10th
SERENITY
WORD OF MY BREATH
This is the celebration of my first son Joshua’s 29th birthday, and if it was his earlier birthdays, I might be writing about the word, regret; not because now I would ever regret that God chose me to be his mother, or that I had him when I was only 19, which I admit was probably too young, but because I was not able to be the mother that he needed me to be, at the time he needed me to be.
You see, almost immediately after Josh was born I began to have intractable migraine headaches, that started at first only once a month, preceding my monthly menstrual cycles, and later, occurring daily. In the beginning, I tried, because of my upbringing and innate temperament, to muscle through them; to overcome them by the strength of my own will power, but was thwarted like the shore when a tidal wave crashes over it, left disheveled in its wake. My whole family and household was pummeled by them; I spent the most painful times in bed; the least amount of light and sound would send me over the bend with excruciating throbbing, and there would be nausea and vomiting until there were only dry heaves, leaving me so frail that even after the pain would subside, I was weak and needed time to recover.
I don’t share these things to shock or gain pity, but to explain the situation my family experienced, and why I felt I was never going to be a good enough mother to my son, and why I might feel regret that he was stuck with me. Many times I thought that maybe God would regret giving me the highest calling of being his mother, though I never thought that His choice of Josh’s dad was a mistake. I knew I would never be a ‘Super Mom’, or even a ‘Mediocre Mom’, but at least his dad was up to snuff and maybe that was good enough.
Josh could never count on me to be the room mother extraordinaire, or the cheerleading mother on the sidelines at Little League games, because migraine headaches are stealthy, and you never know when they will strike; you could promise to be involved in some significant event in a child’s life, with every honest intention, and without warning, be struck to the pavement; unable to bounce back in time to fulfill your commitment to the child you love, but who is just as disappointed as if you did it deliberately.
For relief, I took aspirin, which in the early 1980’s was what everyone took for pain, but for me was a mistake, because I ended up in the St. Agnes Medical Center in Fresno, California, with a bleeding ulcer, from a hole that the aspirin burned into my stomach. By the time I was released, I had received 8 units of whole blood and 2 units of plasma, transfused into my body; almost the entire supply of my life’s blood.
One of the biggest regrets of my life took place during one of the biggest miracles of my life, at the hospital in the fall of 1983, when I was dying from the severe anemia. As my life was slipping away from me, and Heaven was approaching, I felt it drawing me with its sweetness like an embrace. It pulled me in to itself, and came close to me and kissed me. It allowed me to feel and experience the emotions of my Father God that abides in His Kingdom. Every pleasant sensation, joy, love, goodness, faithfulness, all wrapped up and then coated in an overwhelming amount of peace, tranquilizing peace; peace that the world cannot give, nor can it know.
Now, in response to this miraculous event, you would expect a person to be positively transformed; that their life would never be the same. I was never the same after that near death experience (NDE), but not in the way you would expect. I was utterly ruined by that Heavenly kiss. During the wooing and courting, the drawing and pulling, I felt before the embrace of God, in that I didn’t have one cognitive consideration or sentimental impression of concern for permanently abandoning my young son, and the fact that I would never see him again, I capitulated the actuality that I was indeed an unmitigated disaster as a mother. God must regret the fact that He picked me.
I physically recovered from the ulcer, was sent home to be with my husband and son, but thought I would never repair on the inside; for there are emotional wounds so deep, so vexatious, yet so hidden, because they cannot be shared. How does one communicate that they feel they are an utter disappointment to the One who created them, in the utmost and highest calling He ever gifted them to do and be? Why even ever draw another breath? Especially since you personally, experientially know the wonderful, literal Heaven that awaits you when you die and leave this earth?
As a result, a serious cloud of depression descended on me that would not leave; though I tried to beg God for it to, though I tried to run from it, though I tried to work my way out of it, though I tried to cajole my way from beneath it, and though I tried to distract my way around it. It was inescapable to me, and no matter what my husband or I did, it remained. To add pain and punishment, I still had the unmanageable migraines that landed me in the hospital with the bleeding ulcer.
This is where regret could have ended my story as a mother. But the God of this Heaven that had embraced me when I nearly died, began to renew my hope in the power of my God-given calling as a mother and the love I had for this son of mine. Through the energy of His Love, the love of my family and friends, and the amazing insight of medical scientists who finally figured out the source and resolution to my migraine headache infirmity, He showed me that His gifts and His calling never came with regret, but rather serenity, which is its opposite, and that whatever is stolen from me, if yielded to Him, can be reclaimed seven times over.
This was an astonishing concept to me, because what had been taken from me and my family was time and memories, and how can those things be redeemed? I am not sure how it can be done, but I have nevertheless seen that in my life, the God that made eternity, and who is therefore not bound by it, turn time on its head, swirl it around, return it to me in my lap and give it to me as a life-infusing present. I have seen the God of the universe take relationships that have suffered for years, due to the neglect that is birthed of chronic illness and pain, and restore them to the newness of spring born vitality, because of His Love in all of our lives.
Because I am no longer suffering headaches, and my participation can finally match my intentions, God has allowed me to pour my life into a little boy named Hunter. He is Joshua’s first son. I believe that he is part of the redemption and the healing process for our family. As Josh learns to be his father and I am Hunter’s Nana, in a way that I could never be Josh’s mother, somehow God is beginning a recovery in both of us. In Josh, I hope God heals unmet expectations of a mother who tried, but was just too broken; in me I know He has transformed a shattered spirit, about to give up.
You see, I never wanted to neglect my son, but I did nevertheless. I never desired to hurt him, but I wounded him just the same. And the more I wanted to be loving him with a divine motherly love, the more I marred my own deepest self. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t have felt the pain of it so acutely. But the one thing I know about God, is that He loves us more than we even want to be loved, and in my most profound sense of disappointment, He was there to pick up the pieces of the shattered me, convince me that He had no regret concerning the real me, and restore my family into the serenity that only He can produce.
People say that perception is reality. Well, today, on this, my first son’s 29th birthday, the reality for me, is serenity, because of the awesome power of the Love of God working in the lives of regular people. The secret is: regular people encountering an Awesome God, equals serenity.
Happy Birthday, Josh. You are amazing, and I love you.
“For the gifts and calling of God are unregretted.” Romans 11:29
