Hi there - Mondays are hard, aren't they!? Especially after such a beautiful Northwest weekend.  I went to my frend Paula's in Stanwood this weekend.  She has a farm and 2 Bearnese Mountain Dogs.  I'm sure I misspelled that!  I took Casey - just to get out of the house and the routine for a day.  Don stayed home with Cody.  She gave me a hair foil, rubbed my gimpy foot with linament, bought me a People magazine (the sign of a true friend who really knows me!)  I even got to watch cable TV - and got in a half hour of E! "Hollywoods Biggest Meltdowns" which kept me entertained.  Thanks, Paula - for the yummy salmon dinner, the yummy breakfast, the cowboy caviar, and for going shopping with me and holdingg Casey the whole time so I could shop!  You are loved - I can't believe you gave up your nice-weather weekend to serve me.

Casey's cheek is "back."  Went to the dermatologist for the 10th time today - it is shiny red and wet.  It had healed almost completely.  So I'm back to the night time vigil of keeping his hands away from his face.  Ugh.

Speaking of night time - Cody was up until 3:30am last night!  Thank heaven my mom was in town and stayed up with him.  Don slept in the nursery (no, not in the crib....on a mattress on the floor!) and  I slept with Casey and intermittently came out to check on Cody.  He just couldn't/wouldn't sleep.  He finally slept from 3:30am - 7am.  Then got up and no nap all day.  He hit his head during a fall while I was at Paulas and got a huge lump on his forehead and that's all it takes to induce a weekend of seizures.  He had 4 horrible ones sunday and 3 today.  So I think that's what kept him up last night.  Poor kid.  I feel so sorry for him.  Thankfully our overnight respite starts 3 nights a week next week.  And in the meantime mom volunteered to stay up with him a few days this week.

Poor Cody's also just a circus of negative behaviors.  Friday alone he tried to make himself throw up over 50 times!  Eye poking is out of control.  He had to wear arm restraints all day which is just a bad deal.  But I had to cook, go to the bathroom, etc. and he literally can't be left alone without them on or he will hurt his eyes or throw up all over the carpet.  I ran to the bedroom when Casey was crying during a nap and didn't put the restraints on, and there were two huge pools of vomit on the floor when I returned - covering his stuffed animals, toys, etc.  GROSS. 

Have you heard of a book called "The Shack?"  It's been recommended to me by at least 5 people now so I bought it but haven't started it yet.  I can't wait, tho!  I'm still in the midst of re-reading "When I Lay My Isaac Down."  It's about coping with loss.  Here are a few of my favorite exerpts so far.  The author has recently gone through a terrible tragedy involving her son.

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"I find myself angry, often hurt, always broken - but the bottom line of my heart is this:  Lord, where would I go if I turned away from You?  If I didn't have You, I would have nothing.  I have nowhere to turn, so while I'm pouding Your chest with my hurt, pain and anger, please know that I am still facing You, still leaning into the warmth of Your embrace, not sure I can trust You, but knowing You are all I have.  If I left You, I would be completely aimless and lost.  So while I feel devastated by what You have allowed to happen, I still cannot resist pressing into the comfort of Your strong arms.  I am angry that I am not resisting You more, because I know You could have stopped this thing from happening - but I have nowhere else to go."

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"We recognized that everything trivial was just that - trivial.  Spilling a full cup of coffe on white carpeting was not a big deal. Running out of ink in the printer when an important letter had to be in the mail immediately was not a huge issue.  The great debate over the new flooirng in the church sanctuary was not a matter worthy of gigantic amounts of emotional energy.  compared to the "elephant" in our lives, everything else was less significant.  It felt good to realize that "sweating the small stuff" was a ridiculous waste of time and energy.  Having a measuring stick in our lives that helped us understand the difference between what was inconsequential and what was important proved to be freeing."

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"My son is my personal "Isaac."  God seemed to be asking me to lay down my "claim" to him in complete trust and submission, even though everything in my mother's heart was screaming, "there must be something I can do to spare my son, to spare my own heart this crushing grief!  This can't be happening"  But it was happening.  And my own heart's desires were what I was being asked to sacrifice on the altar. 

I also recognized that I had a large amount of personal pride.  High expections for my child's future, natural desires to have a "normal" family with holiday reuniions that included grandchildren opening presents around our Christmas tree.  My "Isaac" was also a big pile of expectations that suddenly weren't going to materialize.  Would I honor God by continuing to love and trust Him in these utterly unthinkable circumstances, or would I spend my days trying to direct and outcome that was so clearly beyond my control? 

In Radically Obedient, Radically Blessed, Lysa TerKeurst writes:  No One understands the concept of offering it all to God better than Abraham...when God commanded Abraham to lay his only son on the altar...I am sure Abraham fully expected to plunge the dagger through Isaac.  It would be an end...the death of a dream.  Yet, Abraham was willing to give up the son he loved to the God who loved hm more, and God blessed him....Abraham walked away having experienced God in a way few ever do.  God wants to know if we're willing to give up what we love to Him who loves us more.  He desires for us to open our fists and trust Him with absolutely everything.

The key is to fully engage our hearts in understanding "The God who loves us more."  I kept wondering, the God who loves us more than WHAT?"  It took me awhile to speak the answer out loud.  He's the God who loves us more than we love our Isaac.  Slowly it dawned on me that one of my initial steps in making a heart sacrifice was to internalize the belief that God loves me even more than I love my son.  The high value of our Isaac is what makes the sacrifice so demanding, because we don't know ahead of time if we'll get our Isaac back.  He lets me decide if I will make laying my Isaac on the altar an act of worship, where I lift up my heart in total trust in Him and release my grip on the object of my sacrifice. 

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(Shawna back now) - I just LOVE these passages.  Especially the last one.

Releasing my grip on Cody - what a concept.  Believing that God loves Cody more than do?  Unthinkable to this pea brain of mine.  Believing God loves me more than I love Cody?  Impossible.  Yet all true.  And all the key to surviving this without going crazy because I can't fix it. 

love, Shawna