Sitting on the couch, the night before our anniversary – it’s not glorious but it’s what The Lord has given us. And it’s what I wanted for years.

Tomorrow, hundreds of people will read about our life when the book releases. It’s exposing, but good.

Tomorrow is our anniversary.

Here’s to Larissa sticking it out for another 12 long months. They’ve been the best 12 months of my life, because I’m with the one I love.

Four years down and a lifetime to go, Squirt. I love you.

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Happy father’s day to two great dads. We were raised by two men who have their lives for their kids and wives.

From Ian “my dad is the greatest man who ever lived. He lived for only one thing: to make God more in himself. It gives me much hope that he’s in heaven before me.”

From Larissa “my dad makes me laugh even when the only other option is to cry. He’s taught me endurance in suffering and how to live and work hard for your family. I’m so glad he listened to my mom when after having two babies, she said that someone was missing”

We love you both dearly, whether here or with the Lord.

Love
I&L

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happy birthday, my dear. 

28 years have been lived, 9 of them with me knowing you. 

more than all, you’ve added to my life.

to others, you always bring laughter. joy. faith.

in 28 short years, your fragile bones and weakness have changed lives, been seen by more than a million and have drawn eyes to see that you live for something bigger than yourself.

you’re not reminded enough, that no one has shown me God more than you, has changed my life more than you, has driven me more crazy than you. in the good, and the bad.

your 28 years are indescribably valuable. 

your life has indescribable worth.

happy birthday, my dear. i’m glad we enter year 29 together.

love,

your wifey

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we hadn’t seen this doctor in awhile, nearly three years, and back then ian wasn’t walking yet.

back then we had shown the surgeon a video of ian trying to walk, but we were moving his legs for him, and he didn’t have much strength to do it on his own.

this time, though, ian walked for the surgeon. the surgeon that had seem him hours after his accident.

‘it’s a minor miracle,” he said, that he was doing what we’d all been praying for, that he was getting his leg to move that has a jumbled up mess of bone and metal screws and scars instead of a knee. that that crazy excuse for a knee was holding up 170 pounds, balancing it as he turned and letting him move forward.

“ian, you made my year.”

he made ours, too, because those doctors that saw him those first few hours are the only ones that knew what he looked like, knew what his body had been wrung through. they were the doctors that were inside his flesh and skull and really, actually know how bad it was.

and each time we see those two doctors, every few years, they see God. they might not know it, but they see God in the legs that move and the voice that now speaks words.

he made our year. because it’s easy to forget all that has been done.

the surgery may come into our lives, or it may not. those are questions to be turned into and through God’s hands and our hearts. 

but for now, we acknowledge that God is God, and we are not. 

thankful for what He’s done,

l

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  Filed under: "a disabled life", "marriage", "our writing", gratefulness
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“if i were him, i’d just want someone to hold me,” steve said, one day, years ago, when ian was still really sick and steve was still alive.

i knew what he meant because in the desperation of ian’s condition those first few weeks, months after the accident, there was nothing we could do for ian. except to show him we loved him.

but there was always a bed in the way. and i wasn’t strong enough to lift his stiff torso toward me.

or there was always a wheelchair in the way, and he couldn’t lean forward so i could get a good wrap in.

so at night, when steve and the care giver would help ian sit up on the exercise mat steve built, i would wait. and sit and wait. and cancel plans because i didn’t want to miss that moment. that moment when steve would open the bedroom door and let me know that i could come in and hug him.

i could put my arms all the way around him. because he was sitting on the edge of his exercise mat, nothing behind him.

my torso was holding his up, but i was around him.

and he tried to lift his arm to be around me, too.

and i forget those times, when a hug was all it took to get me through another day. how ungrateful i’ve allowed myself to become, forgetting that one of the greatest gifts, holding and being held, is right next to me every day.

it’s  there and it’s so sweet. and he now always  wants to be with his wifey. and when someone starts to pray, he reaches for my hand. and when i sit next to him, his arm wraps my waist. and sometimes he squeezes the extra skin that wasn’t there a few years ago and we laugh because he’s not supposed to notice but we have changed in these nine years.

God gives us joys in the littles.

He gives us joy when we look for it in the most over-looked movements.

and even though i forget, what a great God there is surrounding me.

tonight, i’m thankful for arms that wrap me into him tight.

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“i just wish i could skip the holidays,” she told me, as she dreaded the days that meant more memories flooding to mind. memories of the little red-head life that left too soon. 

i get it. ian gets it. 

because the holidays don’t always look like we want them to. or like we think they should.

because some of us are in a house alone thanksgiving morning. some of us don’t have a home. some of us have closed wombs and kids with wandering souls and gaping heart wounds and some of us, some millions of us, weren’t even given the chance to breathe this year.

some of our holidays don’t fit into pinterest-shaped boxes.

some of us, when we get back to work, will be asked how our holiday was and we’ll fake a smile and say “great.” but it didn’t really feel great.

sometimes, holidays hurt. because the pressure of expectations builds and the reality of our lives doesn’t change on  a thursday in november or on december 25.

yet, there’s that blood. that blood that was wrought to fill us every day. the mercy blood that doesn’t skip holidays but is there, available, when we dig in and let it cover us. 

For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame;he remembers that we are dust.
psalm 103:11-14

that blood is there, and when we allow ourselves to enter in to it and know that all of this, before and behind, is grace, we can put one foot in front of the other.

we can fight to have hope. and fight to give thanks. and fight to love. because Jesus did it for us.
  

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we tucked ourselves underneath the feathers of our big fluffy spread, our goose bumps giving in to their warmth. i sat with our bible opened on my knees, a hot cup of tea within my reach for us to share.

“what do you want to do for our quiet time,” he had asked, a question that spurs smiles because it means he’s feeling well.

we’ve been reading proverbs, and so made our way there again.

All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit.

we were sharing our hearts, how differently we see ourselves than how God sees us.

Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord; be assured, he will not go unpunished. 

our patterns, so similar, mine not as refined as his. the habit of anger and pride, that lead to destruction but are so hard to overcome.

“ian, i know i’ve been given a new heart. but sometimes my old self, that still wants to sin, feels so nearby.”  

“it is. that’s why we need Jesus.”

in seven words he takes me to the heart of it, to the heart of my human-ness. in those words he takes me to the heart of our marriage – a relationship that helps me to love and fear God more.

these moments, they are beautiful.

love
L  

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an unexpected visitor came into our home last night, slipping in while
the rain drops pounced off our windows. not forcefully, but gently, she
planted herself in my heart while we laid with eyes shut. when i woke,
she filled my thoughts, not darkness that had greeted me each morning
for what felt like lifetimes.

she whispered life and heaven and redemption in my ears, as i rolled over to look at the eyebrows and shoulders and tousled brown hair next to me that i’d grown so comfortable with but that had altered my life so.

she, Hope, wasn’t expected, yet she was so very welcomed, because she had just hours before seemed to have been a forgotten friend that had no plans of journeying back to me. she had felt very far off and unable to be convinced to come for a visit, despite my tearful requests.

as she laid next to me on our striped gray and white sheets, i wondered how long she would stay, but then decided those thoughts should be forgotten. because she was here as a gift, and although i did not know for how long she would choose to stay in my home, i wanted her to be welcomed.

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