I'm Coming Back. Ever so slowly.

I'm coming back to the blog world. Ever so slowly.

Truly, I never really left. I just walked away from this space in the hopes of redefining myself in another space. In other words... I got scared and I ran. Which I'm really quite good at it. Except I have two bum knees and can't run so fast.

After several months, God caught up with me. I rested. And now, all of a sudden, I can't shake this ever present feeling that I need to write. That even though I am busy and filled to the brim and not quite sure what is going on in my own life half of the time.... I need to write.

So here I am.

Except I'm first going to post the heartfelt posts I originally wrote on the blog I ran away to (Not Quite Qualified) and then start with some new musings and writings. GULP. I hope you'll stick around. And I hope my words will no longer stick in my throat, my heart, my stomach, really anywhere but on the pages they are meant to fill - both literally and figuratively.

A lot has changed over the past almost eight months but a lot is also the same.

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I Don't Know How You Do It (originally posted on March 7, 2014) at http://notquitequalified.net

"I don't know how you do it."

Those seven words are often uttered with a mixture of awe, confusion, frustration, and slight judgement. Whether people mean for those words to come out in such a way is an entirely different matter. I can not speak for another person. I can only share how I feel on the receiving end of the words.

I'm no different than anyone else. Truly. I struggle just as much (if not more) than other people. I have my good days, and I have my bad days. There are times when I get everything done, and there are more times when it feels as though every aspect of my life is crashing down. More often than not, it feels as though my body is under water and my head is slipping beneath the waves - my arms and legs too sore and worn out from treading water for so long to be able to hold me up above the surface for even just a second more.

They say that in our weaknesses He (meaning Jesus) is strong. I can't argue against what they say because I know it to be true. But often I can't see his strength as I am too busy holding onto my own.

The thing is that I am good at balancing multiple tasks. I tend to thrive when I'm busy, overwhelmed, under pressure, and all too scattered. During the moments of silence and solitude, I struggle to get anything done. But what I'm finding now is that this thriving is slowly giving way to (what I feel is) failing.

I can't keep my head above water much longer. But I'm not so tired that I'm read to see just how strong Jesus is.

Maybe it's a woman thing. It could be a social worker thing. Or possibly a foster parent thing. Either way, I am all three.

And no, I don't know how I do it. Most days, I don't feel like I do it. And that it could be anything at all. It's parenting, it's responding to any number of crises in a reasonable amount of time, it's being married (because, yeah, I'm a wife too), it's studying or writing a paper (did I mention I'm in grad school?), it's pretending to wash, fold, and put away the neverending amounts of laundry, it's cooking a somewhat healthy dinner.

In my weakness, He is made strong. You would think I'd be about ready to fully realize the truth of that often overused statement. You would also think that my arms would be chiseled to near perfection (my thighs, stomach, and butt too) from all the treading of water. But you'd be wrong there, too.

For whatever reason, I am here in this stage of life. It's a stage of life that makes absolutely no sense. A stage of life that leaves me speechless and overwhelmed on a daily basis. A stage of life that constantly results in me whispering "oh my" and looking around in the hopes of understanding at least some of the craziness that makes up my reality.

The only thing I know is that I have been called. I have been called to the frontlines of the orphan crisis. I have been placed in the positions I hold. Even on my worst days (and those seem to be increasing in number), God has decided that I am one of the ones He has sent. And while it's more than tempting to turn around and run the other way (or to just go to Mexico and peace out with a margarita for forever), I'm staying where God has placed me and praying that He might provide me with clarity and knowledge that supersedes anything I could possibly hope to create.

God does not call the qualified. Instead, He qualifies the called. I am the ever changing proof of the truth in those statements as I am not qualified for any of the roles in my life.

Welcome to the insanity, the craziness, the neverending questions. Welcome to learning that I can't do it. Welcome to my accepting of the call in the hopes of becoming maybe the tiniest qualified.

a knee update

It's been a roller coaster of emotions and of pain since surgery Friday morning. My husband has been there with me every step of the way - even falling asleep on the living room floor Saturday night holding my hand because he knew I couldn't fall asleep by myself. He's helped me off the couch and into the bathroom and then back onto the couch. He's been my cheerleader as I've used my crutches to make it through the downstairs of our house.

I'm doing okay. My mom says I look great and sound great. And compared to the last knee surgery I had 10 years ago, I am doing much better. But it's still hard. And I feel like the farther I move from surgery the more it starts to hurt.

I want to be able to get through this just with ibuprofen, but my lack of pain tolerance makes that impossible. So I tried just taking a pain pill very four hours which worked for a little while and then stopped. Now I am back to a combination of ibuprofen and pain pills.

I shared this tweet with my mom and my husband earlier today. And I retweeted it. I'm sharing it here now because it's giving me a lot of strength. And I hope it does the same for you.

I feel blessed and loved to have someone dedicate a run to me. And I feel inspired to do the same once I am off the couch and finished with rehab.

I also am reminded of how far I have come since I started this journey. Yes, I've lost weight, but more than that, I feel like I have gained so much knowledge about myself. And I've grown to have close relationships. It's been a difficult few years but they have been more than worth it. I'm excited to see what the next year hold as far as losing weight, finding myself, and building closer relationships.

The amount of love being sent my way and the amount of prayers has been remarkable. I've felt every bit of it, and it's reminded me that I will get through this surgery and I will come back even stronger.

The surgery itself was a success from what the orthopedic surgeon told my husband and mother-in-law. It was open knee surgery, so I will have a scar the runs the length of my knee. The surgeon feels as though he stabilized my patella (my husband might have also added that it's amazing I went as long as I did without surgery) by tightening and moving my muscles. He cleaned up quite a bit of cartilage as well.

Surgery won't fix all the issues. I'll spend a lot of time in physical therapy and rehabbing my knee. But this was the start. It makes me feel grateful for the opportunity to have knee surgery - not everyone can afford the surgery itself or taking time off work.

It's a blessing to get to share this part of my story with you all. I'm excited to continue to share with you all. Life has been moving so quickly and in so many wonderful ways. I know this knee surgery will turn out to be a wonderful things.

Thank you all for being here. For commenting on my posts and for following along. I haven't been the best at responding to comments, but I do read every single one.

And thank you again, Laurie, for taking the time to dedicate a run to me. You've inspired me to stay strong and see the end result of getting off the couch as soon as I can.

a brighter day is coming my way

Today is Wednesday. It should be another Weight Loss Wednesday, but it's been 13 days since I've updated. And I feel like I owe an explanation of sorts.

We closed on our house the very last day of November and then moved the next day - the first day of December. It took us two weeks to have internet installed so my updates were sparse and short at best. I was excited for the date on which internet would be installed because then I could return to the world of blogging. I had hopes that we would be settled and fully unpacked in our house by that time as well.

We were close. There was still the garage to tackle and more boxes to unpack than I wanted to admit. But we were getting there. And we'd have the entire weekend to work together on unpacking and organizing our house.

And then I had an accident. I was at the Oklahoma City Thunder game on December 14th. It was a wonderful opportunity - one provided by the Thunder who donated several tickets to children in foster care. I had the chance to take one of my girls to the game. Everything was going well until I tackled the stairs.

It was the middle of the first quarter, and we were going to get food from one of the vendors. Three-quarters of the way down the steep, steep stairs, the patella in my left knee dislocated and I fell straight down, landing on the edge of a cement stair. My patella went back in as quickly as it moved out of place, and I forced myself off the stairs.

I'm not a stranger to dislocation of my patella. It's something that has happened for years on end, but this time, it felt different. My knee was weaker than normal, and it hurt more than normal.

I stayed for the entire game. I wanted to leave. Being at the game should have been enjoyable but instead I worried and prayed the entire time. Something felt different. Really different. And it most certainly was not a good different. I convinced myself that I tore my ACL. There's still a part of me that worries that is what happened although the doctors I've seen have said they don't think that's what I did.

No matter my fears, I had to stay. I was at the game for the kids, and I stayed at the game for the kids. After the game, I carefully made my way down the stairs and then walked the almost mile to my car. I kept the tears at bay until I dropped my kids off and then completely lost it when I called my husband to tell him I was on my way to the Emergency Room.

By the time I made it to the ER, I could barely walk or talk. Tears gripped my throat and flowed down my cheeks. I was lucky that the ER saw me within 15 minutes. The X-Ray didn't show any breaks and a preliminary test showed that I had likely just sprained (badly sprained) my knee. I was sent home with  a prescription for pain killers and instructions to rest and ice my knee.

My husband did a wonderful job of taking care of me for the weekend. I spent most of my time over the weekend walking with crutches when I wasn't spread out on the couch. By the end of the day Sunday, I was able to hobble without the crutches, and I made it to work on Monday. My dogs also did a wonderful job of resting with me, cuddling with me, and loving on me. They're still on duty now - curled up at my feet and helping me blog.

The past few weeks haven't been the best for diet or exercise. It started because I was busy and lazy with food choices. Then it turned into a need to rest my knee. Now I think it's just excuses. And I need to start over (yet again).

At church on Sunday, someone asked me if I was focusing on just upper body now for work outs. Or if I were swimming instead. I stood there and stumbled over my response. Because I let the injury be the reason for my lack of exercise and weight loss instead of finding a solution.

I don't want to let every difficulty send me off track. I want to take whatever life throws at me and turn it around instead of letting it turn me around.

I did that some with Christmas. I didn't let the things that could have easily stolen my joy do that. Instead I held tight to the reason for the season and enjoyed the holidays even though they didn't go according to plan.

Now it's time to do just that with weight loss.

I refuse to let my injury (MRI pending for January with a real diagnosis of what I did) stop me. Instead I am going to learn from it. And what have I learned from it so far? That's something I will have to wait and share.

(title from "tomorrow will be kinder" by the secret sisters)

a little update

We received the keys to our new house on Friday afternoon. With closing done and our check cleared, we spent Friday night shopping for furniture and celebrating by eating dinner out with friends. Saturday brought more shopping for furniture and assisting the movers with boxes and directing them with where to put all the big furniture.

Internet will be installed on Thursday, and we are slowly getting our boxes unpacked. There are little things I've noticed that need to be fixed.. things that the builder is responsible for. As stressful as moving is, I'm less stressed knowing I don't have to worry about many of the things I worried about with our first house.

I'll be back soon - once I have Internet and my MacBook. Thanks for hanging in there with me during this time of transition, and thanks for celebrating our new house. We can not even believe that this house actually belongs to us.

a little update

I haven't been the best at completing my goals this weekend. Rather than running outside, I have spent the majority of the long weekend inside, sniffing and sneezing into a whole box (if not more) of Kleenex.

It started Tuesday morning and hasn't stopped since. I've gotten out of the house a few times to complete Black Friday shopping, but haven't done much else. There has been a lot of sleeping in, a lot of time with my husband, and a lot of watching episodes of Rules of Engagement on Netflix.

I needed the break. More than I realized. And I plan on enjoying every last second of the rest of the break - even if my nose is starting to resemble Rudolph.

Today I am starting over again with tracking every single calorie and staying under my calories. I've got plenty left for the day, and I plan to enjoy a healthy salad for dinner tonight. Needless to say the holidays were a bit more difficult than expected, but I'm getting back into the groove. No more beer or wine tonight. I've enjoyed a bit too much of both those things.

I'll be back on Sunday with more of an update. Until then, I hope you are enjoying the break and savoring every moment you can.

blaming the machine

I bought a new domain today. My blog is now officially at http://bodywontbreak.com. It should be a joyous occassion, and is in many ways, but I somehow deleted all of the previous comments through IntenseDebate. And while trying to fix it, I somehow deleted my original IntenseDebate account. So the site? It's going through growing pains. I'm going through growing (well, really, shrinking) pains too. If you know more than I do about HTML, I would love your help. I need your help. And if you don't know much about HTML, please be patient. I will do my best to fix the mistakes I've made. And also know I read every single comment ever left (and still have them saved in my email so I might copy and paste them all into their respective posts) and appreciated all the words.

For now, it's time to sleep. And then another early morning work out at the gym. I hope to be back tomorrow with real words to share and lots of thoughts on how I feel at the present moment in this journey. Trust me when I say it is almost 100% good. And trust me when I say I feel like I am unstuck. Though I am hesitant to say of it too loudly for fear I might jinx myself.

(title from "tightrope" by janelle monae)