A Bi-Polar Week.

I'm not poking fun of people who have this disease, it's just the journey this week has been.

Monday, I had an evaluation at work and came out with a great review, in fact, the Director wants me to be taking some leadership classes as she would like to see me in a managerial role.  I can tell you, I never saw that coming.  I have a few tweaks to do to my evaluation, but I am bang on track with it....and humbled and excited for my future career.

By Wednesday, that elation had crumbled and I was overwhelmed.  The journey of 2014 has been a tough one--and my ability to find the good in situations had run out and I was a miserable mess.

Wednesday night, Kent and I got to youth and I was cornered and questioned about my leadership at youth.  Then someone else came in to encourage me -- we prayed.  It was only after I cried a while and explained that flat out working since July fund raising for the trip to LA in August--this has been a long hard haul for me.

Thursday morning I bottomed out.  I had an emotional day--by the time I got home I was done.

I grabbed my running shoes and headed out.  Cried and run 4k, finding some perspective with my Ipod and worship music.  I was focusing on:

In my mind I can see your face

Love pours down in a shower of Grace.

Life is a gift that you chose to give.

I believe we eternally live

Faith is the evidence of things unseen

People tell me You're just a dream

But they don't know you the way that I do

You're the one I live to pursue.  - DC Talk Mind's Eye.

Song after song was an encouragement.  But the time I got home, I cried it out, laid it all before God and was ready to start focusing on the positive.  I'm sure thankful that God is ok with me yelling at him--maybe the people along my running route aren't.  

My biggest problem this week was that Kent is up for a job in Burnaby for a 6 month contract, which will mean he commutes to and from Victoria.  

I needed some time to reconcile myself with the thought of not having Kent here for the majority of 6 months.  I think I am now there.....

So, I woke Friday with a little more of a positive focus.  Made breakfast, missed my bus--oh well, still would make it to work on time.  When Kent told me he had missed a  job fair...I was back to full on irritated.  I worked it out in my head, again, back to focusing on the positive.

I still can't fully process the last week.  I am done with the struggle of Kent's unemployment, the uncertainty of our future, the idea of our family being separated further, not having the money to really do Christmas well and my least favourite season is upon me...Christmas.

I know that God has great plans for us, He's promised us that.  I just am ready for the promise to be made clear, to be bold, to have some courageousness--I'm ready to take some steps of faith,

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for 

and assurance about what we do not see. 

Hebrews 11:1

Faith for the future

Hebrews 11.  I still think that there is a part of the bible that is being written in heaven and that our faith on earth is being recorded.

When we were going through the process of moving to Victoria, I wished I had kept track of what we went through to get here.  There was miracle after miracle.

We got here and really didn't know why we were here or what we were going to do here.  We would work, we would be involved in our local church--but what would that look like?

We were in one of our first church services when we were sitting behind Rob and Chelsea the youth pastor and his wife and I kept feeling like we were there to help build up leaders.

The past numbers of weeks, seeing 40-60 kids at youth with 20+ leaders, we are basking in the preparation that God has made for Kent, Rob, Chelsea and me the past number of years. 

The past number of weeks, I have been feeling like we are not long for Victoria.  Not that I want to move, I have just felt this urgency to purge, nest and get the house ready to sell, and that God is preparing us for change.  Big change.

Last week, Kent found a number of jobs, 2 in Vancouver, 2 in Richmond and 6 in Seattle.  And, we were ok with this.

On Sunday, we did communion and we were praying together when I was overcome with the desire to encourage Kent in prayer, so long after the communion time ended, we were praying.  And I saw this again:

Kent and I joined with Rob and Chelsea to be the abutment on one side of a bridge.  We have been here to get to know the teens and we are now the pontic that is bridging the gap between Rob and who God is calling here to take over the youth ministry.  Once that person is in place, the transition made, I feel like we are free to go.

Kent and I have gotten excited over the future, we know that God is leading us and calling us.  I was thinking the other night about a condo for the 2 of us, with room for our kids to fit in when they come--but just Kent and Kim time.  I get a thrill of excitement every time I think about it.

So as we process through this--I will write.

I'm weighing in...The Brittany Maynard Post.

PJ Day 2014.  I don't think I've had one yet.  I caught a nasty cold on Friday--decided to use up some of my sick days and stay home today.  For the first time in my working career I have paid sick time.  I can hardly believe it really, and because of my earlier Cancer diagnosis, I bank them like crazy--just in case I need to take a serious amount of time off.  Onto the blog post:

This weekend, Brittany Maynard took her life.  She was a terminally ill Cancer patient who was using her right to die with dignity.  Here is her message: Brittany Maynard

This blog would not be complete without her story being told.  This is not a one sided "Pro-Life" blog, but rather I want to just weigh in -- in what I see in this story.  I will not dismiss Brittany's desire, or the fact that she felt that this was the way for her.  This was HER decision with HER loved ones. 

I just know my loved and I ones would think so much differently.

Here is what brought me into this story a couple weeks ago:  We love you Brittany Maynard

I hope you watch all of the videos, so here's my piece.

I've been working with youth since 1988, when Kent and I moved to Kelowna BC.  I've seen great heartache and pains, along with huge gains and great celebrations.

My heart has hurt for Brittany, because I believe she bought into a lie.  Something that has been percolating in the North American Culture for decades.

Life can be easy, painless, effortless.

What it has done has bred generations of people who would not know what to do if tragedy, destruction, famine or war could bring.  We, as North American's in the past number of generations have not had any real hardship.  We. Are. SOFT.

I remember just a couple months ago, the power went out here for 6 hours.  I laid back in my bed, read a book, was completely comfortable with the lack of noise in the house, lack of 'entertainment', not that I like this, but I have trained myself over the past 3 years to be comfortable with little, and content with quiet.

My students....had a terrible time with a lack of access to the internet, TV, they just didn't know what to do!

We have never had to live 6 months on cabbage soup.

We have never had a time where we have been fearful of bombings.

We rarely have to endure or suffer long with pain, because we have access to a great health care system, easy access to drugs, and in a number of hours we can be numbed.

In all this I see a softer and softer generation of people.

When I think of the days when we heard the word Cancer and we didn't know what was coming, I knew that I was laying down a path for my kids and Kent to follow, they were looking to me to see how was I going to handle all of this.

Kent said as he took my hands, we walk this out together.

I can tell you I suffered.  I hurt.  I didn't sleep.  I couldn't eat.  I had a hard time remembering to eat--and didn't poop.  I gained 14 pounds each round of chemo, that I had a tough time losing by the time the new round started.  I lost muscle mass, strength and endurance.

All along, I thought, I would fight this tooth and nail to the very, very end.  I would not take the easy way out.  To cut short this journey--because I knew that people were watching me and I knew that through the strength at God gives me on a daily basis, we could walk this out.

One day, when my days are done--I know exactly what I would want.  To be surrounded by my family, Jonathan and Max playing the guitar, Melissa and Kent singing my favourite songs--leading me to the time I will see the dawning of heaven and being ushered into the presence of the Lord.

There will be no easy way to die, but I chose to have quantity of time with my loved ones on earth--they will be able to say that I was feisty all the way to the end.

There is real beauty in being broken, there is real beauty in suffering.  There is a refining that I wouldn't give up for anything.

When Life hands you lemons...

Friday night, 6 pm, like clockwork.  I caught a cold.  Literally, 6 pm.

My body seems to know when the weekend is happening, IF I get sick, it's generally been on a Friday and I am totally better by Monday.

I am completely sure that when my alarm goes off Monday morning at 6 am, I will be completely fine.

That's how I roll.

When I was really sick and going through chemo, I had a friend online who was posting about her cold.  It went on for about 3 weeks.  I had a really, Really, REALLY hard time feeling any sympathy for her when I couldn't poop, eat, drink, sleep, had gone bald....

I decided that I would reserve my thoughts until I got my next cold....and so, it took 2 years, but I finally got it.

And I have to say that I am not going to whine-online.  I reserve the right to say, when life gives you lemons, make Neo-Citron, suck it up and keep moving.

On the Kent front, he has had some companies interested in him in the past couple weeks, which is a good sign.  Kent was contacted by a head hunter from Seattle, who has given him 6 leads on jobs.  I have never wanted to live in the US.  I seriously would live ANYWHERE, rather than live in the States, but having said that...I will go wherever God calls, leads and directs....including Seattle.

So, we have talked it out, worked out some details, dreamed a little about what life could look like in the next couple years.

I really can't wait for uninterrupted Kent time, in a small little place, with little yard work, or housework....sigh.  It would be amazing.