Hardships and Blessings: Remembering Whose in Control

Whew...what a week! I'm glad it's almost over. It's been a pretty tough week here at our house this week. Our faith has definitely been tested. God has shown us that he alone is in control. That can be a tough concept IF you're a controlling type of person. Which, you know, I'm not! Hold on...got to dodge that lightning bolt! Ahhh!

On Monday morning, our world as we know it was turned upside down. ...and shaken a little bit! Nathan got a call from his boss that morning about 8:30 and he was here in Melbourne and asked for him to come meet him. Nathan's company has been making cut backs and has laid off quite a few people but through all of it neither Nathan nor his boss ever had any concern for his job. All that Nathan has ever heard from them is how well he's doing and how they want to promote him to their home office within the next year or so. But, that's what his boss needed to meet with him about. He had been laid off as well. By 10:30 that morning, everything was gone...his job, his vehicle, cell phone and computer. All gone.

As you can imagine, I was in pieces. Not the best way to be when your husband has just lost so much that he loved all within a couple of hours. Before he even left that morning to go and meet his boss, he was reassuring me that all would be fine and that even though he no longer had a job, God has always taken care of us and he would see us through this as well...for me not to be worried or upset...he wasn't. Easier said than done...as I sat there nearly 6 months pregnant and knowing that being without a job means being without insurance as well. I felt so lost, I can't imagine how Nathan was feeling at that time.

After spending the first three days of this week crying and being bitter, things are better now. Or at least for today. I am finding that we have to take it one day at a time and spend a lot of time praying for God's peace and guidance. God has already shown us in so many little ways this week that he is in control and is taking care of us better than we could even imagine.

Nathan is still in the Air Force Reserves and is able to fall back on that for a while. That was our first major prayer...that he could be put on orders for a couple of months which means that he will be able to work out there every day like a full time job. These orders have to be approved and they don't always go through depending upon a lot of things. That prayer was quickly answered and his orders have gone through. We only have one vehicle now and I'm not sure how that is going to work out but I'm not worried about it as I know we'll figure it out as we go. With him working there we initially thought that he'd be taking about a $1000 a month pay cut. We were okay with that (we HAD to be) knowing that we could make a lot of cut backs here at home to try to make up for it. BUT, another blessing, he found out that he'll actually make a little more working there than he did when he was working for Mercury.

Another thing we had to pray about was our insurance. Mercury offered him a severance package which was 6 weeks of pay and insurance coverage. After that 6 weeks, we have the option to use Cobra insurance which will keep our current coverage on medical only, not dental or vision. The downfall is that it costs nearly $1000 a month. But, we figured it's better to have it than to not. However, God had another blessing waiting for us in this area as well. We found out that we can get on the Military's insurance plan which will cost us a little over $200 a month and we'll have full coverage for our family. Also, they will take me with my "pre-existing condition" (sounds like I'm handicapped or something the way they put it!) and will pay 100% of my prenatal care and delivery. By the end of my prenatal care, delivery and hospital stay, I will have paid somewhere around $250 total for EVERYTHING!! Amazing!! This insurance is so much better than what we already have! We had one small hurdle to jump to get our family on this plan...Emma's birth certificate. I guess I never ordered one from the hospital when I had her. So I got online and ordered it but they said it would take 7-10 days to process and then they'd overnight ship it to us. Well, to get on the plan by Aug. 1st, we needed the certificate sooner. But we didn't worry we decided we'd just keep the insurance we have that is continuing under the severance pkg. and then switch over in Sept. We would have to be out a little more $ than we would if we could switch but it wasn't a big deal. I ordered her certificate on Thursday. Friday afternoon, the FedEx man came with her birth certificate. I was shocked! I don't know why...after all the other small miracles and blessings I should've expected it.

Through this whole week of me falling apart here and there, Nathan has been strong and optimistic. Every day I have 'jokingly' asked "Nathan, where are you gonna work? Nathan, where are we gonna live? Nathan, what's gonna happen?" -all in one breath. ha! It has been our comic relief when we start to get stressed out. We just laugh and laugh. -Yeah, I think we're going a little psycho! Once when I said it, he came back with "I was thinking...YOU go to work and I'LL stay home!" I REALLY laughed at that one!! Loudly and obnoxiously...I think he got the point. ha!

Our phone has been ringing off the hook every day! Nathan's boat companies that he took care of have been calling offering their condolences and letting him know how much they liked him and are going to miss him. They've been just as shocked as he was. Several of them were so upset that they called his bosses at Mercury to tell them what a mistake they've made...that Nathan was the best rep. they'd ever had and that their loyalties were no longer with Mercury any more. Of course, I was like "YES! Tell them about it! Drop them like they dropped us! See how THEY like it!!" (Yes, I know I'm so wrong! Bitterness and anger can get the best of me sometimes, you know.) But Nathan has been the opposite. He has been encouraging his customers to stick it out and see what happens. SO not what I would be doing probably. He is handling everything with such grace. It's really something. He has had the opportunity to witness to several people when they call outraged and wanting to know how he is handling such a terrible thing and wondering what he's going to do. He has been able to tell them how he trusts in God and knows that he is going to be taken care of and how he can have faith and not be anxious about it but excited about what God has in store for him now.

Well...I have to get off of here now. My family is waiting on me to get dressed to go to the beach and they're getting really impatient! Wonder where they get that from??? We're getting out of the house to play for a little while today.

Please pray for us that whatever God has in store for us, we'll be able to see His plan clearly and will make the right decisions. We appreciate your prayers and encouragement so much! Hope you have a great weekend!!!

Pictures you requested...

As you requested in your comments and emails, here are a few pictures of the van that I copied from the internet... I had to put one on here of the "back-up camera" that is in the rear view mirror. Isn't that cool?!! See, vans are cool...vans are cool...vans are cool...vans are...whoops, sorry. The last picture of the dash board is like ours except we don't have the navigation system and ours is dark gray instead of tan.

Never Say Never

If there is one thing I should have learned by now it's to NEVER say never! In my "earlier" years, (I'm refusing to use the word "younger" as I am holding tight to that description of myself...especially in lieu of the events this year has bombarded me with...explain later...) I used the phrase loosely about a lot of things. Such as,

~"I will NEVER move farther away than an hour or so from my parents." I can remember my high school English teacher asking our class just days before graduation to raise our hands if we planned to return to our home town to live after graduating college. My hand flew up as if that was the craziest question ever. Pfff! (that's the sound I made when asked that question and the sound I made just now thinking of how far off my plans were to where I'm actually at now.) It's in thinking of things like this that we can appreciate God's sovereignty! If he'd revealed to me that day where I would be today and everything that has happened in between, they'd still be scraping me up off of that classroom floor! -probably as I fearfully and frantically clung to the legs of my desk.

~"My kid will NEVER throw fits like that! That mom needs to get control." Oh my! My sincerest apologies and regrets for ever judging another mother's parenting. Sometimes, for no apparent reason at all (or simply upon hearing the word "no"), these little people go nuts and start convulsing and screaming to make sure everyone around you knows how terrible you are. They have minds and ideas of their own that do not work as rationally as yours -sometimes-does!

~"I will NEVER use candy or sweets as a bribe to make my children behave in public." Mmm hmmm...I don't call it bribery any more, I call it supporting my local dentist and his family. Helping out my "neighbor"; that's IS the Christian thing to do, you know.

~"I will NEVER go out in public without my makeup on and my hair fixed. Not even to the grocery store or post office." Since I now live in a town with more than a few thousand people, I can reassure myself that whoever I see in those places, I will probably never see again and if I do they certainly won't remember seeing me in that state. I also tell myself that if I do see a friend or acquaintance while I'm in that state, it will only make them feel better about themselves, seeing how hideous I look without makeup and knowing that I am a real person too who doesn't have it all together all the time. -or at all! :) Even though I am probably being delusional in thinking that they ever saw me as "together" in the first place!

~"I will NEVER feel old or depressed about a birthday. Because I'll always look young and feel young and energetic and will never have gray hair, stretch marks, wrinkles or any other cosmetic flaw that would make me feel as if I look older." Is the vanity of my youth showing? Yes, and so is my gray hair, crow's feet, frown lines, stretch marks and who's jiggly arms and thighs are these anyway? NOT MINE! Good bye fantasy world, hello my actuality! Again, praise the Lord we don't know what the future holds for us. :)

~(This "never" belongs to Nathan and certainly warrants adding to this list considering our present situation. This is something I didn't actually say never to but accepted due to his persistence on the subject.) "We will NEVER have more than two children! EVER! Can you imagine adding another child to this household?! NO WAY! We'd have to be CRAZY to have three kids!" Well, crazy is as crazy does, as the saying goes. ...or is it 'stupid is as stupid does'? hmmm... And as you know we ARE adding a third child in the early fall. Once again, our "I will never" has turned into "Alrighty then!" Nathan took the news of our surprise new addition much better than I did, shockingly. I'd been fully prepared to administer CPR and talk him down from a worrisome rage when I broke the news to him. Oddly enough, it was I who needed the aid. He reminded me again of God's sovereignty and knowledge of what is best for us. And now, we can hardly wait till our Addison Kate gets here in early November!

My list of 'nevers' could go on and on but I won't do that to you as you're opinion of me has probably already been altered from what it once was. But I have to deliver one last 'never':

~"I will NEVER own a mini-van. Not that they are not great for those families who need them but I just don't like them for myself." Shamefully I say this: I believe I've said to my mother more than once when she suggested a mini van for us "I'm not old enough to drive a Mom Wagon!" I can hear you now, those out there who drive a mini van..."Whhhell! The nerve of her!" I know, I know, I hear ya, and again, my sincerest apologies for such thinking on my part. My mouth has been slapped shut and my vain pride has been squashed. I am now the PROUD owner of a mini van!
And I say 'proud' with all honesty. I absolutely LOVE it. I've had it for three days now and every day I'm coming up with some little errand that we MUST run just so I can drive it. I don't need to tell you how ecstatic my children are about it. They think it's the best thing EVER! And so do I. Taylor told me "This van is WAY cooler than our old car!" Boy, do perspectives change with age. It has a DVD player for them with headphones so when we get in the car and start down the road, there is PEACE! Ahhhh! Silence, except for the occasional little giggle which is a very much welcomed sound. I was reluctant at first, I'll admit, when we started looking at vans. Nathan was sold on them from the start. I knew that I was going to have to get something bigger since our family is growing but a mini van was not it! And even as we test drove, negotiated price, and finally drove out of the parking lot in our new ride, I still had an aching in my heart for my sporty little car. As I drove out of the dealership parking lot in my new van, I looked at my sad, rejected little car sitting there and said with a tear, "goodbye my youth." Oops, did I say that out loud? Apparently I had as Nathan was giving me look something akin to "oh, please!" and Taylor says "Mama, you had youth? Was that like when you were in high school?" "Yes, honey, I guess it was."

So, I'm coming to the conclusion that maybe vanity is something God wants out of me, now. Ya think?! "And THIS my dear, is the year I'm going to beat it out of you if I have to" said God. Just now, I looked up the word 'vanity' in the Encarta Dictionary and the first definition given is "excessive pride, especially in personal appearance". Uhh! That's not ME! Well, not EXCESSIVE!! humph! Welllll......maybe it is me.

This year, first month of this year to be exact, I turned thirty with much wailing and gnashing of teeth. It was as if I was killing over in the next day or so, the way I acted about it. And it wasn't that I felt old, it was just having to say that number...no more a youthful, preppy answer of "I'm twenty-whatever!" Was I being vain about my age? Check!

Next came the news in March that I would be having another baby. No more just the four of us, now we are becoming a brood. I don't think I was prideful about only having two children. However, looking at having three did change the image I held of myself, I'll admit. At first when I thought of me taking care of three kids, I saw myself looking run down, messy haired, and baggy eyed, wearing lounge pants and an over-sized dirty t-shirt every day and literally falling apart. Not a pretty picture. I know, I've seen it before in my bathroom mirror on my less than graceful days. Prideful about my image? Check!

And lastly, I now drive a mini van. Something I always thought was fine for older women who had lots of kids and needed it but not for me. Remember, "I'm not OLD enough to drive a van." (Sorry, I just poured salt into that wound, didn't I?) Even on the days when I did look like that run down, frumpy mom, you couldn't tell in my black car with tinted windows! My image was given by the exterior of my car, not what was actually driving the car. Again, more vanity? Check!

Well, I've shared more than I should have about my character flaws and personal thoughts. You probably think I'm a terrible person. And while I have made light of myself being a vain person, it is not something I'm proud of. While all brutally true, it was shared in the hope of amusing you. And making you realize you're a much better person than you thought you were! -kidding! Saying all this 'out loud' has helped me to see how ridiculous I can be about things. I think through writing all this, I'm beginning to gain a new perspective about a few of the things I've been prideful about and I'm okay with letting it go.

There is a song that keeps playing over and over in my mind as I've been writing this. It's an old song typically sung by children. The chorus goes like this: "He's still working on me. To make me what I ought to be. It took Him just a week to make the moon and the stars, the sun and the earth and Jupiter and Mars. How loving and patient He must be, He's still working on me.!" How true that is and how grateful I am for His love and patience with me!

If you know that song, you're going to be singing it in your head for the rest of the day!!! ~you're welcome! :)