Associations

Last night my husband brought me an oxygen tank up to the bedroom to give me a "boost" before falling into dreamland. Yes, that's right. I'm one of those people now and smiled inside as he strapped the nasal cannula around my ears. 

Josiah asked me the day before, "Mom, are you one of those old people that have to drag that around now?"

"No, sweetheart! I don't have to take this with me everywhere. It's just to help me with my migraines."

"Oh!" he said calmly and walked off.

I don't remember much of that dark Monday afternoon but as I slipped the nasal cannula up towards my nose, in hopes of warding off my migraines, I realized just how much I hated these, along with non-Rebreather masks, back in the hospitals. Yes. I said it correctly. Hospitals. And I had associated the swooshing noise of the flowing oxygen with everything related to the hospitals.

Memories of me fighting against the doctors in the emergency room the day I had the blood clot. The day that nearly took my life the second time. 

"I can't....breathe! I....can't.......breathe!" I kept saying over and over again. The doctor's and nursing staff had placed a non-Rebreather mask on my face yet I continued to tear the mask away. Extra hands intervened to hold me down. Eventually one of the doctor's yelled at me to focus on him as he pointed towards his eyes. It was then that I relaxed and coded shortly thereafter. The last thing I heard before surrendering to my situation was the swooshing of the oxygen. That ominous swooshing....swoosh...swoosh...swoosh.

And suddenly last night as I recalled the familiarity of that sound, and having to use that horrid oxygen mask, another faint memory came back to me. I was in a dream like state. Something horrible was taking place. That something was unknown to me or my husband standing beside me. 

The mask had been placed back upon my face....that ominous swooshing .....swoosh...swoosh...swoosh....was back. It would be just a matter of minutes now before I would fall back into the unknown; back into the world that continued calling my name. 

"Come with me.
Come with me."

"I'm not ready. Not yet"

A Season of Change

   While sitting in the pulmonary rehab waiting area this morning, it gave me time to reflect on these past 5 months. Five months ago, while lying in a critical and uncertain condition, my doctors did everything possible to keep me stable; to keep my life from slipping away. In a coma like state, my body lie motionless while my family, friends, and people unknown to me sent up fervent prayers for my recovery. In my current predicament, I knew something horrible had taken place. My world had darkened and

"I was getting quite used to this new world that continued calling my name. For reasons unknown to me, I had been sucked back into it. This new realm, this new creation was like nothing I’d experienced in my previous life. Someone was guiding me, holding my hand and I felt like a child protected within His grasp."

   Yet through it all, even though our sun fell that horrible month of March, glimpses and shadows of the cross remained ever faithful. I wasn't alone and my heavenly Father was leading me, just as He had always done.

   This is just a season of life that I'm going through. It won't be forever, even though sometimes it feels like it. God has given me an amazing ministry through this struggle and I'll keep following as He leads.

   I met a lady about a week ago and during the course of our conversation, she was brought to tears upon hearing my story. She reached out and took my hand in hers while I continued on. When I finished talking she said, "This has never happened to me! I've never met someone that has also had a near death experience and been so willing to talk about it."
  
   What an amazing tool from God! To be able to share with complete strangers about His goodness and strength during times of complete despair. God placed the chisel and continued writing His story; He etched it with every painful thrust that struck from the mallet; He molded it with the precision of a skilled craftsman.
  
   Have you thought of life as just being insignificant? As son's and daughter's of the King our story's not yet complete. The completion will take place when He's finished writing each story. It's then that we will find ourselves waking to meet Him face to face in His magnificent glory.

   Don't give up! Your story's not finished. And who knows? Maybe those trials, that suffering, is exactly what God will use to minister to those around you.

  

A Journey of Faith

Today I am saying 'hello!' to the world of blogging. For months I have been wanting to sit down and actually put together a blog. But low and behold life just seems to get in the way. Or should I say my life as it once used to be, now forever changed. I say that with the utmost honesty of gratitude to the place that my Savior has brought me to today.

Several years ago I began feeling the Lord tugging at my heart strings to become a surrogate. I began to diligently pray and the more I prayed about His leading in this matter, the more evident it became that He was indeed leading me down this road. But the doors remained closed. Then in the spring of 2009, He opened them. He opened them so wide that every little detail fell into place without any pushing or prodding on my end.

I have started writing about my experience quite extensively. Not only is it therapeutic for me but it literally is therapy for me. Make sense? 

   "What happened after the delivery was nothing any of us could ever have anticipated. My heavenly Father was prepping me and molding me to prepare for the days that would follow and ultimately change my life forever. What happened in the 14 months that followed the phone call in December of 2009 is something that no one could have ever predicted. We understood the risks of pregnancy, the possibility of something going wrong through the process but my heart was trusting in God. I felt His call pressing on me to follow Him. I just needed to follow through in obedience." 

God doesn't lay a map down in front of us and ask us if we'd like to follow Him or not. He doesn't give us option A or B to choose from. He simply asks for our obedience. Just simple obedience.

His asking of me to become a surrogate and give the gift of life to another family seemed like a very odd request of Him yet I knew that His blessings would be with me. His protection upon me. And His hand of grace and mercy were extended through the sovereignty of His divine intervention.

My doctors and nurses began calling me Miracle Girl for all that I had endured. But I don't feel like a miracle girl. I feel like me. Well, almost all of me anyway. Things are now different and will never quite be what they used to be. But if I'm to be called a miracle girl, it's nothing that I have done of my own doing. It is the absolute sovereign hand of God that declared His glory through my story!

I should not be here today, sharing this blog with you but I am. Four times I should have gone to meet my Creator but I am still here. My story was still being written, it was not my time. God did not give me a story to be hidden and tucked away, it's meant to be shared. Where ever that may take me, I'm not sure of yet. But, once again, I will follow.

I am determined to kick the doors of bitterness closed forever and I will not allow it to get the better of me. Yes, I do have days that I'm sad. It's usually in the evenings when I'm nestled into the coziness of my bed that I begin reliving those long weeks in the hospital; when it's all quiet in the house and everyone's asleep. I'll be reminded throughout the day as my leg involuntarily jumps (which is probably at least a couple hundred times a day). But amongst everything I've gone through, all the suffering that I've endured, I stand in the tangible love of Christ that He has a plan written for my life, already in place.

"As Jeff said a prayer that early Monday morning, I felt so honored to be part of God’s greater plan; that He had chosen me to deliver these precious babes. Before the foundations of this earth, He knew exactly how these little lives would be brought into this world. And there wasn’t anything or any part of it that surprised Him!"