Seeking Peace

You wouldn't necessarily know this since I didn't blog much (okay, barely at all) last year, but I spent the majority of 2014 feeling very restless and a little crazy. I don't usually have a great memory about specifics, but I remember January and February of last year very well because I was so miserable. There was so much snow. There was so little school. The kids were sick. And I couldn't get to work. That started my quest to regain some order and peace in my family's crazy life. I looked for the most reliable childcare options possible, even if they weren't what I would have chosen if reliability wasn't my first goal. That did help some. But I spent much of the rest of the year just marveling at the chaos of our life.

**********
Flashback to 8+ years ago: When Nate was born, I went back to work, first part time and then full time. He got sick so often that winter because: preemie, and daycare. Looking back, that was such a dumb decision. I was all, "He'll be fine! You shouldn't 'baby' babies so much! Back in my day ...." But after Nate was hospitalized twice with pneumonia, after holding him down so they could put an IV in his head, and after all manner of traumatizing experiences, enough was enough. I had never even considered the possibility of being a stay at home mom. Never ever. When I was a girl, I dreamed of moving to the big city and having an exciting career. I probably thought about having children too, but I don't recall a single daydream about staying home with babies. So one night at Walmart I was browsing the book aisle and saw a book about being a stay at home mom and for some reason picked it up and bought it. As I read it, God changed my heart. This is what I needed to do for my son at that point. I needed to keep him home to keep him healthy and help him with his development (Spina Bifida, physical therapy, that stuff).

So I quit my job, even when it didn't make sense, you know ... financially. Blake fully agreed with me and supported me, and he picked up a second job waiting tables after he was done selling mortgages all day. (I'm pretty sure that's what he does.) A few months later, the company he worked for in Lexington closed their office--a SCARY time for us--but transferred him to Tennessee. For six months he drove 2 hours to work and 2 hours back every single day while I worked on selling our home. We finally sold and moved to Tennessee, and two months after moving into a rental town home, that office shut down too. We were freaking out. His mom suggested he look for jobs in Louisville since nothing was panning out in Lexington. He applied for a job and got an IMMEDIATE call. He got the job, we came to Louisville to look for houses, and we bought this house that weekend. We still absolutely love Louisville 6.5 years later. I look back and marvel at that time in our family's life, because God orchestrated all of it, and we were just following even when it didn't make sense. If I had been working when Blake lost his job, it would have been a much more complicated decision to move, and I'm not sure we would have because I know me, and I probably would have gone all "But MY job!"

I had a pretty good hunch that one of the big reasons God moved us to Louisville was so I could get involved with the Spina Bifida Association of Kentucky. I was already working with them on a project to help expectant moms as part of my master's degree, but living in the same city meant we could get very involved in programs. We had Walk-N-Roll teams, we went to playgroups and holiday parties, and I finally finished my project and my master's program about a month before Georgia was born.

I thoroughly enjoyed staying at home. I loved the flexibility of it, and not having to feel like I was letting someone down if I had to stay home with a sick kid. I also worked very hard with Nate during my time at home, and we got that boy walking! (I am not sure how much I actually had to do with that, but I'll forever claim it as a victory anyway.) And of course we made wonderful memories, and I took a lot of pictures, and I even occasionally got a nap.

But that spring before Georgia turned one, I started feeling frustrated. I felt cooped up in the house. I complained that some days the most complex problem my brained tackled was how to most strategically load the dishwasher. I felt stuck. So when the program coordinator from SBAK called me to tell me she was leaving for another job, I had the terrible tact to announce that I wanted to apply for the job. I prayed about it, and I was (and still am) certain that was exactly where God wanted me. I LOVED that job. I was one of those annoying people who constantly told others that I had the best job on the planet. It didn't feel like work. I was so stimulated, mentally and creatively, and felt like I was truly making a difference in other people's lives.

Then the Executive Director job came open. At first, when people asked me if I was interested in applying, I adamantly said no. Why would I? I love my current job! Plus, I wasn't fully qualified for the ED job. But over the next couple of months, God was working on me. I told Him He was crazy for thinking I could do that job. He told me I should do it anyway, and He would work through me. After much prayer and even testing Him a little through the process, I became absolutely certain that was where God wanted me. I applied and interviewed, and to be honest I kicked butt in that interview. I surprised myself. Or I should say that God showed up and made me look really good. I got the job, and I was basically scared to death.

For 3.5 years, I showed up to work fully aware that I was not enough for that job, but I was clinging to Him. I prayed a lot. (Probably why God put me in this situation, so I would have to lean on Him.) I prayed before speaking engagements, I prayed before employee evaluations, and I prayed over grant applications as I put them in the mail. And it was the most thrilling experience I've ever had. What an amazing opportunity to expand my skills and try things I'd otherwise never have the chance to. I designed billboards! I spoke at the Spina Bifida National Conference! I was part of a viral video! I started a satellite office in Lexington! Over those 3.5 years, I assembled a team, and we changed the face of the organization. It was amazing.

When I started, I knew it would be tough to do this BIG JOB and to do it well, with two little kids at home. I got the job in September, and that fall was when Nate had a bunch of health complications and surgeries. Then in January I discovered I was pregnant! Surprise! How in the world was I going to throw another kid in the mix when I was already in way over my head? God wasn't surprised or the least bit concerned. He assured me that He had this. I went back to work five weeks after Bo was born, and at most programs he was strapped onto me in a baby carrier. I pumped in my office. I was a zombie for a few months. But we were still doing really great things, miraculously.

*****
So back to last year. It felt like everything was spinning out of control. It was becoming increasingly more difficult to find the floor of our home. I got so frustrated when one of the kids was sick and I had to stay home because I HAD WORK TO DO. So I spent sick days juggling my little beloved and checking emails and working on whatever project was at hand. Last year was also when we finally got to the bottom of Nate's quirks and behavior issues. We took him to an amazing doctor who evaluated him and diagnosed him with Generalized Anxiety Disorder. We decided to try medication to give him a little relief from his own misery, and we started therapy for him. At some point in the year I started noticing that Georgia is also dealing with her own anxiety. It looks different, but it's just as concerning. I do believe that their anxiety is inherited (Blake has battled anxiety since childhood, though he didn't have an official diagnosis until he was an adult), but I had to admit that our crazy life wasn't helping anything.

So, what do I mean by crazy life. We have the typical crazy mornings of anyone with multiple kids in school. They can't find their shoes, they take too long to eat breakfast, where is your homework? That kind of stuff. But add in extremely terrible moods, the fact that I am not a morning person at all, and my own stress that if I don't get all these little people where they need to be on time, I will be late for work. Many, many, many days, after huge battles and fights and tears and regretted words in the morning, I would no sooner get settled into work before I would get a phone call that someone was sick or forgot their backpack or a thousand other reasons for me to have to leave work. If I did work a full day, I would try to milk every second I could out of it because I didn't know if I would be there the next day, and I would end up leaving a few minutes late, and then stuck in traffic, and completely STRESSED OUT that I wasn't going to make it in time. Either to pick up the kids from daycare and after school care or for the nanny to leave on time. Every single day, I was so stressed that my stomach was in knots on the way home. I hated it. Then when I got home, we often had to immediately head out to therapy or an appointment, run through a drive through for dinner, all the kids were tired and cranky, and then we had to do bedtime routines and get ready to do it all again the next day. I don't want to sound like a martyr here, because Blake picked up a ton of the slack. For much of the time I was working, he was the primary cook and did the majority of the laundry and probably half of the dishes. And by the time I got home I was just so tired--mostly mentally and emotionally--that I just plain old didn't feel like doing anything. I didn't like what our life had become. I didn't know how to get off the crazy train. Still, I loved my job. I really, really did. I loved that organization and everything we were doing. And I felt so torn because I never felt like I was doing enough for SBAK, or that I was doing enough for my family. It was one thing to choose a crazy life for myself, but I realized it was affecting my kids and Blake too.

Last summer, on a whim, I ordered the book "Interrupted" by my fav Christian author Jen Hatmaker. I had already read her book "7" in 2013 and it had turned my life upside down for awhile, so I was prepared that it could happen again. And it did. The premise of the book is that Jen was feeling spiritually dead, despite all the good Christian-y things she was doing, so she prayed, "Lord, raise in my a holy passion." And it completely changed her life. So with some trepidation, I started praying the same prayer. That's a dangerous prayer, and I knew it. But I was also desperate to feel spiritually whole again instead of so spread thin and fragmented.

About a month later was the kids' first day of school. It was a very emotional day. First of all, Nate rode the regular school bus instead of the special needs bus for the first time. I'll always remember him climbing those steps on his own. Even bigger, Georgia started Kindergarten. After I saw them board the bus, Bo and I went to school to greet them as they entered. (I know, lame, but the school asked that bus riders actually ride the bus the first day and suggested parents meet their Kindergartners at school. So it wasn't my idea, but I was relieved at the suggestion.) They were nervous, but everything was fine. And THEN, if that wasn't enough, I dropped Bo off for his first day of daycare at a new "real" daycare. (Previously he was at an in-home daycare with someone we had been sending all three kids to for years.) The previous day we had dropped in for about an hour to sort of introduce him to the place, and I was just haunted by this other little two year old who incessantly--the entire time I was there--bawled "Mommy comin later .... Mommy comin later .... Mommy comin later...." This sad child just kept repeating what the teacher said to comfort her. I couldn't hold back the tears! I still tear up thinking about that. Of course she got used to daycare and is still there and doing fine, but I was just so sad about it all. I strategically dropped Bo off that morning during outside play time, and he couldn't have cared less if I ever came back as long as he got to play outside.

I went to the parking lot and sat in my van and cried and texted Blake to tell him about the morning. He texted back "I wish we could afford for you to stay home with the kids." Three months earlier, I would have probably been really irritated that he said that and even spouted off something defensive about how he didn't think my job was important. But that day, I truthfully answered back, "Me too."

God is so tricky! It amazes me how He not only shows us what He wants us to do next, but he also MAKES US WANT TO DO IT. Over the past nearly five years of working at SBAK, I had no desire to stop working! I'm sure I told a dozen people in various conversations that although I was grateful for my time at home with Nate and Georgia, staying at home just wasn't right for me right now. And that is actually true! It wasn't right for me then. But all of a sudden, it was right. And I want to make that clear--I don't believe that God wants all women to leave their jobs and stay home to raise babies. I don't believe it because I KNOW in my heart that God wanted me to work at SBAK during that time period. But in 2014, starting in the beginning of the year and increasingly as the months went by, He made me restless enough that by the time I dropped the kids off for their first day of school, I was ready to accept that He wanted me to make a change. God knows He has to make me miserable before I'll consent to a big change like that. After that, day by day I became more and more miserable. He was clearly speaking to me. I started longing to be at home. Work started mattering less and less to me. And one day shortly after that text convo, one of us brought it up again. Blake and I were both in agreement that we didn't know how, but we knew I had to quit my job.

That was HARD. That job was a part of me, and it was sometimes physically painful to think about separating myself from it. We made the decision in September that I would resign, but we figured it would be spring or summer of this year before we were financially ready to lose my income. We started taking steps to pay off or consolidate debt, decrease any monthly payments we could, etc. I kept asking God when I should leave, and it was so annoying that all I heard back, every time, was "Now." Um, God? You know I can't just leave, right? I mean, what would they DO? The Walk-N-Roll is coming up, I just hired a new staff person who isn't fully trained yet, and I can't just leave a gap while they find a new ED." Even then, I knew God was chuckling at me and my arrogance and lack of faith. One day I told Blake that I didn't think I could wait until spring to quit. I thought I should be done by the end of the year. He said he didn't think there was any way we could be ready by then. And I said, "I don't think God really cares what you think." He thought about it for less than a minute and said, "If that's what God's telling you, that's what we'll do." Oh, I am so glad I'm married to a man who knows the same God I know. If I was married to a non-believer and said something like that, they would think I was crazy and would never respect my reasoning for decisions. I gave my notice in early November and promised my board chair I wouldn't leave a gap. God kept it up with allowing life to get harder and harder. :) Hey, he told me "Now"! I really wonder what might have happened if I had actually listened. I know for one thing my Christmas season would have been a lot more enjoyable. I was pretty miserable in December. I was stressed about the shopping and the planning and the traveling and the finishing up work and the holiday parties. It wasn't fun. But once Christmas was finally here, we did have a very nice Christmas.

A few days after Christmas, we left for a week long vacation to Florida. Even though I wasn't "officially" done with work, it felt like the beginning of a new chapter. It was such a relaxing week just spending time with our little family. When we came back, I had already taken Bo out of daycare, and I worked part time for two weeks until the new ED was named. And she is one of the staff people I hired, and I think she will do such a great job leading SBAK. In many ways, she will do a much better job. And what a lovely way to leave a job--on good terms, continuing to volunteer for the things I'm passionate about, and able to say no to things I don't want to do anymore. She asked me once how I feel about leaving. Am I sad? Not anymore. I think I would be sad if God hadn't made it so definitely clear that this is the right decision and the best thing for me and my whole family. He doesn't just make willy-nilly decisions. I can rest assured that He has good plans for me. Plans to prosper me, not to harm me. One of the most overwhelming feelings I have leaving SBAK is (I regret to admit) relief. For 3.5 years, the organization rested on my shoulders. That was an honor for me, but it was still a great weight. I also tried really hard to not feel like a failure. I wanted to stay in that job for at least 5 years to provide stability to the organization. But I have just accepted that I was only meant to be there for a season to provide a transition from one ED to the next, and to accomplish a few specific purposes. I may never know the full extent of any impact I had, but I just have to be satisfied that I did the best I could, by the grace of God, and that is plenty good enough. I am also filled with anticipation and excitement. See, I know that God wants me home to spend precious years with Bo. I know he wants me to take better care of my people. But I also think he has some surprises in store for me. Some plans that I couldn't even dream up if I tried, and that I wouldn't be available for if I was working full time. I have some ideas about what those could be, but I don't even want to speculate too much. It's like knowing someone bought you a special gift, and you just savor the anticipation of the surprise, knowing they loved you enough to do something amazing for you and that they want to present it to you at just the perfect time.

Last week I heard myself telling someone that I was trying to create a more peaceful house, and that was the first time it really hit me that that is what is driving everything I'm doing right now. (Hello, Colleen, have we met?) That's why I left my job. That's why I'm so stupidly excited that I am finally, after 2.5 weeks home, caught up on laundry. We've also started some remodeling projects (not typically peaceful, but this hasn't been bad), and I just realized today that I've chosen very peaceful paint colors to replace the bright and crazy colors on the walls now. I've been looking into essential oils more and started diffusing lavender to try help the kids' anxiety, and Sunday night when some friends were over for a Super Bowl party, one of them actually said, "Your house seems really calm." So it's working? I'm trying to create a more peaceful home to combat the chaos we have experienced for a few years now but especially the last 12 months. I'm trying to help the kids learn how to manage their anxiety, instead of contributing to it with a crazy schedule and unorganized home. I love this verse: "My people will live in peaceful dwelling places, in secure homes, in undisturbed places of rest." (Isaiah 32:18) But it just dawned on me a few hours ago that, even though the steps I'm taking toward peace are important, the key to peace isn't having enough drawer space to fit all of our clothes, or having a schedule for me to grocery shop every Monday so we have something the kids like to eat for breakfast every morning, or even me and Bo greeting the kids at the bus stop each afternoon. No, the key to peace is God Himself. He tells us to seek and pursue peace, and he will bless us with it. I am so thirsty for His peace, and it's my greatest wish for my husband and children.

I hope this won't be my only blog post of 2015. One of my many goals for my time at home--however long it may be--is to once again record my favorite memories and all the wonderful and funny things the kids say that I will want to always remember. Here's to a great 2015.