They’re moving all around and are getting more uncomfortable each day, yes. But I also am finding all the more an importance in trusting them. On all levels.
God, help me to see clearly your path and to follow it easily. Make me and the baby well and whole, please. Keep my husband safe. Help us to find ease in trusting you fully, please. And help me to sleep well, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Today was loads better than the last couple Sundays. Cheers to birthday lunches that leave great leftovers to have for dinner (for days).
Thank you, God, for the family and love and food today. Help my husband to do well for his test tomorrow. Help us both sleep well tonight and each night. Make me and the baby well, please. Keep us safe. Keep my husband safe. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Sometimes, it isn’t about what we do together, but about that we be together. Today, I spent time with a former tutoring student and her parents. We live near one another and get together regularly. Today, however, I was still so worn down exhausted, somewhat nauseous, and physically struggling with the new aches of pregnancy’s moving stuff around in my front region, that I couldn’t do much of anything. I managed to get through a short grocer trip, and then had to have a seat for a while while she made smoothies, and then lie down to rest while she baked. After she got me up 30 or so minutes later – I hadn’t slept, but lying down with my eyes closed had still be very helpful – I managed barely to get upstairs to see her recent art and sewing projects. By the time I got back down, I had to pack up and go home. I was going down for the count.
So, I didn’t do much. But it was still a really nice day. Just hanging in the same place together and intentionally spending time together was what made it all so worth it. And I am grateful that it worked out after all. Hopefully, it was just the kind of alone time my husband was seeking, while I got to have the opposite, which I was seeking. Good days all around, I hope.
And happy birthday to my love and husband.
Thank you, God, for my husband. Thank you for the friends today and the quality time together. Help me and the baby to sleep well and to be well. Keep us safe. Keep my husband safe. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Lots more today in the realm of body aches. I sneezed while sitting on a stool in class today, and it hurt. My whole insides in the front felt like they had been, almost, punched. An actual youch.
Fortunately, the kids were great about it. I said it had hurt, and they saw I was in pain. When I asked for someone to bring me two tissues (because my nose was running almost immediately from the sneeze), there was no hesitation. And, I noticed, as I handled blowing my nose and gathering myself, slowly recovering from the blow – ha! – (to my insides, not the nose and tissue) the girls sat there in almost complete silence. Perhaps they were worried. I imagine I would have been so in their shoes. Like I said, it was obvious that I was in pain. And the bizarreness of a sneeze’s having caused it just made it all the more unnerving. But, as I said, they handled it well as a class. They waited patiently and quietly for me to heal, and I did.
But it hurt. And I’ve had their aches on the insides today, too. The skin wasn’t hurting so much today – it had felt like it was actively stretching for about a day and half – but the insides were.
Man… this stuff is tough.
God, thank you for this opportunity. Keep me and the baby safe. Make us both well, please. Help us to get along well and beautifully with one another and with my husband. Keep my husband safe, please. Grant him a joyful and satisfying and safe birthday tomorrow, please. Thank you for him. I am so grateful… thank you. Help us to see clearly and to follow easily your path for us. Also, can you share our baby’s name with us yet? In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
I’m still kind of nauseous most of the time, and sometimes very nauseous. However, it has definitely lessen even further that a couple weeks ago. I am still struggling big time with food and eating and smells, but that, too, had gotten easier than it was only a couple weeks ago. However, I seem to have hit the phase in the past three days where I get the physical discomforts. The girls at school are great about it all and are very forgiving of all my noises and faces and my having to stop and recover here and there.
However, today had a special bit to it.
I had a burp that turned into a bit of puke in my mouth today during class. I apologized to the girls. They all smiled and encouraged me that, “It’s okay!” And several added, “It’s only natural!” One even contributed, “That happened to me one time at soccer. Then I had to swallow it.”
So, yeah. They were great. And it made all the difference being so totally accepted exactly as I am. And even encouraged in it.
Thank you, God, for the blessing of these girls. Help us always to do your will. Make me and the baby well, please, and keep us safe. Keep my husband safe, too, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Being super takes courage. It just does. And being courageous means that, in the face of fear, we don’t let the fear stop us. We are afraid, and we act anyway. We do what needs to be done, despite being afraid to do it.
So, it’s okay to be scared. It’s basically the first step to becoming super.
Help us to be well and to follow you fully, please, God. Make me and the baby well, please. Keep my husband safe. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
My husband was very annoyed. However, he succeeded in installing the blackout shade I bought on super discount at IKEA today. And I have a feeling it might make a massive difference in my sleep, effective immediately. I am quite excited to see how tonight goes. We have three others for the other windows in our bedroom. However, Jose have to be cut to fit, which is even more hassle, so we didn’t mess with them tonight. Just the most important one for tonight, the brightest window.
God, keep my husband safe, please. Help us to sleep well tonight. Make me and the baby well. Help my grandma to be well, too, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Working to sort it all out. God is helping. Not sorted fully yet, though. Might just go ahead and order the mattress, since the discount that started today has a “while supplies last” caveat that makes me nervous. Then we can take any extra time needed for the bed frame. There was no hurry specifically before today, as it was just a it getting better sleep, mostly for me. But the sudden almost 30% discount on the mattress makes a huge difference. So, time pressure now on that purchase.
Maybe we will sleep on the floor at first. Though I hope not.
God, help us to see clearly, please, and grant us ease on this path. Keep my husband safe. Make me and the baby well and whole, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Sometimes, I feel like I wish I weren’t so strong. God won’t give us anything we can’t handle, right? If I weren’t so strong, I’d get easier stuff. But I guess it all would feel just as hard as it does now, because it is all relative to what we can handle.
So, yes, it sucks sometimes being so strong. But it would suck being weaker, too.
So, I’d rather be strong and taking the hard stuff than weak and taking the weak stuff.
But I always will acknowledge that it is still tough. ‘My yoke is easy and my burden is light.’ But they’re still a yoke and a burden – just ones we can handle as we are. Life doesn’t get easier. We just get better stuff the hard stuff.
And yes, depression makes all that sound like lame nonsense that doesn’t help anything at all. But I still trust God. More than ever now, when I feel like I can’t do it. Because I know that I can’t do it. He has to do it through me and with me. I am in His hands and I am safe. I trust Him to use me wisely and with love, intention, and integrity.
Thank you, God, for loving me and for making me. Make me and this baby well, please. Make us safe. Keep my husband safe. And help us all to be our best selves in this life, now and always. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
Today, we went to a birthday party in celebration of the fifth birthday of my husband’s cousin’s twins. I had anticipated only being able to stay a short while, then needing to go home. So, we drove separately over there the twenty-ish blocks.
However, I was almost immediately overwhelmed and wondered if I even would make it half an hour. As the adults all showed up, they were loud. Two of them walked in with plastic cups, their drinks for the road… they live not even 20 minutes away, if that. (Yes, “alcoholics” is the term that came to mind. It wasn’t angrily thought. Just observationally so.) Anyway, they were too loud for me immediately. I was cringing and flinching quite strongly at almost all moments.
So, I went and got my earplugs from the car. I don’t really like wearing them, but they make a huge difference when I need them. For this situation, it seemed likely I could have them only partway in, so it wouldn’t make a seal in my ears and give me that ‘trapped in a bubble’/’underwater’ feeling. Whatever the case, I needed to give them a try, or else I had to leave immediately.
Fortunately, having them mostly in but not sealed worked quite well. There were times I did have to push them in fully, but it never lasted more than a few minutes before I was able to loosen them again.
At one point, as I was happily and, almost even, energetically conversing with someone, my husband asked across the room quietly, ‘How are you still here?’ I told him that I didn’t know, and we chuckled. I felt okay. Not great. But well enough to be hanging out still. And it was after 9pm at this point. We were baffled, to be sure. It was just the perfect alignment of events and balance for me to be able to rest away and be involved in turns.
And I ended up having multiple really great conversations with folks. There were a few shallow and slightly annoying chats – because of the shallowness of them – but I mostly had a really enjoyable time talking with and sharing with others. Including the person who had not previously left any positive impression on me in any interactions. (Granted, she had a baby seven weeks ago, and I know that can change people a lot for the better. Perhaps that played a role. Perhaps the lack of alcohol in her system also made a huge difference. Whatever the case, I am grateful and we had a good time talking both times we two talked.)
I also got to have some good bonding with newer people for me. That was possibly the best part of it all. No, all the good conversations combined were what made it all so good of a time.
We finally left after 11pm. We had been there since before five PM. The kids had long since gone to bed. We adults were well past our times of needing to go to bed. But we were having a great time. It was awesome.
Key moment: The older brother of the birthday boys – he is six – comes running up to me, excitedly slightly out of breath. He declares with delight, “This is the BEST party!” Oh, yeah? “P—-[my husband] is swinging the ball around,” (it is a huge 30″ inflatable, bubble-like balloon ball), “And he’s hitting us in the face with it. And we’re laughing so hard… We’re dying! From the laughing(!)… It’s Awesome!!!” It was true. I had seen just this happening through the French doors – they were inside and I was outside on the sofa, lounging next to the outdoor AC unit. He really was swinging this thing around and smashing it into their faces. It didn’t hurt them at all, since it was like a rubber version of Saran Wrap, and mostly just stretched and molded when it smashed into things. But I had not expected one of them to run out to tell me how getting hit in the face with this thing made for the best party. Haha. It was just wonderful.
Thank you, God, for this lovely day. Thank you for the food I was able to eat and drink I was able to drink. Help me and the baby to be well. Keep my husband safe, please. Help us all to sleep we tonight, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Post-a-day 2024
hannah ananas 