Birdcages, Chandeliers & Purple Blankets

I love my bathroom. I have always found comfort in the running water of a bath. For my 40th birthday, my husband gave me a new master bath. Because the master bathroom is not a place that visitors to my house often wander, let me shed some light on this sacred space. I designed it. It is entirely black and white. It has antique tile. The wallpaper (yes, this is something that people today still use) has black and white birdcages. These are big birdcages, each 12' to 18' tall. There is a freestanding tub with a chandelier above it. Yes, this is a completely impractical room. I'm sure that the next owner of this house will change everything. I don't care.

I don't have expensive sports equipment. I don't have fancy toys. I don't gamble. I don't drink. I don't have fancy purses or shoes. I have a bathroom. With a chandelier.

Almost every night I lie on my bathroom floor. While in earlier years of my life this may have been a distressing scene, it is a normal and comforting one in this season. I have a large basket that holds fluffy blankets. I have throw pillows that I keep close by. When I am ready to unwind, I set up my pallet on the floor, complete with my laptop, headphones and my Coke. Most nights, my family gets in bed and I am on the bathroom floor. About once a month, Lucas wakes up in the middle of the night to find me sleeping there. I just get so darned relaxed! 

Netflix shows are watched in my bathroom. Sporting events are streamed in my bathroom. Podcasts are listened to in my bathroom. I am actually writing this blog from my bathroom floor. Odd? Perhaps. But, did I mention that I don't care?

There was a time when I would have felt incredibly guilty for this space. There was also a time when even when I was in my space, I wasn't able to ignore the phone or lock the door or turn off the day. I am getting better at all of these things. 

This is my time. This is my space. Some people find it in exercise. As much as I am growing to love yoga, I am still not relaxed in my practice. When I am lying on my fluffy purple blanket and have my headphones on, I can find my center. My best sermons are crafted in this space. My deepest prayers are prayed on this floor. My creative dreams are ignited in these 4 walls. My physical body is relaxed in a hot bath with the chandelier sparkling above me.

And these birdcages? Well, they are a reminder to me of the unique, whimsical, creative and very worth it person that is being filled up so she can be set free to fly. 

It may be your car or your bed or your chair or your porch. It may be your backyard or your craft room or your yoga mat or your reading nook. Make a space for your heart, mind, soul and body to be nurtured. Protect that space as your own - even when all the littles and spouses and cats and dogs want to invade it. And then, hide there. For 5 min or 5 hours, give yourself the gift of a big deep breath of rest. I can promise that you will be changed. 

Thank Y'all for Sharing

I am blessed to be a member of a great teaching team at ECL. We are very different and we often approach the text from such different backgrounds and experiences that often I walk away from a Sunday morning and think, well I would have never thought of that! This rich tapestry of life and reflection allows us to better understand the human impact of faith.

Coming back from vacation, I have to confess that I did not spend much time this week dwelling on Psalm 107. This is the text that we are spending the entire Lenten season on in our community. Each week, we are adding a piece of the chapter to show the many ways that we cry out to God and in mercy and grace, God rescues and delivers. 

I walked into church this morning happy to be home but mildly time zone hungover. I was comforted by familiar faces and good coffee. We sang some favorites and settled into the teaching and I could tell in the first 5 minutes that my friend Matt was bringing goodness. 

Darkness to light

That was the theme of the teaching. My mind flashed backwards to the stories that I have shared with you in the past 18 days. It flashed forward to those that I know will come in the weeks ahead. I am a girl of redemption. My life and story is full of darkness. It is also a place of hope and light. But this did not happen overnight. 

I didn't wake up one morning sitting in the depths of complete darkness and think, well today is the day to let the sunshine in. Moving from darkness into the light is complicated. For me, it begins with a tiny match of hope. Someone usually has to light it for me because shining light in the scary dark places is horrifying. If I'm really lucky, the match only has to be lit once. More than likely, though, I will blow it out in fear and sometime in the future I will have to try again.

Every once in a while, the match seems to hit kerosene and starts a fire. Here's what I know about fire. It burns. It hurts. And sometimes it takes a fire and it's refining powers to penetrate the darkness that we are masters at perpetuating.

I absolutely adore my Southern roots, but they are wildly exhausting.  In the South, words like "nice" and "fine" are code for barely tolerable and one step short of misery. 

Let me translate this Sunday morning conversation in the church parlor for you:

Friendly neighbor: How are you today? 

(I am supposed to be kind and great you cordially, but I really don't want to know)

Gracious Southerner: I'm just fine. *insert painful smile*

(There is a good chance that my child is failing in school or I have a sick relative, but we always smile on Sunday)

Friendly neighbor: I'm so glad to hear that! Have a blessed day.

(Whew! I heard that her junior higher is up to no good and her dad got bad news this week, but I wouldn't want to appear to gossip. I'll add her to my prayer list)

I grew up with the understanding that one does not air their dirty laundry. They certainly don't tarnish a family reputation or call attention to messy. There is just no need for the entire world to know your business. Now, in all fairness, this may work for some. It does not, however, work for those of us that find it life's game to see how far outside of the lines we can live without getting caught. 

When you live your life to portray the image of togetherness, you are slowly turning down the dimmer dial on the light. If you are living one life in the light of the church parlor and have an entirely different world in the darkness of your bedroom or kitchen cabinet or wallet, you are not living in the light. 

I'm sure that both of my grandmother's are fit to be tied about my public blogging of my very personal woes. They may be having coffee in heaven with their twice-a-week-set-hair shaking their heads and trying to figure out why in the world I am airing my dirty laundry for the world to read. Bless their hearts.

Here's why. I have received countless emails and texts and Facebook messages in the last 18 days about how much someone needed to hear the story I shared that day. I have literally cried as I read your stories of hurt and loss and life vests and aloneness. I have heard from friends far and near (some that I don't know how they saw this blog) that can't believe that these things happened to someone like me. Can I clear something up? These things happen in our lives because we are human. 

There is no amount of education or money or faith or birthright that will protect you from darkness. It may look different. The resources available to you will vary, but the pain of human experience is the same. So if you find yourself in darkness today, know that you are in good company AND you don't have to stay there. 

I'm not made for pleasantries. I often greet people with "How are you, REALLY?" Let's agree that the answer of, "well, my life is going to hell in a hand basket" is waaaaayyyy more freeing than "fine."

Let's do real. It's the only way in the world that we are going to be bearers of light. And, friends, the world needs some torches carriers!

Better Off Dead

I don’t remember driving there. I don’t remember where I was going. I just know that I was headed east on NASA Rd 1 approaching the bridge. My thoughts were jumbled. Nothing in my brain was connecting. I was physically present, but I wasn’t there. My best thinking told me that everyone in my life would be better if I drove my car off the bridge. At the moment I made the decision to do just that, I looked in my rear view mirror and saw her.

Actually, I could not see her face. I could see her car seat. She was almost 9 months old. She was precious. Her smile and laugh were a gift to so many people. My mind told me that I was failing her. I was fully convinced that her very capable grandparents and daddy would do a better job of raising her than I could ever do. But her presence in that car kept both of us alive that day.

I was dying. No one knew it. I was finishing a busy summer as a youth pastor. I had gone on mission trips and camps and youth week and Astroworld trips. I taught Bible studies and led worship. If you were to look at an album of pictures from that summer, you would see a smiling happy Lacy. I was a master of the cover up. I was a self-sufficient machine that had powered though pregnancy and childbirth. I returned to work after 4 weeks, baby in tow and launched back into all that full-time ministry to students requires.

And then the ground under my feet began to break apart. I had never asked for help before. I began to have these fits of intense anger, like throw someone across the room like a wrestler anger. I wasn’t sleeping, which is not all that uncommon for new moms, but this was more. I spent energy worrying and working in the night on things that didn't matter. And then the anxiety increased. The more I worried, the more I tried to fight it, which only caused a cycle of perceived failure. I could not will myself out of this. I was convinced that this was all because I sucked at being a mom. This little one did not deserve this. I knew she would be better without me. And the deep dark hole of lost swallowed me up like hot lava. I could not outrun it and it was burning me from the inside out.

What I didn’t understand at the time was that hormones are wicked powerful. Combine that with a brain chemistry and DNA that is predisposed to mental health issues and you have a recipe for postpartum disaster. I lived in League City, TX at this time which is less that 10 miles from the neighborhood where Andrea Yates drowned her 5 kids in a fit of postpartum psychosis. That was my only reference point for postpartum anything. I knew that I did not want to harm my baby, so I falsely assumed that this was not what was wrong with me.

We were on a trip with my family when Lucas saw just how bad things had become. I woke from a fitful sleep and FREAKED OUT. That’s a very technical term for a panic attack. He had never seen me like this. He literally held me against the bed. All I could think was I am broken and I didn’t think I was repairable.

Let me pause for a moment for my life PSA: There is nothing more co-creating in God’s plan for redemption than modern medicine. Please don’t ever buy the lie that somehow faith alone is the best path to mental health. Depression and anxiety and phobias and countless other diagnoses are MEDICAL conditions and require medical help. What that involves is best left to your doctor, therapist and your heart to discern, but there is nothing that gets me more furious than a religious teaching that includes spiritual guilt about seeking medical help.

We came home from our trip and I called one of the only therapist that I knew. He patiently sat with me and talked me through these lies and many others that I had perpetuated in my mind. He got me in to a doctor and a psychiatrist. After many attempts, we found medication that helped me see small cracks in the fog. It took many months before I could see daylight.

Remember the story I told about my sister? This was the storm that she carried me through. Because of the fear that encompassed my life, I was petrified when I was given the label postpartum depression. In my mind, PPD meant that I was going to drown my baby. That was not a logical fear, but there was nothing logical about this season. So I did not do bath time - for more than a year. That was Lizzie and daddy territory.

I also needed sleep. When your basic sleep cycle is seriously disturbed, you stack the deck for chaos. The doctors forced sleep with medication, which meant that I had to trust that someone else would answer the middle of the night cries. I had to realize that I could not do it all. And when I tried, I made a mess of all living things so it was time to recognize my humanness.

This was not the first time in my life that I had tried to be a savior to all. That was actually a nickname that friends gave me in college because whenever there was trouble, I would rush in to save the day. But my experience with PPD was the first time that I had the bricks of stability knocked out from under me. It would not be the last, but it opened the door for me to learn to seek help.

Why do I share this story?
I do so because there are new moms that need to know they are not alone.
I do so because there are those that falsely believe the reason for their depression is a lack of faith.
I do so because I am not the only super woman out there trying to keep her crazy contained.

Let me tell you friends, we are better when we get help. We are fuller examples of beauty when we lean on other people. It’s time to shred this idea that we have to keep up the lie of self-sufficiency. We need doctors and friends and sisters and spouses and children and co-journeyers to remind us that there is life and beauty on the other side of our pain. And we have to hand them our hope to hold when we are unable to see the hope of our future.

Who do you need to hand your hope to today?
Who do you need to hold some hope for?

Don’t take on the Healer’s job, you are not their savior, but let's be the flesh and bones of hope to this world.

Haight & Ashbury

I am raising a liberal* minded teenager. The asterisk of this blog is the clear recognition that this is coming from the perception of a white, recovering evangelical Christian from Texas. My oldest is a free thinking, progressive, people loving girl who would tell you that she expects a protest arrest to be a part of her college experience. She is passionate and knowledgable. She is well read and a thinker. I love these things about her and yet I am constantly trying to give her perspective on the world that is a bit more broad than her 15 years might allow for. She does not back away from a hard conversation. Nothing is ever off limits.

She is being raised by a passionate, politically aware and involved mom. Add to this a church family that places a high value on loving all and serving the world and you set up the blueprint for exposure to many people, places, things and ideas.

I love this about our family. I love this about our community. The only down side is that it has created in her heart big, big dreams. Dreams that I fully recognize may take her away from the safe, guarded confines of our home. When we teach our kids to serve others and fight for justice, we have to prepare ourselves that they may see an oppressed people group and want to be a part of liberation.

This is where I find myself today. My girl is dreaming. She is talking to people from different backgrounds and paths. She is listening to people's stories that are not like her own and this excites her. Today, I watched her eyes light up when she heard about interfaith experiences and mental health advocacy on a college campus. I saw the wheels turn when she was presented with the challenge of a big scary demand and she didn't shy away, she set a goal.

Her last request before leaving San Francisco today was to go to Haight Ashbury. As I walked approximately 10 blocks by her side, I saw the world though her eyes. We were walking the same streets where 50 years earlier her grandparent's generation had stood for love in a way that most of the world could not understand. All these years later, my 15 year old was seeing this broken world though her eyes and she was not afraid. We saw a drug deal. We saw a young man rolling his joint on a window frame. We saw countless mentally ill homeless teens and adults. She never once winced. She didn't look away. She saw people with stories. She came up and put her arm though mine at one point and said, "I want to walk with you so I can hear more about the history of this area." And then she went into a record store and bought the soundtrack of The Breakfast Club.

We have encouraged this independent thinking. We have conspired to open doors. We have shared our own journeys (highs and lows) with great passion and now she is itching to make her own path. So, we will have to let her go. We have to allow success and failure. We will encourage and let her dream. We have to help her be realistic. We have moved from caregiver to coach. The parenting journey is amazing. The parenting journey is hard. But much like I said in an earlier post, when we see them becoming young adults that we would want to be friends with...well, I think that is about as good as it gets.

The Group Text

Parenting in today's world is freaking hard. Yesterday, I read a tweet by one of my favorite 'celebrity' moms about group texts. It has been on my mind for the last 24 hours, so as I lay in a dark studio apartment spending some time trying to listen and write, this mental exercise is once again playing itself out.

The last time I was in San Francisco, I was pregnant with my first child. I was a youth pastor with the great wisdom of a 25 year old. I had a very beautiful flip phone, and the iPhone did not exist. Fast forward 15 years and I have two technology savvy teens and a small computer in my pocket. 

Enter modern parenting challenge #4822:

How do I give my child freedom, teach them responsibility and at the same time monitor their digital footprint?

I know I screw this up. I guarantee that I am doing it wrong. For all the things that I am trying to do right, I still have much to learn in this arena. Getting on a plane and flying across the country has given me another opportunity to examine the tech phenomenon facing our kids.

I came to California with my parents in 1988. When we left Houston, my only ability to communicate with friends for the next two weeks came by way of hotel stationary and postcards. My girls, on the other hand, have had instant access to friends, gossip and news from home this entire trip. Don't get me wrong, I get it. I do, too, and I love it. But the challenge to monitor their input has been in my face this week and I am reminded that we cannot let down our guard.

If you don't know what is happening on your kid's phones, something is wrong. Its just that black and white. If your child is in middle school and you cannot access all of their input and output, I would encourage you to reconsider why they have a phone. We gave our kids a phone for convenience, safety and ease of communication with us. We did not give our kids phones to aid in group think, to lower their self esteem or to allow them to speak "anonymously," or to further gossip. 

We have removed our kids from group messages because the result of 15+ girls on a group text (intended or not) usually involves someone in that group with a wounded spirit. We have read and had many a conversation about tone in typing vs intended intent when it comes to the written word. I find these teaching moments to be especially vital in middle school. My kids were not ready for the freedom of Snap Chat in 6th grade. Cute filters or not, the implied temporary nature of the tool has produced a false since of freedom. In my experience, the damage of even a quick thought or image is lost on maturing brains.

My kids know that I have the ability to pick up their phones and read anything at any moment. My fingerprint opens their phone or it is no longer their phone. I know many other parents that follow this standard. Because of this, good kids are moving almost all of their communication to apps like Snap Chat that do not retain a record of communication. What was a gossip and mean girl problem in 7th grade becomes a topless picture problem in 10th. Because I am an in your face, constantly discussing all things that embarrass my kids kind of mom, these are normal everyday topics of conversation. 

A week away has given me time to see what is coming over my kids phones. It has called me to discuss appropriate story topics. It has given me the chance to see the DMs that have been sent. I have GREAT kids. They have great friends. And we all still have work to do in this area. 

I complain when my kids don't text their aunt or grandfather back. I expect them to have Find My iPhone on at all times for me to locate them. Technology is great. Technology is also a tool by which our kids will fail if we don't help them. 

A few things to think about:

If you don't know what a streak, a DM or a filter are, it's time to have a talk with your teen. 

If your kids are using an app or playing a game that you don't understand, learn it. If you don't like what you learn, delete it.

If you do not have access to your kid's phone, iPad or computer, why not? Handwritten diaries are for private thoughts, technology is not the place for things that are not to be shared. 

If you see other kids involved in destructive behavior, what agreements do you have with their parents? This is so tricky, but we can't catch everything and we need our co-moms and co-dads to help. 

Painted Ladies

We had some hard moments on our family adventure today, but there was one memory that stands out. It took a group effort. Lucas was the driver. AJ was the cinematographer and I was the navigator and sound engineer. You see, Ally loves Full House. The show is set here in San Francisco. As the theme song plays, the camera scans past what are known as the Painted Ladies. Theses are brightly painted row houses that are home to the Tanner family portrayed in the show.

Our morning had not gone as planned. Ally was a great sister and took care of loving on AJ as she spent the morning at the urgent care. Our doctor from home wanted her checked. For the 2.5 hours that it took us at the doctor, Ally waited patiently. She rode around with Lucas. She persuaded him to take her to buy a snuggle to cheer AJ up. She would not let Lucas take her to the Muir Woods without her sister. She was a champ.

So as we made our way into SF, I sent my accomplices the signal. I cued up the theme song on the radio as we made our way over the hill. As it blared on the radio, she giggled and AJ said, "LOOK ALLY!" Her smile was classic. AJ caught it all on video. Who would have thought that a dorky show that came out in 1987 would inspire a precious family moment 30 years later?

Sometimes we never know how the creative efforts that we offer to the world are going to shape someone's life. I can almost promise you that when Jeff Franklin set our to create this show, he did not have visions of a 41 old mom and her daughter (who is currently the age that I was when the show was first released) sharing a sweet moment on a family vacation. We just never know.

The world needs more positive creativity. The world needs more family memories. The world needs more goofy group projects that show people how much they are loved. In the midst of the hard days, may we choose to celebrate the silly and fun and great quantities of love in this world.

The Thing That Takes Your Breath Away

Do you have allergies? Perhaps your nose gets runny in March and October. Or maybe you start sneezing when you walk into a pet store. I am allergic to cats. This would not be quite so problematic if I did not have dear loved ones that are cat people. I myself will never own a cat, but my physical discomfort from cat hair is so sensitive that I cannot take fabric hand-me-downs from cat loving homes without significant consequences.

I also have a kiddo with allergies. Hers are a little more tricky. Beginning 16 months ago, she developed rashes and hives. At first, we thought is was chemically based. Then, we began to address stress induction. Today, she had a reaction to what we can only assume is food. Her face becomes flushed. Her throat starts to burn. She has hives. Her chest gets heavy. We carry EPI pens in case of emergency. It's scary.

She takes two monster shots every month to help the hives, and it certainly helps. But reactions like today still happen even though she wakes up each morning and takes 540mg of Allegra and each evening, she takes 30mg of Zyrtec. Every. Freaking. Day. Today, we added liquid Benadryl for safety reasons.

Allergies are terrifying. They literally can take your life giving breath away. But, they also call you to diligent self care. You must take your medicine. You must see your doctors. You get shots. You watch what you come in contact with. You avoid known triggers. And even when you do those things, they can still flare and the only thing to do is rest and let your body heal with added rounds of medicine and napping.

Perhaps it is not acrylic fumes or kitty fur or nuts, but is there something in your life that has the ability to take away your life giving breath?  Something that you have to stand against it in a daily discipline? You may even have a life rhythm that helps you protect against the destruction. But sometimes you have a day where out of no where, your chest gets tight and you can feel the shallowness of your breath.

What's your EPI pen? Is it your best friend? Is it music? It is your Bible? Is it yoga? It is art? If you don't know what to run for when you begin to feel the itching or the sneezing, perhaps you have some work to do. That's my challenge for you today. In the blog or Facebook comments, share your lifeline. Just type one or two or five words. Let's share with each other the many ways that we seek healing. No judgement, there is no right or wrong. May we just be encouraged by the many ways that the Creator is redeeming creation.