Spent a few days at the beach....walking, praying, walking, praying....sitting in the sand and staring out at the water. Watched the morning sun burn off the mist and saw it set again over shimmering water. I listened very hard for His voice. He was there taking care of me.

I am back home and am still listening.

May Your unfailing love be my comfort, according to Your promise to Your servant. --Psalm 119:76

cover this in prayer. PLEASE.

This is for Nate and Emily (and other Calvin Crest fans)

Go here. You will laugh.

Dave Matthews...

has got nothing on David Crowder!!

Hey, when are you going to invite me over for dinner, Jamie?!?!

A little prayer here...

If you could bring me and my body into the presence of the Lord next time you pray I would appreciated it. I came down with a bout of pneumonia and it is not getting better. I was hoping to go to Pepperdine this last weekend but I couldn't and I am trying to do some camping in the next few weeks. I fear that won't happen either. I am appreciating the rest but this is not restful but more debilitating. Thanks...

church

Went to church today. The pastor of the church is an old friend of mine.

I wasn't all that happy about going....being that it was church and all. But, you know... the worship was good.... soaking up the presence of Jesus amidst others who love Him. And the sermon was good... full of truth about loving others the way Jesus wants us to.

But I knew there was more for me there today. Knew it down deep.

Two seconds after I asked Jesus why He had me come there today a woman whom I love approached me, grabbed my hands, and said, "Can I just pray for you? I don't know what I'll say, but...."

And pray she did. She reached way down inside her mother's heart that has shed its own tears and blood and prayed for my daughter so powerfully, so trustingly, that it brought my heart to its knees. She held me in her arms, and sang praises to God in my ear. In those few moments she loved me with her whole body and heart--full of Jesus. Full of faith.

Then my old friend the pastor slapped some oil on my forehead, laughing, saying he had been waiting for the chance to do that for a long time. Then the speaker, a man named Dallas whom I had never met, prayed against the enemy's attack on my daughter with conviction and authority, also annointing me with oil as the mother standing in place for my daughter... in agreement with a small group that gathered. Just to pray.

I was undone and filled up.

Now that's what I call church.

concert report

Dave was intense.

Your night will become as noonday

Last Tuesday I shared with a few people on the prayer team that I have been on a sort of self-imposed sabbatical for a while. Like two years.

In the six years I have been running Dakota House (and the five years before that on a church staff) my heart has been folded, spindled and mutilated. (What does 'spindle' even mean? Isn't that what Sleeping Beauty pricked her finger on?) Without realizing it I had become--as is the big fear of people in 'my line of work'-- burned out. Living on the grounds of Dakota House just about did me and my family in. Not to mention the little baby we took in and lost... as well as others I took into my heart only to watch them tear a piece off and take it with them when they left.

Anyway.... God and I had this little talk and He told me to pull back. I've still been running Dakota House but haven't been doing as much of the hands-on stuff.... have kept this nice little cement wall around my heart. Oh sure.... there have been a few leaks, but I quickly get out my putty knife and block that thing off before it's too late. Mostly.

Well, God gave me a time frame. Not just some open-ended ticket to ride. He didn't say, "No problem, Jamie. Take your time. Whenever you feel like giving it your all again then you just jump right back in. It's cool."

Nope. He told me the time is up on September 1st.

That very day I start Girls Only and dig in full throttle to get ready for our open house. There is also something else God put on my heart to start... it is called Well Women.... but I'm holding off on that until I get the other going. And because I am scared.

But God promised me that when the time came my heart would be ready. So I'm counting on that, and on Him.

A friend of mine who lives in Portland sent me this verse yesterday. Being a bitter and hurting missionary kid he doesn't usually send Bible scriptures.... but he did yesterday. Here it is:

If you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness and your night will become as noonday. --Isaiah 58:10

So there you have it.

Waiting for my light to rise,

Jamie

it has begun

well, it has begun....summer is over! the kids started back to school on wednesday and so far so good. it is getting a little scary, the independence i see in them, the fact that they no longer need their mom like they used to. it is nice though, to talk to them on a different level and laugh about things. the week has been different for sure! dave is off of work with a broken foot, i finally got to see my dad and a few other friends i hadn't all summer. we got our loan money and i got to pay off all the doctor bills, which felt so so so nice! kids are in school, so the house remains quiet longer and stays cleaner longer. i went to a water aerobics class at an old folks home last night, and i really enjoyed it. i am scheduling time for me in daily instead of foregoing it for the kids. homework already, not bad though. i have been working out thanks to my new "medicine". i feel so much better about most things, still really struggling with the inside of me. the memories are horrid! i still am edgy and onery and have walls built up, and if you ask me for advice be prepared that i will give it with no holds barred instead of spareing your feelings. i am still in search of myself and trying not to hate who i am, very hard right now. i still feel like i should go pray for certain people and yet remain afraid and feel totally disobedient to god for not doing it. dave and i still struggle, many barriers i have created will take time to knock down. but i am making it, slowly, i am trying to right myself and get back on track, to continue this journey that i have begun. so it has begun, look out cuz here i come!

On the outside

Walking into my parents house at midnight last night, I was overcome by an immediate sense of sadness. Sadness because of things gone that can never be recovered. Sadness because I increasingly feel like a stranger with my family. Sadness because my dad's extraordinary gifts have been wasted and now flick away like the dead ashes from an old fire. Sadness because this morning I found out my little 9 month old niece has been undergoing all sorts of tests in the past 4 months to find out why she is not developing as she should, and nobody told me. I feel like I'm an outsider, and yet i know my family loves me. If anything, I have put myself on the outside, shut certain doors to make sure I had some measure of independance and solitude.
My parents are not home yet, they have been out of town. I use the quiet to sit in the beauty of the back garden. It reminds me of the garden of Eden...lush and green with blossoms and fruit trees abounding wherever the eye rests. I wonder what would have happened if my dad would have cultivated some little corner of God's kingdom with the same dedication and creativity that he has poured into this garden. The garden's beauty must delight God...but is He able to separate that from the sadness He must feel as He looks at my father? But the garden's beauty tells me something else...it tells me that my dad cannot be completely dead inside. He cannot have been completely successful at killing his emotions. Otherwise, he would not be able to create such a place of beauty and grace. And suddenly, I find the garden a place of hope. Hope that testifies that no matter how dark things are, nothing is past the power of Jesus's redemption. There must still be a craving in my dad's soul for beauty and light and truth. Perhaps as long as he is able to create this garden, it allows enough space for the Holy Spirit's redemptive song.

one sweet world

Tomorow Brad and I leave for Marysville and the Sleeptrain Ampitheater. Dave Matthews and his band are waiting there to put on a little show for us.

I guess I'm just a little bit excited.

emily's whirlwind summer tour is ending

Emily came home from Calvin Crest Saturday.

Saturday afternoon Emily helped her sister Sarah pack for her move to New York.

Yesterday she packed for her own trip and helped me make lazagna for our dinner with Aimee and her boyfriend Jesse last night.

This morning we were at the airport by 4:45 so Emily could get on a plane to go to Boston with her cousin Jacob for five days.

School starts on Monday.

it's all in the blood

You may recall that my Grams was in the hospital for 10 days recently. She is home now, recovering nicely. She even walked outside to her garden the other day.

Grampo got a call from the Madera County Health office after her test results were processed.... it turns out she had West Nile Virus.

My Grams is 93 years old.

When I told my friend Katharine about this she looked at me for a long time and then said, "Holy moly, woman. What sort of stock do you come from?"

The past few days have been hard. But Jesus has been reminding me of all that He has brought me through. He and I are strong together, and He died to take all the power away from what tries to bring us down.

So once again I look to Him for a holy transfusion.

opportunities missed and taken

The other day I was at Walmart and a young woman caught my eye. It might have been the silver sequence belt and red glitter shoes that made me take notice... but then I noticed something else. Across her back, in two-inch letters, reaching from one shoulder to the other, these words were tattooed:

REMEMBER LOT'S WIFE

I felt God urging me to speak to her, but I didn't. Since then I have wished a thousand times that I had. Partly because I knew God wanted me to... but in all honesty mostly because I am now racked with questions and curiosity. Presumably she is telling us 'Don't look back' but what prompted her to mark herself so permanently (and in such BIG letters)? Does she know Jesus? Is He calling to her and wanted me to play a part? Was there something she was supposed to teach me? Unfortunately I guess I will never know the answers this side of eternity.

Yesterday I was riding my bike down Cedar Avenue. At about Cedar and Shields I spotted a young boy walking along holding two pizzas. God very clearly told me "Go talk to that kid." I looked at him. He was about 12 years old, dark-skinned, cornrows peeking out from a red do-rag, wearing a Raiders jersey and sagging pants. Nothing inordinate. I see dozens of kids like him every day. But I wasn't about to argue with God this time. I kept riding along and watched the boy walk towards the same corner where I was heading. And of course, just as I skidded to a stop he was at precisely the same spot, about a foot from my face. God wasn't taking any chances with me, given my recent history. I looked at the kid and realized I knew him.

His name is Jack. He used to come to Dakota House for about a month. I gave him a pair of shoes once.

"Hey!" we said simultaneously. "Jack!" I exclaimed. His face lit up like a Christmas tree. "You remember me?" he asked incredulously.

So we stood there for a few minutes on that hot street corner, him holding his pizzas and what looked like some sort of ranch dressing in a flimsy plastic container. I straddled my bike and as the cars whizzed by I learned that he had moved about a dozen times since the year or so since I had seen him. I reminded him that God has plans for his life, and to keep looking to Him. He assured me he would, and just before I rode off I asked him where he lives now. He told me his family is moving yet again. I asked him where they were moving.

"Um. I don't know. I barely found out. Uh...it's called Paradise."

It turns out 'Paradise' is the name of an apartment complex and Jack will be attending Wilson, which is just a few blocks away from Dakota House.

Moral of the story? Talk when God tells you to. If I could learn to do that, and only that, oh what a different world I would inhabit.

the good life

Yesterday my son Nate and I spent most of the day in Madera with my grandparents. He and I worked together in the hot sun, weeding and pruning and mowing their front yard, and working in Grampo's vegetable garden. At some point Nate stopped and said, "It feels so good to be out here in the country... just listening to the quiet and working. I miss this."

For the first nine years of Nate's life he lived on the farm. Most of the time he was naked, dirty, and dripping with grape juice from his procurement of fruit from the vines. We swam in the ditches together, and walked through orange groves to Grams and Grampo's house, where there was always a big meal on the table.

Yesterday I let Nate drive, though he is only 15 and has no license. This of course is standard fare in the country. He was driving tractors and trucks around when he was five, as was I at that age.

We drove past our farmhouse where we lived before moving into the city at Dakota House. We saw our old stuff: a swing set, and our dog house too... abandoned by the side of the barn. The pen where our geese lived was dilapidated, and the chicken coop, though still standing, was lopped over to one side and barely hanging on.

It was sort of weird for Nate. Everything looked smaller than he remembered, of course. And he is grown now, no longer the little boy with his BB gun slung over his shoulder, out hunting for frogs with one eye out for the coyotes. Now here he was driving around the dirt roads he had walked as a child. He got a little sad. If he'd had his way we never would have moved into the ghetto and away from the beloved grape vines and all he knew as his world. He had to grow up pretty fast on Dakota. He was threatened and beaten up, saw his mother threatened and her heart broken, was required to share his mother and family with all the neighborhood kids, and had lots of his personal stuff stolen. It was hard. I believe he grew so much, and his heart took in things that God will use. But most everything has a cost, and often we don't know what we have paid until the purchase has been made.

I was very proud of Nate yesterday, as I always am. He worked hard and loved his grandparents well. He is growing into a good young man, and I have a lot to thank Jesus for. He paid the price for all of our blunders, and even brings beauty to them. As we flew along down country roads, windows open, heat pouring in, I looked over at my son, who smiled back at me and said, "Man...I have a good life."

And thanks to Jesus, this is true.

leia's turn

Well, things are different, no, I take that back, things are just bad. I suppose I am allowed to use this blog as well, so since I have no where else to vent I think I will. I used to be in control, made sure that whoever was needed, was up, I made sure that we always had money, food, shelter, and that we were where we were needed to be all the time. I was good at this and loved my "job". Then the "discovery" came and we were found out, and still it didn't change my job, because Debbie was in denial and couldn't handle all the craziness that we all seemed to bring to her. But slowly, she got stronger and braver and soon she was in control and that too was ok with me, I just changed jobs and started working more on the "inside". But now, Debbie cannot handle the emotional state that she is in and it is hell! It went from a monthly to a weekly to a daily to an hourly occurance of her discarding her emotions onto someone new. I cannot control the suddeness of these new people many with a single isolated emotion. I cannot control the girls in here who latch onto these newbies and try to merge with them to make themselves stronger. I cannot console the kids who think that they are all alone and are scared and hurting. I cannot stop the memories from flooding over Debbie and I cannot control Debbie. I am swirling in confusion and exhaustion and I hate it. Things are so chaotic here. I want to scream. Debbie wants to run and escape the pain, I cannot remove it. I know why people like us never get "well", I used to be an optimist now I am just a realist. And please don't insult my intelligence by saying to turn to God, I am fully reliant on God now and in the past and future, that is not the case with me. It is easy to spout off with "you are never alone, god is with you". But believe me, while we are keenly aware of this truth, it isn't always a helpful thing to hear. Sometimes it hurts more than the lonliness. I am sorry that I am venting, but i fear I will soon implode if I don't and I have no where else to do it, if you are upset with me, I am sorry, but there is little I can do about it right now. I am drowning and may never recover from this. A mind fragmented is a hard thing to put back together, in fact, the mind never goes back, you just put the pieces into the heart and let the heart melt the pieces and keep them there. So, from the very broken place in Debbie's mind, heart and spirit, I will sign off now, Leia

everything that matters

There are two people I know and love who are struggling with the wait. The wait on God. The wait for an answer to something huge in their lives.

This morning I was talking to one of them and I heard myself saying, "Everything that matters is already taken care of."

You've probably heard me say this before. I heard it from Brad, who heard it at his men's retreat from Ben Patterson. These words have brought comfort to me in the past.... I even made it the text greeting on my cell phone, and often when I turn my phone on and see it the words surprise and comfort me again.

My daughter is moving to New York. I am alternately excited and afraid for her. I go through my days holding her before God.... reminding Him to watch out for her... questioning Him, like, "So... you'll go with her to New York, right? I mean...New York is a long ways away and all."

I'm not kidding. I've seriously caught myself saying that to Him.

Above is a picture of Sarah from Saturday night at the Basque restaurant. We celebrated her birthday and got the whole family together to say goodbye. She broke into tears as we all sang to her. I saw her sitting there in her little party dress, and she seemed four years old again. I became frightened to send her off to that big ol' mean town.

This morning, after I told my friend that everything that matters is taken care of, Jesus reminded me the same goes for Sarah. I don't know what she will have to go through as she finds her way through life and closer to God. I can't save her from the falls and the pain and those hard, inevitable lessons. But I can cling to the fact that God loves her more than I do, calls to her louder than I ever could, and has the things that matter taken care of.

Jesus help me to remember.

i am losing my freaking mind!

i am losing my freaking mind! for a few weeks now, i have struggled internally with really disliking myself, it started with some memories that i have been having and that really disgust me. i cannot imagine that i ever allowed myself to do some of those things. and i am really bothered that i was a coward and created someone else to deal with it. i usually can talk and reason with myself about it and let it go, this time i haven't been able to. i do ok when i am around other people but the second i am alone i start to cry and really beat myself up. last night it got bad. dave and the kids left to go play volleyball and swim at a friends house, i was home alone cleaning and doing laundry, which was fine, until i started to freak out. it got to a point where i felt i needed to escape, from myself?!?! by the time dave was on the way home, i had gotten into the car and left, no where to go, just needed out. i drove around for a few hours, i wasn't going to the coven, no worries there, but i had no direction and no purpose. i ended up at shannons and stayed until after 3 am. i do not understand who i am. i wish i had never started to feel. i told her i was mentally ill and i was scared, she said you are not mentally ill you are emotionally ill. then she explained to me what she meant. it sounded right, but i am really scaring myself. i feel like i cannot keep things together. she told me that i might feel out of control but i very much keep things running, with the house and the kids and everything, and that it isn't obvious to others that i am struggling. i don't know what to do! i feel so frightened by my thoughts, and sickened by my memories, i feel isolated and alone and i don't know which way is up most of the time. i look in the mirror and it is so distorted with rage and bitterness and hurt, it doesn't look human. i hate the way i am feeling and cannot get out of mind and i am scared. i don't want to feel anymore!

where has all the time gone?

where has all the time gone? everyday i ask myself that. time either seems to stand still or move at the speed of light. i have been struggling here lately. i don't really like myself and i find that with each passing day, i go deeper and deeper into a dark place in my mind. i think that if i could change anything the past years it would be that i would never have learned to feel. ignorance was bliss, not knowing even the good emotions was preferable to this. i wonder how "normal" people do it?! having so many conflicting emotions trying to sort them out, feeling like your heart will explode one minute from being so full and the next scraping together the fragments left when it broke. laughing till your side aches and then crying from pain. being so afraid and then feeling invincible. i personally think that emotions suck! i wish that i never became aware of mpd or any of it. i wish that my alters continued to live my life for me. what a coward, right?! i don't care. i feel so incapable of surviving the day to day emotional grind, and it scares me this place i have retreated to. i want the pain to end, to be dull and at peace with my ignorance. i wish that time would go back and remove this burden from me. life is not so fun these days. i cannot escape "feeling" and i hate it so much! to feel for me, feels like death. i am not in a good place and will probably erase this blog when i come to my senses, if i ever do.... that's all

what I learned while backpacking...

Graveyard Lakes

Brad took me on a great backpacking adventure these past few days. He is a great companion, navigator, and one heck of a hiker, I might add. I am happy to be home but miss being in the mountains with him.

I learned something. If a trail or lake or other destination has the words 'hell', 'graveyard', or 'devil' in it, that translates out to "really really hard climb uphill that will make you think you are going to die" and also "amazingly beautiful spot that was worth it all."

see more pictures here.

wen i wuz six

mi mom died
wen i wuz six
i wuz put in a hol
wen i wuz six
hunk up sid down
wen i wuz six
men ped on me
wen i wuz six
put in a box
wen i wuz six
pusd undr wadr
wen i wuz six
had sex wif mi dad
wen i wuz six
met the debl
wen i wuz six
got awai from mi dad
wen i wuz six
got a nu dad
wen i wuz six
got nu frends
wen i wuz six
saw six starwars
wen i wuz six
nevr at is crem
wen i wuz six
at is crem all the timm
wen i wuz six
went tu skool
wen i wuz six
goted mareed
wen i wuz six
waz a mom
wen i wuz six
nu frends lefd
wen i wuz six
nu dad lefd me
wen i waz six
six forevr
six no mor
i hatt six
i hatt paige
i hatt luv
i hatt six
mi mom died
wen i wux six