in my life will work out okay. Lately I feel like every direction I turn the door is being shut in my face almost so fast that I can't even take one step forward. I know that is one of the Lord's ways of telling me not to go in that direction, but I'm feeling like EVERY step I take is the wrong way. I feel like I'm turning in circles trying to find the way to go.

I was able to attend the temple last Friday and I was gently reminded that I was putting my faith in people, situations and things rather than my Savior. I realized that I was putting my faith in the arm of flesh. I had taken my eyes off the Savior and found myself sinking. I have tried my best to focus back on my Savior and have instantly felt peace.

I would love to say that doors have opened and I know how things are going to work out, but I can't. Apparently my current trial of faith is to trust Christ that doors will open when they are supposed to open and that because of Him all things will work out. It will not be because of anything I do. I know at some point I will see things clearly and have understanding. Right now I have to focus on trusting and believing Christ. It is difficult for me, but I have hope that Christ can and will provide the miracles I need when I need them.

Psalms 37:5    Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.

Psalms 37:7    Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him

Faith? I Doubt it....

I know all the standard and trite (and true) expressions for the need for faith. I want to have faith - in fact, it is the greatest desire I have right now. How, though, do I have faith in the face of uncertainty, doubt, and seemingly impossible outcomes? I know, I know, that's the definition of faith! I know that God is a God of miracles. I know that faith precedes the miracle. I know all these things in my head and feel them in my heart. Why then does it feel so hard to do?
I know faith is strengthened when you exercise it but I don't know how to exercise faith more than I already am. I am weary from all the exercise - and lack of rest due to my seemingly endless need for more exercise. I feel like I "do" all the right things - pray, read scriptures, pay tithing, ask, wait, serve, attend church, attend the temple. I feel like I try to "be" who I am supposed to be - unselfish, charitable, kind - Christlike, but not perfect. I'm trying to have faith that my life will get better. I'm trying to have faith that God will keep His promises to me.

Is it ironic that I am so doubtful of my faith?

Amazing Apples

"Women are like apples on trees. The best ones are on the top of the tree. The men don't want to reach for the good ones because they are afraid of falling and don't want to get hurt. Instead, they just get the rotten apples from the ground that aren't so good, but easy. So the apples at the top think something is wrong with them, when in reality they are amazing. They just have to wait for the right man to come along, the one who's brave enough to climb all the way to the top because they value quality."                - Unknown

I'm not one who says a lot of nice things about myself, but do I think I'm amazing? Yes, actually I do. Then how come it's so hard not to think that something is wrong with me? Just waiting for a brave apple picker tends to do that, I guess.

The Hero in Your Soul

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle.
The world you desired can be won. It exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours.

 - Ayn Rand

It exists, it is real, it is possible, it is mine.

NIne Years

Nine years ago I became a mother. I did not give birth to him, but hopefully I have helped give life to him. He has given so much life to me. He is the funniest kid I know and has so much energy - and smart.....oh my, is he smart, too smart, maybe.
In nine more years he will be considered an adult. How does the time go by so fast? How fast will the next 9 years go? I'm crying already just thinking about it (really I am, but I think it has more to do with how emotional I have been all week). I remember seeing him for the first time and seeing his little mustache! I thought this kid will need to shave by the time he's 5 years old! He didn't need to, although he did try to shave once around that age and sliced himself up pretty good. He had the cutest face and biggest cheeks. He was my little boy and I was never happier. We video taped and took pictures of his every move. I remember just watching him do nothing but being mesmerized by him. Every day I have him is a gift and I want to remember and thank his sweet, courageous birth mom Elle for her gift of motherhood to me, and to Heavenly Father who guided her to place him in our home.
Our live are connected to each other a lot more we think. Pay attention to those people who come into your life, even for a short while.
A few years ago I wrote a poem for Alexander and was reminded of it a few days ago by a comment my niece made to my sister. Olivia is also adopted and she wanted to know why she didn't get to grow in her mommy's tummy because she really, really wanted to grow in HER tummy! I know how Olivia feels. I really wanted my children to grow in my tummy, too, but they grew somewhere else instead.  Here is Alexander's poem:

A Seed Sown in My Heart

I longed to be a mother

And the desire within me grew

I tried to do some other things

But deep inside I knew

That I would only be at peace

When you came in my life

But I did not yet understand

The pain and coming strife.

You would not enter easily

Though my arms were open wide

My body – it was broken

And my hopes and dreams all died

I believed there to be just one way

To see my dream obtained

For you to grow inside of me

Was the hope I could not gain.

The Lord showed me another way

To have you come to me

The way you came into the world

Was for more than one to see

Your birth affected many

And you’re loved beyond your years

For there were those who loved you first

And made a choice through many tears

That your life would be ours to raise

Though I did not give you birth

A gift of mother and a dad

To guide your life upon this earth.

I thought you had to grow inside

To make my life content

But what I’ve learned is that

You’ve made my inside grow instead

My heart is even bigger than

My belly will ever be

And I feel the love of God has come

From your life into me.

Now I realize that this love has been

With me right from the start

For your life was the seed of hope

That grew within my heart.

And Back Into the Light

"There are better things ahead than any we leave behind." - C.S. Lewis

"Yes, there will be moments of beginnings and moments of endings throughout our lives, but these are only markers along the way of the great middle of our eternal lives....Being always in the middle means that the game is never over, hope is never lost, defeat is never final. For no matter where we are or what our circumstances, an eternity of beginnings and an eternity of endings stretch out before us. - Deiter F. Uchtdorf

What a difference a day makes. And it's not just the day, it's everything that has happened in that day that has changed me into who I am able to be today. I wish I could have recorded my 1 1/2 hour conversations with my best friends to share all that I have learned. I hope my brain will help me remember all I feel that I need to write - I'm better at poetry.

Be patient with me as there are so many details I wish to share, but because it is late, I want to do it with a fresh mind.

Until tomorrow, then......