That is you. This is me.

 When I was only three years old, I knew that people shouldn’t be compared to other people. My mom told me. 

The story goes that I drew on the wall with my crayons. I really can’t remember if I knew beforehand that I wasn’t supposed to. But my mom was frustrated as she was attempting to clean it up and she said to me. “Jimmy (my older brother) NEVER did things like this.” 

Sassy as I always was, I replied, “well that’s him and this is me!” 

My mom said she felt remorseful at that moment because she knew she should not have been comparing us and she didn’t do that anymore. 

At only three, my words carried more wisdom than I could have known. But then kindergarten came, and I let the world change me, because I didn't know any better. 

First, I had never really been around kids who were mean to me before that. But when they called me names, I at first was shocked and over time just believed what they said, and would spend years trying to be different. 

I vividly remember how proud I was to have my brother’s old Incredible Hulk lunch box. I had ASKED to take it because I loved the Hulk. But then, the kids around me laughed about my boys lunch box. And I went home angry saying I had a boys lunch box and I needed my mom to get me a girls lunch box. 

I think back to this and wish I had my three year old sass that would have just told them I liked my lunch box and could have whatever lunch box I chose. But when we are young and surrounded by our peers, we want so desperately to fit in….to be accepted. I guess it's rooted in our tribal history, from what I have heard and read. So in school, we learn to compare ourselves with everyone else. I began to think if I could just be like this classmate, or that girl in the other class, I would be good enough then. If only I was as pretty or smart as so and so. 

By the time fifth grade came, I was certain that my mom had to let me pick my own clothes, get my hair done right, and whatever else I could do to make myself fit with my peers.  I had to be cool. But by the age of 13 I thought I would never be enough for anyone to really love me and had to work through my first round of depression with a counselor because I dreamed of ending my life. This is what comparison brought me to, and I worry that in this day and age, it must be so much worse for young girls doing social media. And probably for boys too. 

Don’t we work for a lifetime to free ourselves from the comparison trap? Maybe some of us are still trying to as adults. If it’s something adults have to work on in the era of constantly viewing everyone’s highlight reels of vacations, new cars, new homes, fancy dinners, etc, what must our teenagers feel like when they are being raised in the digital world? 

Aren’t these such wise words? It's one of my favorite quotes because I know it's the truth. If we compare our success, or even our problems, with that of others, it will leave us feeling bad. So what if someone else achieved something? We are no less valuable because our life looks different. My sweet mother never thought she did enough to make a real impact in the world. But everyone who ever knew her was impacted by her kindness shown in small acts of love. By Kingdom standards, she was successful. 

God made everyone different because he wanted diversity. That’s why people are different shades and shapes, and all have different gifts. God is not boring and wouldn’t want to create a boring world, so He made us to each stand out in our own ways. You are who you are meant to be. I have had to stop myself repeatedly from thinking about why I couldn't achieve things at the level of others. That's their story. God is writing a different one for me and something else for you. 

I wish I knew when I was young what I know now. The only opinion of me that is the truth is the one God has of me. And because of Jesus, I am perfect in the sight of God. There is nothing I have to do to receive that, and nothing you have to do. The free gift of salvation we get from Jesus also makes us the righteousness of God in this world, so we are seem without fault. (2 Corinthians 5:21) 

And since we are loved beyond measure, we should be proud of whatever we have to contribute to this world in partnership with God.  Being a child of the One True King means there is enough to go around for everyone. Don't look at anyone's success and think you can never succeed. Yours just might look different than theirs. And don't feel bad about yourself because you were sad over your problems and someone else you know has it worse than you. God is big enough to handle all our emotions. I have come to believe that all we need to do in this life is nurture the gifts we have, and share whatever we have with the world. That's how we all make a difference, and let's be sure to do it all for an audience of One. 

Prayer is not passive

 "All we can do is pray." "I wish I could do more, but I am praying." "Our prayers are not enough." 

Have you ever said or heard someone say phrases like these? 

I was listening to a podcast I love this morning and as it sometimes happens, I felt like the Holy Spirit was giving me more to say about the topic spoken of. Other teachings I had learned so much from in the past were brought to mind, and I felt like I had to share what came on my heart. 

So here I am, in the midst of breakfast dishes and piles of laundry needing put away, the Wonder Pets on full blast in the background, sharing why prayer is more powerful than we give it credit for and why the Bible says we need to do it constantly. 

The podcast I mentioned was from Nicki Koziarz, Lessons from the Farm, and it was entitled, "But are we even praying?" 

She put it out in response to what she had been seeing on social media from people who with good reason want to see justice and action to prevent more tragedy after the school shooting in Texas. To sum it up, religious leaders have even said "our prayers are not enough." 

She questioned how ours souls have gotten to a place of seeing prayer as something small that doesn't make a real difference, but also questioned whether we even pray enough to see the real power in it. 

Nicki admitted to not praying enough over her city, the country, and the leadership of the country, and I admit the same. As much as I love God, truth be told, I often forget to even say a simple prayer before I eat! 

As she said she did, I have also prayed over the families who lost someone in such a tragic way. But she reminded us that prayer gives us the power to drive out the forces of evil in this world and to spark revival. Yes, it really does! And if we spent enough time in prayer as a whole, meaning every follower of Christ was united in prayer for this world, we would see a difference! That is the part I wanted to expand on and back up with scripture, so I will do my best. 

Another ministry that has become dear to my heart has shown me a lot about the truth of the following scripture, and the importance of constant prayer.

It was Because of Jesus Ministries and Connie Witter who taught me that any thought we have that does not line up with what God thinks, whether that's a negative opinion of ourselves, or looking at the negative around us thinking all is hopeless, that thought is a lie from hell. The only way the devil has to influence us is through our thoughts. He doesn't have the power to hurt anyone in any other way because Jesus already defeated him when he died on the cross and rose up from the dead. But he uses what Jesus called his native language, LIES, to influence our thinking. All the evil that happens in the world is because Satan influences the minds of people to believe his lies, and to act out of darkness instead of light. When people allow the dark influence over them to continue, it's because they don't know their real identity, who God made them to be. They have believed the lies of the enemy and acted out of that dark place because they were not able to see the truth, or maybe nobody ever shared the real Truth with them. But just because Satan sends us negative thoughts or wrong thoughts, we do not have to keep those thoughts and we do not have to believe them. 

I believe the reason these two scriptures are included in the Bible is so that we can know that it's imperative to let God be the one in charge of what we think....to allow him to renew our mind every day, every moment! I am living proof of how a collection of wrong thoughts, circulated in the brain repeatedly over time, can take a person down. In my own life, the way Satan has tried to eliminate me working out my full potential on God's behalf is through depression. It started out when I was only 13, and that was probably my rock bottom with it, because without mature understanding of God's love for me or how circumstances change, I wanted to end my life, and I thought about it frequently. See how that worked? I THOUGHT. I thought my family would be better off without me and I thought I didn't have anything good to offer in the world because I believed every bad thing that any other person had ever said about me. I thought I was stupid, so I started getting bad grades that year. I thought nobody was ever going to love me for me. But someone gifted by God with the ability to show a young girl the truth helped me instead believe the what was true about me, that I was made by God on purpose and for a purpose. But the devil wasn't about to be done with using negative thinking against me. Depression would come back, and I would beat it, and then something else would happen in my life that was hard, and it would come again. When I had a special needs child, it came back, along with the worst anxiety, when he was going to kindergarten as a non-verbal little boy. Because he had one preschool teacher who was abusive towards children who didn't come to school with their own aid, like mine did, I was terrified that someone could hurt my baby and I may never know. That was the first time I accepted prescription drugs from my doctor to help me get the swirling emotions and panic attacks under control. Now, having two boys that don't say much, I can see how far God has brought me along in my thinking. Whenever my boys are not with me, I have come to understand that God is with them. Yes, bad things happen in this world, as we have just been reminded. And I know that it's because of human free will and them allowing the devil to make them THINK what is not true and it all comes from the depths of hell.  I can't begin to understand why some tragedies are divinely prevented, when others are not, but this circles me back to the importance of prayer. I just pray over my babies, and I know God loves them even more than I do, and I have to trust Him for my families provision of what we need from Him day by day. God has shown me that living in worry or fear of other people, of illness, or any other of the million possibilities that CAN go wrong, will not help my children or me. 

Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?

Luke 12:25-26

I know we won't always be free of worries, but that is when we need to PRAY. Again, back to why prayer is not the passive action that we may have come to think of it being. 

Remember how evil works against us by influencing the minds of people? Making them believe things that are not in alignment with the will of God? This is what Connie Witter and her colleagues spoke about in a Bible study that made me see why it is so important to pray, especially for the leaders whose actions and decisions disagree with what we believe is right based on scripture. Throughout Biblical history, people changed the outcome of things through prayer, and it very much still happens today. The ladies in Because of Jesus Ministries said how the apostle Paul, who previously was Saul, changed from a killer of Christians to one of the greatest messengers of the Gospel because the church prayed about him! They said the church prayed so hard about what he was doing, Jesus himself had to show up to personally stop him on the way to persecute Christians, and he changed his name and gave him a completely different calling. Saul had been doing what he was doing because he THOUGHT it was right. He thought that Jesus was not the messiah and that anyone who believed he was should be done away with. When he met Jesus, he knew he thought wrong, and he himself went to prison for spreading that news everywhere, and was able to write letters about being joyful in all circumstances while he was chained up in a dark dungeon. THAT is the kind of power prayer has. 

That is why the Bible says to pray without ceasing, and because of what Jesus did for us, we have direct access to the throne of grace at ALL times. We have the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, so God is even closer than the whisper of His name. Always. And we are told that when we pray anything according to His will, He hears us, and so we can know that we will receive what we are asking for. 

Friends, it is the will of God that the forces of darkness are stopped. And that's why the most powerful thing we can do is pray. We can pray that God will intervene in the thoughts of anyone being influenced by evil, that he will renew the minds of those who have not yet believed or who have gone away from the truth they once knew. We can pray together even when we are not together, that the people in this world who have believed the lies of the devil will believe them no longer, and that they will clearly see the truth. We need to pray it over all leadership that they will make choices that do line up with God's will. We need to pray it about everyone our children will come in contact with that day, and over each family member and friend. We need to pray it over church leadership in every denomination, that they will stay in line with God's will and not act in sin because of the enemy's influence in their thoughts. We need to pray this over anyone and everyone we can. And yes, it is enough. When we can do other things to help, like provide a need, or send a letter, or share the truth through love in actions, we should. But for the rest of the time, when it seems like there is nothing that can be done, we can pray. So, let's pray. 

Faith and Food

I like studying topics that interest me, and nothing makes health a more interesting topic than the fact that you have become sick. I have had two run-ins with an autoimmune disease in the last 4 years. When I studied and listened to all the information I could about that sort of illness, I found out they are often triggered by chronic stress. While this fact is not spoken of much in the mainstream medical field, those who practice functional medicine all agree that stress reduction and stress management are crucial to health, because chronic stress is a catalyst for illness, especially the autoimmune types of disease. With this knowledge, it became clear to me why I was diagnosed with a hyperactive thyroid and Graves Disease. 

When I had my second baby boy, the expectation was that this one would be "normal." While there was certainly going to be a period of adjustment for Lucas to having a little brother after 10 years as an only child, and to the whole family, getting used to being 4, I couldn't wait for the days when we would see Liam being a friend and advocate for his big brother in this world. But, when Liam was 6 or so weeks old, I got the results of his cord blood test, and those results were positive for a full mutation of Fragile X Syndrome, just like his brother had. I was already experiencing a level of postpartum depression I had not been expecting when that phone call came in, and I got swept away in a lot of anger, sadness and disappointment. I got help and the Lord helped me get much better over time, but in the first year of Liam's life, I definitely had this sense that life just kept getting on top of me. I felt like I was not good at parenting two children, and nursing a baby all of the time while not being able to attend to all of the major needs my older child still had at the same time was very difficult. In the summer of 2018, my husband was working 3 jobs, while I did my best to manage all these things with just a little help in the evenings a few days a week with a home health care aid. I'll probably never forget the level of hurt I felt, both physically and emotionally, the day I finally lost it after trying to do it all for so many months. 

That was the day Lucas was tearing up the contents of the refrigerator during one of his brother's morning nursing sessions, not listening when I told him to just wait a minute for me. I attempted to hold the baby, still latched, as I got up to see what Lucas wanted and get it out for him. Liam had not appreciated being moved and he who had his first few teeth at the time bit down hard. I had a mom freak out moment and moved on but by the next day, that broken skin had become more irritated and the the day after that, it was infected. And I recall having to go to urgent care to get it treated after no doctor was in my network who could treat it and my PCP refused to help me with a problem that they determined required an OB. This incident was surely the straw that broke the camel's back. I had dealt with some stressful times before this, but I can't remember ever feeling so unable to manage. Two weeks later, I had what they call the "thyroid storm." And was pretty sure I could be dying, You can't believe the number of symptoms this can cause in your body if you never have lived it. I never knew one gland could cause so much trouble until I did. 

I went to a regular endocrinologist after my PCP had put me through a series of tests to find out the reasons for all the symptoms occurring and had sent me to an autoimmune specialist when they did see my thyroid was hyperactive but also detected and autoimmune problem in my blood work. The first one told me it was probably Hashimoto's and later corrected it to Graves, saying "sorry, I haven't been into internal medicine that long." The endocrinologist sent me for more labs, and later confirmed Graves, and I was on thyroid inhibiting medicine as well as a beta blocker because of the high heart rate I experienced. But at the same time I got myself a book on thyroid healing naturally and I had started listening to podcasts on food as medicine and healing autoimmune conditions by fixing the gut microbiome. I learned that most of the time, leaky gut contributes to autoimmunity and the foods we eat cause the body to attack a part of itself because it sees these food irritants as a pathogen needing destroyed. Dr. Mark Hyman was the first person who made me believe I could help myself heal from my disease through changing my lifestyle and what I ate, because on his podcast, The Doctor's Farmacy, they spoke about the many cases they had healed simply by fixing the person's gut. People who had crazy autoimmune conditions that were much worse than my own got better from getting their gut bacteria to be healthy instead of unhealthy! I heard these stories and knew if they could heal, I could heal. 

At my next doctor visit, I brought up the common suggestions from these other professionals that it might help me to cut out gluten and dairy, and I wanted to know if she knew anything about this. She told me point blank that changing my diet would not alter my condition. She told me I would be on this medication for life, and if it stopped working or caused me any side effects or caused my liver to eventually shut down (you know, nothing too serious!) my only two choices were to have my thyroid removed or radioactively destroyed. I did not like these options. And I didn't accept them. I cancelled my further appointments with her and I know, that sounds reckless. But I also got on board with a naturalist doctor who had the same condition and had healed without medicine and at that time I just took advantage of all the free information he put out. Dr. Eric Osansky does offer a lot of free and low cost information in case anyone reading wants to check him out. 

I eventually stopped taking my medication, and according to the information I had learned, I stopped eating gluten, dairy, most soy, except organic edamame and tofu, I cut out canola oil, corn, except non-GMO whole corn, eggs, heavy metal fish, and it was recommended not to eat pork but I hadn't consumed that in years anyway. I drank fresh celery juice most mornings, I had lemon and ginger in my water, I upped my veggie intake by a lot and centered most of my meals around plants, I exercised regularly and spent time in prayer and mediation on the Word and positive affirmations every day, and I added a few supplements to my regimen too. And I got better! I stayed better and symptom free for over a year. 

My mistakes added up starting with our Disney World vacation in later 2019. I would have done fine had I only abandoned my healthy ways of eating during the trip. But when we got back, I had a harder time leaving the gluten and other things I had given up alone. And then 2020 happened. While I was generally at peace, not overly worried about the state of things, I was also enforced to stay home with two special needs boys who had their routines ripped away from them, with no understanding as to why they no longer got to do everything as they always had. Stress much? Not to mention, I hadn't fully healed from my original disappointment in my second baby having Fragile X, and the behaviors that emerged and grew during this tumultuous year were hard on me emotionally. I let my thoughts go awfully negative at times. I found myself down because of focusing on the unfairness of things and how hard of a time they were having and when you think that way, the weight will surely crush you. So after several months of that chronic stress and lack of management on my part, along with too much food that wasn't beneficial, early 2021 brought on a relapse of Graves Disease and I found myself back on medication in February to manage my symptoms. 

The new doctor I chose was better than the first, in my opinion, although still very mainstream in her opinion about my options for getting better. This time, I decided I would not bring up the dietary and lifestyle interventions I had learned about, for thinking she would probably have a similar opinion as the first doctor. But one thing I was happy about was that along the way, she indicated that safely going off the meds was a possibility if I could get my antibodies to a normal level along with my thyroid levels. And I would need routine check ups, but it was possible to stay in remission. She still asked me each visit if I wanted to have my thyroid removed and each time I said no, fully believing that while I was on the medicine I would also correct the mistakes I had made and get my body back into self healing mode. I also believed God for healing my body, even if it took a little time. In my prayers and meditations I claimed that healing would be evident. This may sound like a crazy approach for some people, but if you look at scripture, nearly every time Jesus healed a person he said to them, "your faith has made you well." 

Also, Proverbs 23:7 tells us, "As a man thinks in his heart, so is he." To me, this proves that our thoughts shape who we are, how we feel, and what our outcomes in life will be. I began to apply this also to the way I thought about my children and what tasks were required of me every day for their care too. Have our circumstances gotten a lot easier? Not really. I have two boys who barely speak a word, 11 years apart in age, with different wants and various behaviors I wish they didn't have. But I am doing better in life and actually enjoying them more because I have finally learned that I never operated in my full capacity because I allowed the devil to influence what I thought. Now, I acknowledge that it sometimes IS hard, but also, so what if it is? God enables us to do hard things because life in this world is never all that easy. But He promises to make all things possible through Him, and that He will never leave us to do it alone, and I have learned that I can still enjoy every day of life while things are getting worked out over the course of theirs. 

"Finally brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things."

Philippians 4:8

By allowing God to renew my mind daily, I can think about all the things I love about my children....the many, many things that are beautiful and admirable about each of them, and I focus on those, rather than the hard. This makes my stress levels plummet down to so little. I have my moments, and I also know I need to take time out for myself, so I do. But this mindset shift is the main reason I know I will stay well. 

In addition to thinking according to Biblical instruction about all the aspects of my life, I have gone back to the healthier ways of eating for the most part, and recently I did start eating a mostly vegan diet, because those many case studies I hear about the healing properties of plant based eating just keep piling up. I still currently eat chicken once  a week because my dad always prepares some for me and I want to eat with him on Sundays without making him worry about what I will or won't eat. I have had fish a couple of times too, and very occasionally real cheese  but I am leaning towards the belief that I could most likely live happily on a vegan diet. I don't include this to say everyone wanting to eat for healing has to do it, but I do believe from my research and personal experience that eating plants very heavily and sticking with whole foods as much as possible will help heal many conditions. 

Last week, March 2022, my doctor told me I had gone into remission again and said I could taper off my medication. She said we'll lower the dose and check in three weeks, and if everything is still normal, I could stop taking it. I know in the depths of my heart that I have experienced the symptoms of that disease for the last time. What you eat, what you drink and what you think are the top indicators of how healthy you will be. I encourage everyone to check out Dr. Mark Hyman, Dr. Joel Furhman, and Dr. Eric Osansky, because they are the ones who helped me to do what I did. I did pay for a consult with Dr. Osansky and took a course with him this year and I know I got all the tools I needed to never go back. Drink your water, eat your veggies and fruits, move frequently, pray though, breathe deep, and take time outs whenever you can to refresh. These are the things that I know can help us all be the healthiest versions of ourselves.