Because of Bells Palsy

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Because of Bells Palsy

This past Sunday, as we celebrated a special occasion with our church family by eating cake, my life stopped before my eyes. I took a bite of that cake and I was horrified to feel that half my lip was paralyzed. I didn’t know how to finish that one bite I took. I was horrified. I noticed that the right side of my face was slowly starting to feel tingly and numb. I panicked.

We got the kids in the car and we dove over to urgent care. My tongue, half my lips, right ear and basically the entire right side of my face was numb. Was I having a stroke? My right eye was twitching, every noise bothered me, my right ear was screaming at me in pain. I was mortified. As I sat there in the Urgent care office, I just stared at my kids and said a prayer, begging God to allow me the privilege to live longer and raise my children. It was determined that the cause was Bells Palsy – developed because of an upper respiratory virus I had. The inflammation caused by the virus, in combination with all of the stressful moments I had had that week, caused pressure on the 7th cranial nerve of my brain – causing partial face paralysis.

I had no drooping on my face, my paralysis was not very physically noticeable. Thank God. I however, had many glitches and paralysis on the right part of my face -which caused me a bit of trouble, especially driving. In all of this, I learned to value life a little bit differently. While my condition was not life threatening, I still came to an epiphany: I need to write a love letter to my children, words they can cherish, read and re-read when they are older.

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Inspiration to write a Love Journal to my kids

Bells Palsy gave me the inspiration to begin writing a love journal to my kids. I wanted a way to express my love to them in written words.

If you were given the opportunity to choose a super power, what would it be? Although flying around like Super Girl sounds pretty amazing, I would choose the ability to travel in time. You mommas understand me right? I just want the ability to freeze time and enjoy my kids for as long as possible. We don’t want our little ones to grow up so fast, we want to have the ability to remember every single conversation, every sweet moment, & every cute word they say or miss pronounce…every kiss, every hug!

but time…is unstoppable! Its ever fleeing, it doesn’t seem to slow down for anyone…and if you are like me, you try to make a mental note of all the cute moments being experienced. You want to remember specific times & memories, years down the road? right?

spaceThis year, I had one of those moments I never wanted to forget.

As my youngest strolled right into his kindergarten class with backpack, lunch box & confidence on his back, I closed my eyes and made a mental note (and if I am being totally transparent here, I had to close my eyes to keep tears from coming out). I wanted to remember him THAT little forever. It came too fast.

SPACER

I had so much more to tell him, to teach him before he got himself into kindergarten. Who gave him permission to grow up so fast? He was only a baby for a second.

I blinked, I missed it!

Baby stage couldn’t be over so quickly!! But it was! Not only that, my first born, my princess, she was off to first grade…how could all this happen so quickly?

Something inside of me changed…

I sat down that morning and I wrote my kids another love letter.

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Their first love letter from me, is written in my journal. But I wanted to write love letters as often as I could to each child… and I did. That day I bought a couple of journals, one for each child and I began to write.

The journals will be in their hands one day, when they are adults. They will be able to read and re-read special moments in their lives. They will read and know and be reminded of my love for them. These journals will outlast me and so it will be a keepsake for them as well; a way for them to travel back in time with me. They will be able to share them with their kids and memories will have words, not just images.

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Wondering how to begin? Let’s break it down:

purchase a journal *-invest in a journal that will stand the test of time because ( hopefully) this will be around for a while (how cool)!! I looked in amazon.com and purchased these, one for each of my kiddos. (*I have included my affiliate link to amazon.com, where you can conveniently purchase the journals. I make a little money at no additional cost to you).
start writing. -this does not have to be complicated nor elaborate. Keep it short and sweet. If you are looking for ideas on what to write, I have created a Pinterest board with great list of topics about which you could write about.
gift it – give the journals when you are ready to pass them along.

journal Happy writing

This is also a great idea for grandparents to write for their grand-kids. I love including quotes and Bible verses too. Sometimes I even write little prayers for them. It has been a really neat experience and I hope its an amazing experience for you as well.

Happy writing!

Melissa

Do you keep a journal for your kids? If yes, I’d love to hear about it! What are some topics about which you write?

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