Update

Complete exhaustion would describe the way I feel lately. Emotional exhaustion as well as physical exhaustion, due to my pregnancy! I just entered my second trimester, yay! I am still sick and even more sick at night - who coined the phrase morning sickness anyway, for some ppl it's all day!? But that precious gift at the end is indeed worth it!  This little one has been such a source of joy and hope for me. 

My roommate from college, Andrea was here for a few days and that was awesome!  I hadn't seen her in two years, and it was still like no time had passed and we were closer than ever. I love that. She was such an encouragement.  My mom is still here, I won't let her leave! And she's doing an amazing job helping us. 

Lately I have received a lot of questions like, now that things have slowed down and you can really think about the permanents of this, how are you doing? And it's a legitimate question. 

It breaks my heart to know just how permanent this is, I will never see Preston on this earth again. And every time I feel emotionally paralyzed I have to go straight to the Lord. If you're hungry don't you go straight to the fridge? God fills me up and gives me strength. And each time I bring my burden to the Lord he encourages me, he comforts me and he holds me so close to him that it would be impossible to deny he exists. He has been so real and active in my life.  I also talk alot to those around me, what Tara likes to talk?!?! ha ha It's helped me heal so much. 

2 Corinthians 6:10 says, "...Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing" and that is a good summary of what I feel. But Tara, what can you rejoice in? How can you have joy in this awful moment? I have hope. I know that "God works everything out for the good of those who love him", I have joy knowing that Preston is free of this world and completely happy, and that lives are changing as a result of his death.  The love of my life is gone so this is by no means easy, I cry alot and I miss him so deeply, I carry a constant pain within me. God has just led me to embrace my tears, cry when I need to, knowing that he will sustain me, he'll shape me and mold my grief into something beautiful and useful for him. 

And the last totally random thought I've had lately was, what if Preston could see me (maybe he can) or talk to me, what would he say, what would he feel? And I felt so strongly that he would have full confidence that I would be ok, that all of us who trust in the Lord would be ok, better than ok.  Not because I am super human (ha ha) but because Preston has stood in the presence of our God! In all his splendor and beauty, and sovereign power.  He knows first hand the God who is taking care of us, the God who gives strength, peace and love, the one who sustains our life.  It gives me chills and total joy. 

"Therefore we do not lose heart. 

Though outwardly we are wasting away,

yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  

For our light and momentary troubles are 

achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. 

For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" 

2 Corinthians 4:16