Who Am I? Part 2 ~ My Testimony

If you haven't read the first part of my testimony, you can catch up here.

My parents were far from perfect, but the most important, most precious gift they ever gave me was to raise me in a Christian home. I knew from the time I was a very little girl that what I saw in them was real. No matter what kind of problems we had or faced as a family, I knew that they truly loved the Lord and they tried to do the best they could. But, life is not always kind, and I have found that sometimes when you grow up in chaos, you become comfortable with it. So much so that many times you unconsciously create your own at the very same time you are trying like heck to pull yourself out of it. You crave normalcy, and yet once you have it in the slightest measure, you panic. It feels uncomfortable and unnatural. And while you are waiting for the roof to cave in on you, you inevitably create more chaos/drama somewhere else in your life. It's comfortable, and you know how to survive and function in it. It's a vicious cycle, and it's not pretty. But when it is all you know, and you grow up in it, you can't always see it for what it is. Even when you are faced with the stark reality of it all, you can try to do better- to be better. But it isn't easy. The road seems to be filled with stumbling blocks at every turn. And sometimes you fall down over and over again. You're lucky if you can reach out and take God's hand and let Him help lift you up out of the mess you've made. It is very hard for me to write about this. Most of you know that my parents have passed and I don't want to do anything that would mar their memory or disrespect them in any way. But, I want to be truthful about where I've come from and what the Lord has brought me through, because that is where my testimony lies. I used to feel intimidated about giving or sharing my testimony, because I don't have some great conversion story to tell. But, I am a testament to how God can take something broken and make something beautiful out of it.

Addiction has plagued my family for generations. Alcohol runs deep in our veins and seems to be a part of an everyday ritual within our environment. I know it has destroyed lives four generations deep within my family and is as wide spread as it is long. I can not name one living family member who hasn't been touched by it and changed by it's devastation in some way. It is a very powerful disease. My mom struggled to free herself from the strong hold it had on her until the day she died. I don't think my parents realized for a long time that she was an alcoholic. I remember a story she told me once of how she fell a part when she found out one of her brothers had been murdered. She was hysterical, and my dad couldn't calm her down. Being an old fashioned military man, he was raised in a time when emotion was a sign of weakness, and frankly, he didn't know what to do with her. He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, telling her to stop it. She was still crying hysterically when he slapped her, sat her down and then set a drink in front of her and told her to pull herself together. I don't think my mom ever had a single safe place in her life to express her emotions, which only perpetuated her drinking all the more. She survived extreme poverty, abuse (both physical and sexual,) neglect and abandonment, as well as the effects that addiction had on her own family growing up. As I came to know my mother as a woman in my adult life, I was utterly amazed that she emerged out of that part of her life as a whole, sane person. And I think she tried to drowned out the memory of it all in her drinking.

My mom would drink herself to sleep a lot when I was younger, but as the disease progressed, it seemed to wake a rage within her. It was never directed towards me, but it was in turn met with an equal and ample amount of anger and rage from my dad. He did not deal well with her drinking. And when she was drinking, they could really tear each other a part. I always hid when the yelling turned to blows and breaking of furniture. I'll never forget one night hiding under the pool table as I watched blood fall down around my feet. I never remember being scared, just very sad. I always knew that Jesus was protecting me. And I would talk to Him kinda like you would an imaginary friend. But, He was very real to me even then, and I believed in Him with my whole heart. I knew I was safe and that He was with me.

I had to draw upon the comfort and strength I found in His presence when I finally faced my own anger toward my parents. I felt very used by them both, like a pawn in some kind of game they played to hurt each other. They would fight, she would drink, they would fight some more. Then she would take me and leave. We would fly half way across the country to be with her family until he apologized and then we'd return. This happened at least two or three times. Or he would take me and leave and we'd live some where else for a while. She wouldn't be allowed to pick me up from school or dance. (I remember a teacher actually hiding me in a closet one time in school so my mom would think I had already been picked up. I'm sure the teacher thought she was doing what was best for me, since she 'd been told my mother was a danger to me, but it hurt me none the less, and I felt very ashamed.) I remember my dad even pulled me out of school at one point and had a lady watching me at her house during the day, just so my mom couldn't find me. It was only for a couple of weeks. Until of course they made up and we were all back together again. I felt like a rag doll being pulled back and forth between them. After years of the drinking and fighting, false hopes of recovery (she was in and out of six different rehab hospitals in six years,) and the looming threats of divorce, we finally moved out of state again with my dad's job. It was a new start for all of us and my mom prayed long and hard for the Lord's help with her sobriety. She quit drinking and stayed clean for almost twenty years. That was June 1,1986.

When my mom quit drinking, it was as if it had never happened. I closed the door to that part of my life and walked away. I did what I could to get passed the anger and hurt I had and tried to concentrate on building a normal relationship with both of my parents. It wasn't perfect, but it was good. Finally, I felt like I'd found some peace. (I can hear the devil laugh even now, at my false sense of security.) The most difficult challenge of my personal life was yet to come.