First, I love being a mother. I secretly wondered after I discovered that I was prego whether I would miss being just the 2 of us and whether I would really just be a mom or whether I'd have to sort of fake it until I felt like a mom. In hindsight, I loved Archer before he got here and I love him more each day. I feel like a mom and I love being a mom and I'm glad it's the 3 of us now. It feels right that it's the 3 of us. What an incredible change God made in my heart, from not wanting kids at all just a few years ago! And speaking of changes God has made, is making, motherhood seems to have launched me into the "you have an incredibly dark heart that needs to be lit up" phase of life. I've had a lot of meltdowns since April 29th (Archer's birthday), most of which have been started because of the dog situation, but many of which have also been over not knowing what to do and being generally overwhelmed. If you remember a few posts back, our dog Kya had 5 puppies in mid March. We knew there would be some overlap between pups and baby because they were only 5 wks old when Archer was born, however I thought that it would be easy to sell those puppies by the time they were 8 weeks old and thought that I could do anything for 3 weeks. Ha, WELL, they have not been so easy to sell...in fact, we still have 2 left and they are almost 14 weeks old. While the pups are very, very cute, they also make an unbelievable amount of mess and noise and, because I'm a softy, I worry about them a ton. If they're outside, I worry that they'll get hurt or get out of the fence or that the big dogs are being mean, and when they're inside I feel bad about keeping them locked in the mud room and not letting them run around and play and cuddle with us in the rest of the house. I can't say that I'm a clean freak...in fact, messiness has always been somewhat ok with me, but the state of our house pushes me over the edge on a pretty regular basis because of the amount of dirt that is everywhere, and the lovely smell of excrement that frequently peppers the air. I do have to say that it was MUCH worse - just 2 pups is a whole lot easier than 5, and they're starting to understand the concept of pottying outside as well which is VERY exciting! Ok, so back to the meltdowns, I have cried a lot of tears over the mess, over the worry, and, embarrassingly enough, over being mad at God for not selling our dogs in a timely fashion. I had prayed and prayed for the dogs to be sold to good homes and I didn't understand why they just lingered here and I was ticked about it - I mean, didn't God see that I needed a clean(er) house for my little son, and quiet for my own sanity, and less of a burden on my shoulders? He was fully capable of finding the puppies good homes and He hadn't. The day I realized what exactly I was feeling and why I was crying, I was horrified. Mad...at the God of the Universe...because He wasn't following my timeline and my life was so "hard"... sigh. So that was the first of the dark heart realizations. I've also realized that I don't think I actually really believed that God does what is good. I always thought I knew that and would have proudly told you that I believed God was good, but then I had a son and I started to worry about him. The first day that I was by myself with Archer was hard. I felt like I had the sole responsibility and weight of keeping him alive on my shoulders, and so I cried and cried and checked to make sure he was breathing about 8000 times. That night we had a tornado warning, and the news made it look like it was coming straight through our town. I grew up in a place where there are really no natural disasters ever, so the thought of a tornado is terrifying to me, all the more so because now I have a son to protect and all those people in Joplin had just experienced a terrible tornado a few days before. So, I nervously waited in the bathroom with the dogs and Archer while Marc watched the weather channel just about as carefree as could be. The tornado didn't pass through after all, and when Marc and I were talking about it and my reaction to it, I came to the terrible conclusion that I didn't trust God to do what was good. I've also realized in the past few weeks that I somehow think that God owes me. Right, you read that correctly. How ridiculous and how shameful a feeling! I am so blessed to have a God who doesn't give up on me though, but who uses things like motherhood and puppies to bring me to my knees. I've been reading a lot of Psalms with Archer. Psalms are about all I can mentally handle these days, and I read them aloud while I'm feeding Archer...kind of goofy, I know he can't understand them, but it feels like I should start planting seeds now, so I read Psalms to my 8 week old child. Over and over and over again the Holy Spirit is pointing out to me that God loves steadfastly, and that is one of the most wonderful attributes God has in my opinion. God's heart is steadfast when mine is in bad shape, and He will continue to work. Here's the verse that has been my retreat for the last month or so:
Psalm 69:13
But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord.
At an acceptable time, O God,in the abundance of your steadfast love answer me in your saving faithfulness.
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*LOVE*
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