Faithful in All Situations – How to Stay the Parenting Course

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adrenal fatigue, breast cancer, cleaning, disney world, faith, homeschooling, jesus, parent, rollercoaster, school, stress

Whether you are a parent of a child in a public, private, or homeschool, I would like to share with you today what will be a short series on some tips on how to overcome doubt and adversity despite the worst year of your life.  This is not a guide to see life wearing rose-colored glasses.  Though my life is scattered with several hardships, today I am going to share how my worst teaching (and probably worst parenting) year ever has made me into the wiser and smarter parent I am today.  First, I will take you into my story.  The year? 2014.  I will share with you what happened as a whole and how it affected me.  On my next post, I will share with you how, following the dreadful school year of 2013-2014, that summer I read a book I had no idea would change my understanding of who I am, where I came from, and where I wanted to go.  The book was about Helen Keller (the blind and deaf girl) as told by her TEACHER.  In it, there were had so many epiphanies on how not just to help my kids….but me.  I am reading it for the second time now and am still blown away by how her teacher struggle is so relevant to all parents today.

Here’s the setup.  It was my second year homeschooling.  I was teaching 2nd grade to my seven-year-old daughter while also learning to manage a one-year-old toddler.  I think I recall our homeschool year began happily with our usual scavenger hunt to ring in the school year. But soon math was a nightmare.  My daughter fought with me or whined about some part of it nearly every day while my son would scream at the top of his lungs begging for someone to pay attention to him.   I quickly learned that my daughter considered subtraction as her enemy – and therefore, since I was making her do it anyway… I also became her enemy. I was losing my joy – fast.  One day I even videotaped our lessons to show my daughter her behavior… except… yikes!  I was so depressed to see the look of numbness on my face – I never showed her.  No excitement was in my eyes.  Worse yet… I had lost how to discuss math with love.  My tone was business only… yet I also felt bad for the reflection of me on the screen.  That lady looking back at me was SO TIRED.  She was out of options for getting such a smart little girl, completely capable of learning to stop being so stubborn!  She could not see that she was against herself.  I could see that inside her she could do it!  I had to turn the video off; it was too dreadful to watch us both suffering.  I then thought to myself… I was a straight-A student in math in school.  In my background, I had tutored math to the most troubled student to the smartest student.  Why was my daughter, who I loved more than life itself, so unbelievably HARD?

My house was a nightmare.  I could never get things clean after feeling so defeated in my lessons.  The mess negatively affected my husband, who was experiencing a new level of stress at work.  It was a snowball effect of disaster.  By Christmas, we decided we needed a vacation!  Actually, I wasn’t sure a vacation would help.  I was ready to throw in the towel and put my daughter in school.  I thought surely she could learn from someone – just not me.  But as I prayed, God kept showing me the word “faith.”  Everywhere I went I saw the word.  When my husband brought me home a new car, the Hyundai “Santa Fe,” which is “Holy Faith” in Spanish… I knew God was telling me not to give up.  His word to me that kept popping up over and over was “faith.”  It seemed clear that it was not just about school, but also to focus on having “faith” for the incoming 2014 New Year.  So casually, I thought…”Thanks God!”  I mean, who couldn’t use more faith?  And yet I also wondered why I needed more faith… because I am a person who tends to already look for the best of things.

But the funny thing is, I know that God both prepared me and must have had a sense of humor.   People!  2014 was like the year of Job for me!!!  God was SERIOUS. He didn’t cause what was to come.  I think He was telling me to have faith because that year would be like a series of hailstorms, hurricanes, and tornadoes all together!!!

We went to Disney World!  Yippee, right?  No.  Head on over to my blog post for how I survived and thrived after that trip.  When we came back, I was shaken, but not overcome.  But by March, things both for me at home and for hubby at work, became closer to hell, or so I thought.  I became scared about how tired I was.  My doctor increased my thyroid medication.  Didn’t work.  I then saw a new doctor who put me on Naturethroid.  I seemed to stabilize.

Well, turns out Naturethroid wasn’t weapon enough to combat my daughter’s attitude, nor my son not sleeping, nor the stress of my husband dealing with a nightmare employee.  By the end of March, my adrenals were shot.  I was scared.  By July, my doctor agreed that my adrenals needed help.  I detoxed my liver.  Seemed to be stabilized.

Seeing a pattern here?  Crash. Stable.  Crash.  Stable.  On some days I was able to cope with all the adversity.  On other days, I just wanted out.  To go somewhere on a mountain and scream.  But because I felt God had signaled me before the year started to have faith, I was able to hang on spiritually, though I was physically weakening fast.  I knew God heard me.  I also felt His presence despite arrow after arrow coming at us month after month.

But then it got WORSE.

On July 13, 2014, I found a lump in my breast.  I made another appointment back to the doctor the next day, who confirmed that she also felt a lump.  She seemed concerned and immediately scheduled me to have a Mammogram three days later to determine if the lump was malignant or benign.  Those were the longest three days of my life. I did not want to call my mom and worry her.  I felt like I couldn’t breathe.  I felt like the past year of fighting over math with my daughter was wasted time.  What if I died?  Who would teach her about the heart things of life?  What about the birds and the bees talk?  Who would be there for her?  Of course, I worried about my son too.  But I was more worried about the things a mother and daughter should do that we could be cut short on.  However, it seemed that every moment that I felt panicked, God would send someone to pray for me or something to encourage me.  I remember driving home from the doctor that day and just breaking down in sobs at a stop sign.  In between my sobs, I could hear a song on the radio come on in that instant with words as if from God to comfort me.  The next day, I took my daughter to a playdate at her friend’s house.  Her mom and I were also friends and was someone I could rely on to earnestly pray for me.  She heard my story and as we both got on our knees and prayed for our families, she also prayed for complete healing for me.

On the third day, July 16th, I finally went for my mammogram.  I was so terrified.  I left our kids home with my husband so my daughter would not worry about me and I would not have to explain to her why I was there.  All alone, I waited for my name to be called.  When it was my turn, an older nurse welcomed me with a caring voice.  She saw the fear in my eyes and got a warm blanket for me to put on my shoulders.  She asked me to locate the lump.  But when I looked for it, I could not even feel it.  I invited her to check.  She couldn’t feel it either!  I wasn’t phased that not feeling the lump meant anything at that moment.  I only thought it had moved or that I was too nervous to locate it correctly.  She left the room for a few minutes and consulted with doctors.  She sweetly smiled and told me that if I couldn’t find the lump and she couldn’t find the lump, then there was no use in putting me through the mammogram.  However, the doctors all agreed that an ultrasound would indeed locate any suspicious matter.  As I was on the ultrasound table, I slowly began to realize that the doctor wasn’t finding ANYTHING.  He said that there was NO lump whatsoever – anywhere.  But when he said everything looked NORMAL, I was in amazement!  Wow!  God had healed me! No lump!  Which meant no cancer!

Words cannot express my gratitude that the lump had disappeared.  I felt in that moment that this was the climax of my year that God had been preparing me to stay the course.  To keep the faith.  I could have easily fallen apart long before.  But He held me up even to the moment.  I also felt it was ironic that I had been spared such a potentially serious diagnosis.  In fact, that very day I found out my lump was gone, a friend I had known for several years, who was my exact same age and also had a child, was diagnosed with breast cancer and is still suffering as I write this.  So many people I know are struggling with cancer or have lost their battle.  I would wonder to God – Why Me?  Why was I spared?  I will never know but I am in some way thankful for those scary three days.  I got to wear the dreaded shoes to the oncologist area and to realize all the millions of terrifying thoughts that go through their minds.  Perhaps I live to be their voice?  But mostly, I think it is to testify that God still heals today and to share His power!  He’s powerful y’all! And He cares about YOU!

Some questions I still had.  After such a rollercoaster year of huge dips and short periods of normalcy… was my family in the position to remain a homeschooling family?  Honestly, I can tell you that I was NOT ready.  Yet all I continued to feel was God’s continual urge for me to continue to have faith.  (For real, God?)  My main focus for the rest of that summer was to rest in Him.  He was not releasing me from my calling to homeschool my daughter.  My health recovered, my lump was gone, and my husband’s job situation were all regenerated.  Whether I could reach my daughter in her math?  That was a matter I left for God.

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty.  I have learned the secret of being content and in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. ~ Philippians 4:12

I also learned that year to that I will never assume that I know what God intends.  What I thought was going to be a happy go-lucky year of “Faith” really meant for me to be faithful in every situation. I feel God would say not just to me, but to all: “Seek Me, despite anything.  Follow Me and I will uphold you.”  He did just what He promised.

Are you experiencing a drought or storm in your life?  Here are five tips to help you along:

1. Rest.
2. Take it to Jesus.
3. Have Faith!
4. Be Thankful! Even in the darkest of times, a great idea is to find at least three things to be thankful for.  It only takes one good moment to change your circumstances.  Even if it is just a little thing… when we focus on being thankful, we align ourselves more with God’s goodness and are less likely to miss the times He carried us in the day.
5. Surround yourself with scripture.  During this year, I couldn’t always get to my Bible.  But I would be reminded through friends or in the oddest of places verses to encourage me.

Can I pray for you?  Please post in the comments how I can pray for you.  Do you have a story you’d like to share about how you survived an awful year?  I’d like to hear it in the comments too!

(to be continued)… stay tuned for tips I learned that year to regain our household and homeschool joy.

 

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In Your Presence, There is Fullness of Joy! / Second Homeschool Year, Second Grade

Tags

classical conversations, God, homeschooling, joy, planning

August 12, 2013

Update: Please note changes providing a better glimpse of how our school days actually come about.  🙂

Our second year of homeschool has begun! I give all the Glory to God for every part of the day, because, had I actually enforced all the work I had planned in my mind, my children (almost 7 and 16 months), would have had a major fit. (Not to mention, I would have been exhausted beyond belief to survive AFTER school!)

Last year, the lesson that I learned was to stop comparing myself to the overflowing bin of projects and work that my daughter brought home from preschool and kindergarten and to realize that quality, not quantity was better. And on that note, I realized at the end of our year while preparing for the end-of-the year portfolio assessment, that our 1st grade bin WAS pretty full with a lot of great things. Not only that… but it was a bin that naturally happened by God’s grace.  He gave me all of my plans and gave me the clarity of mind to line up a wonderful curriculum with a three month old baby.  And on those days that I *thought* I planned something wonderful… it ended up even better things were orchestrated than I could plan.  It was a great learning curve how to teach while managing a household with a growing baby boy and being a part of our Classical Conversations community.  An added bonus was that even in amidst this unchartered territory, my daughter tried for Memory Master for her Timeline from Creation to the present day, History, Science, Latin, Math, Geography, and Presidents.  She did not earn the complete title.. but nailed Timeline, U.S. Presidents, History, and Science… and that was good enough for us!  My hope of a great education has been blessed!

I literally even now look back with goosebumps and thankfulness that God provided. I was even surprised that the teacher who performed our assessment could see how God arranged teachable moments that I did not plan. I mean, who can plan a week on fire safety and then lightning strikes a neighbor’s house and the whole roof and interior is burned up? How was it that I had a blood work appointment and our science lesson for the day ended up being on all the components of what makes up blood? This teacher was so encouraging and I realized that relaxing made a better mom and teacher for us all and kids who were better students (except for Math, which is another story in progress). She explained to me that school outside the home cannot be fully compared to school within the home. Her analogy was that outside school has so many demands made on teachers that it has become like microwave cooking – so much done quickly, but not the same freedom to explore different topics like when home cooking. A home cooked meal takes much more work and careful adding of ingredients… but the outcome is wonderful and ingredients can be changed to enhance a “dish” anytime. I loved this metaphor.

The truth is, though, that I went through mountains and valleys my first year. I am so thankful for the enormous other classical homeschool moms who came around me to encourage me and spur me on.

As we entered summer, I realized that even with all that I learned as a teacher and how much growth I saw in our daughter, I had no clue what teaching the Second Grade would look like with a toddler into everything while running my health and wellness business from home.  I simply could not imagine what my life would be like.  Then I remember one day, I just realized that feeling like this was okay.  It hit me like a ton of bricks, that if God had made our year so wonderful last year, I could jump out into uncharted territory just the same again.

Even still, I planned.  Slowly but surely, I carefully arranged our curriculum for the year.  There was just one problem.  What would our schedule look like for each day?  I thought and I thought.  Weeks I went over different scenarios in my head.  Even after all of this pondering, I STILL could not figure it out!

Suddenly, August 12th, the day I had picked for so long to start our first day of Second Grade, was tomorrow.  I worked feverishly ’till 2 a.m. trying to comprehend my material and what I would teach and exactly how it would look.  You may be thinking how I could be such a procrastinator to wait until the day before… but truly I did not wait… the mass weight of the school year just crept up on my mind!  I was looking for that theme, that glue, that would catapult us into a positive mindset for a great year.  Last year I had done a scavenger hunt for our daughter to search the house high and low for a gold coin.  And we learned about how searching for Wisdom is worth far more than gold.  She loved it!  Our theme was Wisdom for the entire year.  I knew I had to do some sort of hunt again, but for what?

And then… I found it!  I opened up the book to our first day of our devotions and the word literally jumped out at me.  The question of the week was, “What is man’s primary purpose?”

Answer:  “Man’s primary purpose is to glorify God and to ENJOY Him forever!

ENJOY!  I could hear it in my heart at 2 a.m. that this is God’s will for our year!  Why did He even create us?  To glorify HIM, which brings us to ENJOY him!  How much better is it to be around our friends when we edify them?  As a result of thinking highly of them, we begin to see all of their wonderful qualities even more and we ENJOY THEM!

At 2 a.m. in the morning, it became clear to me that in giving Him the Glory for our year before it even began, He would come near to us and bring JOY to our year!  How did I know this?  Our memory work for our first day of school “coincidentally” was:

“You make known to me the path of life; In Your presence there is FULLNESS OF JOY In Your Right Hand, there are pleasures forever.” ~ Psalm 16:11

Wow!  I quickly realized, He would be faithful to make each school day KNOWN to me!  I am merely a translator.  I don’t need to know everything.  He knows it all and will make it known to me!!  He might guide a whole year’s worth my planning, but He always has surprises that show us all who is actually The Teacher in our house.  It all goes back to Him.  Which is the Classical Conversations mission statement.  Why do we homeschool?  To know Him and to make Him known.  At CC orientation last night, even the pastor commented that we, as homeschoolers, have an awesome opportunity.  We can go out into our communities and bring joy to others.

Pondering more about what “enjoying” meant for our homeschool meant for me that I did not need to stay up past 2 a.m. anymore and could trust that a wonderful first day of school would take place. I could use the theme in every part of our day.  We are gonna throw bad attitudes out (like when Math begins) and learn to enjoy it.  We can go outside and enjoy the day.  It is God’s will for us to enjoy each other.  So just like that, my theme for the first day’s scavenger hunt and the year was made:  ENJOY.

You might be wondering how our day went.  I can tell you easing into the day made it enjoyable to the utmost and I will share the details in my next post.

Below are pics of her discovering the fun and what I wrote on each scavenger card she had to find.  Reading it will not make total sense until I share the meaning next time… so stay tuned!  For now, I will go enjoy my bed!  🙂

                                             

I’m not sure if you can see that each card has a letter on it.  After she got them all, she had to scramble to find our word for the year, “ENJOY.”

1st card (Blank on Back):

Welcome to the 2nd grade!  Can you guess and find the prize and solve the word that cuts our thoughts and heart like a blade?  (Hint: Check the mail!) (Note: She was looking for an “e”nvelope.  Words, you find in a letter, was the word I was looking for that cuts like a blade.)

E:

E is for early.  Waking up early gets us ready for the day so we can do anything and be prepared to go anywhere!

Follow the noise to where you hear the sound to find the letter N! (Hint: It is round and silver!) ( Note: Inside was a nickel hidden by the TV making the sound to lure her.)

N:

N is for Nickel.  We use it to buy thing.  We can’t pay unless we can add and subtract.  We only have fun after it is bought!

See if you can find the next clue in the spinning cupboard next to the dishwasher

(Hint: It is something you eat!)  (Note: The clue was found on top of the “J”elly in our lazy susan)

J:

J is for Jelly.  It comes from fruit.  We can’t do our work without it.  It’s something God gave to us.  The come from His Spirit.  One of the yummiest ones also starts with J.  Do you know what it is? (I was getting her to think of “Joy”)

Where is the next clue?  It starts with “O”!  Put on your shoes and go! (Note: “O” is for “o”utside.)

O:

O is for outside.  We will be out here a lot.  Loving God’s creatures and exploring His earth!

The next clue is a color.  Look up in Heaven with your eyes.  I’ll give you a hint, the color starts with “Y.” (Note:  The color was Yellow.)

Y:

Y is for yellow.  It is the color of the sun.  In second grade we will learn all about the heavens, the stars, the sun, and the moons.  Did you know it was all made to give praise to God’s Son?

Y is also for you.  God made YOU so He could smile.  So we must thank Him by doing everything to praise Him!  🙂

E-N-J-O-Y

When she unscrambled them, she found the card with the word spelled out and on the other side, a picture of an ice cream cone.  Hooray!  Enjoying Ice Cream at the end of our first day!

Remember to enjoy your day!