Think on Such Things

So, we have this incredibly insurmountable week before us. At least, it seems insurmountable to me. You see, we have a little boy who, to say the least, is incredibly medically complicated. His diagnoses have left him famous, but for not the reasons that most parents want their kiddo famous for. Most parents may admit to wanting their child to gain some sort of notoriety. Doesn’t that explain the rise of tv shows in which kids are highlighted for their rare talents? I mean, someone has to drive and apply for that child to be on TV. Maybe it isn’t that type of fame you are seeking for your kid. Maybe you want them to be the best dressed at school. Or maybe even you have nobler aspirations, like you take great pride in them being known for their kindness. Hey, I’m not pointing an fingers here. I’m right there with you. I absolutely swell when someone tells me that they love hanging around my kid. Or, that they want to have a playdate with them. But what happens when your child becomes...

One after another it just keeps coming. Miracles. Trust me friends that we are not deserving of these. Our faith has been stripped and crazy challenged by this life. We have always said that God would still be good even if things never changed for us, even if these tests came back devastating. But for reasons only He can fathom, He has given us gift after gift during this trip. Yesterday we had to do another day of getting ready, a cleanse. More liquid. Then we met our GI doctors and we saw God's grace on us again. Our main doctor walked into our room and immediately commented about all the verses that we had put up in our room. With going through several hospitalizations, I knew that the hardest battles in the hospital for me was the war waged in my mind. That was by far the most exhausting! So, I spent time with my mom writing out verses...putting our armor on. I knew we would need reminders in his room. Little did I know that those verses God would use to not only protect my ...

What was ahead of us today seemed daunting. We had to get Moses"cleaned out" for his big procedure on Tuesday. He has been on a liquid diet since Friday night so he is starving! Normally, when he gets hungry, he gets really angry. That started out being my first worry and then God started to knock out my worries one by one. He was in a fantastic mood all day!!! Like one of his best days ever! Not frustrated, not hangry, no screaming, no hitting. In fact, it was better than just avoiding difficult behavior. God abundantly blessed us with lots of affection from Moses. Something we don't often get. Next I was wondering how he would do in this new environment, since newness can cause him high anxiety. Like I said, amazing! His hospital room has two things that has brought him so much peace...a balcony and a bathtub. A warm bath and access to the sun are often super calming! Praise God!! Most hospitals do not have baths.  Then, of course I was wondering how in the worl...

This week has been a whirlwind of preparation. Making sure we have the right and enough medications. Double checking to-do lists. Laundry. Cleaning. Paying all the bills before we leave. Laundry. Making sure the girls are taken care of. Talking to teachers, therapists, doctors to let them all know we will be gone. Laundry. Then there is making sure that he is prepared for the procedures that we will undertake this coming week. My son, who has a severe genetic mutation, will be undergoing some pretty crazy tests out of state to see what is going on in his stomach. You see, his genetic mutation is newer. Only two twins in Italy have similar symptoms to his. What does genetic mutation mean? It means that we don’t know the scope of his disabilities. It means that we don’t know which parts of his body could breakdown or at what point. It also means that we can’t put our faith in doctors because they know almost as much as we do. It means that our hope and our strength lie in the One wh...

This past month, I have been changed. It seems as though a shift is happening in this road of autism, living with the pain of disability, learning to love the journey. Just looking at those words makes me a little disgusted because they sound so cheesy, “learning to love the journey”. What? How do you learn to love cleaning up poop? Anyway, things are changing in my mind. The gospel is coming to bear on my thoughts and I’m starting to see a tiny glimpse, perhaps, of what Jesus told Nathaniel in John 1. See, Jesus is in the midst of gathering his dream team, his posse, his community. He is traveling around saying to guys, “Come and follow me.” Drop everything you have, all you’ve known, all you thought life would be and follow what I say life is. I’m life. Be with me. Obey what I have to say. You’ll find life here. Scary right? Here he is telling these guys to leave their professions, leave their homes, leave all they know and you’ll see. Right from the get go, he is giving ...

I am undone. What is your undoing? Is there something in your life that has just laid you out bare, stripped you of all you thought you knew? What caused you to become unglued at the seams and your whole world is threatening to fall apart? I was thinking about this question today as I worked outside. Yep, I was working outside in the heat of an Arizona summer and …dun, dun, dun…I liked it. I like the feeling of sweat. It feels like a cleansing to me. Like all the impurities of my week are leaving my body and I have a chance to just sweat it out. I don’t exercise, other than chasing around my four kids. But, I assume that this is one of the reasons why people enjoy working out. Or maybe, this is the reason that some of my Native American people do the sweat lodge. Or maybe, the Finnish have an answer to life that we, in America, don’t yet understand when every house is equipped with a sauna. I needed that cleansing today because I started my day with being hit. That ...

How mom’s can love their kids when it is hard                 By Hannah Stone                                                           Chapter 1  Loving God When kids get in trouble it can be hard when you have lots of kids to take care of or when you are stressed out. But when you trust in Jesus everything is possible. Trusting in Jesus can be hard sometimes but when you do he will strengthen you to do anything. Jesus can do miracles in your life when not expected at all. Like when you accept Jesus into your heart. When you die you will go to heaven and see Jesus there and everything will be perfec...

For me, the last post on anger was a musing of the past. It was emotions that have taken me years to work through and at times, still work through. It began when our family lived in North Carolina several years ago and this journey of having a medically complicated son began. I found myself more and more angry at what God was doing with our life, about how He was orchestrating everything for His glory. I didn’t get it! I still don’t in many ways. That anger that I experienced so frequently turned to bitterness and distance. I just didn’t want to read the Bible. I didn’t feel like going to church. I didn’t want to teach my kids about God because I just didn’t trust him. It was a dark season. At times, it still is. My heart felt so sick and what was worse is that I could see where I was. I have grown up surrounded by the Church all of my life and I knew that my heart was growing cold. Honestly, I don’t remember what the turning point was. I don’t think that there was a big e...

Embed from Getty Images I just realized something a few days ago, I’m a teenager right now. I may be 34 but my new life with Jesus actually began 16 years ago. I was a freshmen in college when God awoke my heart. I don’t have a teenager yet, but I definitely remember being a teenager so many years ago. I remember the awkwardness of those times. I was still trying to figure out the world and I thought I had so much figured out. I thought I knew what I was doing. I thought that I knew what was good for me. Wow, was I dumb! How can I be so harsh with myself? Well, when I was 16, I was in my first relationship…if you can even call it that. I was working at Marie Callendar’s restaurant and crushing super hard on one of the servers. He was 22.  As a mother now, I realize the terror that my mom had in her eyes when she found out I was seeing this boy off and on. I remember her telling me, “You’re never going to see that boy again.” He had gotten fired from the restauran...

This week has been a doozy! We’ve gone through weeks like this before and we thought that they were just the new normal that we had to get used to. Weeks where Moses has these crazy highs and lows. A week where we batten down the hatches and kick into survival mode. No budgets. No showers. No breaks. These weeks make me see the wonder of dry shampoo, wet wipes, credit cards and early bedtimes. They happen about once a month or maybe every 6 weeks. Truthfully, I’m not too sure about the timeline because these weeks are a blur. With everything that has been under concern with Moses's GI tract, I wondered if this were another ileus. That thought drove me to email his specialist and ask for an x-ray. I felt like he was in a lot of pain, besides the fact that he kept saying “owie.” When he’s in pain, he seems to make raspberry sounds with his mouth a lot, like 90 percent of his waking day. Which then causes bleeding lips. His stimming activity is at it’s peak and he can’t seem t...