Waiting and Not Waiting

Hello to whoever happens upon this blog post...stay and read a bit...learn something new, or at least something different.

We've officially welcomed a new member to our family, an adorable little Labradoodle who we've named Franklin (to go along with the Peanuts theme all our animals have: Schroeder, Belle, Lucy,  Linus).

We were on the fence about bringing him home so, thankfully, our friend let us bring him home for a week trial (during which he completely won over my husband, who was against him too begin with!). I, of course, loved him from the very start! 

At the end of our week we went away for a weekend and we had a very serious conversation about keeping Franklin. It seems that, after losing a child, even getting a dog is a very difficult thing to do. I definitely struggled with that fact that if we kept Franklin it really closed the door on what our life "should have been". We would never have gotten a puppy if we had a newborn but the harsh reality is that we don't have a newborn. Having to voice that out loud to John was really hard (like wiping your tears on a cloth napkin in a fancy restaurant kind of hard), and I realized just how difficult it is to move on.

Believe me, I'm the last person who thought that getting a puppy would make you face what you've lost, but it does. As a mother, it feels desperately wrong to leave my son behind. I know I am not truly leaving him behind, but our plans and dreams for him are a lot of what we have left of him. How many times must we remind ourselves that they are no longer achievable and that the Lords's plans for his life far exceed our own? At least once more, it seems. 

Our lives are never going to be the same, and we cannot just sit and wait for life to come back around to us. We must pull ourselves up by the hands of Jesus and keep moving forward. We should not be afraid of moving slowing, or growing slowing, only of standing still. So, we are moving forward, little by little, as Jesus leads us. 

So, we close the door on waiting for the life that "should have been" and now we are waiting for whatever The Lord has planned for us. That's one thing we have going for us, we certainly trust in His plan. We could never have healed/continue to heal through Kimber's loss if we didn't believe it was a part of God's plan.

So here we are...waiting and not waiting. It's a constant challenge trying to figure out when to wait and when to move on, but we've been blessed in our journey, and continually pray for wisdom and discernment.