Beloved

When I met Pop, I was playing college softball and he loved to talk with me about that. I quickly came to realize that he genuinely knew what he was talking about! We would of course talk about UL softball but we would also discuss the in’s and out’s of NCAA regulations and what he thought about them. That was so much fun for me! 

I joined this family by way of Mommom and Pop’s grandson, Zach. 

Zach lived pretty far away throughout the majority of our dating relationship so when his family would go out of town or on vacations, they would just grab me and take me with them!

Through those years, I was falling in love with Zach but was also getting to know and gaining an incredible family. We would go out in Lafayette and Pop would stop just about every waiter at just about every restaurant to tell them that his grandson was a United States Airman and that his name is Zachary and that I was his girlfriend and that we were going to get married some day. 

Pop’s greatest joy was to highlight the achievements of those that he loved. He was really great at making others feel good about themselves. 

Mommom and Pop started to come to my games whenever they could and it is forever a highlight of mine, when I got to see so many of my new families faces when we played at UL’s field. And the next time I came back to visit, Pop stopped just about every waiter at just about every restaurant to let them know the play by play of the games I played at UL.

My senior year didn’t go great but we managed to make it to the conference tournament at a school in Louisiana. I don’t think I let anyone know we were there because I had a feeling it was not going to go well.

I got a call while I was on the bus from the hotel to the field, from Zach’s Aunt Jill. ‘Haley, Tami let Mommom and Pop know where you were playing and I am driving them up there right now.’ 

I lost most of my grandparents who I completely adored, at a very young age. When I got that phone call, I remember sitting on that bus with a smile and tears just pouring down my face.

I looked at my best friend Anna and said ‘It feels like I have grandparents again.’ and she responded, 

‘You do.’ 

We played a few games and ultimately lost, season over, career over. 

That night, I went back to the hotel and everyone was in the lobby. I got myself together and went over to sit with Pop and he could tell I was upset. He grabbed me in a big hug in his chest and I just cried. What he said to me then, will stick with me forever. 

‘Baby, I know this hurts now but you are about to start the most amazing life with our Zachary’ 

Pop, who could literally talk about sports for hours and hours reminded me that these things pale in comparison to what is really important.

He was a man who loved a lot of things but nothing more than his beloved. 

And he made sure everyone knew it. 

The next time we were all together before Zach and I got married, Mommom and Pop took the two of us out to dinner to encourage us and tell us stories about their marriage. Pop told Zach that he has never let a single day go by without telling Mommom that she is beautiful and Mommom told me how much she still loved his skinny basketball legs.

The last time that we saw Pop, he was tired and not feeling great but he kept calling the nurses in for one reason. 

‘I need to get out of here so I can take my bride out to dinner’

Mommom said, ‘that’s okay Pop, we can celebrate right here.’ 

There are so many great things about Pop and the legacy he has left. The incredible things he did with the American Heart Association and the University of Louisiana will live on forever.

I will forever remember him as someone who was proud of his family and loved without condition. In a world of jealousy and comparison, he was a living example of what it meant to champion the ones that you love. 

He made you feel good about just being you. 

Today I know that Pop is exactly where he wants to be but it is fun to imagine him occasionally going to the thrown to say

 ‘I need to get out of here so I can take my bride out to dinner’

-Haley Gay

Encouragement

I hear ‘You can do it brudder’ as I look over to see Zi’s face completely overjoyed.

Brother was thinking about eating an animal cracker and sister was beaming.

To be clear, Tennessee has been eating on his own for a while and this instance was not rare.

That said, Zizi was so excited to cheer on her brother in doing this.

Encouragement is a key focus in our parenting style, because Zach and I both view it as vital in our lives.

We are fortunate to have a great support system but (in my experience)

as you get older, the encouragement of others becomes rare.

Most of us have experienced an abundance of praise.

When you get a job, a promotion, get married, get pregnant, etc., people love to give praise. ‘Amazing, wonderful, good job’

Praise is awesome but I genuinely believe that encouragement ranks a thousand times higher in importance.

Praise happens when things are great,

Encouragement is needed when things are not.

School was never fun for me. It was difficult from start to finish.

I was a B student and genuinely remember counting down the minutes to get out of there.

My sister’s were better at school, which is awesome and I was definitely jealous.

I say this because through my struggle my mother showed me what it meant to be an encourager. When I would have anxiety about testing and class and my future, my mom would always go out of her way to encourage me.

As a kid, I just thought ‘cool, that’s my mom’ but in looking back I realize how monumental that truly was for me.

On the worst days, my mom would be there to say,

‘Haley, I love how much you love others’ and at the time I remember thinking, this has nothing to do with my anxiety over my shitty SAT scores but my mom knew, encouragement goes a long way. And it did.

Throughout my academic struggle, I was able to be confident through encouragement from the people in my life.

As a wife and a parent I try to be extremely conscious of times that I encourage vs. times that I criticize and I think this can be applied to all relationships.

You never know what someone is going through and instead of waiting until they announce something great, why not just take one second to send or say a word of encouragement?

It goes a long way.

Strength

February has been a month of some really beautiful realizations and life was celebrated in every way.

We rejoiced with our son on his first birthday, Zach on his 28^th and we celebrated the life of a woman known for her strength.

While Zach and I were on a trip, we got a call letting us know that his grandmother had passed away.

Coming home and going to her service was hard.

At the end of the day, funerals suck. Every time I hear the person at the front say ‘today, we rejoice and celebrate’ all I think is, ya we get it but I don’t feel like rejoicing today.

No, today I feel like being sad. Today sucks.

I know that may come across as insensitive but that’s really not my intention.

I have been to a lot of funerals in my life and I think it’s okay (and necessary) to accept a loss in stages.

For me, I am sad before am I ready to celebrate.

Sitting in the service, listening to everyone speak I started to notice a theme.

Once I noticed it, I realized it was every person saying the same thing.

‘She was a strong women’

Over and over again people spoke of her strength.

Her strength when her husband went overseas.

Her strength in raising six children.

Her strength after losing her beloved husband.

She was not weakened by hardship but strengthen through the journey.

-

In some cases, weathering a lot of storms weakens the house.

It is nothing to be ashamed of and sometimes you don’t even have control of how the walls were built.

It is with a good foundation, that a house stands.

-

Zach’s family is strong.

Watching Zach’s dad say goodbye to his mother was heartbreaking.

Something I didn’t think would affect me as much as it did, was watching my mother in law say goodbye to hers.

When I got married, I always thought we would keep things happy and cordial but in the past few years, we have developed a relationship that is real.

My mother in law and I have had some tough conversations.

We have made the decision to keep it real and through that, she is someone I genuinely trust and someone I lean on.

I am grateful to have a mother in law who is my advocate!

Instead of criticizing, she cheers me on

Instead of ‘I told you so’s’,

She say’s, ‘I’m here for you’.

My mother in law makes me feel like I am doing a great job at loving her son and her grandbabies. I honestly get emotional writing that because I know so many people who don’t get to experience that.

So much so, that I feel prompted.

If you are reading this and have a daughter or son in law, I ask that (no matter the relationship) you would call or send a text and tell them that

'You are grateful that they love your baby and your grandbabies so much.'

For me, I didn’t realize how much I appreciated that until I experienced my mother in law telling everyone in earshot, how great her mother in law.

So in the same spirit, I also challenge those of you with in laws to honor them by reaching out and saying,

'I am grateful for you, I love you and I will honor you by taking care of your son (or daughter) for all of my days.'

Choose love, always love,

Haley Gay

The Mountain

I have been sitting here for a while now,
trying to find the words to explain two thousand and seventeen.
It was tough.
I am not saying it was bad.
I birthed our second child on valentine’s day.
Freaking valentine’s day.
The day we celebrate love, God brought new life into our world.
Amazing.
I wish I could list out every single sweet moment that was had in 2017,
I am legitimately grateful for all of them.
It was also a year full of what felt like struggle upon struggle and battle upon battle.
For the first time in our seven year relationship (4 years married),
Zach and I could not find our rhythm.
That’s probably vague.
Another way I could put it, would be to say that we were listening to two completely different songs, in two different genres, with completely different instruments and vocals.
And also, the artists who sang each of our songs had a major feud and we sided with each of our chosen artist's.
Makes sense, right? 
Right.
There are a number of different things that can cause distance in a relationship.
Sometimes a bomb is dropped.
One person comes in and gives news of an action committed, that is devastating to the relationship.
This creates distance, a gaping hole, an enormous barrier of intimacy.
That is not mine and Zach’s story but when I would close my eyes and envision my relationship with my husband, I kept seeing this huge mountain.
And I thought, what is this and how did this get here?
As I looked closer into that ‘mountain’ I didn’t see one massive stone,
I saw a million little rocks.
Harsh words,
Disrespect,
Prioritizing other things over our connection,
Putting down things that he enjoys,
Forgetting to enjoy him,
Blowing off date night,
Arguments about laundry and dishes and bullshit.
Parenting as individuals, not a team.
Some rocks were bigger than others but it took a lot of them to create this mountain between us.
Meanwhile, we had both decided to deal with this by ‘praying it away’.
We dedicated to saying ‘God MOVE this mountain, we need it moved because it is to big for us to handle.’
We would do that, feel really great and two days later find ourselves back in the throws of battle.
Frustration doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface.
We were not at all blameless for any of this but our hearts were breaking, in the midst of it.
We had a closeness that we were never able to explain.
We have two beautiful, incredible babies that were made from our oneness.
We were looking at each other, with a genuine love for one another and at the same time, completely unable to understand why the other was hurt, or angry or resentful.
We were praying but clearly still living in the shadow of this beast of a mountain.
-
One night, we were sitting on opposite couches just silent. Not a word and I couldn’t even hear him taking breaths.
And then the silence broke with Zach’s voice.
Which, to be honest didn’t surprise me.
I have to say that in all of this, Zach never quit.
No matter how tough or angry or how much I blew up or shut down,
Zach never stopped in his efforts to draw near to me.
He never stopped putting whatever he had left out there for me, and now I can’t look back on that without crying because wow, what an incredible human.
Anyway.

And then the silence broke with Zach’s voice.

He started praying but it sounded nothing like the lines we had trained ourselves to repeat.
He said
‘God, You possessing the ability to move mountains does not mean that you are required to.
with You, we will climb this mountain.’
All along we just wanted it to go away and be removed from us so that we could continue on in our marriage.
Though it was hard, God had to bring us to the point of realizing that there was only one way to the other side.
We had to climb.
So we started with one foot in front of the other.
One conversation and then another.
We climbed insecurities and bitterness and frustration and post partum anxiety and laziness and being pissed off and being hurt and feeling unheard and
missing each other.
That was literally one of the things that we realized.
We both really missed each other.
So then we started climbing on top of each other (HA! TMI? Probably. No regrets).

I have been sitting here for a while now,
finding the words to explain two thousand and seventeen.
Yes, it was tough but wow was it worth it.
Working towards a connected and intimate marriage is never done.
But I can say that when I close my eyes today
I don’t see mountains or barriers,
I feel his hand in mine.
And for that, I have never been so grateful.


Always Love,

Haley Gay