Hakuna Matata

This past year has been a whirlwind for our family. This time last year we were stuck at home with most of the world, trying to juggle work, school, church, and parenthood all from the comfort, or uncomfort, of our home. Not only did the pandemic change our normal, but several other factors in our personal lives made for a very hard year. My husband graduated law school but the weight of the bar exam hung over him like a dark cloud, so thus began the long days and months of studying. Teaching first grade in a pandemic this past school year was no easy feat. My dad began his first year as a university president in the midst of a pandemic. We had family members battle cancer, put into hospice, and pass away. Not to mention we all had COVID at some point. That is just the short list of this last year in review. I could honestly write a book for each separate struggle we endured this year. It has been one of the most challenging seasons in my life. But because of the Lord’s grace, strength, and provision, we have made it through to brighter days. In other words, Hakuna Matata.

Our life was already a bit chaotic before the pandemic hit. My husband went to classes three times a week, my son was constantly sick while in his first year of daycare, and I was learning how to manage teaching and mommying for the first time. Then in March on Friday the 13th, everything changed. The schools shut down for what we thought would be just a couple of weeks, which then turned into the rest of the school year. Our son’s daycare shut down and my husband began working and doing classes from home. Having to abruptly stop going to school and all of a sudden start teaching first graders from my computer at home is definitely something that I hope to never have to do again. Not only did I have to teach young children virtually, but I also had to take care of our one year old son simultaneously. While my husband was home alongside of me, he actually ended up having to work more than usual because of the way the pandemic affected his job. Then he still attend virtual classes at night. I am so grateful that season is over and I pray we never have to experience anything like that again.

When the next school year began, our school system offered parents the choice to send kids to traditional school or to do virtual. We had teachers who had taught for years in the classroom all of a sudden switch to teaching elementary students from a computer. Thankfully I remained a classroom teacher, but that also brought more challenges than I could have foreseen. We had to try to social distance a small classroom full of elementary students, require them to wear masks at all hours of the day, keep them from sharing supplies, isolate from all other classes, eat lunch in our classrooms or outside, have recess with just our class, have specials like art and music in our classroom, stop all field trips, stop all school wide events, and still try to teach engaging lessons. That’s just the short list of the challenges teachers faced this year. Not to mention having to teach students that had missed nine weeks of school the year before. I could go into great detail about the basic skills that our first graders missed in kindergarten due to the shut down, but let’s just say that was probably the biggest challenge that teachers experienced this past school year.

Just as the new school year was beginning, my husband came home with COVID one day. This turned our life upside down yet again. Once he was diagnosed, both our 18 month old son and I also contracted the virus. My husband and I were miserable for two weeks, while our son only felt sick for a day. We had fevers, fatigue, congestion, cough, headaches, loss of taste and smell, gastro issues, and felt like zombies. We took turns sleeping and taking care of our toddler. All while trying to continue to work from home. Miserable is an understatement. Just take a moment to read all the details if you so wish: Our COVID Story.

Not only did covid hit our home, but several of our family members also contracted it over the past year. My first grade classroom also took a hit. Around Thanksgiving, a student brought it to school unknowingly. Because we had to take masks off to eat, the student beside him also caught the virus. Therefore, after contact tracing, thirteen of my students had to quarantine. I was left with three students. Thankfully, thanksgiving break covered most of their quarantine so not much school was missed. But it definitely messed up everyone’s thanksgiving plans. Even our family plans had to change, as well. I am just grateful that those students, families, and my own family all turned out to remain healthy. This past pandemic year was definitely one for the books.

In the midst of all this hullabaloo, my husband’s grandad was diagnosed with bladder cancer and began chemotherapy. Not to mention all of this happened just months after losing my husband’s grandma to lung cancer. Thankfully through prayer and wonderful doctors, he was healed of bladder cancer. However, we were unable to visit him throughout all of that time due to COVID. We went a year and a half without being able to visit him. In fact, the last time we had seen him was at his wife’s funeral. While we dealt with our own countless issues, we also carried the worry of his cancer and health, as well as worry for our other family’s troubles.

As we trudged through what felt like an impossible year, my dad also began his first year as President, leading students and faculty through the chaos of a pandemic at a university. Not only did he have to take on the challenge of COVID, but several other bumpy roads and steep mountains were thrown in his path in the form of controversies and tragedies. All while recently putting his father in hospice and trying to care for him and my grandma from a state away. And while he was in the beginning works of his presidency, my husband was in the final works of law school.

For several months, we were in a black hole of bar exam prep, work, and parenting. We felt like a hamster on a wheel, running as fast as possible but going nowhere. I do not exaggerate when I say that my poor husband studied for the bar exam from the moment he came home from work to the moment he went to bed. In fact, he even went into work early in the mornings to study then came home and studied through dinner and until bed. He took the last couple of weeks off leading up to the exam and studied around the clock. I’m not sure how studying looks for most law students, but my husband did everything he could to try and pass the first time. While I prayed we would not have to go through that again, I was truly proud of him no matter the outcome.

As my husband toiled over bar exam prep while working full time, I toiled over other work. For four years, he took three classes every fall, spring, and summer while working full time. That was definitely difficult on all of us at times, but nothing was as strenuous as those last months were. Work, study, sleep, repeat. My sweet husband helped with our son as much as he could then would disappear into the dark dungeon that we call our basement. While he slaved away downstairs, I slaved away upstairs but in an entirely different way.

I often felt like the little train that could, puttering up a huge hill with no top in sight and telling myself “I think I can. I think I can.” Some days felt very dark during those last months leading up to his exam. In fact, he was studying round the clock while putting on several Christmas productions at our church, then spent his holiday week off studying all hours of the day. When he returned to work, he began going in early to study then studied as soon as he got home in the evenings until bed. Thus, I became what felt like a single working parent.

My daily life consisted of taking our toddler to daycare early in the morning, going to work and teaching small children during a pandemic, picking our son up in the afternoons, feeding and bathing him, putting him to bed, doing all of our chores, taking care of our three pets, then going to bed just to wake up the next morning and do it all over again. My husband and I only saw each other in passing or on important dates such as our anniversary, his birthday, and our son’s birthday which of course were all celebrated in the last days leading up to his exam. But my sweet husband persevered through it all and still tried to be present to celebrate the big events. Then before we knew it, it was time for the bar exam.

I cannot speak for the bar exam itself, but I can account for the circumstances surrounding the exam. My husband took two weeks off of work leading up to the exam to solely focus on studying for the bar. Then the exam itself took two days, so he stayed overnight to be close to the exam location. I honestly don’t know which of us was more nervous. I could barely sleep the night before his first day of testing. I kept anxiously waking up and praying as hard as I could for him. By the time the sun rose, I was cranked full of caffeine and beyond jittery but still needed to get my son to daycare and myself to school. I loaded us up and nervously ventured off, waiting to hear from my husband.

Around lunchtime, I got a call from him after his first session. He felt fine about it but had a lot more testing to go, so he went to eat and study a bit more before the next portion. Sadly, I got another call just a couple hours later from my mom. The school day wasn’t quite over, so I knew she either forgot about our time difference or something was wrong. Sure enough, she was calling to let me know that my granddad had passed away. He had been in hospice for months, so it was expected. But even when it’s expected, it’s still hard to process and comprehend. And of course it just happened to be the day of my husband’s exam.

God’s timing has been unique in our lives in regards to my grandparents. My sweet Papaw suffered for months from dementia then passed away at the exact time my husband and I said “I do” on our wedding day; my Mamaw passed away only two weeks after suddenly acquiring acute leukemia and we attended her funeral after closing on our home that same morning; and then my Grandoc spent seven months in hospice and passed away the same day of my husband’s bar exam. That week was a whirlwind to say the least. And my emotional self was forced to compartmentalize all of it in order to get through the week of single-moming it, teaching first graders, praying my husband passed the bar, preparing sub plans for the day I’d be gone, writing a speech for my grandad’s funeral, finding clothes to wear to the funeral, then traveling with a toddler and speaking in front of hundreds of people. Let’s just say that when I was finally able to let myself feel again, it was like breaking down a dam.

The day after that long week was over, I was finally able to let out all of my stress, anxiety, nervousness, and grief. I honestly couldn’t stop crying on and off all day. Thankfully, my sweet husband got to actually be by my side all day since his exam was officially over. And of course, I was even more upset by the fact I should’ve been celebrating with him instead of spending the day crying on his shoulder. But he was patient and comforting, as always. I even told my mom that I felt like a nut case, but she helped me to see the root of my emotional breakdown:

“You have been shouldering a lot lately....your husband’s exam and the studying leading up to it, stress at your school, primary care of Levi, isolation of Covid, and then it all topped off with Doc’s death. Add to that your family support system is three hours away. Allow yourself to cry and release the weight of it all. You will find strength after you let it go. I’m sorry I can’t be there physically. Know how much you are loved. Praying for you today little girl.”

My mama hit the nail on the head when she said I had been shouldering a lot lately. I hadn’t realized how much I had been carrying until seeing it all laid out in a text. I definitely did feel God’s strength after allowing myself to let it out that day, but I ended up needing that strength to get me through the next stretch of hardships.

I had hoped that life would become easier after my husband took the bar exam, but instead things took a different turn for a bit. As soon as he returned to work, he went into full force church production mode in order to prepare for Easter and produce new music and videos. At the same time, we had just found out that his granddad’s cancer might have returned. Then on my side of the family, my dad was grieving his father’s death while trying to care for my grandma who they had recently moved close to them, all while dealing with a very difficult controversy at the school. Things were a bit heavy and hard on all sides of our life yet again, all while the results of the bar exam loomed over us in the distance.

After two months of what felt like agonizing purgatory waiting for the bar exam results, the dreaded but desired date finally arrived. We knew the time that the list of names would be released and had decided to look online together. He ran out for an errand but I got a call from him just a few minutes later, telling me that he had passed the bar exam! Before he even had a chance to check the list of names, he began getting calls and texts from friends congratulating him. He also received an official email and of course checked the list just to be sure. I was honestly in shock. It is extremely difficult to pass the bar on the first try, and with all of our difficult circumstances I was preparing myself for the worst. My reaction to the news was a bit comical, starting out shocked and in denial, moving to crying tears of relief, skyrocketing to overflowing joy, then switching in between all emotions throughout the next couple of days until the reality of it all began to settle in. Only by the grace and mercy of God was he able to pass that exam on the first try. And while God blessed us, he also blessed our families in the meantime.

We were able to have an incredible weekend, celebrating my dad’s inauguration as the seventeenth president of the university. Friends and family from all over came to celebrate. The services were beautifully done and the time together was full of love and joy. We were even able to take time to celebrate my husband’s accomplishment with both sides of our family. Moreover, we soon found out that my husband’s grandad’s diagnosis wasn’t as bad as we thought and is being treated without chemo. And later learned that my mother-in-law accepted a position for a job that she had been working towards for years. Then before I knew it, I was officially done with the world’s hardest school year and finally enjoying a much needed summer break. First thing on the summer bucket list was a trip to Disney!

There’s no better place to leave all your troubles behind than the “happiest place on the earth”! Yes, it was unbearably hot and we wore ourselves down to a nub, but it was so worth it to be able to be with our family and see our son light up at all of the magic. It was the perfect way to let go of all of the weight, stress, and worry we had been carrying over the past year or so. Although I came home sore and exhausted, my shoulders felt lighter and my heart was full of joy. In this past year of various hardships and trials, I have hit lows deeper than I want to admit, but God’s strength, grace, comfort, peace, and provision made a way for me through it all.

Anxiety, depression, loneliness, discouragement, hopelessness, doubt, dread, worthlessness, and fear crippled me throughout this year as I continued to press through for my son, my family, and my students. I ate enough comfort foods for a lifetime and gained the weight to show for it. After spending so much time in isolation from others at work and church, as well as in a form of isolation from my husband at home, I had honestly never felt so lonely in my entire life. Although now we have finally entered into brighter days, throughout the past year there were days that felt long and dark with no light at the end of the tunnel. I was mentally, physically, and spiritually drained and exhausted with no strength to even voice my prayers. But my counselor reminded me that when we don’t have the strength to pray, instead we can simply ask God to just be God. And there were and still are more times than I can count when I need Him to just be the Great I Am.

There is a verse that I clung to daily during this past year and still cling to today. In fact, it is hanging on the wall in our son’s bedroom and he loves for us to read it with him. The first time he begged for us to read it out loud, I listened as my husband and I read it over and over again and as our son pretended to touch the words and read it with us. I could sense God’s presence swooping in and surrounding me, reminding me that He is truly with me, my son, and my family wherever we go. It became my anthem verse as I shouldered the weight of our worries over the past year. Although I know that troubles and hardships will come again, I can put my trust in the One who carries our burdens, gives us strength, delivers us, and has already overcome the world. Because of the Great I Am, we can truly say “Hakuna Matata.” For anyone who might feel weak, hopeless, discouraged, fearful, worried, or lonely, this verse is for you: