Walking with faith...

So last November I lost my job as a result of funding cuts in research. I didn't anticipate that six months later I would STILL be looking for work. It has honestly been a real emotional drain! I had no idea the way that what we do with each day could have such an impact on our emotional state of mind!

I have spent a lot of time studying for the LSAT but again I have had to put it off. I will be taking the LSAT in October.  I really hadn't anticipated putting it off but I simply didn't feel ready for the logic game section! I just can't screw this up!

I suppose I could try to stay in research for the rest of my life however, I have a dream! I want to help families heal from the trauma and torture that supposedly "well meaning" CPS workers inflict on unsuspecting families and their children!

I am looking for work to get me through because even if I do good on the LSAT in October I will not be able to start law school until the fall of 2013! It seems like a long way off, but I know it will move by in a flash!

I was invited to participate in a film made by a group that is against corruption in government. I am excited because this film will be shown to congress. Honestly those in government don't have a clue how deterimental DCFS/CPS has become and they NEED to know! I hope and pray that my story will open the eyes of some very influential people and some changes will come!

I certainly plan to do all I can to expose the trauma that I endured and show that CPS has NO evidence for the accusations they leveled against me! My name was cleared when this was brought to light in an administrative hearing, but unfortunatley we have corrupt juvenile court judges who simply don't care about the welfare of the people they are making judgments against!

If you are interested in learning about the video that I will be in follow this link:
http://www.lawlessamerica.com/
If you are interested in learning about how to protect yourself from CPS or similar government agencies follow this link:
http://www.americanfamilyrightsassociation.com/
If you want to become active in fighting for your rights as a parent follow this link:
http://www.parentalrights.org/

If you have had an experience with CPS or DCFS or other similarly named government body and want to share send an email to Bmailto:Bill@LawlessAmerica.com he will can get you in the movie to tell your story to congress! This is an awesome oportunity folks!


If you want to hear more about my story let me know! Click "join this site" and follow me! Let me know what you think by leaving comments and clicking the button at the top indicating "boring, interesting, or thumbs up!"  Thanks for spending a few minutes with me!!

Journey...helping unite families and overcome DCFS!

I'm starting a new journey and the point of this blog is just to document and keep track of where this journey will take me. I have lots of great ideas running through my head about where I want to end up...there is a quote from Alice in Wonderland that my doctor mentioned to me the other day. He couldn't remember the exact quote but I knew exactly what he was talking about.
Alice: Oh, no, no. I was just wondering if you could help me find my way.
Cheshire Cat: Well that depends on where you want to get to.
Alice: Oh, it really doesn't matter, as long as...
Cheshire Cat: Then it really doesn't matter which way you go.

Life is much like Alice lost in Wonderland. We often find our selves feeling lost and waiting...well in life if we just sit around and wait for something to happen to us then something will eventually happen, but what that something is may NOT be the something we wanted!

The past few weeks I have sat rather locked up tight inside myself contemplating the meaning of my life. Why am I hear? I mean I  know the answers that the church provides..we are here to learn, to be tried and tested, to grow in strength and experience, but what does that all mean?

I have to admit I hit rock bottom and didn't even want to get out of bed. I spent an entire week laying around the house and doing NOTHING! I was SICK to death of getting up going to work...at a job where I am not even missed if I don't go in for a week!! and going home to unhappy kids and family just to get up and do it all over again the next day!  I didn't care if I never got out of bed again!!

Well honestly there were several issues all converging on each other at that moment in my life, which are not important to mention here but they all contributed to this feeling of worthlessness, being lost, unimportant, INVISIBLE...I guess I felt that I could pretty much just disappear and no one would really notice...heck, I had done it for a week at work and no one noticed!!

However, I knew that this could not continue. I had to do something and so I started to get out of bed again and I went to my Biology class again...I still have not been back to my Chemistry class. I have to seriously wonder if something that makes me feel so bad could possibly be something that was meant to be a part of my life??

Anyway, while I was on my way to work this morning I was thinking about this conundrum I have found myself in. If all I want to do is help others and make a difference in their lives but I feel unimportant to the people around me and I'm NOT making a difference, at least one that I am aware of, then maybe my focus is all wrong!  Maybe if I am so invisible to the world around me then "I" should focus on me. I don't mean in a selfish way...I mean I should focus on what "I" really want. I really want a family that is healthy and happy. I really want friends that will come and visit me and invite me to visit them. I really want to feel like I have created something beautiful that I can leave behind when I leave this world. A legacy of sorts.

So I started to think again about things that I have thought about in the past ever since DCFS came into my life. That's been 9 years ago now. And I realized I have talked myself out of the things I want the most. I have self sabotaged and halted my progression by feeling like I am not important enough, I am noticeable, I am not big enough in the eyes of the world to achieve my great dreams...

I have to start again from where I left off and move one step at a time toward building this dream of mine. I know it is going to take a long time to get there but maybe not too long!  I have to start with a road map, because unlike Alice I DO know where I want to get to and there is a path out there for me to take. I simply have to take the first step and let things begin to fall into place!

So you are probably wondering what I have been thinking of for the past 9 years. Well off and on I have been thinking how absolutely FANTASTIC it would be to create my own healing center!! I will discuss the ideas I have about my healing center in a future post! but for now wish me luck!! I'm off to start my new journey!!

By the way...if you come across my blog and like what you see click the "follow" button and keep up on what I'm doing! If you know someone who is struggling with DCFS send them my way!  Thanks!!

One flew over the cuckoos nest AND I just may follow...

I know I have been gone for what seems like forever, but writing truly is therapeutic so I am back...

Many of my friends are aware of the trying situation I have been having with Dakota. I was totally amazed at how word spreads faster than fire around the neighborhood when a juicy piece of gossip slips from an innocent siblings mouth.  I had no sooner got home from the hospital than I had people calling to find out if everything was okay and if they could help somehow.

Now don't get me wrong if no one had called I would have felt seriously abandoned and unloved... so thank you all for your love and support!  But I can just imagine the telephone wires around my neighborhood buzzing with the news of Dakota's most recent incident, which is likely going to cost me thousands... say good bye to your education fund my dear. All those docs in the PICU will be sending their kids to college with it.

Now, I know people are just a bit curious and have good intentions, but I am seriously wondering when another family in the neighborhood will be taking our place on the stage. Dakota has decided that he has had enough of "drama" as he calls it, and I didn't have the heart to tell him that he was born into a family that knows nothing but drama, and if he has had enough he may have to disown us all and move to Siberia!

I read another blog tonight where someone wondered why a child "watching her in action" would choose to come to her family and have her as a mother and I have OFTEN asked my self the same question after some contemplation about my children. I think I have an answer. Its something like this...we were all in heaven and God took us aside one by one and showed us potential life situations and we watched with our innocent unknowing eyes and thought oh that won't be so bad. I can do that! Give me the toughest challenge so I can make you proud! And then we came to Earth and got our wake up call!  Not that it is our parents fault at all, but rather that the mere fact of living in this world brings heart ache and uncertainty into our lives for the sake of learning and growth not just for our children but for us as parents. At this point I feel like I have learned QUITE enough and am ready for my vacation package I was promised at the end... I'm imagining nice warm beaches in some tropical paradise with a cool breeze and all the food I can eat, never ending strawberry daiquiri's (virgin of course), NEVER getting fat and absolutely no cares in the world ... "sigh".

So to that dear sweet friend who is contemplating bringing another child into this world I just want you to know that as a mother of six heartbroken and traumatized children, "I FEEL YOUR PAIN!" My favorite quote is from Mother Theresa who said, "I know God only gives us what we can handle. I just wish he didn't trust me so much!"

We had a piece of Heaven...

In 2004 I was in the middle of earning a double bachelors at the University of Utah. I had been a single mom of four and had just remarried. My life was full of new beginnings and moving forward from some of the most difficult times I have ever endured.

I had been waiting for years to go back to school and be able to become self reliant. I wanted to get to a point where I never needed to lean on someone else financially again. This goal was my ultimate dream. It was my way to ensure that my children and I would never have to go with out because of someones bad financial decisions.

In the summer of 2004 not many months after my marriage I found out that I was pregnant. I was a mass of mixed emotions. Joy and delight with the idea of having a new person enter my family. Fear and reticence because I knew I was not in a position to support one more person and I was in the middle of trying to get my bachelors so I could improve my families financial position.

Looking back I recall sitting in the doctors office, receiving verification that I was expecting. I was overwhelmed with emotion and tears streamed down my face. It was the first time in all my pregnancies that I had a sense of hesitation and a desire not to be pregnant. How was I going to make it through school with another child on the way? How was I going to take care of her when I couldn't even take care of the ones I already had.

I had no idea that God was about to change my life forever. I had no idea that God had decided to send a piece of heaven in to my life even if it was only for a brief time...

Kendra was born on March 3rd 2005. I recall looking her over as she lay in my arms for the first  time. She was so tiny, just 5 lbs 14 oz. I was amazed at the fact that somehow nature had seen fit to give this tiny little angel a double chin to match her grandmothers!

As I held her I looked at the shape of her face, her mouth, her nose, her arms and legs, her feet and her hands...As I ran my eyes across her hands laughter escaped me as I noticed how very square they were. They literally looked like little squares with one uneven edge where her finger tips were.  I had no idea at the time how much I would come to absolutely love and adore those precious little hands.

I have two casts of her hands and I still look at them everyday and think how perfect her little hands were and how much I wish I could hold them again. One of Kendra's favorite things to do was to paint her fingernails. She liked pink but I loved red on her. She had the most perfectly shaped fingers and finger nails. When I painted her finger nails a particular shade of red they reminded me of cherries.  We laid her to rest with a light shade of pink on her nails and a brand new tube of pink lip gloss in her hand. She was the ultimate girl and loved having glossy lips and painted finger tips. Lip gloss, fingernail polish and Barbie cartoons were her tools for passing the time while she spent two months of her life in a tiny room up at Primary Children's Hospital.

She couldn't leave her room; which was pressurized to keep the air from the hall way out of her room. The air in her room was filtered for her protection. Flowers were not allowed on the unit where Kendra stayed because they were invariably crawling with germs that could prove fatal to a child with no immune system.

As I contemplate my life I can't even imagine what my life would be like now if she had not come in to it. I didn't want to be pregnant when I found out I was having Kendra. I was filled with dread for how another child could prevent my progress. Now I realize how she helped speed up my growth and progress and I would give up EVERYTHING I own to have her back!