Thanksgiving # 3 2011

Holiday season #3 since Keith's death has begun.

Thanksgiving day was very quiet and spent with friends who are family. The time with "blood" family is happening throughout the long weekend.

How are we?

Well...the kids have had a good time. We've spent lots of time together playing board games, eating good food (even though my oven has died...I hoping MLN can fix it), talking, watching movies, not shopping.

*My Lovely Neighbor

Nick commented about the slower pace. A slower pace is not something we are really familiar with. I've really enjoyed the slower pace.

Kacie has been soaking up the time with me. She has been attached to my side. I'm not sure what's going on with that, but it's nice that she still wants to spend time with me. She is a tween!

She has helped me bake a couple of times in the last two weeks. I'm excited that she wants to learn how. I am realizing how mature she is becoming. Wow! It has happened over night.

How have I done with the holiday? To be completely honest, Tuesday night and Wednesday were tough. Wednesday was especially tough. Lots of grief snuck up on me and ambushed me, I didn't think it was still possible for grief to have that much power after so long without any major episodes.

It does, at least with me. I met with one MLC on Tuesday and another on Wednesday. It took me all of Wednesday to shake off the yuck, but I was great on Thanksgiving day. My oven dying didn't even throw me too much of a curve ball. Just made a plan B and made it work.

The other half of MLN and I cooked (ha ha) up a schedule to rotate food in and out of her oven. I was cooking the turkey in my rotisserie, so it was handled.

I am very thankful that I have had another year with my beautiful children. I am thankful that I have friends who are family and love us so very much. I am very blessed.

How can I say that? How can I feel that way when my son has had cancer for the majority of his life and my husband died?

My only answer is how can I not be blessed? Although I have a heart that has been so broken I didn't think it was possible for it to heal, there has been healing. Although the love of my life and my best friend has gone to his heavenly home, I am blessed to have had the time with him that I did. Although my child has fought for life harder than most people ever will, I am blessed to have been chosen to be his mother. Although I am so undeserving of any of the blessings I have received, God gave His Son to die on the cross for me.

How can I not be blessed?

Do I get selfish? Yes! Absolutely! I want a life without so much struggle, without so much constant stress and pain. I want a man to love me and my children with the kind of selfless love we had before. I want to love someone again. I want to be a wife again. I want to share my days and my nights with someone. I want my son well. I want my daughter to experience a life without worry over whether her brother is going to be okay.

Yes, I get selfish. I want what I don't have.

Yes, I am difficult to shop for. I want things that money can't buy. I want things that only the Lord God can provide. I have to trust Him for these provisions.

So, I take my life that is a lot of stress and struggle and make the best of it. I take my children (who were born out of an amazing once in a lifetime kind of love) as they are and love them, try to raise them right, remind them of their dad, have fun with them, and try to make things as normal as I possibly can. As normal as circumstances allow.

That's what Keith and I were doing before he got sick, and while he was sick. That's what I've been trying to do since he died. Be as normal as we can be within the limits of our circumstances.

The circumstances don't define us. We just make the best out of it.

That's something that I want the kids to KNOW as adults. Your circumstances don't make you who you are. It's how you handle the circumstances that make you who you are.

I wish you a happy and blessed thanksgiving. I hope that you have been able to love and be loved.

May we all remember the reason for this season that is now upon us.

Standing FIRMLY in HIS GRIP!

Kristy