I believe the greatest thing in life is to find out who God
created you to be and fulfilling your purpose here on Earth. I have wondered
for many years what my calling was, what did God create me to do? Is it true
that we are all created with a divine purpose and we are all here to do
something specific with the time we are given? I believe the answer to that is
yes, I always have, BUT (the "but" is inevitable) as much as I have
prayed for guidance I have never felt lead toward any certain path. Is it
possible that I was created for a purpose that I was unknowingly fulfilling
while still feeling completely "unfulfilled" myself?!
This weekend I believe the Lord spoke to me through my
husband, and I'm about 102% sure that he doesn't even realize that it
happened....more details about that to follow, first I want to dive into some
background information about myself that might help the final "point"
of this post.
Since my earliest memory as a child all I wanted to do was
be the boss! I was the little girl who always wanted to play school with my
friends and I always had to be the teacher. I would make all my friends sit in
a half circle on the floor in front of my window bench and I would cross my
legs, put on a pair of mom's reading glasses and proceed to "teach"
my friends. I was then labeled by my family as a future teacher - that is who I
was and that is what I was going to do when I grew up.
As the second youngest cousin out of eight and being the
youngest by many years all of my cousins were getting married and having babies
before I even reached my teens. All my cousins’ kids became my real life baby
dolls. I would carry them around, love on them, drop them on their heads...and
as I got older I became the babysitter, the bottle feeder, diaper changer, the "you're
not old enough to go with us" so you can watch the little ones, cousin –
and I loved it! I looked up to my older cousins; I wanted to be just like them.
I wanted to have a boyfriend and get married and have babies. That is what my
life has been focused on since I was at least six years old. My ultimate goal
in life (while I wanted to also do other things) was to be a wife and a mother
(with approximately 10 kids).
Throughout my high school years, that little bit of
rebellious spirit I had made me start thinking that maybe there was more for me
than being and teacher and more out there than just getting married and having
kids. I still wanted kids, and lots of them, but maybe there was something
BIGGER for me to explore. My parents all but forced me go to college (which was
definitely the wrong thing for me to do at that time - but that's a completely
different story). So I went off to school to find myself and the great
opportunities that waited for me out there. College was the best time of my
life and I wouldn't change the things I got to experience for anything but
during my time there I never did genuinely find out what I wanted to do with my
life. I always had teaching in the back of my mind but it didn't tug at my
heart strings, it was not what I felt like I was meant to do, so I perused my
degree in Agriculture instead.
Jump forward a few years, I meet the man who I would
eventually marry, we struggled through year one of married life, decided to
leave that college town and landed back in my hometown - now what? I felt like
it was now time to put on my big girl panties and fulfill my calling in life,
but again - what am I meant to do? Why was this so difficult for me? I would
pray and pray and pray. I finally decided that this "great" job I had
landed was obviously where I was meant to be (even thought I was not excited to
be in this job) and it was time for hubs and I to start a family.
-Being new to this whole blogging thing I'm still learning
how to give enough back ground info to help establish the emotion behind what I’m
saying and initiate understanding when I finally reach my point without rambling,
so your patience is much appreciated-
Hubs and I were unsuccessful at starting a family for many
years. In August of 2011 I found out I had a tumor on my left ovary and it was suffocating
my ovary to the point of not allowing me to ovulate. My doctor/surgeon told us
that it needed to be removed immediately and we wouldn’t know if there was any
permanent damage or if she would even be able to save my ovary until she got in
there and looked around. I went in for
surgery on August 18th, they made a 9 ½ inch incision on my lower abdomen
(much like a c-section) and took out my ovaries – yes, both of them. They removed the tumor, and some other “debris”
from my right ovary and them put them back in.
After the surgery my doctor informed me that everything went great and
we could start “family planning” after giving my body about two months to
recover. During recovery I spent a lot
of time thinking and went through a period of time that I was not myself – I
refer to that time of my life as the time “I went crazy”, haha. Details on that
of course would be another fun story to tell but we’ll save that for later. We went a full year with no luck conceiving so
I decided to reach out to another doctor for help. She has been wonderful, and we are currently
undergoing treatment to help us with conception – basically I do not ovulate so
I am taking medication to help my body ovulate. If the meds don't work this
month, we have one more opportunity to try in February and after that our last
option is to seek further infertility help if we want to continue
"trying". Emotionally that is not something I believe I can handle
any more of right now, which brings me to what I have uncovered and what my precious
husband brought to me this past weekend that I believe was the Lord speaking
without a doubt.
While he was cleaning up after working on Saturday he began
telling me about a man that he worked with who had adopted children. He went
into detail about their conversation and he told me all about how he felt like
it was a good idea for us to explore that as an option if this ovulation
medication does not work. That spawned a whole conversation about how we could
take in children who have been hurt or lost and give them unconditional love and
attention. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to not have parents to
not feel wanted or feel like I had anywhere to call home, we have been
continually blessed beyond measure and we could use our blessings to change the
life of an innocent child who without us may not have any other chance at
experiencing what it means to be a part of a loving family unit. We talked in great detail about all aspects
of raising children, it was one of the most magnificent feelings in the world
and I haven't stopped thinking about it since.
How beautiful is this? The fact that my precious husband brought this
information to me reminds me that God will use whatever it takes to reach out
to his own children and speak to them. I
prayed, for a very long time, and even though my answer did not come to me
immediately, I finally heard Him and it couldn’t have been in a better
way.
I have always been good with children - since the early days
when I was taking care of my cousin’s kids. I just connect with them on a level
many people can't. I believe without a shadow of a doubt God created me with a
special gift so that I can be in the field of caring for children. I don't
believe it's going to be in a daycare setting and I don't believe it's going to
be in a teaching role and I'm okay with not knowing exactly where this is going
to lead me but I have never felt this much peace and excitement. I have looked
into options here at the local university where I can get a degree in “Family
Life Education – Child Development”. Where
that will take me, I'm still not sure, but I feel like I am going to become an
advocate of children. I am going to be a voice for those who have no voice. “Speak up for those who cannot speak for
themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute.” Proverbs 31:8 (NIV)
So here it is, I have never felt more at peace, and it shows
that we can NEVER lose faith. God has
created us all for something and he WILL give us our hearts desires, and sometimes
we don’t even realize what those desires are until he uses someone or something
to reveal it to you in a whole new light.
My passion and understanding for children is something I am supposed to
use for something greater than just giving birth to my own children. Thank you Jesus for being undeservingly good
to us, I can't wait to start this journey and see where this new adventure
leads.
Maybe
those ten kids I wanted weren't meant to be biological....
