A belated happy birthday

I can't believe that my favorite (only) son Benjamin turned 10 this month and I completely put off writing him a special blog post!!! Goodness, it's like I've been focused on ME and all MY problems lately! Sigh...

So, to my little boy who's not so little anymore...our journey this past decade has not been an easy one. As I reminisce over it, the thought occurs to me that those of us who have rough journeys often see bigger blessings at the end. But let's not start there.

Let's start at the beginning, when you were one of the biggest babies ever born at that time in the SWMC FBC. Ten pounds, eleven ounces and 21-1/2 inches. WOWZA!! Good thing I didn't push you out!!! You were such a content, mild mannered baby, although you often had a worried look on your face (a pre-cursor to your later years, where you lay in bed for HOURS, just thinking). When you turned one, the dynamics of your personality (mixed with the fact that you are a boy, after all) began to show through. Thus begun our up and down journey!!! Good thing Mommy was entirely in love with you, which has made it entirely impossible for me to ever give up on you even in your times of trouble!! AND lucky for Mommy, you are entirely in love with me and don't give up on ME when I make huge mistakes and fail at providing a good example for you.

Just like your best friend Mimi is emotionally very similar to Daddy, you are emotionally very much like Mommy. They are stuffers, we are exploders (or "sharers", if we're trying to describe ourselves more gently). They breath deep, we slam yell and talk back. They take a walk, we slam a door. They get mad then calm down, we cry and cry for hours. The positive in that is that they love loyally and we love deeply...it's a good pairing! :) And then your other BFF Soph? We haven't figured her out yet, but the two of you sure do laugh a lot together.

Some people might wonder why I would speak of things that seem so dark, when I'm celebrating your 10th birthday? But remember that promise I made you years ago (probably not, so I'll remind you)...I will never lie to you or sugar coat life for you. I will always present the truth to you as gently and honestly as I can, while protecting you as long as I can and as best I can from growing up too fast. So, the truth of our relationship is it has been loving yet unlikeable; loyal yet hurtful; fun yet imperfect; joyful yet scary....but I would not ever trade any of it for a different son than I have in you. You have my heart, little man, and you always will.

Your soft heart for the sad things in this world inspires me to be a better person; your belly laugh and quick wit encourages me to always look on the bright side of life; your forgiving heart and deep thinking mind challenges me to always look for truth in the world; and your love and understanding of Jesus keeps me holding on in those darkest hours of doubt and pain. You will never know how much you've changed my life and my heart. I'm so glad I am your Mom!!!

Happy 10th birthday Bugaboo!!!

And just for you, dear Ben....our song! :) I love that you tear up when you hear this song.

The heart of winter

The other day I was commenting to my son that we never really had a summer. I mean, it got hot like maybe 5 days and the rest of the season was so mild. Enter into autumn and we never really had an autumn. Nothing about these two seasons was extreme at all. Here we are at winter, and people are wearing shorts and flip-flops some days. I know, not too weird here in the NW, but still...we were supposed to have the worst winter ever this year and so far it's not been extreme in any way. Well, on the drive home, I got to thinking about people who crave sunshine or warm weather, especially when it's so cold and dreary out. Right in that moment, I didn't crave it. I don't hate the NW rain and lack of sunshine, I've never been too bothered by it. Although as I've aged, it's gotten harder. But on this particular day, I really, really didn't want the sun. I so deeply craved a full on, extreme winter and was feeling ripped offthat we may have gotten through it with no big storms or cold fronts. This led to me thinking that maybe all these "mild" seasons are only considered mild because of comparison and expectation, based on the season before, and that it kind of goes along with the idea that without the sour then the sweet just ain't as sweet!! That led me to start thinking about the winters of our lives. Without the winters in our lives, the summers, springs and falls aren't so sweet. We enter into the easy times of our lives with expectation or comparison to other times, and when they don't measure up or when they measure up poorly, then everything loses it vibrancy.

I then thought that the past few years, when I've been spiritually dry and really searching on my journey, that this is my winter. I've been in the heart of winter. My deep longings are to open up and bloom, to let beauty fall forth, to show growth and abundance...just like the blooms of spring and summer. YET...at that same time, I'm holding on tightly to this season. I don't want to let go, and I am 99% sure it's for a sinful reason. That I want to hold onto this "poor me" time and not move on, despite the yearnings of my soul. Just like, as much as I'm anticipating spring so I can clean up our yard and spring clean and wear less layers...I am holding tightly to winter, trying to let it have its full say and run its course, so upon arrival of spring, I can fully say farewell to winter without holding onto it at all.

These are the things that I think about while driving. Deep thoughts, they are...so pray you don't share the same road as I, in case I find myself too distracted!

Just two songs

Not a whole lot to share today. Just plugging through life, realizing that we've really been caught up in the trap of being too busy to really live life. But listen to these two songs that have really touched me today.

Pretty much sums up my journey right now!

My heart HAS been breaking

So last month, I earnestly prayed that my heart would begin to break. That I would become soft again to the heart of God, that I would see my children and others in a different light and learn to love again. Fully love. Well, God has been at work. Many, many of these stories are for another time, as they are still developing and transforming me. But I'd like to share a story from today, one that, as I continue to process my day and the events that happened, I'm finding it hard to not cry and just sit, mulling it over. Instead, I will write. It's what I do.

I'm not sure how much of someone else's story I should share, but I've realized that my level of deep, sometimes severe, transparency comes from my dad's side of the family. My half-siblings and I don't seem to hide much. So I will share, and if I offend, I'm sure they will tell me. :)

I have 4 half-siblings. Travis is 38 and his parents are Jan and Gary. I am 36 and my parents are Faye and Gary. Earlydawn is 35, Brandy is 33, and Willie is 31 and their parents are Renee and Gary. We also recently found out that we may have a new sister, Howi, who falls somewhere in between Earlydawn and Brandy. I met Early, Brandy and Willie when I was in 3rd grade. We went to school together. They knew I was their sister, but I had no clue who they were. I actually lived 2 blocks from my dad, and had interactions with the "crazy Indian guy down the street" a few times prior to meeting him...but never knew he was my dad. He knew me though.


When I was 8, I was introduced to my dad and siblings. The emotions that have accompanied that over the years are, once again, not a post for today. But I loved those siblings from day one, although I didn't always know what to do with them or how to "be" a sister. As we grew up, I was very close to Earlydawn since we were the same age and grade and kind of felt like twins (we're 9 months apart), and to Willie since he was the only boy and the baby (I have only met Travis 2 times, so he didn't really count growing up). Brandy and I haven't always been as connected but I have always loved her just the same, and love so much about her. In the past year, we've really started to talk more and I love that.

So, fast forward a bit. Willie is 16, I'm 21. He's moving out of Dad's house. I never really talked a lot to my dad. I was never really comfortable doing it, uneasy about the different lives we lived and his "issues" he had. Oh yeah, I was also a bit self-righteous and persnickety. If he was alive, and I could do things differently, I would love him where he's at in his life journey, and accept his love even though it didn't come packaged exactly as I thought it should. Again, post for later times. Anyway, Willie is planning to go live with our Aunt and Uncle, but spends a week with me. It was one of the best weeks I remember ever having. I had a little brother to drag around with me. We laughed, he played softball with my boyfriend and our church team, we ate out and saw movies, he got to have family dinners at my house (which was dysfunctional in it's own way, but not a lot of people ever saw that. I know, save it for another post). At the end of that week, I was able to use one whole paycheck to buy him school clothes before I took him down to Salem. After that week, we didn't really see much of each other. He came back a few months later for my wedding, then years would go by. We'd run into each other here and there, but really...nothing. I heard about him, but I wasn't really talking to any of the siblings.


Then my dad got very ill, and after about 2 weeks, he died. I saw the siblings, but they were all in a very different place in life than I was. I had a baby and was a good, law abiding, prissy, church lady type girl. (I say this very sarcastically--I was uptight and rigid in my beliefs and lifestyle). Way different lives. Their journey through dad's death was not the same as mine. I'm grateful for my support system, but devastated that they understood and experienced Dad's love in a way I never will. I'm elated that I do not have the challenges and baggage they've accumulated since his death, but my heart breaks over those challenges and baggage. Enter my heartbreak (you knew I'd get around to the point of this at some point this year, right?)

Today, my younger brother Willie, who has always, always had a different kind of hold on my heart (all of us girls' hearts, I think) was released from prison after 2 years. He's not the only convict in our group, so don't think too badly of him. :) Just so it's clear, he was imprisoned for theft. He had a very serious drug problem (he's not the only Hopkins to struggle with addiction)...his problem led to choices that weren't so smart. What's still undecided is if his drug problem preceded his mental problems, or if the drugs CAUSED the mental problems. But he has some severe mental problems as well. So today, us 3 sisters drove to Olympia, all of us contributing in different ways to clothes, underclothes, suitcase, hygiene items, junk food, and the best thing...an mp3 player. Could you imagine 2 years without music?

Anyway, us sisters set him up as best we could, with our limited resources. Did you know that most prisoners get released with NOTHING? Just a small box of they're personal stuff and some prison issued clothes (which at the end of the night, he gave his prison issued coat to Brandy since we got him a new one, and he left his prison shoes there...guess who walked away with those shoes? That's right, I'm not about to let only Brandy have some cool prison garb!!) We fed him a bit, spent some time with him, and laughed with him...then got him on the bus on his way to live with our other brother, the kind of absent one, in another state.

It was so great to see Willie again, to help him, to love on him. But I'm so scared for him too. I saw the mental illness, although I DID see "my" Willy in there still too. I also saw the pain in his eyes, the determination to succeed this time, the tiredness, the desire for hope, the need for survival but maybe a lack of faith that he could...I wanted so badly to transfer my faith to him. The faith that he could do this, that life will not always be hard, that things CAN be better. But how do you tell that to someone who has never, ever, ever had an easy life?

He has never lived a life that he wasn't expected to be, at some level, self-sufficient. Both his parents are dead, they were both addicts of some kind, one was a convict as well...does anyone ever really stop and think that our comfortable lives, our nice clothes and cars, our kids' music lessons and CYT classes and sports teams, our warm churches and food on the table and reliable job...that there are hurting people out there who DO NOT know what that is? I'm so struck by the canyon between his life and mine, that we could be from the same gene pool (well, 50% shared) yet have such different lives.

My heart is just breaking for him, because I love him and I want to make his life better. But I can't. It has to come from his resolve and his decisions. It's also breaking because of the stupid mental illness. There are parts of Willie that will never, ever come back because of it. I miss those parts. I don't want to see what's left of him disappear into the illness. I don't know what his future holds and I find myself so scared. But I'm also so grateful to have seen him, and don't want 11 years to go by before I see him again. And I need to look around at my comfortable life and see why I find so much to whine about?

William Earl Hopkins, I love you. Earlydawn and Brandy love you. Madeleine loved meeting you and seeing us all together. You CAN do this. You have so much inside you that is fantastic, and you CAN survive this road you've been placed on and persevere over the darkness.


Anyway, that's how God is breaking my heart today, on this journey to better loving. I also really saw today how I used humor to deal with life. My motto is if you can't laugh at the lemons life hands you, then why bother living? There's really so much that happened that was hilarious that wouldn't have happened if my brother wasn't a convict with mental illness...so I'll take it. I'll be grateful that there was a reason to laugh, and that he's alive for me to love. I'll just take it.

Break my heart for what breaks yours...

I'm in the middle of composing an email response to a dear friend, telling her how I'm doing and talking about my miscarriage. I just wrote this,

"I think I'm more upset that I'm not more upset, like maybe if I was upset then I'd be emotionally motivated out of the slump I feel stuck in."

Then I started to think about how I've felt dead for many years now, emotionally dead. Like, when I was healed of my severe depression, a different type of depression set it. One that was intended for mere survival. If I don't feel, then I won't go out of control. So I allowed myself to just turn off. I used to be someone who was considered "emotional". I HATED being called emotional. I had big feelings, I was passionate, I was motivated and moved by feelings. The last 5 years or so, that hasn't been the case. I'm kind of stoic, logical, dead. And I've seen it in my feelings towards my kids. I don't feel love like I used to. My heart doesn't swell with overwhelming emotion towards them or Teddy. I am clinical, going through the motions, and have allowed attitudes and actions to appear that would have been abhorrent to me before.

As I was writing this email, I realized that I'm scared. I was severely hurt by people I cared about and trusted a few years ago, and was told that the way I am is not right. So I feel like if I allow emotion to have it's way in me, I am doing something wrong and I am vulnerable to that abuse again. But I want to be swept away with this rush of love for my kiddos; I want to be giddy with lovesick flutters when I think of my husband. I want to cry again at the Hallmark commercials and give money to every homeless person and be moved to change the world because my heart breaks for a sick child. I want to be me again, no matter how emotional and dramatic that is. God gave me this heart and I want to let it breathe and feel again.

So, in writing the email to my dear and loving friend, Cindy, I realized that this is all I want for Christmas. I want Jesus to break my heart. I want to allow my heart to feel my hurt and to stop being protected, because I feel like I can't forgive and move on until I let the arrow penetrate all the way in. Then I can yank it out and heal. And maybe then, I can find that love feeling again...that overwhelming sense of being so lost in someone that their entire essence permeates everything I am.

So with that, here's a song that has meant so much to me over the years, even when I'm mad at God or feeling alone. My favorite part is the bridge, my prayer if you will,

Heal my heart and make it clean, open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks yours, everything I am for your Kingdom's cause

Where are you Christmas?

So I've been trying to get into the Christmas spirit. Really. I've been focusing on advent and not presents; trying not be sad that our Disneyland trip needs to be postponed and instead focusing on the positives of our current situation; and trying to dig back into the Bible to find my way back to the faith that I've lost.

So I sit here, trying to see how this next problem is going to play into finding Christmas and my faith. I know it will, as I've seen God's hand very clearly in some situations lately. As some of you know, a year ago I started a weight loss journey and was doing very good for awhile. Lately, it's been hard going, but I'm still traveling the journey, confident that I will see health before I'm 40. Between losing weight and all the miscarriages have had (7 total, with the last 3 being in the past 5 years) I figured we would officially say we are done with babies. So, Teddy volunteered to make that decision permanent. This was about 4 months ago and it was an awful experience for him. Just awful. So awful that he never went back to make sure things were permanent. I hope you're following. THEN, the last 6 weeks, we have been all getting regular chiropractic care. Who knew, all these years of my infertility, that all I needed was regular chiro care to have regular cycles. So I've been having some regularity, my husband isn't sterile like he's supposed to be (apparently), and I found myself about two weeks ago experiencing some symptoms very similar to pregnancy. Two tests were negative, and one was iffy, possibly a faulty test. So Saturday morning, when my dear friend showed up 9 days late, I had a feeling I knew what was going on. I've been down this road enough to know what losing a baby looks like.

So I endured, and even enjoyed a little, Teddy's work Christmas party on Saturday night. We stayed the night at the Red Lion where it was held, but even with all the fun of the night and stuff, I was in pain and uncomfortable. More so than usual. Sunday afternoon was very stressful for other reasons, and by the time I got home from some errands Sunday around 6pm, I was hardly able to walk. Crying, hurting, needing to clean up. What transpired over the next 30 minutes was me, officially having a miscarriage.

I'm not as upset as I should be. I mean, it's number 8 for me and truth be told, I'm not totally convinced that it was a 'real' pregnancy. I have had ones before that were 'maybe babies', where if it had continued we probably would never had heard a heartbeat. Sometimes I think they're like chemical pregnancies, something like that. I wasn't trying to get pregnant. In fact, I was hoping I wasn't, except my kids would be so happy. But honestly, I'm not really upset. At least, yet. And lately, my mothering has been so awful that I don't deserve any more children! That's not saying I'm happy either. And I have a few friends whom I love dearly who are hurting over worse things right now, so my pain is in perspective and I'm grateful for that. But still....puts a bit of a damper on Christmas celebrating, if only for a little bit. I know God can make beauty appear out of the ashes. This is what I'm praying for, for myself and for my hurting friends, and for my family's Christmas.

Important Safety Instructions

I bought a new hairdryer, in hopes of stopping the frizz that keeps happening, and stopping my daughter from hi-jacking mine. She can have my old one now and leave me in peace!

I was reading the instructions for this hairdryer, because that's the kind of girl I am. I know, we all know how to operate one, but what if there's something new to learn in those instructions? What if all along I've been using it wrong and if I just read the instructions, I will end up looking like I have a stylist living in my closet who does my hair everyday (kind of like a trunk monkey, but BETTER!)

This is what I learned from the instructions for my new Vidal Sassoon Ionic Technology Hairdryer Model VSDR5540 (not every rule is listed, just the new or interesting ones). Be prepared to be WOWED!

1. An appliance should never be left unattended when using. (Really? Because I l turn my hair dryer on, then leave it alone on the counter all the time, don't you?)

2. Close supervision is necessary when this appliance is used by, on, or near children or individuals with certain disabilities. (I have never thought of that. What kind of disabilities? Mental? Physical? Educational? What'd they do, test it on an people with different disabilities and come to this conclusion? It seems kind of discriminatory, and they don't say what kind of disability. It's just a random, weird rule.)

3. Use this appliance only for its intended use as described in this manual. (Like, don't use it to dry my nails after painting? Or use on the engine of my car somehow? Or to dry my pants after getting water on them?)

4. Never use while sleeping. (Uh...okay.)

5. Never drop or insert any object into any opening. (Again, okay. And that's really just a good rule of thumb for anything in life, dontcha' think?)

6. DO NOT use outdoors or operate where aerosol products are being used or where oxygen is being administered. (So, I can't take it camping. Okay. Can't spray certain hair sprays around it. Okay, right? I've NEVER used aerosol hairspray around a hairdryer, have you?)

7. Never block the air opening of the appliance or place it on a soft surface, such as a bed or couch. (Shucks, I can't blow dry my hair in bed anymore. Son of a gun.)

So that's the gist of the crazy rules. Maybe these aren't news to you, but I'll NEVER attempt to use my blowdryer while sleeping, now that I've read these rules. You learn something new everyday.