Hi friends! Sorry for the absence. I have been not feeling well and having some more symptoms. I currently have 2 infections going as well as pretty significant fluid retention. I joke that I am turning into that girl from Willy Wonka that swells up into a blueberry. Don’t worry, I did see the Dr today and have started all my new medications. I’m also pet sitting for a family member!!!! I wanted to shout-out all parents and caregivers of small children that are getting up multiple times a night to make sure their charge is still alive. I love this pet but I’m also soooooo ready to sleep through the night! I’m not sure if it’s the lack of sleep, being sick, or just life in general right now but I found this week that pain had become quite the idol. I woke up afraid of how much I would already be in pain before my feet even hit the floor. I have the unfortunate tendency to hyper-focus on my health when I start feeling well. This is literally the worst thing you can do!!!! Every ache becomes, “Am I starting a fever?!?!” and every cough starts the chant of “I’m getting pneumonia again!”. I know this about myself and yet am surprise each time this happens how long it takes before I realize what I’m doing and start to try to refocus myself. I attempt to drown out the nagging voices by singing all the songs I remember from Sunday school…..which would probably work better if I wasn’t losing my memory lol. So I switched to running through all the prayer requests I collected this week for my family and friends. That did help. Knowing that I’m not the only person in the world not feeling my best is a weird, twisted kind of comfort. I eventually broke down. I finally got mad at God. Why does everything always have to be the hard way? Why do You come in loudest when I’m in pain? Why can’t I just catch a little break?!?!?!? And then I got asked a question by a friend along the lines of, “would you trade the worst part of yourself with someone else?”. And that got me thinking….would I really put someone else through all of the things I go through on a daily basis? But here is the catch of the question, I get their worst part in return AND I don’t get to know what it is beforehand. Ouch. That finally broke through the pain fog like and stopped my mental languish. Because, what are the chances that I trade thinking I get a better deal only to end up with a trial that I just can’t handle? I thought and thought about some of the hardest times in my life. Losing my brother to suicide made me a stronger 911 operator. Losing my grandpa to dementia made me a more compassionate caregiver and medical worker. Having mental health struggles of my own gave me an understanding of working with mentally challenges children that proved invauable. And then, that Still Small Voice reminded me that I am NEVER given a challenge that God can’t get me through. What I face has been chosen specifically for me because God knows He can get me through it and I’ll come out the other side better for it. So tonight, as miserable as I feel right now, I’m going to choose to give thanks for my struggles. I’m going to decide to look at them as challenges that God trusted He could put me through and I’ll stick it out. If you’re going through a storm of your own tonight….I’m praying for you. Storms SUCK!!!!!! But you can’t dance under the rainbow at the end if it never rains. God promised that He would never again flood the world with that same rainbow so let it remind you right now that He also promised not to give you something He can’t get you through.