Life in Canada

Hi Friends!

My first blog since being back on Canadian soil has been a long time coming, but that time was necessary. Hopefully this will shed some light on the next steps that many of you have asked about and maybe give you a little look into what being back "home" has been like.

Re-entry, repatriation, adjustment, culture shock, etc, are all words that people throw around to give some sort of label to what this time is like. I found comfort in these words when I was still in the Philippines. Comfort in knowing that many had walked this road, often repeatedly, before me. I thought, if they can do it, so can I. I had prepared myself as much as I thought I could. I mean, how can you actually prepare for this? It's more like you know that the pain is coming, that it will be a bit crappy, and that life will go on. You can't pre-feel the pain, and the light at the end of the tunnel doesn't appear until you are actually walking through the tunnel. Now speaking from inside that tunnel, all I can say is it is so much MORE than I imagined. So much more pain, so much more confusion, so much more joy in some things, so much more everything. It's just MORE.

It is a strange thing stepping back into the country that felt like home for so long and feeling like a complete stranger. It is painful to get up every morning and feel like you have to fake it until you make it because the pain that you are experiencing isn't tangible. It is confusing to relearn cultural norms. It is hard to justify rest. It is hard to communicate about the past two years of my life because so much of it includes things that people are not generally interested in. It is challenging to deal with the pressure to just be ok. Ninety percent of my time in Canada has felt like I am walking through a cloud. I can keep up the act, be happy, be present, only to collapse when I am alone. It is difficult, it is painful, my heart often feels lost, and my head a mess. BUT, it is also so wonderful. The difficulties have also been met with so much goodness!! There is absolutely nothing like getting to hug my family again. Or hearing my niece every morning. Or being completely loved and blessed by amazing friends. I don't want to diminish those things at all. They have literally been a God-send.

Day by day things get a little bit better. I feel a little less like a fish out of water. I feel a little less like I am faking the smiles. And I feel a little bit more at home. I still miss my life in Tabuk a great deal. I miss my friends who became like family, I miss the clinic, I miss the heat (though I am loving the snow), I miss the food, I miss it all. The way my time there affected my life will continue to pour over into whatever I do next and I will always be thankful for that. I am forever changed (and this is a great blog to help explain that! It helped me a lot) by those amazing people, that culture, and the place that I found home.

So what's next, you ask? GOOD QUESTION! I have no idea. Actually, I have many ideas. I am just not yet sure which path to choose. All I can see at this point is the Philippines. Understandably so considering it was the last place I felt most at home. However, that doesn't mean that I am supposed to go back. Right now I am slowly but surely looking at the options of licensing in Canada after I write my board exam in the US. It is a program that takes about a year but is, of course, competitive to get into. At this point my focus is settling into the Soo, taking advantage of quality time with family and friends, working through this whole adjustment period, trying to stay involved in the birth culture as much as I can, and just finding some rest. Next steps will come in time.

I cannot thank you all enough for your support in the past two years. I would not be sitting here, on the other side of things, had it not been for the generosity and prayers of the people around me. I feel so incredibly blessed and grateful. You have permanently touched my life and I am thankful from the bottom of my heart.

Abundant, the clinic I worked and trained at, is a place that will always be so very dear to me and I was so blessed to see the impact that it has on the women of Tabuk and surrounding areas. Just because I am no longer there doesn't mean there isn't a way to still support the work being done there and even sponsor a birth! If you feel led to continue supporting this ministry, please go to www.gthemidwife.com and keep updated there. Any information about continued support can be found on that page.

My journey as a midwife (almost!) is really just starting so I will keep this blog open and will occasionally post updates, but for now, I'm gonna take a little break and just jump into life in Canada. Which, of course, means jumping into a couple inches of snow! :)

Much love and prayers to you all,
A