Four Years Later, Our Family of Three.

Today, I am a widow of four years and my children have grown four years older without their father. We are no longer broken, but some days we are still learning how to live without him. 

I still have some sleepless, lonely nights. My daughter sometimes come to me in tears because she misses how her daddy adored her. My son still keeps a photo of he and his daddy on his dresser and after months of introspective silence, will talk with me about him for hours.

In those moments, my children listen with rapt attention to my stories of our fun dates and silly fights and the life lessons he and I learned together and they retell their favorite, funniest and saddest moments of their dad that fill their memories. Kellan can't remember the day after Donnie passed, it's a complete blur to him. Emmi can recall almost every detail. I try not to remember the day before or the night we lost him and yet I can't help but think about where I was, what I was doing and how I had no idea what was coming. 

Losing your love, your loved one, or your dear friend can be sudden, world shaking and hurt as if you've lost a limb. It takes time to regrow the nerves that were severed, to realize there will be phantom pain, to understand you must work hard to move forward or even re-map your entire life plan. It's a painstaking process that is full of missteps and hesitations, tentatively placing your foot forward and finding yourself falling over and over again until you are finally able to pick yourself up without assistance and start moving forward with a hard fought confidence in each careful step.

I still dream about Donnie sometimes, even as recent as last night, but my dreams aren't as dark as they used to be. ~ In my dream we were planning a wedding vow renewal on a vast lawn under the stars, with lanterns hanging from trees and laughter floating on crisp fall air. ~ Life feels different now versus the last few years; still unknown, but brighter, hopeful and full of new beginnings. 

Today we will decorate our house for Christmas, tomorrow I will start cooking for Thanksgiving and our family of three that used to be four, will see a new year begin in just a few more weeks. We will miss him at each milestone and in the quiet nights. Every birthday, Thanksgiving and Christmas we will experience somber moments. But we will also laugh together, love each other and live each day with the intention of joy. And we will have new stories to tell in the years to come; our family of three. 

Extension Cords and Aftershocks.

Last weekend I took the time to go through a few boxes I had been putting off emptying and found new places to store the things they held. I busily placed the extra components for electronics, cable wires, twist ties and tools in the new-to-me shelves but paused when I came across several sets of extension cords, coiled and then wrapped and tied with the plug end. 

I gripped one of the bound cords in my hands and held it to my chest. His hands touched these last. His hands wrapped these and tied them and set them aside after a Christmas maybe four or five years ago, the last year he was able to actively make Christmas happen for me and the kids before I stepped in to do my best.

It's been a while since something shook me like that. It felt like what I imagine an aftershock from an earthquake would feel. The room around me slightly swayed and left me feeling a little off-center, dizzy and confused. It's funny that something as simple as an extension cord could put me off balance.

The next day I had a dream. He was back. He had fallen again and had to stay in the hospital for a few weeks to recover. We had moved into our new house and I was busy getting things ready for him to come home. But reality broke in when Kellan walked in my room to wake me up and ask me a question. In my stupor, I yelled at my poor baby "I'm not done sleeping!! Ask me later!!" I almost had him back for a minute there. Almost. And I just wasn't ready to wake up to the reality that he wasn't back and he wasn't coming home.

This week I've found myself trying to figure out what's wrong with me when I'm busy doing dishes or folding laundry and feel like there's something deeply wrong or missing. As soon as I sit still I suddenly feel like bawling for no reason. Or I'll catch myself spinning into an anxiety attack when I thought I had nearly overcome them. My chest hurts, again. I can't breathe, again. And I feel crushed, again.

I used to live in moments like these every second. I was overwhelmed in every moment and could literally focus on nothing else. Now, when these emotional intrusions break into my life, they catch me surprisingly off guard because they're truthfully and thankfully no longer the norm. I've come so far. So very far from the broken woman I was even just less than a year ago.  

In just over a month it will have been two years since we lost Donnie. I miss his voice and hearing him pray and sing and laugh. I miss his mad chef cooking skills and confiding in him about everything and talking with him about nothing. He was my best friend ever. Ever. Ever. 

And even though I may be over the bulk mass onslaught of my slaying grief, I know these aftershocks will come. They may last for a few seconds, or an afternoon or a week or two in waves like they seem to be resurfacing now, but in a way I am thankful for them. In the middle of the busy-ness of my life they remind me to stop and pause to remember, not the end of his life and how it devastated me but who he was and the magnificent memories I have of living life with him.

I loved that man from the depths of my soul. I loved him with all that I was and that kind of love doesn't just disappear. It may sleep until it's revived by something as silly and common as an extension cord or a dream, but it's still there. I don't want to forget him. I don't want to bury his memory and walk away. I want to grab those memories and hold them tight to my chest and remember vividly who he was. He was an amazing man. Talented, brilliant, funny, aggravating and amazing. And he was mine. 

True Love.

Easter Sunday 2014, as I was watching Jesus die on a cross, again, I had a sudden realization that something was wrong with me. As I sat there slightly sunken into my chair with my arms crossed against my chest, totally annoyed with the beautiful yet tragic display of God's sacrifice for me, I wondered briefly what my problem was when the answer suddenly hit me. I was angry at God. 

To be bluntly honest, the words that came into my head with this revelation as Jesus was being nailed to the cross were, "Oh my gosh! I am SO PISSED OFF at you, God!" For the rest of the service I continued shouting this at my Savior, inside my head, over and over again. It was empowering and somewhat euphoric. It was emotion I hadn't felt spiritually in quite some time. And it was anger. At God.

I allowed myself to say it. For the next two or three weeks I walked around repeating those words. Sometimes I would scream them out loud. Sometimes I would whisper them. At times the words were monotone. In moments I wept them. But I had to tell Him, even though He already knew. 

All that time, for the past nearly year and a half (back then) since my husband died, I had no idea I was angry with God. For months I was so numb spiritually. My relationship with God was dormant. I was expressive with my words on paper or via blogging but when it came to trying to talk with God, I could barely get the words out. I would try to pray and nothing would happen. It was like there was a door between us and it just wasn't opening. Until Jesus died on that cross again this year. And then it all came pouring out.  

It was freeing to release it. It felt so amazing to be honest. To be real. To tell God like it was. And to know it wasn't the end of our relationship. He didn't turn away from me. He didn't lock the door. He didn't walk away. He stayed right there, even though I was all up in His face, spewing not so nice words from my lips. He didn't leave me. He didn't forsake me. Instead, He loved me.

In those weeks of expressing and confessing my pointed anger to God, a breaking took place. I reopened the door I had shut. I knocked down the dividing wall I had inadvertently and unknowingly created. My anger which had been explosive, strong, hot, heavy and extreme slowly began to dissipate. When my steam ran out, my anger was replaced with a calming, soothing peace.

I began to pray again and was able to worship more intimately. It started being less about me and what I was feeling and more about Him and how He was moving and what He was saying. I felt more alive than I had in months. I felt there was purpose in my life again beyond just getting through the day at hand and began feeling hopeful for my future again.

And while I still don't have all the answers, I am learning to trust Him again to reveal them in His timing. I admit I still have issues trusting Him. I still battle with unbelief that He will move mountains for me, but I must believe that He will, because He loves me. 

And honestly, even though I'm not angry anymore, I'm still hurt. I miss my husband. I don't like being alone, even if I am getting more used to it. This wasn't the plan. I did not sign up for this. But what I've discovered through this experience of severe, earth shattering loss that I've been through is just how much God loves me. He didn't push me. He stood by patiently until I was ready to talk again. He let me be angry with Him. He understood. He listened. He waited. And He loved me. 

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. ~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a

And the Crazy Mom of the Year Award Goes to...

FYI: This blog is written in a wholly sincere tone. Please don't read it in a sarcasm filled, defiant, sassy tone. I can see how it might be perceived that way, but it's definitely not written that way. Thanks... :)

Dear Nice Lady at My Kids' School:

Maybe I'm paranoid, but I'm pretty sure I saw the look of judgement that passed over your face when I dropped my kids off late for their last day of school and they were marked absent for the day since it was past the official tardy cut-off time. I want you to know I get it. I know I'm not mom of the year. I know they've missed more than their fair share of days from school this school year because there were some times I just did not wake up when my alarm went off and I let them stay home to save them and myself the embarrassment of facing school staff in a situation like today's. 

I can understand your raised eyebrow at my hair thrown up in a sloppy attempt at appearing human with my beloved giant hair clip that has saved my life on more than one occasion. I know I'm not the mom who appears at every school function with a batch of homemade cupcakes in  a proper Tupperware poised on my hip. And I realize with a shake of my head that I forgot to run by the store and buy the chips that my son was told to bring for their last day of school spread which I didn't find out about until bedtime 2 nights ago.

I know you're the one who called me twice this year when I didn't show to pick my kids up after school because I slept through my alarm at 3:00 in the afternoon. You know I work nights but I agree it still doesn't make sense that I seem to have selective hearing loss when it comes to my 3 or more alarms I set to get myself up in time to take my kids' to and from school. I don't get it either.

What you might not know is that even though it's one and a half years later, I am still in mourning for the husband that I lost at the far too young age of 42. That although I am doing much better, I still have days that I am unable to function on a normal level because the night before I was struggling to breathe between and during phone calls about passengers' seating misfortunes. That in those moments of sheer terror filled panic I am chanting a mantra of sorts in my head to get myself through each second: "I'm okay. I'm going to be fine. God, please help me. I can do this. Jesus, I need you! Breathe in, breathe out. I'm not dying. Lord, help me. I'm okay. I'm going to be fine."

You may not realize that even though I was able to give away a little time last night and was off work an hour early and went straight to bed because I knew I was exhausted and needed to sleep so I could get the kids up for their last day of school, that when my head hit my pillow, my heart started racing in anxiety yet again and the prickly grasp of panic clawed at my chest and it was all I could do not to scream and wake up my children in the next room at 4:13 in the morning. You don't know that I lied in bed for the next I don't know how long praying, crying, begging God and texting friends 'Are you up yet?' before 5:00 in the morning just so I could hear a human voice and talk myself down from the insanity ledge I found myself dangling from so suddenly.

You and I both have no idea what time I finally cried and prayed myself to sleep. And you don't know the dread and disappoint that filled me when I woke up in a sad sleepy stupor to see it was two hours past the time my children should have been at school for their last day. You didn't see my son crying in the doorway when I told him we were late and he only had an hour or so left with his friends at school if we hurried to get ready and know the reason he was crying is because you failed, again.

You shook your head a little when you asked if I was staying at the school for the awards program and I half laughed to myself and said "No". You don't realize that I've only slept for a few hours and the crazy woman hasn't quite left me yet and sitting through an assembly with other teachers or moms that might look at me the same way you have, terrifies me and my imagination is out of control in one of those thankfully now rare moments of reliving my husband's death and I might end up running out screaming and embarrass my children even further.

Although it has been a whole year and a half since my world turned upside down and you would think I'd be drawing near to the end of my grieving and mourning season, I'm not. I still have these days that overwhelm me and cause me to wonder how I will ever grow beyond the onslaught of emotions that stop me in my tracks and turn me into an inner lunatic that I do my best to push down into a dark little crevice in my heart.  

You see, the truth is there are days that mad woman walks with me everywhere I go. It disturbs me that I can't seem to break away from her. She whispers in my ear when I am laughing with my children. She points at happy couples in ridicule and disgust when she sees them. She pushes against my chest with all her strength until I am gasping for breath and doesn't give me any relief. She rocks herself during songs at church that I led with Donnie and causes me to sometimes clamp my hand over my mouth to keep from loudly wailing in the middle of a worship service. So to take the chance of unleashing her during a school program is for me, absolutely a laughable, 'NO'.

You don't know that this week I've begun two HUGE steps in my recovery. That just last night I met with some people who I am working with to help put on a Night of Worship and that this is one of THE BIGGEST and hardest things I've done to begin to bring myself back to who I am or who I was or who I might be or who I might become or that I'm still iffy about what my future holds and I'm still testing the waters on what God wants for me and trying to learn to trust Him again. 

You don't know that I've had to learn how to worship again when it was second nature to me before. That part of me has been severed and it's like learning how to walk again. That the future I had envisioned was a shared one with dreams that I thought could only be fulfilled with the inclusion of my husband. That I'm terrified of doing this without him because we were such an amazing and powerful team and it's all I have ever known and that leading up to last night's meeting I was such a nervous wreck. Or that sitting there hashing out songs with people I've never worked with felt strange but good and I realized I CAN DO THIS. Or that as I drove home from the rehearsal I realized that I can do this, WITHOUT DONNIE, and that realization hit me with a devastating blow of sadness that I am moving forward without him. WITHOUT HIM. And it feels as if I'm leaving part of him behind instead of him leaving me and that hurts.

You don't know that in just 2 days we are driving back to the area we lived in happily together for five years to the last places I saw him, to go sit in a congregation and look again at a platform without him and hear someone other than him singing and leading worship in that sanctuary where we had experienced such total freedom and liberty as we had never known before. You don't know how nervous I am about seeing people I haven't seen since the few weeks following his funeral. Or that my daughter, who has been so excited about returning there, broke down in my arms the night before last and told me momentarily that she didn't want to go now because daddy won't be there. Or how important it is that we actually return to replace the memories we left with on a sad note, so we can leave on a good note instead, full of fond memories and moments with people we love and who love us.

And you don't understand what it's like to hold your child in your arms not more than a week ago, as waves of grief overwhelm him and he clings to you as tightly as possible pulling back only to stare at you and cry "Mommy!" in desperation and say "It feels like you're not here!" and understand that feeling of void inside of him as the sobs rack his body and he wails and moans and weeps and continues crying "Mommy! ... Mommy!" and you feel helpless as you hold him tighter and closer and repeat over and over "I'm here, mommy's here, I'm right here with you baby, mommy's here.", for hours.

You don't know that after we leave our last home-place together, we'll be driving to Louisiana and the one thing on my mind is through all the fun and enjoyment we will have while we are there, we will also be going to visit his tomb in the quiet sanctuary of the cemetery where his ashes remain. We will somberly stand in front of his tomb reading over his mis-spelled name that they still haven't corrected on the hard marble door that will separate us from him. You don't know how tempted I am to bring a camping chair and just park it and hang out there with him for a while, just to feel close to him again and hear the birds singing while I'm smelling the thick bayou-scented air and watching my kids run their fingertips over his engraved name as I look over all the chalky-white painted tombs.

So I'm not angry with you. Not at all. And maybe I'd judge the same way if our roles were reversed. Maybe I wouldn't understand either how some moms just can't seem to get it together. But the funny part is 'this IS together' for me. I am doing so much better than I was a year ago. I have come so much farther. I am taking huge steps that tend to knock me off balance and push me backwards but the important thing is that I get up and keep pushing myself and keep moving forward, even when it hurts, even when it's painful or becomes tormentive. 

Even when I have to watch my children endure the stages of grief and continue to gently push them forward. Even when people look at me like you looked at me with reasonable disapproval and judgment, I have to keep moving forward. Because even if it doesn't look like it from the outside looking in, we're making progress. So I'll take that Crazy Mom of the Year award or the looks of disapproval like a badge of honor. I've earned it. And I'm proud of it. 

Oh, and I forgot to tell you when I left because I was still wiping the sleep out of my eyes and also being a bit self-obsessive, but I really do hope you have a great summer. ;)

Verbal Vomit.

I so did not want to go to our grief counseling this week. We hadn't been to the past two meetings because four weeks ago I was sick with the flu and two weeks ago I received news just before we were getting ready to leave that our former Pastor's father was about to pass away and it hit me and threw me into a basket case-crying, I can't breathe and I sure can't drive and sit in a room full of grieving people and hold my composure overwhelming hot mess mode.

So this Wednesday, after missing a couple of sessions, I felt anti-social and was just not in the mood to sit in that room with the other adults. But the kids wanted to go. It means so much to them to be able to sit in a room full of other kids their age and hear them expressing the same feelings they have about losing their parent and being able to talk about their daddy. They had missed going and looked at me with those pitiful, pleading eyes as they asked me "Mommy, are we going to The Warm Place tonight?" I told them "Yes, we'll go but only because I love you so much."

I have a serious love/hate relationship with our grief counseling. I hate introducing myself every other week and telling everyone who I lost, when I lost him and how I lost him. It pisses me off when half the adults there were already separated or divorced or whatever and so they don't feel the loss as deep as I do or at least that's the way I feel. It makes my heart beat fast before I have to speak and I feel like I can't breathe and like I need to run out of the room screaming. I hate feeling like that.

I put off speaking until I absolutely have to when it's my time to share because I am such a mess. Then I open my mouth and verbally vomit all my feelings. I choke up and pause and everyone is staring at me, listening to the un-edited, non-eloquent words as they pour out of my mouth, revealing my weakness, my anger, my fear, my horror, my loss, my frustration, my annoyance, my bitterness, my desperation, my hopelessness, my angst, my rage, my anxiety and my loneliness.

I stop and I say I'm done and they look at me with understanding and nod their heads and wipe their eyes after crying with me. And I realize this is why I still need to go. As much as I hate it. As much as I detest sitting in that room and hearing everyone's pain and feeling their anguish as we go one by one around the room describing our loss or our feelings, I need to be there. In that room, I feel abnormal and normal at the same time. Awkward and accepted. Angry and forgiven. 

I love going there. I hate going there. I have to keep going there. 

Living With An Empty Chair

Doing something as simple as eating out quickly became one of the hardest things to do after losing Donnie. When it's just the kids and I eating at a restaurant, they always place us at a table for four and his absence becomes immediately much more visible with an empty chair at the table. So when we eat out now, I tend to make plans ahead of time to eat with someone else. And if the sudden whim hits me to go out, I find myself desperately texting friends to try to fill the empty space.

You know how it is at any given dining place. There are a few tables suited for larger groups, the intimate tables set for two, and then there are the tables arranged for the perfectly sized family of four. When we're shown our table we choose our seats, sit down and although I do my best not to look at the empty chair beside me, I can't help but sneak in a glance. 

That vacant chair changes everything. It's obvious when we sit at a table for four that he is missing. And at some point during our three-person dining experience, our faces grow a little sadder, our shoulders become a little heavier and our conversation slows. It's just not the same, because he's not sitting in that chair.

He always tried new and interesting dishes and I would stick with a boring meal of chicken something or the other. He would work a puzzle or color a picture with the kids on their children's menus. He would tease them and laugh with me. He would lean over and talk confidentially with me while the kids were distracted. And when the kids and I couldn't finish our dinner, he would take his fork and enjoy the meat that was left behind. Now we always have leftovers to take home.

Who would have ever thought that an empty chair could carry so much significance? That a glance at the chair beside me could fill me with sorrow and place a hollowness in the pit of my stomach. Or that the absence of his reassuring arm behind me on the back of my chair could make my food taste like warmed up cardboard. 

This Friday night I didn't feel like cooking. I wanted to go out and do some laughing and celebrate the beginning of the weekend with a meal made by someone else. I started texting my friends, put a feeler out on FB to try to find someone to meet us and just when I was about to head out to meet some friends, I had a check in my spirit. Or to whoever may not believe like I do, I'll just say something made me stop and think for a minute before rushing off to meet friends for dinner.

I know there's nothing wrong with eating with friends and honestly some times for me, it's absolutely necessary. Sometimes I just cannot be alone, even when the kids are with me. But Friday night I took a moment to stop and dwell on my decision and I decided I needed to give the kids more. Not a night where we were tagging along with other people just so we wouldn't have to be alone, but an evening where it was just the three of us, where it was 'about' just the three of us and sharing that moment together.

I texted my apologies to my friend and jumped in the car with the kids on a quest for a mini-adventure. 'Where are we going mom?' and 'Who are we going to eat with?' were the questions that met me as we left our parking lot. 'I don't know Kellan. We're not meeting anyone Emmi, it's just going to be us.' And a collective, disappointed 'Oooohhhhh.' met my ears and my eyes winced the threatening tears away. 

We ended up going to a German restaurant that I had been wanting to go to for months, but never did because I knew it was a place Donnie would have loved to try and I thought it would be too awkward without him. The kids were skeptical and their mouths were twitching in fear at the thought of eating strange food before we even walked inside. And as we walked through the doors of the restaurant our senses were immediately assaulted. 

Festive, rich and raucous notes from a live accordion player shocked our ears. Young ladies in authentic German dirndls met our eyes. We were seated by a girl wearing gingham at a four-chaired table and our waiter, a young man in his twenties, was wearing lederhosen. We breathed in the thick aroma of bratwurst, schnitzel, sauerkraut and fried potatoes. The kids' eyebrows were raised in surprise and smiles started framing their faces.

I talked the kids into trying bierwurst and kaiserwurst with a side of fries and I tried the schaferschnitzel. Emelia danced a polka that sounded just like the chicken dance with the waitresses and Kellan went to steal a peek at the accordion player and came back to the table miming as if he were playing one himself. Their attitudes had changed from disappointment and fear to fun and adventure. And my perspective changed a little as well.

I still noted the empty chair that held my purse instead of my husband's laughing, teasing, food critiquing, bold personality. I saw that it was void and barren but instead of feeling like it was the giant sized novelty chair bearing the burden of his absence, this time it shrunk to a normal sized dining chair that just happened to be at our table. 

We rode home with full bellies, leftovers in our laps and smiles on our faces. The kids and I talked about how even though they were scared to go in, they ended up having more fun than they could have imagined having in a restaurant. I reminded them we only have one life and we need to be open to new experiences. We talked about taking risks and chances and enjoying each moment instead of hesitating in fear and missing out on something special and unforgettable. 

And even though Donnie wasn't there, it was almost as if he was, because he would have enjoyed every moment of the assault of our senses. He would have been hamming it up, trying new foods and he may have even borrowed the accordion to play a tune for us to dance to. He would have lived that moment out to its fullness with laughter and satisfaction. 

There will still be glaringly vacant chairs at our table. His presence will still be unavoidably missing and we will still have somber moments when we dine together, just the three of us, alone and without him. But I will do my best to teach my children to live exuberantly. To take chances and risk replacing their fear with excitement and to take advantage of life's many opportunities. I want them to live their lives passionately and without any regrets. Which I happen to know is exactly what their daddy would want them to do.

Why I Am a Christmas Crackhead

I'm a Christmas nut. It's true. I'm your worst nightmare when it comes to trying to avoid the Christmas holidays until they are right upon you jingling at your door. Why? Because I let you know far too often and way too early how many days it is until Christmas. I'm known to remind those I care about as early as June that Christmas is only 6 months away. 

I've been witnessed singing Christmas carols in 100+ degree temperatures. I watch Christmas movies year-round. I fantasize about how to decorate my house for Christmas months in advance. I have a Christmas tree for every room in my house and the decorations to go along with them. I can tell you what you should get on the 9th day of Christmas for your true love. 

I even have an app folder on my phone titled 'Christmas' that stays there year round so I can play Christmas games, decorate a Christmas tree virtually, cut up a snowflake and check how many days, hours, minutes and seconds it is until Christmas at any given moment the Christmas notion strikes me. And it does. Often.

Some people say I'm sick. Twisted. Insane. And I drive my friend Karen crazy. (Wait, if I'm driving you crazy, maybe that means I'm not really the crazy one Karen, you are! Heehehee!) I can't help it though. It beats like The Little Drummer Boy's drum inside my heart. Ba-boom. Ba-boom. Ba-boom. Fa-la. Fa-la. Fa-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-laaaa! Hey. You were singing with me just now, weren't you? WEREN'T YOU??? Come on, admit it.

I haven't always been this way. I mean, I've always loved Christmas of course. But it's been a progression since I married Donnie, so really I could blame a lot of it on him. Because before I warped into the Christmas freak, he flew the freak flag first. He decorated every square inch of his living space with Christmas whats-its when I met him. The man went all out. Garlands and bows, ribbons and ornaments, mistletoe and kisses. Hmmmm, I'm gonna miss that one. He was so festive that it was contagious. And over the years, I became infested with festivity. 

Several years ago on Christmas night, we were playing 'Santa', wrapping the big gifts and stuffing stockings, making pies and preparing portions of our holiday meal when the funniest thing happened. We had been checking the 'Santa Radar' all evening for the kids to know where Santa was so we could get them to bed on time. All night long the kids would ask, "Where's Santa now?!" to which we would check and answer "Zimbabwe!",  "Finland!" or wherever else Santa was trekking off to next.

We had already tucked the kids in bed at least an hour prior and Donnie was standing at the stove stirring a huge pot of something Cajun and delicious when he turned to me suddenly with his spoon poised in his hand and eager excitement edging in his voice as he asked me, "WHERE'S SANTA NOW?!?" I stopped my stuffing of the stockings to turn and look at him and asked him incredulously, 'Really??' and we both busted out laughing! He had literally forgotten for a moment that Santa wasn't real! It still makes me laugh. 

So yeah, it's gotta be mostly his fault. But I am what I am: a corrupted Christmas crackhead. And I know, I KNOW I have fallen to the commercialism of Christmas. There are plenty of Christians who boycott how sold out some people are to Santa and the wares of the holiday season. And I'll confess, I was one of those people who said I would never let my kids believe in Santa Claus. 

I knew Santa wasn't real when I was a kid. I knew Kris Kringle was just a bunch of bunk. And yes, my brothers and I were 'those kids' who spoiled Christmas for the young believers because my parents respected us enough to tell us the truth. Yeah, it was us that made the other kids cry because we told them it was OUR dad in the Santa suit and Santa was NOT real. And yes, we did feel superior to other children because we had adult knowledge of the facts of life about Christmas. 

But my husband wasn't having it. He wanted his kids to experience Christmas the way he had: nervous anticipation balled up in the pit of his stomach, aching for the swift moment Santa would swoop in as soon as he submitted to slumber so he could tear open his presents on Christmas morning and bask in giddy euphoria of the thought that Santa somehow brought him exactly what he wanted. So I did it. I gave in. And man am I glad I did. Christmas has been so exciting every year looking at it through my kids' eyes. 

OF COURSE Christmas is not all about Santa with us. Please. It's not all about the decor' and the eggnog, watching The Christmas Story movie or It's A Wonderful Life. It's not all about reading The Night Before Christmas or The Elf on the Shelf. If you've known us, then you know Christ has always been our priority and my kids clearly know the TRUE truth behind why we celebrate Christmas. We have read Luke 2 from the Bible to the kids every year and had discussions and celebrations to make sure that clarity remains. But come on y'all, they're kids. And it's Christmas. And we're just having some merriment and fun. Well, a lot of it actually. 

Besides, Kellan knows. He figured it out 2 years ago and asked Donnie and I a few weeks after Christmas whether Santa was real or not. We told him the truth, revealing our deception and I gulped guiltily as I wondered if my son would be damaged goods now that he knew we had duped him. But he just smiled knowingly and shrugged and said he knew it. I could tell he felt wiser and more grown up at the knowledge he had gained and it satisfied me that he could now enjoy the heady feeling of superiority over other children like I had. (Haha!)

I think this will probably be Emelia's last year to believe. But I'm holding it out as long as I can. Because I'm not looking forward to how the suspense of the holiday will lose a little of its luster once she realizes Santa isn't real. She'll know it's me busting my butt to get her gifts and the magic of Christmas Eve will diminish a bit for her and for me too once she becomes one of the superior knowledged children. But at least for one more Christmas she'll have trouble falling asleep and be straining her ears for jingle bells and reindeer hooves. And me? I'll be nibbling on Santa's cookies so she'll think he ate her sweet little offering.

By the way, however you want to look at it, as I'm writing this there are only 68 days OR 1,642 hours OR 98,534 minutes OR 5,912,040 seconds left until Christmas arrives. It's time to get ready people! HO HO HO!!!

Here's some helpful links for your Christmas preparation that a pro like me has been known to use during the holiday season!

Christmas countdown website

Santa Radar Tracking

FREE Personalized Santa Video/Christmas Letter for Kids

Cajun Culture Shock

I thought I knew Louisiana well. I was born in Baton Rouge. We visited my mom's family in Louisiana nearly every year when I was growing up. I played on the Louisiana grasses with my cousins Jonathan and Joanna, picked beans at my Aunt Julia's house and popped their pods apart to fill up a large pale green Tupperware bowl on her porch swing. And I might have dropped a cat from my cousins' Twyla and Lauren's neighbor's raised porch just to see if it would land on its feet. It didn't. I picked blueberries in the trees near my aunt Darlene's house and ate fresh watermelon and homemade ice cream on her lawn between sessions of playing marco polo in the pool with my cousins.

I gazed dreamily at my Grandmother's prided roses and inhaled their heavy scent that infused with the evergreens growing on my Grandaddy's Christmas tree farm and it would overwhelm my senses. I listened as my Grandaddy played his violin while my mom or one of her sisters played the piano and everybody sang hymns together. I slept in pallets on my Grandparents' living room floor with my cousins and my brothers and giggled together in the hush that followed their nightly prayer time as a family, kneeling at the chairs, the couch or the piano bench and marveled at how straightforward my Grandmother was when she spoke to God.

I walked across cattle guards in my bare feet and wandered the acres of my great-grandmother's pecan tree studded farm. I was stranded with my cousin Jennifer in a hay loft in the barn, climbed a giant tractor and sat in it's cockpit just to listen to the radio and feel the AC on a hot summer day and picked grocery sized paper bags full of pecans from the ground to bring back home with us to North Carolina. I stared at the dead rattlesnake floating in a large mason jar on one of her living room side tables as she told us for the 100th time the story of how that thing bit her leg and she killed the snake, took off her bandanna, tied it around her leg and then proceeded to drive herself to the emergency room. 

And I also watched as my great-grandmother mowed her acres of grass all by herself at 80-something years old, wearing one of her bonnets reminiscent of the ones I'd seen worn by the girls on Little House on the Prairie. I drank water from a soup ladle hanging at her kitchen sink that everyone else also drank from when they were thirsty between meals and nobody ever got sick from it. I sat at her long kitchen table to feast on every kind of farm-fresh breakfast food imaginable, all made from scratch by her hands.

I ate even more delicious homemade baked goods at my Aunt Ruby's house, gathered eggs from her hens and played on the swing-set in her yard where I learned the words to the Oscar Meyer wiener song for the first time. And I watched in pre-teen disgust as my Uncle Wilton showed us how to feed slop to a bunch of mud-wallering, snorting, stinking pigs. I made bottle rockets out of empty glass coke bottles and firecrackers and played with matches without adult supervision in my Aunt JudyAnn and Uncle David's long gravel driveway with my brothers and my cousins Eric, Jolene and Curtis. But I wouldn't eat the crawfish.

I went to the World's Fair in Louisiana as a teenager in 1984 wearing my multi-colored twisty beads and saw Andy Gibb in concert dancing and singing in his leather parachute pants to 'Shadow Dancing'. After I grew up I kept going back to Louisiana as often as I could to visit my cousin Eric and my other family members and explored New Orleans and its surrounding cities and the wealth of culture it held.

Louisiana has always been a magical place for me, being my birth state and holding so many treasured memories from my childhood and mid-twenties. Donnie and I always found it funny that I spent so much time traveling in and out of Louisiana over the years and we also discovered we were at the World's Fair at the same time and never met. Okay, I know Louisiana is big enough that we wouldn't meet and we probably weren't actually there on the same day, but it just made the world feel a little smaller and him a little closer, even though it took me 28 years to find him and him 30 years to find me.

But when Donnie introduced me to his part of Louisiana for the first time, it was as if I had stepped into a whole other world. We had traveled with our friends Lisa and Ken for Mardi Gras week. We went to a family parade and all the floats passed by screaming Donnie's name and throwing bags of beads and other assorted offerings at his feet. The four of us hung as many beads as possible around our necks, stuffed our shirts and filled our arms with them to bring back with us. 

He took me to his Aunt Dolly's house where his cousins, neices and nephews and MawMaw were visiting. There were about 10 or 12 of us standing and sitting around her small kitchen table carrying on 6 conversations at the same time. They were speaking in such thick Cajun accents I could barely understand them. And on top of that, they said their words so quickly, I couldn't get a chance to repeat them in my head to try to make out what they were saying. And on top of that, they were using Creole words that I didn't understand the meaning of and Cajun phrasing that sounded like backwards talking to me. 

For example, in my common English I would ask someone, 'How old are you?' or 'Did you see that fast car?' In their Cajun dialect they would say 'How old YOU are?' or 'Mais, you saw dat car go fast fast yeah?' Now imagine those sentences again with the words spoken so quickly they are nearly slurring together with a thick accent connecting them. Now. On top of that... the 6 conversations they were having were inter-connecting. They could jump in and out of and around each conversation at any given moment without stopping and continue right along where they left off in their last conversation. 

My. Head. Was. Spinning! I couldn't keep up! They were speaking another language and I wasn't getting it! Donnie would always laugh about how when he looked over at me, my eyes were bugging out, darting back and forth at everyone talking and my mouth was hanging open in shock! Oh it was so funny. Of course I mostly have it down now, although ask my sis-n-law Kristen and she'll tell you I still can't understand her very well over the phone. I always ask her, 'Can you say that again???' and 'What did you say???'.

Donnie and I would sometimes have misunderstandings over our language barrier. One time we were going to the store and as we pulled into the parking lot he asked me "Are you going to get down?" and I was like "Um, what? You want me to dance right here in the parking lot?". I thought he was asking me to get down and boogie-oogie-oogie! The translation was actually "Are you going to go into the store?" Other common miscommunications we had were turning the AC or TV volume up or down. He always said "Speed it up!" or "Slow it down!"... I got confused every time!

When we were planning our wedding we nearly had a huge argument over nothing. He told me he wanted his sister and cousins to "serve" at the wedding. I thought he meant he wanted them to serve the food and drinks at the reception! I couldn't believe he would want that and I told him there was no way and why would he even want them to serve??? He asked me 'Wouldn't you want your brothers to serve?' and I told him 'Of course not!' We were so frustrated with one another. It was a couple days later when I finally realized what he had meant by "serving" was he wanted them to be our bridesmaids and groomsmen! Doh!

The first time I went home with him for a holiday was another shocker for me. I had always been brought up on meals that strictly included a meat, a starch and at least one colorful veggie, maybe even two. My traditional Thanksgiving holiday meal was a balance of Northern foods from my dad and Southern foods from my mom. We usually had turkey and ham, sweet potatoes topped with marshmallows and mashed potatoes with giblet gravy, cornbread stuffing and Yankee stuffing, green bean casserole and cranberry sauce. 

When I went to fill my plate at my first Cajun Thanksgiving I walked around my bro-n-law's mom's kitchen expecting the foods I grew up on, searching for and never finding anything green; there was no salad, no green beans, nothing. There was turkey, gumbo, white beans, white rice, dirty rice, jambalaya, potato salad, mashed potatoes and corn. Everything was varying shades of white, brown and yellow. I whispered to Donnie 'Hey, where's the vegetables?' He said 'Over there' and pointed to the white beans! Of course everything was delicious. Every bite I put in my mouth was absolutely delectable. But I was floored that our families ate so differently. 

It was kind of like the first time I realized there were people who couldn't or 'shouldn't' sing. I was 16 years old at FCA camp the summer going into my senior year of high school. We were standing in the assembly room, singing praise and worship and the girl beside me, who was a lot of fun, was singing wholeheartedly out of key with all that she had in her little body. I started cracking up and elbowed her and said 'Stop it! You're killing me! You're so funny! Cut it out!' I mean, I was rolling, almost in tears crying because it was SO bad and SO hilarious. She turned and looked at me with confusion, all doe eyed and innocent and said 'WHAT are you talking about???' That's when it dawned on me that there were people in this world who couldn't sing. 'Oh, um, nothing...' I said, and turned back towards the front and joined the singing again, very sheepishly. 

My initial experiences on the bayou felt similar, but I quickly grew accustomed to the differences in 'his Louisiana' and 'my Louisiana'. I grew past the culture shock and found a lot of common ground and embraced the lifestyle of the bayou. Everywhere we went everyone knew Donnie. It amazed me how well loved and well known he was. If we went to Walmart we would inadvertently end up spending a couple of hours there because we would meet someone on every aisle and have a 20 minute conversation. When we went to church there it was as if Elvis was in the building. We couldn't walk 2 feet without being stopped by somebody. It was overwhelming every time and in some ways I seriously felt like the wife of a celebrity. It was awesome.

At first every aspect of being on the bayou was new, different, exciting and sometimes challenging. But now, as soon as we drive into town for a visit and see the bayou running through the middle of it with the houseboats, fishing boats and crab boats and we see the boys and old men fishing alongside the bayou, it feels like home. Our ears itch to hear the Cajun accents and our taste buds scream for the Cajun foods. There's always a freshly made mouth watering gumbo or another yummy Cajun dish and a warm pair of arms to welcome us wherever we decide to stop first. 

The heritage is amazing, the food is phenomenal, the accents are thick, the people are loving and the time we have there is absolutely priceless. It's not the same without Donnie, but his Louisiana has become my Louisiana too. Now I have two families waiting for me to visit when I cross the state lines and that thought is so very heartwarming to me. 

But I still won't eat the crawfish.

The Aftermath, Part 6: Moving Forward

As time stretched forward over the last 10 months I found myself in moments of standstill when I could not fathom even imagining a future without Donnie in it. Being his wife, his ministry partner, his co-worship leader, his companion and his caretaker consumed every moment I had. The future I envisioned was one we had planned together. We were going to conquer kidney failure and overcome illness. We were going to write more songs and record music together. We were going to move into our own home and raise our children there, in one place and finally be settled. But when he died, all of those dreams died with him. 

I can't say it never crossed my mind. When Donnie faced severe illness time after time, there were a lot of 'what if's' circling through my thoughts. When my sister-in-law Amy lost my brother Gerald, I thought "That should've been me" because we had come face-to-face with death more than once already. I wondered where would I go, what would I do? How would I take care of my children? And then I would shrug off the questions, shake off the concerns, face life in that moment and do the best I could for that day. But when he died, the questions flooded back again.

I always had Donnie to turn to when I was undecided or confused about what direction to take. He was my sounding board and my advice giver. He encouraged me and made me see things in ways I never did before. He taught me how to dream and imagine because I always second guessed and limited myself. He made me feel valuable, smart and talented. But when he died, I felt small, abandoned, afraid and incapable of planning a future without him.

Over the weeks as I began to grow accustomed to the unexpected ebb and flow of my grief and anxiety, I found I could open a window now and then and catch a glimpse of myself and the kids actually living life again. Sometimes I would slam that mental window shut because Donnie wasn't in the picture. But in other moments I would lean out just a little and stick my head out of the window ever so slightly to feel the warm breeze, breathe in the air and realize I wasn't suffocating anymore. 

Now that I've realized my life is not over, I've slowly started answering the questions that never had opportunity to land. The dreams that had unraveled are beginning to take new form. And the future, although I still don't know what it entails, does not look nearly as bleak and dismal as it did. It's hard to learn to walk again on my own, without Donnie. But I am. My feet are taking small, hesitant but sure steps. 

I've started attending music rehearsals again. I'm not quite ready to sing on the platform, but I'm slowly getting there. It may not feel the same, but my worship is raw and true and constant, and I know that pleases my Abba. 

I've started writing again. Donnie always wanted me to write stories, books and songs and I was always scared to because when I write, I write real and vulnerable truths. It's not without tears and I'm showing all my ugly open wounds and scars, but it feels right and it gives me hope. 

And in just a few days, I'll start working again. It's been five years since I worked full time. I'm nervous. I feel like a kid preparing for the first day of school; not knowing who I'll eat lunch with or if I'll make friends. But I'm confident it's what I need to do because God answered my prayer so exactly in this position. 

One of the songs Donnie and I used to lead was Israel Houghton and Ricardo Sanchez's 'Moving Forward'. It's lyrics have been echoing in my head the last few days. 

'You're the healer who makes all things new.' 

'You have given me a second chance.' 

'You make all things new and I will follow you forward.' 

I'm so thankful I have a Healer who makes all things new and Who has given me a second chance. I'm glad to be moving forward. And I'm relieved that I don't serve a pushy God. He is gentle and He is kind and He is patient with my slow, small, faltering steps. 

Monday's blog: What To Say To a Grieving Person - And what not to say...

Addendum: Just wanted to say a big thank you to everyone who's been following my blog the last two weeks. Now that I'm starting back to work, I expect my posts will decrease some, but I will continue to try to keep the blog going a little more consistently than I have in the past. Thanks for all your encouragement about my writing, it means a lot.

The Aftermath, Part 5: The Agony of Anxiety

One of the greater struggles I've had since Donnie passed away is dealing with crushing, overwhelming, out of control, debilitating, terrifying anxiety. Over the years I have dealt with occasional anxiety attacks that started in my mid-twenties. They've never been a walk in the park, but they have been subdued to just once in a while struggles I've only had to deal with from time to time. However, in working my way through my grief, the anxiety I've faced has been astronomical compared to what I've experienced in the past. 

When Donnie first passed away, I had great difficulty sleeping. A large part of the reason was as much as I tried not to, I couldn't help reliving the night of his death. The sound of his last breaths being exhaled were constantly in my ears. The confusion I felt when he didn't respond to me replayed through my emotions. The frustration with the 911 call that I won't get into here would continually upset me. The memory of Emelia walking in the room and being horrified when I was trying to do chest compressions on him haunted me. Hearing the Doctor's confirmation at the hospital filled me with dread over and over. Facing my children and telling them their daddy was gone clawed at and crushed my heart. The series of those moments and emotions helplessly repeated without cease in my mind. I would lie down to sleep and face his side of the bed, the very spot he died in and it would start and not end.

When I did sleep, I had nightmares. I kept dreaming that he was alive again, somehow; but he was still sick and in the dreams I had knowledge that no matter what I did, no matter what anyone did, he was going to die AGAIN and I was going to have to face his death AGAIN and go through all of those emotions AGAIN. It was torment. I would dream different scenarios each time, horrible, awful varying deaths often involving a fall of some kind. Each time a different dream with the same result. And then I would wake up and have to tell myself out loud, "He's gone. He's not coming back. He can't come back. He's dead." I had to make myself believe it because the dreams were so real, it felt like he had really come back. It was like being told over and over again that I lost him. Pure torture.

It took 4 months for the dreams to finally stop. I was visiting my Aunt Julia in March and I shared with her my torment. She prayed for me that night before we went to bed. I haven't had a dream like that since then and I've been able to rest better. It took about 7-8 months for the replaying of his death to slowly diminish during my waking hours and finally come to a stop. Since then I've had more peace and slept better and longer.

My anxiety was crippling and happened more often during those days of waking and sleeping torment. I would sometimes go a few days without an anxiety attack and be relieved, just to be blown away by one unexpectedly. My heart would start beating fast, I would find it difficult to breathe, I would feel like running and escaping or crawling and hiding. I felt like I was going insane. I didn't want to see anyone or go anywhere and yet I would have to talk to someone so I knew I wasn't crazy. It was terrifying.

I would also get overwhelmed easily by simple tasks like doing my laundry or going to church, things that were normally second nature to me. I would hyperventilate at the thought of driving further than taking my kids to school. I would wait until I had no food left in the house because just the thought of going to the store for groceries freaked me out. I would be talking with a friend about Donnie and suddenly feel light headed like I was going to pass out. Just thinking about taking a trip somewhere in a car by myself would set me off. If I had a particularly busy day planned in the week, all week long I would dread it and be anxious. Any task that brought about minimal nervousness or fear or anything that took me out of my comfort zone and would normally just make me a little uncomfortable would trigger an agonizing anxiety attack. 

I also found myself facing my own mortality and developed a horrific fear of dying. After I would tuck the kids in bed at night, I would feel overwhelmingly alone. I would think of how quickly Donnie had died and I was so scared the same thing would happen to me. The fear of dying would just overtake me and I would suffer through the nights between that and missing Donnie and grieving for him. It was as if I was waiting for myself to die at any second. I worried the kids would wake and find me dead. I worried about them having to deal with my death on top of Donnie's. I worried about them facing life without parents. I worried about who would take care of them. I just lived in perpetual fear.

Often at night I would be blindsided by an attack, consumed with the loud silence and feel utterly alone and abandoned. I called my dear friend Lisa at 3:00 AM one night to come and sit with me because I was so frightened at how I was feeling. Sometimes an overbearing sense of dread would take me over and my chest would feel heavy and I couldn't think straight. I've had my sweet Aunt come spend time with me as well in some of my more severe episodes, even as recent as a week ago, Monday morning. 

Sometimes I call a friend or a relative and just talk for a while. If I talk to someone and have a sane conversation, it helps me know I'm not insane. It's such a strange sensation. I feel as if I am a balloon, being batted about in a stormy wind, about to drift away forever. But if I have someone here, or if I can talk to someone for a while, it grounds me somehow and calms me, like someone would be reaching up and grabbing my string and pulling me slowly, safely down to earth until I feel like my feet are back on the ground again. 

Thankfully, I have found some things to help me through my struggle with anxiety. I use a daily homeopathic personal blend of Bach flower essentials that my friend Chelsea makes for me. It helps keep me grounded on a daily basis. I also use another homeopathic remedy called Argentum Nitricum. The kids call them my 'chill pills'. They are teeny little sugar balls with argentum nitricum layered in it and they're held in a tube that looks like chapstick. When I feel an attack coming on I just place one or two under my tongue until it dissolves and it helps stop my anxiety attacks quicker, and sometimes completely heads them off at their beginning. Early on I was going through a bottle of the argentum nitricum weekly. Now I can make one bottle last nearly a month... So the severity and frequency of my anxiety attacks have greatly decreased.

My other methods vary, depending on what works in that moment. I breathe in my nose and out my mouth. I tell myself I am not in pain, I am not having a heart attack, I will be okay. I drink hot green tea flavored with mint and hold the warm mug in my hands or close to my chest and let the heat seep inside my body. Or sometimes I drink ice cold water. I turn the air cooler or put the fan on and it helps me feel like I can breathe better. I stop what I am doing and I clean something or empty the dishwasher. I cuddle with one of the kids so I don't feel so alone. I call someone to talk or on those rare occasions I can't stand to be alone, ask someone to come over. Or I get dressed and call someone and ask them if I can go see them. 

I get under my covers and go to sleep. I plan something fun to do with someone I care about so I have something to look forward to. I make a list of my worries or concerns so I'm not carrying them all in my mind. I put on some music and worship. I listen to my Bible ap read scripture out loud when I need to hear another voice and can't reach anyone or don't want to bother anyone. I have a good cry. I listen to Donnie singing or I look at his pictures or videos. I watch Andy Griffith on Netflix. And of course being the Christmas freak I am, I also like to watch Christmas movies on Netflix and usually play free cell at the same time on my phone. 

Why am I sharing all of this? Because for me, this has been one of the more horrific aspects of dealing with Donnie's death. Because I know I'm not the only person in the world who has suffered from anxiety attacks. Because I'm proud that I am slowly conquering them and they have become less frequent and less severe, most of the time. Because I have this personal paranoia thing about not using prescription medications unless it's absolutely necessary and honestly side effects freak me out and I really don't think I need another thing to freak me out, do you? Right. Crazy Sharon is signing off. Nanoo Nanoo.

Tomorrow's Blog: The Aftermath, Part 6: Moving Forward - The final blog in this series. Sort of.

A Love Story

Today is my birthday. I am 42. Oh sweet Lord Jesus, I am 42. Where has the time gone? Today, I want to share with you a love story. One I've shared only with close friends and family. Emelia loves to hear the details of when Donnie and I fell in love. I usually give her little snippets and bits and pieces, but today I'll reveal the whole shaboodle so that one day she and Kellan can read it here and have it preserved in their minds the way it is in mine.

I knew from a young age that I wouldn't get married too early on. I always thought that I'd wait at least until I was 26, because that's how old my mom was when she got married. Smart reasoning, I know. But truly, I knew I would not be an early bride. I dated over the years and I fell in love twice over the course of my college days and cared deeply about the beau's in my past but I eventually found singleness to stay at my door. 

I decided that it would be best if I didn't date anyone for a while because I had an uncanny knack of hurting people I cared about. And I wanted to work on me and focus on my relationship with God. Doesn't that sound holy? I decided Jesus was my husband and if I never married, then I could be happy with that. Of course my hormones raged and I had crushes but I was determined, so I sort of trained myself to not get distracted when an interesting male came into view. I decided to look at them as friends and keep my eyes on the Lord. This way I wouldn't hurt anyone or be hurt by anyone. And it worked, for a couple of years.

Then one Sunday, Donnie came to try out for the position of Music Pastor at my church. I had been away on vacation to either NC or LA and missed meeting him at the first rehearsal the Wednesday before. And that Sunday, I just happened to be running late for some reason, so I didn't get to meet him before church. Donnie would always break in and tell this part: I was running so late that he and the entire choir were already on stage ready to start when I bolted on the platform to take my place just seconds before the beginning of service. He HATED it when people were late! Great first impression, right? (haha!)

The worship service started and I was literally BLOWN AWAY. Our church had been interviewing other potential worship leaders for several weeks. The ministers who had previously tried out had been (and this was in my young 28 year old opinion) either too cocky and showy and had a Mr. Know-it-all/I'm the Man attitude or were too scared, timid, nervous, shaky and lackluster-ly BORING. 

So when he placed his fingers on the keyboard and opened his mouth to sing I was FLOORED. I was like What the WHAT???? This guy is AMAZING!!! He wasn't there to praise himself and lift himself up and he wasn't there shaking in his boots in front of two to three hundred people he'd never sang in front of before. He was there to WORSHIP. And let me tell you HE DID. He gave GOD, not man, his FULL attention. He sang and he praised and he worshiped and he exhorted the people and we entered God's presence that morning in such an anointed way led by him that I was just... SO. TURNED. ON. Ummm, whoops. Sorry!

Hey, let me be real with you. I am HUMAN. And I was in my twenties. And the one MAJOR aphrodisiac that has always been INSPIRING to me was when I would see a man that genuinely, ardently gave his all to worship the Lord. There's no faking that. And he just knocked me over. And it didn't hurt that he was SO cute. And this is the other part of the story that he would always break in on to make me tell. Oh this is SO embarrassing. And well the truth is, that besides being swept away by the presence of God that he brought into the house with his praise, I just could not keep my eyes off of his hiney. There, I said it.

I know. I'm so ashamed. But I couldn't help it. When I realized what I was doing I immediately slammed my eyes shut tight and lifted my head to the ceiling so I wouldn't be tempted to admire him in that way again. I was begging God to please help me and please forgive me in my mind and don't you know God had to be rolling in laughter at me, knowing what was in store for us. It's so funny and still brings a smile to my face, a giggle to my throat and a sigh of satisfaction to my soul. He so made us for each other.

Well, I met him 'officially' following that service and then I booked it out of there because I was so embarrassed at my reaction to him. I mean, I had been able to reign in my emotion towards men for a couple years now and couldn't figure out for the life of me, what in the world was going on??? I figured I may never see him again anyway so I may as well place myself at a distance and besides, I was probably going to be single for life!

Yeah, well, he came back. They called him back for another weekend because someone else had canceled their tryout. He stayed at my house in my room and I stayed at my Aunt and Uncle's home. I left him a note to welcome him and told him to make himself at home. When I returned to my house after he left I found he'd left a note for me, thanking me and saying he hoped he could return the favor someday. I still have the note he wrote. 

Shortly after that, he was hired, moved from LA and became our Worship Pastor. And fairly immediately, we began to 'hang out'. We had SO MUCH FUN together. He made me smile, we made each other laugh and we could talk for hours on end and never get bored with one another. I could be stupid and goofy with him and I made him sing my favorite song, the B-52's 'LOVE SHACK', in full voice in the car with me the first time we hung out and he joined right in. We became best friends almost instantly. It was wonderful.

We went to a Neighborhood Estate Sale together at 6:00 in the morning. We went to the TX State Fair together and had a blast. We went out to eat at Chili's, TGI Friday's, IHOP and the Evergreen Chinese Buffet. We went cosmic bowling and to see movies with a group of youth. We played laser tag and went to Putt-Putt. We went to Gerald's bible study at Starbucks. We shopped at all the thrift stores and picked out 70's clothes for Halloween and youth parties. We went furniture shopping and I helped him pick out his couch for his apartment. We went to Bennigan's and stayed out til 2:00 in the morning sitting in the restaurant talking and laughing and when they played Tom Petty's "Free Falling", we started singing along and they cranked it up. Soon other people in the restaurant started singing along until the entire restaurant was singing Free Falling at the top of their lungs! It was fantastic. 

"We're just friends, we hang out!" That's what I kept telling myself (and everybody else), and I always made sure to pay my own way. But he treated me special. He was thoughtful. He was respectful. He went out of his way to see me and call me and hang out with me. He liked me and he thought I was cool and funny. And I really, REALLY liked him, but I couldn't tell if he really, REALLY liked me. Until one night he called me to make sure I got home safely and called me 'dear' on the phone. Another day he told me I had really amazing eyes. Then one Sunday at lunch he told me in passing at the buffet that I looked really nice that day. And I started to realize that maybe he really did like me-like me.

The first time we held hands was right after Thanksgiving. We were watching that horrible B-rated movie 'Deep Blue Sea' where the sharks become really smart because of some scientific experiment. He was so nervous he couldn't stop speed-talking throughout the whole movie and I was so nervous I could hardly breathe. He was all 'Whoa, did you see that-I can't believe that-That's just crazy-Oh no, I wonder what will happen next-That shark is creepy-That guy better move outta the way-Oh wow, that dude's gonna get it!' non-stop through the whole movie! And I was trying to answer his questions but could barely get my words out because I was so breathless at just holding his hand! It was hilarious. We always laughed about how ridiculous we were every time we saw the movie playing on TV over the years, but could never make ourselves watch the movie again, because it was just that bad.

And then he told me he loved me, within a week! I thought he was CRAZY and I was terrified because surely things couldn't be happening this quickly! Soooo, I wouldn't say it back. I just said, thank you? HAHA! I made him wait about 2 more weeks before I decided that yes, I really could trust myself and my feelings and that I truly was in love with him. So I finally told him 'I love you too' one night in the car when he was dropping me off at home and I'm not kidding you, he gasped out loud because he was so happy and then he kissed me. It was so sweet. 

We had both wanted a long courtship and engagement, but God had other ideas. We were engaged by Christmas and started planning our wedding for June 23rd, 2001. Our wedding was beautiful. After we were pronounced man and wife, we had a fun moment where we surprised everyone by having our friend Renae play the beginning of the traditional wedding recessional and then had the sound man interrupt her playing by starting the song Everlasting Love by Natalie Cole. Renae and our sound man were the only other two people who knew we were exiting to that song. All our bridesmaids and groomsmen did a double take and stared at Renae and the sound man and then Donnie and I danced/walked back up the aisle to the song. We have it on video where everyone in the bridal party and congregation followed us out with impromptu dancing to the song. It was so much fun! 

We stopped briefly in Donnie's office at the church so everyone could line up outside the doors to blow bubbles and also so we could have a private moment behind closed doors. We embraced and kissed and then I asked him to take off his wedding band and read it. I'd had it engraved with the date and a promise. It read "No Matter What". And I meant it.

One more thing to share. About seven or eight months later, we decided to start trying to have a baby. I was dead set against it for the longest time. I wanted to wait at least 2 years before having kids. I was selfish and wanted to keep him all to myself. But he kept talking about how badly he wanted children and he didn't want to be 55 when they graduated high school. But I still did not want to concede. Then one day in January, practically overnight, God changed my heart. I suddenly, overwhelmingly, wanted to have a child. So I told him. I stopped taking birth control and within 2 weeks we were expecting! It was crazy. But we were so excited.

Kellan was born October 1, 2002. By this time we had been living and working at a church in Arkansas. My mom traveled to be there for his birth and spent a week with us. She went home and came back again a few weeks later for his dedication and spent several more days with us and Kellan. She bathed him and slathered lotion on him, held him, fed him, rocked him and spoiled him as much as she possibly could. Then she went back home. The next time I saw her she was in the hospital and she later passed away on January 8, 2003. Sometime after my mom's death, Donnie told me the reason he had wanted to have a baby so badly and had been pressing me so much about it was that God had told him we needed to have a grandbaby for Esther before she passed away. That broke me, but I'm so grateful he listened and that God changed my heart. She loved that little boy to pieces.  

Of course our love story continued. We laughed a lot together for the 12 and 1/2 years of our marriage. We loved one another and grew together and learned a lot of life lessons. We had some trying times like in any marriage and sometimes he was a stubborn man with a strong opinion. But I always secretly prided myself on a shared character trait my Aunt Carol (my dad's sister) mentioned about my mom when she and dad were together. She told my mom she was like an iron fist in a velvet glove, meaning she had a way with my dad. And I had a way with Donnie. But I wouldn't change even the sassy-ness that occasionally came out of his mouth or on facebook, because that's part of what made him who he was; a vibrant, strong, opinionated Cajun who could make a mean pot of gumbo, who loved Saints football and got riled by politics and didn't mind putting himself out there for an occasional 'friendly' debate with other people. 

I loved him, no matter what. I loved worshiping with him, I loved spending my life with him and I loved taking care of him. I'm so thankful God gave me these years with him and the gift of my two children to hold on to. We lived a rich, blessed life together and I couldn't ask for more. 

Tomorrow's Blog: The Aftermath, Part 5: The Agony of Anxiety - A brutally honest reveal of my struggle with Anxiety following Donnie's death.