All I need.

Today is one for the books.
And if it's been quiet around here... well, here's why.
By the time I lay my head on my pillow tonight, I will have worked a total of 14 hours in two different hospitals.

It started with a clinical that I co-led (I know, what?!) for 8 hours, which began at 6:30am. I'm now in my 4-hour break, and I'll go back for what was supposed to be a 12 hour night shift in the NICU. But I asked for grace. Grace for it to only be 6 hours. And they were kind.

My Etsy shop has been so, so busy with new convos coming in at least 10 times a day. So busy that I've contemplated closing it down for the next month just to catch up (i.e. I have at least 80 purses to sew that have already been paid for... and that doesn't mix well with 14-hour days). I know it's stressful being a bride. I've been there. But to get several messages every day saying, "Just checking in to see how the bags are going!" stresses me out beyond belief. I'm a people pleaser through and through, and though I'm not even late delivering the bags, the fact that they could be disappointed in me makes me lose sleep.

I had a professor who once said, "Sometimes you just need to ask for a little grace." It stuck with me. So I guess what I'm saying is that I'm in need of a whole lot of grace. Grace from God, first of all, because I am so not perfect. I get frustrated and overwhelmed and impatient and discontent at this over-the-top busy time in my life where people are pulling at me from every single direction. I need grace from you, too. "You" being everyone around me who is in my life. Maybe that comes in the form of a little less pulling, and accepting when I have to say "no" one more time. Maybe it comes in the form of praying for me... I would appreciate that more than you know.

Here's the thing, too. Sometimes "grace" comes with perspective. I need the perspective that wow, I am healthy and able enough to work 14 hours in one day. I feel gifted as a future nurse and am able to minister to people in their deepest times of need. What a privilege. And on top of it, I have been given a gift to design and sew purses that people enjoy, so much that they are in high demand. And not to even mention that I have a husband and family whom "supportive" does not even begin to describe. They are amazing.

I think these things as I remember one of my classmates who was in a near-fatal accident yesterday, who was supposed to graduate in May right alongside me and the 97 others, and may never wake up. I think of his sweet wife. I think of the patients I spent the last 8 hours with whose bodies are riddled with cancer and disease. And I must think, "Thank you, God." In these overwhelming-beyond-what-I-can-take moments, gratitude is really all I need.