New Lease on Life

I feel like I've been given a new lease on life.

I had my annual review at work this week and it went so well. Better than I expected. I love my job. And I feel truly blessed for it. I have a zest of life for it. That's lucky. I recognize that.

My boss gave me a much higher raise than I expected. He went to bat for me by putting in a special exception increase. I'm in HR. I manage the special increases, yet he did this as a surprise for me.

I manage HR for a growing mid-size company and my boss, the CFO (hopefully soon to be COO) and CEO see promise in me. I've delivered, no doubt, but it's nice to get back what I preach to our managers - appreciate your top performers!!

And I've been given a gift - the gift of a new opportunity. We're expanding into India and I will be managing this endeavor. Wow. I have no idea how I'll do it, but I know I'll do it. That's a good confidence kinda feeling. And I'm half Indian so this is especially meaningful to me.

Most of all, it's given me this new zest for life. I'm so incredibly excited about this. This may sound utterly crazy, but I actually don't want to get pregnant right now anymore. I know, I know. I've learned that us infertiles have little control over timing...

But I'm truly excited about this opportunity. And it's gotten my focus and attention away from the 'what if's' of growing our family. I'm excited about something else!!! For once. For once it feels like in a really long time. And that feels amazing.

I feel like God has finally shown up to give me grace through this opportunity.

Next Steps & Other Musings

Thanks for all your support with regard to our next steps in going to counseling. I believe it's the right thing to do.

My husband still thinks we can work all of this out without a counselor but I think there's some deep-seeded stuff that we just can't get to on our own. Our appt is next Wed evening. I'm eager for it but also a little scared. I know that counseling can sometimes make things worse before they get better...

But we did decide to start instituting a regular date night. I think I was craving quality time and need it in different ways. For example, it doesn't really count for me if we're being social with other people. I need intimate time with him - conversation, no interruptions, cuddling - and not being exhausted!

So, we both made an effort to be home by 7pm. We actually took a walk in our neighborhood, got good take-out shwarmas, ate it on our front porch and watched Mod.ern Family cuddling. It was splendid!

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Other than that, I decided that I need to learn more about foster care/adopt and what it's all about. I did an ama.zon search for books on fostering - both positives & negatives from kids' and parents' experiences. I love ordering from there and getting the second-hand deals, and knowing that I'm 'reducing, reusing and recycling' books that way. I can't wait till they get here. They sounded good for anyone interested:

• Three Little Words
• Practical Tools for Foster Parents
• I Speak For This Child: True Stories of a Child Advocate
• Another Place at the Table
• Orphans Of The Living: Stories

I'll let you know how they are.

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And, I'm very much looking forward to Saturday & celebrating my birthday that day (the real day is Monday). It's a Game Day party because I don't like staying up late so we're starting at 2pm and I love games. My most favorite one is:

Has anyone played this? So, so fun!!

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And finally, I learned more about St. Patrick yesterday via a pastor's listserve I subscribe to, and was inspired to let his passion run through me. This may be a little over-the-top religious for some of you but bear with me on the heavy parts as I paraphrase -

St. Patrick, whose feast day is March 17, suffered much, and was a mystical visionary; he heard voices, and never hesitated to go into peril as his only passion was to serve God and people in need. The famous Prayer of St. Patrick is always worth praying, especially:

“Christ be with me, Christ within me,

Christ behind me, Christ before me,

Christ beside me, Christ to win me,

Christ to comfort and restore me;

Christ beneath me, Christ above me,

Christ in quiet, and in danger,

Christ in hearts of all that love me,

Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.”

St. Patrick was all about making peace among bitter enemies. And, St. Patrick served the poor.

It's intriguing how we piggback partying on top of this sanctity and couldn't help but ask  how can we take an opportunity to give back in this great, holy habit of reaching out?

There seems to be no better way to observe Lent, and prepare our hearts for Easter – or to do something grander than wearing green or downing a pint to commemorate St. Pat.rick’s Day.

Interesting, huh?

I Asked For...

Baby on Mind wrote an amazing Show & Tell post about A Butterfly's Lesson. It's so amazingly beautiful that I'd like to re-copy some of it here. I hope that's allowed.  She got it from an email chain, which I normally don't like but this really resonated with me. (And sorry to the non-religious out there!)

I'm not sure of God's role in all of this exactly because I'm not sure that God gives us good things or bad things (I know, this can quickly turn into a big time discussion; I'm not necessarily trying to do that)... I think God wants to comfort us when we're down and share in our joys when we're up - I actually just commented on Hannah's I Will Be a Mom... Someday's post today on Surviving the 1ww. She needs some comforting words. Please stop by and visit with her.

Hopefully this will be comforting to some of you:

I asked for Strength.....
   and God gave me difficulties to make me strong.

I asked for Wisdom.....
   and God gave me problems to solve.

I asked for Prosperity......
   and God gave me a brain and brawn to work.

I asked for Courage.....
   and God gave me obstacles to overcome.

I asked for Love.....
   and God gave me troubled people to help.

I asked for Favors......
   and God gave me opportunities.

I received nothing I wanted.....
   But I received everything I needed.

Monday's Thoughts on Sunday's God-Filled Day

Sunday morning's church service was AMAZING. Very God-filled.

We had a visiting pastor who told a story about how when she was 8, she hiked Yosemite Nat'l Park with her family and coming back down the switchbacks, she was getting bored starring at her sister's shoes. When she looked up, she saw the magnificent sky & trees and Half Dome on the other side with the river cutting the valley - and immediately started singing How Great Thou Art (her parents were both pastors, so she grew up knowing these songs). Her re-telling of this was beautiful.

During our sharing of joys & concerns last week, I asked for continued prayers as B and I are continuing to go through a painful time trying to build our family. After Saturday's day date with B and my newfound state of peace through blogging and support you all have given to me, I wanted to share my joyfulness and thank everyone for their prayers. It's also been such a relief to lift this up to our congregation and be 'out' with it so that this pain isn't just mine but others can help me through this.

A man also shared how he's in town visiting from Brazil and just happened to find us. He had literally just come from the airport!

For our closing hymn, our choir decided to switch up their line-up so that we could sing How Great Thou Art as our closing hymn. I LOVE this song and felt God's presence. The Brazilian man was into it, the visiting pastor was emotional, God was just everywhere. It was beautiful!

And ended the day by cooking taco meat & cornbread to serve & eat our Taco Fiesta at a nearby women's shelter.  Very God-filled indeed!

Did you feel God's presence this weekend? Did you feel humanity's kindnesses on you?

Where is God's Grace in All of This?

My pastor preached a sermon last weekend on The Suffering on the Innocent. It had me thinking a lot, especially about my last entry on Blessings.

Surely, I'm not innocent. I'm nowhere near perfect and I've done my share of sinning. But I can't help but be angry about my situation. And I can't help but feel, well at least I don't have cancer or my parents are still alive or whatever else enters my mind about all of our blessings.

What makes me angrier is how upset I feel hearing about others' pregnancies. How unfair is that! Can't I just fricken be happy for these people??? What is wrong with me!!!!!

And it mostly happens in church. Again, don't know if it's just me being more vulnerable in church as I'm worshipping (makes me sound like a crazy Christian - I'm one of those ultra-liberal Christians by the way).

This past Sunday in church it happened again. Only two young couples this time with their amazingly cute babies, and I can't help but feel why not us, God?? Why do we have to keep waiting??

How do I carry my pain with grace in all of this - and especially at church - where I'm supposed to be most 'Jesus-like' and genuinely happy for others and what they have...

For those to whom I'm closest to, I KNOW that if I just hold their babies, I'll feel God's grace. There's just something about feeling like you're a part of it all that makes a difference.

So, after service, I made a bee-line toward my friend's 4 month old and just held him. And felt God's grace.

Blessings

We are so blessed.

We have a wonderful marriage, loving families, good health, fulfilling careers, a beautiful home, etc. Is it ok to want more? Is it ok to say I want children on top of all of that?

How does life work?
Does each person have their 'cross to bear'?
Is this ours?
If we get children, do we trade that for something else?

How much worse would that something else be??

Maybe I'm asking for too much, too soon. Maybe it's not that bad. I know we'll have a family - someday, somehow. We just don't know when or how yet...

Maybe it is a blessing to know that at least we'll get there someday, somehow...