I'm on the edge...

of an emotional breakdown. and I really don't know why.  If I were to take a step back and evaluate what's happening, it would seem all is perfect: oldest daughter is taking a nap, youngest daughter is snuggled with me and knocked out, I actually have a "summer" to enjoy, I won't be required to shower every single day, I can pig out on the pantry whenever I wish, my husband is working hard and is home (for the most part) every night and now back to sleeping in the same bed on a regular basis (the complications of pregnancy and Lydia's first months in the bassinet in our room just wasn't appealing to him...), I don;t have any grocery shopping to do this week, I figured out how to pay the last two bills that I always write checks for online, I have the promise of depositing a pretty nice check from a wedding this weekend....and the list could go on. But for some reason, I feel like I could snap or bawl in any given moment for no reason. Do you ever feel that way?

I think I know why - it's either one thing or another. The first possibility
1. I can't bake and share right now.  If you haven't caught on by now, I've been baking like a fool and have been encouraged to start what may be my next career - cupcakes for a living. It sounds crazy - but it has been a blast learning new recipes and sharing them with my friends, and even making some $$ from them.  But M started off with a funky few spots on Friday night, and by Saturday and continuing on, we discovered that she has Hand Foot and Mouth disease. It sounds gross, and it is gross, and apparently she doesn't have the worst case of it. The bumps/rashes are EVERYWHERE, but not in her mouth (which typically characterizes a horrible bout of it).  But nonetheless, it still looks gross. Almost so gross that J and I don't want to touch her. So gross that we wash our hands EVERY time we touch her or something she's been touching. So gross that at the end of the morning or day, I pack up all of the toys she has been playing with and store them away for a DEEEEEEP detox cleaning that night with a powerful soak of "germ-be-gone." So gross, that I'm pretty sure that if someone offered me a cupcake from their house when they had been dealing with HFM, I wouldn't want to even have it near me. So, in an effort to save my friends from HFM and gaining a few more inches on their waist, no cupcakes.  By the weekend, however, we should be in total clearance (really, we're clear after today since she would have actually had the disease for a week now, but just to be safe, I'm calling off baking this week).
And, since this new found love of baking has been my defense mechanism and coping skill over the last month or so, I'm bummed.
But doubtful that no baking would actually cause me to turn into a sea of despair, I'm banking that this is the cause of my down and outs today:
2. People are hurting. Everywhere. And I can't do anything about it. Another friend of mine just experienced a miscarriage. One girl is experiencing the awful crap season of caring for her mother as she suffers from a GBM (what my mother died of).  There is a dear sweet family who trusted that the Lord would bring their adopted baby girl home to them by Easter..it's almost June, and still no daughter.  Too many unexpected deaths from old folks, young children, and fathers/husbands who's time was just too short. I could go on and on, just about the hurts, and pains, and sufferings that people all around me are experiencing today, not to mention those who I have never met.  There it is - pain and suffering - staring at each one of them. And they feel and are hopeless and weak in the face of their thorn.  and I'm just so sad for them.  I don't know what to say, I don't know how to reach out, and sometimes I don't even know how to pray for them.
Perhaps I'm feeling a little overload of sadness for all of them today...

God doesn't hurt us on purpose, right? God loves us, right? So then why do we suffer like this, and why did he pick us to suffer in that particular way? Because God loves us.
I've been reminded of the truth of those answers over the last month in my study in the word of 1 & 2 Peter especially when we're reminded of our suffering and how it brings glory to God and how we, as believers, are called to suffer. For, through the suffering, we gain a knowledge of our Father that we wouldn't have otherwise.  We grow stronger and deeper in our faith.  We learn to call on Him to heal us and our wounds.  We become His children.  Such a transformation to go from bummed and depressed and doubtful, to filled with grace, overflowing with love, and perfected in our weakness.  Blessed to know the Living God today and to trust in those promises and to know that my "living on the edge" isn't the way I live in the light of joy -