I am Christina.... and I am a mess

I thought I'd come out of the closet about the craziness and chaos that summarizes our little Brooks family. When I go out I try hard..... REALLY hard.... to hide it, but it inevitably comes out from time to time and I'm left completely embarrassed. Here are my top 3 examples of our craziness.

1. Our last move. Holy Moly, that was an embarrassing move. Why you ask? Let me tell you why. First of all I kept working during that time and trying to box everything up so some things were inevitably neglected...such as cleaning... and controlling my children's chaos. So the guys came to help us move and when they moved the entertainment center there was the equivalent of an entire lego set underneath it. I nervously cracked a joke about it and quickly went to pick them up.... but... they wouldn't move. They were all stuck to the floor. Apparently some kind of drink...some time ago... had been spilt and the lovely legos under the center were now glued to the floor....

2. Getting ready for church Sunday morning is never...EVER... an easy task. I want to write the boys' Sunday School teachers a note that goes something like this....

 "Dear Teacher,

 Please do not judge me for letting my child wear flip flop with his dress shirt and pants. The dress shoes were not in the shoe bin... or the car... or his room... or my room... or any room in the house. I know he has peanut butter on his face.... and that I have peanut butter on my pants. I'm really okay with it if you are. No he did not bring his bible or memorize his verse. After spending a 1/2 looking for the shoes I really didn't have time to look for his book/bible/ and memorize Bible verses. He probably should not drink from his sippy cup bc there is a good chance that it contains the remnants from last weeks milk. Thank you in advance for being patient with me picking him up late from class. I really do try to hurry, but his brothers are in every opposite corner of the church, so its inevitable that somebody will be picked up late.

P.S. - Thank you so so so much for choosing to be part of my chaos for an hour so I can have a break :D

3. My blessed van. Ohhhh boy... the disarray inside of it pretty much summarizes our family! Lets just say its so bad I just can't bring myself to give a description of its contents. When we moved inevitably people saw inside of it and I was humiliated....utterly humiliated... I'll leave it up to your imagination to picture the interior.

So there it is. I'm officially owning and admitting that my family is an utter mess. I know its just time to accept that this is just going to be my life for awhile. I so so want to have organization in my home... and van... but I just can't with all that I have going on... and I think God is okay with that... and wants me to be as well. I struggle because I want people's approval and... well... a cluttered home with children that are a bit unkept is typically frowned upon! BUT I know I am trying my hardest and those things don't matter to God or impact eternity..... SO I am choosing to be okay with our craziness :)

Finding Joy!

God has truly been blessing me the past couple of months and I've been able to find joy in Him. The past 3 years have been so so hard for me... quite obvious to all of you who have been following my blog! I struggled with a lot of depression as I lost hope in my marriage. Things fell apart right when I found out I was pregnant with Kydon and I literally think I spent half of the pregnancy crying as I had to combat crazy hormones as well! From that time up til this summer I felt like I had such a huge weight on me. Even the easiest most trivial tasks seemed so hard to do. I remember feeling so bad because I honestly didn't enjoy going out with my kids and had to force smiles for them and press through my numbness.

I felt like I had lost all hope and as hard as it was, I needed that at the time. I had nowhere to turn, but to God. I didn't always turn to Him and constantly looked to people to bring me happiness. I don't think those around me knew how much I was struggling bc I found brief happiness in people. It was a struggle bc I needed...oh how I needed support... but nobody could ever truly numb my pain, and when I returned to my empty bed I would be reminded of that. And all that was left was God. I can honestly say I didn't feel 100% satisfaction in Him and so so wanted that. If He wouldn't change my circumstances He was supposed to take away my pain right? But He didn't. He comforted me and He took care of me. He really did take care of me. I was able to stay home with my kids and He provided for me time and time again. I remember meeting with a professional counselor bc I was so overwhelmed with my life. After I would have my weekly meltdown with her she would smile and tell me she thought I was doing a good job and had too high expectations for myself. She said she envisioned God reaching his hand down to me and wanting me to simply hold His hand and just survive this trial in life. She encouraged me to simply focus on surviving right now. Oh no no.. I was supposed to thrive right? Nope, I really think God just wanted me run into His refuge and survive. One night I lost the very lost thread of hope I had been clinging too and I dropped to the floor and sobbed myself to sleep right there in the middle of the floor. I had this mental image of myself crawling to God, my refuge, and it hit me that I don't even have to crawl there. I could collapse right where I was and He would come to me and cover me like a hen covers her baby chicks. Yes, I still hurt and struggled to keep pressing on, but God gave me the grace to endure.

I was thinking the other day that I had to experience every bit of the pain during that time or it wouldn't have been real. That all is just part of divorce. God did not intend for marriage to dissolve and to endure a divorce without deep pain would be completely dysfunctional. If He took away that pain I would not be able to relate and hurt with women going through divorce right now.

So this leads me to where I am now. The past couple of months the weight of sadness has been taken away. I used to wake up in the morning feeling hopeless and numb... I wouldn't even be thinking about anything in particular. I would just wake up with an instant weight on me. Now I am waking up...tired and sometimes grumpy... but ready to get out of bed and start the day. It is SO freeing! I'm not sure what caused the weight to lift, but I'm praising God for His grace! I've loved spending time with my boys and have the energy to take them out and to simply play with them. Just writing that brings tears to my eyes, because it has been such a joy! I even took them to an inflatable play center last week and crawled through the tunnels with them, went down the slides, and just all around had so much fun with them. I praise the Lord for this time in my life. He has been so gracious to me! I would be lying if I said there wasn't still a void in my life that God hasn't completely filled, but I think that is normal. There was a part of my soul designed for a spouse and God will never completely fill that void. I don't think He wants me to go out and try to find someone to fill it right now, but rely on His grace to help me endure that void for the time being. I am so thankful for His grace!