Ashley and I are in Costa Rica on a nine day mission trip with our church. I am so glad she was able to come with me. I have such high hopes that this will bet one of those special bonding experiences that will forever form a thread between us. I can see us laughing together in years to come at the memories we, and we alone share.
We arrived on Saturday and then had Sunday to worship and relax with some sightseeing before beginning the hard physical work on Monday. Visit the blog for the church by clicking on this link wumccostarica.blogspot.com
I was prepared for the hard physical labor, but the spiritual and emotional work I am doing have caught me off guard. Ashley is prickly, to put it mildly. She always has been. She doesn't like to be touched or hugged at all. She has a hard time showing any affection for anyone except her dog. Even her friends think this. She is hard to get close to, even as her mother. I am struggling with connecting with her on this trip. Don't get me wrong, I love her and she knows it, and she loves me. I just want a deeper, more meaningful adult level relationship with her. I want to be able to listen to her talk about her life and dreams and encourage her. I want to share in her thoughts and feelings, to be a safe place for her to vent and no I will never judge her.
I will keep trying, but not too hard since that sends her into super prickly mode. I need to be open and accepting and non-critical. I need to let her take the lead in the relationship for a while.
So be sides the sore muscles, bruises, cuts and scrapes, my heart is banged up a bit. Time to take more pain meds and put my big girl panties on. More hard work awaits me.
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