It's night time, and I am alone again. He is at work, my poor sweet darling, and I am here. The TV's off, a rare occurrence in our house. My last friend just got off Facebook, so I am alone alone. Not just home alone alone. Just me and God alone. I am doing something I shouldn't. Something I haven't done in years. I am reading through the infertility boards. Why, oh why am I doing this? Maybe it's because circumstances lately have brought the could we and the should we and the will we or won't we back to my mind. Babies are coming. All around us, babies are coming. People keep telling us our time is coming soon, but they don't actually know that. How did we get to a place where we can presume to know the mind of God when actually, most of us struggle to figure it out daily? I don't know. What I do know is that whether or not we get a baby is up to God and God alone, and no one knows what's coming but Him. The CaT boards. Complete as Two. Two people, husband and wife, fully resting in the knowledge that God's grace is sufficient. That's us. Isn't it? We ARE complete as two. I didn't want to be. If I'm being honest, I never thought we would be, and yet, again, God's grace is sufficient to supply all our needs. What I needed most, more than anything else, was enough peace to love my husband with reckless abandon in spite of the fact that our family might never grow. Or maybe because of that fact. Really, I'm not sure. It's tough. Usually, not so tough, really. We are blissfully happy. Truly, we are. Happier than most couples I know. We spend nearly every waking minute together, except for those pesky minutes he has to be at work. Other than that, he is almost always close enough I can touch him. I love that. I love knowing that God allowed us to have special circumstances, and I am able to truly appreciate the absolute blessing He gave me in Jesse. I tell people he's my prize for dealing with life's trials. I don't know how that works, actually, if God really rewards us for struggling in such a way, but I know that I got the best of the best, for sure. When I look at that beautiful face, I know that my heart is whole, come what may. I cannot imagine loving anyone more than I love him. That's what it boils down to, really. He is so fabulous, really, truly, completely fabulous, that depriving him of fatherhood is a sin. So many men are not good fathers. He's a good daddy to our furry babies. How much more so would he be to the child who would truly be the fruit of our marriage, of all our labor (pun sort of intended)? My heart is tender tonight. It's been tender for weeks, really. Tender in a way it hasn't been for awhile. We have accepted that becoming a family of more than two is not for us, and we are okay. Really, better than okay. That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt. It does. Hence tonight. Tonight I am thankful that God's grace covers a multitude of sins, even lack of faith. Accidental lack of faith, but I think that's what it is, really. I don't know how to trust God to provide for us either way. I am trying. I am trying to learn to trust Him fully, even in the things I can't imagine.

The God we serve is able

Our preacher has been preaching on the importance of your testimony. This past Sunday, he preached on Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Their story speaks volumes to me. My favorite part is this: "If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us[c] from Your Majesty’s hand. 18 But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." Daniel 3:17-18.

I chose the NIV version because I really like the way it says even if HE does not. Typically, I'm a pretty traditional KJV girl, even though my Bible is NIV. I just prefer reading it the way my Mama read it to be when I was little. Anyway, this really speaks to me, as someone who lives through things daily she'd really rather not have to deal with. I could be wrong, and it's okay to tell me if I am, that's how we learn, but I believe those three men knew something important for us. First of all, they believed that God COULD deliver them, no questions asked. They knew He was able. They knew that standing up for what was right was important beyond all other things, and they did it secure in the knowledge that they served a powerful God. I believe, though, that they also knew that sometimes God removes your circumstances to show His power, and sometimes He carries you through it to reveal His power. They knew God was able to deliver them, but they also knew that they didn't know everything God knows, and He might have a different plan for their circumstance. They faced death, knowing that if God didn't step in, they would surely burn up, and they didn't know for sure if He would or not. They didn't know what He had in store for them, for their testimony but whatever happened, they knew that He was mighty, sovereign, and they knew that He loved them.

That's kind of how I feel a lot of the time. You see, people speak healing over me all the time, and I love that, I really do. It's comforting to know that the people that love me believe that God can remove these afflictions from me. It's comforting for me to know that I serve a God who is ABLE to do that. What I think people don't understand, though, is that until He does that or calls me home, I have to live my days in a body that's broken. It's not fun sometimes. And by sometimes, I pretty much mean, all the time. I don't understand why my body hurts and won't do the things I tell it to, why my foot hurts even right now because I fell down. I don't understand why it just continues to get worse little by little, even though people pray for it to stop. I don't understand why as of yet, I've been denied a baby, something I want dearly, and I don't understand why I cannot be sure I'd make a good mother because of my illness. I don't dwell on this a lot anymore, praise Jesus, but it IS something that's important to me, something that matters, and part of the reason I have peace in the midst of these trials is this passage of Scripture. Whether He heals me today or I have to spend another 20, 30, 40 years like this, I know three things: I know my God is ABLE to deliver me from these things; I know that God loves me and my illness is not a sign that He loves me any less than anyone else; I know there is purpose in my pain. I'd love to tell you if someone offered to take this from me tomorrow, I'd choose to keep it, as I know that it's part of my testimony, part of how God is working in my life. The truth is, sweet friends, I'm human, and I don't like to hurt, and I'd love to have a baby, and if giving up MS meant I could live pain-free, get my vision back, not have to deal with all the little things that come with this, and get to have a houseful of kids, I'm afraid I'd hand it over in a second. Maybe that means I'm weak. I don't know. I'd much rather be healthy and up all night because I had crying babies than because I hurt. If I could trade it in, I probably would. I can't, though. No one is going to make me that deal, so we live here, in the midst of this. I am thankful, though, even though I'd trade it in a heartbeat, that God has let me experience these burdens. We are in such a unique position, all kinds of doors have opened up for us to serve, and I LOVE that. I love that in just a few minutes, Jess is gonna wake up, and I'm gonna get to go play in the church library. I've always dreamed of organizing a library (hey, my dreams are small, folks). When I was little, I tried to run one at my house, but my brother refused to fill out the cards and made me cry. Now, I can officially ask people to sign their name on the check-out card. It's okay that I'm a nerd. God loves me. But I digress. (I really AM excited about it, though) We just get to do things other people living "normal" lives can't do, and it's such a blessing. We are happy, me and this sweet darling who's sleeping beside me right now. Our life is a good one, a blessed one, a precious one, and we love living it.

I'd love for my testimony one day to be that I had this horrible illness and God delievered me from it, healed me completely, and gave me enough babies to make a football team (yall don't tell Jess I said that. He'd probably throw up, cuz he has to pay for said babies, you know). I truly would. I would love for that to happen. I don't know that it will. Just like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, I have to face that my testimony might always be that God was with me and comforted me and provided for me while He allowed me to experience this trial. He didn't choose to allow them to burn up. He saved them. One of my favorite songs is called God Delivers Again, and that's what it's about. I love it, because I know my God WILL deliver again. He's delivered me from a lot of the emotional problems I had and healed my spirit. I want healing to be my testimony. Maybe, though, God wants it to be all the things I did inspite of my sickness. The temptation to give up, to just stay in bed, is real, but I cannot do that. Jesus died on the cross to save me. What right do I have to refuse to serve Him just because I don't feel good? My testimony, right now, today, is this: Before, when I was diagnosed, I was angry, a lot, and for a long time, and I didn't want to serve. God brought me to a place when the tornado hit in April where I knew I didn't have any choice but to serve, and He sustained me through all of those weeks, and He sustains me even now. My body never feels like serving. It really doesn't. Every day we go to church, it's a sacrifice. My heart, though, wants to serve Jesus more than anything else in this world, and I think that's what's most important.

Christmas...a little different.

When I was younger, before I got married, before I really knew what infertility would be like, I used to dream about the Christmas traditions I would start with my children. There were things I wanted to do, things my parents did with us, things they didn't do that I wanted to start in my new family. Things I wanted to share with my children from my childhood while at the same time creating new memories for them to hold on to. For example, my grandma had a little village I knew would be mine, and I can remember watching it as I fell asleep when I was very, very small. Also, I love Christmas pajamas, and I think an entire family in matching jammas on Christmas morning is about the best thing ever. I looked forward to creating my own family, to being able to dictate what memories my children would have of Christmas.

This is our fourth married Christmas. We have no children. No one to wrap presents for. No one to be excited about getting up Christmas morning. No secrets to keep, no toys to hide, nobody to share tradition with. Nobody, that is, but each other.

I try, harder than I should, probably, to make Jesse's Christmases wonderful. I spend more money, more time, more energy, on the perfect gifts, the perfect decorations, the perfect Christmas pajamas. You see, it is so easy to get caught up in the fact that we're just a family of two, so easy to neglect each other because there are no little people to care for. Jess loves Christmas like most normal people love Christmas. It's Jesus' birthday, yay for that, he likes to open presents, but that's about the extent of it. I, on the other hand, would live at the North Pole if I could. Seriously. If I could live somewhere it was Christmas all the time...well, I can't even let myself go there, seeing as how it will never happen. The North Pole, I'm sad to say, is merely a point on a map. Santa does not, in fact, live there. The point is, all these things I love about Christmas, I only have Jesse to share them with. Sometimes I'm tempted to just not do it. After all, it would be much easier to maybe just put up one tree and let that be it. I don't, though, for several reasons. First, I love Christmas so much, I think my heart might break if I didn't go all out in celebrating. Secondly, I always want Jesse to be able to say that his wife did everything in her power to make the holidays special for him. I never want him to say that I was so broken over not having children that I neglected him. I want him to be able to say, always, that his wife loves him intentionally. That she pours everything she can into creating special times for him.

Our lives probably aren't going to be seasoned with babies' laughter and the pitter-patter of little feet. We aren't going to have to stay up until someone goes to bed to fill stockings on Christmas Eve (you know, because Jesse already knows there's no Santa). No one will wake us up every hour on the hour until the sun FINALLY comes up like we used to do to my parents. Still...Jesus was born. He came to earth to save us from the death we deserved. His birth, that tiny baby in the manger, is the beginning of it all, of the greatest heritage any of us have. It's the reason my trees are perfect and my village is huge. This is a celebration, people. A birthday party for the King of Kings. I go all out. Our Christmas celebrations? They are joyful. They might not include children, but they include me and Jesse, they include hearts that are thankful for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, for God who loved us so much He sent the only child He had to die a horrible death so that we might live with Him in heaven, for Mary, who knew that she wouldn't get to keep that tiny infant, that she had to share Him with the world. Hearts that are joyful because we have each other, we have wonderful families, we have food to eat and a bed to sleep in. Our Christmas celebrations look differently than most people's, but they are so full of joy and wonder, so full of tradition.

And yes, they include Christmas pajamas, a tiny village, and all the movies I loved as a kid. After all, just because I don't have kids doesn't mean I can't act like one. ;)

Oh, wow, I have been terrible at writing. Let's chalk it up to holidays and the fact that we are insanely busy. Insanely busy for us, anyway. For anyone else, it would probably be boring, nothing to do, but this is as busy as we've ever been in our marriage. We are both just exhausted. It's November 28, and my house is still not completely decorated for Christmas. I am ashamed to say that. :D

I'd love to say I'll be better, but since Christmas is less than four weeks away (I honestly cannot even process that), I probably won't for awhile. Ha!

A new guitar!

Last week, I had the privilege of buying my husband a guitar. It really IS a privilege to buy this man things. I'm fairly certain the reason we're not rich is he would have so many guitars you wouldn't be able to get into our home. He was soooooo excited, though. He had no idea (well, I had no idea either, until we got in there and saw them...) he would get a guitar on Thursday. We went to find a book for me so I can learn to play my bass fancier, and they had several Gibsons on the wall. Originally, the plan was to save so he could have an expensive guitar for his birthday. I desperately wanted him to have the best, but he decided he'd rather have a cheaper guitar now, and maybe another one next year (although I then proceeded to buy him $400 worth of accessories, so he maybe isn't getting another guitar next Christmas...lol) than only have one expensive one. His eyes lit up when I told him we could take one home that day, even though it would be for Christmas (and...I let him play it Sunday at church. Obviously, he's probably not waiting until Christmas for it). He got so excited, and he looked and looked to decide what he needed to play to choose his guitars. He only played two, his Gibson and a Strat, but he just kept playing and playing. I love to buy him things. He truly is like a kid at Christmas, and he never asks for things. He just gets this look in his eyes, and I know that it would make him happy. There are lots of things I don't get to do to make him happy, so buying him little things makes me happy. I mean, we can't afford tons of expensive stuff. I can't buy him lots of high-priced guitars. I can't buy him classic cars. Once in awhile, though, I can really just make his day, and I love to do that. He walked into the computer room today while I was getting ready to go with Mom to take our kitty to the vet and said, "Have I told you thank you for my guitar?" And I said he hadn't. He grinned and said thank you. He is the cutest thing ever when he's excited about something, and I love seeing that look on his face. Luckily, he also gets that look when I buy him tacos and cds, so I don't just have to buy guitars...

Revival

We had a fantastic weekend. Our home church held a revival, and we were able to attend all four services. Anyone who knows anything about our schedule knows what a miracle that is. Between Jesse's work and playing on Sunday mornings, it was absolutely God who allowed us to be fully present for these meetings. We were so excited to get to be able to participate in a whole weekend of activities. It was very much needed, too.

I didn't realize how tired we get serving. Or, how tired I get, anyway. We sit in with Mom and the kids on Wednesday night, and we play on Sunday mornings, and even though we're in service for the preaching then, I'm tired, physically tired, from waking up early and getting ready and then practicing for an hour and a half. By the time preaching starts, I'm mostly just listening, not actively participating. It was awesome to just have a couple of days where no one was depending on us for any portion of the service, where we didn't have to do anything but sit and soak it up. We did, and it was amazing. So refreshing. I felt that way after the tornado, too, those first few Sundays especially. We were so tired, physically, emotionally, spiritually, that coming together in God's house, worshiping together, just being able to rest in Him, it really gave me the strength I needed to continue.

This weekend, though...we are praying through some things, but we are so excited about the message God has brought to us. Oh, how lazy we are, how often we pass up opportunities to share about Jesus. I'm not bold. I've never been bold, and it's hard for me to share Jesus. I hate that about myself, but I am working on it. It shouldn't be so hard. After all, most people know within 5 minutes about my illness. Why then can't I tell them about the One who sustains me through it? Pray for us as we seek God concerning this. It isn't that we don't want to be bold. It's just...well, we're maybe a little chicken.

Another thing I long for is that I won't even NEED to tell people about Jesus. I will, of course, but I want so much for my life to be so that people can look at me and just KNOW what's important in my life, the reason I'm different. I pray that I am different, that it's not something I have to try so much at.

I want to work on learning Scripture. I want to be the kind of girl who can quote passages off the top of her head. My mom and my MIL can both do this. They barely need their Bibles in church. So, if you have any tips for really absorbing Scripture in this way, I'd LOVE to hear them.

Oh, how we long for more of Jesus. How we long for Him to consume our every thought, our every breath. We want our lives to be purposeful, to be about helping further God's kingdom, not about ourselves. More than anything, we want that. When the tornado hit, I began praying for revival. Not extra church meetings, real spiritual awakening. I know that personally, I have seen some of that, but we are praying that this is the beginning of a fire that spreads through our community, our state, our nation, our world. Oh, grant it, Lord Jesus. Let it start here.

This is not what I intended to write

I hadn't intended to write this post yet. I wanted to do something really happy and fun before more super serious stuff, but I wrote and dumped about 4 different times. I really felt compelled to do this one. Add to that the fact that two people have asked me in the past few days what our plans are, and I knew that this was to be my next post.

It's no secret Jesse and I have not been able to have a baby thus far. It's been a roller coaster since we got married. Lots of ups and downs, mostly downs. There are times it's all I talk about. There are times, like now, I don't talk about it at all unless I'm asked.

The truth is, we don't have a plan anymore. For a bit, we felt like God was opening some doors for us in the way of treatments, but those doors closed rather quickly. I've been apprehensive about treatments from the beginning, and I've never been sure they were right for us. Now, I'm about 98% sure they aren't. They're right for some people, for lots of people. I absolutely believe God gives us medical advancements and we are to use those. I don't think they're right for everyone, though, and we don't think that's a road we're supposed to travel. That leaves us two options: try on our own, or don't try at all. We've actually chosen a position in the middle: we're neither trying nor preventing. This is not the first time in our marriage we've chosen this position. It's just the first time we've been okay with it.

You see, we want a baby. Several, actually. Our hearts truly long to be parents. We've come to understand some things lately, though, that have helped us settle (for now...it's subject to change at any minute) into being content as a family of two.

Pursuing pregnancy got us nowhere. Not just physically nowhere. Obviously, there is that, seeing as how we don't have a baby. What's more, though, is it got us nowhere in our relationship with God. More often than not, I was too angry about not getting a baby to invest anything in my walk with Christ. It hurt too much. He knew what I wanted, but He didn't give it to me, and I was mad. It wasn't good for our marriage. It wasn't good for my health, my sanity, my general well-being, my ability to be a nice person...so we aren't trying. Our philosophy is if God wants us to be parents (and while we long for that and believe we'd be good parents, we aren't sure that's what He has for us. Sometimes, He says wait and sometimes He says no, and it can be hard to distinguish between the two, especially if your heart is really tied up in it), He will give us a baby. Period. We're not preventing it. We're just not actively trying, either. I'm not tracking temperature or taking tests or drinking teas or swallowing handfuls of supplements and vinegar and on and on. We're just trying to let God be God, and we know that if He chooses not to make us parents, there's a reason, a greater purpose for it.

For a long time, I didn't know what possible "greater good" could come from my not being a mother. I still don't, really. However, I know that God doesn't owe me any explanations, that my mind cannot know all the things God knows, and that sometimes, the tiniest things can have huge impacts. I am not an island in this world, and God has certainly shown us how He can use us now, childless, in ways He couldn't if we were parents. Sometimes, I wonder if part of my lesson was to learn to be still and wait before He blesses us with what we want, if it's a kind of protection for my heart while we wait, but I know that even if it's not, even if we really never have a baby, it will be okay.

It still hurts. Everyday, it still hurts. It's hard knowing that if I only had MS or if I only had fertility problems, it would not be such an issue. If it was either/or, we'd probably have a baby by now, and that's hard to swallow. It's also hard to watch everyone else around you get what you want. Christmas is coming, and I desperately want a baby to put in a Santa suit and take to Christmas dinner and buy presents for. My heart is, I believe, what God created it to be: a mother's heart. My desires are unfulfilled, and that's never fun. And yet, it doesn't hurt like it did. If my family never grows beyond what God ordained on my wedding day, there will always be a little hurt. Always. However, when I look at this man, this man who wants what I want and yet has been at peace about it the whole time, I know that he is blessing enough. I'd love to give him a handful of tiny people who look just like him, people we can teach to love Jesus, their family, their neighbors. Tiny people who will grow up and impact the world. I want that, very much. It doesn't consume me anymore, and that's awesome. I have peace, at least most of the time. I think it's a process, like grief, like the acceptance of an illness. There are days we go to Target and I get in the car and I scream, "But why don't I get to buy tiny clothes?!?!" Most days, though, we're okay. We're better than okay. We're happy together, this tiny family of mine. God has given us the thing we've asked for most since the beginning: peace.

I didn't understand for a long time it was okay to still hurt once you were at peace. I thought when I really accepted the fact it might not happen, I'd be totally over it. Hahaha. I'm not over it. I will never, ever be over it. I refuse, though, to let it consume me any longer. It's not as hard as it used to be. I tried for so long to be at peace and wasn't, and now that I mostly am, it's very freeing. I'm still tenderhearted about it. People can still hurt me with what they say, but I'm learning to control that, too.

Two things you should know: adoption is not, at least at this point, an option for us. We believe God could open doors, but He hasn't opened them yet. There are multiple reasons we cannot pursue adoption, and we've known that for some time. I would love to, but it's not for us, at least not now, not in a traditional sense. Also, I talk a lot about baby clothes, the fun parts of having kids. I want all the parts of having kids, not just the cute clothes. It's just that when I see those tiny shoes like Mom and I saw the other day, something happens inside me and my resolve melts a little. I think it's a girl thing.

I believe that these verses are a picture of true faith: "If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us[c] from Your Majesty’s hand. 18 But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.” Daniel 3:17-18. I don't claim to be perfect. We all know that I'm not. I have days I'm sad. Even once in awhile, still, days I'm angry. Most days, know, I am able to believe that my God is powerful enough to give me what I want in spite of what the doctors say and yet still strong enough to comfort me should His plan for me not include being a mama.

I've never really said all this to anyone, not even to my own mother. It's fairly new, I guess. I'm praying my MIL is not hurt when she reads this, and I'm praying that everyone else understands that we haven't given up, we haven't backed down. We've just chosen to love Jesus and each other and let God work the rest of it out.