Run, Just As Fast As I Can...

I started reading the book "Redeeming Love" over this Christmas break. Oh, and what an interesting Christmas break this has been. I am not sure if I have ever posted a blog about this before, probably because I never felt led to share. There is a song by Pink called "Just Like a Pill". Part of it goes, "You're just like a pill, instead of making me better, you keep making me ill." Sex. There, I said it. Thats how I apply this song to my life. One thing in my life that I have struggled with the most is sex. I believed the lies that it would strengthen a relationship, that it would take away all my pains, and that it would bring me worth. Sex has always been a part of my life. I hate that fact by the way. I hate that I gave myself away like that. It isn't how God intended it! We all have those things in our lives that are like "pills". We think that they will make us better, but instead, they make us ill. Not all of us struggle with the same thing, we all struggle with something different. Its all so very personal and meaningful for us. But then, there is another part in the song that goes "Where I can run, just as fast I can, to the middle of nowhere, to the middle of my frustrated fears." When we turn to something besides God, we are running. We are running from our fears and our hurts. I know for me, I used sex as an escape. An escape from the pains around me and everything else. So instead of staying with a "pill" that is not making us better, but yet is making us ill, we should run back to our fears and face them. Oh and, I am pretty sure that Pink never even fathomed that someone would apply God to one of her songs. First time for everything?

Difference Between School and Home

As I have been sitting at home pretty much reading and doing nothing else worthwhile, I have come to a conclusion that some may find hard to believe. I even found it hard to believe, at first. When I am at home, my relationship with God grows and is the most important part of my life. I seem to value my relationship with Him more when I am home as well. As I began to think about this, I started to wonder why. I mean, I go to a Christian School, and do not live in a Christian home, so how is this possible? Should it not be the other way around? When I am at school, it is so easy just to fall into the swing of things. I am not saying that the relationship with God does not exist, but I do not work at it as much. I pray less, I spend quiet time with Him less, and I am not much of a witness. One reason for this I think is because I consider having to read the bible for class as my quiet time (pathetic, I know!). When I am at home, I want to be the greatest witness that I can be for my family and friends. At school, most if not all of my friends are already Christians. At home, I indulge myself in His word more and more. I find it interesting that I find my true strength in Him when things are not the greatest. It would be so easy to praise Him at school because things are going so well. But at home, you would think it would be harder because of the circumstances. So, a new goal for when I get back to school and that is to maintain this strong relationship with Christ.

Restored Relationships (Not Just With People)

So, I began reading this book (I know, me reading over break is something that is shocking to most), and I haven't been able to put it down. I am not sure if I cannot put it down because I know my other book is being shipped today and I want to finish this one before that one gets here, or if it really is that good. Thinking about this now, it really is that good. I have been dwelling on the chapters about prayer, and I keep coming to the same conclusions. First conclusion, my prayer life stinks! Okay so I pray, but I do not pray in the way that I should. Before reading these chapters, I only prayed for certain things, such as the needs that I have and of my friends. I honestly have to say that I rarely pray for my family, and they are the ones who at times need it the most. Another conclusion that I came to was that I am not praying about decisions that I have to make. My mind set has been that God will show me the right decision to make...umm, won't this require me to at least talk to Him about the decision? I am not sure where my thinking was on that one! A neat thing that the book recommended doing was praying for someone that I am struggling to get a long with or someone who I have formed a disliking for. Immediately someone from school came to mind. She is someone who was in one of my classes last semester and she just bugged me to no end. She's pretty and really smart, but does not know the term humility. So, for the next month or so, she is going to be my focus for prayer. I cannot wait to see how my relationship with God, my relationship with this girl, and with anyone else is going to change!

The Joys of Surgery Number 1

Friday was the first of probably many surgeries that I am going to have to get on my bladder..well, if I have anything to do with it, that would be the first and the last. I am such a baby when it comes to pain, so you can imagine how well that went over on Friday. I even started off horribly! No one told me that I was going to have to pee in a cup before the surgery, so I went to the bathroom before I went back to get ready. Well, we waited at least 30-45 minutes just for me to pee in a cup! The ended up just flowing the IV fluids into my just so that I would pee. Then, they threatened to take my nail polish off because they weren't sure if they would be able to get a good heart rate reading from the acrylic being in the way. I bet you can imagine how freaked out I was over that considering my bright hot pink nails were the highlight of me being home. Recovery has been somewhat of an adventure as well. The first night was horrible as far as if I felt the need to urinate, I refused to go because I knew the pain that awaited me. The past two days I have been sore throughout my whole body. Today was a little better but my lungs are still hurting. I went to church this morning and that was my first time there since being home for Christmas break. It was so nice to see everyone, but I really don't remember a lot of it. I was so tired because I am not sleeping all that well at night. The only thing I can do is pray that God will hurry this recovery up!

Sometimes Its Just Good To Be Home

These past couple of days have been great. I have been just laying around, eating pretty much anything I want, not having to study, and having life back to the way it was before going to college. Tonight I am working for the first time since I have been back and I am pretty excited about that! I was supposed to work this Saturday night too, but things have changed. I went to the doctors yesterday and we thought that things would be okay and he would just change my medicine. Of course, it couldn't be that easy. He told me that I would have to get a "procedure" (I like that word better than surgery) done on Friday to stretch my bladder and to take some biopsies. So, we are hoping that this is the right step towards figuring out what is really causing me all of these problems. Everytime I think about having to go back to school, I dread it mainly because of the work. I really am not looking forward to another semester of school work. I feel like I don't really have the energy to work hard enough to pull off what I did this semester. I know it is only the beginning of CHristmas break so I shouldn't really be worrying about it, but I am worried that my mindset will not change within the next couple of weeks. J-term will be nice in that it wont be a lot of work, but its the next semester that is stressful. I also wont have my best friend there...so this is going to be quite different and challenging.

First Semester At College...Done!

This semester went by so fast and I can't believe that I am at home for Christmas break already. Most of my time will be spent at doctors appointments trying to figure out what the heck to do. It has been so nice being home and not having any work to do. Usually during Christmas breaks in high school I would have some sort of paper to write or something, but this time I am free. I have gotten two of my final exam grades back and on my social work final I got a 100 percent and on my western civ final I got a 92 percent. So far, so good! I am worried about two other ones which are my music and my psychology. I am not sure if I did well on them at all and that bothers me. I would like to think that I did and don't have to worry...but thats not going to happen. I took a 3 hour nap today and it was the best thing ever. I finally got to sleep in my own bed! This weekend my entire family went up to State College to a cabin that we have. There was a ton of snow in the mountain and it was pretty awesome. The bad thing was that there wasnt any cell phone service so no one knew that we made it there until the next day when we went into town and could use our phones. It was nice just to be with family again and not really have anything to worry about. Only about 3 more weeks until I am back at HU!

First Finals Week At HU

Well, this really has been the week from hell. Sunday night I decided that I was going to pull an all nighter and switch my sleep schedule so that I could sleep after finals. Yeah, that didn't happen because after my finals yesterday, I was wide awake. Then last night I ended up in the Emergency room with a bad kidney infection. I made it back to school just in time for my finals today. One thing that I have learned from this is that self determination is really what gets you through. It is so weird because in high school, no one studied for finals. Whereas here, almost everyone is studying. It is nice to be somewhere where everyone wants to be. We all may not be wanting to do the work, but we are all putting the effort in that is needed. These next couple days are also going to be extremely hard. This is my last week with Donna. Donna is my best friend here. She is transferring to Moody Bible Institute next fall. It is going to be so hard not having my best friend here. I am not sure how well next semester is going to go without her. We are together all the time. Its kind of like Laura and I in high school, but not as close. I am excited that I am going to get to see Laura over Christmas break. We have been emailing and writing letters back and forth and it has been so good just being able to talk to her. 1 more day until I get to go home!

The Third Victim

Last night, my plan was to work on my paper and to get it done. Well, there is this thing called facebook that distracted me for three hours. What distracted me though was one of my "friend's" facebook page. He wrote a note on his page about his trip home during Thanksgiving break. He found out that his ex girlfriend whom was pregnant had an abortion while he was away at school. She never told him, or even asked him how he felt about it. After reading his note, I could tell how much he was hurt and how angry he was, which he has every right to have these feelings. I then went to his page and noticed that he posted a new picture. The picture was of his ex girlfriend and it was titled "Murderer". Now, I have to be honest. If I were this girl, I would not want my picture on his facebook entitled murderer. It was hard to not just completely go off on him and ask him what the heck he was thinking! He had every right to be angry and upset, but she is also going to go through so much. Anyways, this post is not of my anger rampage. What I liked the most about the connversation that he and I had was that he was so open. He made a good point when he said that he as the father had no rights in this. Another point that I have in writing this blog is that everyone would pray for him as well. That he will take this anger and frustration and use it for good and would be able to heal from this in time.