Triggers...

Well, we did it... we placed membership at a precious church just around the corner from our house. After much angst from this completely indecisive woman, the decision has been made and we're grateful for a place to call home, a place to start putting down some roots. Last Sunday as I made my way across the foyer trying to herd three little boys into worship I saw a sign-up table... the words "Ladies Day" were written beautifully across the top of a clipboard on a beautifully decorated table. My heart skipped a beat in anticipation and excitement, a chance to meet new friends, form new relationships and have some wonderfully needed fellowship. There was not a moment of nervousness (largely in part to the fact that our new church family puts me at ease), not a moment of anxiety or doubt over whether I should go... it was done, my name signed on the dotted line and my children counted in the number for childcare. "Ladies Day" was promptly written on the family calendar after our arrival from church and the week was passed looking forward to this morning...

And this morning arrived with boys sleeping late, breakfast eaten, diaper bags packed and everyone making it to the car somehow unscathed (ok, almost unscathed... there was a "raised voice" episode with Nathan for not having his shoes on when it was time to go... not my finest moment of the day!). We drove the 3 minutes, and I do mean three minutes (how awesome is that?) to the church building and unloaded ready for fun and fellowship. I dropped the boys at the nursery where they didn't shed a tear and I headed in. The first stop, the nametag table. But as I signed in, all I could think of was our Ladies tea nametag table in Cochabamba... the nametags that were made with such love and preparation for the special day... I picked out my nametag, tried to keep from crying over sweet memories and scrawled my name across the blank space. I entered the fellowship hall ready, or so I thought...

As I walked in a woman came along side me and asked, Are you looking for someone? Because apparently the "I don't know many people here and am just looking for an empty seat to warm" look is all to recognizable :) I said, No, I'm just new here so I'm looking for an empty seat. To which this sweet soul said, Oh where are you from? And with those simple words, making up a simple quesion, the trigger was pulled...

Re-entry triggers are the worst! You never know when they will strike. You may have the luxury of being alone in the privacy of your own home, or you maybe in the middle of super Wal-Mart surrounded by so many shampoo options that you're brought to tears. Maybe it strikes over a cup of coffee with a dear friend, or maybe when a sweet unsuspecting woman asks you where you're from... and so it was today! Bless her heart, she had no intention of bringing on the waterworks, no idea that with one question she could turn my emotional world upside down.

So I politely excused myself... made a tearful beeline to the back of the church and sought refuge in the safety of what every woman has used at one point or another... the bathroom stall :) But I knew I couldn't hide standing next to a toilet for the whole morning and so I ventured out into the hallway... but the tears would not stop. I found myself sitting in a preschool sized chair, five sizes too small for my mommy booty, bawling my eyes out, wishing I had a bag like Hermione to tuck entire boxes of Kleenex down inside.

It came out of nowhere, that trigger... it caught me off guard. I had been so excited to meet new people, have a morning with the ladies of our new church family... but now that I was there, all I wanted was to be with my church family in Cochabamba. In anticipation of our new life here I had looked forward to attending church activities as a spectator (not as the coordinator which had been my role with our teammates for so long now), and now, the anonymity of it all was more than I could handle. I wanted to look forward, pull myself up by my bootstraps and dive into our new life, but all I could do was look back and mourn the one lost.

Triggers are good because they push me to unleash some of the emotions from the experience of re-entry. They push my buttons just enough, forcing me to process things I would otherwise avoid. But dadgum... if they could just save their moments so that the emotional meltdowns happen in the privacy of my own home, I'd be much abliged!

(Epilogue... just in case you worried that I spent the entire morning crying... I had my meltdown, my I'm going to cry off all my mascara moment with some precious women who, even though they've never lived this journey I'm walking, came alongside me and held me, loved on me, and gave me a safe space to just have a good cry. And then after the tears had stopped, we had a marvelous time together, worshipping, being silly girls, and enjoying each other's company. Thank goodness for the family of God!)