Short Stories

---

Lessons while sitting on the Edge

Someone once said that writing was the setting down of things for future generations to read and learn from.
This is my attempt to put down on paper all that god has taken me through in these last years and it is my fondest hope and prayer that you will be encouraged, dear reader.
How does one condense into pages the experiences of years?
How do i accurately portray the feelings, the doubts, fears and trials of these lasts years and yet also impart to you the reader, the hope, faith and faithfulness of god.

It begins not with my birth or early life experiences but at my 36th year.
This finds me married since the age of 19 and with 5 children.
The oldest child, a boy, is 16 and is going headlong into the pleasures this world has to offer. He is involved in drugs, alcohol and sex and seems to be rejecting all we have given him as far as values go.

We are going through the rollercoaster of emotions that all parents must go through when our beloved children choose to embrace these self-destructive lifestyles.
What can i tell you of the emotions and chaos these years brought on our family and us? The self-doubt, anger, resentment, confusion, shame, and the guilt that wells up within us.
One day follows the next and are full of tears.
I seem to swing between despair and hope.

And yet in it all there is a loving god who knew the pain of betrayal and loss, and is not unacquainted with my pain and suffering.
God was and is my only light in these dark days.
Drama follows drama and you begin to feel like some badly written soap opera.

Our son is nearly 17 when he is hit off his bike one Sunday night and badly injured. The phone call from a bystander to tell me.
The sickening feeling in your stomach as you agonize over wether to go to the scene of the accident to be with him and run the risk of ambulance arriving there first and missing him, or to go straight to the hospital and wait for the ambulance to arrive.
The what if's assault you. What if he dies before you get to see him?
What if it’s too late to comfort him?

Two weeks earlier we had an elder from the church try to reason with him and he was told that his days were uncertain and just where was he with god.
He had decided not to give his life to god just yet.
What if the worst happens and he dies and doesn’t go home to glory.
This is the secret fear of the Christian parent.

Next to hit the home front is trouble with our next child, a daughter.
This is minor but when you are schooled in the behaviour of the first it hard not to be edgy and suspicious.
She is suffering in her own way from her brother’s lifestyle.
Insecure with herself and with all the confusion that the teenage years bring.
There are her own tears for her brother and a love for the prodigal even if you can't understand him.

Our next child, a boy is injured and has severed his tendon in a finger.
A long night of sitting beside a hospital bed and days of hand clinic and occupational therapy are ahead.
He is our worrier. He has internalized all the emotions of life with the prodigal and has begun plucking out his eyelashes when he feels under pressure.
It is going to take patience and hard work to begin to help him cope.

For every step forward there appears to be one back as well and so progress is slow.

Next is another daughter. She has coped with all the hard times by compensating with food. She now has a weight problem to contend with and we are careful not to extend this into an eating disorder.
Lastly comes our youngest, a daughter also.
She of all of us seems to be the least effected but only now has to learn the lessons of what is wrong with her eldest brother.
It’s difficult to tell a 6yr old that you can love your brother but not trust him.
How to drug educate the family but still have grace for him?

Add to this volatile mixture a father with Parkinson’s disease and a mother who is finding it increasingly hard to cope with him and is leaning on us for help and support.

Something had to give. And it was me.
I suffered a total mental collapse
I had been experiencing ill health for most of 2003, and had some sort of bowel condition that meant continual bouts of illness.
They arrived out of the blue and the specialist had no answers for me on the what and why for's.

Out of the blue on a lovely Friday morning i experienced the first of many severe panic attacks.
There were days of mild to moderate anxiety.
And then there were the days of severe debilitating panic attacks.
This adds stress to the bowel condition so it was hard to work out what was is the real problem.

To say these were dark days is an understatement.
But in it all god was my strength.
He had not left me as i sometimes thought.
I have found a strength and peace that can only come from the lord.
The days are still uncertain. I still have much to cope with.
I still have a bowel dysfunction, and an anxiety disorder to deal with
But i have learnt so much in this time.
Learnt the wisdom of god far outweighs that of man.
I would not choose to go down this path voluntarily but i also wouldn’t miss the lessons i am learning either.
Psalm 34:17-19

The righteous cry out and the lord hears them, he delivers them from all their troubles. The lord is close to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. A righteous man may have many troubles, but the lord delivers him from them all.


Expect periods of hardship to come for i am not any different than you.
Do not be discouraged by these present circumstances but take heart in the knowledge that the lord is very near you and has promised to never let the circumstances be more than you can bear.

---

PLEASE ENCOURAGE AUTHOR BELOW LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE