I'm sitting in my sister's lounge room on her brown leather recliner in Mundubbera, QLD as I type this next blog out. I'm on holidays with my dad...


The last few weeks have been a whirlwind, which is why you have hardly heard from me. I've been working 4 days a week and absolutely love being back at school, it's been incredible, getting into some sort of routine, seeing young teenagers chase me in the playground and say 'AJ, I want to be a christian' (yes, seriously!) and being able to tell of young people of the reality of life and death and tell my students of the peace that my mum had when facing death. What a testimony. BUT, oh... my... goodness it has been exhausting, grief is exhausting...


When I'm not at school, I'm with this guy...

.my.dad.

We hang out quite a bit, I see him every day. I have all the time on the planet for him. We go out for coffee, have daddy daughter dates, we take Molly for walks, I make him dinner at Kim and Beth's, he comes over to my house for dessert, we travel and we cry together - just to name a few things!

This guy is amazing and so precious. He must be going through the most horrible thing on the planet at the moment and he has every reason to not get up in the morning, but he does! Go him! What a great man of God ... he just keeps on going!


I'm not going to say this road I'm traveling is easy, it's hard, very hard and people seem to treat me now like everything is back to normal. It's not. I snap easily, I cry when I feel anything more then everyday pressures, random things upset me, I find it hard to make decisions... that wasn't AJ before my mum got sick and passed away. Things have changed. But, that's grief. But, I also know who I am still. I'm still God's precious daughter and want to serve him wholly and completely. God gives me grace each second of every minute of every hour of every day, I need it, now...more then ever.

Each Thursday since my mums funeral I have continued to go to our youth and young adults prayer meeting from 6:30-7:30am at our church. this is where we pray for our town and the incredible people in it, followed by coffee at the Coffee Club, where beautiful Helen the proprietor serves and makes us the best coffee on the planet! Ever since the funeral I have made this prayer meeting a priority, because in this storm of emotions that I am facing, I know prayer will sustain me, heal me and give me break through as I pour out my requests to God in this season. Yes, you can pray on your own and in isolation, and God will hear you, but I love the discipline of this prayer hour, praying with people I am doing life with is the most powerful thing you can do to encourage a community of believers.

.for.where.two.or.three.are.gathered.together.in.my.name.there.am.I.in.the.midst.of.them.
.mathew.18:20.

Don't you worry! I've had some fun and exciting things happen as well in the last few weeks ;) will fill you in on those things in future blogs!


Just to let you know, I'm not ready to write about July 29th 2010 yet... I've tried to write it on several occasions, but nothing I write seems the right way of writing it and no words express the broad spectrum of emotions that were felt that day. So watch this space, one day it will be on this blog, but for now...bear with me...

Big love to you all

AJ Xx

P.s It's 9 weeks today since my beautiful mum passed away....

I haven't forgotten about this upcoming blog. It's in my head and mind 24/7. It IS coming.

How am I going lately? Life continues. It's hard. So hard. I wake up every morning knowing that I won't hear from my beautiful, precious mum today. I go to work, I go to church, I go shopping, I hang out with friends, I go out for dinner and I feel like something is missing, it's my mum.

I had a good weekend though...

My sister came down to Ballina and spent the time with dad and I, yesterday we saw my Aunty Helen (mum's sister) and Uncle Gary for lunch. I never realised that my mum and Helen had such similar eyes... I kept looking at them and tear-ing up. So nice to see mum's sister, mum loved Helen so much, they used to work together, they had a special sisterly relationship. It was so lovely to see her. So lovely.

.clare.helen.me.

Big love to you all!

AJ Xx

I was having a good day today...

Then all of a sudden I wasn't.

Grief is hard. You NEVER know when it's going to hit you, and then all of a sudden it does. Bam.

I miss my mum heaps today. Her smile. Her laugh. Her soft hands. Her Facebook instant messages. Her tweets. Her blog. Her random texts. Her wise words.

.mum.i.miss.you.today.

That morning, Wednesday 28th July, as I waited in the waiting room, with Daniel, Adele, Kim & Beth, mum summoned each of us individually to her room to have a chat with us. First cab of the rank was little Kimmy. Then me.

When I went in, she was so tired and weak, so very weak. I was probably in her room for about 20 minutes, just me and her. How lovely. She was so exhausted. So sick. Sooooo sick. I cried and sat with her and prayed while she rested. Nothing major was said, we knew we loved each other and she said she was at peace. More was said, but it will remain with me forever.

My most precious time with my mum other then that 20 minutes with her that morning, was the previous Saturday when I was with dad. Shes spoke some things that I will never forget. She was so proud of her AJ.

Two weeks previous whilst in Charters Towers I had a conversation with mum and she said the two things that she was so gutted about if she was to die were, one, not seeing her grankids growing up and two, not being at my wedding. Yep, the first night I found out about mum's cancer, that was exactly what I was so devastated about. Mum and dad have prayed so very faithfully for this Man of God to come into my world, and the thought of her missing out on not only my wedding day but my whole love story, THAT crushes me, so much.

I left the room, so sad but hoping things were going to be ok with mum.

Mum rested most of the day as we knew Kirsty, Michael, Natalie, Sam and Charlotte were arriving later that afternoon.

Check out the waiting room views! You may be able to see the GABBA?!

.samuel.natalie.charlotte.

Kirsty and all the kids had time with mum. She was exhausted.

That evening we waited, waited, and waited....

Late that evening the head of renal department came in to explain mum's cancer to us 'kids.' It went something along the lines of this....

"A spaghetti plate cancer on top of her oven bag"

Ha!

No, it was a rogue cell cancer. A very common cancer in transplant people 5-10 years after their transplant. He explained that if mum tried chemo that she would be able to have much better anti-nausea medication. We honestly knew mum wasn't going to try the chemo, but dad had spoken to mum and said that she sleep on it over night.

On the way home that night, Kim got Subway for dinner, Kirsty and I had the worst Nando's on the planet. We got back to my sister Clare's house. This was so not fun, this was actually really crap, really crap this whole situation. We all went to bed relatively early as we wanted to be at the hospital early the next morning.

Stay tuned...

Big Love

AJ Xx

Happy Fathers Day Dad!!

I've been telling you my story about my mum lately, but I would like to introduce to you today, my dad. He has loved me so much for 27 years...

.my.dad.&.me.

.four.weeks.ago.

I love my dad so much. Today is really all about him. I made him bacon and eggs for breakfast, went to church, had indian for lunch and my lovely sister Clare is cooking him a lamb roast for dinner... I'm feeling full.

All the nice things I say about my dad, just don't really make the cut. I do love him. Thanks for being my dad, dad. I'm so glad I got you!

I arrived at the hospital that Wednesday morning to a very sick mum, my mum..........

.my.sick.mum.

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me- watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” – Matthew 11:28-30 {message}