Von has been a challenging child to raise. As I said in my last post, he started with jaundice and colic. As he started growing older, I noticed little things that seemed weird. He lined up his cars rather than playing with them. He would place something in the middle of his bedroom and if someone moved it, he would throw a temper tantrum. By the time he was two, he still struggled with walking, but he was able to walk. He wasn't talking at all. He would point and say, "kah" for anything he wanted, whether it be his pacifier or food or one of his toys.
Michael stopped flying for a living when Von was 3 or 4 months old. He decided to go back to school full time and get his Master's degree. He had some credit hours but no degree so it was kind of like starting from scratch. He attended 2 schools so that he could take a total of 24 to 30 hours each semester until he got into the MBA program. Needless to say, Michael wasn't around a whole lot therefore wasn't truly seeing all of the strange things going on with Von. And I was working full-time so it was a struggle for me to see it enough to know something was really wrong.
Von was eating a normal diet when he was on baby food, he would eat anything I fed him from peas to chicken and even broccoli! When we started feeding him a typical diet with texture rather than smashed foods, he started becoming a picky eater. His diet selections were getting smaller and smaller and smaller, until by the age of 2, all he would eat was hot dogs and peas! I could set food in front of him and he would refuse to eat until we put what he wanted in front of him. I tried even putting cookies, cake, ice cream and popsicles in front of him just to see if I could get him to eat anything new. My mother told me that if he got hungry enough, he would eat. So, I stopped giving him food he would eat for 2.5 days before I finally gave in and gave him hot dogs and peas again.
I took him to his pediatrician and he told me that nothing was wrong with him and that all kids go through a phase of not eating much. I didn't like that answer. I heard the school system would do Speech therapy and occupational therapy evaluations for infants and toddlers. I had NO idea what occupational therapy was so I just requested a speech evaluation. The lady that came to our house to evaluate him said that I need to see someone in a private practice for occupational therapy because the services he needed, the schools couldn't provide.
So, I took him to an outpatient clinic that provided speech, physical and occupational therapy. They told me that it was a good thing I brought him in because he would have likely been on a feeding tube by the time he was 5!!!!! They also thought that he may have a mild form of autism!!!
Obviously, we started him on therapy at the age of 2.5, when we had all the evaluations completed. They put him in speech therapy, occupational therapy and food therapy! Who knew food therapy even existed!?!?! I sure didn't. So, we started going and Von started eating foods that I thought he would never eat again! They discharged him from food therapy about 9 months later. He would eat ALMOST anything. To this day, he doesn't like sauerkraut or broccoli, but who can blame him. There are foods that he would prefer not to eat, but he will eat almost anything he is served. It was an amazing therapy!
After about 3 months of speech therapy, he was talking, granted he was very hard to understand. He would say something and if you didn't repeat what he said, he would say it over and over and over again until you repeated what you heard him saying. He wanted to make sure that you heard him. After 6 months of speech therapy, they discharged him. He had gone from a vocabulary of 1 word, "kah" to a vocabulary of a 7 year old child!! You could even understand the majority of what he was trying to say! To this day, he will say some things over and over and over until you repeat them back to him or you respond in a manner that he KNOWS you heard what he said and he is 8 years old.
Occupational therapy... well, he still needs occupational therapy(OT) here and there, but he was discharged after 4.5 years. I sat in watching his OT sessions. I thought, how absurd is this!! They are sitting and playing with him. What is this accomplishing?? After a while, I started asking questions. Why are you setting him in a bin full of dry beans, scooping the beans and dumping them on his legs? Answer: This works on decreasing his sensitivity to touch. Why are you placing blocks one on top of the other? Answer: These are 1" blocks and they work on eye-hand coordination as well as pinch strength. Why are you clipping clothes pins in random places? Answer: Do you see how he has to use two hands to open in? This strengthens his hands so that he can hold a pencil better when he gets older. What good does it do to swing my child on a swing? Answer: This helps with balance. Remember how he would be walking or running and would just fall over? This helps him find the middle ground and become successful when leaning, walking, reaching, running or jumping. Why do you have him on his belly on a scooter picking up bean bags and then taking him to the other side of the room on his belly? Answer: Do you remember how he will randomly run into door frames? He thinks he has enough space between him and the door, but he misjudges it because he is unaware of where his body is. The pressure on his shoulder and arm joints tell his body where those joints are.
When they discharged him from therapy, they had decided that it wasn't autism but something called sensory processing disorder. Sensory processing disorder is problems caused by not understanding your senses correctly. A person touches you, but you feel a thousand needles pricking you. What would you do? Of course, you would turn around and slap that person's hand off of you! You sit down to eat something, you put it in your mouth and it feels like a slug crawling down your throat. What would you do? Spit it out!! You are walking down the hallway and you feel like your leaning to the side. What would you do? Lean to the other side, but what if you leaned to the other side and you were actually standing straight. You fall over. These are some of the things my little boy was experiencing and still experiences at times.
Sensory processing disorder is hard to deal with. Imagine walking through a store, and the longer you are in the store, the brighter the lights seem. You are going to start trying to find your way out of the store. But then if your mom put you into the shopping cart, what are you going to do. Cry "I wanna go home." If you are young, you cannot explain why, so you just keep crying. What does that look like to people around you. I'll give you a hint... They definitely don't think you are a poster mom who does everything right. In fact, you have several little old ladies come and tell you that you should get your child in order. You have people walk by and say things like, "Wow, if she would only discipline that child he wouldn't act that way."
After everything was explained to me, I started to slowly know what they were working on when they switched from one activity to the next. I would begin seeing the activity, evaluating what they were doing, thinking about his goals and then asking are you working on...this? As I watched I became more and more aware of what I should do at home with him. But I still had a lot to learn. Life with Von is still hard at times, but learning with him became easier when I started understanding where the problems stemmed from. We still have to let him stand while he eats, bounce and flap his hands when he is excited and cry when he is over stimulated. But we have come a long way from where we were.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Friday, March 21, 2014
Saturday, March 15, 2014
Onto the next stage
Within the first year of our marriage, I found out that I had tumors in both breasts. I became anxious and weak. I still had my faith, but I didn't utilize the power of prayer during that time of my life. Everything was hard because I didn't look to God for comfort. I remember when I was in the hospital, I had to fast until 2pm before the surgery. All I could think about before getting the IV was food. I had to have a wire inserted into the tumor so that the surgeon could find it once the surgery started. In order to get the wire in the right place they had to put it in while I was awake and then have a mammogram completed. Because it had been so long since I had eaten, when my body went through the stress of having the wire inserted into the tumor, I stood up for the mammogram and fainted several times during the imaging process. I can remember the nurse shouting at me because I couldn't stand up straight. It was an awful day, but my parents brought me a salad from Applebee's afterwords and that made the whole thing worth it!! It took a few months but they ran the tumors through 9 different labs!! 5 said the tumors was benign (non-cancerous), 4 said the tumors was cancerous. So, the doctor told us that it wasn't cancerous.
In 2004, we wanted a house!! When we were looking for a house, we wanted one that would be structurally sound so that we wouldn't have dramatic repair bills. But we wanted a good deal on a house too! So, I started looking. I found this house that was priced 30,000 under market value and convinced Michael that we MUST go look at it! It was a foreclosure, so we expected that it wouldn't be in the greatest of shape. We got there and there were a few holes in the asphalt driveway.... not a big deal, we can fill those. The yard was full of trash and leaves... again, not a big deal because we could clean them up! We went into this house and it had an overwhelming smell of cat urine!! I thought I was going to puke!! When we looked at this house, the electricity was turned off, so we had to use flashlights for parts of the house. I remember walking through the house, looking at all the different colors! The living room was lemon yellow! The dining room had some kind of bamboo wallpaper. The kitchen had wallpaper that was mostly ivory, but it had what looked like paint splatters on it. These paint splatters were country blue, mint green and pepto bismal pink! We looked at the bedrooms. One was white with a HORRIBLE baby blue faux finish on top. I wish I had taken a picture and I would have posted it! Another one was white with a HORRIBLE lavender purple faux finish!! We went to look in the bathroom in the hall. It was a fluorescent orange/coral color!! The master bedroom and bath were OK. They were a periwinkle color. But what made this room and bathroom hideous was it had bright yellow suns and moons stenciled on the walls! Needless to say, it wasn't done with the best of artwork... In the master bathroom, the counter top was originally a mauve pink. But they had decided they wanted to paint it Volunteer orange. The paint job was bad enough that you could still see the pink streaking through!! There were holes in several of the doors. But we bought the house!! The basement was unfinished but had some wood panelling up for walls so it wasn't bare concrete. It was structurally sound! We spent approximately 10,000 on renovations and the house was beautiful!
Michael made the basement into his "man cave." And I took care of the upstairs. When Michael was in his man cave, he made it clear that I was only allowed to pass through or come ask him a question, but unless invited, I wasn't to be down there. Again, I was still very naive and didn't know the reason. His reason was that he didn't want me to know how much he was drinking. I still thought he just really like orange juice.
In 2005, we had a little boy! Because of my depressed state, I struggled to enjoy caring for him. Everything about taking care of a baby seemed hard. I wanted a baby because I thought it would take me out of my depression. We named our little boy Von. As a baby, Von was a very challenging baby. He had jaundice and the colic. If you don't know what colic is, your lucky! Colic is a stomach disorder that babies have that make them cry for no reason at all. He would just cry and cry and cry. Around 4 months old, we found out that he was allergic to milk products. So, I stopped breast feeding and we started feeding him soy formula. This change helped some, but the crying didn't totally stop.
Another reason I stopped breast feed was because we found more breast tumors. When I had those removed, a very good friend of mine stayed with me and helped me take care of Von. God blessed me with her as a very good friend in my time of need. She helped me see that taking care of Von was supposed to be a delightful duty because that was my gift from God! Even though it was still challenging to take care of Von, I gained a new perspective. I was serving GOD when I took care of my son!! Somehow this made it a little easier.
In 2004, we wanted a house!! When we were looking for a house, we wanted one that would be structurally sound so that we wouldn't have dramatic repair bills. But we wanted a good deal on a house too! So, I started looking. I found this house that was priced 30,000 under market value and convinced Michael that we MUST go look at it! It was a foreclosure, so we expected that it wouldn't be in the greatest of shape. We got there and there were a few holes in the asphalt driveway.... not a big deal, we can fill those. The yard was full of trash and leaves... again, not a big deal because we could clean them up! We went into this house and it had an overwhelming smell of cat urine!! I thought I was going to puke!! When we looked at this house, the electricity was turned off, so we had to use flashlights for parts of the house. I remember walking through the house, looking at all the different colors! The living room was lemon yellow! The dining room had some kind of bamboo wallpaper. The kitchen had wallpaper that was mostly ivory, but it had what looked like paint splatters on it. These paint splatters were country blue, mint green and pepto bismal pink! We looked at the bedrooms. One was white with a HORRIBLE baby blue faux finish on top. I wish I had taken a picture and I would have posted it! Another one was white with a HORRIBLE lavender purple faux finish!! We went to look in the bathroom in the hall. It was a fluorescent orange/coral color!! The master bedroom and bath were OK. They were a periwinkle color. But what made this room and bathroom hideous was it had bright yellow suns and moons stenciled on the walls! Needless to say, it wasn't done with the best of artwork... In the master bathroom, the counter top was originally a mauve pink. But they had decided they wanted to paint it Volunteer orange. The paint job was bad enough that you could still see the pink streaking through!! There were holes in several of the doors. But we bought the house!! The basement was unfinished but had some wood panelling up for walls so it wasn't bare concrete. It was structurally sound! We spent approximately 10,000 on renovations and the house was beautiful!
Michael made the basement into his "man cave." And I took care of the upstairs. When Michael was in his man cave, he made it clear that I was only allowed to pass through or come ask him a question, but unless invited, I wasn't to be down there. Again, I was still very naive and didn't know the reason. His reason was that he didn't want me to know how much he was drinking. I still thought he just really like orange juice.
In 2005, we had a little boy! Because of my depressed state, I struggled to enjoy caring for him. Everything about taking care of a baby seemed hard. I wanted a baby because I thought it would take me out of my depression. We named our little boy Von. As a baby, Von was a very challenging baby. He had jaundice and the colic. If you don't know what colic is, your lucky! Colic is a stomach disorder that babies have that make them cry for no reason at all. He would just cry and cry and cry. Around 4 months old, we found out that he was allergic to milk products. So, I stopped breast feeding and we started feeding him soy formula. This change helped some, but the crying didn't totally stop.
Another reason I stopped breast feed was because we found more breast tumors. When I had those removed, a very good friend of mine stayed with me and helped me take care of Von. God blessed me with her as a very good friend in my time of need. She helped me see that taking care of Von was supposed to be a delightful duty because that was my gift from God! Even though it was still challenging to take care of Von, I gained a new perspective. I was serving GOD when I took care of my son!! Somehow this made it a little easier.
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
The Honeymooners
A couple points that I forgot to mention in my last post. In November of 2001, Michael decided to give his life to Christ! I was so happy that my new best friend had just become a Christian! As he was growing in his knowledge of Christ, I became more and more attracted to him! He started attending Liberty University online and was taking courses in the New and Old Testament! We had so much we could talk about through that time! We were close before, but with his growing faith in Christ, we were as close as anyone could possibly be!
When we announced our engagement, we announced to each of our closest friends and family members in person, rather than a big announcement! When we called to tell Michael's parents, they said they had news for us too! So, we asked them to go first. They told us they were going to get a divorce. The separation didn't prove to be helpful, so the next thing that needed to happen was the divorce. Michael was greatly disappointed, but we had both seen it coming. Then, we told my parents. Of course, they already knew because Michael asked my dad for my hand in marriage. Then we told my best friend, and then His best friend. His best friend lived an hour away, so we had him down to Michael's apartment for supper. His friend said that he had news for us too. So, when he got to the apartment, Michael told his friend to tell us his news first. His friend had been married for 12 years at that point. He announced that he and his wife got a divorce two weeks ago. How discouraging is that!?!?! Michael goes to announce he is engaged and his parents and best friend announce at the same time, that they are getting a divorce! Oh well, we charged on anyway.
So, back to 2003, we got married. While we were looking for a church to get married in, we decided to attend this cute little church. During the service, the pastor handed out lollypops to all the kids in the congregation. He came up and handed one to both of us! Even though we were thoroughly embarrassed, we loved the look of the church and chose that church to get married in.
On the day of our wedding, I refused to wear shoes. I couldn't be towering over Michael in all the pictures!!! So, we have these cute little pictures of me and my flower girl showing off our bare feet! While were getting ready, I was drinking my daily Diet Dr. Pepper. I spilled a couple drops on my wedding dress. I thought, "no, big deal. I'll just get a paper towel and wipe it off." So, I went into the ladies room and found a paper towel. The paper towels were white with a green ivy print on them. I wet the paper towel and started to rub it on the spot that I had dripped. That place on my dress turned from light brown soda color to bright green!! I was horrified! The spot was just above my belly button and would be seen in ALL of our wedding photos! The good news.. I had a HUGE bouquet. When I held my bouquet, it covered my stained dress. Whew! What a relief! Until... I held it for a couple minutes... The florist later told me that my bouquet was between 15 and 20 lbs! There was a bazillion pictures to take. Needless to say, my arms were sore the next day!
I had the perfect wedding! The weather couldn't have been nicer! The decorations fit perfectly on the rows just as we had imagined! Almost everyone that I loved was able to come! There were no kids wailing throughout the service. It was just beautiful...until...during our "I do's" my best friend's mother's cell phone rings! AND she answered it!! The good news was, she left the room and we were able to continue on with our beautiful ceremony.
We went to Cancun for our honeymoon!! It was beautiful there!! It was the first time I had left the country! In Mexico I was legal to drink, even though I was only 19! So, I tried some of my first alcohol. They put it with all kinds of juices and it was awesome! I didn't want to get drunk or even feel tipsy, so I didn't have many, but they were really yummy! My husband, yes, it felt super weird to call him "my husband", drank more than I thought was necessary. However, I didn't know how much was too much, so I didn't think much of it! We stayed down there for a week. The day before we came home, we went snorkeling. It was a lot of fun looking at the coral reef and all the different colored fish swimming around us! To get to the snorkeling sight we took a ferry to a dock. Then at that dock, we got onto some jet skis and rode out to the reef. We had lunch at a little cafe, then we rode the jet skis and the ferry back to our resort. I had forgotten to wear sunscreen that day. Well, I have red hair and super, super white skin! So, as I'm sure you can imagine, I got a sunburn! But it wasn't red! It was beyond red, it was purple!!!! By that evening, I was in bed shivering with a temperature!!! I had sun poisoning. The last day we were there, we had planned a parasail ride. We paid for it in advance, so we couldn't get out of it. We went on it, but all I remember about it was how much my sandals hurt my feet and how cold the wind was on my skin. It was a disappointing in to a super fun honeymoon.
Soon after we got married, my mother-in-law came for a visit. She was just as nice as she could be! While she was visiting from Nebraska, our wedding photos came in. I thought of a great idea! My father-in-law was going to be visiting from Nebraska 2 months after she left. So, I suggested that my mother-in-law take my wedding photos back to Nebraska and order the ones she wanted. Then she could give them to her parents to look at them. Her parents were still great friends with my father-in-law, so they could give the pictures to him and he could show his parents the pictures. Then, when he came back to our house, he could have what everyone wanted to order and bring my wedding pictures back to me!! :-) This sounds like a great idea...right??
Well, it WAS a great idea until it backfired. My mother-in-law not only didn't get along with my father-in-law, but apparently she didn't get along with her parents either. She didn't tell me this when the pictures were here. She just took the pictures as if she agreed with the plan even though she had no intention of getting them to any of the rest of the family. Two weeks before my father-in-law was going to come out to visit, I gave her a call and kindly asked why she hadn't gotten the pictures to anyone else yet. She told me that she just hadn't gotten around to it and that she would get the pictures out to the rest of the family soon. I was ok with that answer and went on about my business. A week later, no one had seen the pictures. I called and the same exchange happened. Well, three days before my father-in-law was supposed to leave Nebraska and come back to Tennessee, I called up my mother-in-law. I said to her, "You have two choices right now. You can get them to your ex-husband TONIGHT. Or you can put them in the mail to me first thing in the morning. What's it going to be?" I said it quiet and calm, yet very direct. Her tearful, whiny response was, "I need to talk to my son." She cried to Michael for hours upon hours!! I finally told him that he needed to wrap it up about 2am. Thankfully he did and he came to bed and asked me what I had said to her. I told him. He wasn't to happy about it...
The first year of our marriage was HARD!!! I couldn't seem to do much of anything right!! My mother had done so much for me that I didn't know about!! Trying to keep up with the whole household was a lot harder than I thought. But even with all my efforts and striving, I was unable to keep it clean enough for my husband's expectations.
When we got married, Michael decided that I couldn't go to my parent's church anymore because the guy that raped me continued to attend that church. I understood his concern, so we started church shopping. At that time in my life, I was very easy going and could fit into almost any church he wanted to attend. I would get settled into a church very quickly. He would be ok with going to a church for a few months and then he wouldn't let me go anymore. We changed churches every 3 to 6 months until we had tried every church in the area and none of them were "good enough." He said that there just wasn't a good fit for him. So we stopped attending any church all together. This was a very depressing time in my life. Strangely, I didn't know why I was depressed. Looking back, it was obvious that I wasn't in fellowship with ANY body of believers! And because of that, I wasn't being held accountable for ANYTHING! My devotion time with God took a big hit too.
Since Michael was a pilot, he kept all kinds of crazy sleep schedules, but I needed my normal beauty sleep! I would go to bed early and Michael would stay up late watching the news or doing who knows what. After a few months, I found out that he was staying up late in order to drink enough to put him to sleep. As time went on, he stopped hiding it from me altogether and only hid most of it. I still didn't really know that he had a drinking problem. I just didn't like him drinking, so I thought that I was overreacting...because that is what he told me...I was overreacting and that he had it all under control. So, I just took that in stride and assumed he was telling me the truth.
That was the end of our honeymoon stage. It can only get better from here...right?
Until next time! May God bless you in your path!
When we announced our engagement, we announced to each of our closest friends and family members in person, rather than a big announcement! When we called to tell Michael's parents, they said they had news for us too! So, we asked them to go first. They told us they were going to get a divorce. The separation didn't prove to be helpful, so the next thing that needed to happen was the divorce. Michael was greatly disappointed, but we had both seen it coming. Then, we told my parents. Of course, they already knew because Michael asked my dad for my hand in marriage. Then we told my best friend, and then His best friend. His best friend lived an hour away, so we had him down to Michael's apartment for supper. His friend said that he had news for us too. So, when he got to the apartment, Michael told his friend to tell us his news first. His friend had been married for 12 years at that point. He announced that he and his wife got a divorce two weeks ago. How discouraging is that!?!?! Michael goes to announce he is engaged and his parents and best friend announce at the same time, that they are getting a divorce! Oh well, we charged on anyway.
So, back to 2003, we got married. While we were looking for a church to get married in, we decided to attend this cute little church. During the service, the pastor handed out lollypops to all the kids in the congregation. He came up and handed one to both of us! Even though we were thoroughly embarrassed, we loved the look of the church and chose that church to get married in.
On the day of our wedding, I refused to wear shoes. I couldn't be towering over Michael in all the pictures!!! So, we have these cute little pictures of me and my flower girl showing off our bare feet! While were getting ready, I was drinking my daily Diet Dr. Pepper. I spilled a couple drops on my wedding dress. I thought, "no, big deal. I'll just get a paper towel and wipe it off." So, I went into the ladies room and found a paper towel. The paper towels were white with a green ivy print on them. I wet the paper towel and started to rub it on the spot that I had dripped. That place on my dress turned from light brown soda color to bright green!! I was horrified! The spot was just above my belly button and would be seen in ALL of our wedding photos! The good news.. I had a HUGE bouquet. When I held my bouquet, it covered my stained dress. Whew! What a relief! Until... I held it for a couple minutes... The florist later told me that my bouquet was between 15 and 20 lbs! There was a bazillion pictures to take. Needless to say, my arms were sore the next day!
I had the perfect wedding! The weather couldn't have been nicer! The decorations fit perfectly on the rows just as we had imagined! Almost everyone that I loved was able to come! There were no kids wailing throughout the service. It was just beautiful...until...during our "I do's" my best friend's mother's cell phone rings! AND she answered it!! The good news was, she left the room and we were able to continue on with our beautiful ceremony.
We went to Cancun for our honeymoon!! It was beautiful there!! It was the first time I had left the country! In Mexico I was legal to drink, even though I was only 19! So, I tried some of my first alcohol. They put it with all kinds of juices and it was awesome! I didn't want to get drunk or even feel tipsy, so I didn't have many, but they were really yummy! My husband, yes, it felt super weird to call him "my husband", drank more than I thought was necessary. However, I didn't know how much was too much, so I didn't think much of it! We stayed down there for a week. The day before we came home, we went snorkeling. It was a lot of fun looking at the coral reef and all the different colored fish swimming around us! To get to the snorkeling sight we took a ferry to a dock. Then at that dock, we got onto some jet skis and rode out to the reef. We had lunch at a little cafe, then we rode the jet skis and the ferry back to our resort. I had forgotten to wear sunscreen that day. Well, I have red hair and super, super white skin! So, as I'm sure you can imagine, I got a sunburn! But it wasn't red! It was beyond red, it was purple!!!! By that evening, I was in bed shivering with a temperature!!! I had sun poisoning. The last day we were there, we had planned a parasail ride. We paid for it in advance, so we couldn't get out of it. We went on it, but all I remember about it was how much my sandals hurt my feet and how cold the wind was on my skin. It was a disappointing in to a super fun honeymoon.
Soon after we got married, my mother-in-law came for a visit. She was just as nice as she could be! While she was visiting from Nebraska, our wedding photos came in. I thought of a great idea! My father-in-law was going to be visiting from Nebraska 2 months after she left. So, I suggested that my mother-in-law take my wedding photos back to Nebraska and order the ones she wanted. Then she could give them to her parents to look at them. Her parents were still great friends with my father-in-law, so they could give the pictures to him and he could show his parents the pictures. Then, when he came back to our house, he could have what everyone wanted to order and bring my wedding pictures back to me!! :-) This sounds like a great idea...right??
Well, it WAS a great idea until it backfired. My mother-in-law not only didn't get along with my father-in-law, but apparently she didn't get along with her parents either. She didn't tell me this when the pictures were here. She just took the pictures as if she agreed with the plan even though she had no intention of getting them to any of the rest of the family. Two weeks before my father-in-law was going to come out to visit, I gave her a call and kindly asked why she hadn't gotten the pictures to anyone else yet. She told me that she just hadn't gotten around to it and that she would get the pictures out to the rest of the family soon. I was ok with that answer and went on about my business. A week later, no one had seen the pictures. I called and the same exchange happened. Well, three days before my father-in-law was supposed to leave Nebraska and come back to Tennessee, I called up my mother-in-law. I said to her, "You have two choices right now. You can get them to your ex-husband TONIGHT. Or you can put them in the mail to me first thing in the morning. What's it going to be?" I said it quiet and calm, yet very direct. Her tearful, whiny response was, "I need to talk to my son." She cried to Michael for hours upon hours!! I finally told him that he needed to wrap it up about 2am. Thankfully he did and he came to bed and asked me what I had said to her. I told him. He wasn't to happy about it...
The first year of our marriage was HARD!!! I couldn't seem to do much of anything right!! My mother had done so much for me that I didn't know about!! Trying to keep up with the whole household was a lot harder than I thought. But even with all my efforts and striving, I was unable to keep it clean enough for my husband's expectations.
When we got married, Michael decided that I couldn't go to my parent's church anymore because the guy that raped me continued to attend that church. I understood his concern, so we started church shopping. At that time in my life, I was very easy going and could fit into almost any church he wanted to attend. I would get settled into a church very quickly. He would be ok with going to a church for a few months and then he wouldn't let me go anymore. We changed churches every 3 to 6 months until we had tried every church in the area and none of them were "good enough." He said that there just wasn't a good fit for him. So we stopped attending any church all together. This was a very depressing time in my life. Strangely, I didn't know why I was depressed. Looking back, it was obvious that I wasn't in fellowship with ANY body of believers! And because of that, I wasn't being held accountable for ANYTHING! My devotion time with God took a big hit too.
Since Michael was a pilot, he kept all kinds of crazy sleep schedules, but I needed my normal beauty sleep! I would go to bed early and Michael would stay up late watching the news or doing who knows what. After a few months, I found out that he was staying up late in order to drink enough to put him to sleep. As time went on, he stopped hiding it from me altogether and only hid most of it. I still didn't really know that he had a drinking problem. I just didn't like him drinking, so I thought that I was overreacting...because that is what he told me...I was overreacting and that he had it all under control. So, I just took that in stride and assumed he was telling me the truth.
That was the end of our honeymoon stage. It can only get better from here...right?
Until next time! May God bless you in your path!
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Sophomore, Junior and Senior years of high school
Where did I leave off? Oh yes, I was in public school and I had met Jess.
Throughout the year, Jess and I became close. We had three classes together and the one class we didn't have together our classroom's were right next to each other! So, during class we would right notes to each other, and after class was over, we would exchange! We even had our own way of folding the note so that no one else could open it and then refold it the way we had. Wish I could still remember how to do that!! It was fun to fold it knowing that almost everyone that tried to open it ripped it!! After my sophomore year, I went back to being schooled at home and Jess and I lost contact with each other. She went down a road filled with multiple types of drugs and I went back to "life as normal" or at least normal for me.
My youth group was mostly boys with one girl in it, as I had mentioned before. One of the boys, my brother's best friend, came up to me the summer after my sophomore year. He told me of how he was impressed that I stood up under so much pressure. I didn't smoke, do drugs, drink, date the thugs that hit on me, and who knows what else I could have gotten into. He was homeschooled too, and before I knew it, we were dating. Near the beginning of our relationship, I told him that a kiss was going to be saved for the man I would marry. So, he honored that and didn't kiss me. We were both part of a co-op for homeschooler and we were in some of the same classes. We also went to the same church, therefore, we were at all the same events! We saw each other a minimum of 4 days in a natural progression of each week! That wouldn't include times we hung out outside of church and school events or any of the special events at church, such as movie nights, sports nights or couples banquets. We became close friends! We could talk about scripture, events throughout the week, sports (which I still have very little interest in), or just silly nothingness!
He was a high school senior and I was only a junior at the time. He invited me to go to his senior prom near the end of my junior year. That was the first day he had ever tried to venture his hands under my clothes. I was shocked and didn't really know what to do about it, so I didn't stop him. He was not only my boyfriend but my friend and my brother's BEST friend! So I didn't say anything. At my house, I had a roof right outside my window. That night I went and sat out on the window and cried for a long time. I decided that he must have gotten carried away with the night and just decided to dismiss it. Well, it happened again, then again, and again and again and again. I had tried several times to talk him out of it, but didn't have the guts to get up and walk away. There were many things going on in my head about walking away. All of my friends were also his friends...in fact, they had only become my friends because they were his friends. If I left him, I would lose all my friends. If I left him, I would have to explain to my brother why. If left him, I would have to explain to my parents and probably his parents why I left. So, I stayed in the relationship. I had a very low self-esteem and didn't know a good way out. Near the end of the summer, before I went into my senior year, he raped me. The good news was that he didn't get very far, because his father walked in on him. He took me home that night and we spoke very little. The next day, when I got home from my job at a photography studio, there was a note on my pillow. The note said that he felt we should "take a break." In other words, he broke up with me.
Obviously, this did not help my self-esteem. Back when AOL messenger was used, I decided to get online and look through the profiles. I typed in male, single, and then I typed the city we lived in at the time. There were two guys online that night. One was 40 and divorced... ugh!! And the other just said single, so I thought I would give him a try. That night was September 13, 2001. I was still 17 at this point but I was desperate to talk to a guy, so that he could tell me why another guy could treat a girl the way I was treated! The guy I talked to was so sweet, listened to everything I had to say and was encouraging me that not all guys are like that. We talked approximately 7 or 8 hours, into the wee morning hours of the night. Come to find out, he was a pilot, so he had lots of time on his hands because all the airplanes were grounded because of what had happened on September 11, 2001.
So, each day, I hurried through my school work and then signed onto the internet to talk to him! I had absolutely NO interest in a boyfriend at the time because of everything that just happened with my last boyfriend. But as I had originally predicted, when I lost that boyfriend, I lost all of my friends too. So, this pilot was my only friend, his name was Michael. After 2 weeks of talking to him several hours every day, I invited Michael to a sports night sponsored by our church! He said he could come! I was so excited to see what he looked like!! He never showed up. When I got home that night, I rushed to the computer to see why!! He had sent me an e-mail saying that he had been paged for a flight and would be back the next day. I was disappointed, but I understood. Since he was going to be back the next day, he was going to be back in time for church!! I invited him and he said he would love to come!! I waited outside the church for 30 minutes after church had started and finally gave up and went inside. I was disappointed again. I went home and sure enough, he e-mailed me and he hadn't made it home in time to make it to church. The following weekend, we had a movie night at our church. We were going to see October Sky! The church provided hot dogs, soda and popcorn! It was typically one of my favorite activities of the month! So I invited him. He didn't show up. I had another email, he had gotten called out on a flight. I was still talking to him almost every day on the internet, so, I knew it couldn't have been a lie!
One day, I went to my mom, I told her everything that had happened, and how he hadn't been able to come to each of the events. Michael and I had talk almost every day, if not every day, for 2 months!! But we still hadn't met in person! She suggested that we invite him out to our farm for supper!! I said to mom, "What if he is an ax murderer? We live 1/2 mile away from our closest neighbor!" She said, "You have been talking to him about two months. Right?" I nodded. She then added, "Well, your dad has a 22 and your dad and brother will be here, it won't be a problem. You have told me that he doesn't have any friends, and that you aren't interested in dating. I think a friend will be good for you." I hesitantly said, "Ok." I went upstairs, and as always, he was online. So, I asked him if he would be interested in joining me and my family for a home cooked meal. He agreed.
Michael showed up at our house the next day for supper. I still remember sitting on our porch swing with my dad, anxiously waiting for his arrival. He drove up in a purple Dodge Dakota! PURPLE! When he got out of his pickup, I leaned over to dad and whispered, "Look how short he is!!" Dad smiled and said, "I thought you weren't interested in dating." I said, "I'm not, but he is so short!" He got up to us and shook our hands saying it was nice to finally meet us. And who knows what other pleasantries that I don't remember. (that was 13 years ago!!) But what I do remember is his smell... He had the weirdest smell of anyone I've ever known. It was bearable, but didn't smell good. I couldn't identify what I was smelling though.
We had supper together, and he got along really well with our family. Before we knew it, Michael was having supper with us on a weekly basis, then almost a nightly basis when he wasn't flying. He was 21 when we met and I was 17. My dad predicted that as soon as I turned 18 and I was "legal" to date, we would start dating. On my 18th birthday, I wanted to go to a country dance club. I went with my brother, one of his friends, Michael, and another female friend I had gotten to know along the way. Michael was the only one of the whole group that was old enough to drink, so he had a couple. Once he had himself loosened up enough to dance, he danced a couple songs with me. I mostly did line dances and danced with my brother and his friend. We had a great time that night!! I will never forget it.
A month later not only were we not dating, but Michael was dating someone else! I couldn't stand the girl!! And to this day, I don't know if it was because I was jealous or because she was ugly or because I knew she was bad news. Maybe all three! I was still talking to Michael every day, but he started ignoring my calls one weekend. I started flipping out!! Where is he? Is he ok? Is he alive? Is that GIRL telling he cannot be my friend anymore? So, on my way to church on Sunday morning, around 6:30 am, I drove by his apartment. And that girl's car was there!!! I tried calling him and he didn't answer the phone!! I instantly knew what was going on!! She had spent the night!! But I was a very trusting person and I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. Later that day, I called and left ANOTHER message on his answering machine. Apparently, the girl he was dating told him that I was in love with him and that he better call me back. So, he did. And he dumped her pretty soon after that.
Three months later, sure enough, we started dating! He took me to the Louise Mandrel Show in Pigeon Forge. That summer, (Summer 2002), I had graduated, and I had the opportunity to meet his parents from NE. They were separated at the time, so I got to meet them individually. The first time I met his mom, she was hysterical! She talked about how glad she was that I was in her son's life. She cried in my car for almost an hour talking about how Michael always said he wasn't going to get married and that I would make a wonderful daughter in law. She asked if I would ever consider the prospect. I was dumbfounded, that wasn't even on my radar yet.
Soon after, in September 2002, I was buying a wedding dress!! We later got married in April 2003!!
Next time, I'll move into the first year of our marriage! Exciting time!
Until that time! May God bless you in your path!
Saturday, March 8, 2014
Beginnings
Well, I have never blogged before, but I have wanted to try it for a long time! So, I finally decided to jump in head first! I've always been told that I need to tell my story. I haven't found it to be incredibly exciting, but apparently it is to others.
I'm not entirely sure where to start. So, I guess the most obvious place is in the beginning!
I was born in a small town in Texas a few hours away from Dallas. I was homeschooled along with my older brother. He is 2 years older than me. That age gap made us close enough to enjoy each other's company. But left a big enough age gap that he convinced me to do things that got me in trouble even when he knew better.
I moved away from Texas when I was 6, so I don't remember a whole lot but I'll tell you what I do remember!! The people!! Granted a lot of my family live in Texas, I remember others too! I lived in a neighborhood with quite a few kids. We had one boy that lived a couple of doors down. My brother and I always got into trouble with him. Several times we decided to build bike ramps in a nearby church parking lot. Once, my brother went up the ramp thinking that he was some kind of trickster flipping over and on his way down he smacked his face into the neighbor's fence. This stunt was something like what you would see on America's Home Videos.
I was getting ready for church one morning, for some reason my mom wasn't available to help me get dressed, so my dad was picking out my clothes. He pulled out a purple dress and some pink panties. I HAD to have matching clothes, so I told my dad that I needed my purple panties! My dad looked and couldn't find them so he insisted that I wear the pink ones. I asked him to look for my pink dress if he couldn't find my purple panties. He couldn't find the pink dress that matched my pink panties so I refused to get dressed!! I ran through the house naked throwing a temper tantrum about my clothes not matching!! Finally, I hid in the shoe closet, thinking I could blend in with all of my dad's boots. My mom thought that was so cute that she took a picture that we STILL have to remind us of that day! My mom finally decided it that it was best for my dad to help my brother get dressed and that it was best for mom to dress me. Well, she found a blue dress with blue panties and I happily went to church.
Another fun time in Texas was a day that my dad laid concrete. My dad had worked all day, and probably the day before to get the sidewalk from our house to the shed nice and smooth. He borrowed some tools from the neighbor for the project. When he went to return the tools, he told me and my brother that we were to stay off the sidewalk while he was gone. Well, we watched out the front window until he was out of sight and ran to get our big wheels! We were so excited about riding on nice smooth concrete instead of the bumpy sidewalk in front of the house! And dad would never know if we just tried it a couple of times before he came back!! Well... he knew...at the time of getting my spanking, I didn't know how he knew. But later he showed me how he could see the tracks of our big wheels in the concrete. And due to the different tread marks on each of our big wheels, he knew that we had BOTH ridden on it! It was a good "learning moment."
I had a little boy that was "in love" with me. He was the same age as I am. For Christmas, the year before we moved, he made a cute little bench. I went on a scavenger hunt all over his farm to find it. We went through the chicken shed (FYI... I'm terrified of chickens). I cannot specifically remember my feelings of that day (because I was 5) but I know that it had to be humorous to see me looking around a chicken coop for a paper clue!! His house had a fence around the whole yard. He had many animals within that fence, including an emu, a horse, a couple pigs, a cow, several dogs and cats, a few guinea hens and who knows what else. Those are just the animals that stuck out in my head. I eventually found the bench in the second story of his house. But because there were several weak spots and holes that would drop me down to the first level, he made a walking path with construction paper and I had to only walk on the paper to get to the bench. Our fathers had to carry it downstairs and to the car because it was too heavy, but also because I didn't know where I could and couldn't walk.
We moved from Texas to Tennessee. The day we unpacked some of our stuff into the house was halloween! I had never celebrated halloween because I was homeschooled and sheltered from it. A little after dark my mother sent me out to get the mail. And there was a woman in a night gown with a green face and curlers in her hair walking down my driveway!! I ran inside and got mom. About the time I got her to come look this woman had rung the doorbell. When my mom opened the door the woman said trick or treat and held out a Walmart sack! I hid behind my mom trying to figure out why someone would come to a stranger's house dressed like that and then talk in some code. The good news is that mom could speak the code and told her that we had no candy! I had nightmares of that woman for a couple weeks after that!
We got the moving truck in the next day! The first things that came off the moving truck was bikes!! Mom and Dad said we could ride while they unpacked the truck!! We had just come from super flat Texas to east Tennessee in the Smokey Mountains! We didn't have to build ramps anymore! My brother and I took off to go explore the hills of our neighborhood. My brother figured out that if we went on our neighbor's driveway, across the cul de sac, then down the other neighbor's driveway we could go faster on our bikes than ever before!!! We could even catch some air at certain points!! Being the cautious one of the two of us, I finally got up the guts to follow in my big brother's footsteps... I went to the top of the first neighbor's driveway... took a big gulp of air and went! I didn't even half to pedal, but I did just a little anyway! I got to the bottom and hit my pedal breaks as I turned to tell my brother how much fun that was!! From that point, everything went into slow motion I went to lift my foot off the pedal and I couldn't get it to move!! I remember looking down to see my shoelace tied all the way around the pedal several times!! I looked at the asphalt drive as I was starting to go over on my bike. I decided I should try to pedal again but it was too late! I went face first into the asphalt!! So my brother helped me limp home. I'm not sure how he did it, but he halfway carried me AND got both of our bikes. My mom had to take me to an emergency dentist appointment because I knocked out several teeth that day. The good news was that I only had baby teeth in my mouth. The bad news was that it was moving day, it was Saturday, and we didn't know a dentist or anyone else for that matter, so getting a dentist in on such short notice was a challenge. But my mom was supermom, so she took care of it.
At the age of 8, I accepted Christ as my Lord! I repented of my sins and chose to follow Him for the rest of my days!! Little did I know then what an amazing commitment and journey that was! I am able to depend on God for the power, strength and endurance to make it through everything that this world throws at me!! God has given me peace, joy and comfort through the years... that is when I asked for it and had the faith to lean on His strength instead of my own. My faith has grown a lot since then, but that doesn't mean that I don't try to lean on my own understanding sometimes even now. All good things come from God! I praise Him for that!
Skipping ahead some years... When I was 11, we moved from out neighborhood in Tenneessee out to our mountainous farm! By this time, my parents had started up a church with some other folks. My mom was the Pastor's secretary and my dad was an elder. After about a year at the farm, my brother got into high school and we would have youth group events at out house!! In the youth group, from that time all the way until I graduated high school, there was 1 girl and the rest were boys. Of course, with me there, the group had 2 girls. The other girl saw me as a threat to her dating each and every boy in the group, so we were never able to have a friendship that really flourished. I was a tomboy at heart, so I didn't need girly friends anyway!
My sophomore year of high school, I got to attend public school for the first time in my life!! I hadn't ever been kissed or even had a boyfriend for that matter. But because I was around boys all the time, I didn't see a need to pick ONE of them!! I like to play games, go hiking, ride horses, and talk to any and all of them. I wasn't ashamed of that fact either because I didn't see it as a benchmarked of who I "should be." Anyway, when I got to school, I sought out the christian club and joined. I love the Lord and saw no reason to be ashamed of that either! I enjoyed the first month or two of public school! I was in choir one day and I started talking to a girl about Christ! I was so excited! This was the reason I wanted to go to public school! I could share my faith and win others for Christ!! She started asking questions about church and youth group. Then the questions turned to me. I didn't feel like I had anything to hide, so I told her everything she asked me, including if I was a virgin and how many boys I had kissed!! The next day I came to school, I had multiple people want to confirm that I was a lesbian!!! I was like, "WHAT?!?!?!?!" That day my life changed! Despite my efforts to convince people that I was straight, I was kicked out of the Christian club. I couldn't sit with the friends I THOUGHT I had anymore. I was only able to sit at the "gay" table. There was a courtyard where all the smokers went to smoke and they accepted me there. So, I began staying in the courtyard during lunch time and started skipping lunch most days because I couldn't handle eating food around such awful smelling stuff!!
Come to find out, the people in the courtyard were a mix of potheads and other forms of drug addicts. I didn't know what ANY of it was. I knew what cigarettes were but any of the other drugs were a new to me. They also used a lot of language that I didn't know or understand. So, I found one person that I felt like I could trust and I asked her what all the words meant that I didn't understand. When I came home and used some of them, not having a true understanding of what they meant, I got in a lot of trouble!!
The friend I found, Jess, was a pothead. Even though I didn't know what that meant, I knew that she needed Jesus and I needed a friend. So we spent a lot of time together over the rest of the school year. At one point in time, my mom got called into the principal's office. The principal called her simply because he didn't think it was wise for me to hang out with such a bad influence. My mom told him that Jess was one of my only friends and it was apparent that Jess didn't have any positive influences in her life. She told him that if I started getting into trouble then she would reevaluate, but for that point in time, she wasn't going to tell me not to be friends with Jess. I didn't even know about that conversation until several years later. Jess and I are still friends to this day!
I couldn't handle being considered a lesbian throughout most of the school. So, my mom allowed me to finish my schooling at home. That one day in the choir room was the turning point in my life and on another day, I will continue to unfold the repercussions which I call, "walking in my path." (I wanted to call it walking my path or walking on my path, but those were taken.) So, I will walk in my path!! :-)
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
I'm not entirely sure where to start. So, I guess the most obvious place is in the beginning!
I was born in a small town in Texas a few hours away from Dallas. I was homeschooled along with my older brother. He is 2 years older than me. That age gap made us close enough to enjoy each other's company. But left a big enough age gap that he convinced me to do things that got me in trouble even when he knew better.
I moved away from Texas when I was 6, so I don't remember a whole lot but I'll tell you what I do remember!! The people!! Granted a lot of my family live in Texas, I remember others too! I lived in a neighborhood with quite a few kids. We had one boy that lived a couple of doors down. My brother and I always got into trouble with him. Several times we decided to build bike ramps in a nearby church parking lot. Once, my brother went up the ramp thinking that he was some kind of trickster flipping over and on his way down he smacked his face into the neighbor's fence. This stunt was something like what you would see on America's Home Videos.
I was getting ready for church one morning, for some reason my mom wasn't available to help me get dressed, so my dad was picking out my clothes. He pulled out a purple dress and some pink panties. I HAD to have matching clothes, so I told my dad that I needed my purple panties! My dad looked and couldn't find them so he insisted that I wear the pink ones. I asked him to look for my pink dress if he couldn't find my purple panties. He couldn't find the pink dress that matched my pink panties so I refused to get dressed!! I ran through the house naked throwing a temper tantrum about my clothes not matching!! Finally, I hid in the shoe closet, thinking I could blend in with all of my dad's boots. My mom thought that was so cute that she took a picture that we STILL have to remind us of that day! My mom finally decided it that it was best for my dad to help my brother get dressed and that it was best for mom to dress me. Well, she found a blue dress with blue panties and I happily went to church.
Another fun time in Texas was a day that my dad laid concrete. My dad had worked all day, and probably the day before to get the sidewalk from our house to the shed nice and smooth. He borrowed some tools from the neighbor for the project. When he went to return the tools, he told me and my brother that we were to stay off the sidewalk while he was gone. Well, we watched out the front window until he was out of sight and ran to get our big wheels! We were so excited about riding on nice smooth concrete instead of the bumpy sidewalk in front of the house! And dad would never know if we just tried it a couple of times before he came back!! Well... he knew...at the time of getting my spanking, I didn't know how he knew. But later he showed me how he could see the tracks of our big wheels in the concrete. And due to the different tread marks on each of our big wheels, he knew that we had BOTH ridden on it! It was a good "learning moment."
I had a little boy that was "in love" with me. He was the same age as I am. For Christmas, the year before we moved, he made a cute little bench. I went on a scavenger hunt all over his farm to find it. We went through the chicken shed (FYI... I'm terrified of chickens). I cannot specifically remember my feelings of that day (because I was 5) but I know that it had to be humorous to see me looking around a chicken coop for a paper clue!! His house had a fence around the whole yard. He had many animals within that fence, including an emu, a horse, a couple pigs, a cow, several dogs and cats, a few guinea hens and who knows what else. Those are just the animals that stuck out in my head. I eventually found the bench in the second story of his house. But because there were several weak spots and holes that would drop me down to the first level, he made a walking path with construction paper and I had to only walk on the paper to get to the bench. Our fathers had to carry it downstairs and to the car because it was too heavy, but also because I didn't know where I could and couldn't walk.
We moved from Texas to Tennessee. The day we unpacked some of our stuff into the house was halloween! I had never celebrated halloween because I was homeschooled and sheltered from it. A little after dark my mother sent me out to get the mail. And there was a woman in a night gown with a green face and curlers in her hair walking down my driveway!! I ran inside and got mom. About the time I got her to come look this woman had rung the doorbell. When my mom opened the door the woman said trick or treat and held out a Walmart sack! I hid behind my mom trying to figure out why someone would come to a stranger's house dressed like that and then talk in some code. The good news is that mom could speak the code and told her that we had no candy! I had nightmares of that woman for a couple weeks after that!
We got the moving truck in the next day! The first things that came off the moving truck was bikes!! Mom and Dad said we could ride while they unpacked the truck!! We had just come from super flat Texas to east Tennessee in the Smokey Mountains! We didn't have to build ramps anymore! My brother and I took off to go explore the hills of our neighborhood. My brother figured out that if we went on our neighbor's driveway, across the cul de sac, then down the other neighbor's driveway we could go faster on our bikes than ever before!!! We could even catch some air at certain points!! Being the cautious one of the two of us, I finally got up the guts to follow in my big brother's footsteps... I went to the top of the first neighbor's driveway... took a big gulp of air and went! I didn't even half to pedal, but I did just a little anyway! I got to the bottom and hit my pedal breaks as I turned to tell my brother how much fun that was!! From that point, everything went into slow motion I went to lift my foot off the pedal and I couldn't get it to move!! I remember looking down to see my shoelace tied all the way around the pedal several times!! I looked at the asphalt drive as I was starting to go over on my bike. I decided I should try to pedal again but it was too late! I went face first into the asphalt!! So my brother helped me limp home. I'm not sure how he did it, but he halfway carried me AND got both of our bikes. My mom had to take me to an emergency dentist appointment because I knocked out several teeth that day. The good news was that I only had baby teeth in my mouth. The bad news was that it was moving day, it was Saturday, and we didn't know a dentist or anyone else for that matter, so getting a dentist in on such short notice was a challenge. But my mom was supermom, so she took care of it.
At the age of 8, I accepted Christ as my Lord! I repented of my sins and chose to follow Him for the rest of my days!! Little did I know then what an amazing commitment and journey that was! I am able to depend on God for the power, strength and endurance to make it through everything that this world throws at me!! God has given me peace, joy and comfort through the years... that is when I asked for it and had the faith to lean on His strength instead of my own. My faith has grown a lot since then, but that doesn't mean that I don't try to lean on my own understanding sometimes even now. All good things come from God! I praise Him for that!
Skipping ahead some years... When I was 11, we moved from out neighborhood in Tenneessee out to our mountainous farm! By this time, my parents had started up a church with some other folks. My mom was the Pastor's secretary and my dad was an elder. After about a year at the farm, my brother got into high school and we would have youth group events at out house!! In the youth group, from that time all the way until I graduated high school, there was 1 girl and the rest were boys. Of course, with me there, the group had 2 girls. The other girl saw me as a threat to her dating each and every boy in the group, so we were never able to have a friendship that really flourished. I was a tomboy at heart, so I didn't need girly friends anyway!
My sophomore year of high school, I got to attend public school for the first time in my life!! I hadn't ever been kissed or even had a boyfriend for that matter. But because I was around boys all the time, I didn't see a need to pick ONE of them!! I like to play games, go hiking, ride horses, and talk to any and all of them. I wasn't ashamed of that fact either because I didn't see it as a benchmarked of who I "should be." Anyway, when I got to school, I sought out the christian club and joined. I love the Lord and saw no reason to be ashamed of that either! I enjoyed the first month or two of public school! I was in choir one day and I started talking to a girl about Christ! I was so excited! This was the reason I wanted to go to public school! I could share my faith and win others for Christ!! She started asking questions about church and youth group. Then the questions turned to me. I didn't feel like I had anything to hide, so I told her everything she asked me, including if I was a virgin and how many boys I had kissed!! The next day I came to school, I had multiple people want to confirm that I was a lesbian!!! I was like, "WHAT?!?!?!?!" That day my life changed! Despite my efforts to convince people that I was straight, I was kicked out of the Christian club. I couldn't sit with the friends I THOUGHT I had anymore. I was only able to sit at the "gay" table. There was a courtyard where all the smokers went to smoke and they accepted me there. So, I began staying in the courtyard during lunch time and started skipping lunch most days because I couldn't handle eating food around such awful smelling stuff!!
Come to find out, the people in the courtyard were a mix of potheads and other forms of drug addicts. I didn't know what ANY of it was. I knew what cigarettes were but any of the other drugs were a new to me. They also used a lot of language that I didn't know or understand. So, I found one person that I felt like I could trust and I asked her what all the words meant that I didn't understand. When I came home and used some of them, not having a true understanding of what they meant, I got in a lot of trouble!!
The friend I found, Jess, was a pothead. Even though I didn't know what that meant, I knew that she needed Jesus and I needed a friend. So we spent a lot of time together over the rest of the school year. At one point in time, my mom got called into the principal's office. The principal called her simply because he didn't think it was wise for me to hang out with such a bad influence. My mom told him that Jess was one of my only friends and it was apparent that Jess didn't have any positive influences in her life. She told him that if I started getting into trouble then she would reevaluate, but for that point in time, she wasn't going to tell me not to be friends with Jess. I didn't even know about that conversation until several years later. Jess and I are still friends to this day!
I couldn't handle being considered a lesbian throughout most of the school. So, my mom allowed me to finish my schooling at home. That one day in the choir room was the turning point in my life and on another day, I will continue to unfold the repercussions which I call, "walking in my path." (I wanted to call it walking my path or walking on my path, but those were taken.) So, I will walk in my path!! :-)
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
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