Last May Eric and I moved to Nashua, New Hampshire and found ourselves in an amazing ward that was very welcoming and we enjoyed getting to know people and attending ward activities (which happened a couple times a month)... While living there Eric was ordained as a Priest in the Aaronic Priesthood. It was such an amazing experience to see him go from being a new convert to getting the priesthood. Around the end of July we got a phone call from Eric's mom in Pennsylvania. She informed us that his grandma's health wasn't the best and also that she was bleeding internally and that things were looking good for her as well. After hearing the news we made the decision to once again pack up all our stuff and make another move.
Right from the start of being there we encountered trial after trial. Everyone at his grandma's house smoked and I had a very hard time being there around it. I struggled to breathe through out most of the house... A few days after arriving in Pittsburgh we attended a funeral of a family cousin. While there, one of his mom's cousins pulled me aside to talk to me about some things. He is a minister in some faith that I can't remember... anyway, he said something that really struck me. He told me that no matter what happened while Eric and I were staying with his Grandma that we needed to stick together as a team and not let anyone in the family divide us, because they would be trying. At first I brushed it off but the longer I lived there the more and more I thought of it.
Eric and I love to joke around that Jerry Springer has nothing on his family. They could do a whole dramatic series about them and make a ton of money. His oldest uncle was constantly beyond drunk and always causing drama of one kind or another... unfortunately though the biggest problem ended up being his mother... who by the way was only bleeding internally because she drinks too much and was in no real danger of dying, she just wanted to get Eric back down to Pennsylvania to live and decided to lie to get him there. She also can't accept the fact that Eric has another woman in his life and would constantly demand she be put first. There were many times she got in my face over nothing at all but to let me know this. There were many times during this period of time that I wanted to just let it all go and walk away... however I found ways to keep my head on my shoulders and move on from each and every dramatic day.
In January I was talking to my mom on the phone about how fed up I was with everything that was going on in my life and how I didn't know if I could take much more. She was always good to talk to and was a very good listener. I am thankful I have her in my life. I guess she had just had home teachers over that day and was given a lesson about writing in your journal. They talked about how sometimes it seems like you have nothing good to write about but later on your children are going to love reading about your life. She challenged me to record the stuff I was going through so that my children could later look back at my life and see how I dealt with the challenges I was faced with. While months have now gone by since I was challenged to do this... I am now doing it.
When it comes to the 7 months I spent in hell (aka with Eric's Pennsylvania family) some of the things I have learned or re-learned is how grateful I am to have the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life. Through this I have become the woman I am today. I am thankful that I grew up in a family that is super close and always there for each other and where abuse was never acceptable. Without my family behind me I don't know where I would be today. I am grateful that I know that I am a choice daughter of God and that he is always there for me. I also learned that I don't deserve to be treated the way I was and while running away from trials isn't a good thing, sometimes leaving and moving on from them is the only thing you can do....
While there was a lot of drama going on... Eric and I also took some time to go out and do a few things while we were there... here are a few pictures of things we did...
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| Exploring Downtown Pittsburgh |
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| At the Hookstown Fair... |
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| Fun in the Snow... |
