When I was Planning Out My Life in my twenties, I assumed I would: Get married Adopt a puppy Have 2 biological kids Foster and/or adopt another kid or two Live Happily Ever After I got married and we soon adopted a puppy. Three years later, we gave birth to our first daughter and […]
My brain is overwhelmed with a multitude of new and important things at the training I am currently sitting in. Did you know that trauma and neglect in early childhood actually changes the shape and size of the brain? My own brain hurts from listening to statistics and documentation about how children of neglect actually […]
Listening to My Mother is an Act of Learning to Love Myself When I learned I was pregnant, I was scared because I was the shape of the moon and I didn’t think that my body carried enough light to make the night sky shine. Whittling a daugther from your flesh feels […]
My mom prunes the Mexican Oak tree in my front yard with her bare hands. The tree stands catty-corner to the chain-link fence, standing guard against the neighbor’s driveway. It appears diseased as my mom tirelessly rips off each limb. The branches fall around her like the many stories we hold and can’t quite bring […]
I admit to being a bit spoiled: my husband hardly travels much for work anymore. Now, as a church planter, we practice staying put, putting down roots, being placed. (How else, can we plant an outpost for God’s kingdom if we’re always moving on?) But over the holidays, I sent him off on a plane […]