Week 4: Do not Fear

I will recap on the other weeks on my next post about week 5.

Last week (from Jan 21-27) was focusing on letting go of our fears.  It took me a lot longer to actually do this one than I'd have liked.  I'm not exactly sure why, but I was praying in the beginning of the week for God to reveal my fears to me, and he did.

I used to struggle with fear constantly.  I was always afraid of something, mainly letting people down, or not doing well enough at something in particular, not knowing something, looking silly, that sort of thing.  I managed to get over much of my fears from my adolescence later on in life, and realized that my fears did not permit me to move forward as I could have, and should have.  They held me back.  I did not experience the many blessings in certain areas of my life that I could have, due to these fears.

Through God's help, I managed to fight off many of those fears that held me back as I entered university, then marriage, and eventually motherhood.

My greatest fear was of childbirth.  It has always been one of the biggest fear issues for me.  Well, once you are pregnant, you really have no choice but to go through childbirth, in one form or another.  That is the nature of things.  I remember when I was pregnant with our daughter, as we grew closer and closer to the due date, the thoughts that went through my mind.  I became paralyzed with the fear of labor and delivery.  How on EARTH was I to push a 7lb or more baby out?  Seriously, it made no sense to me!  I know women have been doing this since creation, but it still baffled me.  How?  And not only the how, but my goodness, the pain stories, the horror stories of things going wrong, the stories stories stories... I was terrified.  But each passing day, I was that much closer to discovering it for myself.  I finally had a complete mental breakdown one day, acknowledging my fears (finally... I had been pushing them aside for so long thinking I was being silly), and through it all, God told me that He was ultimately in control.  It didn't matter if I understood, or if I knew when or how or what or anything.  All that mattered was trusting Him to show me what to do, when.  Trusting that He made me in this way, and my body would do exactly as it was made to do.

So... I did.  I had no choice.  And everything worked out fine in the end!

I didn't fear things with my son.

Fear has been coming back to haunt me lately, however.  And not just of childbirth.  You'd think I'd be fine with things, considering I have two healthy beautiful children already, but I'm not.  I'm terrified.  I don't know when, I don't know if I'm ready, I'm scared the house isn't prepared, that I will be too tired to do anything after baby is born, etc etc.  I'm just... scared.  And it is all out of my control.  So what can I do?  All I can do is trust, and I'm having a hard time with that for some reason.

As if all this wasn't enough, we have other rather huge financial decisions on our laps right now... things that will completely change our future as a family, and the stresses of dealing with that and the decisions we need to make... I am so afraid of making the wrong one.  I am afraid of what will happen with a house or a job, everything.  Will we be all right?  Will we be able to make ends meet?  Will our family be better off here or here?  God, where are you in all this?  Where are You leading us?  Which decision is Yours?  Through this week, I have discovered that I really do trust that God will lead us to make the best decision, that God's way is the best way... but what I don't trust is myself.  Am I hearing Him, or me?  How do I know I'm choosing the right way?  How CAN I know?  I am so confused, and my emotions, the stress of everything, and the chemical changes due to pregnancy aren't helping.  I know God's way is best, and I believe that with everything... but I don't know if I am hearing Him, or me.  And I don't want to do what I want...

Sounds confusing?  Yeah... me too.

So, we pray.  And pray.  And pray some more.  We feel that this path is right, but maybe not right now?  So we are preparing for both scenarios... which is not an easy task.  Especially with a baby coming.  But we are preparing... 'feet fitted with the boots of readiness that comes from the gospel of peace'.  As long as we are ready for either-or, and don't get too comfortable with only one choice or the other, I think we'll be OK.  Then, when God says 'it's time for you to take this step', and if we've been praying and following Him, we'll know.  And we can do it.

I'm just so afraid of missing His call.  I don't want to miss it.

So... I need to trust that He will make things known to us in His time.  And that is hard somehow for me to do.  But I will try, and I will continue to pray that He will make it known to us.

As for my other major fear right now... labour and delivery is inevitable.  I don't know when, and I don't know what this one will look like exactly, but I know He is with me, and I know He will help me, just as He always has.  So, really, I have nothing to fear.  Now if only I could move that head knowledge to the rest of me.  It will take time again... but I'm sure it will happen.  It always does... just in time.