There's actually been a lot of good things and good thoughts going on for me.  I've been spending time with the Lord almost everyday.  When I spend some quiet moments with Him, I find myself refreshed and replenished and the ever circling thoughts in my mind are often, not always, put at ease.  You know, grief messes with your mind a lot.  I've known the truth of God in my heart for a while now.  The truth of the fact that "I am a child of the King."  The truth that "I am free from shame and condemnation."  The truth that "I am God's workmanship."  But in the middle of and throughout the journey of loss and grief, these thoughts and truths have been challenged in my mind several times. 

When I'm feeling the sadness of the loss of my ever longed for baby, I get a bunch of messages going through my brain.  Kind of like a series of text messages that I keep reading over and over again. "You suck"  "You're no good"  "Life isn't worth it"  "If I can't have what I planned, then I don't want anything at all."  "You're a horrible mom"  "Get it together"  "What's wrong with you?"

Do you see how terrible these messages are?  I used to think that these messages, or negative self talk, were uncontrollable.  I often didn't even know that i was saying these things to myself.   Today in church, my pastor was talking about how we can be navel gazers (constantly in self pity or constantly complaining), or we can be thankful for having a God that is our provider, our protector, our healer.

After putting the kids into bed tonight and doing something in the kitchen while the house was quiet, these negative thoughts started circling my mind again.  "You suck"  "Life isn't worth it"  "I miss my baby so much that I just can't go on"...and as the depression started to settle in. 

I conciously chose a different path for my brain to think this time though (something I've not done too often before over the years of knowing depression because I didnt' know how).   I thought at first...."I know these feelings, these are feelings of depression, and I'm familiar with them.  I want to get better, I don't want to be in this place of sadness.....ok I'll try saying what I'm thankful for to get me into a different train of thought...I'm thankful for my family, for my home, for all that i have, I'm thankful for..."   But this didn't work.  Being thank ful for what i have just didn't do anything to my thought process or my mood or my attitude.  I still felt down, I still felt like life wasn't worth it......
......
.....
.....
but then......
.....
.....
I thought about what my pastor told me this morning.  "Thank you Lord for being my Protector, thank you God for being my Healer, thank you Lord that You are my Provider."
.....
.....
.....
and all of a sudden, it happened.........
......
.....
I felt the depression lifting,
I saw the text message lies being deleted,
I felt a feeling of wholeness,
I felt like I COULD carry on.
....
How profound, that when I think about God and His Character and my identity in Him, I feel good.

Shall we accept the good and not the adversity?

Imagine you had 10 wonderful grown children who were married, imagine you had dozens of pieces of real estate with no mortgages, imagine you had a staff of over 100 people whom you employed who respected and enjoyed working for you, imagine you owned a dozen fortune 500 companies and they were thriving.  Imagine you were rich, had it all, were fit, were married to a wonderful person and were totally successful and totally content.
What would you do if one night you went to sleep in your comfy king sized bed, and were woken up by the panting of one staff member pounding at your door..."I...I...I was the only one who got away....there was a raid....all of your children, were murdered!"  and then another knock at the door with another staff member panting again..."I...I...was the only one who got away...all of the staff have been imprisoned!"  You stumble barely catching yourself to lean against the door frame when another person comes running..."I...don't know how to tell you...but all of your real estate was set fire...everything has burnt to the ground!"  Then finally the last person runs up the driveway also catching his breathe and says,