The God of All Comfort

As I sit here writing my first post, I’m finding it very hard to not laugh at myself because I am seriously the last girl on planet earth to start a blog or spend time updating social media. Not only am I really protective of my privacy, but I also kinda can’t help but wonder why anyone would really care what I do or have to say. And I gotta be honest and tell ya I just really don’t like the spotlight. Like, at all. If you don’t believe me then check out the photos of my wedding ceremony, which consisted of only seventeen people that were immediate family, because I just couldn’t handle the pressure of doing something so intimate and sacred in front of 300+ family members and friends. Yet, here I am, ready to bare my soul over the internet, which confirms the fact that this is a God thing. Otherwise, I can assure you…I wouldn’t be doing it. So, here’s my “why” story.

After graduating college in 2008, I started my first real job writing for a publishing company. I bought a new car, was finally making my own money and was even doing some modeling here and there. I distinctly remember feeling like I had the whole world at my fingertips. On the way to work one day, I was listening to my favorite Christian station and prayed a prayer I will never forget for the rest of my life. I said “God, I want to know You more.” I had no idea at the moment  what I had just gotten myself into. Within weeks, I started having panic attacks, which were something I had only experienced one time before on a much smaller scale. These were full-blown “I think I am dying” panic attacks and I fell into a state of constant unexplained fear and anxiety. I can’t count the nights I slept with the light on and my arms wrapped tightly around my Bible. A heavy cloud of doom and an overwhelming fear of death began to envelop me in darkness and defeat. Just getting out of bed in the morning became a huge struggle. I nearly lost my job as I wasn’t able to be productive at work and to this day, I still struggle with guilt over being such an unreliable employee, especially since I had always been such a hard worker up until this point in my life. My life felt like a bad dream I couldn’t wake up from and I cried out in fear to the Lord literally hundreds of times a day. It seems I couldn’t go even minutes without clinging to the hope I found through reading His word, so yeah, my Bible went everywhere I went. Even to work functions! I know I must have seemed like such a freak. Looking back, I know that season was a major spiritual attack, but also a very significant trial that God allowed me to go through so that I might actually get to know Him more. And that’s exactly what happened. (Oh and it’s true what they say, be careful what you pray for). Slowly, I climbed out of that deep pit by the day-to-day grace and mercy of Jesus and my sweet family who stood by me so patiently and I walked out of that valley with a joy, peace and intimacy with God that I had never known before. For the first time in my life, my relationship with Him felt closer than any human relationship I had ever experienced before.One night during that season, I was reading my Bible and came across 2 Corinthians 1:3&4, which says,

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” Those words literally jumped off of the page at me and I distinctly remember the revelation I received that night, that although I didn’t know how and I didn’t know when, I knew that my purpose in life would be to use what I was going through to help others who are going through the same thing, whatever that might look like.

My heart stirred with compassion and desire to reach out to those were desperate for comfort and hope, because I knew exactly what that desperation felt like and it literally broke my heart to think about someone else going through that kind of pain. And THAT is why I am writing this blog. Because I know how hard this stepmom gig can be. I know how much it hurts and how confused and isolated it can make you feel. There isn’t a strange, mean, sad or shameful thought I haven’t thought in the past 4 years of being a stepmom. And honestly, there probably isn’t a crazy or dysfunctional situation I haven’t experienced or can at least really relate to! I’ve been the girlfriend, the childless stepmom, the full-time stepmom, the custodial stepmom and non-custodial stepmom with a child of my own. I promise I have been where you’ve been and I have felt what you’ve felt – the good, the bad and the ugly. And I know there is a lot of really inspiring and awesome advice out there but as a child of God, when it gets down to the nitty gritty of stepmom life, practical just doesn’t cut it. I need SPIRITUAL. You can tell me all day what I am supposed to do, but I need something that will pierce through the filth of my flesh and awaken His Spirit inside me to reveal what HE wants me to do and how to do it. I need something that will expose the sin in my deceitful heart and cleanse me from the inside out. Something that will renew my mind in a way that will not only change what I do, but will transform the way I think and feel. I can’t do this stepmom thing without Jesus, the One who knows me inside and out, because HE is the only way my heart will survive this for the long haul. You see, I have been through a whole lot in these past four years and things aren’t getting easier any time soon. Yet, with every bad day, every setback, God has never once stopped comforting me, gently chastising and guiding me out of my own way and steering me back onto the path He laid out for me before the creation of the world. A path full of peace and purpose. And so here I am, ready to walk beside you on this journey because I want nothing more than to be right there, reminding you over and over again that you are right where you are supposed to be and that God alone can calm all of your fears, soothe your hurting heart and reveal Himself to you in the most special and magnificent ways, ways He never could have if you hadn’t decided to jump headfirst into this crazy thing called stepmomming! And most of all, I want you to know beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you are not alone.