What They Don’t See

They see me run.

But they don’t see the struggle,

fierce determination,

deep hurt,

raw pain,

rejection,

and anger unleashed.

Ten more minutes.

Why is it that the last ten are the hardest?

My breaths become deeper,

The pain is a reminder of what I’m fighting for.

Nine.

They don’t ask, so I don’t tell.

When they don’t know, all must be well.

Keep to myself, nobody gets hurt.

Eight.

I tried so hard,

A wanna be person.

Driven. Focused. Self sufficient.

Unimportant.

Seven.

No cheerleaders here.

Pressing on on my own,

Fighting my battles with tears.

Six.

Maybe if I try just one more time,

Would they see my soft heart?

Or despise my persistence.

See my deep longing?

Or loathe my existence.

Five.

Half over.

I heard of a man who knew all the Psalms,

So it became my mission to know them all.

Quote my verses some more.

I know ever so many, but no clue what for.

Four.

I paid all my bills not a second to late,

Gave all my tithes,

Opened my gates.

Three.

I forgave all my foes,

But they haunt me at night.

Why continue pursue me when I gave up the fight?

Two.

Learning a language.

But why bother, just to speak it alone?

Writing a book,

But if no one cares, what am I writing for?

One.

One more minute of striving for this,

Why do I bother?

Driven to conquer sadness,

Through sadness.

Done.

I’ve conquered this run.

I’ve won the struggle.

Left depression behind.

The next day to find.

Tomorrow I start it all over again.

Waiting for the day, my running can end.

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A Homeschool Pause

Today I want to share something that is going to be incredibly life changing for me this coming year. As many of you know, I am currently homeschooling four of my five children – and now, after my sixth year of homeschooling, I am going to take year seven to pause and reflect.

Thats right! My five precious children will be strapping on their backpacks, and lining up like little ducklings to face “real school” 😜 this fall! (For those of you who don’t get my reference to “real school” I mean public school, although you fellow homeschoolers will know exactly what I’m mean!!) Watch out everyone…the Bergen’s are coming!!

I have known our plans for a couple months now but just recently have begun to share the news and I must say, it’s very interesting to see all the different reactions that have come from this decision…

I’ve had it all from, “Are you sure you want to send your kids to Public School?!?” (Spoken like I’m sending them away to some evil war camp) to “Wow! Good for you! Won’t that be nice to have an empty house and all that free time?” to “Oh finally you’ve come to your senses! Are you going to be normal get a real job now?”

Ok. I’m exaggerating just a wee bit. None of those things were actually said to me, but I’ve had many conversations that give me each of the vibes above and I’m quite sure that none of them are what I’m actually feeling.

So let me answer these questions for those of you who are too polite to ask them in the first place:

1) Yes, I am quite sure that for this year, our five children are going to attend school together. One of the reasons I am sure of this is that for the past few years I have felt very split up as a family, having one child in public school and the rest at home. I have comforted myself by the fact that we would be split up anyway if they were all in school (as in my youngest was still to young for kindergarten so he’d be at home with me.) This year is the first and only year that my children will ever be able to attend the same public school altogether. This brings me so much joy and excitement – the thought that my five kids can experience school life together; bus rides, assemblies, family days, etc. I also am confident that even though yes, there will be some negative influences in their lives, the school is a very good one with wonderful teachers. I also am prepared to clear our evening schedules as much as possible so that I have time to spend with our children each evening.

2) No I don’t expect a break. I don’t even expect an easier year. I don’t expect calm days of doing whatever I want. I just don’t! Helping five kids adjust to public school after homeschooling will take a lot of correspondence with the teachers, a lot of patient evenings helping with homework, a lot of volunteer hours so that my children can see that I still value their education and work environment, a lot of healthy lunch planning, ALOT of papers brought home (found in crumpled balls at the bottom of their school bags – along with…”Eewww!!! What’s that?!?”), and to top it off a lot of driving around and planning for the future!

3) And lastly, no, I’m not going to finally be normal. I will continue to be my weird self, no “real” job in my near future, AND my hopes are to continue homeschooling at least two of my boys the following fall.

So, you may be wondering…why the change? Will one year off be worth all the paperwork, adjustments, etc. of public school? Why not just keep the two boys at home and start a new normal?

To answer that I would refer back to the first answer I gave: But they’ll all be together!

And I also will add that these last couple years my homeschooling hasn’t been at its finest. I’ve still been committed to giving my kids an excellent education, but I’ve really resorted to doing the bare minimum and even that lacks creativity. Quite simply, I’ve lost my former spark and zeal for homeschooling.

So instead of viewing this year as a rest, I’m focusing on using my year “off” to reassess some of the reasons I began homeschooling in the first place. Creative teaching and planning takes time, lots of time and to continue for a couple more years I’m simply setting aside this year as a gage of where we are at. I’ll be answering a lot of questions. Is my heart still in it? Do the benefits of it outweigh the inconvenience? What is our long-term goal, and how is homeschooling accomplishing it? How has homeschooling been beneficial to my older kids? Have they been able to adjust to life among their peers? And so on. You get the picture.

So that’s my big news for today! How about you?

Do you homeschool? A former homeschooler? Have you ever had to make a similar adjustment? If so, how did it turn out for you?

Participation Awards

Chess has been the board game of choice in our home lately. I’ve never been great at chess – no, let’s be honest, I’m really terrible at the game. Whenever I finally think I’ve got a brilliant scheme to get the upper hand, some pawn comes out of nowhere and kills my queen. And puts me in check mate. In the first five minutes.

When I first started teaching my kids, I took no mercy. Every chance I got, I pulled out my best strategies and made a good show out of it. I took great pleasure in my victories!

Finally, I had worthy opponents to my skill level!

Years have passed since I introduced the game to my offspring. I can’t remember the last time I’ve won against my oldest, or my nine year old for that matter…. My daughter, like me, isn’t the most skilled at this game – but, then again, is it really a necessary life skill?

However, I’ve still secretly revelled in my ability to win the game against my youngest two boys. I mean, they’re smart kids. But alas, the inevitable day came early last week when my seven year old beat me. In approximately ten moves.

Humiliated and desperate to redeem myself, I challenged my five year old to a match. Surely I could recover gracefully through a sure victory!

I grinned from ear to ear as I pulled out the best of tricks I could think of….but then…oops! I didn’t see his Knight there! And again! What?? That Rook came out of nowhere!

As the game wore on my smug smile slowly faded and I realized just how bad I really am at the game. I’m far too focused on one area and I forget to watch the whole board and all the intricate pieces which make different moves. I make wrong assumptions based on what I would do and low and behold, half an hour later I had lost the only shred of chess-playing dignity I had left: I officially lost to a preschooler (who was snickering at me and saying: “easy-peasy!”)

And then, just when I thought I couldn’t stoop any lower, my snarky eleven year old daughter comes into the room with this:

A participation award!!!

Oh the humiliation! Oh the embarrassment!

My only comforting thought was that I was, in fact, the one who taught him to play chess in the first place. In fact, I’m really his only teacher thus far. So he had most likely learned his skills from me right??

I’ll leave you to judge whether that’s a good thing or a bad one.

A Parents Call to Pray

I’ve been all over God’s word today… Deuteronomy, Psalms, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Ephesians, Proverbs… and you know what I see throughout it all? The same loving, gracious God, gently calling and beckoning his people to walk in his ways and teach his ways to the next generation.

And the realization hit me: I can teach my children, but it is God alone who can save their hearts.

God alone can grow the seeds that I’ve so earnestly planted. God alone can hold their hearts and win their love and devotion. This is why my prayers are so important. For what my teaching is powerless to do, my prayers CAN do! I don’t want God to just have their outward obedience! I want him to have their hearts to the very core!

Dear parent, do you feel helpless for where your family is at? Pray!

Do you feel like all your efforts in teaching your children were in vain? Pray!

Have your children rejected your teachings? Pray!

“Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labour in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain. In vain you rise up early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat, for He grants sleep to those he love. Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from Him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in ones youth.”

Psalm 127:1-4

Surely the Lord answers our prayers in accordance with his will. And we know from scripture it is his will that NONE should perish, but that all will come to repentance.

In the Waiting

“Wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” Psalm 27:14

These words have been like a beacon of light in a very dark valley for me. For years I’ve been asking God hard questions…questions of when I will be united with like-minded believers, questions of how long I will feel alone, questions of why I feel so much like an outcast, a misfit, a foreigner.

And I hear Him over and over again speaking:

Wait for the Lord. Yes, Lord, I’m waiting.

Be strong and take heart. I’m trying Lord, really, I am!

Be strong and take heart. I’m tired of being strong God.

Take heart and wait for the Lord. I’m tired of waiting God.

I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Do you believe this promise? Do you believe my words? God, you know I do.

Then wait for the Lord. Be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Beautiful March

I don’t know what it is about turning the calendar page and seeing that uplifting word “March” that lightens my heart so. Maybe it’s the promising thought that the worst of the winter winds, storms and temperature drops are over. As I’ve shared in the past, winter in Manitoba, Canada is no picnic. With windchill, temperatures where I live can drop as low as -50 degrees Celsius (That’s -58 Fahrenheit for my American readers)…This last February we spent almost a week in such weather and I don’t need fancy wording to describe what it feels like: It sucks. 

Kids get out of sorts, vehicles break, snowblowers break. My doors freeze shut and I literally have to blow dry the handles to thaw them. It’s just too cold. And I know I’m not the only one around here who asks the question, “Why do people LIVE here?!?”

But then, March! A glimmer of hope, the end is near! Spring is near. With it, longer and brighter days, sunshine, fresh cool air that doesn’t hurt to breathe, mounds of snow that day by day look just a little bit smaller. And yes, spring comes with its own troubles here… BUT after the dirty roads begin to dry, after the flooding ditches and after the loads upon loads of laundry from kids playing on the soggy, soaked grass and mud, after all this comes a beautiful and dreamy summer. Summer in Canada is wonderful! And every time it comes I thank God over and over for this country I call home. The skies are open and blue, the fields around my home stretch out for miles. It’s so warm and sunny that winter is but a distant memory. I forget the harsh reality that winter lasts half of the year; starting gently in November and December, freezing harshly in January and February, and slowly thawing from March until April.

I wonder, would I fully be able to appreciate summer if I never experienced the harsh, cold realities of winter? Would I love every minute of the sunshine if I hadn’t experienced the long days without it? Would all the warmth be taken for granted if I had never been without it?

Interesting to think about, that hard seasons of life make the good ones so much better. If I light a tea light in a sunny room, it goes unnoticed. But light that same candle in a room that is pitch black and the candle shines brightly. It reminds me that even bad things can serve a purpose in this world and that thought fills me with so much hope. Sickness makes health so much sweeter. Pain makes comfort all the greater. Going without, does bring about thankfulness for the things we have and it’s no secret that a thankful heart is a happy heart.

So, I guess (though I hate to admit it), even winter in Canada has it’s purposes.