Five Minute Friday "After"

Lisa Jo Baker offers a challenge each Friday. Take 5 minutes and just write whatever the prompt for the week inspires you to write. It was actually another's post that convinced me to do this for the first time today.
Here is my After.

After

I live in the after. The after of finding that I am not alone. The after of learning that when everything changes, one thing stays the same. The after of no longer believing in coinicidence. I live in the after of accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior.

There are so many afters in life here in creation. After we meet the Creator, though, the afters of life become more enjoyable or more bearable.

The after of ceremony when you are now husband and wife. The after of birth, when you hold that soft little one in your arms. The after of watching those first steps, a first kiss, the after of the moment where your heart soars. The after of the astounding blessings of God.

Some afters aren't always bearable in the moment. There are afters that you beg for safety, a plucking out, a desperate wish to not experience. The after of the last breath of one you love. The after of the diagnosis you didn't want to hear. The after of the broken heart where the pieces are still falling.

God can calm the storm. He can flatten the waves. He can toss the mountain aside.

He can also provide one more heartbeat. He can give one more breath. He can push one more step.
Oh! To experience the afters with the knowledge that He is with you, that He hasn't left you. "The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." Philipians 4:7

One day my after will have me at His feet. Only then will I understand the whys of them all.

And then I will know why I ought to praise Him no matter what may come or what has passed. 

Reading

I was always a voracious reader. I was typically bored to tears with school. I could pretty much sleep through class while getting perfect scores. I realized this at a very young age, I was in kindergarten. My mother said I was a born skeptic and, frankly, being told I would learn what I needed in life at school was quickly disproved by my experiences.

One of the first issues I had at school was with reading. I hit an annoying wall with our elementary school librarian. Policy dictated that I was only allowed to borrow books from the children's section until 2^nd or 3^rd grade. Picture books and pages graced with no more than five words were the only offerings there. I longed to be allowed into the young section. Each time I drifted over, I would be redirected. I complained to my folks. My mom responded by taking me to the local library. I ran into much of the same problem. There were more books of a higher level of reading comprehension available but they didn't last long either.

Then my dad came to my rescue.

He gave me his library card.

The words to explain how I felt at that moment are inadequate. In my little hands I knew I held the key to worlds far beyond my imagination. I suddenly had the freedom to fly to the moon if I wanted.

I walked into that library with my head held high. With proud steps I approached the previously forbidden sections.

The first book I chose was The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom.

It was one of three or four books I checked out that week. I do not recall the titles of the others. It was this book that left a lasting impression. I was eight.

I didn't completely understand it all. Not really. There are things that while you may comprehend you don't fully feel until you have certain experiences. Ms. Ten Boom relates the story of watching a mother being forced to choose between her two children. The mother knew that the one she did not choose would be sent to the gas chambers. She also knew that if she did not choose, both children would go.

She sent the girl to die. In her heart, I am sure she thought she was saving her physically weaker child from a horrible death. Unfortunately, her strong son became sick and died just weeks later.

I'm a mom of five now. That story rips out my heart in ways that as a child I couldn't understand.

The book also relates how strong her sister's faith was. She never once seemed to falter even when she was dreadfully ill. You can hear the awe in Corrie Ten Boom's voice as she tells of her sister's insistence to give, help, serve the others in the concentration camp.

The book also follows as her father attempts to stand up to the encroaching Nazism. The reader watches as the rights of the Jewish people are slowly taken from them.

Needless to say, a child may not fully comprehend the cascade of events but as I have aged, I tend to look at the broader range picture of things that go on in the world around us. Seeing the big picture can be distressing.

When it comes to things like the healthcare law that passed a couple of years ago, all I can see is where it will end. That is a truly horrible place that I can't even express in words.

When it comes to where the educational system went wrong, I see the beginning as the moment the Bible lost its proper place at the center of all learning. Civilization begins to crumble without a purposeful, moral compass.

When I look at evolutionary theory, I see that the only conclusion is that we are hopeless mistakes of a useless chaotic accident.

When I look to God, I see joy, grace, love, purpose, belonging, oh the words can not dare touch the amazement!

Fourteen Weeks

It was fourteen weeks of emotional roller coaster rides in purgatory. 

On January 25th my mother in law had her accident.  On May 2nd, fourteen weeks later, she passed away. 

My last post explored the truth that God provides help for families facing the hard decisions when it comes to caring for ill parents.  It has become a moot point.  When the doctors told her there was no hope of her getting off the machines that kept her breathing, she chose to turn them off.  She had always stated that she never wanted to live at the whim of a machine.

She was not the healthiest person I knew.  Her body had spent decades betraying her wish for an independent, active life.  She fought through pain each and every day.  She had a myriad of medications that she would not take because they would cloud her memory. 

Every day she insisted on coming to our comic book store.  For years, she would open on days we were supposed to be closed.  She would join me on days I was supposed to be working alone.  She could not stay away.  Her "kids" and "grandkids" might come by that day. My husband may be an only child but Gail claimed oh so many more as her own.

Over the fourteen years that I knew her, (yep, I met her before I met her son) I watched her go from walking and shopping to depending on a scooter unable to manage more than twenty feet.  One thing she did have was the ability to talk.  Gail would greet customers after not seeing them for years by name.  She could inquire after family members.  She remembered what books everyone preferred.  I don't know if Gail ever read a comic but that wasn't why people came to see her.  It didn't matter that she knew nothing about the drama and action in the stories.  It mattered that she knew the people. Gail turned a business her son began into an extended family. 

The ventilator took away the one thing Gail had no trouble doing.  It took her voice.  To breathe, a tube was inserted into her neck taking the air away from her voice box.  To use the "button" for speaking she could not be on pressure assistance, it required breathing on her own.  Determined as always, she managed to communicate without her voice.  She had the final say on whether the ventilator stayed on. 

On that Tuesday, she spoke with our pastor for quite a while.  She accepted Jesus as her savior.  The family witnessed her baptism there in the hospital.  Then she looked at my husband and said she was ready to go home. Angels celebrated a new life in Christ even as they welcomed her home.

 That evening the machine was turned off.  A couple of hours later she fell to sleep.  Gail woke up in Heaven the next afternoon. God healed her.

She will be terribly missed but I thank God that we will see her again.

Tough Decisions

I saw on Facebook a couple of days ago a question posed by one of the blog writers:

“Would you/do you care for aging parents in your home? Is it ever acceptable to place them in a nursing or retirement home or some other state-run institution?” emphasis mine

This query hits home right now. The verse quoted beneath it was Timothy 5:4 & 8. I've recently seen these verses used erroneously to argue against large families. I read them as meaning that the family provided for its extended family especially if there were no other parents, children, uncles, etc. available for that purpose. I read it as taking in homeless family, providing financial assistance during crisis, and love no matter what the situation. Now it is being used against nursing homes.

I do not ever want to put any of my loved ones into a facility to care for them. I find it hard to leave someone in the hospital alone. (I have extremely good reasons too!) Sometimes you don't have a choice.

Right now my family is faced with a problem. Three months ago, on January 25^th, my mother in law was involved in an accident. An 82 year old man did not stop at the stop sign, failed to notice the flashing caution light, and pulled onto a major four lane highway in front of her. He walked away with bruises. She was life flighted to a level one trauma center.

She survived the accident, filled out all the paperwork, answered all their questions. Unfortunately, during surgery to put a rod in her leg and pins in her wrist she experienced a stroke. Two weeks later because of a pharmaceutical mistake by that hospital, she ended up on a ventilator.

Here we are in week 13 of this ordeal. She has spent the last 67 days in a specialty hospital that is a three hour round trip for us weening from the machine breathing for her. She had real success for one week. Once again an infection has forced her back onto the ventilator. Her body does not have the strength to fight a disease and breathe.

The problem is that now insurance considers her stable enough to move. We couldn't get her moved from the level one trauma center when we were desperate to get her out before they could do her permanent damage. All because they were the “better level of care”. Now that we want her to stay in a better level at the specialty hospital, they insist she needs a “lower level of care” because she is “stable”. The insurance has it's own definition of that word. Even the doctor would prefer to keep her because any kind of infection or cold could send her spiraling down. This past week is further proof of that. He has no choice.

We were given the option of a high level nursing/rehab home that accepts patients in her condition or getting trained on the machines and bringing her home.

Yep. There it is. While I have yet to figure out how those two are equal, we have the option of bringing her home. Many facilities won't take her because of the vent needing specialized care but they can train a non medical person to handle it. Really? If people who spend several years and tons of money on medical degrees are hesitant, what in the world are they thinking to hand the job over to a woman who only took CPR when she was eight?

The verses in Timothy say that the children are to care for the parents. Okay. My husband is an only child. He manages our business and is an instructor at the university to support our family of seven. Because my mother in law loves being around people and in order to keep busy, she ran the day to day operations of that 25+ year business. Now our five children and I run the store...every day...open to close. She would require 24/7 care. I would have to stay home. We would have to give up our business or his instructor's position. This would devastate us financially. I don't make that comment lightly. My husband lost his main financially supporting job a year ago which took with it our health insurance and half our income.

So there you have it. The bible states that a child should care for his mother. I agree wholeheartedly. I simply don't know why the quoted verses are used to insist on care at home. Wouldn't the better choice of care be a facility that has trained staff that can work on regular schedules with equipment they have practiced using for years? Isn't that taking care of your parent? How well could a sleep deprived, barely trained mom do? Wouldn't forcing your family into bankruptcy, probably losing your home, and potentially becoming dependents of the state be exactly opposite to taking care of your family?

I watched my mother suffer extreme guilt when she finally placed my grandmother in a home because of Alzheimer's Syndrome. Grandma could not be left alone even for a second. Sitters were expensive. Her mind continued deteriorating to the point of her needing near constant medical care as well. My parents worked full time. My brother lived and worked 3 hours away. I was pregnant and 4 hours away. Grandma's son worked full time 3 hours away. Her other daughter's hands were full with a sick husband and a mentally challenged adult son. I understood without hesitation but that did not ease Mom's conscious. She nearly had a breakdown over the stress.

I don't write this as some kind of justification of my position. I do believe that some people will judge us harshly. Others who have been in similar situations won't. My hope is that perhaps someone who feels the extreme guilt that can accompany these decisions, who has had this verse thrown in their faces, will read this and know that God has provided a place for people to receive care like their loved one needs. God will provide a place where my mother in law can receive the care she needs. My husband, children, and I will visit as often as we can, as we have since this ordeal began.

I Will Enjoy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is just a week away. On Facebook, several of my friends are posting an item a day for which they are thankful. Friends are posting about Christmas shopping. Stores are having sales on turkeys and all the fixings that go along with them. Everywhere is fun and excitement and eager anticipation.

I am not. This time of year has been difficult for me for years. Thanksgiving of the year 1998, found me feeding my 23 year old husband a small amount of turkey and the mushier side items while he reclined in our bed. He tried several times to spoon food up to his mouth but each time the utensil would fall away losing its load. I sat beside him. I took the spoon. I asked what he wanted first. He told me the name of one food. My memory refuses to allow me to recall which. I scooped it up. He said no. He wanted that one. I tried again. After three attempts to give him the item he kept requesting, I asked him to point. He had confused the names. The item he requested was on the other side of the plate. 

My prayers became simple. I only wanted God to help him through the holidays. I did not believe his grandmother could deal with his dying so close to Christmas.

Hilarious things happened during that holiday. Cooking mishaps, literal cat and mouse chases in the living room, all like any other family get together. My husband pulled his aunt and grandmother to the side and gave them very specific instructions. He wanted to get me one last present and it had to be perfect.

That year I got kid style footed pajamas. I don't know where they managed to locate the tweety bird pjs but they were exactly like the ones he and I had joked about before. I could not figure out why no one made the sleeper style footed pajamas for adults when they looked so practical. I always got annoyed at having to find my slippers or sliding around in my socks. Those were perfect.

I admit shock when I opened my present. I could not figure out how anyone would know I wanted them. That was when his aunt told me about their conversation. Our marriage had had more than it's fair share of issues. I knew this perfect present was his way of saying he was sorry and after all we'd been through that he loved me.

He died 21 days after Christmas on January 15^th 1999. He made it through the holidays with a few days to spare.

The holidays are hard for me. I have had many wonderful memories made in the 12 years since. The next Christmas I was remarried and pregnant. The next our first son watched in awe the lights and paper and fun. The next gave us a second son that cooed amongst the presents. The next another pregnancy. The next our first daughter. The next a fourth pregnancy. The next a miracle boy who had to fight to breathe his first week of life. Two Christmases after that welcomed our final child just 9 days prior. I've had more good memories than bad over the years but each season I fight tears as my memories of 1998 entered my thoughts.

Today is such a day. I am supposed to have the “day off” as my dear husband takes the kids on an adventure giving me time to enjoy a cup of coffee and paint the master bathroom. I enjoy the projects in our fixer upper house but many things need to not be assisted by smaller children. I plan those things on my day off and try to toss in a trip to the local coffee house or some reading time.

I called him to ask if I would be intruding on any special plans if I accompanied them today. I don't want to be alone. This year's holiday season comes with the knowledge that my mother has the same disease that took Andy all those years ago. While I comprehend that the situation is different because her immune system is not compromised the way his was, it has still hit me hard. She can be and will be treated and overcome it. I know this but it still doesn't stop the ache in my heart or the tears welling in my eyes. It doesn't stop the urge to curl into a ball and stay there. So I will go with my family on an adventure. I will spend time with the blessings God has given me. I will give thanks for the time I had with Andy and the life I have had.

Today, I will enjoy Thanksgiving.

Seasons

The shadow caught my eye. It was just a small shadow gracefully drifting across the green of the grass. No specific rhyme or reason. I never broke stride as I continued my walk although my imagination blazed. A bird? Drift to left. Which birds were still around? Drift right. Maybe one of the hawks has spotted something I haven't seen? I laughed when the yellow-brown glider enter the top of my view. I watched as it settled to the ground. A flash of dull color in a sea of green. Just a leaf.

A maple leaf destined to drop from it's tree home as autumn swirled around. The tree was going to sleep to await warmer weather and to survive the next season's cold. Seasons. Times of newness and excitement. Times of warmth and growth. Times of harvest and preparation. Times of loneliness and waiting.

God knows when we are entering winter. His divine imagination programed even the trees to prepare in order to thrive again. Preparation isn't always easy. Things sometimes fall away. Things sometimes sleep. Things sometimes die.

That leaf drifted down to me. Earth's time of sleep is just beginning. My winter is finally starting to come to a close. I've waited long. I've battled the loneliness of the cold months. The snow is melting. The harsh winds have stopped their howling. The hope for green and color of spring is growing, warming.

I didn't feel well prepared for such a long season. There were so many times I just knew I would crumble beneath the snow and ice. But my roots are strong, growing in good soil. Even as I pulled into myself, the nutrients I drew in were rich and plentiful.

A branch far too long and large, pulling me over, my pride fell away. Anger dying, cracking and falling piece by piece. The hurt clinging to me as dead leaves unwilling to release finally pulled away in the warmer breezes. Love warming my core. Joy stretching it's way through my branches.

The world around me slows to winter. I race toward spring.

A Mom's Body

During my twelve years of marriage I have become mom five times. Each pregnancy came with weight gain and loss. 

I've not really thought much about my body until recently. My youngest turns 3 this December. I didn't intend to start a diet but I began to lose weight anyway because we've had many changes to our lifestyle over the last while. I decided now was as good a time as any to get rid of the “baby fat”. 

I started paying attention to what I ate and started walking. A few weeks ago I hit my target clothing size. I can claim a good weight for my height. I meet all the typical healthy numbers.

Then I look in the mirror. My belly has stretch marks and has long passed the idea of taunt and flat. Evidence abounds that I chose breastfeeding over bottles for each of my babies. My legs have varicose veins in spider web patterns. My hips are curved with marks of their own. I have a mom's body.

As I was preparing to take my children to the beach, I complained that wearing a swimsuit would be better if I didn't have “mom legs”.

The next thought came with a laugh. If I didn't have mom legs I wouldn't be going to the beach.

The whole trip was planned because my youngest three want to fly kites. They had tried to do so in our backyard to no avail despite the autumn winds. What better place to fly kites than the beach?

 

Practically, every year during my childhood my family would go to Jekyll Island for several days. I remember noticing my mom did not look like the models in the swimsuit catalogs. Of course not, she was Mom. She was beautiful. She didn't have to be one of those too thin models.

I studied myself a bit more in the mirror. I have 5 beautiful children. Children who drive me and each other crazy some days. They are loud and quiet. They are polite and rude. They are boys and girls full of love and deeply loved.

I may now weigh what I did long before I had children. I may wear the same size clothes as I did when a teen. But my body is a radically different entity.

I am proud of my weight loss. I am pleased with my progress with exercise. Most of all I am overwhelmingly joyful that my body is radically different. 

 

I was told long ago I should never have a baby because I would not survive to see it born. Now my body exhibits the badges of pregnancy all over. 

 

I will don my swimsuit knowing the privilege God has granted me and take my children to the beach. God gave me a mom's body, now it's time I give my children some fun memories of a woman who doesn't look like those pencil thin models playing with them on the beach.