Trading Four Lokos for Forever Love

Letter From The Editor: A lighthearted reflection on my testimony about the girl I was to the mother I became

My grandma had my mom at 20.

My mom had me at 20.

I, on the other hand, had my first at 27 and my second at 30, almost 31.

I also just celebrated ten years since giving my life to Jesus in May (yay!) and I’ve been reflecting a lot on what I’ve gained in that time: a husband, 3 children (1 in heaven, 2 on earth), a laundry list of sanctification, and an alphabet soup of diagnoses (PCOS, ADHD, CPTSD, ABCD, you get the picture 😂).

I’ve come a long way in my faith and just in my journey overall as a person and, while I don’t miss who I was pre-Jesus and pre-kids, I did humorously reflect on how the traits I had in college would have actually been so beneficial to have now as a mom.

So here are the 3 ways my college self would have been a better mom than my current self 😂

She Had an Iron Stomach

One thing I miss about College Sarah was that she could eat healthy and workout and lose weight like a regular person (shocking I know).

College Sarah was also loco…literally. She could survive off of Four Lokos and Doritos Locos tacos without a stomachache.

College Sarah didn’t mind throw up; “puke and rally” was her party motto.! Surely she wouldn’t mind some baby throw up or surviving off of leftover goldfish and juice boxes?

Now Current Sarah just LOOKS at gluten and gets an upset stomach and can have about 1.12483434 glasses of wine before her body decides enough is enough.

She Had Iron Stamina

If college me could see what I consider to be a workout now, she would laugh in my face.

Freshman year of college, I took an hour long spin class on Thursdays as my PE credit from the most shredded, high energy perimenopausal woman I have ever encountered still to this day.

She made the class look like light work while my 18 year old legs were noodles afterwards.

But somehow I still managed to go out every Thursday, commute 1.5 hours round trip to the larger town over, and go country dancing/line dancing for HOURS.

Another time I all that while I had a sore throat and the next day I had to go the doctor because it turned out I had STREP!

Now I get a cold from kids and languish in bed for 2 days. I can’t help but wonder what I could accomplish will that perfect blend of youthful capacity and sheer audacity.

College Sarah really should have left some stamina for Current Sarah. How selfish.

The Key Takeaway

This isn’t a huge revelation, social commentary, or theological essay.

But I think there are some things, humorous and holy, that we can take away upon reflection of our past:

1. It’s ok to laugh at yourself. I often feel like I can’t talk about my past because I was ashamed of who I was and how broken I felt. But where is the power of my salvation in Jesus if I can’t live in the freedom of the gospel? I’m not who I was, praise God for that. I can also accept that she existed.

2. Look back but don’t stay there. There’s obviously been huge trends online for a few years now of romanticizing simpler, analog times like the 90s and, hey, I’m here for the softer and slower ways of life and romanticizing things by finding the magic in the ordinary. But after reading post on , it did get me thinking of how often I wish I could have the body I used to have, the energy I used to have, the bandwidth I used to have. And praise God I don’t. You know why? Because Gods power is made perfect in my weakness (2 Cor. 12:9).

Would I be a better mom if I had the iron stomach and stamina I used to have? Sure, maybe.

Would God be able to show up and show off if I was able to do everything on my own? No! And where’s the fun in that?

So do I honestly think college Sarah would be a better mom than current Sarah?

Absolutely not 😅

But she is someone I have so much grace for. She’s like a little sister who I can see now was so broken and so starved for love.

She was called “desperate” so often in this time of her life.

And you know what?

She absolutely was.

She was intense in her pursuits of friendships and relationships that pushed people away because how can one person fill a God-sized hole?

She was so desperate and she hated herself for it.

She hated who she was.

And she hated even more how she couldn’t seem to break free from the things she knew was causing her pain.

Until one day in May of 2016, Jesus saved her from herself in the floor of a jail cell.

And praise God she has never been the same since.

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Your presence here is the greatest gift, and I am so deeply grateful to learn alongside you!