I am learning that my life in this new season [of working full+ time and Ivan being Mr. Mom] is leaving very little margin for error. It seems like every minute of free time is calculated and planned to a great degree. I often feel that different forms of self care are even costly as I find that there is very little wiggle room in my day to day life of working, and more working and taking care of children, and being a wife who is supposed to look in the eyes of her husand every so often. There are very small spaces for grieving, for nurturing my internal world, for talking with Jesus. I feel cramped in and shoved in a tight place, threatening to buckle under it all.

So when I mess up the times of appointments and get there an hour and a half too early after rushing out of the house and getting slack for blowdrying my hair, putting some color on my eyes and spritzing my wrists with cheap perfume and realize I forgot all my normal things I would bring with me anywhere: knitting, a journal, a book or some work to do from my home care nursing job, I KICK MYSELF—over and over and over again. [I'm aware of the run on sentence; that is how my life feels these days, one big run on sentence.] As I cry with someone I confide in regularly, I realize that my life has very little margin for these sorts of error. I cannot afford to waste any time whatsoever and every half hour is so precious.

So you might understand why it appeals to me to run away on most days. I drive over I-94 and fantastize about just driving north, deep into the woods of Wisconsin. Drive and drive until I get lost and can’t find my way back. But then it occurs to me that even if I did “escape”, I would be haunted by life here and the family I left behind. It just wouldn’t work. So I stay and keep plowing hoping that I don’t get so utterly depleted that my insides compress and there is nothing left of me. Kind of bleak, eh? But, hey, that is where I am at most days if I really sit still and distill it all.

I cling to these words in this bleak and leaky place…”And I rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but I also rejoice in my sufferings, because I know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint me, because God has poured out his love into my heart by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given me.”

God is producing something in me.

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