from an article originally posted August 21, 2014…

When the doctor calls and humbly says he decided to change his mind. When the offer he gives you feels impossible. When he offers you the hard you are already experiencing and wants to add more impossible—he wants to return you to bald, desperate, awful—you simply weep.

I started to pray for the kids on their first day of school and I simply wept. Ugly, awful crying that you try not to do in front of them... Your sweet second-born says, Mama let me pray. And you hurt because this is not how you wanted the first day to go. You see a quiet grow in your boy. But every child says, Mama we will still love you bald. And you know, you know, you know that to be true. We have done this before.

Then on your last back-to-school date with your baby, she notices a sequin bikini she doesn’t need and through your tears you say, Get it. Then she finds a stuffy and you say get it. Then she trades up for a bigger one and you simply smile through tears. You have no idea what the bank account reads, and it just doesn’t matter.

Then you realize your bed is going to be your new residence, so you simply wade over to the bedding and buy something happy for your bed and cry. Because you don’t want your bed to be your residence.Then all you think is you need to go pet puppies. So you ask your girl if she wants to go pet puppies. And what girl wouldn’t? So that’s where we are headed. Jason, I can’t help but think a big old dog is all we need right now...

You know grace will show up—it always does. Jesus will meet me at this edge. He will.