recurring dreams

so....

i've been a really really naughty girl this summer.

i think i've only been to church, like, three times.  that's really not good.

and i really don't have any good excuses.  the first two times i missed were for legit reasons....i was on call and had to work.  and then, it was like, i just didn't want to, or i found other reasons i had to be home.  or, rather, i wanted to be home.  okay.  that's not okay.

and i can't figure out why i didn't want to go.  i love my church.  LOVE.  like, in capitals and underlined and italicized.  i fit there.  i love the people there.  i can have a for real, nitty gritty conversation with the Lord there and i feel like i'm home when i'm there.  

last night, i had the latest in a string of recurring dreams that i've had since i was a little girl.  i have always had these recurring nightmares about tornadoes.  i think this probably spawns from my mother's fear of them when i was little.  mom would seriously FREAK when there was inclement weather, and i probably translated that into my head.  but whenever i would have the dreams, i could always see the tornado, my family was always there, and i could somehow, in my dream, control something in the situation....whether it was getting away from it, or whatever.  and i'm sure, being as type-A as i am, that the whole reason that tornadoes scare the crap out of me is that element of non-control and chaos that the tornado represents.

the last few times, last night being the most recent, my mom has been in the dreams.  and she's there, and she's ever-so calm.  she's laughing, she's in control.  i can see her, she's guiding me, she's listening, she's offering advice, and in every one of these tornado dreams she's in, no one is hurt, no one is sacrificed, and i wake up without the panicked feeling that i usually wake up with.

which makes me wonder....is this possibly a way that she's trying to reach out to me?  is she trying to tell me to get my butt back to church, to have a convo with the Big Man himself?  is she just letting me know she's there?  is she offering me guidance?  or is my subconscious relying on coping mechanisms i used to have several years ago?

transitions

on july 10th, 2012, i was blessed with an honor.

well, rewind.

i was blessed with an honor even before that.  in november of 2011, truly.  that's when i found out that my sister was pregnant.  pregnant for the first time.  directly after she married the guy that she'd been searching for her entire life.

this guy, brian, is awesome.  he makes Sister so happy.  he really does.  so to find out they were pregnant was awesome.

to watch her during the pregnancy was amazing.  even though she had terrible nausea and developed ankles the size of small tree trunks, she did amazing.

she came in to the office on july 9th, after having pretty intense contractions all morning.

this was TWO DAYS after her baby shower.

baby's heart rate was good, but i kept her here, because she was only 36w6d and we got her started on some procardia to stop the contractions.  well, that didn't work, because her water broke here at the office in the bathroom.  she was so nervous and scared and anxious.

as was i.  in the few years i've been practicing medicine, i've never been the one to drive someone to the hospital.  i always show up after that part, when it's time to the catch the baby.

so i took her to my house, where we met up with brian, and he took her to the hospital.

Sister had asked me to be there at the hospital, since Mom couldn't be there.  brian's parents were there, dad was there, tery was there.  and we waited.  we drank coffee.  and we waited.  Sister dilated.  and we waited.  dad and i sat in my truck with the windows open, eyes closed, telling stories about childhood memories, and we waited.  and then i got the call to come back up to the labor deck because Sister was 9.5 cm dilated.  hooray!

and after about 15 minutes of pushing, i watched her make this amazing transition from my baby Sister into a Mommy as she gave birth to 5#9oz Daggar Xavier, born at 37 weeks.  10 fingers, 10 toes, all perfect and tiny.

i got to deliver my nephew.  how cool is that?  who gets to do that?!?

and it was amazing.  the most amazing thing i've ever done.  of all the babies i've ever delivered, aside from my own, this was the most special thing i've ever done.

uncle

i suppose one could say that i'm a complex individual.  although, i'm sure we all are.


i don't know why it's taken me so long, but to be truthful, i still don't know my limits until i've passed them.


looking back, we always have the benefit of hindsight.  i can look back at things that i've done, and think, "wow, i can't believe i did that."  "i can't believe i was such an idiot."  "i can't believe i pulled through that."  we all do that.  we all have highlights and low times that we look back on, and it gives us strength to press on.


however, the last couple of years, i keep thinking that there is going to come a time when i finally call "uncle."  i think to myself, "if i have to go through this one more time, i am not going to make it."  and then whatever it is happens again, and i wake up the next day, giving myself another ultimatum. 


why do we do that?  why do we almost defeat ourselves before we're even put into a particular situation?  is it that we don't believe in ourselves enough?  is it that we look back and think, "but i've already been through so much!"  do we feel sorry for ourselves and want to give ourselves a way out?  do we doom ourselves by imagining another go-round of a particular situation?  or are we simply too coward to cry "uncle" in the here and now?


i would like to think that i don't cry "uncle" because i'm so tenacious and that i am the eternal optimist.  but i know that's not always the truth.  i don't want to give up on something, or someone.  ever.  i want to hold out hope that things will be okay.  i believe that whatever it is, i can fix it, i can make it right, and i can believe that okay-ness into reality.


and things will always be okay.  always.  sometimes it just sucks in the process.


and it's a blow to the ego when things don't turn out as okay as i would like.


and there's a big part of me that's starting to realize that i have to quit taking responsibility for others' actions.  i need to stop feeling responsible for the choices that other people make.  and i need to stop trying to find my fault in their situations and their decisions.


that's a tough thing to swallow.


the truth is, no matter the outcome, the only thing that we can do is what we do....we can't plan around an outcome, a possible insult, a perceived slight.  we need to love anyway, be happy anyway, smile anyway, cry anyway, give anyway.  even on the days when we think we're at out lowest, or we're facing our toughest challenge, another person may be relying on our love, our smile, our gift, to pull out of something that's tougher than any of us will ever know.  maybe they are crying "uncle," and they need us to take the pressure off.

first to last

today was piper's last day of kindergarten.

where did the year go?

she started the year knowing her alphabet, shapes, colors.

now she can read.  she knows her address, phone number, and lots of other things, like how to play games, the rules to duck-duck-goose, how to sing.  she has favorite bible verses.

she has gained confidence, courage, and a sense of self.

she has lost teeth, lost shyness, and lost her "toddler"-ness.

how did this happen already?  and how amazing is this?

first day of school

last day of school

publicly unacceptable

this is so the truth.  seriously, the first thing i do when i walk in the door, without fail, without interruption, is take out my contacts and put on comfy clothes.

so i wonder something....in a world in which we are inundated with photos and social media, telling us what celebrities do all the time....why do they always look absolutely perfect?

i mean, i know that's, like, their job, but seriously.

do prince william and duchess kate ever wake up and have bed head?  surely, he must see her without makeup and in sweat pants.  i wonder if she even owns sweat pants. 

you know, i might send her some of mine....if i didn't love them so much.



this concludes the random thought of the day.  :)

accept...except?

if there is one thing that i could guess was a universal truth, it's that people want to be accepted.  not excepted.  


this has been a resounding theme to life in the palmer household as of late.  jay wants acceptance with his chronic illness.  he wants a solution.  right now, without a solution, he is an exceptance.  he wants to have acceptance.  


i know exceptance isn't a word.  but it is today.


piper wants acceptance.  there was a whole knock-down-drag-out explosive meltdown last night.  about how she doesn't want to do the things that are asked of her because her younger brother doesn't have to do the same thing.  kids are very literal.  she doesn't see that her brother is only mature enough to do the same things that she was doing at that age.  and that because she's older, she has different responsibilities.  she wants acceptance, not exceptance.

none of us wants to be different.  it's a catch 22.  we're all unique but we're all the same.  we want to fit in, we want to be a puzzle piece that matches and is turned just the right way to fit into our place.  we don't want to be that one piece that belongs to a different puzzle and accidentally got mixed into the wrong set.


it's a tough thing to teach, no matter the age, especially when it's not all figured out in the first place.  so what is there to do?  be supportive.  encourage.  demonstrate.  accept.


if i want to be accepted, my mind tells me that i have some accepting to do.  if i except, then i will be excepted. if you want to have a good friend, you have to be a good friend. 


one of the best things i've learned about relationships, and it's probably because i heard it somewhere and can't remember where...is that a person's contribution to a relationship and the value that they hold in that relationship is based on what they can contribute, not what they can take.  every relationship is about being accepted, not excepted.  but one should look at it from the point of view of what can i give to this person?  what can i provide for them?  


there will always be times when a person has to take, too.  but that gives the other person the opportunity to give.  sometimes it's really. really. difficult to give, because it's so easy to feel selfish.  it's so easy to feel slighted, to feel that i'm the one doing all the giving.  it's so easy to feel that we want to give up, and stop reaching out.  but sometimes, the reaching out is what fosters the continued relationship, the feeling of acceptance.  the denial of reaching out gives expentance instead.


sometimes the giving of acceptance is all that is needed.

be brave, young grasshopper

i want to get brave enough to do this....

it's me that i have to get over.  jay wouldn't care...if i'm happy, then he's happy.  but that's what i want to do.  could be funked out, or smoothed down....and would be cool in the summer.  hmm....can i do it?  that's the question.  we shall see.  


like anything big, i must think on it for awhile.