CHRISTIAN TROUBLES

I don't remember my Dad very well, because my parents got divorced when I was four years old. My Dad only visited us, a hand full of times. My Mom raised seven kids by her self, and it must have taken its toll. I am the youngest of the seven. I remember very little of my child hood. I do have some memories though. My sisters and I got along better than most as kids. I remember getting made fun of, more than the other kids. I guess it was because I was a bit different from other kids my age, though I didn't understand why. It was hard growing up and feeling so different. I seemed to had hard time learning things. After a while, I just just started believing and accepted the fact that I just wasn't as good as everyone else, though I know now that it was not true. But it sure seemed to be true then. It got so bad, that I even invented an imaginary friend, as I suppose many children do.

My Mom was always busy, with the three of us girls still living at home. And I could never bring myself to tell her about how I felt so very different from other kids. But, looking back, I think she knew, but she just didn't say much about it. I think she felt hurt. When our children hurt we hurt, and feel weak when we can't help our kids stop the hurt. My Mom didn't handle stress very well at all. In fact, sadness wasn't allowed at our house. It was called moping. I think Mom was frightened and felt a bit inadequate when she could do nothing, so she made the no sadness rule. My Mom believed that talking about problems didn't help anything and was afraid to get help. So, I learned to keep every thing locked inside. My Mom yelled a lot and called us names. She said we would never amount to any thing. That had a bigger effect on me than it seemed to on my sisters. I guess it was because I believed her.

When I was fourteen years old, things got much worse. I had my first of many grand mal seizures, and there were many to follow. I was bringing my bike up the stairs at my sister's apartment complex. It was a building which had a very narrow stairwell. I fell and my head bounced off both sides of the wall. We were told I had epilepsy and had to take medication. I also had head trauma from the fall. I took handfuls of pills every day which made me feel so tired. Soon after that, I began to have tremors and seizures every day. That is all I needed. Something else to make me appear much different, than everyone else. I didn't have friends and didn't feel I could talk to my Mother about it. I had seizures almost every day, even with the medication. I had a real bad one and was in a comma for ten days, but my Mom prayed for me and I woke up.

Soon after this, my Mom was advised to send me away to foster care. So off I went, I never could understand why we have such a throw away society. It seems that parents are too eager to just surrender and they just send their own children off into the care of others. But, I was hard to care for I guess. At either rate, I ended up in a foster home. The foster Mother had two kids of her own and they were in the process of adopting the foster child that lived there already. they had their own little family going on, so I wasn't accepted. The kids made fun of my shaking and because I was a slow learner. The foster Mom and I didn't get along at all because she let the others pick on me. I tried to take it, but after a while, it was just too much. I ran away from there.

The police were called and the foster family threw my things out, in garbage bags and told my Mom to come and get them. They found me that day and took me to my Mom's house. Because of what had happened, my relationship with my Mom was now one of anger and mistrust. My seizures continued and my outlook on life was one of anger and hurt. I was depressed and just wished God would let me die. When I was sixteen I entered the mental health system. My first placement was a halfway house for children, who the world likes to pretend don't exist. But not all children are what society calls ... Normal. I just could not figure out what I had ever done, to be sent to a place like that. My Mom used to lie so places would take me. She said she did this because she was frightened and thought I was out of control and felt she had no choice. MY mother's choices right or wrong, were made out of both fear and love and the two just don't go together. Love isn't fear, but fear consumes without Christ. There is no fear in love. (1John 4:18)

I remember in group therapy, we were supposed to tell everyone what terrible things we had done. I told them about my running away. They said that wasn't why I was there. They demanded that I tell them the REAL reason I was placed there. I must have named of everything I had ever done in my life, but they still insisted that there was another, more sinister reason. I was there for three months before I got to go back home. By then, the relationship between my Mom and I was worse than ever. I never thought she liked me as a kid. I didn't understand why. I could not comprehend why she had lied, so that they would take me away. I didn't understand why life had to hurt so much. I just ... Didn't understand.

I started running away from home, to keep from hearing her yelling and to stop the echoes from the kids at school, saying things like "you can't learn, why do you even come to school." I remember that I just wanted to stop existing. So, I just sat in a chair and went off somewhere else, in my head. When that didn't work, I even prayed for death. But, when I opened my eyes ... I was still here. Every time I would get caught, I would just run away again. I got angry and did some things and I found myself in a lot of scary situations. But, I would leave again, because I just could not take being told I was worthless and the threats of being sent away again. They say that staying home, and dealing with your problems is always better than the things that happen on the street. But, it sure did not seem like it at the time.

It was a Friday, in the dead of winter and freezing cold. I had just decided to run away again. I was sixteen now and walking on the high bridge which overlooked the river. I don't know what I hoped to accomplish as I was heading to who knew where to do who knew what. As I was walking, trying to sort things out in my head, a car slowed down and came to a stop next to me. A man rolled down his window and asked if I wanted a ride. I was cold and confused, so i got in. I do not even remember where he said we were going. He drove to an apartment complex. We got out of the car and went up to one of the apartment doors and he knocked on the door. He said to the man who answered the door "I have got you another one Joe" ... The man named Joe paid the man who brought me to Joe's apartment, some money.

I knew right then that I was in big trouble. I will never forget those words as long as I live. They just kept echoing in my head "I have got you another one Joe" ... I started to become very frightened. I knew I needed to get out of there, but I had no idea where I was and it was so cold outside. I had no choices. He was drinking and doing drugs. He kept me there as a prisoner all weekend. I was so afraid to try and leave. But, I could not stay here and let him do this anymore. I knew he would be going to work Monday because he spoke of work, and I knew he needed money for his drugs and beer so I planned to try and leave then. I decided to pretend to be ok with what he was doing, until I could make my escape. It worked. He believed me.

He did go to work Monday morning. I woke him up as I was instructed, for some "fun", as he called it, before work. I think that dumb drunk, really thought I would still be there when he got home from work. I acted like I could not wait for him to get "home" so that he would leave. He finally did and I searched his Apartment for money. I looked in his pockets, on the floor, everywhere. I found enough money to buy a pair of shoes and started looking for my home. I was so lost and I knocked at a door and asked the lady who answered for a ride. The lady called the police who once again, took me home to my Mom's house. I never told anyone about that terrifying weekend. I felt dirty and very bitter toward everything. My life was a mess and I guess that somehow, I had been made to believe that I had somehow deserved all that had happened.

The next thing I know, its off to another facility, for them to try to figure me out. I wasn't easy to get along with. I just couldn't trust anyone. Each placement harsher than the first. I refused to cooperate with their programs. I would cause trouble and even had to sleep in a padded cell, at one place. I was acting out my pain, on every one else. This caused the people in charge to see it in my best interest to send me to a State hospital. I stayed there for six months and got more "help" as they called it. I think that was the word they used, but it didn't help me. More programming, man's programming, I felt isolated and worthless. I was only seventeen. I should have been out enjoying life, having fun and experiencing new things. I should have been allowed to live in peace.

After that, I went to a halfway house. It was hard to live like that. I got myself into a lot of trouble. Arguing, threatening and just not following the "program" ... They sent me to the hospital psychiatric unit. I was so frightened. I felt like a caged animal and still trusted nobody. I became violent and they put me in restraints and left me there all night. After I had sufficiently calmed down and I convinced them that I was better. They freed me from my restraints. They changed my medication and stuck a label of "post traumatic stress disorder" and that I suffered from a state of depression, associated with post traumatic stress disorder. I was told I would have to work at handling my life better. What a crock.

I was eighteen years old and had no concept of the real world and was told to try to live in it. Some of the places I was in were better than others but I managed to screw things up and back to the hospital I would go. Until I decided I was going to get myself out.

I wrote affirmations to myself and stuck them on the walls of my room. I didn't believe any of them at first, but what did I have to lose. After a while I started to feel better. I made up a worry box, where I wrote down what the conflict was and how I tried to solve it and if it was effective so when that problem happened again I could deal with it, in the same way. I realized that I could handle things without getting so defensive. It took me two years to get myself out of the system. No one could get me out but me. After being in it most of my young adult life, I was finally FREE. I realize now, that God was there and He got me out. He changed my heart.

I moved to an apartment and got a telemarketing job. I was twenty-four years old and had little idea what the real world would be like. I continued to see my Mother, though our relationship never was a good one. After working for six months I met the man who I later married. He was nice to everyone, funny, and ,not bad looking so when he asked me out ... I said yes. We had a daughter together two years later. My family hated him because he was an ex convict and my Mom found out about that and did anything she could to break us up. She claimed she was worried. He was a good man, but got in trouble before we met. He had turned things around in his life, like I had done and was a good Dad to our little girl. We were always broke and it was hard. He couldn't find a job that paid enough because of his criminal record. So, food was scarce. We had a baby to care for and my family would not help. They didn't like him and used that as the reason that they weren't going to help. They didn't owe it to us to help, but he wasn't even allowed to come to my Mothers house. Like I said ... Its a throw away society.

We moved out of state, to live near his family and to find a better paying job for him, and had lived there for three months. We had an Apartment with a three season porch for our daughter to play in. We were finally getting it all together. Then ... We had a fire which was caused by bad wiring. We got help from the Red cross. They helped us with a hotel to stay at for a week. Then, we went back to our apartment. The three season porch, that our daughter's toys were kept, is where the fire started. We had to throw most of her toys away. I wish we would have known GOD more than we did. We thought we knew Him, but we didn't. We only knew of him.

We went swimming in the quarry to try and have a little fun in a world that seemed so filled with problems. We just wanted to relax and have fun. My husband decided to try and swim across the quarry and back. He couldn't make it back. My daughter and I watched as he struggled to make it back. I felt so helpless. I could do nothing but stand there screaming, as I watched him disappear. My daughter and I were in the midst of a turbulent storm with no stronghold. I didn't know what to do. And, I still didn't go to GOD.

I called my mother and she bought us plane tickets so we could go home. I wanted to stay but I had to get Elizabeth back to her family and her Grandma. I wanted that plane to stay in the air and not land. My family and I, were not close at all and now I was moving in with my Mother. She still made me feel small, with her constant words of abuse to me. But, she loved Elizabeth and I and I would endure her words for my daughters sake, for 22 months. I saved what I could and we moved into a townhouse, in the low income district. That was seven years ago. I grew up quick and had to depend on myself. I really was ...Alone. Elizabeth was four years old when we moved into our townhouse. My Mom visited a lot, but would always put me down and tell Elizabeth that I was mean. I should have told her. It takes two to have a bad relationship. That woman has caused me a lot of hurt and pain in my life. I was afraid of her. I was angry and felt stupid because I saw myself as a victim. believing that, made me a victim.

Now my Mom has passed away and I cant tell her how sorry I am that we never worked things out. I blamed myself. I always have. But, I know that God forgives and I am forgiving myself little by little. It has taken a long time for me to come to Christ and my faith still needs to be stronger. But, I will never feel that low again. And my child won't have to feel like I did. Because I have learned from my past mistakes and those of the people around me. I will be a good Mom and with a Father like we have in GOD ... My little girl will be happy.

Remember this ...