I've been living in a state of denial since I left Pinnacle. Somehow we made it through Christmas, my dearest friend helped me through my kids received presents.
It is ironic that so many of our Christmases have depended upon the generosity of others, Christmas has always been a struggle for my little family even back to the beginning.
We were so poor, I had hope for the future though and a plan to work hard and go to school so I didn't mind much.
I don't remember much about the first Christmas that I had with my husband, I was still a child, still in the same room that I had grown up in, I think I felt disappointed in the fact that I received so little in presents but it makes sense to me now. I was so ignorant about how the world really was, and could I be taught easily, no, it took a long time.
The next Christmas was spent apart from him, I spent my days in a stupor barely able to get to work, hardly able to take care of my oldest son. I was pregnant with my second child and had been betrayed by my husband and his family. They took him away to Tonga before I knew what to do and I spent the next nine + months trying to get him back. I was so lonely and lost, I really didn't know what to do, I wish I would have had some guidance then, I wish I had it now.
The next Christmas he was here. We lived in a little two room apartment furnished with cast off couches that I had sewn together, a table that I had bought on layaway and paid off and a $30 dollar dish cupboard that I kept my prized "Blue Willow" patterned dishes that I had saved up for and bought a bit at a time from the store that I worked at. That year I learned that God listens, even if he doesn't make your trials go away. I made a list of things that I needed, a washer, a dryer, a toy chest for the kids, and wooden shoes. My Uncle called up and told me that he was cleaning out his basement and getting a new washer, he wondered if I would like to have it. I told him that I would and we went there to get it with my dad, we got looking through the stuff in my uncles basement and stumbled across a toy chest for the kids, an old tent, and under some other things a pair of wooden shoes with leather on top. I wore those shoes all winter even though they had little bits of wood missing in the heel which I tried to remedy by filling them with wood glue. Soon after we got the washer, (which my dad and husband fixed up), my husbands brother offered us a dryer, so we had all that had been on my list.
But Christmas was coming and I didn't have anything for the kids. I bought stuff at yard sales and at the dollar store, they were little and didn't know the difference, but I also wanted to give them some wooden blocks. I looked for them everywhere and couldn't find any, I looked on-line and found that they were expensive, so I decided to make them out of two by fours. I had my Dad cut them up and I worked many hours sanding them down, then I decided to make some for a lady in the ward who was beat by her husband and spent many more hours sanding blocks. I used a hand held jig saw to cut out half circles in some of the blocks, that was really hard and they came out slightly wrong but I did it.
Somehow, when the kids got there presents and were happy I was grateful, a lot less stung by the fact that grownups get less presents.
Every year since then Christmas has been struggle and miracle. People have given us gifts on our doorstep, someone paid for our dinner one night as I went through the drive through, someone bought me a Christmas CD when they overheard me try to put it back because it cost too much money.
That's how life has been actually, struggle and miracle. I've had to pick up and start over with our finances so many times. I've paid off so many ridiculous debts, debts that I never would have incurred except for a fiscally irresponsible husband.
I find myself at this point in time at an odd crossroads. I'm divorced, something that I did not want though I knew it would probably come, I have four kids and no job.
On top of that... the pending imprisonment of my ex-husband for the crime that he committed against me on the 8th. That means no money coming in for child support. Now what am I going to do? That leaves me with small options, and I've not been thinking about it... but now I am.
In fact I get paralyzed by jealousy, I see that someone did something better than I have or can do something I can't and I go into a ridiculous self sabotaging rant in my mind about how I could have/should have/would have done whatever it is better. 
