Recap of 08

After a couple blogs I frequent did year end recaps, I began to recap MY year. At first, thinking about my past month or so, I thought I did not want to recap, but as I began to look through the 88 posts I published this year, I realized it may be worth listing the highlights.

So here it is. 2008 experienced by daphne in one neat little blog post:

• I had major surgery with even more major recovery needed including a botched boob job.
• both my love and I were able to check off a goal we set last January. I will have read through the bible in a year and he finally got our credit cards under control and we NO LONGER USE THEM!
• I blogged and shared my Testimony with a Moms bible study at my church and did not even get asked to leave. ; )
• I discovered SCL, Twitter, & Facebook. Love all but Twitter!
• Got a fab new Tat that was even in a contest that I did not win but I feel like I made the finals.
• My family and I dressed as pirates and went to a Pirate Festival for Mother's Day
• I followed the rise and fall of Todd Bently
• I discovered archery and love it! My goal for 09 is to shoot a squirrel!
• I decided cussing was fine then my pastor preached strongly against it and now I cuss almost as bad as when I was in the army. Not sure what that is about.
• Wii Fit kicked my ass but then I started mastering it before the power went out for over a week and wiped the memory clean and I was too lazy to start again from the beginning.
• I listened to The Last Lecture. This was his last year to give it before he died.
• I celebrated the 10 year mark since my first daughter was born and died.
• Our family attended a real and true family reunion and I learned about my family roots and history
• My love and I learned about a kid in foster care named Leondre.
• I attempted to up my efforts to go green.
• With my girls almost 5, almost 7 and 9, we have had more talks about the birds and the bees and also race.
• We fostered Yorkie puppies and it was hell but so fun. Like it to having a newborn but on a much lesser scale.
• Gustav hit us HARD.
• I splurged on a pair of high heeled Crocs and I Love Them!
• Despite my aversion to Christian trends, I read The Shack and got hit below the belt with it.
• My oldest discovered arm pit hair.
• And finally it snowed in the deep dirty south!

Being in such a dark, cold winter season of my life right now, the snow covering the ground in Southern Louisiana was quite symbolic. I called a friend that is in her own blizzard and can handle my foul language and told her I was pretty sure we had brought down the wrath of God because the tree that the hurricane uprooted in my front yard was covered in snow.

After confirming I had not in fact missed the Rapture, I realized while things seem impossibly bad for me, this too shall pass. I may show my ass a lot on the journey and through the process but I will come out of this and I look forward to 2009. Thats what Im talkin bout, baby!!

Bles8ings

My girls and I are huge fans of the TLC tv show Jon & Kate Plus 8. I have always admired the family and could see they had a faith in God despite their secular tv show. Maybe it made me like them more because instead of Jon & Kate Plus 8's Bible Verse Song Sing-a-long they chose a wider path to tell their story.



When I saw they had a book out, I asked for it for Christmas. While I was interested in the read about a family I have grown to love, I wanted a way to 'support' them as well.



As I started the book while avoiding the rage that threatened to boil over and as a way to steer clear of the bible, I was hit rather hard by the fact that God continues to speak to me no matter how hard and fast I try to run from Him. I guess Tarshish is all booked up this time of year.



I have almost no circumstances, no details to match that of Kate or even Jon Gosselin, yet page after page of the book spoke directly to what I face today. Who knows. It may even carry me to the next moment I am believing the lie that I have, despite all the power and sovernity that is God, found a way to seperate myself from His Love for me.



I say we have no sameness, but that is not really true. Just the major points of their story are not the major points of mine. But like Kate, I am a control freak who has an action plan and tons of to do lists to help me map out my life. When God's plans are different, that can be hard for personalities like ours. And while I have never really faced infertility, I remember what is feels like to believe that all my dreams had ben stolen and left me empty, betrayed and broken.



Kate mentioned Psalm 139:16 which says all of our days are fashioned for us before we even live one of them. God knew what was going to happen to me today. And He knows how I will move through this winter into more barable spiritual tempatures. I loved when Kate talked about how she reacted to her sickness during pregnancy with her twins that kept her in and out of the hospital. She felt she had paid her dues and should not have to suffer again in this way. It was not fair and she whined and complained the whole way through.



She shared about an adoption she had to walk away from that broke her heart and how knowing a decision is the right one to make, does not make the sting of the consequencs any easier to bear. Kate also shares about her many face to face confrontations with the Why me? monster. I mean, I am so sorry for all that family had to go through to get to the cute little 30 minute show we watch on tv, but I still find some comfort in the recording of her journey. Right before Kate was admitted to the hospital with the sextuplets, Jon lost his job because his company did not want to pay insurance for the family. Even after the courts admitted this truth, Jon still lost the hearing and was out of a job. That must have been horrible! We have been there, just on a much different scale. But Kate talks about how it grew them as a family and enabled Jon to be there for their twins while Kate was in the hospital for months. They realized God had a bigger plan than they could see. It felt like a nightmare at the time but in hindsight turned out to be a blessing that taught them trust in a God worthy of trust and so much more.



I am only 50 pages or so in and I have found what I need to finish today and start tomorrow. I accept the comfort my God is offering me and trust when I am next drained, He will continue to be faithful. That's what Im talkin about.

The Way Things Are

I believe a good indicator of the future can be the past. Factor God in and anything can happen. I am not so cynical to believe things will never change. But I am a realist.



Right now because of a loophole, we are fighting to prove we own the home we live in. I told my love while I do believe we will get through this, something else will come up as long as my mother is alive. I believe this about sums up the Christian's life too. It must suck to not be a believer in Christ and hear that if you decide to become a Christian, things may not get better. I can say there is a difference to my trials and hardships now than there used to be. I can find hope and joy among the difficult things I face. I can find peace in knowing I am loved with a Love nothing can ever destroy. I find comfort in the fact that one day my life on earth will end and I will enter paradise.

But man, I am wasted. Just when I was getting over the holidays being traumatic, I am back to the way things are. I was talking to my mother-in-law about what is happening to us and she says she can not wrap her mind around it all. I told her I could because it is just my life. It is what I have known and what I am used to.

I tell you the difference this time; compared to 10 years ago, or even 5, the rage boils internally but Christ gives me a sliver of self control so I do not have to heap guilt and condemnation on my brokenness. The blackness of rage feels so sick as it swirls around a home Christ dwells in. It is so hard to walk into a church service, or talk to the Pastor's wife or do all the other cute little things Christians do and not let the darkness show through. Then there is the idle conversations with her about traffic and whatnot after she just said she was going back on her word and she owns everything I thought to be mine. To be honest, it is all fucking exhausting.

It matters not if we are right or wrong. It matters not what we suffer or what our children are put through. It matters not what is true or just. There is a price to pay when you sue your mother to keep your home. Especially if it leaves her with nothing in the process. On the outside, people will look at me different and on the inside, because I have daughters of my own, what it does to the inside is vile.

Hatein on Joyce

I was introduced to Joyce Meyer veeery soon after becoming a Christian and have followed her ever since. It helped that my church likes her and has her over (to speak, not for a pajama party or whatever).

I bought this teaching of hers a while back even though I almost never do that. I am a reader. I can not 'get it' by listening but I watched her on TV one day and thought the teaching would be helpful to someone else in my life. Maybe my sister. Don't even remember and I never got around to giving it away. Funny, right?!? So I put it on for positive background noise while I worked like mad on my non-profit stuff and it was about the exact things I have been thinking about so here is an email to a few choice friends that resulted;

So I am listening to Joyce M because I am trying to not sit around and think of ways to make my mother disappear and I got some conviction which I guess is good because it means I can still hear Him.

She said something that pissed me off and I thought it good enough to share. She said if your life is crap (I am paraphrasing) change your thoughts and attitude. She said even if nothing ever changes and gets better or even gets worse, if you choose to think on Good, ie God and His Word, even if your life is still crap, you should feel better because of the power of the Word.

So I think to myself, Joyce is nuts. She don’t know. But then I go to read my bible reading o’ the day and it is Psalm 121 (because I have been busy premeditating murder instead of reading my bible and I am behind) and I think to myself, do I believe this or not? Not how do I feel but do I believe it is True. I say yes. So I read it a few times and thought of all my friends that I can not even encourage and support because I am in such a hole and I prayed the Truth for yall.

I may not believe Joyce or believe that things will ever get better for me or you but I still have enough faith to believe the Word is True, even if only on the other side of heaven.

Psalm 121
I look up to the mountains – does my help come from there? 2 My help comes from the LORD, who made the heavens and the earth! 3 He will not let you stumble and fall; the one who watches over you will not sleep. 4 Indeed, he who watches over Israel never tires and never sleeps. 5 The LORD himself watches over you! The LORD stands beside you as your protective shade. 6 The sun will not hurt you by day, nor the moon at night. 7 The LORD keeps you from all evil and preserves your life. 8 The LORD keeps watch over you as you come and go, both now and forever.


Things are shit right now. Some of the things my friends are facing are vile. I hate it! I hate drug addiction and divorce and bad economies and sickness and doctors that can not heal and red tape keeping a child in an orphanage and parents that have children but abuse and I am gonna stop before I start cussing but I hate it. But I guess I still think my God is Good. And He is gonna have to be enough. Thats what Im talkin bout.

Psalm 19:14

I do not feel it, I do not even really want it, but how can I deny a God Who sends me so much support and encouragement when I am at my worst?

I am still in the Word and have chosen to say out loud as often as I can Psalm 19:14 May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in Your eyes oh Lord my Rock & my Redeemer.

Thanks to each of you for holding me up when I could not do it myself. Yall are gold.