Today I got up and instantly became enraged at my son. Yesterday he went to a party with a bunch of food that he brought in borrowed containers and a cooler. It was messy food that was sticky and would need to be washed off when he got home. I told him 5 or 6 times to wash it when he got home so that he could return it asap or when the lender wanted it back. FIVE OR SIX times I told him this. Yup yup yup was my answer even as he was returning with all the “dishes”. This was in addition to loaning him my car to drive there so he was borrowing lots of favors from people and in my opinion needed to make it right right away. Well this morning I got up and what do I see? The sticky tin pans in my sink left for me. Well he didn’t leave them for me but as a person who likes a clean kitchen in the morning, who is doing dishes 10x a day and is not quiet about not wanting dishes left in the sink for me to do, I thought it was pretty clear that he left them for me. So I marched around making breakfast for my other son and my husband, muttering to myself and just getting more and more angry as the minutes clicked by. My older son even asked me if I was angry because I was acting angry. I’m not good at hiding it when I’m mad and I’m also not good at stopping to ask God for help when I’m mad so I don’t say stupid things. It is hot today and I was dripping sweat and cooking over heat and mad. not a good combination.

When everything was finished and I had eaten and done dishes I stopped and prayed for help. I told God that I know I’m not good at asking and that I don’t want to say mean things to my son or treat everyone else badly and if he could help me take a step back and address it differently I would appreciate it. I prayed out loud and if you’ve ever felt your body temperature change when standing in front of a fan when you’re hot, that’s what it felt like as the burden of my anger fell away. As I prayed, God breathed patience into me and I felt calm. I knew I could talk to him calmly and with love now rather than yelling at him the minute he gets up and making the morning awful for both of us. I had a choice. I could be a raving lunatic and hurt his feelings and say things that were mean OR I could bow my head and pray and talk to him with love in my heart. As you see I choose to act with love thanks to the help of the Lord. Choosing is hard because all I have ever wanted to do in my life when I’m mad is to stay mad and be left alone. Habits are hard to break and sometimes we need help getting there. All things are possible with God and today I needed Him and He was there as he always is. I just needed to choose to ask.