Sharing . . .

It was a busy day. We went on the LifeWalk, raising money for our local pregnancy center, Alpha Women's Center, which we shared about a few days ago. Our group which consisted of several area churches, raised over $12,000. There were 99 walkers. Our family raised almost $700 which our children mainly did themselves. It was neat to see them involved and be excited to do this. We had a little scare though. Melody (5) got at the beginning of the group and sat with a friend in a wagon. We were at the end, and could not find her. Several of our children ran to the front of the line, and could not find her. Norm and the twins went back to the church where we started from & could not find her. Then, just nonchalantly, Katie says "Oh! Melody is with Ashley in the wagon." (Grrrrrr!) I think Stephen got the 3 miles in with running back and forth before most were halfway done! :) And more gray hairs for me.

Tomorrow is our 20th anniversary. Norm's parents took us out for a nice dinner last night. We had a very pleasant visit with them. They have been very encouraging to us and concerned now especially for Norm as they can too see his sad coutenance. I am sure Norm's mom has a heart like mine, seeing her son hurt, just as we see our children hurt, and we can't take it all away. They gave us a nice gift to be able to do something special for our anniversary, which we were not necessarily planning on but now will. :)

Our funeral home sends us a booklet (The Continuing Care Series, by Doug Manning) every few months that has been very helpful. It was interesting to find one comment so similar to our situation, that we could relate to. Norm read it too, and we agreed:

"Everyone has detatched days. Days when we just can't seem to care about anything. That is normal, but if we have those for many days in a row, that is a red flag that says we are depressed.

A classic example of this type of depression was a young mother whose son had accidentally hanged himself. When she and her husband met with me she kept saying, "I just don't want to go on. "

When someone says that to me, I react immediately, so I asked her if she was thinking of suicide. She said, "Oh, no! I could never do that to my family. I am saying I don't want to go on, not that I want to die."

The next logical step is to show her all the reasons she had for going on. The urge to explain things overcomes us all. I said, "You have other children and a husband who loves you. Can you go on for them?"

With some exasperation she said, "That is the point I am trying to make. I have all of these reasons to go on and I am going to go on. The problem is I don't want to. I want to want to."

Then it became clear. Her depression had left her cold and detached and she thought her lack of desire to love and take care of her family meant there was something wrong with her. The "Why don't I want to?" was almost overwhelming to her.

We talked about the detachment and the fact that depression can do that to us. I told her the feelings would come back, but they would come back much sooner if she did not fight herself because they weren't there. Until they returned she must just put one foot in front of the other whether she felt like it or not, and it was all right not to feel"

From the Continuing Care Series, Book 3, The Dimensions of Grief by Doug Manning (page 17).

Thankfully, I can say I think we are getting past the "detached" part - at least right now. But this "grief thing" is unpredictable. I am praying again, for JOY.

This Christian Fellowship Devotional, The Joy of the Lord is My Strength was encouraging to me.