Rebekah’s Story Part 1

People have been learning about my sweet baby girl and her loving family and have been asking for more background information.  As I look back over the last three years of my life, there are events, feelings, and circumstances that fall together to make a story that I never realized would have the impact that they have had.  It is one of those times where I wish there had been a “PROCEED WITH CAUTION” sign up in my way that I would have had to stop dead in my tracks to read – – not caution tape so that I would not have entered; just a sign to tell me that a season was upon me where I would be stretched farther than I thought I could go and I would become stronger than I ever knew possible.

Let me start this off with a very odd tale of a re-occurring dream that I had while I was in college.  I can’t even remember the first time that I had the dream or how many times I had it.  I don’t have the dream any more, but I remember it like I just had it last night.  The setting is a large open area with people walking around.  Kind of like the scenes in the movies where there is a large courtyard or open space in a market and people are walking, talking, standing around, etc.  I am there, although I don’t see myself – I am actually myself in the dream (On a side note, do you ever watch yourself in your dreams…that’s weird!).  I am with a man who is carrying a child.  This man is my husband.  Unfortunately, I never could see the face of the man.  While dating in college, this piece of information would have been helpful.  I knew that the man was my husband and I knew that the child was my child.  I didn’t know if the child was male or female; just that they belonged to us and that we were happy together.  The child couldn’t walk and that was why my husband was carrying the child.  I knew that the child had special circumstances that made him unable to walk.  It wasn’t that they had hurt a foot or something like that…more like a disability.  We traveled through the open space, just walking and being together.  That is pretty much the whole dream.   This dream never scared me that I remember.  I do remember thinking that God was preparing me to take care of a very special child.  A child that would need someone who would and could give extra time, effort, and attention.  I held this dream close to me and only told a very few people about it.

One of the people that I told about this dream was Chris Wheeler (yep, THE Chris Wheeler).  We were dating pretty seriously and I had a few things to tell the boy before I was sure he could be the ONE (I have another blog in draft on this topic!).  My parents had divorced when I was young and I wanted to talk that through with him and tell him my feelings on the subject; and I had some medical issues then and thought he needed to know.  The subject of special needs children doesn’t come up every day unless you live in the world of disability.  I told him about my dream and told him that I felt very strongly that the Lord was preparing me to take care of a special needs child of my own.  Fortunately for him, (wink wink) he said that he was fine with all three topics and that none of them scared him away from marrying me.  I was very impressed with his calm disposition and unflinching advance.

So, in July of 1999 Chris Wheeler and I vowed to love, honor, and obey. (Yep, we actually said OBEY.)  From there, we have done a lot of learning and growing.  It hasn’t been all cupcakes; but he is my very BEST FRIEND!

In May of 2005 we had a beautiful baby girl named Kayla.  She had (well, has) ten fingers, and toes.  A very bright brain, and immediately made me fall in love.  She is 5 years old now and the smartest kid I know.  She motivates me and pushes me to think and experience life.  She loves to sing and dance.  Loves fruit and ice cream.   Watches Food Network with me and mispronounces words all over the place.  We are currently working on manners, being helpers, and preparing for our upcoming year of home school for Kindergarten.