A New Year...

Ok, it's that time of year. Let's look back at the past year and forward to the new one. Because I said so, that's why!

This has been an amazing year for me in so many ways - I have a new job that I love at a great school with co-workers who have really made me feel accepted and welcome. I've become involved with a great group at my church and made new friends there as well. And let's not forget that I've lost over 100 pounds (almost at 120 now!), so I look and feel like a new person, and all the myriad of new things that go with that. At this time last year, I had none of that - or even an inkling that any of it would happen!

So why am I still not satisfied? Why do I want more, more, more?? Why do I feel like none of these things are good enough if I can't find a husband, get a house, and have a baby? Because I'm a fallen, sinful, greedy human I suppose. My small group (yet another blessing to come out of this year!) has been studying John Piper's book When I Don't Desire God: How to Fight for Joy. So my goal this year is to do just that: fight for joy. We are commanded by God to fight for joy, which comes only through growing closer to him. Although you would have to do the whole study to really get a lot out of it, here are Piper's 15 strategies to use in the fight for joy:

1. Meditate on the Word of God day and night.
2. When reading, focus on the centrality of God.
3. Do not skip the terrifying parts of the Bible.
4. Learn to preach to yourself.
5. Pray earnestly and continually for everything you need to be happy in God.
6. Fight against every sin in your life.
7. Share your faith.
8. Spend time with God-saturated people.
9. Read biographies of great Christian saints.
10. Read great books about God.
11. Get the rest, exercise, and proper diet that God has ordained you need.
12. Make a proper use of revelation in nature.
13. Do the hard and loving thing for the sake of others.
14. Get a global vision for Christ and pour yourself out to the unreached.
15. Be patient in the night of God's seeming absence.

It's an overwhelming list, so I'm just going to concentrate on making sure I do at least one of them daily.

On a completely different note, I went to the movies this morning. (Marley and Me - cute, made me cry, but not going to make my top 10 list) They must be making those seats bigger. I fit in it with room for my arms as well and room to spare. You can't imagine the horror of going to the movies and being afraid you won't fit into the seat until you've been there....or of having to put your arms on the armrests because there's no room for them in your seat.

Being disappointed with life...

I just read two great things by Max Lucado that super applied to me. One, a weekly email devotional that I get, was about servanthood and reaching out to those who are "overlooked". Believe me, fat people can emphathize with being overlooked! But it's my call not to feel sorry for myself, but to reach out to others. I'll admit, there are times when low self-esteem drags me down so much I don't even try. I think, "They don't want me to reach out to them, they want someone better". But Max had an interesting challenge. I'll quote him:

"Every day do something you don’t want to do. Pick up someone else’s trash. Surrender your parking place. Call the long-winded relative. Carry the cooler. Doesn’t have to be a big thing. ... “Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort” (1 Cor. 15:58 MSG)."

I also like to read the quick daily message on his webpage. Today's was about dealing with disappointment. He used two examples - Miss Haversham from Great Expectations who stopped living her life when her fiance called off the wedding, and Paul who ended up in jail instead of ministering in Spain, but used the time to write letters that became our New Testament epistles of Philemon, Philippians, Colossians, and Ephesians. Guess which one we're supposed to imitate???

As I sit here at 30 without a house, husband, kids - or even the potential for any of those! - disappointment is a topic that comes up frequently. But maybe - just maybe - God intended for me to hear those two messages together. Could it be that hiding in my house sulking isn't what He intended for me to be doing with my life? That feeling sorry for myself isn't part of his great plan for me? That my way isn't better than His way? Shocking, I know. So I will be praying for God to turn my focus outward - looking for what I can do for others, not what they can do for me. And I'll keep working on that tenth commandment. :)

Welcome to my life!

I'm a little unsure about this whole blogging thing, so here's the plan - I'm going to start one and not tell anyone about it. Makes good sense, right? Well, maybe I'll end up telling people. We'll see.

To start with a scary fact about me - I am THIRTY years old. Yes, 30. That is a freakin' scary huge number for a fat single girl in a tiny apartment. Not so scary for a married woman with a house and a baby or two. But for me, yes. By the way, while I'm on the subject of my age, let me say this: I am really tired of people telling me that I'm still young and have plenty of time to have babies and most people are waiting until they're older now anyway. That's fine and dandy. I am happy for those people. I am fine with them deciding that they wanted to wait. It's just not how I wanted MY life to go. Oh, well. I suppose God has his own plan out there for me...I'm just working on finding it.

So speaking of God's plans for me...I've made a lot of major life changes recently. I up and quit my job teaching Kindergarten in Charlottesville and moved to Richmond, where I got another job teaching Kindergarten. So far, I love living in Richmond. Mostly because my best gal pal, Julie (yes, I know she would love being referred to that way), lives here along with her husband Jeff and my two other good friends Katie and Jon. So we hang out a lot and that's exciting. I love Richmond. Never thought I was such a city girl, but I love all the shops and restaurants and stuff. Maybe not all the traffic...

My job has not turned out to be quite as exciting as I hoped. I have definitely learned the Kindergarten is not the place I want to be. But luckily, I just finished my M.Ed. in reading so I have gotten a new job. Next year I will be a Title 1 reading teacher. I don't know where I'll be, but it won't be at my current school. (To be a Title 1 school, you have to qualify by having a large percentage of free and reduced lunch kids, and my school doesn't qualify) I will probably spend part of my time working with small groups of kids that are struggling with reading and the other part of my time helping teachers with ideas for teaching reading. I am SOOOOOOOO excited about this!!! It means I get to do my favorite part of my job - teaching reading - but not all the other stuff - behavior notes and looking for lost coats and lunch money and collecting field trip forms and conferences and the list goes on and on and on. It's REALLY hard to get through the rest of this year, but I'm spending a lot of time praying for a positive attitude about it.

Here's another major decision that I have recently made - I'm going to have RNY gastric bypass surgery this summer. This is a weight loss surgery that staples a small portion of my stomach off and bypasses some of my intestines to that even the small amount of food I'm able to eat doesn't all get absorbed. It's completely scary, mostly because I'm going to completely have to change the way I eat and be more serious about exercise. And if I cheat I get really sick. Here's where the whole process stands right now:

- My insurance does not have the necessary rider to cover the surgery, so I'm doing this self-pay. And by self-pay, I mean that my wonderful parents are paying for it. Deciding to accept this money from them was a HUGE obstacle in making this decision.

- I have gone to an orientation meeting, and met with my surgeon - Dr. Elliot of the Richmond Surgical Group. Another doctor in that group was actually recommended to me, but I ended up meeting with Dr. Elliot. He moved here recently from CA, but he performed WLS there as well and I have heard lots of good things. He's not particularly gregarious (big word!), but I think that he will be a good choice for me.

- On Tuesday, I'm going to another doctor to begin a nutrition program for the next 4 months leading up to the surgery. (I'm waiting until summer because you have to be out of work for up to 6 weeks, and as a teacher summer made more sense) They were recommended by Dr. Elliot's office and they said that they may be willing to take me on as my primary care doctor as well. That would be good, since they obviously work with WLS patients. However, in addition to being medical doctors they practice "holistic medicine" and I'm not sure how I feel about that so we'll see how it goes...

- On Wednesday, I'm having my psychological evaluation. *gulp* Who knows what they will say about me? ;)

I promise future posts will not be this long. I'm not even sure that my life will turn out to be interesting enough for a blog ;) OH WAIT.

I forgot to tell you the most important and exciting thing about me - I'm an aunt!!!! My sister, Kay (who rocks a lot) is Mom to this perfect, adorable, wonderful 13-month old girl named Abigail. Abby is absolutely my favorite person in the whole world. I love her SO MUCH! Unfortunately, my sister moved all the way to Charleston, SC which is really far away. I usually end up seeing her about once a month though b/c Kay is really good about coming here and letting us go there. AND Kay is having another baby in September! Abby is absolutely the focus of my whole family. You should see my parent's refrigerator - solid Abby pictures. She's been walking for a while now (I know, she's so gifted) and she just is on the move constantly. She's started saying "uh-oh!" when she drops things and imitating things that people do. She's amazing :) I'm including some current pictures because I can and I KNOW that everyone wants to see her!







And, for good measure I'll add one of my whole family as well, from this past Christmas



If you want to see videos of this cute baby, check out my youtube page: www.youtube.com/sarahruth23