Grief doesn't change you, it reveals you

“Grief doesn’t change you , it reveals you” This is a quote that stood out to me the moment I read it in the book  “A Fault in our Stars”. It is true .  The grief I experienced when my sister died revealed who I really was at that time , who I had been for years. I was holding on desperately  by a thread functioning my way through life. Then her death rocked my world and I couldn’t pretend anymore.  My grief revealed who I  really was stripping away the façade I had created . Then  years later with no tragedy or grief for a while I found the Lord and my life was changed, I was changed literally from the inside out. When my father died  I grieved but didn’t fall apart as I might have if God had not laid a strong foundation in my life , more than anything I was thankful He found the Lord and grateful for the restoration of our relationship  because I had finally accepted that I could not change him. After daddy died I really thought he was the last to die, I know that sounds silly but I felt comfortable in the fact that there would be no more deaths in my immediate family. It made sense to me. Then Alexis died and I was shocked and in utter disbelief. There are still days where I just pause and think “My child has died, I can’t believe I have lost a child” But again the grief has revealed who I am now , I am a child of God and trust HIM with my whole being. Yes there was despair , yes there were tears from places so deep I didn’t know they existed , and yes there was and is unbearable pain but there is always hope . My grief has revealed my hope . My grief doesn’t make me want to shrink back and hide as it did before. My grief wants me to share that with GOD all things are possible, my grief wants me to share the love HE has shown me on this journey. So thankful I am who I am today. I have a long way to go but I have come so far from who I was back then. I am also thankful that the grief from Kathey’s death stripped away  the many masks I wore and the walls I had built up to protect myself because those walls ultimately kept any healing from taking place.  Grief’s from the deaths of two of the most important people in my life  revealing two different people within me that are ultimately the same. It is so true Grief doesn’t change you, it reveals you. Thankful for ongoing change.

Just another day in paradise !

On the way to work today I heard the song “Just another Day in Paradise” by Phil Vassar. It is amazing how a song can take you back in an instant. I love that song and I always have but the memory that came with it was heart wrenching. It was the late fall of 2000 and my life was snowballing out of control. It just seemed to keep picking up speed and I didn’t know what to do to stop it. There were a lot of changes at that time: I changed jobs, we moved to a new home,  and we even  changed cars. All these changes were forced upon me but I thought that maybe things would finally get better, that the bad luck would stop. But it didn’t because the one thing that I needed to change was the one thing that I didn’t : my drug use. You can’t move away from your problems. You can’t change the external things in your life without changing the inside. You can change jobs, homes, churches, you can  even move to a new city but the problem is you are taking yourself with you . Bottom line, I was the problem not my job, home, or car. As  I said things were bad , very bad, and one day I heard this song on the radio. The first time I heard it I loved it but it also made me very sad.  And I think the reason it did was I longed for what he described in the song, there was a lot of stuff going on : unpaid bills , broken appliances, and  screaming kids but there was such love, his life with all the problems was paradise and he wouldn’t change a thing.  So I searched everywhere for his CD, I wasn’t even sure who sang it .  My life was so messed up and I was functioning in a drug induced haze but I finally found it at a Kmart off of Skillman somewhere .  The memory of  buying the CD  in that Kmart  is so vivid and I remember playing it over and over. Maybe on some level I thought if I played it enough I would be happy.
It was playing t the day I jumped out of our car on I-30 and began to run.  We were strung out on drugs and my husband and I got into a huge fight. I just couldn’t take it anymore so I told him to stop but he wouldn’t so  I opened the door as if to jump out  and  he finally slowed down and pulled over . Then  I just jumped out of the car. I was near the Samuel exit in east Dallas  and  in that desperate moment all I wanted was my mother so I decided to go find her. As I ran into the Grove Hill cemetery I didn’t have a clue where she and David were buried. I had never gone to visit her because to the best of my ability I had pushed her out of my mind pretending she didn’t exist. If she didn’t exist then I couldn’t have killed her and that was my underlying fear that I was responsible for her death 21 years before. But that day I didn’t want to pretend anymore I just wanted my momma so I ran aimlessly through that huge cemetery (since 1911 there has been over 60,000 burials )   hoping I could find her and remarkably  I did. Crying hysterically I finally paused for a moment  looking around and there was the marker that said Rosemary DeFace  . In shock and disbelief that I found her I  fell onto her site begging, pleading, and calling her name.  I laid in the grass for a while and then I heard a car . Sitting up I saw my husband watching me and crying .Wiping my eyes I got up and brushed the grass of the pajama bottoms I was wearing and walked wearily to the car and got in. We just sat there in silence for a moment crying then he said “Watching you run through this cemetery looking for your dead mother’s grave is the saddest thing I have ever seen in my life”  For the first time in a long time I felt loved and that he still cared. It was such a sad depressing scene but that feeling was nice and warm . We both just sighed and he put the car in drive and we headed back to Rockwall. I wish I could say that was a pivotal moment , that finding my mother and feeling loved inspired me to make the changes I needed to make but it didn’t . I know without a doubt God led me to her that day because there is no other way that I could have found her site in that massive cemetery but I didn’t recognize HIM. My heart was hard and I was still blinded.  My life would completely implode in just a few short months .
The memory of that day has always remained and has popped up from time to time but I never connected it with that song or remembered that song playing until now . What I really feel God is showing me is that I was yearning for HIM even then .  I didn’t  care if I had an easy life I just knew I was missing something  but I was so addicted and the chains were overpowering that I couldn’t even conceive of being free.  It took a while but he delivered me from the addictions and broke each chain that had me bound for so long. Today I love to go to Grove Hill . It is a peaceful  place and I love taking flowers to my mother , brother , and grandparents. We even took Alexis there after she died , I don’t know why that was important to me but it was . So I just wanted to share what was on my heart and again say that I am so thankful for the freedom HE  has provided and grateful that he changed me from the inside out even though I fought it tooth and nail for so long . That freedom is available to everyone.  Today  I don’t need to run from anything,  pretend, or hide  because now  I am healthy.  Just so very thankful  for my life , the good and the bad, and as that song says “  I wouldn't trade it for anything , And I ask the lord every night , For just another day in paradise”  Thankfully we each have our own unique paradise.

Warning Signs

Yesterday as I was driving around Sherman delivering flyers to my Pansy, Pumpkin, Pulled Pork Festival I'm having at my model home this Saturday my brakes started making a funny noise as I would press down on them. I hated that sound and it made me cringe so I turned up the radio and blocked it out. It seemingly worked because I couldn’t hear the sound anymore…………………... This is the way I used to deal with life in general, I would mask the problem, ignore the problem, or drown out the problem and  I never dealt with the actual problem I only dealt with the symptoms. It finally all caught up with me and almost destroyed my life. In high school I was given a ‘72 pale yellow Cutlass Supreme with an 8 track player and white leather seats when I turned 16. I loved that car but I was given that car with no instruction at all: I knew to put gas in it but that was about it, I didn’t know about oil or any of the other things that made a car run efficiently. Needless to say one day my car started making a really loud knocking noise. I hated that sound so I turned up my 8 track player and listened to the Beach Boys  ( Be True to your School, California Girls, Barbara Ann), Ted Nugent, Boston, Grease, etc.  as loud as I could. The knocking  sound seemingly went away but of course it really didn’t . My car was out of oil and I didn’t heed to the warning so there was a lot of damage that thankfully we were able to fix.  That incident, in a way,  foreshadowed what would happen to me personally  because I didn’t stop and deal with the any of the many problems  running rampant in my life, I just tried to pretend they weren’t there as if that would make them go away. Because of that negligence there was a lot of long term damage. God has been able to put most the broken pieces back together again but it would have been a lot simpler on me as well as my family if I would have addressed the problems at hand when they arose and not tried to hide them, numb them, or drown them out with busyness.  Yesterday I finally turned the radio down and listened closely.  Tomorrow I am getting my brakes looked at. This incident with my car now and back when I was a teenager reminded me we should listen to the warning signs in our life whether it has to do with our health, our car, our behavior , our relationships , and so on . We can’t afford to ignore them or pretend they aren’t there because in all these instances we can drown out the signs for a little while but the root of the problem is still there getting larger and soon will most likely grow out of control. It is best to nip it in the bud and cut it off at the root: ))

Prophetic Signs

The SHOE

One day not too long ago I posted something about the shoe I found in Alexis car after she died and a friend of mine that I admire and respect said this about the shoe :

“I think that shoe is really a prophetic sign of the footprint - legacy that she left here on earth... Her life and memory continues to impact lives... While tragic -- it really is a story of beauty!”

That moved me beyond words because she has such spiritual insight, it was a post on Facebook and I made sure to save it.

The BRACELET

Last week I shared that I was down to only two of the green beaded bracelets made in her honor after she died and another friend I admire and respect had a prophetic word about the beads which again moved me beyond words.

“Think of the little green beads as they break away as your grief breaking away as God heals you. Think of the new bracelet that you save as Alexis' perfect body that she's given in heaven and representative of how she'll be when you see her again. Love you!”

Amazingly enough when I decided to take off the bracelet with the broken beads there were 20 beads left: one bead for each year of her life on this earth.

The DOOR HANDLE

And now God gave me my own prophetic word about the door handle I found at the crash site the day she died. Last week Riley and I were vacuuming my car and I opened my little storage area between the two front seats of my car and pulled out the door handle that I keep there. For a very long time I carried it in my purse but one day I just knew I was ready to keep it in my car. I still needed it close but not with me all the time.  I pulled the door handle out and held it to my chest remembering the day I found it.................

It was all that was left  of the car at the site. I remember picking it up and hugging it to myself wondering what had happened,  I was so confused and at that point had not seen the car but I knew in that instant I would hold on to that door handle forever.

As I sat in my car with Riley vacuuming the back seat God reminded me of this scripture : Hosea 2:15  I will make the Valley of Achor (Trouble) a DOOR OF HOPE AND EXPECTATION . I never knew of this scripture until early in 2012.  When I first read it I believed it represented my life and that was before I lost Alexis. I was so impacted by it then that I used it on my website as one of my life verses.  When I first read it I never knew how much more meaningful it would become and now God has tied it together with the door handle I found where she took her last breath, where Alexis ROSE to be with Jesus.

"This door handle represents the hope her life will give to others. The hope her life and death,  illustrated through my story when I share my testimony will give to many.  Her death was my greatest sorrow but I believe God has shined brightly through my  trouble and brokenness allowing me to help others open the door to His kingdom allowing HIM into their hearts. This door handle is from the passenger side which I believe is meaningful as well , it is too late for my Alexis but this is the door handle others can use to open the door to their hearts and let Jesus into their lives.  He can speak through me and my Valley of Achor making it a door of hope for others but the key is you have to open the door. He has given me the handle to help others do that !!!"

That is what he told me J)