It's Okay to Change Sometimes

Recently I read a meme posted by a conservative homeschool site. It had a picture of a child scribbling happily in the background and said in sweet curly letters, "Remember: Your worst day at home is still better than their best day in school."

Homeschool mothers chimed in, grateful for the encouragement. Last year I would have been one of those moms, desperate for even the tiniest morsel of confidence. The last two years of homeschooling had been absolutely brutal. It was like being locked in a cage with no key. Multiple pregnancies. Our rental house nearly sold out from under us. My grandpa's cancer diagnosis (that ultimately took his life). More than two months out of one year spent in North Carolina. And I'm supposed to do school?

Other moms encouraged me that there was grace, that we would catch up. The days slipped by and at the end of each one, I'd lay in bed in the evening feeling like a total failure. It wasn't only that I'd miss a day (or three) doing school, but when I completed school with my kids I felt like I was ruining their lives. Our time together would start gracefully and almost always end with one of us crying. I'd changed curriculum dozens of times and even found a curriculum I loved, but balancing the subjects, with a social life, with plain 'ole housekeeping was draining me of my will to even face another day [Feeling like you are failing your children is THE WORST].

Why did I persist?

Because I felt called. I felt convicted. I felt I belonged with this forerunning generation that wanted to have big families, live on homesteads, and have homechurch. There was this cliche that became so attractive to me because it looked wholesome and good. Please don't hear me putting down this way of life, because I'm not. My point is, I came out of the jungle of 6 years of homeschooling and realized what I was doing was not working for me. It took almost two years of tears and shame and hopelessness to figure it out because I lauded the idea of doing hard things, of leaning into grace, and persisting whatever the cost.

 I've realized in this season of my life that sometimes the HARDEST thing is giving up the life you thought you wanted to do what works best for your family. If you want to know what that looks like, it's the sound my kids fixing their own lunches in the mornings. It's the sound of my son messing up and making it right. It's my daughter thanking me for putting her in school. Or my son, who said recently, "Putting me in school is the best thing you ever did for me."

And I'm a good stay-at-home, Mom! I know that about myself. I make homemade snacks, we play board games, we sing and dance in the kitchen, we have fun. But one thing I'm not great at is challenging my kids. I'm also not great at getting out of the house for activities because I'm a homebody. My kids were desperate to get out often, which piled on the shame that I couldn't be who they needed me to be.

Since my big kids have been in school, I've had the quietest days. I jump on the trampoline with Phoenix. I play at least an hour of board games a day with Trinity. I color with Cori and we've started on phonics and a workbook. And when I'm face-to-face with my littlest ones, I feel grateful, first of all, that I had that same opportunity with my big kids once upon a time. As they grew, however, the responsibility to school them PLUS discipline them and be present in their lives was removing the energy and time I so desperately wanted to give to my middle children.

Today I played Go Fish and cried. Why? Because I wanted this so badly for so long. I wanted to give this time to my sweet Trinity, who is only going to be 5 years old once.

One thing I have so loved about homeschooling is keeping my children close. But I've realized that at times I do that against their will. I clip their wings, so-to-speak. Again, this is ME. This is my experience. I've watched them the last several years trying to pull away from me but I just couldn't let go. I couldn't swallow my pride. It was never about rebellion or hurt or conflict with my kids- it was about maturity. They were ready.

So when one of my children says, "This is the best thing you've ever done for me," regarding school, I take enormous offense to memes like I quoted above. It keeps moms like me stuck. It keeps us serving a movement instead of our children.

Do kids know best?

Not always. Obviously, I am the parent and I navigate what is in their best interests. I'm writing from the perspective of I know, now. Even on the worst days at school, they'd still rather attend school.

Jake and Sonora attend a hybrid school that only meets three days a week. It has been the perfect option, AND I still get to homeschool on Fridays. However, we are soon to be relocating to Austin and I am already on the hunt for the perfect school- not just for Jake and Sonora, but Cori, too. If it's full-time, we'll explore that route. My kids are worth it...and I'm starting to realize that I'm worth it, too.  All those days I went to sleep weighed down by shame that I wasn't who my kids needed me to be, now I don't feel that. Now I feel good that my 2-year-old is my buddy, not the greatest hindrance to my day. I love to play games with my little kids in the morning, and my older kids after dinner. I still love being a stay-at-home mom.

Guess what? The whole giving up who I wanted to be still hurts sometimes. Every now and then, shame will attach itself to that and take me down a dark road (why wasn't I enough for my kids?). But now I know that doesn't matter. If I take each season for what it is, make the best decision I can, that's what matters. Looking at each kid and asking myself what they need and how I can best fulfill that need, that is the kind of parent I want to be.

Intuitive. Flexible. Trusting. Safe.

And for myself, at peace.

Coming Home

When we lived in Redding, California I experienced a deep sense of belonging. I wondered how I’d ever live apart from that experience. It wasn’t just Bethel Church, or the friends I had made, or our backyard that grew fragrant with seasonal rose bushes. I developed this imaginary notion that Mount Shasta was mine. I searched for her every day, no matter where I was in town. Her snow-capped peak captivated me, and when I’d see her a feeling would swell up within my heart- I had a place to call home.

I remember telling God that I couldn’t leave Redding…but over time, my spirit begin to entertain transition. I’d think, “No, that’s not God’s plan.” I even painted a prophetic picture and hung it in my house. I titled it, “Prayer to stay in California” (of course).

I’ll never forget when I felt the shift. I was doing the dishes, of all things, and God’s voice penetrated my spirit.

“You’re leaving Redding.”

Such peace accompanied his voice that I kind of stood there with a wet sponge in my hand and accepted it without a fight. I knew that if God was asking us to leave, He’d only lead us somewhere better.

The hunt was on and I was excited.

I had spent years feasting on Revival history. Like my bizarre connection with Shasta, the idea of Revival happening in my lifetime felt like it was part of me. I took notes and listened to sermons. I’d pay any price. I could go into the backyard, sit among the roses, and hear God’s voice like a friend. I had dreams that I’d raise the dead and I believed it. I was destined for an extraordinary life!

So we moved to Texas.

It was miraculous how God gave the word and confirmed it. We were meant to move here, to form some of the most beautiful relationships we’ve had in our lifetime. However, Kerrville, Texas has truly been our wilderness.

Two weeks after we arrived, Paul did not get the job we moved here expecting. He transitioned into a six-month-long depression while I was pregnant, soon to have four children on my own. Paul got a job waiting tables. And everything, everything since, has been a fight to stand on what we know is the truth about God and His goodness, despite circumstance.

Recently our family was given the opportunity to move to Austin and we accepted. A close friend asked why I would ever leave...and why so quickly?

Honestly, I can’t wait to leave. Even with all the people I love- and there are incredible, salt of the earth people living right here in this little town- I am tired.

I tried to go deep today, sit with my feelings. Like a movie, my time here began playing through my head.

I was standing in my bedroom the day I learned my grandpa was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. That one detail set off a chain of events in my inner-world that caused immense pain. 

(If you haven’t watched someone you love die of cancer, I don’t recommend it)

I had two unplanned pregnancies in the middle of hard, life-shattering circumstances.

My husband worked five different jobs in five years.

We almost lost our house multiples times.

Relationships I expected to become partnerships- family- stagnated.

We transitioned out of two churches (soon to be three), all of which I loved. I had never even left a church before this season. I thought, honestly, that people who left churches were selfish and shallow. But, ladies and gentlemen, TWO CHURCH transitions in three years.

And more than anything, I forgot how to hope for anything good. I’ve let myself grow bitter, apathetic. I’ve been frustrated. I’ve doubted God’s nature, his faithfulness. I’ve felt filleted open, uncovered, exposed by my grief. And in the midst of it all, I’ve been responsible for my own discipleship, and that in itself is exhausting. In the last year, I’ve experienced two panic attacks in public. I don’t even recognize myself, or how to find her. I don’t know how to close my eyes anymore and hear God speak clearly. All I know is how to put one foot in front of the other and hope beyond all hope that it leads me out of this season.

Forgive my haste. I’m not in a hurry to leave Kerrville as much as I need something new. A new adventure. I need to remember what it feels like to abandon everything and have God standing on the other side.

I need to believe again.

Someone posted a picture of Shasta recently, my old friend. Such hope filled me that I might have a new home very soon, and I felt ready- finally- to sit with my grief, my pain, and say goodbye to the wilderness. It served its purpose but I’m ready to come home.

Enough.

I love when clarity drops into my lap as an unexpected gift, the voice of my Savior reminding me that it's all going to be okay. 

I haven’t had many of those moments lately. The dysfunction has felt heavy, like I’m sorting through dirty clothes, smelling piece by piece, determining what needs to be dealt with and what can wait a little longer. But last night I was sifting through a particularly smelly bunch and something happened. All that I’ve been learning about myself, about shame, about unhealthy mindsets came into focus and I had an epiphany. A moment of clarity. It was really beautiful and timely.

For me, this all began months ago while learning the Enneagram, this sorting of myself: the good, the bad, and the ugly. For one, as a neutral observation, I received validation that it’s normal for “people like me”- the 9- to have an ongoing conversation in my head, with myself. Talk about clarity...You mean this isn’t insanity?

No. It’s called ruminating and seems comparable to a cow chewing its cud. Dirty laundry - Cud, it’s always turning circles in my head. I also have an inner-critic, like most people, but to a greater extent with that strong 1 wing. It tells me that I’m one step away from losing everything, disappointing everyone. Yes, going insane. I have to daily retreat into the space of reality and love. These skills are both learned and chosen, they are the key to progress.

Out of this struggle, I began to devour Brene Brown books- about shame, imperfection, fear, all in contrast with whole-hearted living. It became glaringly obvious that I was not living from all of my heart, which caused me to do an even deeper dive into the Enneagram and personal growth.

Why am I stuck?

Why don’t I laugh?

Why don’t I dance?

Why am I choosy with my love?

I made a conscious effort to laugh more (and if you follow my facebook, you know the Weird Secondhand Finds group has been integral). I made a playlist of my favorite music, songs that make me feel like myself. I started singing them loud, teaching them to my kids...and yes, dancing.

But choosing to love and be loved has come a bit more slowly. I was standing in church last month, looking around and having an internal dialogue with myself, “I let this person love me, but not that person. I let this person love me, but not that person.” In the end, in a room full of more than a hundred people, there were only 2-3 people I had let close to me. I then tried to settle the blow by thinking, “Well, I don’t even know all these people.” To confirm this claim, I made another list, this time of all the people I trusted, the people I allowed to love me. And still, despite the fact I’d opened myself up to consider my entire circle, I only had about ten people on my list. As if God wanted to nudge me with His cosmic elbow, that very day the enneagram wisdom for 9’s was this:

At first I denied it, like a very good 9. “I am the most loving person there is!” But gradually I realized that just wasn’t true. I realized, instead, yet again, that I am very choosy with love. Very choosy with time. Very choosy with trust. And people very choosy with these things can come across as cold and detached. I don’t want to be that person.

I want to live whole-hearted.

In the pursuit, I finished another Brene Brown book. I listened to about ten podcasts on my Enneagram type. I started going out more, making plans. Becoming aware, present. Big growth, there!

Yesterday, however, I did not feel very grown up. I felt very small and detached. I was productive around the house. Heck, I was dressed before 8:00am! Yet, I had this nagging thought throughout the day that I wanted Paul to become desperately in love with me. It followed me around more persistently than my toddler, whispering in my ear, What if Paul was so obsessed with you, he’d never even look at another woman? It seemed perfectly logical to want Paul to love me more. As the evening progressed, instead of winding down, I powdered my face with makeup and combed my eyelashes. I painted on the mascara and lipstick. I chose a gown that was much too small for me at this stage in pregnancy, to which I apologized to Paul, "I'm sorry I'm fat and pale." And he replied, like a good husband, "Honey...you aren't fat." [When I was young, my nickname was "Snow White"]

He was not a fan of my plan to pursue him, to prove to him that I was worth loving, worth staying. He wanted to know why. 

I rolled onto my back and started the dirty laundry sorting process, and there it was. Earlier in the day, while innocently listening to one of my "authentically me" songs I had the thought, “I wish I could sing this song. I wish I could play it on my guitar. I wish I could play it for _______, and they’d think I was so cool and hip, and then they’d like me.” It was all subconscious, playing in the back of my mind: "I should buy this person a gift. I should make them dinner. I should write them right now and tell them a compliment."

It sounds like something a middle-school student would think, and yet, here I was. 

Thirty-two years old, trying to win someone over.

"Why do you care if this person likes you?" Paul asked. 

It was a valid question and I wasn't sure right off. As I lay there digging deeper and deeper, the truth revealed itself: I trusted them...and Holy crap, that's scary. I started to cry, "I think I'm going to let them love me." 

I looked over at Paul and realized why I'd been so relentless to pursue him. I trust him more than anyone else in the world...and that's a gift. It's a risk. 

Love and trust are vulnerability in its rawest form. Once I realized this, I got really excited...because I'm getting it. I'm letting myself become vulnerable so that all the insecurities float to the surface and I can name them:

Am I enough?

Cool enough?

Smart enough?

Pretty enough?

Social enough?

Emotionally healthy enough? 

I sit in this muck, this cud, and tell myself the truth. 

Worthiness is not determined by any action or stature or knowledge. It's determined by love- and I am loved, and I do belong. 

Yes, the stepping out is vulnerable. If I could remove every ounce of discomfort from my life, I would. Trust me, I'm an E9. Avoidance is what I do best, it's my first language. But it's exhausting to block love, it really is. It's isolating. It's not God's intention. Self-protection and facades are to building authentic community like sand is to the foundation of a house. 

Ah...but vulnerability within a relationship built on trust and love, it's the key to intimacy. It's the rock that steadies us. It's a journey worth taking, to overcome the shame and fear attached to vulnerability and allow ourselves to be fully loved. It's not what we do, but who we are: worthy. When we can begin to see ourselves as imperfect, but still worthy and good, this is when all the grace flows in. 

You are enough, and so am I. 

I am you.

Last week was your birthday but I tried not to think about it. I didn’t want to pause my day and think about you because I was enjoying my family. But the next day I stood in the shower beneath a steady stream of water and the thought occurred to me that I’d not let myself grieve and I needed to.

I cry a lot. Often I don’t know why I’m crying but there is an invisible pressure, almost like a knot that won’t come undone unless I surrender. Yet, when it comes to crying about you, I am endlessly eluded. Because I’ve forgiven you hundreds of times, and for each moment I choose to lay down my resentment, I find myself in another moment, crying, hating you again.

I didn’t always hate you. It was more like idolatry- your gifts, your talents, your stories, all on a ginormous pedestal of perfection. I didn’t care that you were an addict, that you walked out. I didn’t care that for more than half of my life you were homeless. I used forgiveness as padding for my heart, not allowing you to hurt me.

I knew pain, but not resentment. It was a quiet loneliness, a feeling within that no one could understand me like you, had you given me a chance. I was different than almost everyone else in my family- quiet, contemplative, content to be lost in the pages of a book, or outside, lost in my thoughts. I knew you’d understand me. My mom told how quiet you were, that the happiest she ever saw you was sitting on a porch with your guitar. I knew you loved the ocean, how you often ended up living there. I loved the ocean, too. I loved music. I loved culture. More than anything, I loved to write. You loved to write too. You sent me several letters throughout my childhood and I read through them until they disintegrated.

I grew older. My hope swelled. I wanted you to come for me, to know me as a fourteen-year-old. A fifteen-year-old. I wanted you to read my poetry, hear my stories. I wanted you to hear my voice. But the last time I heard from you I was thirteen. You called to tell me I had a brother. Then you said you were homeless and happy in the woods, and you wanted the entire world to leave you alone.

And I still hoped. I still believed that you were not too far gone. I have always believed outrageous things, about love, about possibility. I used to be brave like that.

I grew up attending Al-Anon alongside other children of addicts. I learned that you had a disease. I learned it wasn’t my fault. I knew the concepts and one-liners, but I never stopped believing you could just choose to love me. And I could choose to wait for you.

Then you died.

You were 36 years old. You killed yourself living on the streets, numbing your pain with drugs. You killed yourself.

I still wasn’t angry. I took the idol I had built and told myself it’d never die. I would live a life worthy of all that you were. I would embrace creativity and freedom. I’d play music. I’d love men on drugs, give myself to them, and swear it didn’t hurt me. I’d give them money, spend the night at crack houses, clean up vomit, do whatever it took to show you that I’d never be offended. I wasn’t angry. I forgave you. Then I waited- hoping, believing- that the theory of my childhood would prove true. Someone would turn from their addiction and choose me.

But it never freaking happened. Instead, I wound up pregnant. Single. Alone. I had to quit school.

And, somehow, I still wasn’t angry at you.

God began piecing together my identity, my heart. He began putting me back together. The symptoms of abandonment resurfaced again and again and I dealt with it methodically. Acknowledgment. Forgiveness. This has been the most frustrating part of my Christian journey, convincing God, convincing my pastor, convincing myself that I’m not angry.

I’ve dug into your past, the truth of what happened. Your parents abandoned you in a house without food and water. You were torn away from your siblings, placed in foster care. You were starved. You were abused. Later you were adopted by a family that meant well but was immediately overwhelmed by your baggage. They sent you back to the orphanage before trying one more time. You started running away when you were twelve. You started inhaling fumes from the lawnmower when you were thirteen. You married my mom when you were nineteen. 

I knew you were broken and it was easy to forgive you. I remembered when you tattooed my name and birthday across your back. To me, this was the very essence of love. I blamed you for nothing.

But last week I was sitting in therapy crying because I cry all the time and I never know why. My therapist asked me what I needed and I told her peace beyond the pain. Also, hope. How do I hope anymore? All of my hope, a lifetime of hope, was spent on you.

I don’t know where the heavy pain has come from. Maybe transition? When life shakes, I can no longer lie to myself about how safe everything is. Maybe it’s because I met my brother for the first time and I’ve seen and heard how abandonment affected him. I could forgive you for leaving me, somehow...but not him. It wasn’t okay that you left him.

What is clear to me is my Enneagram test results and how this has affected my life.

I am a 9, the Peacemaker.

Enneagram 9, The Peacemaker

Key Motivations: Want to create harmony in their environment,

to avoid conflicts and tension, to preserve things as they are,

to resist whatever would upset or disturb them.

The minute I tested for a 9, I knew you were a 9. I realized for the first time that as much as I’ve idolized your better qualities, I’ve never been able to look in the mirror and see your flaws.

But they are all over me. This was really why I went to see a therapist. I don’t know how to face pain. I don’t know how to feel anger. I don't give myself a voice. All I know is how to protect peace, which often results in numbing myself to this beautiful life. I have missed so much life for having locked myself in the bedroom to be quiet. I thought I was being creative, but I have no idea what being honest looks like. I thought I was being contemplative, but I actually don’t know how to be still. Perhaps most telling of all was when she asked me if I’d ever been suicidal.

“Do you want to die?”

I said no right away because it’s true, I don’t want to die. Still, I squirmed in my seat. “Sometimes I think the world would be better off without me.”

It hit me like a freight train. I am you. I am more than eloquent words and a quiet soul. I am more than compassion and tenderness.

I am a runner. Like you.

I hate this about myself. And for the first time in my entire life, I realized that I hated you. I cried in the shower the other night because I hated you. I am angry. I don’t even know what to do with this emotion, how out of control and empty it feels. I don’t know if I’ve ever felt the full force of it before. But I have to let myself feel it.

I have to stop telling myself that you running was for my own good. That you made everything better by your poor choices.

Rehab would have been for my own good. A therapist would have been for my own good.

A dad.

I’m sure it was torturous to know what you’d given up for man-constructed peace, John and I. In that way, I have compassion. I’ve felt a sliver of this in the last year, having escaped into my inner-world to avoid pain. I miss my kids. I miss laughter. I miss the quietness of God’s voice. It is torture to run. It is torture to avoid stillness. I actually think we could sit and have a conversation about this had you not checked out of your own life, let yourself die. 

I just wanted to tell you that I am angry, finally. I forgave you yesterday and I’ll probably have to do it again tomorrow.

Yet, even though I’m angry, I still find myself grateful… a strange dichotomy. I like being a Peacemaker. I’m grateful you gave me a brother, a little piece of you to know and love.

I imagine the three of us would have really enjoyed one another’s company.

But I’m tired of romanticizing it all for comfort. It can’t happen, because you’re gone.

All we have left is our own lives, our broken hearts. A million questions. And still, a choice: to be engaged in our lives… to heal…. to feel…. to be present.

To stay. No matter the pain, I will stay.