{FAITH OVER FEAR} Motherhood, A Journey Of Trust

She will be 19 on Sunday. Where have these years gone? Am I really old enough to have a daughter turning 19!

I don’t share much about my children, partially because it’s their stories to tell one day, and it’s my job to cover them while they figure it all out.

However, there is this other part, that if I’m totally honest, it’s the part where it’s sometimes easier to live behind the perception of another than to be vulnerable. Yet, stay there long enough, and you’ll discover it’s a ridiculous amount of work, and simply not worth it!

Today, with Kaitlyn’s permission, I want to share my Faith Over Fear story of motherhood.

When I held that little angel in my arms 19 years ago, I was 25 and the world was my canvas! I was young in the Lord and discovering my own identity. What could I possibly know about raising a child? Looking back now, NOTHING!

Kaitlyn’s never been one for patience, and she showed that coming into the world six weeks early – weighing in at a mere four pounds! She was perfect in my eyes, and to me she would be everything I could never be and more! I would do it all better than those who had gone before me.

We weren’t parents for very long before we realized something wasn’t right. She wasn’t doing what all of the other babies were doing. She wasn’t reaching enough miles stones to keep me from worrying, but not missing enough to worry the doctors.

That wrestling match between physician and parent went on for years until she was finally diagnosed as developmentally delayed in both gross and fine motor skills, and the long journey of occupational and speech therapy began. As she became school age, her diagnosis enlarged to include Specific Learning Disabled – which wasn’t very specific at all.

For years I sat in the world of blame. Was it the wine I drank before I realized I was pregnant? Maybe I should have been more persistent with the doctor about her kick-counts during my pregnancy. I should have taken those prenatal vitamins the entire time I was pregnant! The torment wouldn’t end! 

I wanted answers, I wanted a label, and I wanted to blame someone ~ only I was the one who carried her in my belly, so the blame started and ended with me! Year after year, appointment after appointment, the condemnation only increased, and was magnified by her every battle!

Seared forever in my mind, are the never-ending, heart-crushing moments I’ve witnessed as she has struggled to be like everyone else.

The endless nights I cried out to God to answer her prayers, answer my prayers, and make her like everyone else! Make her brain and body function, as they were intended to! The worry I’ve stored in my heart wondering how she will ever make it on her own keeps the fear of the future in the forefront of my mind.

The endless doctor appointments, therapy appointments, and IEP meetings at the time seemed so overwhelming, and they often took me to the very end of my being.

Looking back, it was all preparing me for a fight I hadn’t expected.

See, on top of all of that, my daughter has struggled with severe anxiety and depression for the past 10 years of her life. It’s a silent battle that rages deep within her, and it storms the walls of our home like a raging wildfire trying to consume everything in its path. It makes the worst IEP meeting, doctor appointment, or medical report look like child’s play.

I’ve never felt more helpless, disappointed, discouraged, or alone as I have battling this demon with her. My ministry is to women. I mentor, speak, teach, and encourage women daily – but the one woman growing up under my roof I’ve fought to reach, only to feel I fail more than I have succeeded.

I’ve watched her lose all of her friends over and over again, because they just can’t deal with it. I’ve sat outside her bedroom door talking her down from suicide, and I’ve hidden all the sharp objects to run interference as she resorted to self-harm.

I’ve prayed for wisdom, help, and deliverance – to watch her come up for air only to be pushed back under again!

I cannot tell you the amount of times I’ve asked how in the world we got here.

How could holding that little angel in my arms get to here? What type of parent am I? How could I possibly minister to others if I cannot even minister to my own child? How can I pray for healing and deliverance and watch woman after woman be healed, but fall so short of my own flesh and blood?

BUT GOD!

There is a constant thread of faith being woven amongst this chaos. A thread where my faith snuffs out my fear and my hope is made new because of my God.

Over and over GOD has spared our daughter’s life. From birth when she stopped breathing 24-hours after delivery. To when He encountered her in her bedroom during a time she attempted to end her own life.

It is my faith in my God, who I know authors our stories, that keeps me persevering.

It is faith in a bigger plan, which helps me see beyond the chaos and pain.

It is faith that she has a song in her soul, which will be sung out of the rejection, and isolation she has endured.

It is faith that He breathes life on that which is dead, and she WILL share it in spite of the temptation of death, which taunts her in her mind.

How can I have this type of faith? Because of the One in whom I trust!

Like Abraham with Isaac, so Kaitlyn is my Isaac. And as Abraham placed the fulfillment of God’s promise upon an altar, so have I with Kaitlyn.

Like Abraham, I have come to believe that even when it looks like God is taking something from me, it’s only to bring it back to life and place it right back into my hands!

 Hebrews 11: 19 say, “Abraham reasoned that even if Isaac died God was able to raise him from the dead.”

Abraham trusted God for the things beyond his control. Knowing that whatever was in God’s control, God would make live!

In spite of my daily trials, and the cavernous pain I live with as I watch her battle life, I have come to continually ask God to increase my faith like Abraham’s when it comes to my children!

Through that request, He alone has taught me to stand upon the promises of God. Like Abraham, I stand on the word of God for Kaitlyn’s life and for Joshua’s life.

God’s given me an understanding that no matter what she or this family goes through; in the end God can make what is dead come to life and what is broken completely whole!

It’s the very essence of Remade Ministries – God takes what is dead and brings it to life. He takes what is discarded and brings it into community. God takes what is broken and restores it!

As humans, we naturally trust what we know. I’ve come to know my God through this journey called motherhood. So, when it comes to my children, the safest place to put my trust is in the hands of the one who created them and gave them to me.

{NOW YOUR TURN} If you’ve made it all the way to the end of this exceptionally long blog, now I want to hear from you! What are you battling in motherhood? What promises are you standing on for your children? Let’s continue the conversation in the comments below.