What I Wish MY Church Knew About ME

In case you didn’t think memory loss was real, I’ve had this paper sitting on my desk for about a month now with blog ideas scribbled on it so that I wouldn’t forget them. I purposefully left it there to remind me to write a post. And what do you know today I sit down to write and behold, my paper (okay, to be honest, it was a prayer sheet from church…but hey…I have to write on whatever I find at the time…) was gone! I looked all over for it and then remembered that I cleaned off that area earlier this week and could I possibly have thrown it away?? Noooooo…surely not. So I went to my bedroom trash can and looked through it but no old prayer sheet. 😦 And I can’t search my main trash can because I did some crafting this morning and there is glitter and modge podge in there and EVERYONE knows you can’t open that back up.

All that to say this is pretty much the only post I remember from the list and I’m still waiting for the others to come back to my brain so this is what ya get today!

It has come to my attention that Sunday is usually the hardest day of the week for me and almost no one at my church knows it. It’s my fault. I’m really good at putting on a fake face, so good that I fool myself sometimes. I’m still learning to be more open with people. I know I need to work on it.

Sundays are hard because they require a lot of energy. Mental, spiritual, and emotional energy. There’s also pressure to be “put together and cheerful” although there shouldn’t be.

Sunday School starts at 9am. I walk to church (duh) which I love to do. Don’t get me wrong- I am surrounded (literally) by people who go to my church and would gladly give me a ride but I like the 11 minute walk there. If it’s raining, that’s another story lol. SS is great because it’s more interactive than church. But it requires more thinking and concentration- first energy drainer.

There is a half hour in between SS and worship to fellowship. My heart really likes that time because I get to talk with people and find out how they are doing. But sometimes it can be really hard, if I’m feeling lonely or tired, it’s hard to put myself out there and engage others- second energy drainer.

Worship is my favorite time because as stated before, I LOVE music! I wouldn’t trade the singing time for anything. But I also said before that the noise hurts my head most days. A lot of Sundays I think to myself, “Which would you prefer, Lord? Do you want me to stand up and be silent or would you like me to sit and actually sing? Because I’m not sure I have the energy to both stand AND sing right now.” -third energy drainer.

By this time, I’ve actually made it to the sermon. I will listen as much as I can but I won’t be able to tell you what it was about later. For instance, I can tell you my Pastor right now is preaching out of Titus on elder qualifications because we are in the middle of a pastor search but probably anyone who follows our Facebook page could say the same thing. Pretty sad, huh? Once in a while, something particular will catch my attention and will stick but not often. And taking notes actually makes it worse as weird as that sounds. I usually remember more from SS because of the interactive nature of that setting than from the sermon- fourth energy drainer.

And then I will walk home (or sometimes get a ride) to fall asleep on my couch for a while. Later that night, I’ll either go to small group or Sunday night church- fifth energy drainer.

You might be asking: why do you go if it’s so hard? I’ve asked myself that too sometimes and occasionally I need to leave early to give my brain a break. But it’s worth it. It’s worth it to fellowship with my brothers and sisters, to worship our Lord together, and to learn more about Him. My struggle is infinitely less than what he went through for me and he still counted the cost and thought it was worth it. What a good God!

But if you see me dazed or sleepy on a Sunday or doing something unusual (like the fact that I usually take off my shoes during the service lol…) come ask me about it and I’ll gladly explain.

 

The Art of Being an Old Lady

I love old people. I mean, I pretty much have to, considering the age my Dad is getting to be. Ha! I can’t wait till he reads this!

But seriously, old people are the cutest. Plus, they have a huge advantage over most of the population. Let me explain. Have you ever noticed that old people can pretty much say whatever they want (which is sometimes what everyone is thinking but doesn’t think it’s socially acceptable to say) and they get away with it?? For example, an old person that you may never have met can (and will) outright ask your relationship status in front of a group of people AND proceed to give you all sorts of advice OR set you up with a family member of theirs. Your initial thought will probably be that it’s not really any of their business but then something will click in the back of your head and whether consciously or not, your brain will tell you, “Oh don’t worry about it; it’s an old person and they can say whatever they want.”

What??! Why? And how do I get that status?? I can’t wait to be old. I’m sneakily storing up all sorts of embarrassing things to say and do- does anyone know the official “old” age?? I want to be extra prepared when I reach it.

I’ve been thinking about old people recently because I’ve been feeling old (but without the perks because I don’t think I’ve reached that magical age yet.) I’ve been tired a lot but that’s not what makes me feel old. I really feel like I’m losing my memory and it’s actually pretty sad for me. If you ask anyone, I used to have the best memory in the world. At my old job, I remembered everything. From long and strange passwords, to people’s names and faces, to things that I never should have known but somehow it got stuck in my head. People were always asking me if I knew such and such or if I knew where something of theirs was, even though there was no way I should know. And most times, I did.

But not now. A few weeks ago at work, I was learning how to make all the food for the hot lunch we offer. I had about 9 pans in the oven at once so it was a lot of multi-tasking. At one point, the lady teaching me had a pan of meat and I watched as she put a little bit of water in the bottom and then she was showing me how to put the sauce on the meat. By the time she had finished, I looked in the pan and said, “Now did you put water in there or is that just grease from the meat?” She looked at me kind of funny and that’s when I realized I had literally watched her put that water in less than 2 minutes before.

I’ve found that now I have to keep track of things a lot more whereas before I could just rely on my memory for everything. For instance, I rarely used to put things on my calendar because I just always remembered my schedule. NOPE. Doesn’t work that way now. EVERYTHING must go in my phone because I can’t trust my memory. I used to know the birthdays of my family members AND all the kids I babysat and now I have to sit and calculate my Mom and Dad’s ages (good thing I still remember what years they were born!) I used to keep my shopping list in my memory- bahahahahaha! That seems like a joke. I could be getting 2 things from the store and I would still need to put them in my phone to remember them.

Do you know how frustrating and sad this is?? I guess I didn’t really think that the memory loss part of epilepsy would happen to me. What I mean to say is, I pretty much FORGOT about it! I have so much more respect and patience for old people now! You need to ask me the same question 3 times because you can’t remember? You go right ahead! At the same time, once again, people expect that from an old person and they give a little bit of extra grace. But they don’t expect it from me. I started to notice how bad it was when my best friend would call me at night and ask how my day was, and I really couldn’t remember what I had done. So I would give a general answer and when she wanted specifics, I would have to really really think. It’s like my brain used to be a nice filing system and someone has gone in and dumped out all the folders and now I have to sift through them to find what I’m looking for.

So if you ask me how my week has been and I look confused and like I’m searching for an answer, I probably am. I’m trying to remember, literally, what happened this week.

Please give some patience while I try to figure it out.

And maybe a hint or two would be nice.