I am now pro vanilla syrup in my lattes.
And white wine if the meal or the mood calls for it.
I am anti top sheet.
I quit therapy.
I bought a matching pajama set.
I started therapy back up again.
I own some land.
I think I’m entering my hat era and I feel great about it.

These things may feel trivial to you because they are, but I’ve spent a lot of time over the last two years trying to re-learn what I like and want and care about and the more the list gets refined the more the haze of my biological role of procreation lifts a bit.

When I was three weeks postpartum with Penny I wrote this list on my phone:

I forgot about it until just now, sitting down to write this, thinking about how hard it is to want things, but I stand by each one. And that’s because I’m learning myself well enough again to agree with me, finally.

I hear a lot of women talk about “finding themselves again” after having children. And I resonate deeply with the loss that suggests.

Becoming a mother has been the single best thing I’ve ever done and it has been utterly disorienting in almost every aspect of my life. It’s just taken me a few years to realize it.

And much of the time I’ve spent away from this space has gone toward working my way back. Not to the pre-baby version of me because she is gone. Like a character in a book I read and loved once but can never open again in case it doesn’t hold up.

But back to some kind of home within myself. A true north or place of self-assuredness that I left years ago without knowing it.

I don’t say any of this out of sadness or feigned martyrdom. I’m not feeling wistful or waxing poetic. It’s just a fact.

A curiosity more than anything. A wandering within myself, to myself, through myself that has somehow felt both profound and playful all at once.

Learning How to Be

Both of my postpartum seasons were filled with eight thousand ideas about what I should do with my life.

Become an esthetician! No, a therapist! Start a YouTube channel. Start a business. Start a(nother) book. Move to Utah. But also to Austin? Pick tennis back up. And French. And find a spiritual director. And then become a spiritual director. Consider homeschooling. Or pottery. Tell Ryan we’re getting chickens.

You get it.

The confusion, I think, is a mix of wondering how I can have these tiny angel humans in my care and still spend most of my time as an accountant (???) AND seeing the perfect, pink embodiment of how precious life truly is and wondering if I’m spending mine well.

And the answer, I think, is a contradiction.

Because on the one hand, I’ve never been less sure about who I’m supposed to be. And at the same time, being a mother is the most me I’ve ever felt.

I love motherhood so much more than I could’ve ever imagined. AND it pushes me even further into myself, wanting to know so much more about this person that is the mother of these two beautiful girls.

That juxtaposition felt like tension for a long time. An unsettledness in both knowing and not at all knowing who I am or want to be.

But recently I’ve started to wonder if what feels like tension might actually be balance. If this all too domestic dichotomy might be keeping me (mostly) level. Not letting me fall too deeply into the knowing or the not knowing, but rather, safely staying afloat, steady in the acceptance that not all questions require answers.

Learning to Lose

This revelation, like most I think, is one born of loss.

The loss of so many things. Like the idea that purpose is something that needs to be found. Or that identity is some static thing that needs to be defined.

At its core, it’s the loss of a need for certainty.

Which for me, is a deep and unearthing loss. Because I LOVE certainty. I crave it.

I’ve spent many years convincing myself that uncertainty only exists for those unwilling to do the brave work of overthinking everything all of the time!!!

I’ve also, I now realize, spent years of my life conflating the roles of faith and certainty. As if they were two sides of the same coin. As if one couldn’t exist without the other.

I wasn’t comfortable with a faith that didn’t exist within the security of absolutes. I couldn’t understand it. When I read that faith is the assurance of things unseen (Heb 11:1), I stood pretty heavily on the assurance part. Conviction, inerrancy, and so forth.

When something happened I couldn’t make sense of, I’d roll it around in my mind until I understood it. Tumbling the stones of loss and broken things. Polishing their rough edges into pretty pet rocks I could stack and categorize and put on a keychain.

The stones of certainty. Of everything having a reason, a purpose, a place in the Great Order of Things.

Stones etched with a well worn evangelical narrative:

If I lost something, it was a lesson from God to teach me to rely on Him more.
If a decision felt unclear, it was an opportunity to grow in discernment.
If I was asked to endure something painful, it was so I might be able to encourage others in that same situation one day.

Everything could be reasoned away. Everything was certain. Most of all, me.

The technical term for all this is epistemic complacency.

I never questioned my own logic; I reinforced it through well-rehearsed comfort verses and shared stories of “redemption” and all the other ways we tie up brokenness with twine and lace and call it good.

I stacked my stones, one on top of the other, building a wall of protection against anything and everything I might not understand.

When we were last here together that wall had just fallen down around me. The loss of our unborn baby became the one rock I couldn’t tumble into meaning.

I wouldn’t - and won’t - accept any great purpose in the loss of our son’s life.

And the snag of that thread unraveled the entire blanket of certainty-veiled-in-faith I’d sewn into my skin for so many years.

The unraveling happened fast and wide and quiet. I was angry and lonely and deeply, deeply confused.

And the mess of it all just, lingered. It lingers still.

But of all the unlearning I’ve done since that day, the worst and most merciful was releasing that addiction to certainty. Letting go of the need to understand.

Which is great, because I still don’t and likely never will.

If I think too hard about that loss or hear of another family walking through a similar struggle, I am right back in the wide angry quiet of it all and I don’t pretend there’s any resolution or redemption or twine and lace to be found here.

I just finally seem to know (again) that God doesn’t operate through transactional sanctification.

He isn’t cold. He isn’t just sitting around waiting to teach us the harsh lessons of life and dying to self. His methods aren’t dressed in misery.

Most of life is just a gift and He delights in giving it.

I know this because we’re potty training Jo and every time she pees in the potty she gets a wizzy fizzy star that turns the toilet water purple or blue.

And I give her that star each time because I love her.

I want her to learn. I want it to feel fun, to feel safe.
I am rooting for her. (I am rooting for our carpets too.)

And I am not a better parent than God.

He is not looking for ways to punish us.

I’m not sure what the divine equivalent of wizzy fizzy stars would be but I’m guessing it’s something like baby yawns and browned butter and that look your spouse gives you from across the room when someone says something unhinged and you know you’ll get to laugh about it together on the way home.

He doesn’t give us stones when we ask for fish. No matter how hard we try to collect them.

Learning To Let Go

There’s just so much not-knowing. Who I am, what I’m supposed to be doing, what I want, how to mother, what to have faith in, why any of it happens.

And I’ve spent so much of my adult life desperate for certainty, desperate to know more when all along the invitation was to know less. To be less convinced of things. To try to convince other people of things less too.

To just, receive. To accept. Heavy on the things unseen part.

And if you’re like, well duh that’s what faith has always been, I’m like, OK you’re right!

But it’s so much more about the unlearning itself than it is about the conclusion.

It’s the process. It’s the digging out of the false sense of security, the sandcastles built and lost and built again.

Faith isn’t just believing what we can’t see, it’s unbelieving what we can.

It’s letting go of the person I’ve told you and myself and even my husband that I am so I can simply find out who is there underneath it all.

It’s no longer trying to find my purpose and my calling and my one-true-path and instead simply looking down at my feet, taking off my shoes, feeling the wet mud of this trodden way between my toes, and taking another step.

Learning to Love

I spent decades trying to will myself to believe that I was willing to lose everything for the sake of Christ because the Bible tells me so.

I believed that pain was sanctification. That loss was tough love from a good God. That loving anything too much was a surefire way to ask God to take it away from you in order to not sin! Not have idols! Not be a bad person!

But the hard-wired biology of motherhood and the excruciating love I feel for my children has finally opened my eyes to see that the most compulsive act of love isn’t to take away but to give.

Not to compare my love for my kids to God’s love for us (although, idk maybe?), but just to say that if He created this kind of love, if He IS love and by extension everything I feel for these ravenously needy girls of mine is OF Him and BY Him and WITH Him then my desperation to give and to give and to give to them has to mean that it is His desperation too.

Not because we * don’t * take away - I’ll scoop up those magnatiles in a heartbeat if it means safety or redirection for Jo. But only if absolutely necessary. Only if everything else didn’t work. And only with a sadness I share with her in that small loss because I hate to do it.

I’m on a tangent now.

I think my point is that I spent so long trying not to love anything too much out of fear that it would tip over into idolatry and God, being GOOD, would take it away.

And now I’m convinced that that’s a terribly reductive and inaccurate view of how He operates (thank God!!!!) and now I can love good things as much as I want and that kind of unrestraint feels so wild in my body.

Sometimes when Jo is excited about something new, she opens her mouth as wide as it can go and shakes all over because she doesn’t know how to express it and that’s exactly how I feel all the time now.

I take one look at her curls or Penny’s blue eyes or the laugh lines on Ryan’s face that I feel largely responsible for and I just can’t. fucking. take. the goodness of it and the fact that that doesn’t scare me anymore is an absolute wildflower field of joy within me.

Learning to Receive

What I’m trying to say is, I’ve been really, really wrong about how God loves us and that’s such a funny place to be at 36.

I’m trying to know Him again. While also trying to know myself.

I’m learning my children as they grow and change and learn to turn sounds into syllables into words into songs.

I’m learning how to mother as a whole person. How to steward a curiosity in them about themselves and life and the world around us as an outflow of my own. How to answer Jo’s seven thousandth “why” of the day with “I don’t know” and let that feel like home in my body.

Because I don’t know. I don’t know why the feral cat that tiptoes behind our breakfast nook window is grey and not black. I don’t know why we can’t eat rocks. I don’t know why Daniel Tiger isn’t wearing pants.

I don’t know why potty training is so hard. I don’t know why it feels excruciating to love these little humans so much. I don’t know why miscarriages happen. I don’t know how we move forward.

But we do.

Unlearning as we go. Scraping our knees on all the uncertainty. Letting the blood wash it all away.

Let’s catch up.

I haven’t stepped back into this space in a while and while I’d love to sound romantic and writer-y and tell you my soul has been aching to write during this absence, the truth is, it’s only been the last week or two I’ve felt like writing at all.

I didn’t intentionally set out to step back from this space – I just…did.

Due in large part to my suffocating need to feel like I have things sorted out spiritually before I put pen (fingertips) to paper (greasy keys).

When I left you, I was in a pretty dark place.

I shared a winding, convoluted thought maze about the purpose of suffering and the intentions of God that barely made sense and never resolved and then I just BOUNCED.

And I guess I didn’t know how to step back into this space until I’d sorted those things out.

Which – great news – I still have not done.

And I’m starting to think maybe I just won’t (??).

Does anyone? (This is not rhetorical!)

So instead, I’ve been spending the last few months figuring out how to be a human who doesn’t understand the purpose of suffering and the intentions of God.

How to be someone who exists in that absence, that mystery.

And it’s silly, because when I really think about it, I’m not sure I understood those things before all this came to a head last year either.

I just, I guess (?), thought I did.

Or maybe life was simply easier for a while — a long, gentle season of not-really-suffering that I drifted through, blissfully unaware of how much these questions would matter to me someday.

But when that lull finally lifted — when suffering became personal and real and smothering — it leveled me.

And suddenly, I wasn’t just confused.
I was untethered.

I didn’t know how to be a person who couldn’t make sense of it all.
I didn’t know how to live in the absence of such deeply-needed answers.

And that sent me into a spirally, messy mix of anger, confusion, grief, loneliness, and apathy all at once.

The dark, twisty place, as Meredith Grey would call it.

Lately, that spiral seems to have slowed down a bit.

Not because I’ve found any resolution, not really.

I still feel confused about a lot of things.

I still don’t have answers for the questions I really, really want answered.

I still say things to Ryan like, “well I’m in a weird place spiritually but we should pray about that.”

But it feels as if a quiet, a steadiness has started to seep up from the ground around me and in my exhaustion or wisdom or both, I’m just trying not to fight it.

Maybe it’s the warmer weather.

Maybe it’s the Easter season.

Maybe it’s the baby kicks I feel throughout the day reminding me of new, whole, miraculous life happening within me.

Maybe it’s grace.

Either way, I’m just thankful to be standing for a bit.

Still surrounded by all my questions and doubts and fears and grief – but steadier, maybe.

At least for today.

Maybe that’s enough.

SOME OTHER THINGS

I’m Growing A Baby

At the time of writing this, I’m 26 weeks pregnant with baby girl #2.

I feel huge and immensely grateful.

Sometimes I’ll snuggle up in bed with Jo and put one hand on my belly and just think, I couldn’t possibly be happier than this. Just me and my girls. (With Ryan and Hudson nearby, of course).

That said, I’m still fighting some deeply rooted anxiety around loss, even as I round the corner into the third trimester.

We’ve been given nothing but clean reports from all our various scans and tests around baby’s health.

Because of Jo’s heart condition, we were seen by a specialist to rule out any potential heart complications for little sister, and thankfully, they haven’t seen anything concerning this time around.

Still, the fear and fragility are ever close to me. On good days, keeping me humble towards the immense miracle that is new life. On bad days, keeping me paralyzed with darkly shaded what-if’s I just can’t seem to shake.

Not much to be done but to carry on – keep bouncing on my little pregnancy ball and going on walks and melting every time Jo calls the new baby “cuppy” because she can’t pronounce baby’s actual name (any guesses??).

My app says 14 weeks to go. And that baby is the size of a bunch of kale. And that mom is the size of Jupiter (ok, it doesn’t say that).

But we’ll both take all the prayers for health and peace and safety that you want to send our way.

We’re Moving! Or, We’re Not!

I’ll spare you the long and boring back story of how we got to where we are today, but the TLDR version is that our house is currently on the market.

Ryan owned a house in a suburb of Dallas when we started dating (we love a financially minded man).

At that time, I refused to live there because its where I went to high school and I was still in my NYC CITY GIRL ERA and couldn’t bear the thought of moving back to my hometown where there’s no good coffee and too many people I used to know.

Fast forward a few years, we bought a house in Dallas proper and rented out the other one to friends. And it’s been the best.

We love our life here – we’re close to the lake and we love our church. We can walk to a playground from our house and we have so many good coffee shops nearby that we’re over budget every month on our coffee spend.

I adore this house. We brought Jo home to this house. We have a dingy garage gym set up that I love and an office Ryan and I get to share and oversized windows all throughout the living spaces streaked with natural light and tiny toddler finger prints.

But for a lot of reasons not worth going into – boring, “practical” things like interest rates! property taxes! school zoning! day care costs for two! – we think it might be time to lean into our suburban parent life and make the move to the coffee desert house.

I have all-the-mixed-feelings about it. We both do.

And also. We have absolutely no control over the outcome because either our house will sell (before the baby comes) or it won’t.

And the market and timing and economy is weird so it really feels like it could go either way.

So either we’re moving or we’re not.

Either we’ll never drink good coffee again or we’ll go broke on a fount of it.

Either we’re making a huge life change this spring or we aren’t making any change at all and we won’t know which one it is until we know.

The unsettledness about it all has been particularly difficult for my Type A, obsessive planner, “in a weird place spiritually but we should pray about this” self.

But…idk…I guess we’ll see?

Anyway, buy our house! Thx!

I Quit My Job

I don’t really talk about work much around here because it’s finance and that’s not the world’s most exciting topic.

But to make a long story less long, someone I worked for at my very first job in NYC reached out recently about a (remote) role at his new company and I couldn’t pass it up.

Six months pregnant is generally not the best time to change jobs, and it wasn’t exactly on my bingo card for this pregnancy.

But when something good seems to fall into your lap out of nowhere, it feels silly not to pay attention to it.

So, I did and here we are.

It’s a funny thing to be starting a new job during a season where it’s hard to be at “your best.”

Pregnancy brain is real. Third trimester exhaustion is real. Wanting to give 100% at both work and at home but not being able to do so simultaneously is very, very real.

But there’s something to be said for starting something new in a posture of humility and with an awareness of your limitations.

And as I continue to stumble through this whole working mom life thing, I’m thankful to be reminded that weakness and worthiness can exist at the same time.

And that showing up – even imperfectly – is enough.

A Partial List of Things I’ve Loved Lately

This mascara and this lip balm.

Family naps:

Some recent good reads: Lucy by the Sea, Intermezzo, The Most Fun We Ever Had, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

Farmer’s Market Bread:

Some pregnancy must-haves for anyone interested: this pregnancy pillow, this dress which I now own in 3 colors, these biker shorts, slip on shoes (humbling, but worth it).

This farro fatoush receip by caro chambers that I’ll be eating for lunch every day this week.

Washing all my produce on a Sunday.

And lots and lots of days like this:

OK, That’s All For Now

Thanks for catching up with me!

I’ll be back with more updates and unanswered questions in the coming weeks. In the meantime, hit reply to this email to say hello and let’s be friends on Instagram.

Ryan and I spent New Year’s Eve at the hotel in Austin where we got engaged. After hosting Christmas, we were excited for a little getaway just the two of us, and as Austin is only a few hours’ drive, it seemed like the perfect place to go.

We dropped Jo off at Nana’s for the night, tanked up the car with gas and ourselves with coffee, and hit the road.

Ryan is many things: a fairly good driver, a present and warm father, a source of quiet fortitude in our family, a deviled egg enthusiast. But he is also, as shown by the artwork in our home, the random YouTube videos he watches late at night, even the song that was playing when he proposed to me at the aforementioned hotel in Austin, a massive Radiohead fan.

I, decidedly, am not.

Before marrying into this world, I knew the song Creep (because everyone does) and that was the sum total extent of my knowledge of the band.

Ryan, on the other hand, knows everything about them. (Ok, probably not everything – I can feel him rolling his eyes at this while reading it. He’s not like, a weirdly big Radiohead fan. He’s just a big Radiohead fan, ya know?)

I mean, we have multiple coffee table books in our living room dedicated to their music and album art, so, you decided.

All this to say, on our drive down to Austin that day, we found ourselves listening to a two hour podcast all about the history of Radiohead and their music.

Now, for those of you who, like me, are normal – that is to say, are not huge Radiohead fans – here are some quick hitter facts about the band that will change your life in no way other than to set the stage for what I’m trying to write about today:

• They’ve released nine studio albums between the years of 1993-2016

• They’re largely regarded as one of the most influential bands in history

• Their music is…complex / advanced / intricate? They employ a lot of unconventional structures and time signatures in their music that other bands just simply weren’t doing at the time (according to the podcast!!).

It’s interesting to hear explained, even as someone who has no real emotional connection to their music, but the part that really stuck with me, and the point I’m taking an extremely long time making, is the question of purpose that was asked all throughout the episode.

The host was interviewing a Radiohead expert and music theorist (is that a thing?) and really focused in on a lot of the “easter eggs” you can find in their music.

I won’t go into too many details here because I’m sure you, like me, don’t really care! But it’s the idea that certain combinations of time signatures, lyrics, and even the sequencing of songs across albums seem to add layers of meaning.

And the host kept asking the interviewee expert guy, do you think they did that on purpose?

To which he responded, multiple times, I don’t really think it matters.

His stance was that the magic of the music and all the various nuances and layers therein was beautiful and meaningful and all the things fans tout it to be regardless of whether or not those choices were deliberate.

The significance didn’t depend on the intentionality.

My faith in this season has felt a bit worse for the wear.

It’s not something I’ve talked much about with anyone other than my therapist and a little with Ryan because it feels very vulnerable to say outloud, especially when things haven’t exactly resolved.

For a while, I wasn’t even sure how to name it, really. Christians like to use words like “distance” or “drought” when describing this kind of thing but neither of those felt fitting.

The word that feels closest is unsettled. That feeling of walking back into a room you’ve been in a hundred times before and suddenly everything just feels slightly askew. Like the picture frames were rearranged or the furniture all moved one inch to a left and no one seems to notice it but you.

That’s what my faith has felt like recently. And the most frustrating part was that I couldn’t understand or explain why.

Until that moment – sitting on some random stretch of I-35 listening to that random woman on that random podcast ask the question, does it matter?

And I realized I’ve been asking that question for years and am only now starting to care about the answer.

My spiritual journey (ugh, forgive the phrase) has been a wandering one, for sure. I was raised peripherally evangelical, came to Christ in earnest at a hardcore frozen-chosen presbyterian church in college, did a stint at a mega church in Dallas, another at a more charismatic one in NYC, and finally settled in the Anglican church where we baptized our baby and plan to stick it out for a while.

This to say, my exposure to, comprehension of, willingness to struggle with, and general tolerance for questions of free will, predestination, and other light topics has been…broad.

And in that breadth, I realize I’d taken a pacifying comfort in answering the question does it matter with a whole and hearty maybe!

When it came to certain events or circumstances, happenings in my life — losses, coincidences, griefs, heartaches, joys — I was constantly questioning whether or not that thing was specifically ordained by a sovereign, all-knowing God or was simply something that happened within the bounds of free will that God had then “used” for some other purpose in my life.

The Calvinist presbys I used to run with would say it’s the former.

The southern evangelicals, on the other hand, seem to be addicted to the latter. To this idea that God uses everything in our lives to draw us closer to Him.

You’re experiencing something difficult? You’re being refined.

You’ve been taken down a notch or two in life? You’re being taught humility.

You’ve come across financial difficulties? You’re learning the gift of relying on God.

You’ve been hurt so deeply you feel you can’t trust anyone? Trust me to tell you that now you will be holy enough to put your trust in God.

It’s an idea that’s aligned with scripture, to be sure. God disciplines his sons – we see that in multiple places in scripture and at times, this has been a comfort to me.

As someone who desires a closeness with God, refinement and humility and reliance and trust in Him are beautiful gifts to be given.

But at some point, that quickness to assign meaning to whatever hardship I was facing devolved into an expectation of sorts. That a hard lesson was coming just as soon as I got too comfortable in any one thing.

If I feel convicted about my spending, I assume Ryan or I will lose our jobs in order to teach us to be better stewards.

If I experience a season of doubt or disillusionment or just a general lack of discipline in spiritual things, I start looking for the next loss that will surely come my way to “draw me back” to a closeness with God.

Somehow the idea of God using all things for our good and His glory has turned into a constant anticipation of when the other spiritual shoe will drop.

It’s a tension I’ve struggled through but largely quieted in my spirit for a long time with the pacifying assumption that the answer is probably multi-faceted and maybe too mysterious to wrap my head around.

Without knowing it, I’d asked myself the question, does it matter, and answered, surprisingly, I don’t think so?

Until I experienced a loss I could only make sense of on one side of that coin. A miscarriage at 12 weeks — a loss that swept me off my feet in a way I’m still not really recovered from.

And in grappling with that loss, I wrestled through purpose and pain, grief and loneliness, deep sadness I hadn’t experienced in quite some time, and an accidental stumbling into the realization that suddenly, the answer did matter to me.

Because if the loss was by design, if it was ordained such that it would be a useful tool in drawing me or Ryan or whomever further towards God, I no longer accept the terms on which that arrangement stands.

I simply cannot allow for an innocent life to be lost so that I can be a better Christian.

And I know that’s a vast oversimplification.

I know it’s much more nuanced than that.

I know that the mystery of God and of suffering is not as binary as this argument of - intentional or not - which is an extended version, I think of - free will or not - and if it is, then it isn’t something we as humans are capable of answering in full. Not really.

But if you’re asking me - or rather, if I’m asking myself - does it matter, and the answer in this case is a resounding yes, it goddamn matters, then where does that leave me when the answer is likely unanswerable?

Unsettled, for one thing.

In a room full of uneven picture frames and furniture just slightly off center.

Because I am not interested in a faith that involves simply running around and putting bandaids on everyone’s pain with ideas of the SuPeR VaLuAbLe lesson they’re learning in return.

Nor am I interested in a faith that’s simply a constant recalibration of my “holiness” and a battery of refining experiences in response. (And also, aren’t we already made perfect in that whole now and not yet kind of way through Christ??)

But am I interested in one where shit just happens willy nilly and God’s role is to come in after the fact and just try to make the most of things?

Am I interested in following a God who’s just kinda working with what He’s been given, circumstantially speaking?

Probably not.

Which is good news, since I don’t think those are the only two options.

But the third option - which is to say, likely the right one - continues to elude me.

Did Thom Yorke (lead singer of Radiohead for all you non-fans) write those specific lyrics to pair with that specific time sequence or was there no deliberate connection and Radiohead fans have been merely created meaning out of something accidental for years and years?

Do bad things happen to us in a broken world because God designed it to be that way (whether by direct intention or the allowance of the enemy’s schemes or whatever other spiritual explanation we want to emphasize) or do they just simply happen and Christians are so obsessed with having answers for everything that we play God and assign our own meaning to our pain?

Is it discipline or is it what man intended for evil God intended for good (Gen 50:20)?

If you read that verse in earnest, it appears that man’s intentions and God’s intentions for the same act can coexist and contradict.

Which, one could assume, might be that elusive third option we’ve been hunting for. Maybe two things can be true at the same time. But whose intention came first, the chicken’s or the egg’s? Thom’s or the fans’? God’s or mine?

Does it matter?

I think so.

And if you’ve read this far hoping I’d wrap this up with a satisfactory answer to the various questions I’ve hung on this crumbling hearth, I’ve got unfortunate news for you.

Instead, I was actually hoping to crowdsource some thoughts on this. Knowing, of course, that we likely aren’t going to solve the problem of sin and suffering here on this Substack.

But I have to imagine that if you are a human navigating faith and loss and life in the way I think all of us are, I bet you’ve thought about this at some point. I bet you’ve experienced some deep and terrible loss and considered the why of it all. I bet you’ve questioned what you’re “supposed to be learning” when faced with some kind of challenge. I bet you’ve heard Creep at least once in the last decade and maybe even sung along with the chorus.

And if at least one of those things is true, I would love to know how you’d answer the question, does it matter?

Because of the many things I do not know in this unsettled season, I do know that the struggle to fight for truth and clarity and discernment does, in fact, very much matter.

And I hope to continue to foster a space here where we fight that fight with the freedom to speak openly, a willingness to be wrong, grace towards poorly formed arguments (hi, it’s me), and faith in a God who is not afraid of our questions.

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Ah yes, the season of beautifully curated gift guides is upon us.

If you're looking for a list of overpriced trinkets handpicked by influencers who do this kind of thing for a living, rest assured—you’re in the wrong place.

This is not that.

This is my Slightly Unhinged Holiday Gift Guide.

A guide for the impossible people on your list. The ones who say they don’t want anything (but will definitely you if you oblige). The ones who you normally just get a puzzle because it’s too hard to think of something more personal.

So, if you’re tired of sifting through lists of $200 candles and artisanal butter, buckle up.

Specifically, I’m here to help you shop for:

• the person who pronounces croissant the "right" way

• the person who got really into CrossFit for a week

• the person who overuses the phrase "gut health"

• the mom who only texts in emojis

• the overachieving holiday host

• the basic betch that’s in all of us

• the person who’s made coffee their entire personality (me!)

• the dad who doesn’t need another wallet

(Full collection here.)

If you can think of any other niche personality types you have on your list this year, comment them below and I’ll do a part 2.

Happy 2-day shipping!

And not that you asked, but if you need some ideas for YOU, here’s what’s on my wishlist this year:

• Rothy’s casual clog a la daycare drop off chic

• Aesop soap and lotion because I don’t want to spend the money on this but I also want to have it by my kitchen sink, ya know?

• Necessaire shampoo & conditioner set because adulthood is boring

• Necessaire body wash (see above)

• This Braiser in white.

• Stitchy bc omg how cool!

• A spa day, always, and alway here

• A new devotional - but idk which one so send me ideas!!

Ok, that’s all for today.

Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, eat lots of pie, and take big fat naps because I think we’ve all earned that this year!!!

I cut my finger on the top of a yogurt tub yesterday and bled an accidental trail from the kitchen to the letter J on my desk keyboard.

If someone wanted to murder me this would be a great time to do it as I doubt they’d solve the case due to sheer distraction.

Victim was making a snack! Victim was typing an email! Victim’s commute to work is roughly ten yards and littered with dog hair, protein bar wrappers, a spare AirPod, blood. 

They’d probably look to Ryan first — it’s always the husband, after all. But they’d quickly realize that underneath that great, rugged beard is a wildly gentle soul without the capacity for harm.

Plus, I’m pretty sure he still loves and likes me. Mystery unsolved.

There’s no warning on the yogurt tub about injuries. McDonald’s coffee cups warn you that coffee is hot. Pharmaceutical commercials warn you that heart burn medicine may cause death. And somewhere, RFK is screaming into the void warnings about every single food you didn’t grow in your own backyard, composted with your own manure. 

But yogurt tubs warn you of nothing other than their own expiration — a date that is somehow always too soon. Big dairy, amirite?

I admit, I have a bit of a flare for the dramatic. I’m a middle child, so its latent birth order trauma, I bet. But I’m telling you, though this is one of those cuts that is so small it looks absolutely ridiculous to anyone you complain to about it (Ryan), it genuinely hurts all the time.

It’s on the tip of my pointer finger. Easily the second best finger.

This morning alone I’ve used to it put in my contacts, wipe Jo’s nose 100 times, slice her strawberries into pieces small enough I won’t have anxiety about her choking, and type every Y, H, N, I, J, U, and M in this post.

If my mom were here, she would dutifully express sympathy for what I’m going through and then recommend putting alcohol on it to take the sting out. A remedy for most of our childhood ailments, which inevitably burned worse than the injury itself.

If you were really lucky, she’d prescribe hydrogen peroxide instead. A highly favorable trade off. No sting! Fun bubbles! Cute bandaid!

But alcohol was the far more common sentencing. A cotton ball the all too willing executioner.

There’s some kind of irony in drowning your pain in more pain to hopefully feel less pain — some kind of metaphor to unpack there.

But metaphors always feel a bit heavy handed to me. And I’m still not sure I really know what irony is (despite how often I’ve relished in quoting the only good movie Will Ferrell ever made, “dramatic irony - it’ll fuck you every time”).

I haven’t written much since I wrote about the miscarriage. A very different kind of post, a very different kind of pain, quite a bit more blood, no yogurt that I can remember.

I’ve been a bit lost since then, creatively. Also, physically, spiritually, chronologically even. How long has it been? What month is it now? How old would our son have been today? 

Mostly, I think I just wasn’t sure how to follow a post like that. What do you write about next? Like, hey everyone quick update im doing great only crying myself to sleep every now and then but mostly fine and be sure to send me your address for Christmas cards!

No one likes a downer, least of all me. Especially when there’s already so much sad going around what with elections and disease and going home for the holidays. 

Not to mention consumerism, the decline of handwriting, broken promises from self-help books, the expiration of novelty, illiteracy, lost mail, iPods, all the missing hair ties, cyber trucks. 

How do we put alcohol on those things? What kind of burn do we need to endure to take the sting out of all of that pain? And, seriously, where are all the fucking hair ties?

The worst part about this kind of pain (I’m talking about the finger again now) is the dullness of it. At least when it was bleeding it was kind enough to be productive. To do something. To make its presence known.

It’s the lingering inactivity of it that I find so hard to endure, so incredibly boring.

It lies in wait, just long enough that I start to forget, and I then I have the audacity to do something like press the elevator button at the mall and the pain is all like, AHA! you thought you could GO somewhere without me? Not on my watch!

I guess what I mean to say is, the pain wont let me leave it behind.

It just…finds me.

When I’m standing in the checkout line at Whole Foods.
Or finishing up a yoga class.
Or joining a Zoom call.
Or reading a book to my daughter. 
Or buying Christmas tchotchkes at Home Goods.
Or scrambling eggs.
Or opening the yogurt.

The pain sneaks back up, bloodless, invisible, desperate to not be forgotten.

And of course, of course, I don’t want to forget.

But the whiplash of how it finds me, paired with the boredom, paired with all the other things that currently exist that one could be sad about, paired with all the feelings of “should I be over this by now?” — it hurts my neck.

(We all know I’ve stopped talking about the finger now, right?)

And maybe that’s why I haven’t written in a while. My neck is too sore from all the turning and tightening. My keyboard still a bit too stained by blood.

I don’t know how to put alcohol on this wound. I don’t how to take the sting out or how to feel about trying to open the yogurt again.

I think maybe I just want my mom. And my non-murderous husband. And a little more time to heal. And maybe a safer snack.

Victim has sworn off yogurt! And elevators! Victim is busying herself with Christmas cards and table decorations! Victim will be back to her writing one of these days!

And I will. I promise.

There’s no soft or eloquent way to start this post, so I’ll just say it as abruptly as it happened — last Wednesday, I was 12 weeks pregnant and by Thursday, I wasn’t pregnant at all.

I went to see my midwives Wednesday afternoon to assuage my anxiety after some light spotting. It was totally normal, they told me, but let me come in for an ultrasound anyway.

I was prepared to leave there feeling relieved and maybe a little bit silly for overreacting. But I hadn’t spotted at all my first pregnancy and my anxiety wasn’t letting it go, so I was happy to trade in some chill mom chips in exchange for a little reassurance.

Our nanny wasn’t available that day, so we brought Jo with us to the appointment. Ryan held her as such fussed and fidgeted while the sonographer placed the jelly and the big wand and told me just to breathe.

It was my second ultrasound of this pregnancy.

The first had been at 7 weeks, confirming what the digital tests had told me - life, new life, small and sturdy. Heartbeat strong.

But this time was different. That life had ended without me knowing it. The baby was still there, the heartbeat was not.

We left in shock with instructions to just wait and let my body “do its thing.”

To say I fell apart would be an understatement. A loss of that magnitude is simply too much to hold.

That night, we went to bed early. I watched baking videos on YouTube while trying to stop crying. I heard Ryan’s rhythmic breathing beside me and eventually that or the baking lulled me into sleep.

Jo woke up around 3 - not entirely uncommon as she’s never been a great sleeper. I got up to walk to the nursery, preparing for our usual routine, some gentle rocking, me humming you are my sunshine until she settles.

But on my way to her room I felt things start to spin. I was sweating and shivering at the same time and then looked down to realize the bleeding had finally caught up. A horrible relief that the wait wouldn’t be long. 

I woke Ryan to tag in for Jo duty and asked for a towel and some water when he returned. And then I sat in my bed, alone at 3am, and felt my child draining from me. 

I’ll spare you the details of what followed but it was graphic, violent. And so it should be, I suppose. Death has never been gentle. It is deep and visceral. It is garish and vile. 

I know the statistics around miscarriage. 1 in 4 pregnancies. 25%. I knew them when I was pregnant with Jo and I knew them this time too.

I knew them when I took the test and lost it over the sight of the word “pregnant” because I couldn’t believe how lucky we were to have another.

I knew them when I put Jo in a Big Sister onesie to surprise Ryan with the news.

I knew them when we told our families and closest friends.

I knew them when we learned it was a boy - a son - and we laid in bed watching Lost and trying out all the male characters’ names against Jarrell. 

I knew them. 1 in 4. 25% in the first trimester.

But we’d made it to Week 12. We were so close to the end of that window. I’d started to let go of the fear. I thought we’d made it to the other side.

That’s the thing about statistics. We love to spout them off as if they matter, as if they mean something.

I think they give us a sense of control - a feeling of agency in the prison of uncertainty in which we live. 

But they don’t. They don’t give us anything.

Because when it comes down to it, the odds for you are either 0 or 100%. You’re either the 1 or the other 3. Your baby will either live or it just fucking won’t.

I fell back asleep at some point that night with Hudson at my feet and Ryan’s hand on my arm. A gesture so small it wouldn’t be worthy of mention except that being held in that moment, even just at the elbow, by the one person I needed - I need - most in this world might’ve been the only thing holding me together while my body split itself into parts.

It’s so common, I know, to lose a baby in that first precious third of a pregnancy. So common that I bet you’ve thought of at least two people you know while reading this who’ve experienced it. So common that one of those 2 people might be you. 

And yet, the loss is so personal, so intimate, which is to say, so goddamn lonely, that the idea of it being so common feels somehow worse. 

It’s like there’s a room full of women who’ve all been through this similar, horrible thing but none of us can hear each other over the static of loss.

Like each of us is standing in a box made of glass. Stacked in rows next to each other. Surrounded, but trapped.

People talk about how common this kind of loss is as if it might help somehow. Like there might be some comfort in knowing how frequently this happens, how normal it is. 

But there’s nothing comforting about thinking of the millions of other women who’ve laid in bed feeling their child rip away from their insides. There’s nothing normal about hoards of us who have to endure this loss while measuring our own bleeding to make sure it isn’t “too much.”

It is too much. Any amount. Any life lost. Any one of us having to house and feel and witness and, unbelievably, dispose of the loss itself. 

I take no solace in the sameness of our suffering. It doesn’t matter how many women are in this room with me when the room shouldn’t exist in the first place. 

Normally this is the part where I start to tie things up with some spiritual ribbon of hope or grace and we all leave here on a good note. 

But I don’t think I can do that this time.

If I’m honest, I’m pretty pissed at God right now. (Don’t worry, He’s aware.) And I have no words of comfort to offer on our way out. 

So, I will offer someone else’s words instead. In the hopes that maybe they will encourage anyone else standing in a glass box today. In the hopes that maybe, one day, they will encourage me too.

Leader: O Christ Who Gathered
Children in Your Arms, 

You know our ache. You know this void
no human words can fill. 

You understand this grief for our little one,
lost while in the womb. 

You were witness to our rising joy.
You saw our crumbling hope.
Now you behold our sinking sorrow. 

People: Christ, be merciful, for we are frail.
And in our frailty we have suffered such loss. 

Heavenly Father, see what room our love had already
carved out—in our home and in our hearts—for
the welcome and the wonder of
this child, whose face we had not kissed,
and whose tiny hands we had not held,
but who had already grown so precious to us. 

Were we not radiant with anticipation, O Lord,
building forward to the day when we would
finally meet and cradle our sweet child? 

Only to be met instead with this cratering
heartache of sudden loss, this unexpected
death of our little one before birth; and with it
this dying of dreams for all that might have been.
Christ, be merciful for we are frail.
And in our frailty we have suffered such loss. 

For here we have entered a communion, O Lord,
a fellowship none have ever wished to join, of all
mothers and fathers and families across time
who have wept for their lost children. 

We lament so much that now will never be.
This child we lost will be for us in this life like
a song unsung, and a story untold. 

Christ, be merciful, for we are frail.
And in our frailty we have suffered such loss. 

The petitioners sit a moment in the silence of this grief. 

And yet, even in our deep loss, O Lord,
you have not abandoned us
or left us without light and hope. 

For we remember how you, Jesus, loved and
welcomed little ones, touching their heads and
blessing them, declaring that the
kingdom of heaven belonged to these. 

And you have told us that your promises
are for us and for our children. 

And this one whom we lost, was this not
also our child, O God? 

Our hearts ache even to ponder such things,
but is it possible that when all creation is
made new, we will find fellowship there with one
we could not hold in this life? 

Could the redemption of this world’s harms
run so deep? So beyond all imagining? 

Your word says little of such mysteries.
And yet, in what is revealed
we find good reason to take heart. 

Christ, be merciful, for we are frail.
And in our frailty we have suffered such loss. 

For even amidst uncertainty, this we know
to be true of your works, O Father, and this
we will cling to: 

Your grace, your mercy, your redemption, and
your love will extend further and will be more
wondrous in their perfection
than we have ever imagined. 

However we might try to conceive of such joys,
that conception will be either errant or
incomplete, because we, in our finite knowledge
and capacity for hope, will limit the picture we
paint in ways that you, in your limitless joy and
relentless grace, will never be bounded by. However
we might envision the redemption
of this loss, the actual redemption that you
effect will be still more glorious. 

So let us learn to steward well this holy sorrow,
assured that it is in some way the buried seed
of a flower that will blossom into eternity. 

O Christ, be merciful, for we are frail.
And in our frailty we have suffered such loss. 

Indeed, this future hope will not end
the pain we feel today. It does not negate
the emptiness of the womb where new life
stirred. It does not fill the empty cradle. 

But it does declare that the empty cradle
and the empty womb will not have power
to grieve us forever, for one day our eternal
joys will flow backward in time, even to this
broken place. And then those joys will fill every
emptiness and every heartbreak the children
of God have ever endured. 

Now, O Lord,
we remember your past faithfulness.
We receive your present comforts.
We await your future redemptions.
Let us, in this and in all sorrows,
be met by your lovingkindness
and consoled by your hope. 

For yours, O Father,
is the kingdom,
and the power,
and the glorious redemption
of all our losses. 

Even of this one. 

Amen. 

I’m having a crisis, of sorts.

I’m tempted to label it an identity crisis, because so much of it falls in the realm of how I view myself and who I want to be.

But I have a few issues with that phrase: identity crisis.

For starters, to have that kind of crisis would suggest that one is able to identify (intentional choice) their identity. And I’m more and more convinced with every additional year of learning myself and every additional person I meet, that we aren’t often able to truly do that.

We don’t really know who we are; we know who we think we are; we know who we think other people think we are. But those things are very often incongruent.

A topic for another day!

My second issue is a more personal one. It’s the 90’s evangelical voice inside of me that hears the word “identity” and immediately, Pavlovianly responds “in Christ!”.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with the idea of one knowing (learning? becoming convinced of? understanding?) their identity in Christ.

It’s just a phrase with too much baggage for me to navigate when I’m already having a crisis!

So, identity crisis is out.

The next option I considered is midlife crisis. An offensive, somewhat pejorative term as someone who does not identify (intentional choice still) as being mid-life, despite what my crows feet or birthday might suggest.

Midlife crises are for men who buy sports cars that look ridiculous and hook up with their secretaries to make themselves feel better about their hairlines and waning self importance.

It’s all very pedestrian. Which may not be an inaccurate word to describe what I’m currently going through, but I am not humble enough to admit it.

There are other options still: a crisis of faith, a career crisis, a hostage crisis, a family crisis, a national crisis!

But while some of them touch the edges of this feeling, not one of them describes it entirely.

In fact, the more I type the word “crisis” in this unnecessarily long introduction to today’s post, the less it looks and sounds like a word altogether.

I suppose now we have a crisis crisis.

Maybe I’ll just call it a funk.

Here’s the problem: I’ve come to a place in my life where I no longer have any idea what I want.

Or, maybe more accurately, where I want everything all at the same time.

I want it all. I want to reach the full potential of this career path I’ve been on for so long. I want to get that C-suite title. I want to get that C-suite paycheck and then be someone who perfectly stewards those resources and “doesn’t let it change her at all!” I also want to quit and start my own business. I want to take writing more seriously. Maybe start a podcast or an advice column. Maybe try the publishing route again. Surely, this time, it’ll take. I want to be someone who is content to trade her 9-5 for money and pursue the path of slow living in the 5-9. I also want my side hustles to grow, to throw my weight behind them, to see if they might be the missing piece to whatever puzzle I think I’m putting together. I want to open a bookstore or a coffee shop. I want to never see a calculator ever again.

I want to raise my family well. On a big piece of land where we work with our hands and bake fresh bread and spend our days outside and our nights around a fire. I want to live in a small town that hasn’t heard about inflation yet and to protect my kids from the white, suburban Dallas-ness around us where everyone drives luxury cars as soon as they turn 16. I also want to move back to the city and live in a too-small apartment with our stroller parked in the hall and learn to do more with less. I want a doorman that knows Jo’s name. I want the diversity and sounds and experiences of New York to educate and humble and refine us as a family. And I want us all to eat more plants, ideally grown by farmers in our area, with reputable practices and a respect for their land. But I also want spend wisely and the rate at which we go through blueberries around here does not support the purchasing of locally-grown, organic fruit.

I want to read more - alone and with Jo. I want her to learn more words and learn to love the feeling of a book in her hands as much as I do. But I also want her to play independently and, sue me, to watch Ms. Rachel while we make dinner so she’ll sit still for a second and maybe learn words that way too? I want to be the montessori, sensory box, wooden toys mom while also being the laid back, hand-me-downs, occasional screen time mom.

I want to date my husband again. And I want it to feel easy. I want a list of restaurants we’ve magically forgotten about that will make “what do you want to eat tonight” a question that doesn’t immediately illicit frustration. I want to feel nervous and flirty and, dare I say, hot getting ready for a night out with him, instead of him seeing me whitening my teeth while standing in my needs-to-be-thrown-out bra that still has milk stains on it from nursing.

I want to slow down and enjoy this season. Because I know it is fleeting. I know she’ll never be this small again and that there will be (God-willing) other kids after her and that life is already going so much faster than I ever expected it to. But I also want to hurry up and do all the things we keep saying we want to do and figure out what our careers are going to look like and how we’re going to stay afloat while raising this family and dating each other and reading books and making bread and living on land or in an apartment and writing for fun or for an agent and making enough money to buy good produce but not so much that it changes us and figuring out who the hell we are supposed to be in this “one, precious life” — the most suffocating turn of phrase I’ve ever heard.

What kind of crisis would you say this is?

A weighty one. A convoluted and distracting one.

A relatable one, maybe? (You tell me.)

An untitled one, for sure.

A title probably wouldn’t do much to help the what-the-fuckery of it all but it would make it easier to describe to people what I’m feeling when the inevitable “how are you doing” text comes through.

It might make it easier to peruse the right shelf of the self-help section at my local bookstore.

It might make me more articulate when describing to my therapist what I’m experiencing and trying to convince her that, no, I don’t think it’s me going off my anxiety meds that’s causing it.

Then again, it might make me less likely to pray about it. I could see a tightly fitting title to this experience leading me out of a posture of prayer and need and into an effort of single-minded investigation about what God might be trying to teach me. (A spiritual swap I have perfected over the years - just call me Job.)

Maybe the wordlessness of it all is a helpful, humbling nod to the “groanings too deep for words” the Spirit utters on our behalf.

Maybe the invitation to this unnamed crisis crisis is to be still, to be quiet, to simply receive.

Or maybe I just haven’t found the right words yet. It seems these days the only ones I have are these:

Here I am again, Lord — a strange tangle of gratitude and hope and to-dos. Maybe I’ll just sit here awhile and see if the next step becomes clear. If you’re interested in writing down a life plan for me, I’m interested in reading it. Just lmk.

I haven’t known what I’ve wanted to write to you for some time now, but I’ve known what to title it.

It’s a phrase I stole from my therapist (although, is it stealing if I paid, insurance-free, for the hour in which she said it?). She was encouraging me to dig a bit deeper into some areas that I’ve written off as “healed” but that oddly (???) keep causing little paper cuts on my soul.

My rebuttal was that if the other party in these said areas (forgive the ambiguity here, but I’m not paying you) isn’t working on trying to fix these things, isn’t even aware of them, I’m sure, then why should I? Wouldn’t it be more productive to just chalk it up to that whole seventy times seven forgiveness thing and not dwell on it?

To which she annoyingly, wisely said, “but that’s the courage of the work” - looking inward when others won’t, being curious about yourself for the sake of learning and growth, rethinking what it means to be in broken or difficult relationships.

I immediately took out my phone and typed that phrase into the notes app.

I didn’t yet know if I agreed, I just knew I liked how it sounded.

I left her office and promptly forgot about it, bought my daily $6 latte on the way home and floated back into the universe that is my desk on a weekday.

I’m two months into my new-ish job and still finding my footing a bit. There are personalities and dynamics I’m not quite sure how to navigate. A long list of things to-do and not enough resources or time to get them done. A shadow of uncertainty cast by my dear friends imposter syndrome and anxiety.

I could hear Jo babbling from the playroom. She’s inching ever closer to her birthday and every time I think about it I cry.

I was texting a friend about it later that day, telling her how rude it is that Jo is nearly one, to which she replied:

And she’s right. To be planning a celebration for her first year of life, and all that it entailed, feels like some shade of mercy I couldn’t begin to describe.

That night at home group, a friend of ours shared about her struggle with viewing God’s love as a “hard lesson” kind of love (my words, not hers), something I’ve wrestled with on and off for most of my adult life.

I’ve grown so accustomed to trying to find what God might be teaching me in hard seasons, that I have some kind of pavlovian reaction to hardship now to see it as a means, maybe the only means?, to sanctification.

I don’t know that that’s not true, but I’ve definitely over indexed a bit to that side of God’s character. So much so that now when something overtly difficult isn’t happening, I not only feel distant from God, but I start looking for all the ways I’m falling short and assuming what He might do to “lovingly teach” me a lesson again.

If we spend a bit frivolously one month, I convince myself I’m going to lose my job so we’ll stop loving money.

If I get frustrated with Ryan about something stupid, I convince myself that our marriage is going to be tested so we’ll learn to treat each other well again.

And I know, even as I’m writing this, that it sounds a little crazy and a lot heretical. I know that God’s kindness and care is just as instructive as His discipline and redirection.

But it’s confusing to my little human brain. Especially when our culture is so obsessed with creating meaning out of things that we’ve convinced ourselves we can know what God is doing is any given circumstance.

“God’s just trying to teach me patience.”
“God wants me to find my contentment in HIM not in my circumstances.”
“God is just humbling me.”

Like, okay maybe?? But also how do you know that? Isn’t this how Job got himself into a whole mess, by trying to assume what God was doing?

Anyway.

Of course, I didn’t share any of this at home group because it takes me 17 years to process thoughts in any meaningful way and I can still barely articulate it now as I’m writing this.

But in doing so, it’s brought my therapist’s words back into my mind - the courage of the work.

And maybe its just because I love the phrase so much, but it feels like it applies so much more broadly than I realized when I jotted it down in my phone.

Sometimes the work is being curious about yourself when you don’t want to be. Seeking understanding about why certain bruises on your soul still feel tender or certain people in your life are so hard to love. Sometimes the work is being willing to admit that what you thought had healed still needs your attention.

Sometimes the work is pushing through insecurity and “new girl syndrome” (self-diagnosis) when you’d rather just hide. Navigating new dynamics with as much grace and confidence as possible and being patient with yourself as you adapt. Sometimes the work is still doing your best when you feel overlooked and fighting the temptation to stake all your value on how you’re perceived.

Sometimes the work is just gratitude. Deep, knee-buckling, indescribable gratitude that the shape of your whole heart can change in just a year. Sometimes the work is accepting - truly, open-handedly accepting - gifts you are wholly unworthy of. And simply giving thanks instead of finding ways to try to earn it.

Sometimes the work is telling God all your misgivings about Him. All your misunderstandings, all your confusion, all your fear. Sometimes the work is accepting that we don’t always understand what He’s doing (thank God He isn’t so simple that we even could!) and not trying to impute meaning to every little thing along the way. Said another way, sometimes the work is a prayer as simple as, “I don’t get it, thank you that you do.”

All of those things take courage. All of them would be easier not to do. It’s scary to be curious, to learn, to change your mind, to walk in faith.

But sometimes, that’s the work itself. The work is finding the courage. The courage enables the work. Throw in some prayer and a $6 latte and you’ve got everything you need.

I’m curious what “the courage of the work” means to you - drop a note below!

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Ryan and I went to Tahoe recently on a trip paid for by the bank my (now ex) company works with. It was a “client appreciation” event, which is to say, a sales event, but it promised free skiing and an open bar, so we went.

On the flight home, I got bumped to first class (sry, Ryan) and I spent most of the boarding period staring at my book without reading it thanks to an aggressively loud phone-talker one row up.

He was dressed in business attire, forcing all of us to listen to his important-business-man-phone-call until boarding ended and the flight attendant politely asked him to hang up the phone.

He was openly irritated by this request, as indicated by both his tone and dismissive hand gesture, effectively saying with the wave of a hand, CAN’T YOU SEE HOW IMPORTANT MY BUSINESS-MAN PHONE CALL IS!

(As an aside, the conversation did not sound very important at all, but admittedly, I could only hear his side of it.)

His rudeness was such an obvious hint at some deep-seeded anger, some epidermis of pride stretched over a thick self-importance, insulating him from the rules and from other peoples’ feelings.

I’ve known men like this. I’ve worked with them or for them. I even married one once – on this exact day seven years ago. April Fools indeed.

So I sat there on my first-class throne of judgement, seething with disapproval of his (and all their collective) attitudes.

And then I caught sight of a pack of M&M’s sticking out of the bag between his feet. And without warning, I started to cry.

Ryan would probably suggest, in his gentle, wise way, that these tears were a result of my recent decrease in dosage of my anxiety meds. He’s probably a little bit right.

But it was something else, too. Some kind of uninvited intimacy. As if I’d walked in on him naked. As if I’d seen a part of his soul I wasn’t supposed to see.

Maybe that’s a lot of weight to place on a bag of M&Ms, but the youthfulness of candy up against the aged aggression of a 40-something man with an ego just screamed so loud it knocked me over.

Big, rude important-business-man and his little sugar snack. All man, all boy, and just right out here in the open for all to see.

It left me thinking about all the little intimacies we elicit unknowingly. The things we hide from others in plain sight. The parts of ourselves or our lives that we leave behind like subconscious breadcrumbs that might one day lead us home.

There’s nothing groundbreaking in me telling you that everyone hides. One interaction with a stranger at the supermarket or a quick scroll through social media confirms that we’re all living behind a façade of how we want to be perceived.

But what does feel new, what does feel novel, to me at least, is the realization that we’re doing it so ineffectually. We aren’t really hiding very well at all.

It makes me wonder why we struggle so much to get past small talk with people when big chunks of our soul are stuck in our teeth.

Why does it feel so rare, so good to hear “me too” when we can clearly see each other’s pain smoldering on our skin.

Said another way, why are we all so damn lonely when just a little attention paid to one another can reveal how much we all hurt and hope and want and grieve just like anyone else, just like me.

I may not know what you are grieving, but I know that you are by your rounded shoulders, your self-deprecating humor, your over-drinking or over-thinking or over-sharing on Facebook.

I may not know what you hope for, but I know that you do by the fact that you’re still here. The despair hasn’t taken you. The light hasn’t gone out.

I may not know what injured important-business-man but I know that he is in pain because he is so desperate to be seen as important, so absorbed in his world that he’s lost his compassion, so hurt that he must hurt in response.

My own breadcrumbs now come into focus. The pieces I hide out in the open for others to see.

Like the heavy-handed effortlessness with which I go through airport security because I want you to know that I’m well-traveled, I’m interesting, frankly, I’m better at this than you.

Or the jokes I make about my baby not sleeping because I’ve learned that tired-mom is some kind of badge moms seem to wear and I want you to know that I, too, am a tired-mom. Maybe that will give me some sense of belonging in an otherwise strange season of change.

And then there’s my eagerness to mention being newly (“ “) postpartum because I want you to think my body normally looks better than this. I want you to know that I know that I have softer spots than I used to. That my jeans hug a little bit tighter. That something atrocious is happening with my hairline.

These things may not be a bag of M&Ms sticking out of my bag, but they’re just as much an inadvertent invitation to intimacy neither of us consented to.

They’re just as much my pain, my insecurities, worn like freshly sewn Girl Scout patches — how many boxes of my soul can I put you down for?

Humanity is dripping all over the place. It’s pooling at our feet as they stick out from under the curtains we think might hide who we really are.

And there’s a grief in that realization. And a responsibility too.

A grief that we all waste so much time trying to hide the things that might connect us. That so much loneliness lingers in a world full of people terrified and desperate to be known.

And a responsibility to figure out what to do with that reality.

Is it a service to one another to point out what’s stuck in our teeth? Is it a kindness to pick up the breadcrumbs and help point each other back the way we came?

It makes me think we, or maybe just I, might’ve misunderstood what it means to be salt and light. What if instead of our cute little bible verse mugs and bumper sticker faith, our calling is to be a people known for ditching the ineffectual facades? A people proudly wearing our hurts and hopes and wants and griefs as trophies of grace (Ephesians 2:7), as invitations to those around us to connect, to be seen, to belong?

Wouldn’t that be wildly more compelling for the non-believer than a suped-up Hobby-Lobby-meets-rock-concert church service or people lazily weilding bible verses to support their social ideologies and opinions?

How many “Christians” are bringing major important-business-man energy to the political sphere this year? How many churches are furthering the lie that we need to hide our mistakes by being the ones to HIDE THEIR MISTAKES ad nauseam? (Oops - a tangent!)

My point is, if salt is for preservation and light is for visibility, the act of being wholly, unmistakably, unapologetically, and with abandon the fullest, most forgiven version of yourself provides a much longer shelf life and a much more accurate view of the gospel than whatever the hell it is that most of us are doing now.

And it might just be another beautiful, undeserved gift of the abundant life – abundant freedom, abundant exposure entirely void of shame, abundant connection with those around us, with ourselves, with our Creator, and abundant grace - received, given, celebrated, known.

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I read a wonderful Substack post this week by Mari Andrew, whose writing I adore, and I imagine you would too.

Her post is called “When To Quit”, a simple title for the subject matter. Not too clever, not overly contrived, but direct and straightforward. Which seems ironic in a way since quitting is rarely either of those things.

Do you ever read something and realize you’ve been thinking about a certain topic for a while without knowing it? That’s what happened to me with this post. Its as if I’ve been unwittingly doing mental gymnastics over the thought of quitting for weeks now and I didn’t realize it until I somersaulted into the foam pit of Mari’s words.

Remember foam pits? The very best part of taking gymnastics as a kid. When you’re that young you have absolutely no concept of injury or fear, so you fling yourself from various springboards or trampolines or uneven bars into the giant pool of foam blocks that happily absorbs your fall.

Quick aside here, but that can’t be sanitary, can it? Surely, they don’t clean those foam blocks. God knows how much sweat or skin particles are left behind by years of kids flailing freely into those pits. Someone research this and let me know.

Foam pits, previous question aside, were the friggin’ best. Until, of course, you had to get out.

In the same way that no one looks cool walking on sand, absolutely no one gets out of a foam pit gracefully. Everything you know about physics and gravity goes right out the window when you’re trying to climb out from one of those.

Kids at least have the benefit of being small and not weighing much. Can you imagine trying to do that as an adult? I can think of few more humbling things.

And that’s exactly how I feel after reading this post. Like I’ve flung my very adult, still mildly postpartum body into a giant foam pit of thought and now I’m scrambling like an idiot to try to get back out.

As she describes her relationship with quitting (things, pursuits, boyfriends, etc.), she says at one point, “I didn’t know if I was allowed to leave. (No idea who I looked to as the keeper of the permission slips, but it sure wasn’t me.)”

And then later, “…I remind my intuition that I live in a society dominated by the masculine demand for explanation based on external facts, rather than the feminine value of mystery fueled by inner wisdom.

My intuition rolls her eyes. I tell her I’ll do better next time.”

Mari’s Foam Pit: 1, Bailey: 0

The Type A, achiever in me has a complicated relationship with quitting. I think of the age-old parenting question of what to do when your kid goes out for soccer, makes the team, gets the jersey, and then two practices in decides they hate soccer.

Do you make them go because they made a commitment and there’s a lesson to be learned there? Or do you let them quit because they hate it and life’s short and there are a million other extra curriculars they might like instead and don’t you want them to pursue their passion???

Thankfully, Jo is too young to try out for any teams or decide she hates anything other than, so far, avocado. I have a while before I have to figure out the right answer to this parenting conundrum. (Or I’ll just ask Ryan because he’s infinitely wiser and more measured than me.)

But in the past, when I’ve been simultaneously both parent and child in this scenario in my own life, when I’ve hated the proverbial game of soccer, that is to say, a hobby or a relationship or a job or even a book, I’ve never felt like I was allowed to quit.

I’m not a quitter. I’m a follow through-er. I can think of very few examples of times I’ve actually quit something in my life.

I mean, truly quit. Not leaving one job for another or picking a new major in place of my original choice (which I did 5 times and still ended up with accounting??). But really quit. Signed, sealed, delivered, we’re done.

The only two that come to mind are a hostess job I quit in high school because the manager grabbed my ass in the back room. And my first marriage. (Although marriage seems like a very generous term for what it really was. And quitting seems a bit narrow.)

Enter: “the masculine demand for explanation based on external facts.” I’m tempted, always, to explain.

Not the job, that one is pretty straightforward.

But the marriage – even all these years later, even in the midst of a second, very happy marriage – one that actually does deserve the weight of that word – I want to explain. To give you the facts. To back up the decision with logic and reason and maybe even Biblical justification.

But why? Why isn’t the “feminine value of mystery fueled by inner wisdom” enough? Inner wisdom that is, I think, inclusive of logic and Biblical truth, but not reduced to them alone.

Ultimately, that inner wisdom, which, as a Christian, is guided by the Spirit (or is it one and the same?) is what led me to that decision. And, painful though it was, it felt certain. It felt sufficient. It felt complete.

So why then, all these years later, does it not feel like enough of an explanation? And what does that have to do with today, when no one is even asking me to explain it?

Well, I’m thinking about quitting, again. Not my marriage, obviously. (Have you met Ryan? He’s literally the very best of people. And that beard…come on.) But my job, maybe. My career, maybe?

I’m still undecided.

But I have no idea how to talk about it because I don’t have the words to explain how I got here.

Unlike the divorce, it’s not that I think the facts aren’t enough of an explanation. Its that the facts aren’t really working in my favor this time around.  

Logic would tell me to stay. To keep the steady salary, the health insurance, the 401k, the stability. To stay in the lane I’ve been paving since college. To let the title and the stock option vesting schedule be enough to drown out the little voice in my head that whispers, is this really what you want?.

The facts say, sit down, ya hussy. Be grateful. Do your job.

And I am grateful. And I am, for now, doing my job.

I just don’t know that I want to. And I have no facts or logic to back that up other than that I feel it deep in my toes. The whisper. The mystery. The inner wisdom…I hope.

That might be reason enough to make a decision. Mari would say thats as good a reason as any to quit. But I’m still clawing my way out of this foam pit so I’m not steady enough on my feet yet to agree.

Instead, I think what I need to quit today is my need for certainty. My need for answers.

I think I’ll just try to be OK sitting in the discomfort for a while, giving my inner voice the time and space to figure out what she wants to say.

And meanwhile, the discomfort will keep me awake. It will be the pebble in my shoe reminding me to pay attention. To keep looking, asking, seeking, praying. To keep trusting God and myself and the ancient mystery that connects us.

To keep listening to the whisper, wherever she may lead.

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My daughter has recently found her feet – a discovery that seems to both delight and overwhelm her. She sticks her milk white legs in the air and stares at them, focused, amazed. The same marble-eyed stare she had when she first discovered her hands.

That, of course, was ages ago when measured against the length of her life. A stage that left as quickly as it came – lost somewhere in the haze of sleepless nights and pumping. One of many things we knew barely long enough to grieve its passing, and yet, we did, we do.

It must be such a strange experience to find your hands for the first time. To discover a part of yourself you never knew you had. To wonder at its purpose, its utility, and, apparently, its taste.

I don’t know at what age a baby’s eyes settle into their color but hers still haven’t. I hoped, and still do, that she’d get her dad’s eyes. His are an almost unsettling shade of blue. For all they’ve seen, they’ve stayed generous and soft. I want her to see that way, to be seen that way, to unsettle this harsh world with her softness.

For now, their color remains elusive, masked in gloss and camouflage, shifting with the light or the color of her jammies. Too busy taking in the trees out her window or the shimmer off my wedding ring or the hands she finds at the end of her pillow arms to pick just one color to be.

She’s started to learn how to use them. She grabs at things, places them against me when I hold her, puts one in her mouth when she’s fighting sleep. I think they might be old news now, replaced by the surprise and novelty of her feet. And yet, to me, they’re still so worthy of wonder. Tiny hands I warm with my own when we sit on the back deck and wait for dad to get home from work. Tiny hands made within me. An everyday, oft forgotten miracle.

In a way, I know some of what she must be feeling. This year I found a part of myself I never knew. I like to think the tenderness was always there – sometimes buried beneath layers of disillusionment and cynicism – but there, nonetheless. I know the anxiety was. So too, the abusive relationship with time.

But the mix of those things – the tenderness, the anxiety, the pain of time – have formed some kind of new muscle that sits tightly somewhere in my chest. It strains from the shameless desire to hold so much love at one time. It’s knotted with this ache to make the days slow down and the nights to pass more quickly. It’s sore from hoping so severely that life might always be this sweet, my purpose might always feel this certain, her hands might always stay this small.

I suppose you might call that muscle motherhood. But its more than that. It’s not just being her mom, it’s being a parent with my husband. It’s being a daughter to her grandmother. It’s being best friends with her godmother. It’s being her advocate with her doctors. It’s being a woman within the collective whole of mothers everywhere.

It’s as if my very axis has changed, and as the spinning fades a bit from that initial shift, I find myself wondering where to go next.

I’ve done just about every version of new year planning that you can do. I’ve made the resolutions, then called them goals instead because it sounded smarter, then chose a word for the year, then a verse, and so on. I’ve made bucket lists and vision boards. Kept notes on my phone with little checkboxes next to each line. I even went so far as to try bullet journaling once – a hobby I envy but am undoubtedly not artistic enough to maintain.

This year is no different. I may even share my list of goals-resolutions-to-dos-visions-what-have-you at some point.

But right now, I’m much less inclined to look forward than in years past. I find myself instead grasping at this deep-seated need to be present, to be here.

To be aware of my own hands and feet, in this space and time and season. To feel the strength of this new muscle as my lungs mark their contented rhythm. To deepen the roots beneath this new axis of my life.  

I want the richness of this day, each day, to be enough. Because it is. It is more than enough. And soon, much too soon, it will be gone. I’ll have forgotten this new taste of tenderness within me. Without warning, her feet will be old news too.

So while I’m sure this new year will have plenty of goodness and grief to offer us, I will empty my hands of the weight of what’s to come and simply hold space instead for this morning, this daily bread, this version of each of us as we are right now – a little tired, a lot happy, and one of us with our feet in the air.

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There were so many Christmases when I was young that seem hazy now. Impossibly tall trees and cookies left out by the fire and dad’s smile hidden behind the camera in the morning.

There were some when I was older - too cool now to be videotaped, too self-conscious for cookies.

I try not to remember them. Precious time wasted at the altar of the skewed perspective of youth.

There were Christmases after I left home. Suitcases full of college-stained laundry sitting strangely within the walls of a younger me.

Those were always too short. Not enough time spent with family. Too much spent with friends from high school I hadn’t yet lost touch with.

There was the Christmas after graduation. When I would use PTO to sleep in and my new paycheck to buy real gifts for the first time.

I knew everything and nothing then, like every other 20-something before and since me. I remember feeling trapped by an unknown future, only realizing far too late how much freedom comes with that kind of uncertainty.

Then there were my first few Christmases married. Away from my family for most of them. With another that I barely fit into. A family that wouldn’t be line for long.

Those Christmases ached. The longing, the waiting, the unsettledness. An Advent embodied in a way I’d never known before. Flesh and feeling put around a hope deferred.

And then came the first Christmas after. Home again, finally. But also, what then was home? My old room with this new emptiness. My old last name with this new identity.

That Christmas and those that followed would heal me. Heavy with surrender, strung out with lament. The holy dirge of silent, silent nights. Fear not, for behold – this good news, this great joy.

Fear not, fear not, fear not.

And then.

Our first Christmas together. Hope and happiness tempered in part by old wounds, but swollen, too, with the promise that God delights to give good gifts.

And then.

The next Christmas we were pregnant. And I spent much of it nauseous, thinking of Mary in such new light. What discomfort she must have felt. What joy. What wonder. What loneliness, what honor, what humility. What a God.

And now.

A new tiny stocking hangs next to ours. And I cry at the sight of this piece of my soul with such tiny feet. I look around and could crumble at the thought of all this goodness. It hardly feels fair to feel this content. It barely feels real in light of so much that came before.

And I know, as I sit here typing this by the fire, and she coos from a quilt laid on the floor, littered with toys, that this season too will pass and be replaced by something new.

I know life ebbs and flows, that trouble is promised, that true peace is both now and not yet.

But isn’t that the wonder of Christmas? That every year we celebrate the “now” of that tension. That no matter the kind of Christmas we have – the hard ones and the happy, the ones that break us and the ones that heal – the story doesn’t change. The manger, the Messiah, the wonder, the gift.  

Isn’t this what Christmas does? Exposes wounds just to heal them. Takes broken hearts and fills them with that tender truer love. Dethrones our every idol to make way, make way for Christ is born.

Doesn’t it always turn the humble into holy? Guide us home with a single northern star. Take our offerings of song, stable, swaddle and lay them down before the diapered divine. 

And oh worthy these things are of celebration? This story, already written, wrapped around us with sovereign, omniscient care.

Undeterred by our circumstances, unaltered by our mistakes, universal in the goodness of the news it brings, yet immeasurably intimate, mercifully near, utterly life altering to each and every one who hears.

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I love a gift guide. I keep a running note on my phone that holds gift ideas for the people in my life and add to it any time I see something that makes me think of them throughout the year.

Giving thoughtful, unique gifts is one of my favorite holiday traditions and putting together a silly little gift guide each year is fun extension of that for me.

I hope this guide helps you drum up some ideas for what to put under your tree this Christmas, or, if nothing else, serves as a brain-break for your Monday.

But first!

If you missed my email (and embarrassing video) from last week, I’m asking all my subscribers (and their friends/family) to consider helping provide Christmas for a family in need.

The ask is simple: e-gift cards (of any amount!) to let this family know that they are seen and thought of, even by strangers, this time of year.

The video will explain more, but I would be so so grateful if you would consider partnering with me on this.

Even a $5 Starbucks gift card would go such a long way in spreading joy for them this season!

Ok, Onto The Guide…

Books

Starting off strong with my favorite category. There’s just something so personal and quaint about gifting a book you think someone will enjoy. Here are some favorites of mine you might want to consider for (yourself or) your people:

• For a laugh (comedy, non-fiction): Wow, No Thank You

• For a good cry (memoir): Seeing Ghosts

• Fiction for the sake of fiction: The Heart’s Invisible Furies

• To foster deep thought or conversation (theology, non-fiction): How to Inhabit Time

• To feel something (fiction, memoir, respectively): Migrations or The Salt Path

• Books for Breakfast Coffee Mug - pop a gift card to your local bookstore in here for the i-like-to-pick-it-out-myself reader

• Bonus: Ryan got me this “Ideal bookshelf” print, customized with my favorite books, for Christmas when we were dating and when I sent a picture of it to my friends the response was “HE’S YOUR PERSON.” This is such a cute idea and a beautiful way to say to someone, I get you.

Health, Food, Fitness

What a better gift to give than the gift of health? Here are some personal favorites for the wellness guru in your life:

• Cryotherapy Ice Roller - Last year, my sister, sister-in-law, and I all unknowingly gifted each other these ice rollers for Christmas. Clearly, it’s a holiday fav (and very affordable!).

• COSRX Lip Balm - Fragrance-free, paraban-free and the perfect gift for the girlies in your bible study, knitting club, book club, etc.

• Alo Socks - Every. Single. List. I’ve seen this year of “it girl” products includes these Alo socks. As someone with #BigCalfEnergy, I don’t think I can pull these off, but I plan to gift these to the gals in my life who can.

• Ouai Hand Soap and Lotion Set - I LOVE this set as a hostess or housewarming gift but think it would work perfect for Christmas too. Add it to the list of indulgent-ish items we probably wouldn’t by for ourselves but would love to receive.

• Nothing Fancy Cookbook - Cookbooks are one of my favorite gifts to give (and receive) and this “unfussy food for having people over” is an evergreen favorite for me. So good.

• Molly Baz Cookbook - I’m obsessed with all things Molly Baz and this cookbook (esp. the cover) is no exception.

• SM Water Bottle - I will forever hold fast to the idea that the Stanley water bottles are overrated. I’ve used my SM 64oz bottle (in sea glass sage) for over a year now and it never leaves my side. Toss those Alo socks (above) and some LMNT packs in here and you’ve got the perfect fitness girl gift.

• CRZ Leggings - I was influenced by no less than 10 people on IG to try to these “lululemon legging dupes” and I have to say, the internet was right for one. I’ve asked a lot of my leggings over the past year with pregnancy, postpartum, and back-to-work-but-still-refusing-to-wear-jeans and these have held up.

• Bonus: Know a mom or mom-to-be who’s into health and fitness? The WellMamas app provides workouts, meal plans / recipe guides, and mom-focused meditations, with new content added every month. Admittedly, I’m biased here because, well, I created it, but for $12.99/mo I think it’s a pretty darn good deal and would make a great gift for you or someone you love.

Beauty

I feel like I really found my footing this year with my mostly-low-tox beauty staples. Beauty bits are some of my favorite things to gift on their own or to add to a larger gift to jazz up the packaging. A wrapped present with a little lipstick tied on top? The cutest.

• Summer Fridays Jet Lag Mask - This is my go-to overnight mask when my skin is feeling extra dry. Feels very luxe and would make a great gift for a frequent traveler or skin care enthusiast. (Mini version here.)

• Rare Beauty Liquid Blush - I recently purchased this blush in the shade Joy and have fully converted to a liquid blush believer. The color is stunning and lasts all day which, for me at least, is so hard to find in a blush. The packaging and size would make this a great stocking stuffer or present topper!

• Merit Lip Oil - These vegan tinted lip oils have a full ride scholarship to the front pocket of my purse. I love the Marrakech shade.

• Caffeine Under Eye Patches - Presented without explanation (by a mom of an infant).

• Saie Illuminator - I wear this on its own on no-makeup days or mixed with a BB cream if I’m feeling FaNcY. Give the gift of glow.

• Gucci Perfume / Lipstick Gift Set - I get my mom this perfume roller every year for Christmas and it is divine. This little gift set is the perfect stocking stuffer for the elegant lady in your life.

• Gold French Pins - These are so elegant, but so affordable.

• Bonus: Fount Society Body Butter - This product is one of Oprah’s favorite things this year and for good reason - it’s fragrance free, non-toxic, and super hydrating. Plus, the container is massive so you get serious bang for your buck. Body butter is one of those products people don’t always buy for themselves so it makes a great gift, especially in the winter. *Code: BAILEYREEWRITES20 gets you 20% off!

Clothes & Jewelry

This is a wild mix of sentimental and silly so buckle up.

• Honoring Motherhood - I’ve followed this brand for a while on IG and love love love what they’re doing to help mamas honor various seasons of their journey. I recently ordered a ring that will hold some of my breastmilk as well as some threads from the “lovie” we used during Jo’s heart surgery / hospital stay. I’m so thankful to have something beautiful I can wear to remember everything we’ve been through this year and the gift that it has been.

• Catbird Earrings - Every gift guide I’ve ever made has had at least one Catbird item on it. This dainty little pair is the perfect gift for the classy minimalist in your life. (And this one is the one I’m hoping Ryan will see on this list and be inspired by…*wink*.)

• Taylor Stitch Men’s Hat - Speaking of Ryan, I got him this hat for his birthday and, I must say, he looks damn good in it. This entire brand is a go-to of mine for guy gifts.

• Pendleton Men’s Sherpa Shirt Jacket - Another guy gift / brand I can’t get enough of. Great for the GQ fella in your world.

• Christmas PJs - I bought these recently for myself and was pleasantly surprised at how soft the material is. Find me wearing these every night this season drinking hot chocolate and watching The Holiday in bed. (And of course, I bought something for Jo too.)

• Bombas Socks - Listen, getting socks for Christmas is only lame until you’re 30. Then, it’s the absolutely best, especially if they’re Bombas.

• Girl Dangerous Oversized NY Sweater - This is on my personal wishlist this year, for obvious reasons. But this entire collection is worth perusing for the girls giving main character energy.

Other

Some gift ideas are too good to be contained by a category.

• Sugar and Creamer Stoneware Set - Obsessed with this set. So pretty. Surprisingly affordable.

• Chillin’ With My Snowmies Holiday Mugs - I love a kitschy holiday mug, which is why I sell some on the shop. This is another favorite based on a Christmas hymn I absolutely adore.

• Everything Bagel Making Mix - I love gifting a baking mix of some kind, especially when it’s packaged so beautifully like this one. Pair it with these gorgeous measuring cups or some elegant cloth napkins and your gift is complete.

• Pendleton Park Blanket - We are big Pendleton fans in the Jarrell home and, though not exactly affordable, this is a great gift for the outdoors-y member of your crew.

• Pickleball Set - We all have that person in our life that’s currently in their pickleball era. Why not enable them with this super fun set?

• Disco Queen Puzzle - Is it even a holiday if you don’t gift someone a fun puzzle?

• Beverly & 3rd Air and Linen Spray - Another great stocking stuffer to round out the list.

Phew - OK, stopping myself here because I fear I could go on and on. I hope this helps you with some of those hard-to-buy-for folks on your list. As always, Christmas is about so much more than presents, but what a fun tradition to show the people in your life that you love them.

Happy Holidays, friends!

And please please don’t forget to help out our unofficial The ReeWrite adopt-a-family with a gift card to spread a little joy this season.

*Please note that some of the above links are affiliate links that earn me a small commission at no additional cost to you. But I’ve only included items I’ve actually used and enjoyed. The extra ten cents doesn’t sway my opinion, I promise :)

I would love for you to join me in making Christmas happen for a family in need.

Here is the list of e-gift cards for you to choose from. Again, ANY amount is appreciated - no gift is too small!

There are gifting instructions on the site but feel free to hit reply and ask any questions if it isn’t clear.

Quick note: Even if a gift card appears to have already been purchased, you can still purchase one to the same place - the tech on this site is just a bit limited but that’s showbiz baby.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for considering this opportunity and for helping spread a little joy this Christmas season.

Feel free to forward this on or share this site with anyone you think might be interested in helping out!

When I was 22, I spent Thanksgiving in Chicago with my comedian-turned-carpenter brother and our younger sister. We spent the weekend eating thai food on the floor of his dirty apartment and walking around the city in hand-me-down coats we never needed back home in Texas.

He showed us all around downtown Chicago – his small corner of it first and then all the touristy attractions after that. I remember standing between my siblings in front of that ridiculous silver bean, our bodies stretched and shrunk to silly degrees. The image comes back to me so easily – the three of us melting into each other, united, I think, for the first time.

I remember thinking how nice it was to make new friends with people you’ve known since you (or they) were born. Maybe some siblings get that earlier in life. For us, friendship was hard earned through shared trauma and familial chaos. Which makes it sweeter, in a way. Or at least stronger.

A few years before that, I spent Thanksgiving in my college town, lazily asking for the attention of a boy I loved at the time but shouldn’t have. All our friends left town for the holiday, but he was staying around to pick up extra shifts at work and, I think, to avoid his family.

I found some excuse to stay too – something about studying or grad school entrance exams – and we spent Thanksgiving Day eating cold turkey sandwiches under blankets on his front porch.

I read books while he went to work, and we spent the evenings listening to John Prine and drinking bad wine out of coffee mugs. I didn’t spend a minute studying that weekend, but I learned a lot. Mostly about emptiness. The kind that feels so new when you’re young and life hasn’t had the chance to disappoint you yet. The kind that comes from asking to be loved too quietly for anyone to hear.

At 27, I spent my very first Thanksgiving in NYC. I was newly married, new to New York, and living on the 14^th floor of a building on 6^th Ave. Of my many terrible decisions from that season, living in midtown proved to be in the top five, with the one notable exception of living in a building that overlooked the Macy’s day parade.

My then-in laws came to town and I’d Pinterested and prepped to serve everyone brunch in our tiny studio apartment. I made little turkeys out of cinnamon rolls with bacon spread out like feathers. There was a spread of fancy crackers and cheese I’d bought at Murray’s, a holiday cocktail served in glasses with sprigs of rosemary floating on top, and a bottomless pot of coffee we poured mostly for warmth as we huddled onto the balcony in the cold.

We were eye level with the balloons as they floated by, bobbing along like bath toys. Christmas music played loudly from an apartment nearby and our noses turned bubblegum pink as we stood side by side against the wind.

It all felt so festive and dreamy, standing there above the magic that is New York during the holidays.

Until I saw the people below the balloons. There were hordes of them – balloon handlers, as they’re called. They shuffled around frantically, clinging to a web of ropes designed to level the weight of the characters waltzing above them.

They looked manic. Running up and down and into each other while their hands rubbed raw from the friction and the cold. But by design, no one was looking at them. Their effort went largely unnoticed. We were all too busy standing there smiling stupidly at Ronald McDonald and Charlie Brown, bloated and bouncing along in the sky.

I know now, thanks to an embarrassingly long internet deep dive, that the balloon handler position is actually a coveted one. But that morning, I assumed, or rather, projected, a deep sadness to their experience: all that effort to just keep their feet on the ground, an entire war waged just out of everyone’s sight.  

This year, I’ll spend Thanksgiving with my (second) husband and our daughter, seeing family on both sides and, inevitably, watching the Cowboys game (read: napping).

And maybe in a few years I’ll write a newsletter reflecting on this Thanksgiving in a similarly wistful way as these others.

It is, after all, our first holiday season with a baby. Our third together as the two of us (three including Hudson!). And I imagine the nostalgia of these early years as a family – the chaos of figuring out bedtimes and pack ‘n plays and the sweetness of little footie pajamas with turkeys all over them – will burn ever deeper as time passes.

Because that’s the thing about the holidays, they serve as a sort of time stamp each year. A marker for this particular season in life; an Ebeneezer to whatever grief or goodness is present at the time.

They bring with them an inherent degree of reflection. You can’t help but notice all that’s happened since this same day last year.

For us, last Thanksgiving fell just after we’d told our families we were pregnant. I was exhausted and perpetually on the edge of throwing up and flooded with anxiety about whether or not we’d make it through the first trimester. But I was also a deep, down to my bones, can’t find the words, crying all the time kind of happy that I might get to bring a baby into the world.

I get a little weepy thinking about it. The exhaustion and nausea feel like so long ago. (Actually no, the exhaustion is still here, but you get the idea.) We didn’t even know she was a girl yet. We didn’t know her name or that she’d have the most perfect little Whoville nose or that she’d fulfill every ounce of that expectant happiness the second she entered the world.

We just knew she was coming. And now, a year later, she’s here and time feels so wobbly and intangible and precious and kind.

It happens every year in varying degrees. The table is set and the food is served and the distinct, milestone of this particular year is marked in its silent, subtle way.

And yet, at the same time, strangely, each year is some bizarre amalgamation of all the years that came before it. Every version of you sits gathered around the table like extended family, telling their old stories and asking invasive questions about your life.

I used to hate it. I’d come home for the holidays in college and feel haunted by the high school version of me still tacking My Chemical Romance posters on the wall. Or I’d come home in my early 20’s and be hit with the stark reality that I thought I’d be spending the holidays with that John Prine boyfriend of mine and instead I’m splitting a piece of pie with my childhood dog.

Don’t even get me started on that first holiday season after my divorce. I was the loneliest I’d ever been, surrounded by every past version of me, feeling like the butt of all their jokes.

When life hasn’t gone the way you expected (which is to say, always), the holidays can feel like a highlight reel of foolish hopes you once held and bad decisions you made because of them.

And even when things are going well, nostalgia always greets you with a sting. Time passes and life changes and the ghosts of younger you show up for dinner every year regardless of if you invited them.

It’s easy to bemoan their presence. Or even ignore it. But this year – maybe because I’m extra sentimental (hormonal?) after having a baby, because I’m so acutely aware right now of how precious and fast and convoluted and beautiful life can be – I find myself wanting to invite all those old versions of me to hang around for a while. To pour a drink and grab a chair and load their plate up with seconds. To tell their stories over again. To start from the beginning.

I want my daughter around to hear (most of) them. To grow up knowing them like lore.

I want her to know how cold the pad thai was when it finally arrived that night in Chicago. How strange and lucky I felt to realize my siblings had become my best friends. How good and right and worth it it is to love and be loved, to forgive and be forgiven, to give space and to ask for it in return so that everyone in the family has room to be fully, safely themselves.

I want her to know how hard I fought to figure out who I was in college outside of a bad boyfriend. And how easy it is to fall into shitty relationships if you’re not careful.

I want her to know that three houses down from that porch with the bad wine and the dumb boy lived two girls that became my best friends and helped me heal from all that nonsense – two girls that I still talk to every day, 15 years later. I want her to know how rare and precious deep friendships can be. How they are a gift from God, worth praying for and investing in at all costs.

And I want her to know that boys can be incredibly dumb, especially when they’re young, but that not all of them are. Some of them, like her dad, are gentle and kind and patient and worth waiting for. Some of them will love you well without you having to ask.

I want her to know that New York City is the greatest city in the world. And that living there is a dream and a drug but is also stupid expensive so maybe just visit during the holidays.

I want her to know that sometimes you’re standing on a balcony surrounded by so much newness and life can feel dreamy and festive and too good to be true. And sometimes it is too good to be true. Sometimes people deceive you. Sometimes you’re thrown off that balcony and are suddenly below the balloons trying desperately to hold on. Most people won’t know where you went or that your hands are bleeding from the rub. It’s OK to ask for help then. And sometimes, it’s OK to let go.

I want her to know that sometimes your heart gets broken so badly you think you’ll never recover. But then you do. And one day you’ll realize you don’t even think about it that much anymore. One day you get back to just enjoying the parade.

And I want her to know that sometimes your heart gets everything it never knew it wanted all at once. Sometimes the Lord is more gracious to you than you ever thought possible just because it His heart to do so. Sometimes you wake up one day and find yourself married to your best friend, holding the squishy, giggly baby you made together, dressing her in turkey footie pajamas for her very first Thanksgiving.

I want all the stories to be told. I want more of them to be written. I want to hear everyone else’s too and to celebrate together how weird and wonderful this life can be.

Every milestone, good or bad, marks another year of God’s faithfulness. And if, instead of bemoaning all the ghosts of our past, we take the opportunity to see all the ways He’s been present and gracious and longsuffering and kind, we will make way for hope where there once was heartache.

So wherever you find yourself this Thanksgiving – whatever grief or goodness this year marks for you – I hope you make space for every version of you and your loved ones to tell their stories and reflect on God’s faithfulness together.

I hope your table is filled with memories of mercy, with heartache turned to hope, with unrealized expectations shadowed by expectant joy.

I hope you’re gracious with yourself, past and present, knowing that you cannot be outside the will of God – that your mistakes are not that meaningful in light of His sovereignty and grace.

And I hope your Thanksgiving is marked by gratitude, community, football naps, parades, and turkey footie pajamas, if you’re lucky.

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Well, hello!

It’s been some time, hasn’t it? My unofficial maternity leave from this space has seemed at once both painfully long and not-quite-long-enough, but I’ve been feeling the itch to return in increasing measure. I miss you all. I miss writing. I miss creating, sharing, producing something other than breastmilk.

My official maternity leave from my “real job” ends next week and I am decidedly NOT itching to return to that space.

When you’re pregnant, people love to ask you what your “plan” is after your leave (if you get a leave, that is – smh @america). It’s a funny question because it seems innocuous in and of itself but, at its core, its wildly personal and invasive.

How do you begin to answer a question like that when so much of the decision is wrapped up in identity and finances and the soul-sucking, self-induced shame that many (most?) mothers feel when deciding whether to work or not? (I’m tempted to point out that no one seemed to be asking my husband this question, but I’ll save that battle for another day.)

More to the point, how do you answer a question like that when you have no idea who you’ll be when the time finally comes to decide?

How intimate, how vulnerable to feel pressed to produce such a shame-soaked, financially-weighted, identity-shaking answer.

**

I would’ve told you I was certain that I’d want to return to work after our baby was born. I’ve spent the last 11 years busting my spreadsheet-loving bum to get to where I am today. I’ve accomplished many things I’m proud of – things that may not sound impressive to anyone outside of the finance / startup / tech world, but that I’m proud of anyway. I’ve made great friends with coworkers past and present. Had terrible bosses and inspiring ones. Fired people, hired people, tried to mentor where I could, tried to learn from my mistakes when I didn’t do it well.

Admittedly, my ethos towards work was pretty skewed by my time spent living in NYC. That culture, that pace, combined with my personal circumstances in that season, quickly inflated the importance of career, salary, title, LinkedIn profile in my mind.

When I left New York, I got a little perspective. Enough to see, at least, that not everyone lives that way. And I would’ve told you I learned something from that realization. But I’m not sure that I did.

At least not enough to change anything. Not enough to leave my New York-based job. Not enough to stop building my life around the resounding rhythms of stress, tuned to the metronome of Slack.

Instead, I just told everyone, and myself, that I was handling it. That it was fine. That if I could just get through this quarter/this audit/this acquisition/this month things would calm down.

I would’ve told you I was certain I’d go back.

And then, on June 19^th, I had a baby. And she was tiny and squishy and wild eyed and perfect, and for a while, nothing mattered outside of being with her. And I thought, of course I won’t go back – look at this child, this body born of mine, how could I ever do anything other than be beside her?

…That was June 20^th.

In the months that followed, baby would need a tongue and lip tie release, she would struggle to latch, she would develop a milk, soy, and possibly peanut (we’re still working down the list) allergy, she would have heart surgery, she would have reflux, she would never, ever sleep. (She never, ever sleeps!)

And I would think, maybe I should go back to work? Maybe I’m not cut out for this. Look at this child, this body born of mine, I can hardly even feed her. I can’t fix any of her problems. I can’t figure out what I’m eating that’s still making her sick. I can’t get her to go to sleep. (WHY CAN’T I GET HER TO GO TO SLEEP!!)

Maybe she’ll like the nanny more. Maybe I don’t have the maternal instincts I need for this. Maybe I can best serve her by financially supporting her future. Maybe – can I say this? – maybe, I need a break.

Maybe if I was supposed to be a stay-at-home mom, I wouldn’t feel this way.

… Maybe if I was supposed to be a stay-at-home mom, I wouldn’t feel this way.

**

I read a poem this morning – well, an excerpt of a poem – by Louise Gluck. It reads:

I was young here. Riding
the subway with my small book
as though to defend myself against

the same world:

you are not alone,
the poem said,
in the dark tunnel.

And I cried because motherhood has felt, so far, like every possible analogy in those lines. A subway, a small book, a defense against the world, a loneliness, a dark tunnel, a poem.

As a subway – it has carried me from a former place to whatever is next, wherever “here” is today

As a book – I have lost myself in its story, learned from its pages and longed for more, celebrated each tiny chapter so far and scourged myself with paper cuts trying to flip ahead too quickly

As a defense – it has shielded me, in a way, against so much that doesn’t matter, so many things that I used to fight, to fight for, that seem so pointless now that she’s here

As a loneliness – it has shadowed me, untethered me from so much of what (and who) I once felt connected to, convinced me of an alone-ness that seems both inevitable and unfair

As a tunnel – it has blanketed me, at times, in a depression that felt long and silent but for the echoed drippings of the invisible above falling somewhere off in the distance

As a poem – it has unlocked in me and for me a beauty too difficult to capture in words, a love that can only be expressed in the slow unfolding of one all-encompassing line after another

And while each analogy on its own would be enough to fall in love with this poem, what I love most about it is that it’s written as if in reflection. It’s written in the past tense – “I was young here” – suggesting an older, wiser version of the author at present.

It’s how I feel when I think about myself in New York – chasing after titles, eating dinner at my desk, racing, quite literally, through the underground with book in hand, hoping to get to the office early, hoping to find myself there.

It’s how I feel when I think about the moments I was certain I’d go back to work, and the ones I was certain I wouldn’t. Both were genuine, but uninformed. Driven by emotion, (or post-partum depression), “as though to defend myself against” …something.

It’s how I feel now – coming back to this creative space after so long away, heading back to work next week after so much has changed, trying to figure out who I am, or will be, in either context when I’m not really sure who I am in any context right now.

I was young then.

I don’t know that I’m necessarily the older, wiser narrator now, but I know the tunnel still feels a bit dark.

So on we go, in search of the light, or at least of the next stop on this line.

 **

What I do know for certain, is that in both very figurative and very literal senses, this new phase of life requires a paring down that is good and right and necessary. I am still working through what that looks like in many areas, but one I know for sure is that this Substack will be moving to a monthly cadence, rather than a weekly one.

I want to protect this space and the time I spend in it from the pressure of arbitrary timelines so it can continue to be the hopeful, living, breathing, inquisitive, freeing space I’ve always intended it to be. And for now, a monthly post is the most realistic way to try to do so.

And as for “work work”, I welcome your prayers for wisdom and direction and freedom from anxiety as I log back in next week. I feel all the feels about spending more of my day with Excel than with my baby. But wiser moms than I have made this decision a million times over and I trust that we are all, myself included, just doing our best to be faithful to wherever we’re called in each season.  

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Hey, Hi, Hello!

It’s been a minute, hasn’t it? Consider this post a soft resurfacing from my unofficial Substack maternity leave. It’s good to be back. It’s good to be writing. It’s so very good to be a mom.

As much as I’ve tried, I’ve never been very successful at capturing the heart of life’s big moments in words. I’m much more articulate with – or maybe, much more present for – the little, seemingly unremarkable things.

I could give you ten pages on the magic of morning light or a brief interaction with a stranger at Whole Foods, but describe these first *eight* weeks as a mother? Not a chance.

I can only say that the person writing this post today is not the same person that wrote the one that came before it. I am irrevocably altered – a soul now splintered into two – and I’ll forever feel unworthy of this gift.

Tomorrow, we have our two-month check-up with the pediatrician. They will weigh her and ask questions about her poop and listen to me read my list of worries off a note on my phone and tell me everything is normal. Babies just do that. She’ll grow out of it. Etc. Etc.

It will all be very routine and uneventful and probably take less time end-to-end than the time it takes for us to drive there. And that would all be well and good if Tuesday wasn’t going to quickly be followed by Friday.

Friday is anything but normal. It’s the day we’ve been thinking about since our 20-week anatomy scan came back abnormal. It’s the day we check-in to Children’s for Jo’s pre-op heart surgery appointment.

The surgery team emailed us a PDF about what to expect on that day. Her actual surgery is not until Monday, but there’s apparently a whole host of tests and scans and hullabaloo to be done in advance that warrant two full pages of instructions.

I read it a few weeks ago when the appointment was scheduled. I don’t remember much except that it said there’d be a break for lunch and to bring a sweater because the hospital is cold.

Those are probably the two least relevant things they could’ve told us, and thereby, the two least important things for me to remember. How could anyone not be cold in a hospital? How could anyone eat lunch on a day like that?

Again, I don’t know how to write about things that are quite this big. I want to tell you that I’m anxious, but I imagine that’s obvious. I want to tell you that I’m fine, but it’s only partially true. I want to tell you that she’s strong and brave and a fighter, but how could I know if she’s brave when she can’t tell me how she feels? How could she have the chance to be strong when she has no idea what’s coming?

I want to tell you that I trust God, because I do. He has been with us at every step of this journey – from the day we found out, to the eight billion sonograms we had thereafter, to the moment she was born and I heard her first, long-awaited cry, to this seemingly endless wait for her surgery to finally arrive. He has been near and present and gracious unto us. So when I tell you that I trust Him, I mean I know that He is trustworthy.

But I also want to tell you that I’m totally fucking terrified, because I am. I would give/do/say/pray/steal/commit/pay anything to protect this child. But I can’t protect her from this. I can’t do anything to heal her heart on my own. I just have to hand her over to a team of doctors she’s never met and trust they’ll bring her back all healed and whole.

The words “take heart” keep showing up around me in that not-so-subtle way God sometimes speaks. I’ve heard them in sermons, seen them on Instagram, read them in articles, and heard them from friends, all with seemingly no connection to each other.

(The writer in me with an aversion to anything trite wishes the phrase wasn’t quite so on-the-nose here, but the mother in me who is desperate for comfort is utterly thankful that it is.)

When that kind of holy repetition happens, you’d be foolish not to pay attention to it. So, I’m trying to. I’m trying to pay attention. And I’m trying to take heart.

Take Heart is found 25 different times in scripture. (I looked it up.)

The verse that first came to my mind is from John:

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

But there were many others in books like Deuteronomy, Joshua, 1^st Chronicles, and the Psalms all used in a similar command tense.

“Take heart and be strong” makes up 18 of those instances. “Take heart and have no fear,” a close second.

And can I be honest about something? The idea that we should, that I should, take heart is a fine, vanilla-y, church-y idea.

On its own, take heart sounds sort of weak, a bit pithy. It’s a throwaway encouragement. A nice thought in a cute, two-word package with about as much meaning as don’t worry or Happy Holidays.

So at first blush, being told to take heart in the face of this surgery warrants a close-lipped-smile, gee-thanks kind of response. It’s thoughtful, maybe, but a bit tone deaf to the magnitude of the event.

But take heart AND be strong? Take heart and HAVE NO FEAR? That just sounds cruel.

To ask that of me now, in the midst of all this, feels, at best, impossible, at worst, cold and unempathetic.

But I know God is not those things. He is not cold, He is not cruel, He is not tone deaf, and I sort of doubt He’s pithy.

It calls to mind some of the other commands in scripture: be holy as I am holy (mult. references), love your enemies (Matt 5), do not be anxious (Phil 4), do not be afraid (mult. references).

All of these on their own – on our own – are impossible. All of these have an undertone of heaviness, difficulty, and, out of context, oppression.

So we’re forced to put them back into context. Because we know our God is not a God of oppression, but of freedom.

And in the context of the larger picture, in the context of Christ, these commands are not really commands at all, but rather, invitations.

On our own, we would never be able to fulfill these asks. But through the Spirit, we are given everything we need for life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3). We are given everything we need to pursue holiness, to love our enemies, to put away anxiety and fear, to be strong, to take heart.

The mechanics of the command – the ways by which we step into the Spirit’s strength in place of our own – I admit, are still a bit murky. But I think it’s mostly prayer. And surrender. And radical faith in the face of despair. And buckets of grace.

But the mercy in the command is all the more clear as I approach this surgery this week.

He is not asking me to face this alone or in my own strength. He is asking me to face this in His. To let Him go behind and before us (Psalm 139:5). To stand firm. To take heart.

So as Friday (and, more importantly, Monday) approach, I humbly ask that you would take heart with us. That collectively we would come before the Lord in view of His faithfulness and ask Him for a successful outcome, a quick recovery, and perfectly whole and healed heart for baby Jo, and a whole lot of strength and peace for Ryan and I as we wait and trust.

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Hey, hi, hello.

It’s been a while, I know. As I always do after any time away, I’ve missed this space and connecting with you. But the closer baby day approaches, the more loosely I’m holding this practice. Life is shifting and I’m trying to be open-handed about what that means for my habits and routines. So for now, I intend to show up here when it makes sense, and give myself some grace when it doesn’t. I hope you’ll do the same.

There are three things that stand out about the month since we’ve last spoken. Three milestones of sorts – three moments that have marked this season in their own distinct ways.

1. The one-year anniversary of my sister’s sobriety,

2. The one-year anniversary of my marriage, and

3. An updated diagnosis (and tentative plan) for our baby.

At face value, these three things seem entirely unconnected. Big moments to be sure, but unrelated to each other in form and substance.

And yet, here they all are, marking our lives with indelible ink.
Here they all are, giving rise to perspective and prayer.

One.

My sister’s battle with addiction isn’t something I’ve ever written about publicly. There’s a tenderness to the topic that doesn’t warrant that kind of attention – so many intricacies to the road our family has walked that have been ours alone to know and to navigate together.

Still, with her permission, the anniversary of her first year of sobriety felt worthy of mention. Not only because of the deep gratitude and joy I feel over her having made such incredible strides towards healing. And not just because today, coincidentally, is her birthday. (Happy birthday, seester!!)

But because there is so much within this anniversary worthy of celebration. So many prayers answered, so many small steps she alone has taken in faith, so many things that made no sense to any of us at the time, but that now pave a clear, mercy-soaked path that led her to this day, to this renewed sense of self, to this inspiring person of strength I am wildly thankful to know.

Of course, that path has not ended. Her road, like all of ours in different ways, is one of daily struggle and surrender. Little victories, unseen battles, one day at a time, again and again.

But after so many years and so much pain endured, she reached a milestone she wasn’t sure she ever would – an entire year of choosing hope over despair. And man, what a beautiful thing.

Addiction isn’t something I pretend to understand.

And yet, it has made a home in my family.
It has sunk its claws into a person I love so deeply.
It steals from so many lives – greedily taking without remorse.

Recovery isn’t something I pretend to have endured.

And yet, here it is, awaiting celebration.
Here it is, giving new life to dry bones.
Here it is, making a way where we didn’t see one, giving a life back to its owner who deserves all it can offer and more.

Two.

Ryan and I celebrated one year of marriage in early May and it came and went with a sweet sense of normalcy I don’t think I expected.

Maybe it’s that pregnancy seems to overshadow most other things in life these days. Or maybe we’re just caught up right now in the busyness of work and settling into our house and trying to prep for the baby while having absolutely no idea what it means to “prep for a baby.”

Whatever the reason, our anniversary seemed to sneak up on us a bit.

We drank coffee in bed and got croissant from the bakery we love and had dinner at a place downtown topped off with espresso and dessert, our favorite nightcap.

But there was very little pomp about the whole thing. We didn’t exchange big gifts or start some grand tradition. We just toasted to the beautiful year behind us and the bigger one ahead. We thanked God for His grace in bringing us together. We went to bed by 9 because that’s about all the excitement I can handle at eight months pregnant.

Thinking about it now makes me weepy. If you’ve been around for some time, you’ll know that Ryan and I both experienced pretty painful divorces before we got together. Neither one of us knew if marriage would be in the cards for us again. Neither one of us expected to find it in a random run-in on a Tuesday at a coffee shop.

But by God’s grace and faithfulness, we did. And it’s going pretty damn well. So much so that our anniversary didn’t feel like some big mountain top summited, or milestone hit – it just felt easy, obvious in a way. As in, of course we made it a year. You’re my person. I would do this a million times over.

And there’s something just so generous in that kind of grace. That it could feel this easy. That the date nearly went unnoticed due to the sheer enjoyment of all the every-days it represents.  

Divorce is malignant - the breaking of something holy, a fracturing of souls that was never part of God’s plan for His people.

And yet, it is not the end of the story.
It is not beyond the bounds of grace.
It is not some scarlet letter its victims must wear for the rest of their lives.

Redemption, in its many, multi-faceted forms, isn’t ours to demand or feel entitled to or manipulate into being.

And yet, it promised to us through Jesus.
And it plays out earth-side in ways we might never expect.
It is the kind and generous gift of God, doled out how and when and in the ways He sees most fit for His glory and our good.  

Three.

Since I last updated you on our baby’s heart condition (LINK), we’ve been to ~ roughly ~ seven thousand doctor’s appointments and offered up countless prayers that as she grew her heart would heal in such a way that wouldn’t require surgery or any further treatment.

A few appointments ago, we learned that, as of now, that hasn’t happened.

Instead, they’ve learned more through additional scans and have now changed her diagnosis to something slightly different and a bit more complicated.

Surgery immediately after her birth went from a possibility to a probability, and our doctors have started to prepare us for what that will look like, how they will coordinate with one another upon her arrival, and what the hours and days to follow might entail.

This wasn’t the news we were hoping for. It wasn’t the birth story I pictured or the way I dreamed of starting our life together as a family of three. There are a million questions and unknowns and what-ifs and fears floating around us that seem to block out the sun a bit on harder days.

But we are not without hope.

We are thankful for our doctors and we pray for them by name. And we know that God loves this child infinitely more than we can even imagine. However hard that may be to believe when I already love her so stinkin much.

The Lord doesn’t always answer our prayers the way we want Him to.

And yet, He is present.
He is near to us in our fear and our wanting.
And He has proven, time and time again, that He is worthy to be trusted.

And so we try.
And so we do.

Life is messy. It’s painful and lovely and ridiculously hard and insufferably beautiful, somehow all at once, in glints and glimmers throughout all our days.

Some milestones are reached through miracles and strength of will. Others sneak by as simply as a long string of Tuesdays. Still others lurk ahead like a storm we aren’t sure we’ll survive – dark clouds rolling over the horizon, the calm beyond it not quite close enough to see.

And yet, not an ounce of it is accident.

And yet, every moment is gifted in grace.

And yet, we are held by the holy hands of a loving God who walks beside us, behind us, and before us each step of the way.

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There’s really no delicate way to put this so I’m going to just jump right in – my boobs are leaking.

According to the internet, and confirmed by my midwives, this is, apparently, totally normal. But be that as it may, it does not feel normal. It feels weird and kinda gross and pretty embarrassing.

Pregnancy has been a seven month (and counting) long journey of humility in many ways. I’ve heard there are women out there who love the experience of being pregnant. I hear they feel beautiful and in tune with nature and even experience the ever-elusive pregnancy glow that I’m still waiting to find.

I, however, am not one of these women. I actually don’t even know if I know any of them personally. But if that’s you, then, here from my bed in the middle of the day because I’m exhausted, I salute you. And envy you. And maybe hate you slightly but in a friendly kind of way.

I am not now, nor have I ever over the last 29 weeks, feeling beautiful or in tune with nature. I’m feeling huge and grumpy. I am an out-of-breath mouth-breather with swollen feet, a total inability to sleep, and as of recently, leaky boobs. And we’ve still got 11 weeks to go.

This is not to say that I’m not happy. I am constantly in awe of this little creature moving (aggressively) inside of me. I cry almost every week at church thinking of what holy truth she might already be absorbing through the womb as we recite the Lord’s prayer or take communion. And every tiny onesie or baby book that shows up at our door from my late-night-insomnia-induced online shopping makes me giddy in a way I find almost too embarrassing to admit.

The point is just to say that amidst all the happy, there has been a lot of forced humility, and I wasn’t prepared for how hard that piece would be.

There’s a lot to marvel at when we think of how God designed this process. Life is the Lord’s to give, and given what we know about His character, we can be sure that every moment from conception to delivery was crafted with divine intention, spoken into being with our good and His glory in mind.

And yet, I have to wonder, could we have done without the nausea, maybe? Or the stretchmarks? Or that fateful moment with the innie bellybutton you’ve always known pops out to cast a shadow announcing six more weeks of winter?

Wouldn’t it be just as beautiful without the raging heartburn and hemorrhoids? Could we leave, at least, our eyesight and feet size out of the deal? And maybe, if it isn’t too much to, could the milk stay IN the boobs until the baby is around to help out?

There’s a loss in all of this that I don’t quite know how to name. I described it earlier on in pregnancy as a loss of self, but I don’t know if that feels entirely accurate anymore.

In a way, I feel more myself than I ever have. There’s certainly more of me, (she types, with cookie crumbs scattered across her hands). But there’s also a sense of purpose I feel I’m stepping into. A sense of being called to something greater than just my little life for one.

And though that call feels like one I’m entirely unequipped to answer in full, like so many things in life, I’m reminded that following God is a one-day-at-a-time endeavor. All that’s being asked of me right now, is to be faithful with whatever is before me on this day.

And today, what’s before me is the humility of pregnancy. Today, I’m asked to be faithful amidst aches and pains and leakage.

Which – despite my grumbling and self-deprecating humor to help cope – strikes me as sort of beautiful. This idea that we are stripped of ourselves in so many ways in order to care for a tiny, helpless soul we’ve never met. This all too visceral reminder that loving the least of these isn’t glamorous or comfortable or all that fun.

Scripture often tells us to lay down our lives - our pride and our preferences - for the sake of others. But, for so many of us in our cozy little worlds of privilege, humility has become an idea we love to discuss and an experience we’re quick to avoid. It’s a thing we pray for with one eye open hoping God doesn’t answer too quickly. Like patience. Or the strength to not love money.

So maybe all the pregnancy problems can be chalked up to hormones and science and the aging bodies of women having babies later in life than they used to.

But maybe it’s bigger than that. Maybe it’s as divinely intended as every other miraculous aspect of this design. Maybe it’s a small reminder that love is messy and sacrificial and antithetical to any desire we have to look good and put together to those around us.

Love is a service, an offering, a mortification for the sake of another. It’s the act of saying, my comfort and my wants are far less important than someone else’s soul. My likely-to-not-be-seen-again waistline and the ruining of my 33-year-streak of not leaking from my boobs are easy losses in light of partnering with God to create a life that He saw fit to set into motion.

And I don’t think it’s a step too far to draw that comparison to Christ. Who, on a scale so much infinitely larger than words could convey, laid down His life, His body for the sake of our helpless souls.

Any chance we get to reflect that, however small or silly, in humility or hemorrhoids or befriending the weird girl at church despite looks from the people around you, is a worthy, welcome invitation.

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