SUFFER THE CHILDREN
By Linda Nixon
As we mature into adulthood and embark on a more refined,
spiritual
understanding of the truly golden pieces of our life,
we sometimes are
forced to experience much pain brought on by
self induced, perhaps
justified, guilt, that stems from realizing
our past shortcomings. Several
years ago, after I had given my
life over to Jesus, I experienced just such a deep depression with respect to the way I had handled my children's early adolescent years.
They were both under the age of seven when their father and I
separated. Up
until then, I had lived a very sheltered life. My
children were forced to
bear with me as I used my young adulthood
to experiment with the life
lessons I should have learned in my
teens. Having gotten married at the
much to early age of sixteen,
I felt repressed and eager to participate in
a world I understood
little about. My children were forced to endure with
me through
several injurious relationships because I was looking for love
in
all the wrong places. Somehow, right from the start, I managed to
get
myself involved with the debased characters of society, the
kind your
mother warns you about.
Foolishly thinking that I was on the right track of life, I
endured
experiences that were both dangerous and down right
lethal to myself and my
children. It was only through the kind
graces of God that we were able to
pass through those years. I
find it strange how those years seemed to have
wiped themselves
from their memories. My son Darryl, now almost twenty six
years
old, can't seem to recall anything up until the age of about ten.
My
twenty two year old daughter Karen, retains a very limited
memory of those
years as well.
As they grew up and entered the stages of their late teens years,
I
realized how alone I felt in this world. I missed those young,
trusting
kids I had ignored when they were fully dependent on me.
My children had
started to make separate lives for themselves, as
all children do. At
night I would lay on my bed and long for the
young children they used to
be. Always wishing I could relive
those years with them, Oh! how different
they would be. I
sincerely regretted those many lost years that were wasted
on my
irrational, selfish, quest for personal fulfillment. A special
time
when I should have made them the center of my life, but had
sometimes
thought of them as only a burden.
Now, in my dreams, I was haunted with visions of them at play
during
different periods of their growing life. They were always
dressed in
clothes I had long forgotten about, but that had been
part of their
wardrobe at whatever age I would dream them in.
They were always the world
to me, or so I had justified at the
time I was raising them, as a self
induced single mother. Yet my
eyes had recently been opened to the true
underlining nature of my character and intentions during that special time in their past. For
weeks, I woke up in a torment of tears. Wishing I had a
second chance to
teach them differently, to wipe away the anguish
I put them and myself
through. Today my oldest child, Darryl,
doesn't believe in God. I had never
taught him to put his faith
and trust in Him. When I returned to God
myself, he was too old
to influence. Although I had always believed in God,
and had on
occasion taken them both to church. Nevertheless, I trust God
will work that out with Darryl someday. I longed for a second
chance.
Because of my actions, or lack of them, my son Darryl
was scarred
spiritually. I praise God that my daughter, Karen,
accepted the Lord into
her life and was baptized at the of age
19.
God may have forgiven, yet time isn't such a forgiving treasure.
Nor do we forgive ourselves that easily when our past actions
have hurt
others. Suffering the consequences of our disobedient
attitude is the
punishment we endure for the rest of our lives.
The sins of the parents, do
get passed on from one generation to
another by way of indifference and bad
habits. I had come to
accept the past, yet it failed to stop haunting me.
Perhaps there
were still lessons for me to learn by reliving history that
all
the others around me seem to have buried.
One day, while still in the mist of my great despair. I was
riffling
through an old box of childhood items, momentos I had
stashed away over the
years. Having decided to compile an album
of keepsakes for my children to
present to them at Christmas.
Inside of my troubled soul, I felt that I
would be moving on, to
what I didn't know. But I needed to complete the
past first. This
wasn't the first time I had riffled over the small
treasures in
this box. Karen's baby teeth. Darryl's baby hair clippings,
school work they had brought home. Cast of small plaster hands, I
knew each
and every article well.
Among the items I spotted a strawberry print, cloth covered book,
a slim
journal my sister-in-law had given me for Christmas years
before. Having no
memory as to what it contained, if anything, I
was completely caught off
guard as I opened it up and discovered
months of personal entries I had
made concerning my children and
life during the period I had been dreaming
them in.
I began to read dozens of details that had totally slipped from
my mind.
There was the time when my son had helped a neighbor
shovel his driveway
without being asked, and how that neighbor
had given my son, along with
another boy who had been playing
with Darryl, a dollar bill. After
receiving the money, the other
boy took off before the job was completed,
taking the dollar with
him. My son had stayed to complete the task, never
once
mentioning the fact he wasn't paid. He was so gentle and
kindhearted
even at the age of seven. Then I found an entry about
how he had brought
home muffins for me and my daughter on the
school bus, being ever so
careful not to damage them, while all the other kids had eaten theirs in class after they had baked
them. I read
on about how my daughter begged me for a little
plastic umbrella, one with
little lambs printed all over it. She
was just four years old at the time,
but she insisted she had
wanted one all her life, and promised never to ask
me for another
thing in her entire life, if I only bought one for her. It
was a
promise she failed to keep! I had to laugh as I showed the entry
to
her later.
There were tender, lost memories stuffed into that old strawberry
diary
that made me cry. Quite unexpectedly, I had been given back
a piece of what
I had been yearning for so often lately, a
glimpse into the my distant past
with my babies. I also began to
realize I hadn't been quite the bad mother
I had convinced myself
I had been. I realized something I had always known,
the natural
goodness planted in my son's heart, giving me renewed faith for
his one day turning to his Creator. Near the ending of the
diary, I
discovered an entry that read," I don't know why I'm
writing about all
these small details, but I have a feeling that
someday this will be very
important to me." Now I wish I had
written much more in that journal, for
the book was only half
full. God had been so kind and caring to have
impressed on me to
compile such a book. Then he wisely had me safely tuck
it away
from my sight and mind until the day came when He knew I would
treasure it the most.
Just a few weeks after this experience, I had another helpless
child enter
my life in very unexpected ways. Ruth, an old friend of
mine from those dangerous
years I had mentioned earlier, suddenly
reappeared in my new-formed world.
She had a young daughter, then
age seven, whom she had planned on giving up
for adoption at
birth, but later had a change of heart. I might
add, I
had been at the hospital with her for this birth.
I had lost touch with both of them over the years, as our paths
had taken
on polarized directions. Now my friend Ruth reappeared,
scarred and broken.
I soon sadly discovered she was still weaving
her life and her young daughter's
around fruitless relationships, as
she continued to carry on the self-centered life style I had
walked away from years earlier. Ruth had never
given up her
quest for the ultimate party, having taken that search to
levels
I would never have dreamed of venturing into. But because of her
daughter, I'll call her Jenny, and my recent guilt about my own
children's
wasted years, I gladly volunteered to look after Jenny
whenever it suited
Ruth. An offer Ruth took full advantage of
often. The first time Jenny met
me (first time she could
remember anyway), she had asked me if I was a
social worker. I had
questioned her as to why she thought that. Her reply
came as a suprise to me, she said because
I wore a jacket ( black sports)
and didn't drink beer or smoke.
My new frame of mind caused me to be much more tolerant with the
undisciplined child then I ever would have been before. I became
very devoted to Jenny, as I understood well the confusion she had
experienced in her young life so far. Often I protected her from
the insults
thrown her way from the rest of my household, as the
result of Jenny's
sometimes wild displays of attention seeking,
hyperactive actions. I
endeavored to install the idea with those
who stayed with me (I had two
young boarder friends and my
daughter still at home) that we had a special
opportunity to help
mend some of the damage that had been done to Jenny. I
tried to
explain to them that it was our duty to show her love and
acceptance. I explained that real love was to love the unlovable,
and that
it wasn't Jenny's fault that she acted the way she did
sometimes. After
that, they tended to be a little more patient
with her, especially my
daughter Karen.
Together, Jenny and I spent many happy hours sewing doll clothes
and
making doll furniture out of plastic bottles and boxes. I
treated her as my
own child, only better then I had treated them
at that age. I bought
material and sewed her many new outfits.
She loved to wear clothes someone had taken the time to
actually create for her personally. I took
her to church with me
often. I wanted to expose her to a different view of
life.
Afterwards, she always referred to me as the church lady. One
Sabbath
evening, she silently approached me, putting her little
arm over my
shoulders, she looked me square in the face, and
said, " I know Jesus is
your friend, will you ask Him to please
take care of my mom?"
We had prayed together for her mother before, but recently Jenny
had began
to realize that her mother's actions were not normal.
Jenny would sometimes
come over to my place for a few scheduled
hours and end up remaining days,
in which time we never heard a
word from her mother. At these times she
fell asleep in my arms,
crying for her mother's safety, praying and crying
that
God wouldn't let anything bad happen to her mother. It broke my
heart
to see her like that. I would reveal Jenny's concerns to
her mother when
she finally decided to return. But Ruth would
just brush it off. Finally, I
felt forced to greatly reduce my
availability for Ruth. Reasoning that I
was enabling Ruth by
always being there for her. But Ruth would just send
Jenny to
other places with people who didn't take an interest in Jenny's
welfare.
Eventually, I felt forced to report Ruth to the child
authorities.
Something I had repeatedly warned her I would do for
Jenny's sake as well
as her own, if she didn't start to get a
grip on her life. Ruth and her
friends were indulging heavily
into cocaine then, causing Ruth too lose
weight and reason at an
alarming rate. One of Ruth's male friends, who drove
Jenny around
frequently, had been in a major car crash while stoned. I was
very concerned about Jenny's safety in light of the
developing situations. I felt the situation was becoming
extremely lethal
for both of them. Furthermore (as if I really
needed another excuse), I began
to notice signs in Jenny's portrayal
of family life in her doll playing
that frightened me.
I had volunteered to care for Jenny for as long as necessary
while Ruth
went to get the treatment she so badly needed. Both
Ruth and Jenny were in
full agreement with this arrangement.
Eventually, Ruth finally agreed to go
for help after a especially
harsh weekend of self abuse on drugs and
alcohol. A week into
this arrangement, however, when I was updating Ruth on
how Jenny
was doing, I told her I had sent Jenny to a SDA summer camp for a
week because my work schedule was especially heavy, and I wanted
Jenny to
enjoy her summer holidays.
With a little over a week of drying out and healthy eating under
her belt,
Ruth had began to gain a tiny bit of her former
strength back. She had
already regained 7 pounds and had finally
gotten the sleep she had so
deprived herself of. Upon hearing
that Jenny was safely tucked away
somewhere, Ruth saw fit to sign
herself out of the program and used the
opportunity and partly
renewed strength, to continue to party the week
away. She claimed
she would return when Jenny came back, a promise she
never kept.
By revealing to Ruth that Jenny was at camp, I had loosened the
only hold I
had on Ruth to stay in the program. She realized if
she hadn't gone, I was
going to call social service. She thought
that if she repented upon
Jenny's return, I would soften up again
and resume the same arrangement. It
was at this point that I felt
I had no choice but to call the authorities
for Jenny's sake.
Social services were at Ruth's door the very day Jenny
returned
from camp. I didn't want Jenny to witness an argument between her
mother and myself, so I had agreed to allow Ruth to pick up Jenny
upon her
return from camp. I knew quite well Jenny woouldn't remain
with Ruth for long.
Social services never understood why someone
hadn't called them earlier.
The situation was so far gone that
they forfeited the usual lengthy
inquires they were accustomed to
performing and took Jenny immediately
away.
Social services had suggested I foster-care Jenny, as Ruth had
signed
papers leaving her in my care when she first entered
rehabilitation two
weeks before, and due to the fact we had a
close relationship. However,
Ruth still had a say in where they
would place Jenny. In an effort to
punish me for reporting her to
social services, Ruth wheeled what little
power she had left and
informed them I wasn't allowed to see, or even speak
to Jenny on
the telephone. Sadly, the last time I ever talked to the child,
was when I placed her on the bus going to camp. Social services
had no
other choice but to honor Ruth's wishes. From time to time,
however, they
did keep me informed of Jenny's progress, fully
realizing why Ruth had
refused custody to me in the first place.
I was forced by circumstances to
give up my friendship with both Ruth and Jenny, for the sake of getting them the help they so
badly
needed. I knew many of Ruth's so-called friends, and they
hounded me for months
because of what I had done. I tried to
explain to Ruth that these people
weren't her friends, that they
were only using her. Yet, she remained blind
to my reasoning. The
last I heard, Ruth never did seek treatment, even
though it was
the major condition of having Jenny returned to her.
Jenny herself, began to understand her mother's neglect of her.
For a time
Jenny refused to visit her mother, because on the very
first, brief, one
day visit, after a three month separation, Ruth
had pawned her off on a baby
sitter so she could go out. Social
Services never allowed Ruth to have a
home visit with Jenny again
after that. In the end Jenny was made a
permanent ward of the
court.
If it wasn't for the guilt and memory of my own selfishness in my
outcast
years, I don't think I would have had the patience to
endure that
stressful, yet rewarding, relationship with them for
some difficult, three
years. I could have easily turned my back
on both of them from the very
beginning. All in the name of self
preservation. I know many people who
would never have ventured
into such a situation, perhaps because they never
would
completely have understood the complex mechanics involved in
addiction. It really does take one to understand one. I now
believe that
God had been preparing me for their pending reentry
into my new life, by
forcing me to deal with my own personal
guilt issues,(especially about by
son whom I neglected to teach
about Jesus), before Jenny arrived.
I now pray I never forget those rough times that God protected me through,
and that He continues to allow me to feel a deep
compassion for others, no
matter how lost we feel their lives
have become. I also pray for Jenny,
that I did the right thing
and perhaps planted some seeds in her heart for
the love of
Jesus. We might not be able to change our past, but we surely
can
make the future better for all those God has placed in our
circumstances. At times, the Christians duty may seem harsh to
those who
don't understand, but true love is sometimes tough
love.
Suffer the little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me:
for of
such is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 19:14 (KJV) Don't
allow yourself to
ever create walls of burdensome regret that
might weigh your heart down,
because you're past actions might
have misguided those who rightfully
belonged to God. But, with
patience and pleasure, take hold of those
extraordinary, precious
gifts God has so wonderfully placed in your care, be
it your
child, or the stranger within your gates.
The End
HOME
As we mature into adulthood and embark on a more refined, spiritual understanding of the truly golden pieces of our life, we sometimes are forced to experience much pain brought on by self induced, perhaps justified, guilt, that stems from realizing our past shortcomings. Several years ago, after I had given my life over to Jesus, I experienced just such a deep depression with respect to the way I had handled my children's early adolescent years.
They were both under the age of seven when their father and I separated. Up until then, I had lived a very sheltered life. My children were forced to bear with me as I used my young adulthood to experiment with the life lessons I should have learned in my teens. Having gotten married at the much to early age of sixteen, I felt repressed and eager to participate in a world I understood little about. My children were forced to endure with me through several injurious relationships because I was looking for love in all the wrong places. Somehow, right from the start, I managed to get myself involved with the debased characters of society, the kind your mother warns you about.
Foolishly thinking that I was on the right track of life, I endured experiences that were both dangerous and down right lethal to myself and my children. It was only through the kind graces of God that we were able to pass through those years. I find it strange how those years seemed to have wiped themselves from their memories. My son Darryl, now almost twenty six years old, can't seem to recall anything up until the age of about ten. My twenty two year old daughter Karen, retains a very limited memory of those years as well.
As they grew up and entered the stages of their late teens years, I realized how alone I felt in this world. I missed those young, trusting kids I had ignored when they were fully dependent on me. My children had started to make separate lives for themselves, as all children do. At night I would lay on my bed and long for the young children they used to be. Always wishing I could relive those years with them, Oh! how different they would be. I sincerely regretted those many lost years that were wasted on my irrational, selfish, quest for personal fulfillment. A special time when I should have made them the center of my life, but had sometimes thought of them as only a burden.
Now, in my dreams, I was haunted with visions of them at play during different periods of their growing life. They were always dressed in clothes I had long forgotten about, but that had been part of their wardrobe at whatever age I would dream them in. They were always the world to me, or so I had justified at the time I was raising them, as a self induced single mother. Yet my eyes had recently been opened to the true underlining nature of my character and intentions during that special time in their past. For weeks, I woke up in a torment of tears. Wishing I had a second chance to teach them differently, to wipe away the anguish I put them and myself through. Today my oldest child, Darryl, doesn't believe in God. I had never taught him to put his faith and trust in Him. When I returned to God myself, he was too old to influence. Although I had always believed in God, and had on occasion taken them both to church. Nevertheless, I trust God will work that out with Darryl someday. I longed for a second chance. Because of my actions, or lack of them, my son Darryl was scarred spiritually. I praise God that my daughter, Karen, accepted the Lord into her life and was baptized at the of age 19.
God may have forgiven, yet time isn't such a forgiving treasure. Nor do we forgive ourselves that easily when our past actions have hurt others. Suffering the consequences of our disobedient attitude is the punishment we endure for the rest of our lives. The sins of the parents, do get passed on from one generation to another by way of indifference and bad habits. I had come to accept the past, yet it failed to stop haunting me. Perhaps there were still lessons for me to learn by reliving history that all the others around me seem to have buried.
One day, while still in the mist of my great despair. I was riffling through an old box of childhood items, momentos I had stashed away over the years. Having decided to compile an album of keepsakes for my children to present to them at Christmas. Inside of my troubled soul, I felt that I would be moving on, to what I didn't know. But I needed to complete the past first. This wasn't the first time I had riffled over the small treasures in this box. Karen's baby teeth. Darryl's baby hair clippings, school work they had brought home. Cast of small plaster hands, I knew each and every article well.
Among the items I spotted a strawberry print, cloth covered book, a slim journal my sister-in-law had given me for Christmas years before. Having no memory as to what it contained, if anything, I was completely caught off guard as I opened it up and discovered months of personal entries I had made concerning my children and life during the period I had been dreaming them in.
I began to read dozens of details that had totally slipped from my mind. There was the time when my son had helped a neighbor shovel his driveway without being asked, and how that neighbor had given my son, along with another boy who had been playing with Darryl, a dollar bill. After receiving the money, the other boy took off before the job was completed, taking the dollar with him. My son had stayed to complete the task, never once mentioning the fact he wasn't paid. He was so gentle and kindhearted even at the age of seven. Then I found an entry about how he had brought home muffins for me and my daughter on the school bus, being ever so careful not to damage them, while all the other kids had eaten theirs in class after they had baked them. I read on about how my daughter begged me for a little plastic umbrella, one with little lambs printed all over it. She was just four years old at the time, but she insisted she had wanted one all her life, and promised never to ask me for another thing in her entire life, if I only bought one for her. It was a promise she failed to keep! I had to laugh as I showed the entry to her later.
There were tender, lost memories stuffed into that old strawberry diary that made me cry. Quite unexpectedly, I had been given back a piece of what I had been yearning for so often lately, a glimpse into the my distant past with my babies. I also began to realize I hadn't been quite the bad mother I had convinced myself I had been. I realized something I had always known, the natural goodness planted in my son's heart, giving me renewed faith for his one day turning to his Creator. Near the ending of the diary, I discovered an entry that read," I don't know why I'm writing about all these small details, but I have a feeling that someday this will be very important to me." Now I wish I had written much more in that journal, for the book was only half full. God had been so kind and caring to have impressed on me to compile such a book. Then he wisely had me safely tuck it away from my sight and mind until the day came when He knew I would treasure it the most.
Just a few weeks after this experience, I had another helpless child enter my life in very unexpected ways. Ruth, an old friend of mine from those dangerous years I had mentioned earlier, suddenly reappeared in my new-formed world. She had a young daughter, then age seven, whom she had planned on giving up for adoption at birth, but later had a change of heart. I might add, I had been at the hospital with her for this birth.
I had lost touch with both of them over the years, as our paths had taken on polarized directions. Now my friend Ruth reappeared, scarred and broken. I soon sadly discovered she was still weaving her life and her young daughter's around fruitless relationships, as she continued to carry on the self-centered life style I had walked away from years earlier. Ruth had never given up her quest for the ultimate party, having taken that search to levels I would never have dreamed of venturing into. But because of her daughter, I'll call her Jenny, and my recent guilt about my own children's wasted years, I gladly volunteered to look after Jenny whenever it suited Ruth. An offer Ruth took full advantage of often. The first time Jenny met me (first time she could remember anyway), she had asked me if I was a social worker. I had questioned her as to why she thought that. Her reply came as a suprise to me, she said because I wore a jacket ( black sports) and didn't drink beer or smoke.
My new frame of mind caused me to be much more tolerant with the undisciplined child then I ever would have been before. I became very devoted to Jenny, as I understood well the confusion she had experienced in her young life so far. Often I protected her from the insults thrown her way from the rest of my household, as the result of Jenny's sometimes wild displays of attention seeking, hyperactive actions. I endeavored to install the idea with those who stayed with me (I had two young boarder friends and my daughter still at home) that we had a special opportunity to help mend some of the damage that had been done to Jenny. I tried to explain to them that it was our duty to show her love and acceptance. I explained that real love was to love the unlovable, and that it wasn't Jenny's fault that she acted the way she did sometimes. After that, they tended to be a little more patient with her, especially my daughter Karen.
Together, Jenny and I spent many happy hours sewing doll clothes and making doll furniture out of plastic bottles and boxes. I treated her as my own child, only better then I had treated them at that age. I bought material and sewed her many new outfits. She loved to wear clothes someone had taken the time to actually create for her personally. I took her to church with me often. I wanted to expose her to a different view of life. Afterwards, she always referred to me as the church lady. One Sabbath evening, she silently approached me, putting her little arm over my shoulders, she looked me square in the face, and said, " I know Jesus is your friend, will you ask Him to please take care of my mom?"
We had prayed together for her mother before, but recently Jenny had began to realize that her mother's actions were not normal. Jenny would sometimes come over to my place for a few scheduled hours and end up remaining days, in which time we never heard a word from her mother. At these times she fell asleep in my arms, crying for her mother's safety, praying and crying that God wouldn't let anything bad happen to her mother. It broke my heart to see her like that. I would reveal Jenny's concerns to her mother when she finally decided to return. But Ruth would just brush it off. Finally, I felt forced to greatly reduce my availability for Ruth. Reasoning that I was enabling Ruth by always being there for her. But Ruth would just send Jenny to other places with people who didn't take an interest in Jenny's welfare.
Eventually, I felt forced to report Ruth to the child authorities. Something I had repeatedly warned her I would do for Jenny's sake as well as her own, if she didn't start to get a grip on her life. Ruth and her friends were indulging heavily into cocaine then, causing Ruth too lose weight and reason at an alarming rate. One of Ruth's male friends, who drove Jenny around frequently, had been in a major car crash while stoned. I was very concerned about Jenny's safety in light of the developing situations. I felt the situation was becoming extremely lethal for both of them. Furthermore (as if I really needed another excuse), I began to notice signs in Jenny's portrayal of family life in her doll playing that frightened me.
I had volunteered to care for Jenny for as long as necessary while Ruth went to get the treatment she so badly needed. Both Ruth and Jenny were in full agreement with this arrangement. Eventually, Ruth finally agreed to go for help after a especially harsh weekend of self abuse on drugs and alcohol. A week into this arrangement, however, when I was updating Ruth on how Jenny was doing, I told her I had sent Jenny to a SDA summer camp for a week because my work schedule was especially heavy, and I wanted Jenny to enjoy her summer holidays.
With a little over a week of drying out and healthy eating under her belt, Ruth had began to gain a tiny bit of her former strength back. She had already regained 7 pounds and had finally gotten the sleep she had so deprived herself of. Upon hearing that Jenny was safely tucked away somewhere, Ruth saw fit to sign herself out of the program and used the opportunity and partly renewed strength, to continue to party the week away. She claimed she would return when Jenny came back, a promise she never kept.
By revealing to Ruth that Jenny was at camp, I had loosened the only hold I had on Ruth to stay in the program. She realized if she hadn't gone, I was going to call social service. She thought that if she repented upon Jenny's return, I would soften up again and resume the same arrangement. It was at this point that I felt I had no choice but to call the authorities for Jenny's sake. Social services were at Ruth's door the very day Jenny returned from camp. I didn't want Jenny to witness an argument between her mother and myself, so I had agreed to allow Ruth to pick up Jenny upon her return from camp. I knew quite well Jenny woouldn't remain with Ruth for long. Social services never understood why someone hadn't called them earlier. The situation was so far gone that they forfeited the usual lengthy inquires they were accustomed to performing and took Jenny immediately away.
Social services had suggested I foster-care Jenny, as Ruth had signed papers leaving her in my care when she first entered rehabilitation two weeks before, and due to the fact we had a close relationship. However, Ruth still had a say in where they would place Jenny. In an effort to punish me for reporting her to social services, Ruth wheeled what little power she had left and informed them I wasn't allowed to see, or even speak to Jenny on the telephone. Sadly, the last time I ever talked to the child, was when I placed her on the bus going to camp. Social services had no other choice but to honor Ruth's wishes. From time to time, however, they did keep me informed of Jenny's progress, fully realizing why Ruth had refused custody to me in the first place. I was forced by circumstances to give up my friendship with both Ruth and Jenny, for the sake of getting them the help they so badly needed. I knew many of Ruth's so-called friends, and they hounded me for months because of what I had done. I tried to explain to Ruth that these people weren't her friends, that they were only using her. Yet, she remained blind to my reasoning. The last I heard, Ruth never did seek treatment, even though it was the major condition of having Jenny returned to her.
Jenny herself, began to understand her mother's neglect of her. For a time Jenny refused to visit her mother, because on the very first, brief, one day visit, after a three month separation, Ruth had pawned her off on a baby sitter so she could go out. Social Services never allowed Ruth to have a home visit with Jenny again after that. In the end Jenny was made a permanent ward of the court.
If it wasn't for the guilt and memory of my own selfishness in my outcast years, I don't think I would have had the patience to endure that stressful, yet rewarding, relationship with them for some difficult, three years. I could have easily turned my back on both of them from the very beginning. All in the name of self preservation. I know many people who would never have ventured into such a situation, perhaps because they never would completely have understood the complex mechanics involved in addiction. It really does take one to understand one. I now believe that God had been preparing me for their pending reentry into my new life, by forcing me to deal with my own personal guilt issues,(especially about by son whom I neglected to teach about Jesus), before Jenny arrived.
I now pray I never forget those rough times that God protected me through, and that He continues to allow me to feel a deep compassion for others, no matter how lost we feel their lives have become. I also pray for Jenny, that I did the right thing and perhaps planted some seeds in her heart for the love of Jesus. We might not be able to change our past, but we surely can make the future better for all those God has placed in our circumstances. At times, the Christians duty may seem harsh to those who don't understand, but true love is sometimes tough love.
Suffer the little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 19:14 (KJV) Don't allow yourself to ever create walls of burdensome regret that might weigh your heart down, because you're past actions might have misguided those who rightfully belonged to God. But, with patience and pleasure, take hold of those extraordinary, precious gifts God has so wonderfully placed in your care, be it your child, or the stranger within your gates.