Running the Gauntlet

This is what my September has felt like so far.

Challenge #1:  My Mom's health is declining.  She has Alzheimer's and is in an assisted living facility.  She is more confused, not wanting to eat and staying in bed most of the day.  She has been fighting nausea and diarrhea the past several weeks.  Her doctor feels she will benefit from going into hospice care.  He feels she is very frail and may not last more than six months.  I had to evaluate the information, talk to family members and make a decision.

Challenge #2:  Tom began having health issues.  There are now concerns with the condition of his heart.  He is on oxygen now.  We are doing tests to see exactly what is going on with his heart.  This is on-going.

Challenge #3:  I went for a bike ride and took a small fall.  Didn't brake or skin-up anything.  My right knee (which is the better one) took a HARD hit in the area below my kneecap.  It flat part of that knee (the area you kneel on) has been numb since the fall.  Totally no feeling on the surface.  I'm walking fine - I can weight-bear.  Mostly soft tissue damage, probably irritated the heck out of that bursa and it is healing slowly.

Challenge #4:  Came from dealing with Challenge #3.  After a week of my knee not getting better and being scared about having no feeling there, I went to the doctor.  (I have no insurance, so going to the doctor is a last resort situation.  Tom has VA  to help him, thank God!)  In taking my history, the doctor learned I hadn't had a mammogram for two years.  She told me about a program that offered free mammograms to those who met the criteria.  I met it.  I got one. 

I got a call the next morning that they had found a spot in my right breast and they wanted to take another mammogram to double check it.  Of course they called on a Friday and couldn't get me in until Monday.  WHY does bad news always come on a Friday??  And you have all weekend to stew and worry before you can actually DO anything about it??? 

It was a very LONG weekend - but by Saturday I had turned it over to the Lord.  I figured He already knew the outcome of the test.  He knew what was in store for me.  Me worrying wouldn't do anything to change the situation.  I decided to put myself in His hands (again) and through His strength I would be able to handle whatever the outcome would be.  It worked out wonderfully.  Turns out what they saw was a lymph node and it was perfectly normal.  Amazing how a scare like that puts everything into perspective...

All of that within the same two weeks! 

Thy Will Be Done

I've been updating my son's blog for him  and it got me thinking. (His birthday is this weekend, so he is much on my mind.  This will be the second birthday that I haven't been able to see him.)  He was writing about our visit, just a couple weeks ago.  One of the things we talked about was adversity...go figure.  It seemed to be a good topic, considering.

We were saying how wonderful hindsight is.  It's always 20/20!  Looking back at a hard time, it's always easy to see the blessings and the good that came to you because of that particular experience.  It's easy to feel grateful then.  But what about DURING?  How do you feel during the hard times?  For me - I am not happy. 

Now, I have an unusual way of looking at trials.  I admit it. 

I actually CAN express gratitude during the dark times because I know (if I listen and trust the Lord), it will ALWAYS turn out better than it was before the trial.  I've been through enough of them - I DID learn that fact!  I will never say "why me" again.  I've whined enough in my younger years; I'm not doing that now!  I express faith in His wisdom and love.  AND I have been known to tell Him I don't see the purpose at this point, and I'm not enjoying the experience.  But I always end with "Thy will be done."  And I always end up on higher ground than when it all started.  Sometimes I am a little skinned-up and emotionally bruised, but they were lessons I needed to learn  - truly.  I am always grateful on the other side.

My son has been studying a series of tapes about learning to become spiritually centered.  He shared the idea that to be spiritually centered, one should be happy DURING the trial, as well as after.  We had a good opportunity to examine that idea. 

My husband and I had big car problems during our trip to visit my son.  The van was in the shop five days and the repair bill was in four figures.  It looked like, in the beginning, that I might not be able to make my visit with my son happen at all.  My son asked if I was happy during all the stress of the situation.

I told him no.  I told him that I had told the Lord that I trusted Him and that I knew there was a reason for this.  I didn't have a clue what that might be.  I told Him, "Thy will be done."  What I learned was that I didn't really mean it.  In my head, somewhere, I was thinking - "He knows how much I want to see my son.  He knows how much this visit means to my son.  He will make it possible for me to see him." 

The first day that didn't happen.  I believe that the Lord never closes one door without opening another one somewhere - and I was LOOKING for that other door!!  But it wasn't there.  We ran into road block after road block.  No - I wasn't happy.

I went to bed in tears.  I realized that I might NOT get to see Matt.  I remember that I had said "They will be done" in the morning.  I accepted and released.  I felt peace.  The next morning, the whole picture changed.  We were able to get a rental (don't even ask my about why we couldn't get one the day before!!) and I got to visit.

Matt knew all this when he asked if I had been happy in the process.  I realized the limit I had put on my accepting God's will.  Matt shared that the tapes talk about this very thing.  He said when a crisis arises - you should imagine the worse possible outcome.

For him, when I didn't show up on Saturday for our first visit; he knew that wasn't in my character.  I would never just not show up.  But he had no way of calling us, to make sure we were okay.  He knew we were driving a long way and there is always the possibility of an accident.  So - he imagined the worse possible outcome:  there was an accident and we had been killed.  Then he thought how that might be a blessing.  He remembered that Tom and I had been sealed.  He had been born under the covenant.  We were an eternal family.  Though he might miss me here on earth, he could have me forever.  With that reassurance, his worst fears dealt with, anything that developed after that, he was ready to handle.  So, I was late - but I was there.  His spiritual self helped him through a scary time.

So on my side - the worse possible scenario was not getting to see Matt.  I was not wiling to accept that possibility on Saturday.  I SAID I accepted His will - but REALLY it was only as long as it matched MY will.  I learned an important lesson.  To accept His will means to be at peace with even the worse eventuality.  To release and submit.  I have never been good at that.  Ask my husband!  But I going to get better.

Doing "Hard Time" in a Motel 6

There's an old quote:  "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions."  Sometimes I think it was quoted for me.

I ALWAYS have the best of intentions...and nine times out of ten they don't turn out the way I thought they would.  I think it is my inattention to details, glossing over with my enthusiasm, and never taking the limits of time and energy into consideration.  I want to please everyone - which only brings conflict because it is impossible.  Who am I to take "impossible" for the last word???  There HAS to be a way around that....

Such is the story of my weekend. 

Almost year ago my son was sentenced to 10 years in prison.  Probably only a handful of people know.  Such is the shame level that comes from having someone you love screw up in a huge way.  I've worked through whatever that was. I have never believed in "family secrets."  They breed shame and low self-confidence.  Yet, I succumbed.  It's taken me a year to "come out of the closet."

I don't know what I thought was going to happen.  Maybe people wouldn't notice that he is no longer in our family get-togethers?  Maybe people wouldn't notice he was gone?  Maybe they wouldn't notice the sad look in my eyes, at times, when I spoke of him?  Now I find I can't share the happiest of getting to see him on the limited opportunities I have.  People don't understand the importance of getting a letter from him.  They probably wonder why we don't phone and text like the rest of the world.  Letter-writing is becoming a lost art.

His prison is in a different state from where I live, so face-to-face visits, though possible, don't happen often.  He has been in almost a year and I have only gotten to visit him twice.  Once in February, and the next time was to be this weekend.  He set up a special visit for me, since I DO live out of state; and we were have three consecutive days to see each other.  It didn't turn out QUITE that way.

We arrived safely on Friday, after an eight hour drive, at our motel and settled in for the night.  Early Saturday morning, we got ready to run the errands we needed to before making the trip to the prison.  Surprise!  During the night our van had given up the ghost.  Will not start.  No how.  No way. 

What to do?  What to do? 

My analytical mind snaps into action.  "We'll get a rental car - and life will go on..."  We get a tow truck.  Get the van fixed.  Carefully going down all the logical steps to getting the problem solved and us back on the road.  Right?  Wrong.

Van may not be resurrect-able.  Due to our successful accomplishment of passing the Utah written driver's license test, we are now the proud holders of a TEMPORARY Utah DL.  The rental car companies were not so impressed by our accomplishments.  They don't rent cars to mere "Temporary" drivers license holders.  You must have the actual CARD in your hand - which, by the way, WILL be delivered by mail in about two weeks.  Yippee-I-Ki-Yay!  We followed every lead, reasonable and non, and still found ourselves car- less, stuck in our Motel 6 room.

Now the problem with prisons is that they don't have voicemail for each inmate.  They don't take messages.  My son knew nothing of our frustrations.  I had no way of letting him know WHY I wasn't there for our visit.  He only knew he had set up a visit for me on Saturday and that I did not show up.  He knows I had a long drive.  He doesn't know if there was an accident.  He doesn't know if I changed my mind?  He doesn't know and has no way to check things out.  I felt so bad that he was looking for a visitor and no one was there for him.

Saturday ends with us knowing our car will be visiting with the mechanics at least another 24 hours.  We have no transportation.   We know no one in town.  We don't know what this is all going to cost! I know it is God's hand.  I have to believe it is going to work out - somehow.  (to be continued)