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By: anniegroves October 13, 2017
Uncategorized

Brewer Ohana

When you’re on vacation at your favorite beach and it’s the kids’ first time… you better believe it pays to capture it!!!brewerohana-7brewerohana-10brewerohana-8brewerohana-29brewerohana-35brewerohana-2brewerohana-42brewerohana-67brewerohana-11brewerohana-64brewerohana-58brewerohana-6brewerohana-3brewerohana-1brewerohana-92brewerohana-62brewerohana-13brewerohana-78brewerohana-70brewerohana-12brewerohana-9brewerohana-4brewerohana-81

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Oldroyd Ohana
Pennington Ohana

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Our summer in California. Every day. Cousins and cousins and sun and swim. #kodak #film
I’m going to tell you a story that I now find truly funny in one of those sure-this-is-happening-in-real-life now kinda ways. It has absolutely nothing to do with this photo, though I love this photo because it means I was out in the water capturing Hawaii as I see it on a regular basis.⠀ ⠀ This summer on July 5 in California, I asked my mom to take me to the emergency room. JD was grabbing a beer with a college friend and roommate (also my boyfriend of four years in high school and early college because that adds just that much more flavor to the story, though you should know there is only sweetness and gratitude associated with our long ago pasts and he and JD were roommates for three years), and I gave him the option of going home with the kids or coming with me. He’s a good man so it wasn’t long before he walked into the waiting room to find me with my mom and an IV in my arm.⠀ ⠀ I had crazy pain from an actual thing which led me to believe I was actually dying and needed a doctor to confirm my imminent death. 🤪 (clearly I was wrong but anxiety is FUN! Haha)⠀ ⠀ Anywho. July 5 in the evening. Kids were at home with pops and my brother and sister in law, swimming and enjoying Bakersfield summer nights, which incidentally are still a favorite for me. The ER isn’t too busy but I’m a bundle of nerves. ⠀ ⠀ And then the earth starts shaking. ⠀ ⠀ And keeps on shaking. And shakes some more and people are holding wheelchairs in place and watching the camera shake on tv that is filming the baseball game in LA. For a full minute the earth shakes. And then I start to shake while JD tries his best to stop my shaking (kinda like labor all over again except not even a little bit). Then the earth shakes a bit more and I’m called in to the ultrasound room.⠀ ⠀ The earth shakes again as they are raising the table with me on it. The tech looks at us and tells us the nearest exit should we need to run. I guaranteed have bulging cartoon eyes while JD calmly sits in the corner with his arms over his head because he actually sells tools to keep hospitals safe in seismic events and is scared not even a little. And then the earth shakes (Continued in comments)
My needs as a mother are shifting, and I have been slow to acknowledge it. Partly because the three year old is just young enough to still put me in the category of mama with littles, and partly because I have to stop and feel every bit of every season and it makes me a little sad and also a lot excited. I still need friends, community. I still need to hear how mamas are figuring out their preteens and teenagers. I no longer need respite from days of feeding a child from my body or ensuring they sleep every few hours. I am still trying to keep order with the path of destruction left by each child throughout the day, now with more ability to clean up after themselves. Sometimes they cook and bake without needing my supervision. It’s messy, but they can do it. They do their schoolwork after school without being told on most days. They know where there soccer cleats and ballet slippers are. I don’t know what’s ahead in these preteen almost teen years, but watching them discover their loves has been the absolute best. Claire and dance. Melia and soccer (she asks me to practice with her every day, bless her heart). Ellie and baking and any sport really because sports mean people and friends and learning new skills. This is a sweet season indeed friends.
I met this mama when she was new to motherhood. She came to our church fresh on the island with an infant baby and her doctor husband. There was a misunderstanding with our kids ministry and I chased this mama down with texts and coffee to make sure everything was made right. Four years later she was leading our mamas group, a Bible study, and on her second babe. Watching her grow as a mama and a leader with quiet strength and wisdom and the most compassionate heart has been so dear to me.⠀ ⠀ (Mahalo for your love and encouragement with my recent post about clinical anxiety. I couldn’t write about it until I got to a much healthier place, honestly. Words didn’t come until some hurdles were jumped. I shared it because I think it is powerful to know we’re not alone, and until that point, I’d never experienced clinical anxiety. We are so loved friends!)⠀
“I’ve been an actor on a stage. Playin a role I have to play. I’m getting tired it’s safe to say, livin behind a masquerade.” - Lauren Daigle ⠀ ⠀ I lay on my bed an hour before ballet and soccer practice pleading for help. Kids watching screens I normally wouldn’t allow during the weekday. My body on pins and needles with the reality of months of anxiety wreaking havoc. Pain shooting down from my abdomen to my leg from ruptured ovarian cysts that don’t quit. I take half a Xanax, get the girls in the car and wait. I know it’s coming.⠀ ⠀ God is faithful. Every time. Every SINGLE time. The text appears after dropping off the girls and tears spring to me eyes because once again, it’s everything I need. This is pruning. This is freaking hard and it is also good.⠀ ⠀ I read the verse a friend texts and slip on my tennis shoes and start walking the neighborhood with Lauren Daigle singing my faith to me. ⠀ ⠀ I didn’t willingly take the masks off. Stress, anxiety, burnout, and conditioned thinking forced them off. BECAUSE MY JESUS LOVES ME TOO MUCH TO KEEP WEARING THEM.⠀ ⠀ ⠀ “I’m ok.”⠀ “I don’t need help.”⠀ “I can do this.”⠀ “If I don’t do it, who will?”⠀ “If I don’t reach out who will?”⠀ “If I don’t carry this who will?”⠀ “Other people do more. I can keep going without help.”⠀ ⠀ It’s not that I’m not honest. These are the masks I’ve worn and I’ve believed them or forced myself to believe them.⠀ ⠀ And so they take their toll. I fight to keep them on and Jesus says, “enough, baby girl.” So they come off and I let people see my tiredness, my fear, my anxiety, my weakness. I can’t censor this stuff anymore or curate it to be juuuust enough to seem human but not enough to show how depleted I have become.⠀ ⠀ (Continued in comments, photo taken by my girl @kclostetter who is MOVING BACK IN A MONTH!)
The happiest.
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