I am living.

There are some things that I think I want to be, but not really. I watch cupcake wars and think how incredible it would be to create those edible masterpieces. But then I realize I really don't want that because I am NOT thrilled with the idea of baking something and waiting for it to freeze and then spending hours upon hours on itty bitty little details to make 3000 flowers on a cake. I like how the finished product looks and I want to eat it, but I do not want to create it. I see amazing gardens of freshly grown organic produce and am in awe. I think about how wonderful that would be to just go in my backyard and pick fresh tomatoes to add to my salad. But then I think about building the boxes like Mama VP is doing here. And I think about all of the money put toward soil and soil additives and seeds. And then I think about all the time into making sure certain plants get a lot of water and others get a little bit of sun but not too much. Oh my, overwhelming. That is NOT my thing. I like the idea of being an organic vegetarian, bohemian, "crunchy", natural, artsy, cool mom.....pretty much a compilation of all my friends.....but that just isn't me. Of all the years of comparing myself to those around me I realized something that profoundly changed my life:

If you really want to be something, you have to want the process of becoming that something as well.

Let me tell you a little story: The only thing I ever wanted to be was a mom. Sure, there were other things like becoming a teacher or one season of my life I wanted to be a pilot, but my heart just wanted to be a mom. When I was 19, I went to a Dr. who diagnosed me with PCOS- Polycycstic Ovarian Syndrome (You can learn more about PCOS here: What is PCOS?) The doctor told me that there was a 80% chance with my symptoms and history that I might not be able to have children. I bawled for weeks. I lost soooo much weight. I was severely depressed. I mean, this is who I was. I KNEW this was what I was supposed to be. I just knew it. I wasn't eating. I was working two different jobs from 4am to 11pm. One of the jobs was working at two different photography studios where I had to take pictures of families, pregnant women and newborns constantly. I wasn't interacting with friends or family. I was just miserable. Then I woke up in the hospital. I can't really remember what happened. I was told that I had a seizure while driving from Norman, OK to Lawton, OK after I finished one of my jobs. I was talking on the phone to a friend and he came and picked me up from a Love gas station that he had me pull into. He drove me to the hospital and I was there for several days. While at the hospital I was severely malnourished, dehydrated and had several more seizures. They did all sorts of tests and scans and couldn't find any chemical imbalance or problem in my brain. This is what they did find: I have an abnormal heart rhythym and my resting heart rate is 30(normal resting heart rate is between 60-100). They noticed that when I was stressed, my heart rate spiked and that's when I would pass out and have the seizure. They are called Psychogenic nonepileptic seizures and are emotional and stress-related.

 

Nothing really crossed my mind until I woke up in the hospital bed one day with this pain on the back of my leg. With the nurses help, I got up and looked on the back of my leg to see a spider bite. Seriously?! It was at that moment that I just asked myself the big "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" question. Sure PCOS sucks and ruined my idea of what life is supposed to look like, but it's not cancer. I wasn't dying.

 

But I wasn't living either.

 

I checked myself out of the hospital that day and decided to start living. A lot of other crazy things have happened between then and now. Those stories I will save for a later time, if I ever tell them at all. But this is a major point that helped me define who I am. The dehydration, the sickness, the depression, the hospital stay - it was all caused by me defining who I was from what had happened to me. It all could have been avoided.

 

I am living with a low resting heart rate which means that every time I have to be hooked up to the heart rate monitor at the hospital, it will beep and nurses will rush in to see if I am still alive. Annoying when you are in labor and trying to get sleep? yes, but not life-threatening.

 

I am living with PCOS which means that I am truly blessed that me and my little girl conquered that negative 80% chance that I would never get to see her sweet smiling face. I may never get to experience another pregnancy, but I will not let that define WHO I am.

 

I am 24 which means that I have a lot of life to live, but I will not let others look down on me because of my age. I will be confident in what I have learned because God does not impart great wisdom with great age, He imparts great wisdom with great faith.

 

I am divorced. I am average. I am a little fluffy and curvy. I am not the smartest or the prettiest or the most entertaining. But I will not be defined by anything that I have done or haven't done. This is merely life. The testing and the baby steps. The trying and failing. The success and memories. The effort and the reward. The consequences and the second chances. Taking deep breaths of God-given fresh air. Smiling often and laughing even more. Taking too many pictures. Being love to those around me. Who I was is not who I am now. Who I am is not who I want to be indefinitely. Because I don't want to just be, period. I want to continue to be on and on and again and more. Growing, nurturing, loving, being.

 

One day at a time.

 

So who am I? I am living.