I'm a Christian homeschool mom from northern Virginia -- that's in the greater Washington, DC area, where I've lived most of my life. I have sleep apnea and low thyroid, so I'm tired nearly all the time. I'm most tired in the morning when I woke up; it usually takes hours for me to recover from sleeping; I often finally feel awake -- or not groggy, I guess -- sometime in the evening. So, time moves fast which makes it hard to get things done. Homeschooling is not always easy; thankfully, my son is now almost 15 (how did that happen!?!) and is able to work on his own a good bit of the time.

I am trying again to lose weight by counting calories; I have done it before and can do it again, though when I'm as sleepy as I've been most days, it's not easy. It's harder to be self-disciplined when you're tired, and you're more inclined to eat to try and get energy. But with God's help, I can lose weight. I had sleep apnea, even when I was a good weight (20 years ago), so it won't cure that but it will help.

Hanging out in the old Rest Ministries chat room and now in our Peace in Chronic Illness room has been a blessing to me. It's amazing because God uses me there and I have been helped as well -- encouraged and made friends with folks who understand the "new normal" of chronic illness. And praying in the chat room is amazing! It's hard to believe that praying in a chat room even "works" but God really meets us there. I'm not sure how to explain it, but we are very grateful.

My favorite hobby is photography.  I carry my camera in my purse so I can take photos whenever I see something I want to catch.  Other hobbies are reading and playing video games.  I used to do cross stitch, crochet, knit, etc, but I don't have a lot of time for that these days. Professionally, I used to write software though it's been a while since I've done that. Perhaps when my son is grown, I'll get up to speed and take that up again.  The photo on the right is a butterfly who had landed on the rock that makes Natural Bridge in Virginia.

We have a border collie and two kitties who are a real blessing.  Life without animals seems very strange; the last time we had no animals, we only lasted 3 days!  The photo on the left is Luath catching a tennis ball -- a favorite pastime of his.  There is also a photo of our cat, Pepper, below in his cat tree.

Where I came from

I was born in Washington DC in 1957 and grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, just outside of DC.  My dad was born in 1910 in Wolverhampton, England and immigrated to the states in 1926, so I am a second generation American on his side.  My mom was born in Gordonsville, Virginia in 1919 and grew up in the village of Churchville, Virginia.  Through her I have an ancestor that fought in the Revolutionary War at King’s Mountain -- far from second generation immigrant on that side!

I grew up Presbyterian.  When I was in 4th grade, I had a Sunday school teacher who taught us that we needed to be born again.  She invited us to her house to watch Billy Graham on tv.  Thru her, I asked Jesus into my life.  As I got older, there were times, I had doubts, but as I saw God working in my life, my faith grew.

I went to Montgomery Blair High School and graduated in 1975; my favorite subject was math.  I then went to the University of Maryland and got a BS with a double major in math and computer science.  I continued at Maryland in graduate school in computer science because I thought it was fun.  I studied artificial intelligence; I enjoyed that a lot, especially developing clever data structures to represent knowledge more efficiently.

In my 20s, I joined what became Covenant Life Church and that helped me believe more in God’s love, seeing it in the love shown to me.  Prior to this, I had been quite shy; seeing God’s love through the people there helped me become more confident -- though perhaps confident in God might more accurate.

I married my husband and moved to Altadena, California

, where I lived for nine years and where my son was born in 1993.  I liked living in California and getting a perspective of the world as seen outside the Washington DC area.  Altadena is in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains which was a beautiful place to live, even if it wasn’t as green as it is back east.  In 1996, my husband was transferred and we moved to northern Virginia.

Shortly after arriving here in Virginia, my sleep apnea got a lot worse.  I had put on a few pounds while in California and that, combined with mild allergies, made my sleep quite bad; see the tired jokes on the right to get an idea how tired I was.  So, I was plunged into the world of chronic illnesses, of trying to get better, and finding a million obstacles, like HMO’s, incorrect treatment which caused me to gain weight, inadequate treatment, and odd forms of disease.  More recently, I was also diagnosed as hypothyroid.  At this point, I’ve reached the limit of current technology on both conditions and am only partially treated.  So, I am still tired, thought doing better than I was before being treated for it.

This is our pack with Iain as they were shortly after we moved to Virginia.  The dogs were adopted from the wild in back of our house in California and were wonderful, smart, and good.

Through it all

Meanwhile, the Lord Jesus is teaching me thru all this.  He is close to me, blessing me with His presence.  He has been good to me!  I also see, thru Peace in Chronic Illness, that I can still help people -- and that Jesus is there even if the 2-3 gathered in His Name are in a chat room!