My biggest fear used to be losing my husband. I felt like losing him just might be the end of me. I remember someone asking me the totally unfair question ” Which would be harder? Losing your spouse or losing your child?”. I thought about that dreaded question and came up with an answer. Of course losing a child was and is devastating to imagine, but I chose losing a spouse as being the more difficult path for me to walk. I think most moms would come up with another answer, but I didn’t.
Here was my reasoning. I could not imagine walking through such great and devastating loss without the support and care of a husband by my side. See I had walked through tragedy before. Within 15 months of our marriage, I experienced a brutal assault that left me needing both physical and emotional help for years. Although I had help and support from both friends and family, it was my husband who had walked most intimately with me in the grief and the healing. Family and friends were amazing, but it was my husband who witnessed the real anguish that came in the dead of night. It was my husband who would anchor me in the midst of an anxiety attack with the coping techniques we had learned in counseling. It was my husband, who I could call at any moment of the day, when I was hit with extreme fear when someone knocked on my front door or I had to walk by myself in the dark. It was my husband, who sat with me awake all through the night saying scriptures over me and wiping my tears. How could I ever lose this kind of a support system? If I lost him, I felt like I would be completely and utterly alone in the times that grief was at its worst. That was my greatest fear. Yet it was my husband who told me the night of my assault, that when we allow our biggest fears to consume us, we are not trusting that God’s grace is sufficient to carry us through whatever that fear is.
At the end of 2016, my greatest fear became a reality and I lost my husband. Although I had played out this fear in my mind a million times, never once did I imagine that I would lose my husband by his own choices. I would lose him, but I could still hear his voice on the other end of a phone call. He was still in this world, but he was gone from my grasp. The guy who carried me through so much heartache was now the cause of so much more. My grief was overwhelming, crashing over me like tidal waves that just wouldn’t relent or let me have a moment to take a deep breath. Friends and family swarmed in to lend their love and support, but as predicted I found myself in the dead of the night utterly alone with an anguish that felt like it would swallow me whole. As the days, turned to weeks, and the weeks turned to months, I found myself actually surviving my greatest fear.
After my assault I spent the first 6 weeks off of work as a time of resting and healing. I would spend the entire mornings with a cup of coffee, an open bible and journal, and the bright Texas sun shining through my window. Each morning I could feel his mercies renewing and a hope in my heart. I had several friends and family come stay with me who brought great encouragement to my soul. My husband was there for me nearly anytime I called for him for emotional support. All of these people and moments were great gifts from God that I did not take for granted. However in contrast, my days and weeks after my husband’s arrest were the opposite of peaceful. They didn’t feel like gifts filled with hope and encouragement. Everything looked dark and desperate. I didn’t have hours of quiet time spent with the Lord reading and meditating on the truths of the Word. I could barely manage to get 5 minutes of reading in. I found myself crawling through my day. I had so many things to take care of for my family. In one day I had so many responsibilities that were placed on me that I wasn’t used to. Everyday was a huge checklist of physical things that needed done as I also cared for my two year old and a nursing baby. They were also going through major transition as they had lost their highly involved dad and moved across the country to a new home and city. My time with the Lord looked more like desperate cries to get me through the moment. My prayers were shorter than ever, “help me Lord, I can’t do this anymore, and redeem this Jesus” were on repeat. My faith wavered back and forth during a single day.
Many people called me strong and commended me for pushing through hard times. I knew they meant well, and I truly appreciated it. However, I knew there was no strength in me. Those people couldn’t see my 1 am self, completely exhausted from a day of single parenting, still up with a sick crying baby who didn’t sleep all the while trying to sort through pain that kept resurfacing. The once stranger called anger was now an uninvited guest in my home who wouldn’t leave. I wasn’t strong, I was a complete mess. Weakness oozed out of me in every direction. I would lay awake crying out to God in desperation for him to help me, and He did. He showed me that I most certainly wasn’t utterly alone in the dark. Although I didn’t have a physical presence to hold my hand, I had scriptures such as Isaiah 41: 10- Fear not, for I am with you. Be not dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you. I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Every night for months I reached out for Jesus to show himself to me and carry me through. I often felt as though it was a miracle that I made it through the day and wasn’t sure how I would get through the next without God’s grace in my life. As I now understand suffering in a broader way, I think that is the whole point.
I heard someone say in a podcast “The only thing as believers we need is need”. I rewound this a few times and let it sink in. Oh yes, I can resonate with that. I need to know my need for God. Its when we lose touch with our need for God that we lose the point of the good news completely. The Gospel is for today, not just for a future afterlife. It is Jesus, our Emmanuel “God with us”, in and through the pain, day in and day out, no matter how long it lasts.
Its been over 7 years of being divorced and parenting on my own and God continues to allow me to be “needy” on him each day. I am surviving and enduring my worst fear which doesn’t feel as scary anymore. Its incredibly hard, yes, but not as scary. The loneliness and exhaustion are real especially at night, but I have learned so much about my God who never leaves me or forsakes me in the middle of the struggle. God’s grace and mercies continue to reach down into the middle of my mess and pull me up out of it.
Of course new fears have risen to take the place of my old ones. There will always be circumstances to worry about and fears to consume us if we let them. I am incredibly guilty of going to the worst case scenario in panic. I have not conquered this tendency, however I do know if I stop to think about it, these fears do not control my life, only my creator does. My God is sovereign and cares for my soul and my kids more than I do. I lean into His goodness and trust, that whatever fear comes true next, He will be kind and near me each step of the journey.
Sound of Surviving 