I Am Still Here.

I Am Still Here.

This is what I heard one late night while driving recently. It wasn't a voice necessarily but a loud thought interrupting my own thoughts, my mindless chatter. The next night, I also was out late running errands and again heard a voice/thought saying,

I Am Still Here.

I knew what it meant. It gave me peace. It assured me. It was a no-brainer. This has been spoken to me everyday of my life only to fall on deaf ears. But for once, years of my selfish desires have become impossible to fulfill and my dreams are now seemingly unreachable. And it is in this place where I really heard Him. I have been stripped of everything I thought was important only to hear the most important thing.

I Am Still Here.

Oh Lord. I am sorry. I am so sorry it's taken me this long to release my death grip on things that relentlessly tore at my commitment to you. It's like I have been voluntarily tone deaf all of my life and now I finally can hear the notes. Sing me your song now Lord. I promise I will listen.

You know, I will be honest. My death grip.

Babies.

Having babies has been one of the biggest highlights of my life. I refused to ever think there would ever be a time that I could not bear children. Foolish, I know, but I just could not bring myself to think of the grief I would experience once this stage of life came calling uninvited, to my door. There was this feeling that I would not be able to survive the sadness of it all. Fleeing the inevitable grief took its form in many ways including, but not limited to, exercising, constantly looking at older woman who birthed babies as proof I deserved it too, an impeccable diet, and prayers that were, in reality, deals with God. If I believed and did all these things, He would give me a baby and I would be the first woman to bypass menopause (not really...but kinda :) I would be unique and defeat the inevitable.

Here is what I have learned.

I am not unique. I can not defeat the inevitable. I believed the lie and suffered. I learned again that God is unique and God did defeat the inevitable. I have miscarried and looked at numerous negative pregnancy tests. Really, these last few months of trying for a baby, only to come up with nothing, probably has been the best thing for me.

Painful, yes. Deadly, no. Freeing, definitely.

I am not white-knuckling it anymore and my death grip on this issue is slowly loosening......and I am still alive. When I see that I have sprouted more gray hair and several more smile creases, instead of being afraid that I am that much closer to not having anymore children, I find myself feeling thankful that the Lord has allowed the health for my body to give me so many. When I grab that rare chocolate covered doughnut, that I have only eyed from afar in the past, I enjoy it instead of fretting that with every luscious mouthful it might hinder my chances of conceiving another baby. Oh how ugly it is to admit how this desire sapped me of so much joy and filled me with so much fear. I believed the lies being whispered by the enemy, "You will never again have this much joy once you can not bear children anymore." "You will be worth nothing when this is over." and "Once you can't have children anymore, it means you are old...and no one likes old people." I am sure there are many more lies I believed along these lines but these were the most prominent.

So now I am embarking on what the enemy swore I could not live through....and I am alive and well. Like going through detox from drug addiction, I am getting clean and things seem more vibrant and in focus. And I can finally hear these words that have been spoken so often but were drowned out by the white noise of my fears:

I Am Still Here.