Wake Up Call

Update: In a few days, I'll finally be posting about my son's birthday party and I'll try to attach downloadable templates for the decorations I made.

On topic: I know religion is a taboo topic in this world, but I'd like to share an experience of mine. This may be a sloppy post and all over the place because I didn't put too much thought into it before I wrote it. Haha.

I realized the other day, I hadn't been to church since I was early in my pregnancy...and hadn't been a regular church go-er since before I GOT pregnant. As most of you know, my son just turned one and that's a LONG time to go between visits.

Here's a little bit of background (and I really hope my family doesn't get mad about me posting this): My family is Christian (specifically Catholic), but my parents were never really church-going other than Easter, Christmas, and Baptisms, at least once my brother and I got older. We were baptized in a Catholic church and I can remember going to CCD (?) and doing all the preparation for my first communion, but I never attended my first communion (and I don't remember why). From then on, we tried a couple of churches in the area when we moved, but none of them stuck. Not saying my parents aren't religious people, because I know they both very much believe in God, I just think they never really found anything that FIT them.

I went to youth group and church by myself from the time I was 13 until I was 18. I went to three different churches throughout that period of time; one for youth group until I could drive, one by myself (which is my "niche" and the one we're attending now), and one with James once we got together that was in our area. They're all great churches, but my FIT was definitely with the 2nd church. I had been going there for two years and I was almost a member by the time I stopped going. Then I went to college, dropped out after a semester, and experienced a "dark period", which was also when I ended up getting pregnant. After that, my faith was at the bottom of my priority list.

I never felt like God had given up on me. At the time I had "more important things to do". I realize now that they weren't as important as I had made them. I also felt like if I went to church pregnant, while everyone knew I wasn't married and wasn't planning to get married anytime soon, that I would be uncomfortable and unaccepted. There are always people who are going to judge, but my fear was more my feelings than actuality. I don't think any of the people I talked with in church would have disassociated me because of it, I was just so AFRAID and ashamed, that every time, I talked myself out of going. There were days we'd be completely ready to walk out the door and I'd psych myself out and change my mind. We had DRIVEN to church and once we got there, I told James to keep on driving.

ANYWAY...the point of this whole book...
This past Sunday, I finally sucked it up and went, and it was GREAT. Totally refreshing. They just combined with another church, so most of the people didn't even think we were new, they just thought they hadn't met us yet, so it was less awkward for us to introduce ourselves to a bunch of people. And a lot of them remembered me, which made me feel better too, since I thought most of them would have forgotten me by now. I have a feeling that a "side effect" of attending is going to be a renewed interest in music. I had pretty much given up on that when I got pregnant too, but it felt GOOD to be singing in church. It's hard to describe just how amazing this was for me, unless you've been at this kind of turning point yourself. :)