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    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’S Journey in Letting Go
    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’S Journey in Letting Go
    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’S Journey in Letting Go
    Ebook113 pages1 hour

    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’S Journey in Letting Go

    By Susanne Kessaris

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    About this ebook

    Author Susanne Kessaris knew from the miraculous births of her children that God was speaking to her early on about letting go, but like most parents, she wanted to cling tightly and was not prepared for the day they grew up. In Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings, she talks about how she fought to surrender to Gods will through a series of events.

    First, she had a scary ordeal with skin cancer. A few short years later, she found herself facing an emergency hysterectomy. Next, she struggled to release her daughter to pursue a calling to go on a mission in South America. She later lost her father to congestive heart failure. When her family decided to sell their house and move, she was finally willing to let go and realize that God had strengthened her to face her life challenges one step at a time.

    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings refers to sounds that will forever stir Susannes soul and remind her of each of her painful journeys of letting go. Her inspiring story of grace and faith challenges you to embrace God, the only constant you have when your world is falling apart around you and the future seems hopeless and out of reach.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherInspiring Voices
    Release dateMay 7, 2013
    ISBN9781462405527
    Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’S Journey in Letting Go
    Author

    Susanne Kessaris

    Susanne Kessaris, currently a bookkeeper in the family’s real estate appraisal business, has a bachelor’s degree in recreational therapy with a psychology emphasis from UNC–Chapel Hill. She wrote Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings: A Woman’s Journey in Letting Go, available on Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com. You can read Susanne’s blogs about gardening, decorating, and crafting on www.myfavoritepasttimes.wordpress.com, or follow her on Facebook. She and her husband have two grown children and live in South Carolina.

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      Book preview

      Bagpipes, Planes, and Strings - Susanne Kessaris

      Copyright © 2013 Susanne Kessaris.

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      Inspiring Voices books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      Inspiring Voices

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.inspiringvoices.com

      1-(866) 697-5313

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      ISBN: 978-1-4624-0553-4 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4624-0552-7 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2013903613

      Inspiring Voices rev. date: 5/1/2013

      Table Of Contents

      Dedication

      Preface

      Chapter 1: It Started at Birth

      Chapter 2: The Lord Taketh Away, and the Lord Giveth

      Chapter 3: Early Memories of My Children

      Chapter 4: First Words and Funny Isms

      Chapter 5: Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star

      Chapter 6: Memories with Friends

      Chapter 7: Amanda Played Sports

      Chapter 8: Our Friendly Son

      Chapter 9: Boots

      Chapter 10: Favorite Toys

      Chapter 11: Not Afraid to Fly

      Chapter 12: Beautiful Feet

      Chapter 13: Family Vacations

      Chapter 14: Our Outdoorsy Girl

      Chapter 15: Letting Our Children Drive

      Chapter 16: Amanda’s High School Graduation

      Chapter 17: College Day Blues

      Chapter 18: My Health Crisis

      Chapter 19: The Health Crisis Was Not Over

      Chapter 20: My Hysterectomy

      Chapter 21: My Search for Significance

      Chapter 22: More Graduations

      Chapter 23: She Flies

      Chapter 24: College Day Blues Revisited

      Chapter 25: The Longest Five Months of My Life So Far

      Chapter 26: Filling My Days to Pass the Time

      Chapter 27: Wisdom Teeth Extraction

      Chapter 28: A Daughter’s Journey in Letting Go—Part 1

      Chapter 29: A Daughter’s Journey—Part 2

      Chapter 30: A Daughter’s Journey—Part 3

      Chapter 31: A Daughter’s Journey—Part 4

      Chapter 32: A Daughter’s Journey—Part 5

      Chapter 33: I Didn’t Want to Say Good-Bye

      Chapter 34: Dad’s Funeral

      Chapter 35: The Memorial Service

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      Dedication

      Idedicate this book to my parents, who showed me how to love my own children; to my husband, who encouraged me to write down my thoughts, though they were painful; and to my children, who brought me joy in the journey.

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      Preface

      I am writing this book in the hope that somehow what I have experienced might be an encouragement to someone else going through the painful process of letting go.

      This will be helpful to me as well in the healing process, as I have found that writing is a great way to pour your heart out in prayer and find the peace that God can give. May this be a resource for others as well to share in their grief, and thus we may encourage each other. Some names of people and places have been changed to protect their privacy.

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      Chapter 1

      It Started at Birth

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      Ken and Baby Amanda

      I guess I can say that I had to begin the process of letting go of my daughter on the day she was born. She was two and one-half weeks premature, and so on the day she was born, she had undeveloped lungs. When she was born, she was placed on my stomach for only a brief moment for me to bond, and then she was whisked away for them to work on her to clear her breathing passage and make sure she was breathing correctly. It was a scary moment, but I could only trust in the doctors’ abilities to take care of my precious firstborn baby girl. I was stuck to my bed with an IV in my forearm and was being monitored closely since I had toxemia (high blood pressure) at the time of delivery. I could not go to the special intensive care unit for infants since I was confined to my bed.

      I was in an out of consciousness for several hours from the exhaustion of labor, which had occurred around 5:00 p.m. on that December day with snow flurries. The next morning, bright and early, I remember longing to see my new baby. My husband came in to see me and had been to the nursery, where my daughter was to be in an incubator for several more hours. He said that he had gotten to hold her and had already bonded with her.

      When the nurses finally brought her in to see me, I was beginning to get upset. Finally, after twelve long hours, I could hold her and begin to bond with her. It seemed like an eternity. I remember those first moments being so precious. She was so tiny but was very alert and looked at me intensely as if to take everything in and take the world on from day one. I didn’t want to ever be separated from her again, but in those first moments, I felt the Lord saying Don’t hold on too tightly. Enjoy her, but always remember that she is yours for only awhile.

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      Baby Amanda and I

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      Chapter 2

      The Lord Taketh Away,

      and the Lord Giveth

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      Nina Mama Kessaris and her new grandson, Ethan

      In March 1990, my husband, Ken lost his father. He passed away suddenly from congestive heart failure. He had a serious heart attack while in his late forties and a mild stroke several years before he died but otherwise had been in fairly good health, so it was a huge shock to lose him. We had moved from Augusta, Georgia, to Rock Hill, South Carolina, several months before, so it was good

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