30 Days of Thankgiving: Day 10

Today

I am

Thankful

for

margins.

White space.

Not the kind of margins you find on a page, though.  I'm thankful today for finally finding some margins in my life.  You know what I'm talking about.  The down time.  The "breaks."  The "me time" that we as people, but especially as moms, really need but often don't get take for ourselves.  We're so busy being super moms, being everything to everyone, that we often forget neglect to take time to re-center our own lives.

Take today, for instance.  Have a look at my schedule:

7:30 carpool

9:00-11:15 meeting

11:30 preschool pick-up

12:00 lunch/naps

2:00 carpool

3:30 therapy

4:30 dinner

5:30 zumba

7:00 kids' bedtime

7:15 crash on the couch

This day looks incredibly hectic!  Right now I'm sitting down for 15 minutes to eat a bit of lunch and regroup before I scurry around making sure the house is clean "enough" for when the therapist gets here.  I can't stand to have someone come into my house when the floors aren't clean, particularly when I know that someone will be sitting on the floor!  So, you probably look at this crazy schedule and think I'm going to be absolutely exhausted at bedtime.  You'd be right in some ways.  I'll be physically tired and ready to sleep.  For a week!

But today?  Today is my day of rest and rejuvenation!

That meeting this morning?  That was a MOPS meeting.  I've been 3 times now.  It's been so incredibly wonderful to sit and chat for 2 hours every other Thursday with like-minded moms.  Today my table (the red table) spent a great deal of time talking about potty training!  It seems almost all of us have at least one child in various stages of training.  It's been a lovely, refreshing gift I've given myself (and a friend gave me) to have that 2 hours of down time, that two hours of worry-free time where I know the kids are taken care of and I can just be who I was created to be!

And Zumba!  Some days it feels like another thing that has to get done, particularly on days like to day where I know the afternoon will be rushed.  But I never EVER regret spending that hour in a room of hot, sweaty, stinky ladies.  Never.  In part because of Zumba, I've begun to give myself and my family the gift of my health!  I'm not even just talking about my physical health.  I'm talking mental health.  My attitude is so much better when I've had a good workout!

Friends, until a couple months ago I didn't have margins.  My husband, my kids and my house have the the center of my life.  They've taken all of me, edge to edge.  No, that's not true.  They haven't taken all of me.  I've given them all of me.  Every bit.  And I forgot that I need to keep a little bit of me for...well, me!  So when I looked around a few months ago and couldn't even recognize myself anymore, I knew something needed to change.  I needed to find a way to get a little bit of "me" back into me.  I'm working on that, and it's still a slow process, but I am finally TAKING the time for me.  (It does help that there is childcare at both MOPS and Zumba!)

I'd like to encourage you, today, to find a little bit of a margin in your life!  It's hard.  I get that.  I really do.  I have a husband, 3 kids, and a dog.  There is ALWAYS something that needs to be done.  There is always something I'm putting off or pushing aside in order to find my margins.  But I'm finding them.  I've set time aside.  My husband knows there are times right now that, unless there's an emergency, I'm in "me" time and I'm just plain not available.  To anyone.  Except for me.  The more I force myself to live a little bit of my life in the margins, the more I find that I've been needing them all along.  Find your margins.  TAKE your margins.  You need them!

Dear Lord, thank you for rest!  In the business of a day like today, I am reminded of how much I need to take a little bit of time here and there to focus on me.  I'm reminded that you made me to be exactly who I am, and if I am not taking the time to remember who I am, I'm not following your will at all.  I need to be rested and refreshed to be the kind of wife, mother, friend, person that you've made me to be.  Thank you for giving me a husband that, although we're both still learning to understand I need my time, accepts that I need a break her and there.  Thank you for giving me that gently nudge mighty push into the unknown so that I could recapture me.  Lord, I know I have friends out there who don't have time...or make time...to focus on themselves.  I know because I was one of them until you told me that wasn't what you had for me.  Please help my friends to find their own margins.  We all need them.  Help my friends to see that they're possible and they're critical.  Thank you, Lord, for showing me just how critical margins are!

Grown-ups scare me.

I've been a stay at home mom since last February and I LOVE it!  I love that I get to watch my kids grow.  I love being the one to pick up Thing 1 from school each day.  I love feeding Bugsy lunch.  I love watching Stinky grow a tiny (BIG!) personality.  I love love love being at home!

Around last September, however, I began to long for certain parts of my old "working mom" lifestyle.  I missed friends, to be exact.  I still do.  I realized that almost all of my "friendships" were linked to a life I no longer lived...the workforce.  And unfortunately, due somewhat to my own choosing and somewhat to theirs, the ties didn't survive my leap into stay-at-home-mommyhood.

I'd been so busy being mom to a newborn baby, a toddler, and a preschooler that I hadn't noticed the void.  But then Thing 1 started school and I started babysitting and I stopped leaving the house.  It's hard leaving the house when you have 5-6 kids every day.  The "easiest" places to go without 6 kids are stores, where you spend money...and the easiest places to go with 6 kids are expensive!  So we started a routine of simply being at home.  It was a workable routine, or so I thought.

Around September I started getting ansty.  I started noticing that I was pretty much alone (aside from my husband, who's a great help) and I DON'T like to be alone!  I began to ponder what should be done about this situation.  I started to see other people's posts on facebook; things like, "We had a great time at MOPS today!" or "I love my mommy small group!" or "We're off to our playgroup!"  Every time I saw one of these posts I got a little sadder.  Imagine what it would be like to have a support group!  Wow!  I sure missed that.

I began to formulate a plan.  It started simple: we needed a women's ministry, an active, up-to-date women's ministry, at our church.  And someone needed to lead it!  So I started researching.  MOPS looks to be a fabulous group, but it's way too expensive for me, so I am sure it would be for some others as well.  There were tons of other "mommy" curricula out there, but none fit what I felt we needed.  I decided I needed to figure out what we needed!  (Or, actually, I needed to figure out what I needed.)

The more I thought, the more I realized that what I really need, more than anything else, is FRIENDS!  I need people who will love me for who I am.

I need people to go on "girls' nights" with.  (Yep, more from facebook.)  I need someone who will call me if I don't show up for church to find out why I wasn't there.  (This is rare, but I DO have 3 kids, and they DO get sick on occasion.)  I need someone who will be there to hold my hand, literally or figuratively, when I have to do something scary, like hand a baby over for surgery.  I need someone who will surprise me with a note or a call or an email or anything out of the blue because they were thinking of me.  I need someone that wants to hang out and do things that interest me!  I need someone that will listen and care when I talk about my kids for hours on end because, let's face it, they're pretty much at the center of my life right now and I have a lot to say about them!  I NEED FRIENDS!

About the only place I go regularly is church.  What this means is that, ideally, my friendships will come from church.  It means that I might have to *gasp* see "those" peope outside of the 4 walls of the church building.  I might have to see them some other day besides Sunday!  So I started to research curricula that were based on developing relationships.  I fell in love with the idea of girlfriends unlimited by Group. 

It was exactly what I was looking for!  The mission of girlfriends unlimited is to BEFRIEND women and give them a place to BELONG so they will come to BELIEVE in Jesus and BECOME more like him!  This was perfect! 

And then I realized that I would have to be in charge and that TERRIFIED me.  You see, I'm good at being in front of a room full of 4 year olds.  REALLY good.  But grown-up?  Grown-ups scare me.  Grown-ups talk behind your back and laugh at you and throw things if they don't like what you have to say.  Grown-ups are mean!  Grown-ups have bigger attitudes and bigger influences!  Grown-ups are my PEERS!

I bit the bullet, had the curriculum ordered, and got started.  We've had a kick-off party and a Christmas party, and this month we're kicking off G! groups.  We're well on our way to a very vital ministry! 

Perhaps just as importantly, the women in my church are on the way to establishing REAL, honest, vital friendships!  That's the part I'm most excited about.  I can't wait!