Ch-ch-changes

sometimes change happens when we have no other choice

Dear Reader,

Lately I find myself rubbing my left thumb, tracing lightly over the scar from my surgery last December. Under the scar there’s a firm raised area that feels more like a mountain than a molehill. When I try to bend my thumb it resists, like a guitar string that’s been strung too tight.

My left hand is my dominant hand and it’s been familiar to me my whole life. I’ve used it for practical reasons like holding a fork and brushing my teeth and I’ve used it for creative reasons like drawing, painting and writing. It’s held the things most precious to me like four babies and my husband's hand for the last twenty-six years. It may sound silly, but with the change in my thumb’s landscape (along with its new limitations), I find myself mourning over this part of me that will never be the same again.

I can’t go back to the hand I had before the damage was done. I didn’t choose the accident that caused the problem or the subsequent surgery. Whether I like it or not I’ll have to get to know this new version, accepting the permanent scar and the stiffness in my grip. I’ll have to compensate for a weaker thumb that hurts when I ask too much of it. It will take time to adjust to this altered part of myself.

When Change Chooses You

We tend to think of change as something we can control. We make lists of the ways we want to evolve and plan to methodically work toward those goals. It’s February now and the resolutions of January have started gathering dust. It may not be impossible for change to happen by setting our minds to it but mostly I’ve experienced change when there’s been no other choice.

For example, when I became a mom at twenty-two, a year and half after getting married, I was still part-child myself. There I was, wearing my husband’s jeans to accommodate my soft belly, learning every second how to give up my life for the tiny precious being in my care. My body was not the body I knew before and no one had prepared me for my job. I did the only thing I could do, which was slowly learn how to be the version of me that I appeared to be from the outside. A total upheaval to my life and identity came first, adaptation and growth came afterward.

When a tornado of health problems spun my life out of control about on the even of turning forty, I didn’t recognize the person in the mirror. The constant physical pain plus the anxiety that ran over me like a tidal wave stripped me of all the parts that made me…well, me. I was no longer the the friend who showed up to events, the wife that could be depended on, or the mother who homeschooled her kids and provided for their needs. The last seven years have been getting to know this new version because there was no way to go back to the person I was before. (I have to say, though, I quite like the person who’s come out on the other side.)

I could take you down other avenues of upheaval: having a baby with medical issues, learning how to homeschool four kids, caring for a dad with mental health issues, and losing my dad. Events that left me spinning without an anchor, forced to adapt or give up. Some of these inciting events I chose and some of them chose me but with all of them it felt like I was being hurled into a new version of myself. Not unlike the adaptation required with my post-surgery thumb.

A sketch from a few years ago, looking back on the early days of marriage and parenting.

Becoming More of Who I am

In a recent post my friend Shannon suggested that the maturing process is more of a stripping away than being replaced by a new model.

“I used to imagine myself like the Ship of Theseus — over time all of me would be replaced until I was an entirely different Shannon. Now I imagine it’s more like I began adulthood wearing a suit of armor I had crafted. When I was less mature, I needed more to protect me from the world. As I’ve grown in maturity and in relationship with Jesus, it feels safe to put down pieces of the armor bit by bit… Hopefully instead of becoming someone else, I am becoming more of who I am.”

I have the luxury of looking back at the catalysts I’ve mentioned from a safe distance. I’m able to see the compassion, the faith, the courage, and the healing that’s evolved from the very hard things. As a Christian, these are some of the qualities I’d hoped to gain by doing enough Bible Studies and saying enough prayers. In reality, God has allowed a more hands-on/kinesthetic approach to learning (though studying scripture and prayers have been part of it, too).

All through my adolescence and into my thirties I pressured myself to change into the person I thought I was supposed to be. It turns out I could have worried less about it. Simply navigating the landscape of this life has provided more than enough opportunities to grow, as painful as each of the growth spurts have been.

And, of course, there’s been nothing simple about it at all.

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What about you? How have you experienced growth and change in your life? Has it been through setting intentions to grow? Or through catching up with the newest version you see in the mirror? Or both?

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From the Sketchbook

With less time to sit down at my art table (i.e. kitchen table), I find myself carrying my sketchbook with me more often.

. This sketch is inspired by a photo someone posted on Substack.

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One Last Thing

The cat picture you didn’t know you needed today.

These friends had the best Pal-entine’s day party ever. Just look at them. (My daughters’ cats.)

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Blessings from the Guest Nest,

-Aimee

P.S.— Fun fact: this is my 98th newsletter! 🥳

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Thanks so much for reading, sharing, and contributing to the conversation. You can support my art and writing by donating to my art supply fund and by sharing this newsletter with friends who might enjoy it.

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