Search. Prune. Change. Repeat.

"Search me, oh God, and know my heart.
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting."
Psalm 139:23-24


Change begins with me.

Sounds logical.  Almost a no-brainer.  Of course it does.  Even sounds easy.
But it's hard to change when you don't know what needs to be changed.

When you're sick, you see the symptoms.  Your throat hurts.  You can't breathe through your nose.  Your head hurts.  You may have fever.  The symptoms get worse.  You see the symptoms, and you know that there is a problem, so you try to fix it in every way you know how.  You use Halls drops, Chloriseptic spray, Tylenol, take more vitamin C, do nasal rinses - the whole shabang.  Some things seem to work, but only for a while, and then you just feel lousy again.  The symptoms never go away for good.  You get frustrated because by golly, you are doing everything that you know to do, but nothing will shake this thing!  Why can't I shake this thing?  You call the doctor and tell him your symptoms.  You're hoping he can just give you a prescription over the phone so that you can start feeling better now.  You've looked up all your symptoms online, and you're pretty sure you know what the problem is, so you give him your opinion as well.
The problem, however, is that no matter how much you tell him about the symptoms, he can't make you better until you go see him and he examines you and diagnoses the problem.  Sure, you can tell him what YOU think it is, but only he knows how to make you better.

You know where I'm going with this...but here's my story anyway...

After Balian was born, I went through a really rough time.  I struggled with PPD in the form of irritability and anger.  But for some reason I would only take it out on my baby girl, Bella.
At first, every time I screamed at her, or was just down-right mean to her, I would be horrified, and I would go in my bathroom and cry my eyes out.  As time went on, it was "like" I was getting calloused to it...but I wasn't.  I thought I was getting better, but I wasn't.  The other PPD symptoms left - my hormones seemed to be regulated, but one thing remained: anger.  And I was always angry at Bella.  Always.  I saw everything negative.  All I saw was what she did wrong - her misbehavior - her disobedience.  So I tried to fix that, but to no avail.  I still got angry.  She still disrespected me.   And I got more angry.  I yelled, when I never yelled before.  And why did I always feel so angry still?  I was never an angry person.  I felt so incredibly stressed out - why?  It just didn't all make sense.  
I was meeting with the Lord, and learning and growing a lot.  I would talk God's ear off about all of these symptoms.  I just wanted to be back to normal.  I wanted to get better.  I wanted the symptoms to go away.  Can my compliant, obedient baby girl come back?  I didn't want the stress.  I didn't like being angry.  I asked God to take the anger.  I felt like I truly gave it to him.  But it was still the same.
Through prayer one day, I was asking God what it was that I do differently now in my parenting than I did when Bella was younger.  He led me to go back and look at some transcripts from Elizabeth Elliot's radio show Gateway to Joy, which I had read in the early days for encouragement in motherhood.  And in one of her transcripts about teaching children obedience, she talked about how if a parent has a problem with anger toward their children, then it's possible that the parent has some unforgiveness in their heart - causing bitterness to take root.
That struck me.  I've been so angry.  But I'm not a person to hold grudges.  My feelings may be hurt by someone, and it may take me a while to get over that hurt, but I'm quick to pardon.  I thought for a while...Is there anyone I haven't forgiven?  I couldn't even think of a hurt that I hadn't gotten over.  Not even with Neil.  Right then, I presented my thoughts to the Lord, and said "Lord, if there is someone that I need to forgive, please, please let me know."  The next morning, during the sermon, I was in my own world with God.  Just sitting.  actually waiting and listening.
 And the Holy Spirit said "You haven't forgiven yourself."
BAM!  Talk about getting hit between the eyes.
Say what?  "I haven't forgiven myself?"
His reply: "You haven't forgiven yourself for how you treated Bella during your time in the wilderness."
I was speechless.  So I just sat and listened more.  He continued to reveal everything.  And it all made so much sense.
I was angry, and at the time I felt like I couldn't control it, I was so mean to Bella.  It horrified me.  Every angry word, every hurtful action - it stuck with me.  The tears may have left, but the guilt didn't.
Even when the "wilderness" was over, and I felt like God had given me victory, I couldn't be totally healed, because I was still carrying around the guilt and the shame.  Every time I looked at Bella, I was disgusted with myself.  How could I have treated her so horribly?  And I knew that I was the cause of her misbehavior.  I was looking into a mirror.  So I got angry with myself...and continued to project that anger on Bella.
It doesn't make sense at all...and yet it totally makes sense.
I just never thought it could run that deep.
It's amazing what a little bit of Holy Spirit clarity can do.
No longer treating the symptoms, but rather treating the root of the problem.
It wasn't Bella's behavior.  It was mine...but instead of letting go of the guilt, I held onto it with clinched fists.

I couldn't just talk to the Doctor.  I had to let him examine me.  So that he could tell me the True diagnosis.
So that I could forgive and let go.
I'm working on that one.
And God is making some pretty big changes as I work through it.
Praise God for his never-ending love.  He is always good.

"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness."
Lamentations 3:22-23

Oh, Bella

 This is Bella.  My curly, blond-headed, blue-eyed 4.5-year-old. 

She loves to sing, dance, and twirl. 

This was one of those moments I just had to catch.  "Mommy, take a picture of me dancing!"  There is something incredibly beautiful about it.  I look at this picture and I see time flashing before me.  When did she get to be a little girl?  When was the last time I just watched her, and took in her beauty - and relished every moment of it?  When was the last time I just sat there watching, thanking God for the beautiful girl that she is - full of life and expectation, vibrant and passionate?  Oh that we all would be so full of life!  Jesus said that He came to give us abundant life.  I have no doubt that this little girl will live that out.

I've never really known how to encourage Bella in artwork.  No matter how old she is, or how much she draws, I really haven't seen much improvement.  I have always complimented her, encouraged her, no matter what it looked like.  See below:  The big green thing is a stable...Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus are in there somewhere...not sure what the green sun looking things are...

But apparently drawing just isn't her forte, and play-dough is more up her ally.  It's not like we've never played with play-dough.  We have.  A lot.  But Lately, this girl has been amazing me with her creations.  The pictures below are true creations of Bella - with absolutely NO help from anyone.  Her thoughts, her hands, her work.  She just came and said "Mommy, look what I made!"  I looked, and I was amazed.  Snapshots soon followed. 

Butterfly and Flower.  Not that you couldn't tell.  I was not expecting this.

She made a person out of her rolling tool.  Kinda reminds me of a wooden clothespin person...only instead of fabric, we have play-dough.

This may be a little tricky, but it's a ladybug.  Complete with black spots, eyes, and exactly 6 little black legs.

I said "wow, Bella - you even gave the ladybug 6 legs!"  Her reply "Of course, mom, that's how many legs ladybugs have!"  I guess she learned it from observing ladybugs in nature?

And here's an activity that we did this week.  Matching words to pictures.  She has to read the word, then find the picture that matches, and place the word underneath the picture.  I helped her with the first word, just so that she knew what to do.  

The rest she did completely on her own, and she got every single one right.  Such a smart girl!

I've noticed that she definitely performs a lot better (and stays on task a lot longer) when she works independently, rather than me hovering over her.  So I try to let her do things completely on her own as much as possible.  Handwriting, activities like this.  With reading that's tough to do though, so she wants to give up quickly.  Any thoughts?

Oh, and one more thing about Bella.  She is the dress-up QUEEN!  Every time I turn around she is wearing something different.  (=clothes Everywhere, all day long)  She's always so creative - making a way to turn herself into any character.  Here is an example.  She is Ariel.  A red dress for hair, A blue shirt turned upside-down and tied on the side for a fin, and her swimsuit top (tucked under on the bottom) to make a bikini top.  I'm always amazed...and yet never quite prepared for what I'm about to see...

She is just so incredibly creative.  Imaginative.  Love it.

Love her.

10 Months Already?

I'm wanting to push the stop button, or at least the pause button.  My baby is getting so big so fast and I'm left wondering where the time has gone.

I weighed Isaiah the other day with his clothes on, and he was about 16.5 lbs.  So probably more like 16 is accurate.  He's our petite one, for sure.


We are still successfully breastfeeding, although I'm starting to re-evaluate the word "successful".  For a while there, I thought we were going to have to stop nursing all-together, because Isaiah is just so curious about EVERYTHING going on around him.  Nurse for 2 seconds, off for 5 minutes.  Nurse until I have a let-down, then immediately come off  to look at something, and get sprayed in the face with milk.  He gets distracted by the smallest, most insignificant things.  A noise.  A toy he sees.  The phone or TV remote catches his eye.  Daddy is somewhere in the room, he just knows it!  He comes off to flirt.  He comes off to play.  It's definitely been a battle the past couple of months.  This month, it's gotten a bit better, but we had to throw nursing in public (or around other people) out the window.  For those situations I have to pump and give him a sippy cup.  Otherwise, I'd be flashing everyone around me about a million times in one feeding, or he would be too distracted to eat at all.  Heck, we have that problem at home sometimes!  So the pump has become a very close friend of mine.

Isaiah is definitely loving table food right now.  I've been giving him some finger foods, but I'm also using the food mill more than I have for either of the other kids.  I love it!  He's eating a lot of the same things that we are now, which makes preparing food for him a snap!

His favorite foods right now: meat sticks, yogurt, bread, crackers, applesauce...but he really eats anything we give him.

Isaiah is still taking his time in the movement department.  He is on the floor playing ALL the TIME.  We don't put him in a jumper, walker, or any other contraption, and yet...He still isn't crawling on all fours.  He does his scooting version of the Army crawl.  I noticed today that he totally has the crawling down except for his left knee.  If I help him move his left leg, he does the rest himself.  Maybe something is out of line?  He's getting on hands and knees and rocking, moving into a sitting position, and even trying to pull up on things (only successful on his knees at this point.  No pulling to a stand yet, although he's trying).  He likes to stand and hold on to things, like his play-table and the ottoman in the living room, but we definitely have to be right behind him, because he isn't very steady on his feet yet.  It'll all happen in time.  Right now I'm kinda glad that he's taking it slow...more time to cuddle with mama instead of running away :)

In other milestones, Isaiah has reached the point of loving books for other reasons than eating them.  He actually looks at the pictures, touches the textures, and gets excited about book time.  He loves turning the pages as well.  And he loves turning off lights now.  Before naps and bed I let him turn his light off before putting him down in his bed.  Makes him happy.



And speaking of bed, Isaiah has a new thing with sitting up in his crib, taking out his binky, and throwing it over the side and onto the floor.  Sometimes it isn't a problem, but sometimes I'm wondering why it's taking him more than his usual 5 minutes to fall asleep...turning into like an hour...I'll go in and yes - he's done it again.

Isaiah officially has 4 teeth now.  He just cut his top two teeth at the same time, and you would never have guessed it, thanks to a Baltic Amber teething necklace.  The day before we got it, Isaiah was starting to get pretty fussy.  I put that necklace on him, and within a couple of hours he was back to himself.  seriously.  I never took it off, and you never would have thought he was cutting 2 teeth.  no fussing, no nothing, except a bit of drooling.  Amazing!

What I love most about Isaiah:
1. His beautiful eyes.  He has the longest eyelashes of any of the kids, and his eyes are brown and blue.  They are brown in the middle and blue around the edges.  All the time.  Just beautiful.  I've never seen anything like it.
2. His smile.  It takes up so much of his petite face.  I love it.
3. He is a happy, go-with-the-flow baby with a no-quit attitude.  Happy, persistent, and patient.  That's hard to find.

It's Not a Resolution

I don't make New Year's resolutions.  Truth be told, I don't need to make them; my husband makes them for me.
Apparently Neil likes to sign me up for races that are made for crazy people.  I guess he thinks I fit the bill.  A couple of years ago, he signed me up for the Ragnar Relay - where a team of 12 people ran a combined total of about 200 miles across the state of Florida in a little over one day.  My mileage was a total of about 16.5 miles, but broken up into 3 separate legs.  I thought he was crazy.  No way I could be a part of that.  Then, I trained, and I did it.  But let's not mention the fact that Neil got the stomach bug and didn't end up participating...

So this time around, Neil's brother, Jonathan, calls and asks if we want to do the Hotter'n Hell race in Wichita Falls, TX.  3 different events.  A 100-mile road bike race, a 13-mile off-road mountain bike race, or an off-road trail run of either a 10k or a half marathon.

Did I mention it's at the end of August...in Texas?  CRAZY!!
Yet Neil is like "c'mon Pammy.  It's not like it's crazier than the Ragnar - and you did that."
Yes, I did run my longest leg of 6.6 miles in something like 95-degree record-breaking heat in November, in the middle of the afternoon without any shade...after having next to no sleep because of running in the middle of the night and then trying to sleep on the floor of a middle school library...
But Ragnar being crazier? I'm not so sure about that.

Right now, I'd be starting pretty much from scratch as far as training goes.  I've taken a running sabbatical, so to speak, for a couple of months...or a lot of months now.  (Life just got crazy and super-busy with 3 kids, home school, and breastfeeding.)  I ran on Friday, and I made it a mile...in 11:30.  great.  But I know that I can start from scratch.  I did it when I first started running, and I've done it every time I've had a baby...this time I just have to start from scratch for the second time since having Isaiah.  So this will be my 5th time to do it.  It's no fun at first, at all.  But give it about a month, and I'll be loving it as much as I always have, and I'll eventually pick up the pace again.

But even if I do the half, it isn't the distance that scares me - it's the heat.  Especially considering how many consecutive 100-degree days we had this past summer.
I know that the right gear is everything.  Hydration belt or pack.  The right attire.  The right shoes for running trails.  And some of those amazing energy gel things that you can suck down when you feel like you have no energy left...so long as I can find the caffeine-free kind.  Also running outside in the Texas heat to train is a good idea.  No problem, I'll just step outside my door in mid-day come summer-time and go for some "adapt to the heat" kinda runs.

And this time around I'm going to train the right way.  I'm going to give myself a break every couple of weeks and just have a "slow and steady", low-mileage week.
And I'm going to do strength training too, to prevent injury.

I guess we'll just see how it goes.  I'm sure I'll be proven wrong again...and I'm sure I'll love it.  If nothing else, it gives me something to train for, right?  Motivation - setting a goal - is everything.

So when do I start training? Good question...