Emotional Overload

I'm grateful to say that I am a person who has been blessed with a wide range of emotions. I'm not one of those boring people (like the boy or his mini-me... just sayin') who doesn't range like us super fun people who are ALL. OVER. THE. BOARD.  What???  What's that you say?  That's not always a good thing?  Hmmm, I'll have to think that one over.
Anywho.  I can be an emotionally charged person, just ask my family.  They would all concur.  And as for those emotions, they have been overcharged and on overload for the last... well... while.
There are so many emotionally charged things going on, indirectly, in my life.  That sounds weird, I realize that, but that's the best way I can explain it.  All these crazy things keep happening to people that I know.  But the main thing is premature babies.  There have been 6 premie babies that I know, all born at least 10 weeks early, in the past 6 months.  Don't these little ones know that they are giving Auntie NeeNee gray hair?!  And the funny thing is, my start to being a mama was to a premie baby, 10 years ago TOMORROW (November 14th).  Though he was only 5 weeks early, it was early enough to give his mommy and daddy a little scare and spend some time in the NICU.
When the first two babes were born in June at 25 weeks, I was in shock, and then another baby in July and then another baby in July, and then another baby in October and then another baby in November.  Did I mention they were all more than 10 weeks early?!  That puts a girl into prayer mode.  And it's hard, when the babies are born early and God answers differently than we ask for.  But I know that He knows the big picture and I do not.  A particularly difficult thing for me in all of this is that I. Am. A. DO-ER!  And for multiple reasons, there is so little that I can do for any and all of these situations.  I process by doing and when I can't "do" then processing is a wee bit difficult, thus the roller coaster ups and downs in my head and in my heart.

Yesterday was the pinnacle of my emotionally charged roller coaster... I hope.  Very early in the morning, my very good friend Holli (who lost her sweet 15 month old, Hannah, a year ago) delivered a baby boy at 30 weeks.  Ethan was born at a whopping 2 lbs. 8 oz! They are doing well, praise the Lord!  Then I got word that Mandy, who delivered Lincoln at 28 weeks and has been at Children's Hospital since July, got to take Lincoln HOME!!!  As I was processing these things, I was also grieving the fact that the Ethiopia team was leaving for Ethiopia and I was not with them.  Even though I know that this was not my year to go, I was still full of emotions!  They were flying to D.C. yesterday and heading straight to Ethiopia from there, today.  Early on, Dana started out the morning, letting several of us know that the whole team was having major glitches in flights.  They all had to rebook and reschedule, praying all the while that they'd actually get to D.C. before this morning, so they could depart for the other side of the world today.  As of right now, they are high above Africa, close to their destination, praise the Lord some more!

So all of this is going on and of course it's a Wednesday and an Awana night.  So with that comes it's normal coordination, but then there was a snafoo with a lost voice and I got word that I needed to do the lesson for the K-2nd graders.  OK!  Here we go, prepare a lesson to give in a couple short hours.  As I'm reading through the lesson in Acts about Peter, God was just waiting for me to be done so He could tie it into the day in an incredible way.  The lesson was when Peter was in jail for teaching and preaching about Jesus' saving power.  King Herod had plans to kill him after Passover was done.  Well, as Peter's friends were FERVENTLY praying, God pulled out the big guns.  As Peter was sitting in his jail cell, chained between two guards with FOURTEEN more of them outside of the cell, God sent an angel to release Peter.  The chains fell off and Peter and the angel walked out of the cell and out of the jail into the city.  Then POOF!  The angel left him.  At first Peter was astonished, but realizing what God had done, he went to his friends to tell them and show him that he was there!  The Lord had answered their prayers in the EXACT way they prayed!  They were also JUST as surprised and astonished!  Here's one of the funny things, we shouldn't be surprised when God answers our prayers, but so often we are.  God tells us to pray continually.  So again, we shouldn't be surprised when He answers them.

So onto how God was just waiting to tie this into my day.  But first back up about 7 months.  My dear friend Becky's 1 year old daughter was diagnosed with leukemia.  ISH.  What's up with that?!  A one year old with BLOOD CANCER?!  Talk about a blow to the gut.  Well, it was time to get our prayin' hands together and we did.  Countless amounts of people were praying for sweet Evelyn and her complete healing from the cancer.  Well yesterday, just as I was reading through the lesson about God answering prayers, Becky and Jeremy were receiving the results of Evelyn's tests saying that everything came back clear and she was CANCER FREE!!!  They took the central line from her chest, leaving her to cry for a couple seconds (normally they put children under to remove a line like this, but NOT EVELYN!  She is one tough little cookie!) and then in her not-yet-two-year-old voice proclaimed, "All done!"  Praise Jesus for complete healing and a perfect answer to prayer!

And to top it all off, near the end of the night I got word that another person close to me is newly pregnant.  I am going to speak loudly into the tummy of that mama to that baby to STAY PUT until 40 weeks, lest all my hair go stark gray.

My emotions needed to purge here on this blog.  Thanks for reading... if you even got to the bottom of this!  If you did, I applaud you  :)    

And just for funsies, here are two Isaiah quotes from today.  While still snuggled up under his covers this morning, I was chatting with him and he said to me, "Mom, I don't have jammies on.  Just boxers.  And Mom, did you know that I just gave myself a huge wedgie?!"  No Isaiah, I wasn't aware, but thanks for the info.
Then tonight after dinner the kids were playing downstairs and Isaiah came up half laughing, half crying and said, "Mom, Jonah was making me laugh so hard that I peed a little.  Sometimes I do that."  When I busted out laughing, he was not happy with me, so I straightened up real quick.
Thanks for the laughs Pal.  I needed the lightheartedness.