CHOOSEDAY.......this one is even heavier than the last!

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 1 Cor 13:11

Oh how I wish I could say that I have put childish ways behind me, but alas I have not!!

On the eve of my 38^th birthday (YIKEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES) I am looking back and wondering where time has gone.

When I was growing up (and more specifically a Miss Know It ALL teenager) I thought 35 was like ancient.  When I was in my early twenties I believed that by the time I hit thirty I would be happily married and working on baby number four.  In my late twenties I thought that by the time I was thirty five I would be happily married and working on baby number three.  In my early thirties I revised the plan and thought that by the time I am thirty five I would be happily married and getting ready to work on baby number two.  At thirty five I had to take another look at the plan and thought that when I hit forty I would be happily married and working on baby number one and sorting out details to adopt baby number two.

Well here I am, I’m no longer circling forty’s block but am on the street!!! I am NOT married (happily or otherwise) and am NOT working on having any babies.  That is my reality but I want to reason like a child and throw a temper tantrum because I don’t have what I always wanted!!!!

The problem lies in the fact that I really wish the desires of my heart were more God orientated if you know what I mean but they are simply this: I long with all that I am to be a wife and I ache to be a mother. When I write it like that it seems so stupid and so shallow but that’s what I earnestly desire most.

Yesterday a friend's 5 year old daughter asked me what was wrong with me because I am so old (groan) and not married. This is not the first time it’s happened. The first was when I was at Bible College and in my final year I was asked (as a 20 year old) by an older lady (bless her heart) at church. Just about all the girls in my dorm had gotten engaged that year and one Sunday this old dear saw me and grabbed my hand and when there was no bling said "Lisa, what is wrong with you. Everyone is engaged except for you". I was devastated and have been pretty much ever since.

In less than 24 hours I will be 38 and every month I watch the chances of my having a child of my own disappear and it hurts to badly. I can almost handle the thought of never being married, of spending my life on my own and dying alone but I can't/won't accept never being a mom. I feel it in my blood, in my heart, in my soul that, that is why I was born a women. If I am not meant to have children then I may as well have been a man.

I am embarrassed to admit that I used to wonder how the spinsters at church or later at work handled being single and now I wonder if I am being punished for those thoughts!!!! 

God made me and He knows everything there is to know about me then why is He allowing me to suffer because the desires of my heart are not being realized. Is there a lesson that I must still learn, is there a point I am just not getting or is it just that I am such a terrible person that I don’t deserve to have my own family. Even worse does He know me so well that He knows I would make a terrible wife and be an awful mother?????????

I have stopped accepting invites to kitchen teas (bachelorettes) , baby showers, engagement parties and even weddings because I sit there with such envy in my heart and I get so down and I start to question Gods love for me and I turn into a really ungrateful yucky person and I don’t want to be like that. I know that I am blessed and I want to live my life with an attitude of gratitude but when I see other people finding love and starting families I just can't see past that. I can't see Gods love and I can't see or understand His plan for my life. I walk away hating myself (because I am questioning God and acting ungrateful), I find myself happy for those who have been blessed but so very very sad for myself because I am not. I am not attending a friend's wedding this weekend because of this. I don’t know how to handle it anymore because quite frankly I don’t know how much more happy endings which are not mine I can deal with. 

For me it is not about the white dress or the pregnancy (although having said that after watching this video clip I have had a change of heart)…....for me it is all about the family. Being part of something that is so special, of knowing that the person you brush your teeth with tonight will be the same person you brush your teeth with tomorrow morning and every morning which follows. To feel life that God has made and your body is manufacturing. To smell your baby's breath for the first time, to see them smile and hear their little voice. I can't imagine not knowing that. They say you can't miss something you have never had, well for me that is not true. I dream about someone I have not met and my heart aches for a little person I don’t know.

And then I ask why, why does God not bless me. Am I so low on the list? Am I even on the list?? I feel forgotten and neglected and unloved. And then I remember that I have my parents and I have a job and mu fur-babies and I have food in my tummy and a roof over my head. I have so much to be grateful for but I can't get over not having these two things. I battle to pray because I feel such shame and such anger and my relationship with God suffers because how do you have a relationship with someone that you feel is passing you over. One of my closest friends and I have known each other for 24 years. She met and married and awesome man (who I was crazy about and she did not even know his name but despite my best efforts he chose her) and they are expecting their 8th child. Yip I said EIGHTH!! They are missionaries in Cape Town. When she called to say she was pregnant I was devastated...I could not even talk to her. Unlike most, it is not because it is number eight that I have a problem with but because somewhere in the back of my head I had that I would be next.......so many of my friends had babies in the past two years (including her) that I just thought it has to be my turn and yet it's not!!! Will it ever be?????

At what point do you give up on the desires of your heart???? At what point do you say "OK Lord you win....I won't dream about a sweet little girl or a grubby faced boy and I won't see the loving eyes of a husband. I give it all up, it's ok. I'll accept that this was not meant to be, that the desire, the absolute aching longing I feel does not exist. I don’t know if I am strong enough to give up on this all-consuming dream. Is it so wrong to want to love and be loved and to have that love be realized in the form of a child. To have Christmases filled with children’s laughter, to have date nights and to just be a family dealing with laundry, spills and homework. I often read posts on the blogs that I love and think how blessed you all are. Even those with special need children’s stories feel so precious and wondrous even though there is difficulties and heartache.

I just don’t know. I am in such a hole as far as this is concerned. I can for short periods of time pack it away and focus on all the blessings and all the good things in my life but it never stays buried for long. I live my life with these desires just below the surface, they are continuously in my prayers, never far from my thoughts and always always in my heart.

So here I am, on the verge of turning 38, single and not a mommy and I wonder if the message is not obvious. Sometimes we can clearly discern God’s hand working and we can attribute His working because it is so clear. But most times, life just seems to unfold naturally, in the natural order of things. Does this then mean that it’s time to CHOOSE to let go of thoughts and reasoning of a child.  Is this the point when I CHOOSE to put those childish hopes and dreams behind me and accept the reality of my life.  Maybe I just need therapy!!! 

I am not sure if any of the above makes sense. I was going to do a spell and grammar check but I am crying so much I can't see the screen. It's just a bad "I miss something I have never had day". I work hard on not having them often but today is just one of those days. Tomorrow things will look a little better and I will be able to live with an attitude of gratitude but today, today I am going to take the time to mourn for the desires of my heart I long for and wonder if I will ever have.

Here, however is what I CHOOSE:  I CHOOSE to believe that God is not malicious or unfair, I CHOOSE to believe that God does not hold out on us in order to teach us lessons or to break our spirits.  I CHOOSE to believe that He is a loving Father and as such does not behave in such a manner. I CHOOSE to believe that God is in all of the details of our lives and hears our cries!!!

I CHOOSE…….

"Certain thoughts are prayers. There are moments when, whatever be the attitude of the body, the soul is on its knees.” ~ Victor Hugo