Doctors Update

Sam's fevers have gone.

He is brighter this afternoon.

And so am I after a little nap.

His GP has diagnosed that in addition to his school sore he also has a throat infection.  Praise God it's not something worse!

Sam will stay on low dose antibiotics up until he has his cardiac catheter.

I have called the hospital to let them know and they are going to get back to me early next week to make sure that plan is OK. 

I pray that is it.

There is nothing else I can do.

It is all in God's hands thankfully.

Outside I am calm, inside I feel like I am running a marathon.

Outside I am quiet and thoughtful, inside I am imploding.

You know that feeling of when you close your eyes lay down and it feels like the house is shaking.

Time to be still and know that He is God.

Anxiety Is Not My Friend

Anxiety and stress are sneaky and almost undetectable until you are in their grasp.  I haven't been sleeping well for the last two weeks and it is beginning to show.  It has been warm at nights, and I am sleeping lightly.  I wake many times a night and find that I am clenching my jaw then wake with headaches each day. I already have cracked molars that need fixing, due to stress and cannot afford to have them fixed.  So I am concerned about doing more damage unintentionally. The tension in my neck and shoulders is unmistakable and food has become bland and un-enjoyable. 

It's not like I am laying awake in bed and panicking over Sam's upcoming surgery it is a more sinister and underlying form of anxiety, that seems to be thwarting my attempts at any kind of rest.  As I cover Jack's books for school I am worried about how he is going to go in this first term of year one, with so much disruption.  I feel like I am not going to be there for him, when he needs me and that I am going to miss out on things because we will be apart. 

Last night at about 2.30 as I lay awake the jumble of thoughts that hide in the recesses of my mind throughout the day, come out to play.  I think about the catheter and the fact that Sam's previous stroke was triggered by a clot from the scar tissue in his heart.  What if the catheter dislodges more such clots?  What if the catheter goes wrong and stimulates cardiac arrest? All of these are possibilities. 

How long will we have to wait to know if Sam is a candidate for the Fontan?  Will he need the additional stents in his lung arteries? What does that mean for his blood thinning meds?  I don't want him to be on warfarin forever. These are the thoughts that plague the dark hours of the night for me. And then I pray and try to sleep, flitting between the conscious and somewhere just outside of sleep.

All of this means that I am less the Mum I need to be during the daylight hours.  I am short in temper, and not a whole lot of fun, which causes me to feel even more guilty for not enjoying the time I have with my boys now. 

It my all seem silly to you, but I need your help.  I need you to pray for me before you go to sleep tonight.  That I will know peace and sleep in a very intimate way, because as of late we are mere acquaintances.

I know that God hears me call out to Him, I am just weary of the battle and was hoping that someone might add their voice to mine. x

Learning How To Rest

I don't remember exactly when it happened.  It was in my teens that I became aware of it.  The fact that if I was not busy, then I must be lazy.  I think it kind of meshes well with today's lifestyle.  We get up, and go go go, until we drop into a chair at the end of the day exhausted. While there is some sort of satisfaction in having done a hard days work, I can honestly say there are many days that I get to the end and say, "Wow, I'm exhausted and I don't even know what I achieved today."  There seems to be so much emphasis on being all we can be, having all we can have, and doing all we can do, that the essential element of rest has been lost.  Now rest is seen as indulgent, a bit naughty and even sinful, when God never intended it to be. 

I will share two exciting tidbits from the bible about rest that may help to frame this thought.

...And evening passed and morning came, marking the first day.(Genesis 1:3)

When God separated darkness from light, the evening came first.  The time of rest came first, then followed by the day.  This amazed me.  I thought that day came first and then the night.  Instead evening was the first, a time of rest and refreshment, followed by the new day.  We must rest and be ready to for each new day and the challenges that come with it.

Then Jesus got into the boat and started across the lake with his disciples. Suddenly, a fierce storm struck the lake, with waves breaking into the boat. But Jesus was sleeping. The disciples went and woke him up, shouting, “Lord, save us! We’re going to drown!” (Matthew 8:23-25)

Even in the midst of the storm Jesus rested. I absolutely love this passage.  It is crazy!  The boat is about to capsize and Jesus is sound asleep.  Can you imagine the noise, the rocking, the water drenching through to your skin?  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't be sleeping.
We cannot allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by our circumstances.  Jesus knew who he was, he knew who his Father was, and so he kept his eyes and heart firmly fixed on the one who orders his days.  We do ourselves no favours; running ourselves down and trying to get through our 'to do lists'.  We need to start living with purpose and peace, not for process and product.  When the world around us starts getting demanding, we have to learn to shift our focus back to our God.  We must rest in Him, and live our daily lives with purpose and satisfaction, not to complete tasks, but to please God.  Not only will our weary bodies then find the rest they need, but it also strips away the pride of 'getting it all done'.

So I am still learning how to rest.  It is not easy, but Jesus is a patient teacher.  The two things I must continually remember are:

1. Rest before Action

2. We must know who we are in Jesus, and keep our heart beating as one with his.

Then we will find perfect rest, in the day to day tasks of our lives, and  even in the midst of the most ferocious of tempests.