Life at 7000 feet

It's been snowing since we woke up this morning. Still hard for me to believe that May is just a few days away and we have snow, but we need the moisture and this is the form it takes for us, so I'm not complaining. It's very cold outside though--the weather icon on my screen reads 30 degrees with a wind chill of 22. Fun spring weather, huh?

Twenty-six weeks ago today, I had my last Diet Coke! That's half a year without one! I'm pretty proud of that. I was on the 2, 3, sometimes 4 a day plan, so this was a pretty drastic step for me. A good step though. I feel much better, and I've actually lost about 5 pounds. I'm convinced it's from not drinking soda because I haven't drastically changed my diet.

Last night I gathered with some ladies from my church to pray/listen for the needs of the women in our body. I seem to be the "young mom" representative. When asked about what I was sensing, I just couldn't keep my honest tears from falling as I confessed that I was tired. Really tired. Physically, yes, but also emotionally and spiritually. If you're a mom, you know what I'm talking about. Meeting the many, many needs of my family is exhausting. Yesterday was a hard day to begin with, but that question just opened up a range of emotion I was keeping at arms length. Initially, I was a little embarrassed by my raw display of emotion, but the ladies surrounding me seemed to be grateful for it. It confirmed for them what they were sensing too...that most of the young moms in our body feel the same way. One dear lady thanked me for my tears (wow) that she felt represented the tears of a lot of moms. And I really think she's right. We spend so much time trying to hold it all together and make things look "good" and perfect on the outside when we're just dying on the inside. And it's so tiresome. It's hard to confess your fears and struggles and indadequacies to fellow mom if they seem all too perfect and never appear to struggle with their kids, their husband, their finances, their faith, and on and on and on. I've been on both sides of this, and I am sorry for the times I tried so hard to appear together and perfect! The reality is I'm not. I'm a mess most of the time. A ragamuffin as Brendan Manning would say. And I'm so okay with that. I know who I am, but more importantly I know whose I am and I know how He sees me. So, my tears last night were in some sense healing for me. The most basic reason I went last night was to escape by myself for a few hours. However, God had more in mind for me, and I came home with a deep sense of peace, a new friend, and a lot of affirmation that we're in exactly the place (church-wise and in life) that we're supposed to be right now.