Thursday, May 2, 2013

Does he need me?

Sometimes I like to analyze things...maybe over analyze things. I'm sitting here scrubbing the dining room table contemplating whether or not I really need to nurse my 7 month old through the night. He acts like it's a matter of life and death... and I'm just trying to stay alive from sleep deprivation. He needs me too much...Then a stark contrast enters my mind. Does my 2 1/2 year old really need me at all? In his mind, it seems he doesn't. He would go all day in a soiled diaper, eating raisins and bananas, and is highly skilled at operating the water dispenser to fill his own Dixie cup, thank you very much. He knows what tv show he wants to watch, when we need to go to the park, or what t shirt he doesn't want to wear. The difference between he and his brother is a matter of time...time in the nicu.

I have been told the attachment issues my 7 month old is experiencing are present because he was taken away at birth to an entirely different hospital on the other side of town for ten days. It was at least 2 days before I even held him. Smelled his sweet hair...touched his skin. He was born with a keen awareness of my presence and the trauma of our separation.

Back track two and a half years to the birth of Nehemiah. Born at 24 weeks of gestation, he lived in the nicu for almost three months. The nurses were his mother... the beeping of machines lulled him to sleep. He never had the opportunity to really comprehend his need for mommy. It was about a week...maybe more when I saw him for the first time. The innocence and newness of his transition of life outside of the womb was only residue covered by layers of thick medical tape, as he was tucked safely in an incubator under bilirubin lights. It was probably a month or more before I even touched his sweet hand without gloves. To him, all that time, I could have been another nurse. But in my heart, in my being I knew better. He knew...I was mommy. I am mommy. I will always be.

Sometimes with his independence, I fear he will forget that he needs me...yes my job is to prepare him for the world and let him fly in time and it's coming fast...all to fast. Will he ever really know? For he doesn't know he was meant to be held in my arms... meant to be nursed at my breast. Lulled to sleep by my love songs.

Hmm...

Well, What I missed then is mine to give now. I have to teach him. I choose to give him all my love and more. I won't have him forever. So go ahead sweetie. Fill up your dixie cup and let the water fall on the floor, cause at the end of the day, I tuck you in bed with your big Brown blanket and Mickey mouse with the chewed up nose that you refuse to sleep without. I read you the same story over and over again. Sing you the same songs and I kiss you goodnight. I am irreplaceable and I am yours-
whether you like it or not. :-)

Yeah, these guys need me...no matter how much or little it seems. Truthfully, I'm pretty sure I need them a little more.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Motherhood

My job isn't easy, for it requires all of me. I work overtime everyday, yet my job is never done. My role and purpose has opened my eyes to some horrible flaws in my character, yet everyday I am in awe at a new capacity to love. It breathes and expands everyday. When I want to throw a tantrum as a backlash to the attitudes and behaviors of my little ones, and give them time outs, and throw away all of their toys, I am so easily reminded of the nature of Christ. We throw tantrums, reject His good gifts, bruise him with our words and behaviors, yet instead of returning the good gifts he has so thoughtfully chosen to lavish upon us, he just saves them for a later time. A time when our eyes will be open to see that He is good. His wrath relents, for His love surpasses it. Beautiful Lord. I want to learn to parent like this. 

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Resurrection Sunday!

Happy Resurrection Sunday! One thing that keeps resounding in my heart is the reminder that Christ choose to live for you today! Isn't that is a wonderful truth. People talk about how Christ died, but today He chose to LIVE for you. Woo hoo! I hope you can rest in the peace and freedom of that reality.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

The Blank Slate

As I'm writing this, tears are streaming down my cheeks. I just read the simple introduction of the blog of a friend of mine at the beginning of a new found freedom and love in Jesus and I am undone. 

For years, I've had these plans... these goals that in my mind would be attainable if I just worked a little harder, managed my schedule better. Always falling short. Never to succeed. Not until reading a simple excerpt full of conviction did I even think- even consider surrendering all those seemingly unattainable plans. Write a book, sing on a CD.  Publish a children's book, lose weight, open an art gallery, open a youth camp, join the peace corps. The list goes on and on. The expectations at one time may have been God things, but the God that I serve is into doing new things. WOW. To place everything at His feet and begin again. No expectations. No plans. No deadlines or feelings of failure as I watch unattainable goals pass me around the merry-go-round of my life again and again. 

Its Blank Slate Time. Wow. The thought of it is so very liberating. No expectations. No failures. Just me and God. Amazing...There is so much freedom in that.

 

-Mel

Monday, March 11, 2013

My daily soapbox

Humanity is so oft gripped, and overcome by fear. These fears so easily prevent us from becoming and accomplishing all that we were born for. Too often, we live lives as shadows of what we could be, all the while longing for greatness that seems to never come into the clutches of our grasp… because of fear.

Now, not all fears are irrational. We come to know fear because of experiences that shape who we are and how we see everything around us. The irrationality of fear is recognized when we come to understand our true worth, potential and destiny. Your greatness, when realized, trumps all fear, making it null and void.

Within us all can be birthed or is already present a fledgling desire to thrive. Unless snuffed out or suffocated, there is also a desire to overcome… a desire to attain predestined greatness. If fear continues to rule a life, the potential of greatness inside a soul will scream to be realized everyday of your life until it is active.

The duty that you owe to yourself and to humanity is to face and eradicate your own fears so that you are able to freely walk and thrive in the greatness of your destiny. It is not your duty to emulate the destinies of others.  YOUR personal purpose was meant to be attained so that God can use your life to bless the world.

Face your fears. Kill your fears. Chase your destiny. Change the world.