Just Hangin On?

Today is my birthday.  I love birthdays.  I love new beginnings.  This is my very own new year.  I feel like I get to start over, change the rules of the game just a little if I want to.

I'm 38 today.  My twenty year high school reunion is this year.  It is amazing how time has flown by.  We all know it does, but my head still spins sometimes while I'm on that speeding time train.  I thought I would hate getting older, and I will say that I'm not loving all of it, but I love the way I feel.

It's awesome to be a 38 year old wife and mom.  I have amazing kids, and a marriage I'm proud of.  I have faith that sustains me, quiet moments that renew me, purpose that drives me, strength that surprises me, people who love me, health that allows me to do what I want to do; together it's a story that makes a life I want to have.

When Emily and Abby were babies and I didn't know what our life would look like I would often pray that God would give me a glimpse of what our life would be.  I held and rocked them for hours, staring at their tiny faces and holding their little hands, so afraid that what the doctors said they'd be would be true.  I begged Him to let me dream of them, to see what they would become for a just a minute.   I thought if I could just see them, I would know that I could do this and everything would be alright.  God in his infinite wisdom did not give me that vision.  At only a glimpse, we are absolutely not alright.  Had I seen one moment of this life, I would have run screaming from the room.  I would have seen kids in wheelchairs that couldn't walk or talk.  In one minute, I could have only seen what was lost.

I wouldn't have known how much I could love those girls, I wouldn't have even looked at how amazing Hannah and Sarah turned out.  I'm sure if I were standing outside looking in for just a few minutes, I would see my greatest fears realized, all that was completely wrong.   How could I have known at the sight of my girls in wheelchairs how full our lives could be?   I couldn't have felt the love and respect I have for my husband for walking this very hard road with me. I wouldn't have imagined the pride I feel in all of my girls as they work hard, help each other and love so sweetly.   I couldn't have understood then the love I have for Jesus, the understanding I have of his ways; the support and comfort my faith and my church family would bring me.  I wouldn't know at a glance of the precious friendships I would have with families of children with disabilities and the amazing strength they possess.  Then, I couldn't have seen me now and known how abundantly blessed I'd  feel. 

A single snapshot of the family we would become would never show me Jeff's steady, hard work and commitment; Hannah's generous heart and helping hands; Emily's fiery temper, determination, and wicked sense of humor; Abby's overwhelming sweetness and sometimes unsure eyes and her need to be reassured; Sarah's precious, healing spirit, her humor and love. 

When I held those little broken babies all of those years ago and opened my broken heart to them, God took all those fractured pieces of us all and made a whole.  A complete, rounded, loved, abundantly full life that at a glimpse would still look broken. 

So how could inching toward 40 be so bad?  I love me at 38.  I love that I can see how very blessed I am.  I walk into my 39th year grateful and praying that God would continue to bless me in ways that at a glimpse, I wouldn't understand.