Counting My Gains But Losses...

Hello everybody! I'm still here! I apologize for the month off! I have missed blogging, but have just felt too overwhelmed to even bother with it. So, today I just had to sit down and do it. I had to make the decision to sit down and type. As my friend, Michelle, would say...I had to do it on purpose.

I feel as though my life has been in upheaval for a few weeks now, and as I sit here typing, wondering how much is okay to share, how much is okay to say, and what is too personal, I wonder "God, what comes next? What is the next step?". The hardest thing about change is the not knowing. Maybe it is easier to follow when we are blindfolded. Maybe it causes us to hold tighter to Christ when our eyes are covered so that we are unable to see the next step, causes us to not want to let go of His hand because as long as we hold on we know He will never, EVER lead us astray. Perhaps if my eyes were opened to see everything that would happen, I wouldn't have to trust Him as much and might depend too much on me.

For instance, yesterday my glasses finally broke. I have had them for a few years. I have contacts, but my allergies have been at their worst ever for the past three weeks. Now, I am forced to wear my contacts with the nice, gritty, sandpaper, itchy feeling in my eyes caused by allergies. Nice. Really nice. No, not really. I am frustrated and aggravated. I cannot afford new glasses right now. None of the eye doctors I know do payment plans. I have been told that one eye doctor does in special cases, but I would feel weird about that since he does not like to do it. I have no vision insurance currently. I miss my glasses.

I don't know what will happen next for my eyes. I don't know when I will be able to get glasses. But they are a need, a NEED, and my heavenly father will meet all of my needs according to His riches in glory through Christ Jesus. So, I wait, and now I have to trust, because I don't know what to do. I just don't know.

The glasses story is of course the least of my concerns at this time.

Another major concern is that I am now unemployed. I have been able to work from my home doing medical transcription since 2001. It has been important that I worked because we needed that income really badly. Now, it is gone. And, I am a homeschool mom, so my options are really limited. I have to say it has been hard to work at home, teach at home, be a wife and mom, be on staff at church, and still find time to take care of myself and my home. So, in that aspect I am glad I don't have the job anymore, and my husband is glad too. Now, we have to see if we can make it. Lord, we need Your help!

This major change in our income has also caused us to have to tighten up the belt in every area of the budget. One of the main ways I continued to lose weight was through eating different food than my family. And now, I can't afford to buy much of anything extra. So, that has been incredibly frustrating for me and my weight loss efforts.

Not being able to control what I buy for myself to eat has really affected my mindset. I have to fight consistently, daily, against the old eating disorder. After all, if I can't afford to eat right, it stands to reason that I would be better off not eating, right? WRONG! I find myself laying in bed at night poring over ways to keep from eating and making it okay, or eating as little as possible so that I will still be eating and be okay that way. I am battling myself, and no worries friends, I am absolutely not allowing that mindset to win. I will keep fighting.

There is more that I cannot share right now, but will probably share at a later date. I also do believe that all of this is going to aid me in writing my book. I only have one chapter completed at this point, and I can already see where some of this whole upheaval process is going to factor into my fiction.

As I close for now I just have to say that I know this has not been particularly encouraging, I just want to say honestly what I am going through. I just hope that it helps someone who reads it to know that even when we don't know, God does. We have to hold tighter to His hand and trust His guidance. He will lead us along the right path and right where we need to be.

Phillipians 3:7 NKJV
But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 But indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ.