BLESSINGS IS THE REWARD FOR A THANKFUL HEART

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.

Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand
Psalm 127: 3 & 4

Americans pause every year at this time to celebrate Thanksgiving, a time of year when families gather over a large feast as they give thanks for all the blessings in their lives.

We do not celebrate thanksgiving in this part of the world, but many of us try to be thankful every day for the blessings in our lives. This year has been rough for many of us, financial problems, joblessness, health issues, you name it, and it is so refreshing when we can pause to say thanks to God for the good things we do have as well.

I know it is a struggle for many of us, especially at this time, to do this because we are so overwhelmed by the bad things that are going on with us. When I was struggling with infertility, many days I felt like this, I was just so sad and hopeless and if anyone asked if I was grateful for anything in my life, I would have had a hard time coming up with any. This is indeed difficult for me to admit, but that is what hopelessness does to people.

While doing my regular ‘blogroll’ reading, I came across a blog by a young lady who stutters (I follow stuttering blogs as well because as many of you know, I also stutters and have plans of starting one of my own). This young lady also has other challenges in her life, especially at this time, yet she chooses not to be bitter about these things, but to give thanks for the good things she has going on in her life. I am not sure if she realizes how many she came up with, but I noticed and want to say that, some of us feel at times that we do not have much to give thanks for because of the many challenges we face, but we would be surprised if we begin to write down the blessings we do have, I am sure it would add up to a lot. Try writing the first few as the gift of life, the gift of love and the gift of freedom, things so many others are struggling to keep in their grasp even as I write, and many of us take for granted.

We should therefore not wait on a special time of year to give thanks, we should begin each day with a thankful heart, because blessings is God’s reward for a thankful heart.

Here is the link to this young lady’s blog, entitled ‘Giving Thanks’ http://stutterrockstar.wordpress.com/2009/11/26/giving-thanks/

Read and be encouraged.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME………It’s the little things that matters

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.

Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand
Psalm 127: 3 & 4

If I had written this post yesterday as I originally wanted to, based on how I was feeling, it would have been one so gloomy, I probably would have depressed you all.

Well, it is another birthday for us, my husband’s was yesterday and mine is today and no, we did not plan it as many have been asking. The weird thing about this one though, is that I have not been feeling even a twinge of joy as it approached and this almost sent me into depression because for all my birthdays, no matter what I was going through that year, as soon as November stepped in, I started feeling excited about my birthday. This year, it was not so at all, I felt nothing, I dug and dug deep but came up empty.

This morning, I woke up bright and early and decided to check my email before my husband was off to work with the lap top and what I saw changed my mood, as I had no hopes of having a great day. My inbox was filled with birthday greetings, thirty-eight messages to be exact and that cloud of sadness and despair was lifted immediately. There was another forty-six messages with birthday wishes, waiting on me when my husband returned from work a short while ago. Thanks so much to my facebook friends and to those who sent e-cards. I am truly feeling blessed.

While retrieving these messages, it occurred to me that I have no reason at all to feel down because so many people care and care enough to send me greetings on my special day. It was then I started feeling guilty, so guilty for not being more appreciative of the little things in life. I did not receive big expensive gifts or got taken out to expensive restaurants for lunch, but people who care, took time out to pen their personal birthday greetings to me. I feel so blessed.

I then look again and saw something else that I should not take for granted. My beautiful, perfect healthy baby boy who is wreaking havoc in the house and giving me a heart attack every time he did a flip or climb on the burglar bars. If nothing else, I should be feeling blessed and grateful for this, grateful for the fact that this birthday, I am not dealing with the difficult issue of childlessness.

I am still trying to figure out why I was feeling like this, this birthday. Is it the fact that we recently moved house and had a difficult time settling in? Is it my PMS symptoms or is it just how birthdays feel as you make your way into your forties? The thing is though, I do not feel older than twenty-five, therefore age could not be the reason that I was feeling like this, because I have no problem with my age except people do not believe me when I tell them how old I am. I remember having to show someone my driver’s license for them to believe me. My husband and I have been told that we do not look our age, time and time again and we consider this a blessing.

I am feeling much better now and my day turned out great. Later, my husband and I will celebrate over wine and cake. Don’t worry its non-alcoholic, therefore our son can be a part of it if he is not sleeping, as we include him in everything.

I am now looking towards the challenges and stand ready to embrace the joys that this next year of my life brings.

To all those who share this birthday with me, Happy Birthday and may the peace of gold enfold you and may his spirit guide you into this new year of your life.

Be blessed and until next time, keep clinging to hope.

WOMEN ARE STRONG AND RESILIENT BEINGS

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.
Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand
Psalm 127: 3 & 4

Last Sunday at Church, a young lady approached me and asked if I was not going to try for a baby girl. I wanted so much to tell her oh yes, because we do need a sibling for our darling boy as he currently thinks that we are his siblings, but sadly I could not.

I instead proceeded to tell her of all the odds that were against us in trying for another baby, (health, age, finances and a promise I made to God when I was struggling with infertility, that if he allowed me to conceive even just one child, I would adopt a sibling for this child. I would help an unfortunate child, who would otherwise not have the gift of a loving home and family and this would be my way of thanking him for granting me the desire of my heart). I strongly believe God is holding me to this promise, in light of the fact that I did get pregnant earlier this year and lost it. I am sorry, I really have to think so, because I really did not believe God would allow me to go through the pain of another loss, after such a painful struggle with infertility. We are finding out now though that adoption is not as easy as we originally thought but we still intend to pursue it though and pray that God in his mercy, will see us through this as well, and even more so because we intend to honour the promise I made to him

As the conversation with this young lady on Sunday progressed, we were by then joined by another, who is the mother of a son and this part of the post reflects the reason for the caption as I believe you might by now be wondering when will I get to this. I quickly found myself telling them both that I do have my girl, only she is not with me, she is fulfilling her higher calling. That was when the young lady who started the conversation with me said, you are so strong for surviving the loss of a pregnancy, if it were me, I would have ended up in the mental hospital.

The conversation did not allow me time to give her any details of how I dealt with this loss, or she probably would have changed her statement, how I cried until I felt I had no more tears, how close I came to ending up in the mental hospital and could have also ended up in the morgue as I had intentions of ending my life, because I was not sure I could go on living. I had invested everything emotionally in this pregnancy and was feeling that I was well on my way to overcoming infertility only to have it ripped from my grasp.

Ever so often, my thoughts wander back to that loss and with tears in my eyes, I relive the horror, the despair and the pain I felt. This is pain compared to none other I have felt. The thing is though, women are resilient beings and just as I bounced back from this tragedy, this young lady, like many of us who have had losses, would have bounced back from a loss of a pregnancy herself, she just does not know this, because she was never given the chance.

I have heard on many occasions how strong I am to have dealt with infertility and the losses that came with it, but I do not hasten to revel in this glory or give myself any credit over any other woman who have walked or will walk this scary road, as I must conclude that women are indeed strong and resilient beings who bounces back from any tragedy, any difficult situation, to complete the task that has been given them on this journey of life. You might have heard or have noticed that more men actually end up committing suicide than women and this I strongly believe, is because women will show their grief, they will grieve deeply but openly, they will show their pain but men on the other hand are not known not to, they instead internalize things.

Women, be encouraged therefore, and until next time, keep clinging to hope.

“CAN’T STAY AWAY FROM YOU…………”

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.

Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand
Psalm 127: 3 & 4

Well, after two weeks break, I am ready to start blogging again. I recently moved and as you all know moving turns your life upside down and that includes your mental state of mind.

Imagine being without a refrigerator and stove for almost two weeks. It was hard and some days I felt like packing up my few things and heading back home. What happen really is that since we migrated, we have been renting furnished homes. This was so convenient as all we had to do was to walk in with our few personal effects and begin living, no hassle, no stress, except a higher rent of course. Unfortunately reality set in one day, as our son who is now two began ruining the people’s things and so made the decision now to rent unfurnished homes, so that the things he ruin would be ours.

This was daunting at first because all we owned at the moment was a chair and so we had to rely on one of our local furniture companies for the bare necessities we need to make living comfortable. You must have heard the saying that ‘poverty is a crime.’ Well because we could in no way purchase all these things cash at the moment, we had to seek credit and that was when we began feeling that we had committed a crime for being poor. The furniture company wanted every document we possessed and had us going back to them for couple days in a row with additional documents they needed and so we ended up waiting a whole week and a half for our, oops, their stuff. The only good thing is that the apartment is so so cozy, the owner thought about every possible detail just to make his tenants comfortable.

Our son was the real trooper in all of this as he had to make do with room temperature beverages and take out, as he could not receive his home cook meals of mash potatoes and macaroni and cheese which he loves dearly. Some days, I actually felt like crying because of what we had him subjected to, but he is our tough little guy and this just goes to show that children are actually more resilient than we give them credit for. Did I mention we had no television either and so he made himself comfortable with dvds of his favorite cartoons which he watched over and over again on our laptop.

Well, we are cooking now and having cold beverages, which is such a delight (can you imagine, another saying goes, cow never know the use of his tail until he loses it). I would have given anything for a cool drink of water those couple of days, something we usually take for granted because it is always available, except as those of us in Tropical Regions know, when those hurricanes strike and take with it our electricity.

Thanks very much for bearing with me for the last two posts, as I fill you in on our recent moving experience. I will be back to the blogging business at hand in my next post, so catch up with you then.

Hey all, I have not fallen off the face of the earth

We just moved and is going through the teething process of settling in. Our apartment is very nice and cozy and so that helps a lot.

We are awaiting some furniture from our local furniture company and they are just rubbing us the wrong way, I guess its because we are not natives in this country, they want every freaking document that we possess, the only document left for them to ask for is our baptism certificate and even though we tell them we have a young child and is finding it difficult to take care of him without these basic items, we are still waiting.

We are so distressed. Anyway I wont bore you any longer, I intend to return to blogging as soon as my mind is settled and I can focus again.

Thank you for bearing with me.

talk soon.