THE POWER OF LOVE

Posted on by apeaceofmymind

                I loved my bump. I cuddled and cooed and lovingly massaged oils all over my body. My diet flipped out and I ate weird things for the duration – normally a grapefruit, soda water girl – I’d devour two greasy burgers and chips in one go quite easily, and regularly, then washed it all down with cans of coke! I waddled about happily, and was in love with my baby from the moment I knew I was pregnant.

                When the time came, my normal fear of pain made it easy for me to go along with my trusted gynaecologist’s advice of an epidural, which turned out to be an “arghhh – what were you thinking!?!”  kind of pain. But with all my hang-ups – it sure did the trick – and I had a baby.

The warm sun streamed into my room at the smart Parklane Clinic in Johannesburg, and kissed all the pretty flowers’ faces banked all around the walls. Their smiley faces soothed my mind as I tried to absorb the massive transformation that had taken place in my life. I was a mother – what an awesome privilege – and was I capable to even do this?

                Daddy had dashed home to change, but the memory of his big blue eyes bulging with tears at the event, was a precious memory.

“Let me take her for a while” the smiling nurse offered.

“Oh no, please, can’t I …”.

                “But you need to rest and let us attend to her” she insisted. “I’m guessing this is your first”? she said laughingly as I protested.

“But I don’t need to rest, leave her for a bit longer please” I begged, shifting away as she leaned over to take her. “Just a bit longer please …”.

And so, the tug of war continued – I hung on to her for dear life.

It continued for years I’m afraid. Just having someone to pour all my love into and receive unconditional love back, was simply the best thing. I loved and adored her, she came first in everything and all my devotion was to her – even to the exclusion of daddy at times – big mistake moms. It felt so good being needed at last, so my life revolved around her.

Loving that precious little person, was a wow – what an amazing treasure! What a responsibility! I was going to make sure she was loved and picked up and held and cuddled, just treated like the miracle she was.  I didn’t want anything else, just to love her to bits and keep her safe, and make sure others treated her with love and respect too. She was so helpless and defenceless. What a privilege to have this little baby. She deserved to be taken care of all the time, and she deserved my time to really listen with both ears as she grew, for her to know I’d heard, and all the time too, and to make sure I’d understood when she needed me, to drop whatever I was doing and fix whatever it was, to be there when she cried. No one was going to hurt my lil angel. 

But then – he didn’t want to be married anymore – before her second birthday. Suddenly I found myself a single mom, bewildered, and trying to be both parents. I messed up badly all over the place, and abysmally in a dad’s role. Perhaps afraid to discipline firmly, fearing she wouldn’t love me anymore or worse, alienate her if I said no. I wanted the lines open between us – always – and for her to know I’d always be there for her…  I’d never known that; someone who was always there. I wanted to shield her from that pain of feeling unloved, confusion, fear, abandonment, and ultimately rejection… naturally I couldn’t, it’s just not humanly possible to do it all.  

The only thing I knew how to do was to love her, and for her to know she was loved and valued just the way she was. Hoping to build her up on the inside so that when the nasty spiteful words spew out from the world, she would know in her heart that it wasn’t true, and she wouldn’t take it to heart and believe it. I just wanted her heart to be filled with love so that fear and self-doubt, which grips and imprisons the mind wouldn’t take over. It breeds all kinds of anxious lies and illnesses. I wanted to shield her from everything so she knew she was acceptable just the way she was. She was such a happy baby, always singing and smiling, everyone loved her.

Then one day I became a Christian, and started reading my bible, which was so intimidating for me I can tell you. Mocking, teasing images from childhood kept me silent and literally in the dark, I just believed I couldn’t do it.  Now, I had this beautiful, heavy, leather book to read, with its delicate, gilt-edged pages of thousands of words in tiny print… how on earth was I to cope with this challenge…on my own?

But grace and mercy had touched my torn heart… and it moved, things stirred deep in my soul and I wanted to know more. And with the wonderful people from my new church in Johannesburg, who all came alongside me to help, even the pastor. Such a blessing in a huge church. They’d pick me up for home-group and phone me to see how I was doing, brought meals round, gave my daughter lifts to school, offering help wherever they could. Their love for Jesus produced overflowing kindness toward me and showed me that God loved me, me? I feasted on their wonderful fruits and experienced a sense of family I’d long since forgotten… boarding school left a gaping hole – an abyss – between me and life itself… I belonged nowhere. Now this church was bridging that gap, I was one of them immediately, I belonged to the family of Christ. They were helping this baby Christian crawl.

My bible knowledge was zero, so when I read in Matthew 10:37 …He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me – I’m afraid I had a bit of a McEnroe reaction “You can – not be serious”!

I meditated on that to try and understand. Until I did, I just believed it like a child and tried to obey. Our love for loved ones multiplies when Jesus controls our hearts; when He is Lord of our lives. It doesn’t diminish like I feared, it overflows like a gushing waterfall, and is enough to share with others forever, bringing glory to God. Not surrendering to God’s love and honouring Him first, stunts our potential and blocks off love at the source.

Gratitude and forgiveness flow easily when love opens the door to it.

1 Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient and kind; it is not jealous or conceited or proud; love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs; love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth. Love never gives up; and its faith, hope and patience never fail.

Proverbs 10:12 …love covers a multitude of sins. (True love seeks the highest good for another. John MacArthur Study Bible).

She took me to Corfu for my 70th birthday. I’ve always loved the sun, sea and sand and besides it was the place I had my honeymoon and often dreamt of returning there. The love of God never fails, what a blessing!

IS THERE ANYONE OUT THERE?

Posted on by apeaceofmymind
Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

Brain fog – what a blur these past few years have been!

I’d say It stemmed from Covid; shocked into being shut out from the world by law, ostracized from my daughter and son-in-law – my only family. Not permitted to have a broken tooth fixed as people in the 70s were ‘vulnerable’ and had to stay home, developing excruciating sciatica, forbidden to ‘see’ a doctor, so prescribed strong pain-killers over the phone, which I survived on for years ( 8 a day ) in desperation, as I couldn’t walk properly, was the alternative. I ended up lying flat on the floor for relief sometimes.

The devil loves it when you’re low and not coping, its then, he heaps alllll your failures on you to crush you even more, leaving you in a state of unworthiness and totally dejected. And because there’s no one around to counter all those false notions, with a kind word or any kind of practical help, you believe it all.

I could no longer attend my weekly aqua fit class at the gym – no more Pilates classes either. I loved walking to the gym too, but that all stopped. No outlet.

Then I moved! Another huge upheaval for one who is older, lets say.

Although I’m extremely grateful to God for bringing it all about. I was suffering anti social behaviour from a neighbour, but reluctant to say anything due to Covid pressures on everyone, it didn’t feel right. But I hadn’t slept for 18 months and felt tormented and strung out. So when it happened that I could move, I was over the moon and jumped at the opportunity with immense gratitude and praising God. I ordered nice big boxes, tape, rolls of bubble wrapping online and packed up everything in quick time. My daughter and husband moved it all onto the hired van and off loaded it all again on the other side. Stressful, backbreaking stuff. All with masks on too.

The scary part was, once I’d moved, apart from the back ache, everything was new. Where were the shops and Church? What bus goes where? Not to mention doctors and dentists! New neighbours. I felt as if I’d been dumped by a parachute in a big open field nowhere.

A nice Christian lady down the passage, introduced herself and pointed me in the right direction to find a number of practical things, as and when. I was also completely bowled over, when cards were put through my door welcoming me to my new home! That! was very different to what I’d thus far experienced in UK. God is really good.

Doctors; well that was a shock to the system; slashing my prescribed medicines I’d been on for years; no help offered for my sciatica, so found myself eventually having to repeatedly ask for x-ray’s to assess my leg/hip/back pain. They were all less than helpful. Then I took myself to A&E by bus in desperation. Turned out I have osteoarthritis and osteoporosis, as well as sciatica – ( one doctor said I didn’t have sciatica and there was nothing wrong with me, and to keep taking the pills for pain! ) Only after being x-rayed and prescribed strong pain killers by a nice doctor, was I heard. They believed me at last! By this time I was on the third doctors surgery, really nice doctors now. Hallelujah.

It took me years to find my feet, to settle. I wondered about in a blur; as if I didn’t belong. My new flat is half the size of the old one, scaling down to a single bed for the tiny room. No more dressing table to sit at and brush my hair or just do what most women enjoy to do. No cupboards. What a hassle it is finding your clothes if they’re packed away somewhere. Also a surprise to find things I’d forgotten I had. But all in all I am happy here, and praise God I can look out onto lovely trees, green grass, wild animals like foxes and squirrels, with plenty of lovely birds chirping and singing continually. I enjoy watching the seasons come and go, dried out twiggy trees becoming beautiful displays of blossoms then lovely leaves for shade. The birds enjoy it all too. They make my day. Sadly, my poor kitty-cat can no longer jump out the window to eat grass like she used to, and sit in the sun, because we’re on the first floor. But she’s 17 years old now and sleeps a lot, but also sadly, can no longer sleep on my bed, which was nice company for both of us.

Once I’d unpacked everything, I filled many many black bags for charity, who fortunately came round and took it all away. The first time there were 12 bags. They’ve been back a couple of times since. My daughter and husband took away pieces of furniture and the like, off to the recycling centre, I just had no space.

I mention all this, just to say that a move is not easy for one thing, and not having friends, nor a whole lot of confidence, nor the wherewithal to just get in a car and drive out into the country just to feel better, is hard. It is a major knock to the system and you just don’t know what’s happened to you. My seemingly, insignificant little world, had shifted on its axis.

I managed to unpack all my things. I remember walking up the road to try and find my way around and do food shopping; but I found myself sitting on various neighbours garden walls, or just standing still for a while till the pains subsided. I joined another gym up the road, to try and get back into aqua, but I couldn’t walk home again for the pain afterwards. This went on for a year or so. I found it all very embarrassing and stressful.

My previous doctor had booked me in for a colonoscopy which took place a week after I’d moved in. Another hectic experience. My daughter managed to get time off to fetch and carry as it were. Such a blessing to have someone near who knows you at such tricky times. This was all still during Covid so much testing and distancing etc. prior to the procedure. Fortunately all was well.

My broken tooth saga had begun to kick off too after a couple of months. The filling fell out and an abscess had developed. I’d found a dentist who kindly prescribed anti-biotics over the phone judging by the amount of pain I was in. He couldn’t see me until it was gone, but I needed two lots of pills to do this.

When I finally had the large tooth removed from the upper jaw at the back, I was grateful for the relief from the discomfort. But, it wasn’t easy. I recall him saying to the nurse, this tooth is deeply embedded in the jaw pass me a blade will you!

He prescribed strong pain killers to take for after, but when the injections ‘wore off’… !! I cannot put into words how much pain I felt. The swabs of cotton wool in gauze he gave were used up frantically as he warned of bleeding too. I lay on my bed and just cried and cried, and called out to Jesus to help me. Then I thought of him suffering on the cross after all that beating and lashing and nails…for me… I asked him to forgive me for not being able to even bear a simple tooth extraction pain…I felt so useless. I just kept crying. Then an amazing thing happened. I felt – and heard! – my jaw bones moving and creaking/crunching sounds – then unbelievable pain for a few seconds – then nothing – the pain had gone.

My Saviour was with me, then I fell asleep.

My face swelled up and turned all kinds of bruising colours. My Christian lady friend down the passage would knock on my door to see if I needed anything sometimes (still Covid). She said laughingly that I looked as though I’d been in a fight. The bruises went right down to my chest. It was such a horrible thing to look at and most embarrassing so I stayed indoors mostly, but no pain.

My daughter and a couple of long distance friends; one in Cape Town and two in Newbury where I used to live and one in an area too far to get to, kept in touch on WhatsApp regularly, with encouraging words and mostly understanding. Thank God for them.

I was so alone.

Late one night I had terrible chest pains – but being and acid reflux sufferer I took it to be that. But it is easy to feel nervous about things you don’t know, especially in the middle of the night when it always seems to occur. I didn’t want to frighten or upset my daughter either. I was told before though by a nurse, that it is advisable to rather phone the ambulance just in case. This time I did because of the dizziness and strange feelings in my limbs. The ambulance took 5 hours to come. They went to the wrong flat and went back again. Finally I was checked by two capable young ladies when they did arrive – the second lot – and it turned out my hiatus hernia had appeared again. But to hospital I must go. Many tests etc before being sent to A&E, then an hour later saw a doctor who sent me for an x-ray then back to A&E to wait for results. 4 hours later, very cold and weak, I enquired meekly at reception what was happening – they’d forgotten to say all was clear and I could go home. I phoned for cab and came home. I’m managing it now with medication.

Finding a new church…

Then I met another nice Christian lady. My nice neighbour joined me in visiting a church – still Covid restricting times – turned out too far for me to walk to as sciatica ruled. But that’s where I met this new friend who actually lives over the road from my building. They were all lovely and kind and very helpful. But, taking lifts from various people each week at different times felt hard for me – I never knew where I stood, and perhaps I’m just old so felt uncomfortable; a nuisance. But I met nice people. The lovely lady over the road did loads of food shopping for me for many months, she’s still an amazing blessing.

I’m in a nice church now. In fact its the first one I went to with my neighbour during Covid, but wasn’t sure. But I felt the Lord directing me back again. I can get the bus up the road and it stops a block away from the church. But having said that, there’s another nice lady who’s been at the church for many years and willingly lifts my friend down the passage, so I join in if possible.

I moved into my flat just over three years ago, I feel as though I am settling in at last. The roots are taking hold so now I can grow. I hardly take pain killers now.

Romans 8:28 And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

As true believers in Jesus Christ, we really should take care of our bodies, after all it is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in us, and is from God. The bible says we are not our own and we need to live for him according to 1 Corinthians 6:19.