so tired

Sunday was just so exhausting. It started with the verse from Matt 2:18 being read aloud; A voice heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentations, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be compofted, because they are no more. I just burst into sobs. Then we learned of a little boy who was born 11 weeks early and is in the NICU fighting an infection and I just feel surrounded by painful reminders and suffocating events and then I can't breath and my heart races. Our sermon was about the war beginning and I feel like I'm at war. We were encouraged to live both soberly and joyfully and yet again my split life continues. I am so torn. It was still good to be at church and God's word speaks to so much of my life. Jeremiah 17:9 reminds me that "the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick; who can understand it?" and in Isaiah 42:3, I was shown "a bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench." This is so helpful when I let my mind have control over what I know is TRUE. I don't like feeling depressed and if I just preach God's gospel and truth to myself instead of listen to myself. I also appreciate in Isaiah 53 v. 3&4 where it says that he was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief and surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Then pastor said that we need to ask God to rescue us from small minded thinking and reading and ask him to help us see the big picture. Open our eyes to see the purpose of God throughout history and help us to see the difference that this makes for ME. In Him, we have life now and also the promise of eternal life where all tears and all mourning will be done away with and all things will be made new and JOY will reign forever. So many times throughout my day, I forget the big picture and I fall deep into my own selfishness and own purposes and I forget how beautiful our time with Renner was and how God was so real and big and how He carried us. I get so caught up in the things that God has said NO to and I forget what He has said YES to. Lord, help me to remember! OK, so then I spent some time after church talking with my friends and receiving encouragement. Good but tiring. . .then on to dinner at my mom's where they had invited some guests. Sometimes, people don't make all the connections that we are Larry and Chelley's children and that we are the parents of Renner and that he died. I can't fault people but sometimes it is frustrating so then we got into and talked and cried about the loss and how the insuing months have been hard and how we are or are not dealing with all this. My mother pulled me aside and shared that one of the men was a recovering addict so that we might have a connection. As we talked more, it turned out it was a sex addiction which is a little more than I can process right now, I mean, we all have sins. Let's just leave it at that. I just felt like after talking with these guys so exhausted. The one shared about his life, his abuse, his medications, hospitalizations for attempted suicide and etc. . .I'm just not up for all this. I'm just not strong enough and I felt like this was not helpful. And what is most frustrating of all was that my own mother just doesn't get it. She doesn't understand nor does she try to, she doesn't feel or . . .who knows. My father said today that Sunday must have been good for me since I "really got into it" and I'm like NO. As I have been think aabout and talking over these events with my husband, I have decided that I'm just not up to dealing with all these details. I don't mind hearing about other peoples plans and how life is going but getting into someone elses life story and pain and hurt is a bit much. Opps, I guess, now I know better, I'm sure that God was accomplishing His purposes but I felt more than a little used by my parents as a freak show. I didn't want to be part of the sunday dinner entertainment. We should have just quickly eaten and left like we were planning on doing since the bears were playing but what can you do? It was late afternoon by the time we got home and then Helen fell asleep on me while we were sitting on the couch and it was lovely. I slept too but I felt so beat up and tired from the day. We then had Marie, Trently, Hope and Luke over for pizza and a movie, Happy Feet. Then still had to finish the laundry, my cousin John stopped by and they all played ROOK. Learned that Donnie is chewing tobacco and while this is gross and I hope that he doesn't continue in it, the thing that bothers me the most is that I didn't know about it. I don't like that he was keeping something from me. I realize that he is hurting and grieving also and neither one of us really knows how to handle this since this is all so new and hard. I just don't want us to keep anything from each other because when we don't have trust or each other then we have nothing.
Monday, awoke positive and since Marie and I were both working at our clinic in Franklin, we dropped the child off together and drove together. It was good. Helen was positively adorable in the am. And Marie says that I'm her person and this makes me feel good altho' I don't feel like we have really had any good time to talk lately, mostly related to me having fallen off the face of the world. The day was going great, or as well as can be expected until my aunt and two cousins show up at my work, like they haven't been across the yard for the last two days but now they have to interrupt my day at work and painfully remind me of the everything. She is just so awkward and I feel like she always want to morose and diagnose. She was going on about how she has to go back to work after being off for the last four months since she broke her foot the day before Renner's service so she was unable to make it and how bad she wanted to come and I'm so sorry, whatever. If you don't want to go back to work than don't, if you want to spend more time with your grandson, then do it, I mean, he is alive isn't he? UGH! I was totally combobulated after their visit, my heart hurt and it was hard to breathe. WTF! Anyway, finished out the day, good to be home with Helen and Donnie, who made grilled cheese and tomato soup with a huge spinach salad and then offered to take care of Helen's bedtime routine so I could go straight to bed, which I did. I love that we do pray together, Helen's bedtime prayer. I know taht I was cooked because I didn't write yesterday. I knew that I needed to and that I had a lot to get off my chest but I just couldn't. TOO TIRED!
So today, finally called the woman who lost a child. Jamie, the NP at one of our clinics gave me her number and thought it would be helpful for me. But all I got was her voicemail. Then I spent another two hours on the phone with our insurance company and the billing department of CHOW and MCW trying to figure out these bills. I added up all the monies billed for Renner's care totalled $246,657.00 approx. with $23,101.00 approx for OB services making the total approx. $269,758.00. WOW! But not all the money in the world could make him better or buy me his life or let me keep him. Anyway, I just want to make sure that I take care of the details and what I am responsible for. We received a bill for $9,000.00 on 12/23, Merry freaking Christmas! He is long gone and why bills now. Don't like having anything outstanding. . .I guess that I figured out that everything will be taken care of, just BCBS of IL need to talk with BCBS of WI and they need to get medical records from CHOW and MCW, who needs to send then back to BCBS, yadayadayada. I just miss him and this is not something that I wish that I was dealing with. I just cant wait for the new year and our trip to Mexico. . .I think that I have gone on long enough and I feel like i have unloaded all my thoughts that run around and around in my head to ren and about my ren. I wish that things were different but they are not. I do need to get my act together, soon enough. . .I'm just trying to be were I'm at and enjoy the blessings that God has given me. Life is good and many women have lost many babies over the years and they get on and so will I.