Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / April 13, 2021 | Expresso - Shay Nelson

Transcript

April 13, 2021 | Expresso - Shay Nelson · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Jay Nelson.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: So growing up, I grew up in Dodge City.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we moved to Dodge City when I was six weeks old.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I was born in Columbus, Nebraska.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the oldest of two.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: My sister's 28, so she's two years younger than me.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's my mom and my dad, Jan and John.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: My dad is the second oldest of ten kids.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: And my mom's the youngest of six.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: So big families on both sides, more so on the dad's side.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: So growing up, we went to church every Sunday.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: My best friend, who two summer two, not COVID summer, the summer before.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've actually known her since I was three years old.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize I had known her that long.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was like kindergarten, because that's why I knew everybody else.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: But they actually lived across the street from the apartments my parents lived in.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: So her dad was the pastor at the Church of God in Dodge City.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: So always was in church, Sunday school, you name it, we were doing it.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: I also had some really good friends who were Catholics, so I kind of got both sides of it.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like I would go to CCD with them a couple times just because we were already hanging out, so I just tagged along.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so I kind of saw both sides of it.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: I went to church camp almost every single summer.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: I would go down to Oklahoma for about a week, go out in the middle of nowhere, Oklahoma, to church camp, and it was like the one thing I always looked forward to.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then my cousins started being counselors in Nebraska, so I went up there a couple summers too.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: The last time I went was middle school, and it was at Mid-America Christian University in Oklahoma, which ironically enough was the last time I went to church camp there.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: But my friend Amanda and her sister both graduated college from there, so it's kind of full circle, I guess.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: Amanda ended up moving to Cushing when I was in second grade.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it was kind of a kind of a blow because she was like my really good friend, but we'd still obviously go visit and everything like that.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: After her dad left, we didn't quite agree with the new pastor and how it was going, so we switched to the Nazarene church because my fifth-grade teacher actually went there.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we're like, oh hey, she goes to school there.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: We'll go to school, we'll not school.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: She goes to church there, we'll go to church there.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I always enjoyed going to church, learning about God, everything like that.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I had fully comprehended everything with it, but I kind of knew it was there.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um then in sixth grade, so November of my sixth grade year, um, we moved from Dodge City to Wamigo.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was really hard for me.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: I did not want to leave.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: I did orchestra.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: I play the viola sort of still, but I did orchestra.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: I did not want to leave because I was really mad because we had a big concert coming up, and I just remember being so mad at my parents that they were making me move when we had this big concert coming up, and that was the only thing I was concerned about.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um and for me, I don't make friends very easy.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm very shy, although people who know me I don't would never guess that.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I'm I very much keep to myself and I would rather stay at home than go out.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: So um making friends was a lot harder for me.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I ended up meeting some new friends once I moved to Omigo.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was easier for my sister, she was in fourth grade, and she's like the social butterfly of the two of us, so it was easy for her.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um we tried a few churches here and there, go with friends, but never like found a church.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um we'd go when we visit my grandma in Phillipsburg or my great aunt, we would go when we'd go up there.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: I had aunts and aunt and uncle who were involved in Teens for Christ, so they were always in church, always going, but like we just never had that like foundation once we moved.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um then when I was in eighth grade, so I had told most of my friends when we moved, um, but there was one of my really good friends that I never got the chance to tell we were moving, and I had gone back to Spearville.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: So Spearville is like a little tiny town outside of Dodge City, like you drive by, you blink, you'll miss it.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I remember her, Lindsay, or one of my other friends telling me that.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, have you talked to Alexis?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: And um, they told me that she had passed away from my brain tumor.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, I was very mad.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: I had a very, very hard time with that because one, I felt terrible.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't get to tell her I was moving, and even though she knew I moved, and the fact that she was the same age as me, and I'm like, why?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I just couldn't wrap my head around that at all.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that was kind of my first instance where I started questioning, and I was just like, why?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: I don't understand why.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then it got even more.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um then when I was in seventh or eighth grade, so about the same time, um, my grandma here thinks of my dad's mom.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: She passed away from Parkinson's, and I my only memories of her are her in a nursing home.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: So those were we'd always go visit, look at the birds, they had a birdcage, and they had a dog there, and those are all my memories of her.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I wasn't super, super close to her, but it's still it still kind of sucked either way.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then my cousin Chris, he had gotten hit by a car in Tennessee and he died of a blood clot not long after that.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: And he um he was always the one that when I was little, like he could get me to stop crying when I was a baby, because my mom lived with them for about six weeks until she moved to be with my dad in um Dodge.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: So he's the one who could always get me to stop crying and stuff, and um he had some mental disabilities, he functioned at like third, fourth grade, if even that.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but he was the best person, and so that kind of it was just like one right after another after another.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I was just like, why does this keep happening?
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so get to high school, 2005, and you do the lot of stuff.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: I definitely look back on.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I do not even know why I did that.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, I still talk to some of my friends and stuff from there, but like we would drink, we would, you know, do things that now I'm looking back on and I'm like, and I look at high school I teach, so I see like high schoolers, middle schools, and I'm like, why are you guys?
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, okay, I don't have room to talk.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: I did that too.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, it's going.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: But I kind of got away from God then.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: I just kind of like was all over the place.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: And then um, March of my junior year high school, I met my now husband through my current boyfriend at the time.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's a very complicated story.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: The guy I was dating at the time was really good friends with Devin, so I kind of met Devin through him.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um went, I remember we went and saw the movie Jumper, and um, my mom knew him because she worked at the same high school that he went to.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so then, of course, he comes to pick me up, and my mom's talking his ear off, and my mom will talk anybody's ear off and just talk.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um so um we started dating.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we graduated high school in 2009.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, he didn't ever he didn't ever really know what he wanted to do.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: I always knew I wanted to be a teacher, and I every interview I've ever had, I always joked.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: I used to force my sister to play school with me when we were little.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: So that's kind of how I knew I wanted to be a teacher because I she would do it even if she didn't want to, she was still gonna do it because I was older.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: So um, so I decided I was gonna go to the Highland Community College branch in Wamigo, do all my gin eds there because it was like I don't want to go sit at K-State in a lecture hall learning math with however many people, 200 people in there, and I'm already terrible at math, so I really don't want to do that.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: So, and I was like, it's cheaper too.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: So um, Dev and I both went to the Highland branch there, and then in 2011, um my grandma Darlene had passed away, and this hit the hardest because I was super super close to her, so it's my mom's mom.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: So it's super super super close to her.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: We'd go stay with her, she'd come with us, like she took a road trip with us.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: We had to go to New Mexico for a wedding, but so we took the motor home and went like all over the East Coast to make it to New Mexico, and she tolerated it.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I was like, Yes.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, she had had hip surgery, and so they moved her to Westmoreland, the nursing home there, because it was close to my mom.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the week before she was supposed to go home, she had a stroke, and so she was never the same really after that.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like she would say things, and I'm like, You would never say any of these before.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like, she was it was still funny.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I would always go up and I would when she was in she stayed in Westmoreland, so I'd always go up and hang out with her, and our thing was paint our nails.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: That was our thing.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: I would always go up and paint our nails, watch Little House on the Prairie, maybe do some crosswords.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: She used to always, when we were when I was little, she'd get mad at me because I would do her crossword puzzles, and that was her thing.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: So she'd always get mad at me.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but she was never really happy in Westmoreland.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: She wanted to go back to Phillipsburg, that's where her siblings were, her friends were, everybody was.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we moved her back to the nursing home at Phillipsburg and she had another stroke.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: And um she passed away on January 6, 2011.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I just remember that being like the hardest for me.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: And granted, I she was like in she's in her 80s, 70s or 80s, I believe.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: So like I think logically I kind of knew it was coming, but like the way it happened, I was just like, why?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why'd you have to do this?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like, she's my one of my best friends.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why'd you have to do this?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: So I kind of was really, really angry with God.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we I lived at home, so amongst all that I was still living at home.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: Devin had an apartment in Manhattan, and he was, and the good thing was he was there for me during that, which was kind of like our first, I don't know if you want to call that big test of a relationship.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that's what you want to call it, but he was there for me through that, and he's gone through a whole bunch too.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: So it kind of really helped.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I graduated from Highland in 2012, so I did three and a half years there, and so then I transferred to K-State.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I was going to get a bachelor's in education.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, that's just what I'm gonna do.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so then Dev and I decided, hey, he's already working in Manhattan, I'm going to go to school in Manhattan, let's just go buy a trailer together.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: So he sold his motorcycle and we use it as a down payment to buy a trailer.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: And like nothing, I were like, oh, it's fine, you know, it'll be good.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it it was um, he he's a drummer, and you might know him because he does he drums here at church every now and then, too.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: He's doing the service on the lawn.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: So he was in a bit of rock band, and so we had to go to Aggieville in Manhattan while I'm going to school and whatnot.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so we still just kind of did our thing, like concerts were our thing, hanging out, um, not making the wisest choices at times.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but he wasn't a big believer, and I could always kind of feel God there, but like I just kind of shrugged it off, or I just kept it to myself.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was just like, eh, it's whatever.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think I was still really, really angry with everything that had happened up to that point.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um then the day after my birthday in 2013, Devin proposed to me.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: So we'd been dating for about I believe four years at the time, and I kept I kept wondering, like, are you ever gonna ask me to marry you?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like, we're going on four years here.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Are you ever gonna ask me to marry you?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Finally did.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody knew, obviously, but me.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I was telling everybody, like, oh yeah, we already knew.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, I did not even see this coming, saw none of this.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we didn't have a really religious wedding, we got married at Cave State, so they have Dan Ford Chapel, which is like, I'm like, oh, we'll get married there.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: And then I looked at it, I'm like, this is a really tiny chapel.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think we could fit everybody in here.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: So we went across the hall to the all-face chapel that they had.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we didn't have a religious wedding.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: We're like, we're not that religious, it's fine.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: His bassist and his band was ordained, so he married us.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of a funny story.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: We're like, hey, the bassist of his band married us, you know.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and at the time we'd only ever go to church like holidays, or my mom would ask me to go to church, and we're like, yeah, sure, I'll go with you, whatever.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: And then I graduated from K State in 2015.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then we moved to Topeka because I got a I had interviewed in Dodge City.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh, we'll move back to Dodge.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: I have friends there.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: I got like five job offers, and I was like, I don't know if I want to move that far away from my family.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, that is like five hours away.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I don't think I want to move that far away from my parents.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I accepted a job teaching at 501.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I taught at Ross my first year, I taught second grade.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um in 2016, we had two big things happen that year.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, 2016, I think it was January that year, Devin's mom passed away.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: But with that, his mom was never in the picture growing up.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: She left when he was 10.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: So he never had like she never talked to them nothing.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: So it was hard for him, but like he didn't quite know how to feel because he was like, Do am I should I be really sad or not?
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: I really don't know.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then on on my birthday, um my great aunt passed away.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: My great aunt Florence passed away, and so she was my grandma's sister, and I was super close to her too.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: And she was like the most godly woman ever.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: She always went to church.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think when we were cleaning her apartments, she was like giving money to we're like, what are you like, okay, go for it, grandma?
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Or not grandma, and she was she was my great aunt.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: I always just called her my Aunt Florence um or Aunt Flo.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that was another really, really big blow.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Cause I was like, she was in her 90s when she passed, but I was like, she's healthy, she's just like really faithful to you.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: Why did you have to do this?
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then I was also kind of mad that it had to happen on my birthday, too.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just like like, okay.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: So um then I found out I got non-renewed after my first year of teaching.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: So non-renewal is basically they don't want basically they don't want you to come back, but they I had to resign so that it didn't go on my records to say that I I didn't want to stay because I was like the worst year I've ever had teaching for a first year, so I didn't have much to compare to, but I knew it was pretty bad.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: And um so I got non-renewed, and I just remember they had a walkway between the bill, like between one door and another.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: I remember sitting on the stairs and I was like, How am I gonna tell Devin that I don't have a job?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I don't even like I don't even know how to process this, let alone how do I tell him that I don't have a job?
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um this is a really big blow, and then one of my co-workers co-workers had interviewed at Jackson Heights, and so she's like, call and you know, send an application, and I got a job teaching up at Jackson Heights in 2017, no, 2016, February 2017, I found out I was pregnant with our son with our son Carson, and then I found out I was non-renewed again, and it was of no fault of mine, it was just small town, small school stuff.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I was like, how am I gonna tell Devin that not only am I pregnant, but I don't have a job again?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, it was just like you feel like the biggest failure because you're like, I can't even do my job, right?
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I've lost two now.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um I interviewed and interviewed and interviewed at a job in Holton.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: They knew I was pregnant, didn't get the job.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: So we just decided I would just stay home my first year.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: I started my master's in library media specialist because I'm the biggest bookworm ever.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so I have like three books, two, one and a half at home, and I have like three full in my classroom.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I have bucus of books.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was like, I'll get my master's in library media specialists because if I could work in a library, it'd be amazing.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I started that, finished that right, or I didn't finish that, finished my first semester right before I had Carson in October of 2017.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it was really hard for me to stay home because I've been work, work, work, work, work, always had like, always had a job to do, something to do.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm at home and Devin gets to go to work and he gets to see people.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't, I get to see a baby, and I'm like totally, you totally lose yourself, and I'm just like, I don't even know how to do this.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Gone to mom's group, but it still didn't like help.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: So my anxiety, probably a little bit of depression, kind of all wrapped into one.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um so then in 2018, I got my job, I got the job at Valley Falls, and that year I taught sixth grade.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I had taught sixth grade at Jackson Heights, so it's like works out perfect.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I really like the people I worked with, you know, how they interviewed and whatnot.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so they offered me the job, and I was like, yes, I'm taking it.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because I was supposed to have an interview at Santa Fe Trail like the week before, and I was like, Yeah, I accepted another job.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm going.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I'm gonna take the first job I can get.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then around that same time, Devin had kind of started about finding a church, you know, what we kind of believed because we'd kind of gone back and forth, but not really.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then one of his co-workers told him about the light show.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we're like, okay, well, we don't have anything else to do right now, so yeah, let's go to light shows, take Carson.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: He loved it.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: I saw pictures of him just sitting there, like, this is awesome.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and then Doug caught us at the end, and I remember walking out after that, and I was like, he seemed like I was like, it was so refreshing to talk to somebody who actually genuinely cared that they were talking to you.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't just like, oh hi, yeah, let me hear your story, but not really like paying attention.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it'd been a while since I'd had that, like he actually cared, and then we were like, Okay, we'll come to Christmas Eve service.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: And he still remembered everything we talked about, and I was like, you don't find this very oft often, like this is kind of refreshing.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so then we've that was 2018, so we've been here ever since.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so then 2019 we were baptized.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: We're both like, yes, we're gonna do this, be baptized, and then um that same year, my dad got diagnosed with prostate cancer.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: And my dad is there's a giant age gap between my parents, and so growing up, everybody always thought like my dad was my grandpa.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, he's my dad.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um he just turned 79 this year.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: So in 2019 he got diagnosed with prostate cancer, but he's also a Vietnam vet, so a lot of his health issues go back to Agent Orange and to service.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: He can't hear to save his life, even with hearing aids in.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm like, it's fine, I'll talk loud to you, Dad.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: You're good.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it is nice to go over there now, and he has a thing where he can hear the TV and his hearing aids, so then the TV's not cranked up to like a hundred, and you have to yell across the room at somebody else.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's very nice.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: Although then he can't hear you even more.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: So um, but I remember trying to stay like very calm because my mom is mom's like, oh, it'll be fine, you know.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: She's staying calm, which is strange because she's has a very short fuse.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I was trying to stay calm, but like I always had that in the back of my mind, I was like, I don't want to lose my dad.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like, he's my dad, like I'm very close to my dad.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: I look just like my dad.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I'm very close to him.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Did radiation, his levels went down.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, it's one of those who always have it, but it's like deradiation if it brings it down, awesome, but you can't do it again.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, okay, there's always that in the back of my mind, and all his other health problems.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then after I mean, we did small group, I did Bible studies here at church, always praying about that.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just like, like, what is going on?
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Thankfully, it has all pretty much gone good, and then COVID hit.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember we were in it was in March, we were on spring break and we went to Colorado.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: We always go to Colorado for our university because that's where we went for our honeymoon.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: Went on a snowmobile tour.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm never driving a snowmobile again.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I told Connie this last night.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: I almost probably could have killed us on a snowmobile.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I am never driving one again.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Learned my lesson.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember we were on our way to Red Cliff, so we stayed in Redcliffe, and little tiny, tiny town south of Vale.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think we made the population 252 people that night, is what they told us at the restaurant.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, sweet.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it was refreshing.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: No cell phone service, nothing.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was like really, really refreshing to not have any of that.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: And on our way down there, we stopped to eat, and I was one of their like, COVID just came over the Vale Pass, and we're like, okay, cool.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like, we're still going snowmobile, I'm still going to Esther's Park.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's fine.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: And then we're in Estes Park, and I get a text from our daycare, like, hey, if you can get hand sanitizer, you should get some.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, what is going on?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like, we're in our own little bubble here in Colorado.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: What is going on?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then everything went crazy.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um get back.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, school shut down for two weeks.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, awesome.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Two days later, school's closed down for the rest of the year.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, how's this gonna work?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then my daycare closed because they were kind of in at the time in the age range, so I'm like, okay, I have to teach online and have a two-year-old and two dogs at home.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: And Devin still gets Devin's not gonna be home to help me.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: This is gonna be awesome.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: So, like, had to coordinate office hours with nap time, and I'm just like, this is not good.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: And right when we had gotten back, I got diagnosed with really severe anxiety because I knew I had it.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: But then driving in the mountains in Colorado just made it about a hundred times worse.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't driving, so it really made it worse.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so COVID kind of made that kind of amplified because I'm stuck at home again.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Full circle again.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: Here I am, stuck at home.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Devin's like, Well, I can't go anywhere.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, you still get to go deliver pop because he works for Coca-Cola.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, you still get to go deliver pop and see people, even if you don't want to see them.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I get to stay at home with a two-year-old and two dogs, and I can't really go anywhere.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it just kind of made it worse.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then COVID was still here, and we found out we're going back in person.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, sweet, but you have to wear masks and six feet apart.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, okay, it's not gonna be an easier.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's fine.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we had started trying for another kid that previous year, and then found out I was pregnant end of October, into September, and then on Devin's birthday, worse something about birthdays in us, I found out I had had a chemical pregnancy, so basically the egg never implanted in me, so I was showing all the signs, but I wasn't pregnant.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I did it, was gonna, I was like, Oh, I'll go to work that morning, go to the doctor, and I knew something was wrong, but they just kind of I felt like they kept blowing it off, like, oh, it's normal somewhere.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, this is not normal.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: I never had this with Carson.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, this is not normal, and so I got to work and I walked into one of my coworkers' rooms and I just started bawling.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And another one's like, I'm gonna go tell the principal, you're going home.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, and she's like, You're going home.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, I'm going home.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going home, guys.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: Like, because I can't can't stop crying here.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so I really started questioning again, like, why, like, why me?
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why does all this keep happening to us?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: To like why?
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I really, really had a hard time with that and still would have a hard time.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'd see all the friends on Facebook having kids and this and that, and I'm just like, I'm so happy for them, but at the same time, I'm like, why can't I not have one?
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I went to if conference a couple, was it like a month ago, a couple weeks ago?
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, my days, my weeks are they kind of blur together after a while.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and um I'd wanted to go two years ago, sometime after we started here, but I think Devin had a race or something.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: He runs crazy races, so it was like, okay, won't go, we had something going on.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I remember we they had Mike Toddhood um spoke, and what he talked about was like God being our anchor, and it like really kind of resonated with me, and I like could not get that thought or Hebrews 6.19 out of my head, like the whole night.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I cannot get this out of my head.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the night, um, they're like, Okay, here's time to pray.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: You can leave when you want to, it's not gonna be anything formal.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: And Connie was actually sitting at the same table as me, and I was like, I just started bawling, and I have always prayed, but I've never prayed out loud or said anything out loud.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: And if I did, it was just like superficial stuff.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, I just was like, I told God, I was like, I need you, like I can't, I just can't keep doing this.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I need you, and I was like hysterically bawling, and that's fine.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not much of a crier, it's fine.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think I said that I don't know how many times uh dinner or less times, it's fine, I'm fine.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um but like I said it out loud and kind of surrendered everything, which is very hard for me because there's certain things in my life I love to have control over relinquishing.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: Control is not easy for me to do to anybody, and so I did that, and I've kind of been ever since then, it's been very calm.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: I've been very calm, and I've not like my anxiety still comes out when you when you teach fifth graders, it definitely kind of comes out.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I've definitely been a lot calmer and just kind of had that acceptance with everything, like, okay, I got this, we got this, I'm good.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then I always look at like go to Sunday school.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: Carson goes to Sunday school and he's finally in the two-year-old room.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: He's so excited.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: He loves to go to church.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: He'll ask, Are we going to church?
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like on a Monday or on like a Tuesday.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, church is closed today, Carson.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: But always hearing him say his little Bible verses and he remembers them, like, just like melts me every single time.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: So it just makes it all worth it.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then looking back, I can kind of see where God was just like, I stayed home for that first year with Carson, and it was just supposed to be, and it was the best year, and might have been one of not the worst year, but a hard year for me at the same time, and just he was there through all of it, and looking back on it, I was like, okay.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I used to always get mad and really struggle with like, and Devin, I love him to death, but he loves to give me advice when I don't want it.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: And when I don't want it, and I was like, he's like, God has his timing, and I was like, I do not want to hear this right now.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: Like, this is not what I want to hear.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I was just like, just stop.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like people would say that to me, and I'm like, I know, just stop.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then now it doesn't even bother me.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'm just like, okay, it's fine, you are right.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: It will happen when it's supposed to happen.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: And it was something I was had a really hard time processing, but ever since doing that at if conference is just all kind of come full circle, and here we are.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's about it.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: Hold on, I'm gonna make you so.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: Did you have Hebrews 619 pulled up?
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: Were you gonna share that?
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: You don't know?
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: I can.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: You can.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_00: So it said, oh, this is that's not 6.19.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Hold on, I gotta find my page.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm close.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: That was at 6-1.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: I said, This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: It leads us through the curtain into God's inner sanctuary.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the verse that just sticks with me.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: That and then Hebrews 12:1, like run this race with endurance.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: We saw that one when Devin does all these obstacle course races and runs a hundred miles.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you heard me correctly, a hundred miles.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we were at World's Toughest, and it was at this really gorgeous equestrian farm in Atlanta, and one of the runners had those had that verse posted everywhere.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's kind of been it's kind of been another one of our verses, which is fitting for him because he loves to run.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I was like, this is your verse.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: You don't get any say about it.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: This is your verse.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: So you guys need to know that that the fact that Shay is up here is kind of a minor miracle in and of itself.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how many times I rescheduled you.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: A lot, a lot.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: She's like, I'm so sorry.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, it's fine.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: A lot.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm good.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, she every she says it's fine, it's fine, it's fine.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: She's the most flexible speaker we ever didn't have.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: It kind of comes with the job, yeah.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: So I just, I mean, I I was as soon as she started talking, I just felt a little emotional because you know, it's just it's been different things, kind of like her story, you know, it's it's different things every time, but just seems sometimes like it's it's all the time, it's something, it's always something.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: And and I would just cringe when I'd have to text her, you know, here's what's going on this time, or you know, it was weather one time, or it was COVID one time, or it was me double booking people one time.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was just and anyway, she was just always so gracious.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: And so when it finally, like, I almost doubted like, is it actually happening now?
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like, for real, we're marching right up into this.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: So I am so grateful that you shared what you did.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate you coming tonight and sharing with us.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: It was really great.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much.