Strong Parents

There are experiences that define each of us and change who we become. In an earlier post I wrote about a car accident my family experienced. It was an experience that changed almost every one in my family. As an older teenager when it happened, I can honestly say it was a traumatic event for me.  However, I can also say that I am so glad for the lessons learned. One of those lessons was the strength of my parents. They are both some of the most amazing people you would ever meet. No matter what life throws at them, you can not keep them down for long. I hope that I can be even a tenth of the kind of parent that they are.

At the time, I could not fully process everything. I was a Senior in high school getting ready for college. I remember I had a history teacher that first semester who was really hard and strict. He was not very understanding of me arriving to school more than 3 days late. I really struggled in the class because of the homework and my deep desire to spend as much time as possible with my parents. Yet, I was really shy and did not have the nerve to tell him my personal struggles. Instead I did the best I could. At the end of the year I left him a small note on the back of my final. I have no idea if he read it or cared, but I really did not want to be judged on my performance that year. It was not my best year in so many ways.

Sometimes it is hard when you are going through bad times to see the light at the end of the tunnel or understand why you are going through the experience. Each and every one of us involved had our own experience and our own way of dealing with it. I can promise you that the Lord wants you to go through whatever it is and not just for you. You are a big influence to your kids and so many other people around you. So take heart if it is one of those rough times for you (divorce, car accident, death of a family member, family drama, financial stress, etc.). Whatever you are going through, I promise you if you take it to the Lord he will eventually help you to know the reason for it. However, I do caution you look up and don't dwell too long in the pity party. It is ok to mourn and be upset for the stresses of life, but do not stay there. Negative never helps lift you up, it just keeps you down. Look for the positives in your life, even if you can not find positives about the current trial.  

My parents example throughout the whole experience and the years afterwards have left an impact on me. As part of a writing class I took at the local library, I was given writing assignments. Since I love my parents and find them inspiring I wrote about each of them for two separate assignments.

The first assignment was to write about someone you admire and I wrote about part of my mother's experience recovering from the accident:

You might not notice a difference in the way she walks unless you really pay attention. Not enough of a difference to cause you to wonder why she walks that way. Nothing that would tell you that for over a decade she has had 3 metal rods and at least 6 screws in the middle of her leg bones keeping them straight and making it possible for her to walk. That she underwent physical therapy at the age of 44 to relearn how to walk. It was months of pain and taking one step literally at a time, to learn how to be able to put one foot in front of the other. Pain that came from her bones melding together with titanium and healing until they became one. Still longer when she finally got home, to take one more stair step each day until she could finally go up the stairs to her own bed again.  
 

Her walk would take years to perfect to get to the point that it is now, where you could hardly tell anything was different about her legs. At first it was almost a duck waddle where the legs were not lifted, but more shifted forward. When she was teased by her children for waddling, it became an exaggerated lift. The knee lift was high and came from the hips and looked painful. Still it wasn't a normal walk and you could tell that something was different about her legs for a few more years.  

She never gave up though and continued to strive to forget the metal and bring her walk and life to some sense of normalcy. The pain would not go away and over the years that small spot of bone missing would only barely start to heal and grow bone. However, keeping her legs covered with pants, stockings, or long skirts would prevent all but the keenest observer from noticing that difference as well. 

Now you can't tell, but that simple walk of hers is a walk of strength. A walk of defiance that you can't keep her down and she will fight whatever battle life has to offer. She will do Crossfit, spinning, bicycling, and anything else she wants. She refuses to be labeled or thought of as handicapped. After all she isn't, just look at her walk.

Later in the series of classes I was given the assignment to write about an object.  I wrote about my dad's screw (It was published in a local newspaper write up on the class):

The over sized callused hands covered in age spots, freckles, and some dark hairs shakes the old-school film canister. A rattle comes from within in response to the shake. He thinks of how no one really uses film anymore, but that isn't why he is drawn toward this container. Nor is it because of the sound that it makes as he shakes it and the screw inside moves around.  

It is that simple screw, a reminder of a wound worthy of Achilles himself. After all it was his Achilles tendon that was snapped in two; in addition to both his ankles being broken. Wounds that a simple screw and a couple casts would fix, but would leave him forever changed. Forever unable to sustain walking for long distances and create a swelling in that right foot and ankle that would dub him "elephantitis foot" from his children.  

Such a small moment in time to affect his body and activities the rest of his life. Isn't life just a collection of these small moments in time. He wondered why he kept this screw, other than the fact that it had at one time been a part of his body. A reminder of that day was not needed, it was in every step and every hard days work. Always there.

He supposed that he could try to do less, but he honestly did not know how. His mind and spirit were hardwired to move and keep active and engaged. Pain is just an opportunity to show strength. The opportunity to break down barriers and grow stronger. Just as muscles scream out in pain as they are torn down, his spirit screamed out in protest to keep moving. And like his muscles, his spirit every day finds the break down as a chance to grow stronger. So why keep the screw; he didn't know other than it was a part of him.

Their example continues to teach me so much.  It just goes to show that a parents job is never over and we always need them. So to all you good parents out there. Take heart, keep doing the best you can and know that it does make a difference.