Prayers, please.

I'm not normally a fan of writing blogs where I complain, but tonight I really feel like I should.

This past year has been exceedingly rough on me and there have been numerous times where it has been worse than others and I've just broken down and cried my eyes out, for the exact same reason as every other time. I'm saying this because last night was one of those nights. It was weird how my thought process got to that point but basically it went like this:

I got to my dad's house where he had dinner made for me. I was so grateful because I hadn't eaten hardly anything all day and my head was hurting from being so hungry. I love my dad's cooking and last night's dinner of ham and mashed potatoes was no different and neither was the milkshake he made me afterwards. Nothing can compare to the food you grow up eating, so while I enjoy other people's cooking, my dad beats all. After I went to bed, I started thinking about that and how that was one of the few things I miss about living with my parents, the general comfort level in familiar things like food...that's where it all spiraled down. I've been having a lot of financial issues the past couple of weeks and it's been really stressful. So my thought process went from how nice it would be to have been able to continue living with my parents and have the normal come home and have dinner with the family and tell them about your day kinda deal to wow, it would be nice if my parents hadn't been so screwed up and I could still live with them because my life would be so much easier that way. I wouldn't have to worry so much about how I'm going to pay the few bills I have right now because they'd be things my parents would help take care of. I wouldn't have to worry about being a burden on the people I stay with or being in their way because those people would be my parents and they'd love me unconditionally. Really, that's all I want. The normal home with unconditional love from my parents. To be able to come home and tell them about my day and have a nice dinner and know that if I'm struggling with something, they can help. I just feel like if I had that, the weight I carry around on a daily basis would be significantly lighter. I wouldn't feel like if I made one tiny misstep, I'd screw up my whole life like I do now.

The past 6 1/2 years that I haven't lived with them, I've had a really positive outlook on it. I know that the whole situation has shaped my personality in ways that I am proud of. I've always been one, that when people hear about what happened and give me the pity reaction, to tell them that if it had to happen to anyone, I'm glad it was me. It's not to a response either, for the most part I completely believe it...but in the past year there have been many times where I just cry so hard and wonder why my life couldn't be normal.

Right now, I just need lots of prayers. I don't know where my life is headed and that's not a good thing. I need to get out of this rut I've been in since last summer because this amount of stress and anxiety cannot be good. I need to find my place, where I don't feel like a burden, and I need it to happen soon.

This past weekend I got to go out of town to Kernersville to spend some time with two of my best friends, Ryan and Meghan. It was an absolutely amazing weekend. Here's a summary of what went down...

Friday: Me, Ryan, and his dad decided to go out to Stone Mountain. This was my first time ever climbing and it was not what I expected. While we did spend some time walking along a trail through the woods, we also did a good amount of climbing up this wall of granite. It was amazing, but so hard. I definitely realized just how out of shape I am. Once we got up to the summit we hung out for a little bit and then began trying to find the waterfall there. The waterfall was absolutely amazing! Ryan and I climbed up along the side of it so that we could walk out to a dry spot somewhat in the middle...it was so cool and so much fun! After that we made our way back to the car and went to dinner, then I went to Meghan's house for the night.

Saturday: Meghan had to get up early for work, so I didn't get to spend the day with her then either. Once I got up, I waited for Ryan to come pick me up. We then went back to his house and waited for his sister, Angela; his brother in-law, Brian; and his friend, Eric. Once they got there, all of us, including his dad, left for Hanging Rock. When I had woken up that morning my legs were sore, so I was really hoping we wouldn't do a whole lot of climbing, but I was completely wrong. I think we actually did more than the day before. We walked up this trail that came out to a watch tower and a pretty cool area of rock that me, Ryan, Eric, and Brian climbed out on. After hanging out there for a little while, we all made our way back and then headed over to the lower cascades. The waterfall there was so pretty! We all did our own little exploring of the area, which was a lot of fun. Ryan, Eric, and Brian ended up climbing up the side of the falls, going across, and climbing out to this ledge above it. When they got back and told me where they had been, I knew I really wanted to go. I convinced Eric and Ryan to go back up with me, but I had no idea what I was getting into. We walk up a little bit through the woods and then get to this part that was nothing but a vertical wall of rock and they tell me I have to free climb up it. Now, I've climbed numerous fake rock walls at the Y and I'm pretty good at it, but there you have the comfort of knowing you have a harness and there's normally a mat below you. Here, we had to do basically the same thing just without a harness and if you fall, there's no mat below you...just a long hard fall down. I was terrified and stood there for a few minutes trying to tell them there was no way I could do that while they kept telling me I could. I don't know what came over me, but I eventually was just like FINE and started climbing it. I slipped once which freaked me the heck out, naturally ha, but I did make it. And of course, Ryan decides to tell me afterwards, "for your second day climbing, you really shouldn't have attempted that." I was shaking for the longest time afterwards and it didn't help that there were parts of the rest of the climb to the ledge that you really had to be careful on...if you missed a step, you'd pretty much fall to your death. But we did get there and it really was worth the experience and story. After that, we headed back down and out to the car to go home. That night I went to downtown Winston-Salem with Meghan and her boyfriend, Chris, for dinner. We ended up at Foothills Brewery surrounded by a ton of drunk people screaming at the Wake Forest game on T.V. One of Chris's friends, who's name I really cannot remember, met us there for dinner and afterwards we all walked around until about 11. Downtown Winston is def an interesting place to walk around in at night, that's for sure. We then headed back home, where me and Meghan crashed.

Sunday: I was so exhausted the next morning that I skipped church...first Sunday in probably about 8 months that I haven't been to church, weird. I got up a little later and got ready to make the trip back with Ryan. Once we got back to MACU, it was like getting back to reality. That night was filled with so much drama from so many directions it was insane. But once I got home after class Monday night, life started to calm down and so far my week has been good.

This will probably be my only post for the next few days, but I'm still trying to keep it a regular thing. I'm so stoked for spring break because there's a good chance I will be spending Sunday-Friday morning RVing somewhere, probably S.C., with the younger siblings and my cousin; and then I'm being a sponsor for two girls for Oasis at MACU Friday-Sunday. It's going to be awesome.

Begin the more regular posts...

I've been thinking a lot lately about attempting to post on here more regularly with stuff just about what I've been up to that week, any exciting things coming up, or even just a simple picture...just something that I can consistently update on here.

So this week has been a little strange thus far. Sunday was horrible in a lot of ways. I was incredibly stressed out all day, it was just one thing after another coming up...like once one thing got worked out and I felt like I could sit back and breath, another thing surfaced and it was like that literally from about an hour after I got up until probably about an hour before I went to bed. The really bad stuff didn't happen until that night though, the most major thing being something that I can't be specific about, but made me feel like I had been lied to and that I didn't know a certain friend as well as I thought I did. It ended up being on my mind constantly for the next couple of hours and infuriated me so much that I had this overwhelming feeling to find a punching bag and go crazy, cry, and scream as loud as I could...and of course the overload of emotion led me to feeling like I was going to throw up as well. Of course, I was just being a typical girl and reacting without thinking and getting way too emotional which I now feel slightly ashamed of...but the next day I was able to calm down and once I did, I realized what had actually happened and the situation wasn't bad at all. The sad thing is, even though there was nothing wrong with it at all, the way I initially portrayed it has shaken my confidence in that person quite terribly and I haven't been able to fix it yet. I guess time is always a factor in healing though, so I'm hoping with time my confidence will be restored.

I also spent a good deal of time last night researching some "out of the box" summer job ideas. While I will probably do some normal job around here this summer b.c of time constraints and financial needs, I am hoping to find either an internship or job in a different state for next summer. I was looking into jobs that expect most people to be out of state so they provide living arrangements. I really did a lot of research into the big florida theme parks like disney and seaworld and I'm putting a lot of thought into doing the Disney College Program which would have me living there and taking classes through them for a semester while working in the parks. I just think it'd be really cool to have the experience of living there for a semester and it would look good on a resume. I'm also looking into some kind of student job on a cruise ship so that I could spend the summer working abroad, but so far I have had no such luck.

That's really the two most pressing things that have been on my mind the past few days. I've got classes tomorrow, work all day Thursday, then choir practice, then heading to Ecity to meet Ryan and driving overnight out to Kernersville (a little town between Greensboro and Winston-Salem) to spend the weekend with him and Meghan...so excited to be getting out of town for the weekend!