YOUNG AND SKINNY...not to mention very, very, very poor. College students. Living off of $300 a month. In love and enjoying the bliss of ignorance having no idea what marriage would be like. Didn't care. I was so enthralled with being a young married couple attending college studying ART. Shortly after this picture was taken, I'd become pregnant.
About two months later to be exact. Wham, I was pregnant. How'd that happen? Well, let's see...we were on our HONEYMOON and I mooned my honey. We were so in love. When I started getting flu-like symptoms, I thought I had the flu. That's all. After all, my Mom had trouble conceiving and so did my older sister. Apparently, I would as well. No need to be cautious about not getting pregnant. Supposedly, I'd have difficulties conceiving as well. My main focus at that time wasn't about making a baby. It was about studying art and being young discovering how it is to be starting out as a young married couple mastering everyday living. I was in no way a HOME MAKER. Heck, I was barely a wife. I was lost as lost could be when it came to being a mature married woman.
I was a free spirited woman. God had other plans for this young married couple. I did indeed get pregnant and boy was I sick with Morning Sickness. Morning, noon and night. I was so sick. I wasn't aware that there was a condition called hyperemesis gravidarum.
I was just reading up on this condition and it generally starts when about 9 weeks pregnant and pregnant with a girl. Not me. I started becoming ill shortly after conceiving and I was pregnant with a boy. I would have been about two weeks pregnant when I became so ill I couldn't keep food down. The nausea was horrendous.
I had to stay home in bed, missing out on classes and part time work being employed at JC PENNEY. The day I stared feeling ill, I had gone to work and became so sick. I left work and drove home thinking I had the flu. We were married on August 31, 1974 and I became ill starting November 4th. I was pregnant with my first child and became ill on what would be my second child's birth day three years later.
After being so sick for a few weeks, I made an appointment with a doctor that practiced medicine in Marion. I thought it better to go to him instead of a Wichita doctor where I had only lived a few months. I was like a fish out of water in Wichita as I grew up in Liberal. I figured I would be better off going to a doctor in the same town as my Parents lived. I went to see a Cuban doctor, Dr. Guerra. I went to my appointment then went to my folk's home. I received a phone call where Dr. Guerra personally talked to me saying, "Congratulations. What do you want, a boy or a girl?" I asked him, "What?" He repeated, "What do you want a boy or a girl?"
It didn't register at the moment that I was indeed pregnant. After all how could I be when my mom and sister had a difficult time conceiving? I was stunned. From there, the rest is history. I began to think that I am going to be someone's Mother. I was fast forwarded into becoming a grown-up. You might say I sobered up rather quickly after I realized I was pregnant and started planning on having a baby. How were we going to do this? Baby would need this, this, this, this, this and so forth. After I held my baby in my arms for the first time and looked at him, I was a changed woman. This gave me so much meaning, it surprised my free spirited self. I was a bonafide grown up. June 16th, 1975.
I had gone to Dr. Guerra for a physical before I married. He advised me to not go on the birth control pill as I had Rheumatic Fever as a 6 year old child and believed it best to not take this pill. So I listened and had the delusional thought that if my mother and sister had trouble conceiving then I would as well. After all it must run in the family, right? Little did I think that I was an individual and just because a relative suffered something didn't mean I would as well. I forgot that I could become pregnant when being sexually intimate with the opposite sex. duh. I was out to lunch when dealing with this adult subject matter.
How could I be so naive? I just was and as life would have it, the older I got the more interested in God's ways I became. I would be enlightened that there are so many human mindsets that are not convenient.
I continue to learn as I go and if I had to live life over, I would have buckled down sooner embracing the things of God and drawing nigh to Him in all His ways. I would have been sheltered in the Most High's shadow long before I finally did. I would have been asking Him in prayer what He wanted me to do and was it alright to do such and such. I would have been more concerned about what He wanted for me and not just what I thought I wanted for myself.
I'd learn the hard way, that it's hard to kick against the pricks. Painful and hurtful to kick.
KJV Acts 26:14 ...it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
I definitely am not Paul of the Bible, but I know that when we are being rebellious and also a Christian, that when we go against the Lord, it will be hard.
We had a Christian Wedding, but as a couple we did not seek the Lord first for His guidance. We did not pray together, we did not worship God together, and we did not read the Bible...period. We were not behaving or living as a Christian couple that loved the Lord. We were actively in pursuit of doing our own thing and that was the best we could do at the time, so I thought. As awkward as it was, our relationship to God was distant and not as fruitful as it should have been. I was pregnant, this I would say was fruitful, but our marriage was tainted by worldly desires so we were bankrupt in many ways when we could have been so wealthy and satisfied by God's tender mercies and favor.
We chose the rocky road and it had pain in it. As a young child, I loved the Lord. I loved God, but I had a anemic relationship with Him as I grew into a young adult. I didn't know Him the way that God desires. That sweet and intimate relationship between child and daddy was vacant. I was missing in action. I was the one that stayed away from His glorious presence that blesses us. I stayed away from reading God's word. What I thought was important wasn't.
As the years passed, I returned to wanting to know Him and His ways. Having children assisted me in wanting to get to know God's ways better so I would raise my children in the admonition of the Lord. Being married to who I was made me buckle to my knees falling on my face as a broken woman and cry out to God for help in every area of my life. Our marriage was headed for divorce and I was not a well woman. I was only a fragment of what I was suppose to be. Our world fell apart. My Husband turned to God to rebuild our marriage. It was during this phase of our lives that we truly sought after God for healing and having a marriage that was biblically sound. God became OUR God.
As I was a stay at home wife and mother being a homemaker made me to lie down in green pastures leading me beside the still waters to restore my soul and led me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake.
Just as Psalm 23 says...
1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
3 He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
I am a child of God first before being a wife and momma. I am a child of the most high God before being a HOME MAKER. I am to seek His face, learn of His ways, embracing His counsel and grace. I am to consider His guidance and protection. I am to know His word, the history, the love letter to His children, the poetry, His divine ways. I am to know HIM to become a healthier me. It is in loving God and embracing His ways that I can become a more loving person that understands the ways of God which will only enhance the life I am to live. It will make me a better woman, wife and mother. If I put Him first, He will help me love my family all the better. I will be a better person for loving God and being baptized in His spirit.
After living LIFE where I ignored God's word and rebelled against His ways, I decided that I wanted to be BLESSED instead of kicking against the pricks. I want His blessings and protection. I want to have peace and joy with joy unspeakable. I want to be who He wants me to be. I want to be a godly Wife and helpmeet. I want to be a spirit filled woman that's a godly wife, Homemaker and godly mother. I want God's mercy and grace, I want to know Him the way He wants me to know Him. Blessed be the name of the LORD. This abundant LIFE He promises...I want it. I need this.
Psalm 91 [1] He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. [2] I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.
THOUGH IT'S TUESDAY, SOON TO BE WEDNESDAY, I'M JOINING THE PARTY @
https://familycorner.blogspot.com/2022/03/happy-homemaker-monday-03072022.html
WEATHER: WINTER ADVISORY THAT RAIN AND SNOW ON WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY.
OUTSIDE MY WINDOW: GLOOMY WEATHER.
RIGHT NOW I'M DOING: GETTING READY TO GO TO SLEEP. LONG DAY.
THINKING AND PONDERING: ???
HOMEMAKING TIPS: DO YOUR BEST TO MAKE YOUR HOME A HAVEN.
HOW I'M FEELING: TIRED.
BREAKFAST PLATE: HOT MATCHA GREEN TEA IN A CUP.
READING LIST: DR. COLBERT'S BOOK ABOUT BEYOND KETO.
TV: THE GILDED AGE.
MENU: LOTS OF VEGGIES, SOME PROTEIN, A LITTLE FRUIT, SPRING WATER AND HOT MATCHA GREEN TEA.
FROM THE CAMERA: GETTING READY TO BOX UP CHINA.
LOOKING AROUND THE HOUSE: THE JUNK ROOM NEEDS ATTENTION.
TO DO LIST: LAUNDRY, GO THROUGH BOXES, EAT BETTER.
PRAYER LIST: HOME AND FAMILY. RUSSIA INVASION OF UKRAINE.
DEVOTIONAL: PROVERBS 8 AND 9.
