My heart soars...

My boy came home tonight to surprise me...he thought I shouldn't be home alone for so long, he had been gone since Wednesday working. He goes to work about 3 days in a row in another city doing maintenance for a nursing home, he makes 10.00 bucks an hour, his first job...I'm proud of him. I have to say for 16 he looks after his mom pretty well...He honestly thinks of others first...not only did he come home early but he did some yard work, made me some tuna salad, got me something to drink chatted with me on my bed and now he is in the shower, filthy from working...his dog is sitting at my feet peaceful even though the fireworks are going off, if she weren't in here she would be running from window to window barking. I hate what the 4th does to dogs...

Being sick is hard on a single parent...At least it has been on me because I'm the caretaker and provider of my family. I have done pretty well by my children, but chronic sickness makes us fail in our own strength...there is no way to keep juggling it all...something falls by the side...I was able to keep working, I was able to go through divorce and keep our home so their life felt stable...for that I am grateful...and I have to admit that it was simply Gods grace that got us through and it was His favor....I should have lost my home, I should have lost everything but God made a way...

The hardest thing to watch sometimes is your kids having to grow up in speed time...I didn't want Hunter to have to find rides in a new school with kids he hardly knew to football practice, I wanted to go see all his games, not just the three football games I got to....I really wanted to go to all his lacrosse games...I got to two...I wanted to be more involved checking up on his homework and grades...I wanted to be the one taking him to church Wednesday nights and picking him up, I wanted those car conversations...I wanted him to have a "normal" life. Instead he is a 16 year old with a sense of care for his Mom most kids don't have to endure until they are middle age, he understands respite care because he lived it for two years with me...He gets away for work and he comes home early...we are going to have to change that...

Allie has been gone this week up to Henry County to the fair, she goes every year to this fair. This is the first time she has taken the entire week, she just couldn't before this summer, I was too sick. She was Hunters taxi, our grocery shopper, cook, and kitchen cleaner. She has had a ball with her friends and her guy this week...I have missed her so much...she lights up my life the same way Hunter keeps me laughing...she is stable, and true, and loyal...She just like Hunter think of others before herself...I think one of the biggest things I saw her do this year was a decision she made to taxi Hunter to youth group across town every Wednesday...at first it was hard for her with all her responsibilities at school but I reminded her Hunter asked for one thing from us, and that was youth group. I reminded her how it grounded him...and you know what as soon as she thought about it she made the best of it, she found a coffee shop dropped him off went and had a latte and studied...I love that she put someone else first and not only that made it a treat for herself...

In the Word we find out God makes everything work for Good...and that is what I see...character in my kids that is good, it wouldn't have been my choice, they simply would have learned these lessons later in life...did God cause my sickness...absolutely not...he provided for my healing 2,000 years ago...but he used this situation and showed all of us we can trust in Him, not just for our eternal lives but in everyday life, for our mortgage, for food, for lacrosse fees...I found healing for a chronic disease that has no cure in Him, he is restoring my health in ways I never imagined, our family came out stronger...everything was held together and most of all we grew and we met God, Christ crucified along the way...my heart soars...