The trip to perfection

 Today my hubby and I are headed for Raleigh, NC for some work related seminars. We are so fortunate to be able to do this several times a year and in 4 or 5 different states. We are able to take a company vehicle, lodge in a very nice hotel (always a king bed with a down comforter and many, many pillows), eat whenever and wherever the mood strikes, and I can usually fit in a little retail therapy! Sounds perfect doesn't it!?

Well yes, unless you are my better half and have your PTS, OCD, neurotic, guilt-ridden, wife tagging along with you. OOOKK...here is a picture into one aspect in the life of my sainted hubby!  The craziness begins weeks before our trips. He comes home from work and informs me that we are going so "clear your calendar!" At first I am always very excited and just the thought of a break from our routine makes me smile...and of course the thought of a king size bed and all the Starbucks coffee I could want. But then the guilt starts to creep in. How can I leave my mama and my daughter with their health issues? What if they need me and I am 2, 3, 400 miles away and can't get back? Who is going to give both of them that shot of joy, the encouragement, the companionship they might need? And then there are my grand-babies. Who is going to do my part...their parents have jobs that they have to go to. They just can't stay home because I want to go away and stay in a king size bed with lots of pillows and unlimited Starbucks's coffee. So I spend too much time mulling over whether I should go or not while my husband has a BIG calendar taped to the bedroom wall marking off the days until our "together getaway" in a red sharpie. My guilt and my irrational thinking display itself to him. When he talks about the fun we are going to have I respond in a very guarded way mostly because I am not sure whether I am going. Irrational guilt!

Speed ahead until a few days before we leave and, YES, in my mind I have not fully committed though I probably need TO BE COMMITTED! Hahaha! We play this little game of needing directions printed. Yes, to your question...we both have smart phones that have GPS on them. But I am old school and love MapQuest on paper. I want the turn by turn with the miles printed between each exit and the map with the dark blue line showing me the path. And, for heaven's sake, I want the return trip directions printed also! He prints them off usually the day before we leave but almost every time we get in the car and a little way down the highway I find there is a problem. There is either no return directions, part of the directions didn't print, or there is no map. How in the world are we going to be able to get there!!??  Can we all spell neurotic! How about OCD!

The day of the trip I anticipate having his company SUV to drive. Normally, we do but once in a while something comes up and we have to take a different vehicle. Yet there have been times instead of our big, heavy, high sitting SUV we had to take a car. A very nice roomy car but it is a CAR! And I don't travel in casr since my daughter's accident. This really doesn't make sense because she was in one really big truck when she was in that tragic accident but PTSD is a really strange character. Normally as we pack the vehicle I can feel myself getting stressed. We get to the interstate and it seems like someone has bought me a ticket to a super duper bumper car track. There are all these cars whizzing around us, they seem to have added more lanes on the interstate, the lanes are so close together the other cars are crossing the dotted lines,  and vehicles are flying off the exits in a frenzy headed straight for us and we are in a CAR! Everyone is driving soooo fast and way too close to us. My heels are digging into the floor board and my knuckles are white from my hands balling up into a fist. I am trying my best not to continually shout out "watch out!"  But I sure am shouting it on the inside. Isn't there any other way to get to where we are going...maybe call on Samantha Stevens from Bewitched to twitch her nose for us!? PTSD and  neurotic all balled into one! 

Why am I sharing all this with you? It definitely doesn't paint a very good picture of me but I am flawed. I believe that there are many women and men that wrestle with all sorts of fears, doubts, anxiety, and struggles. We don't have to be "For we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body as well". James 3:2  The struggles we wrestle with do not define us, whether it is OCD, ADD, PTSD...it is whether we fight or not that defines us. Do we hang in there and use God, His word, prayer time, friends and family to overcome the struggles in our lives!? Do we bring our neurotic ways, our anxieties, our fears to the one who made us and knows us best? Working through our imperfections gives God the chance to strengthen us, to build us up, to share himself and his mighty ways with us as we share our flaws with him. "For we all stumble" and the maker, our creator knows the how and the when and the why and he wants us with and through him to overcome the fragile parts of us so that His glory can shine through us. "Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything." James 1:2-4.

We arrived at our destination without any harm befalling us even though I am not very good at super duper bumper cars! I am learning to "cast my burdens upon Him"  and really understanding that "He will sustain me" Psalm 55:22 . He is teaching me to turn more readily to Him and he will take care of all those flaws that are named by letters. Is the process easy? Am I always successful in just jumping in the vehicle, driving into the sunset with my hubby and leaving all my cares, guilt, anxieties, and neurotic tendencies behind me? No, but as with most challenges in life practice makes perfect  but the attempt has to be made. So with each trip and each decision to pray, to rejoice, to put each mile in God's hands I find God and I together are making progress. Praise God for the work our Father is doing in all of us to bring us to the place he desires us to be...mature, complete and totally His!

"Being confident of  this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Philippians 1:6