I love these pictures. Meredith has been blessed with such a talent to capture the beauty that women don’t even know they have. Looking at these photographs, I can’t help but notice how joyful I look, how carefree; I wasn’t always like that. I wasn’t like that six years ago.
Six years ago, I was six months pregnant. I had just found my way back to my mother’s house after being gone for nearly a year. I was a teenager. I was scared. I was angry and hurt and lost. But let’s rewind for a moment, back to the beginning.
Six years ago, I was six months pregnant. I had just found my way back to my mother’s house after being gone for nearly a year. I was a teenager. I was scared. I was angry and hurt and lost. But let’s rewind for a moment, back to the beginning.
Sophomore year, I had a group of friends, I was flourishing academically ,enjoyed being in FFA ,Colorguard, writing for the school newspaper, and even rocked a part time job at a retirement community restaurant. I excelled at just about everything I put my hand to – except sports, but who cares about sports anyway? I was brilliant, my test scores were off the charts y I was writing at a college level by 15, but still invisible. I had experimented with different looks, preppy, sporty, nerdy, and yes even goth ( don’t judge me, I was finding myself), but I was forever going to be flower child- it just felt comfortable and I could have picked a worse look right!?
So here I was, a 16 year old hippie girl who wrote beautiful opinion pieces ( and became editor of the section), showed dairy cows and sheep at the State Fair, and co- captain of an award winning colorguard for the Blue Devil Band- then he came along. For the sake of the not so innocent we’ll call him Jake, short for Jake the Snake because make no mistake, that exactly what he was, but he was a beautiful creature, he had to make up for his internal ugliness somehow I guess. I have now learned that the things that will kill you come the most brilliantly wrapped. I should have known from the beginning, I should have turned and run, but I he showed such a genuine interest in me and seemed to see things about me that nobody else did. Like my “forest eyes” as he used to call them, he would smile and say that my eyes were so and green that a person could get lost for days in them. Satan always uses flattery and vanity to destroy us. There could be a whole other story here- and there is, I’ll tell it to you one day if you bring me coffee and have an hour or so, but to give you the general gist of it. By the end of March of my junior year, I had been screamed at, routinely grabbed and hit, and even thrown from a vehicle,( moving slowly thank the Lord). This first boy set the stage for a few more to treat me the same way- and they did because I let them. I don’t know why, but I did.
I quit school senior year and ran away to Nashville, Tennessee with a boy I had no business being with. I broke my mother’s heart, but I didn’t care. I didn’t like her, I didn’t really like myself either. I didn’t like what I had become, a victim. While in Tennessee, I found myself pregnant, so I tried to fix my mistake myself and I married the boy and finished school. That of course didn’t last and I ended up back home with my mom.
In February 2009, I gave birth to a perfect baby boy. 7 lbs, 2 oz, 19 inches long, born at 1402. I remember laying in the hospital, waiting to be discharged, crying my eyes out. I didn’t want to leave, I was so scared.
So here I was, a 16 year old hippie girl who wrote beautiful opinion pieces ( and became editor of the section), showed dairy cows and sheep at the State Fair, and co- captain of an award winning colorguard for the Blue Devil Band- then he came along. For the sake of the not so innocent we’ll call him Jake, short for Jake the Snake because make no mistake, that exactly what he was, but he was a beautiful creature, he had to make up for his internal ugliness somehow I guess. I have now learned that the things that will kill you come the most brilliantly wrapped. I should have known from the beginning, I should have turned and run, but I he showed such a genuine interest in me and seemed to see things about me that nobody else did. Like my “forest eyes” as he used to call them, he would smile and say that my eyes were so and green that a person could get lost for days in them. Satan always uses flattery and vanity to destroy us. There could be a whole other story here- and there is, I’ll tell it to you one day if you bring me coffee and have an hour or so, but to give you the general gist of it. By the end of March of my junior year, I had been screamed at, routinely grabbed and hit, and even thrown from a vehicle,( moving slowly thank the Lord). This first boy set the stage for a few more to treat me the same way- and they did because I let them. I don’t know why, but I did.
I quit school senior year and ran away to Nashville, Tennessee with a boy I had no business being with. I broke my mother’s heart, but I didn’t care. I didn’t like her, I didn’t really like myself either. I didn’t like what I had become, a victim. While in Tennessee, I found myself pregnant, so I tried to fix my mistake myself and I married the boy and finished school. That of course didn’t last and I ended up back home with my mom.
In February 2009, I gave birth to a perfect baby boy. 7 lbs, 2 oz, 19 inches long, born at 1402. I remember laying in the hospital, waiting to be discharged, crying my eyes out. I didn’t want to leave, I was so scared.
One week later on March 3, 2009. Wyatt got a fever. Wyatt was transferred to Children’s Hospital in Asheville and diagnosed with Encephalitis. We came so close to losing him. By summer, Wyatt was well again, his father long since gone, and the two of us started getting on with life. I started school taking some general classes. I had no direction, no drive anymore. I knew what single moms did, they worked for nearly nothing and never went anywhere in life. I was so wrong. I was convinced that nobody would ever love me again because now I had “baggage.” I was sure I’d have “teen mom” and “failed marriage” stamped on my forehead like billboard that warned people to stay away from me forever.
But God’s plan is always better than our plan. When Wyatt was five months old, I met Isaiah Norman for the first time at a high school football game on the first night that I had had to myself. Over the next few weeks, through a series of coincidental meetings, which I later learned were carefully orchestrated ( stalker much?), we exchanged phone numbers and began to get to know one another. I dropped the bomb that I was a mom and much to my surprise he said, “Okay.” I couldn’t believe that he hadn’t left in a cloud of dust. But he didn’t and in January of 2011 we were married and in January 2012, Isaiah adopted Wyatt. ( In North Carolina, there is a 365 day waiting period for step parent adoptions.)
Here is it November 2014. I have been Mrs. Isaiah Norman for nearly four years, we now have two sons. Wyatt is 5 ½ and is learning to read is kindergarten, and Bowman is 3 and learning to mimic everything his older brother does in order to drive him nuts. I have graduated college and we moved to Greenville, SC where I got a job after graduation. Isaiah is in school and I am working on a bachelor’s degree. Life is good but I can’t help but feel like a scared 18 year old with a baby still. More often than not, I am still ashamed of where I’ve been, and the junk that I allowed to enter my life. I feel like I have my sins written on me in permanent marker so that when people look at me, they know exactly what I am. The more I learn about marriage and the weight of it all, the guiltier I feel about entering into it so lightly and then letting it dissolve without trying to revive it. Many days, I feel like I have failed God and am going to spend the rest of my life trying to fix my mistakes.
But that’s just not true. I am the child of the Redeemer. I have a friend who made the most beautiful mosaic the other day. The picture is breathtaking, and its all made of broken pieces of tile. The tile was just a plain colored square, but it had to be broken in order to make the bigger picture. She took a hammer and smashed it and then glued the pieces into something great. He is the Potter. The potter molds and shapes the clay into what He wants it to be and several times during the creative process, the clay is reduced to a muddy heap and then the piece has to be put through the fire before it has the shiny glossy look that people love. We have to let ourselves be broken and chiseled and fired if we are ever going to live up to the brilliance that God has planned for us. God took every mistake that I had thought I made, every ounce of potential that I had thought I wasted and made it into a life I never thought I’d have. He blessed me with a marriage to a man who is good. He never hits me, he will never hit me. He treats me like I am the daughter of a King , he sees me. He loves my, correction, our son unconditionally and has never spoken about him as though he is less than. I admire a man like that and I get to call him mine. God uses Wyatt to teach me new things about love and Himself everyday. God gave me a new purpose, or maybe this was my purpose all long and I had to get here this way or it just wouldn’t be the same. Only He knows.
I have learned about hope, and forgiveness. I have learned most importantly about perseverance. I am no longer defined by my past. How are you supposed to conquer today if you’re still crying over yesterday? The enemy uses whatever he can to steal, kill, and destroy. He won’t get me. Today, I am wiping off the labels. Today, I am free through Christ.
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