I never thought I'd share this now

As I stood in my parents kitchen last New Year's Eve surrounded by family having a great time, I thought to myself that 2013 was going to be a good year. I don't know why I felt that way, but I did, and I was certain that God would have His beautiful way with our lives.

I couldn't have been more wrong...well sort of.

2013 started out like normal. Two weeks into the month of January, I found out I was pregnant. We were thrilled since we had planned this baby. We rejoiced and couldn't believe it happened so quickly. We kept it a secret for a week to let it really sink in, then we shared the news with family. Everyone was happy for us and we were so giddy.

Right after we shared our wonderful news with family, the problems started. I was plagued with what felt like every pregnancy symptom out there. I was so confused as to why I was having such a tough beginning because my first pregnancy was a walk in the park. Plus, before I got pregnant, I prayed and asked God to spare me the awful symptoms and expected that He would.

Well, for whatever reason God decided that my pregnancy was going to be anything but easy. After the initial aches and pains of the first trimester, I developed twenty cysts on my ovaries and experienced excruciating pain. It was so bad, I prayed to die.

At that time, it was only February and already the year that I thought was going to go so well was turning out to be pretty bad.

I did get prayed for and the cysts eventually shrunk, but around the same time, a building in our development went up in flames. This scared me to death and I soon became fearful our building was next. I secretly went over scenarios as to how I would get my family out of our condo in the case of a fire. It consumed me and every night I had trouble sleeping.

I thought after my cysts shrunk that things would get better, but with the fire and all that I experienced with my pregnancy so far, I was traumatized. I developed serious anxiety and started seeing a therapist. I wasn't allowed to take any medication because I was pregnant and 'talking' about it all didn't help. There were days I wanted to jump out of my skin because I couldn't handle the stresses of the day. I really felt like I was losing control and I didn't feel like myself at all. My husband shared later on that it was hard to interact with me because I was such a mess. I really wasn't myself.

Finally, in September, Aaron was born and it seemed as if things were getting better. I didn't experience any baby blues or postpartum like I thought I would considering all that I went through. I was completely in love with my new baby. Finally, this year is going to turn out they way I initially thought!

I was wrong.

Shortly after Aaron was born, we found that our condo was closing in on our family of four. We needed a bigger space. We started talking with realtors and mortgage people about selling our place and finding a house. We came to find out that we were so far under water with our mortgage and that condos in our development were going for half of what we paid for it. We bought when the market was still high and we were pretty much stuck. There was no way we were selling our condo.

We explored different options and found that renting our place was the best option and when our neighbors told us they'd rent it from us starting Jan. 1, we were thrilled. We started looking for houses and quickly fell in love with one. It seemed perfect for us. As you can imagine, as we pursued this house, it fell through and we couldn't get a mortgage for it. It just cost too much. We were devastated, but we explored more of our options.

We started looking at cheaper houses and found another house we really liked. Again it seemed perfect for us. As you can imagine, again, it didn't work out. We were sad, but we felt we still had options, so we kept looking.

Again we looked at another house. It seemed perfect for our little family. Everything seemed to be able to work out with this house and we moved forward with a mortgage. Eventually, after our request for a mortgage went to the underwriters, we found that because we had negative equity in our condo, we couldn't qualify. We were devastated. Basically, we were stuck in this condo until we paid it down.

I cried for hours and couldn't even talk about it. Just after it seemed like things were going to get better, our lives were flipped upside down again. The second half of the year was worse than the first.

We decided that even though we couldn't get a house that we would still rent out our condo so we could eventually claim it as income when we went to qualify for a new mortgage in the future.

Eventually, we moved on from the idea of owning a house and just tried to get through the rest of the year in one piece.

Then, there was news at John's job that layoffs were happening, and people would be switched around and shuffled. At first, we weren't concerned about John's job, but as things progressed, we became worried. Two new positions opened up at work and both would have been promotions for John. He interviewed for both and was passed up for a new guy who hadn't even been around for a year. John's boss got shuffled and now John would be working for the new guy, who had plans to change everything in his department.

Luckily, John currently has a job, but the devastation that came with being passed up for a promotion that went to a guy who hadn't been around as long as John, was just terrible. I cried.

This year hasn't been a good one. I've found myself crying more than I think I ever have. I've found myself anxious, fearful, worried, depressed, and simply not myself.

As we continue this year and I look at what's ahead, I've become more depressed. At 31 with two kids and a husband, we are moving into my parents basement until we figure life out. And although many of our friends have done this and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it, it hurts when I look back at my life and think that at 31, I didn't see myself in this situation. The market shouldn't have crashed. We should have a home, a dog, and a white picket fence by now.

I've waited a whole year for this 'testimony' to have a happy ending so I could share it with everyone. But one day, when I was praying for John's job prospect, God revealed that the best testimonies aren't always those with a happy ending. In fact, it's the ones where life got tough and people stood the test of time and remained strong in their faith that were great testimonies. And although I wish this testimony had a happy ending, you can clearly see, by earthly standards it doesn't. But God did have His beautiful way with our lives this year. And although there were so many times I wanted to quit, throw in the towel, give up on God, got mad at God, screamed at God, wondered what in the world God was doing, I can say, despite all of the mess and heartbreak we've experienced, we still love God, we still serve Him, we still know He is faithful, and we still trust and believe in Him.

So although this year didn't turn out according to plan, I can confidently say that I am grateful for these trials because it has brought John and I closer. It has grown us both spiritually and has allowed me to see God in a new way. And I find that those thing are more important than any house or an easy pregnancy.

If you are reading this, you can pray for us. Pray for guidance, acceptance, and peace.