One Weird Thing About Me

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end."   ... Ecclesiastes 3:11


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Yesterday I read Judy's delightful post which listed six weird things about her. What a treat! And afterward I thought, "I should write a post about my own weird ways." But this morning it came to me, "Nah. I'd better just list one weird thing. My readers' shocked heads would pop all over their computers, and well, I wouldn't want that."

So here's just one weird thing about me:

1. For ten years--from the time my daughter was 4 until she was 14--I did not hold one single baby in my arms.

Not one. Not even while attending church all those years more faithfully than even the pastor and being surrounded by women having babies, like, every ten minutes.

Why not? Because by the year Naomi turned 4, I'd pretty much realized I was unable to have another baby, at least, the old-fashioned way. It just wasn't happening. And not being ok with that at only 25 years old, it would shake me for days each time I held someones baby at church.

So I stopped. I simply ceased holding babies for ten whole years.

Though, I shouldn't say 'simply', for it became tricky wheedling out of it. If I was asked if I wanted to hold the latest baby, my instant response became, "Oh! Let Tom hold her please? He absolutely loves to hold tiny babies. He'd considered it a treat." (Fortunately that was truth. Tom could hold babies from breakfast till midnight and not have one, "I wanna carry this baby home!" feeling.) 

Fast-forward ten years. There I was at a Christmas party at our pastor's house and late in the evening, a woman stepped up to me with her baby and asked if I'd hold her while she got her coat. Well, the fear and great hesitation must have shown in my eyes because the mom said, "Don't worry! I'll hurry and get it."

Finally, there was no way out. I mean, what was I going to say? "No, I can't hold your baby! I haven't held one for ten years because I'm afraid of the yearning which will come with it."? (I did consider saying that, though. heh.).

No, she handed me little Chrissy. I held her. And I felt fine. Fine! 

No yearnings, no anything. Soon I even smiled hugely because all that came to me was, "Man, remember how much work new babies are? The constant laundry, sleepless nights, exhaustion. Whew. Glad those days have passed." I stood there looking into Chrissy's face, rejoicing that now--finally--I could hold any baby in the future--and be la de da hunky dory.

And ever since that day? I, too, could hold babies all day, then gladly release them. 

Now you know I must slip a lesson into this silly story, right?

--Never should I try forcing someone to do what they're not ready to, nor form ignorant opinions about their inability to do it, either. God arranged a no-way-out for me to begin holding babies again. He 'repaired me' in His time.

And only God knows when the people in our lives are ready for their breakthroughs, also. Only He can make those kinds of permanent changes.

"But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."  2 Peter 3:8



Oh! And an important note: 

A major reason I could easily hold the baby? I'd long before come to accept that I was meant to have just one child. Seriously. I'd just forgotten to tell my "can't hold babies part of my brain" that fact. heh. It had become a habit and really! How wonderful to break that habit.



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