I made a decision tonight.

Discussing dreams and goals over dinner with my son, I thought about living.  Really living.  I thought about enjoying each day, redeeming the time and not being afraid to live.  I thought about seeking new opportunities.  He has been such an example of that.  My son carries an infectious zest for life, and passion to help and encourage others.  He desires to see the best in an individual and pushes them to reach their fullest potential.  My little chunky blonde-haired, green-eyed toddler has grown up into a young man that brightens every place he enters.  I remember one of his high school teachers telling me, “He is just a bright star!”  I really didn’t think he’d be living with me full-time again ever.  But he is!  And it is terrific!

I love how God surprises us.

This is the kid that announced he was moving out the day after high school graduation.  He didn’t even stay home that summer before college.  He was ready to experience life for himself and at a distance from his home and immediate family.  In the last ten years, Ross has finished four years of college including a semester in Spain, traveled overseas and lived in California.  He’s climbed a volcano, surfed, witnessed machete/hijacked chicken buses in Guatemala, salsa danced his way through Columbia, toured a Gelato factory in Italy, and volunteered with an orphanage in Mexico!

This young man has had more life experience at 27 than hundreds of people will in their entire lifetime. 

Ross has met all kinds of people.  He’s landed a handful of commercials and film series in an acting career.  Many nights he’s enjoyed taking in a California sunset on the beach, recently hiked to the top of a rock mountain in New Mexico, driven a 24 foot truck across the United States marketing for a beer company, and given out samples of a popular energy drink at a ski resort in Tahoe!  He never stops!

I asked him, “What drives you?”  He had a simple response –  “Mom, I don’t want to watch life go by.  There’s too much to explore and experience.”

He continues to inspire me.

The most important truth is that the impact Ross’s influence on me has been life-changing.

The most difficult thing I have ever encountered in my life has been making the decision to separate from my marriage partner of 29 years.  That was not in my plan.  After years of confronting and pleading with him for change, I went forward with distancing myself for my physical and emotional well-being.

My intention was to separate to allow us both to seek the help we needed to make our marriage work, but it ended in divorce.  After many years of living in denial, I was able to admit I had become a victim of abuse.  I lost my own identity and reached a point where I couldn’t function making simple decisions on my own without hysteria.  I was headed on a downward spiral, and things were only becoming worse.

Often, I wonder what it must have been like, to be my son, encouraging his mother to leave his own father.

Horrible.  Nor would he have chosen that if given a different opportunity.  But he persevered.  He knew what was right.  And what was wrong.  He kept encouraging me to look inside myself, and truly evaluate the circumstances for what they were — not what people were telling me they should be or what they had to be.

I was dying.  Emotionally, physically, mentally, and spiritually.  For years I prayed and asked God to help me.  I begged God to help me.  To deliver me.  To change things.  To make them better.

Now that I can see clearly, I believe He was interested in changing ME and in doing the work that had to be done through me.  I believe God gave me the strength and courage I needed to confront the behavior that was destroying my very being, and a I had to trust Him in the journey and trust Him for the outcome.

It was intense.  Frightening.

I truly believe God desires us to have and maintain healthy relationships.  People don’t put in the work because it’s too difficult, they’re afraid of what others think, or they’ve just settled.  Its too uncomfortable.

It has taken me many years to reach this point of understanding and to realize I had to be responsible for the life that I had been living.

I look forward to this new season in life and am thankful for all of the gifts, blessings, and lessons I have received along the journey.  I continue to pray for my husband of many years, and hope for healing and restoration according to God’s plan.

Now — the decision I’ve made — I’m going to embrace my long-shelved passion to write, schedule another visit to the ocean……..and buy a house!!

Welcome each new day as an unwrapped package!  Don’t be afraid of living!

And remember……..You don’t have to stay in the chaos.  You just don’t.

Now I know.