Coming home from the hospital was overwhelming. I was still in a whole lot of pain and needed precise medication dosing. I slipped pretty hard in my codependency recovery during this season. It was just so much easier to become passive and let others take care of me when I was in the hospital. When I got home, though, reality sank in. My illusion of safety in my life had been shattered, and I was terrified all the time. I didn’t like to leave my house at all, but even at home I faced the fear of someone coming in and attacking. I don’t think I had ever been this aware of my own mortality. One of my ways of dealing with my lack of control in my life was to try to hyper control everything and everyone else. I fanatically managed my own medication schedule and really wouldn’t allow my husband to help me, even though he was willing. I became very particular about how I wanted things. I only have vague memories from this period, but I am certain I was a bear to live with.

I turned 50 three weeks after I came home, and I was very disappointed that I couldn’t have the ’80s party I had envisioned. I was cleared to eat a soft (read: pureed) diet on my actual birthday and so my husband and friends planned a small get-together for me on the Saturday I had originally planned to hold my party. It was another example to me of Dad’s love through others, and I was struck again by how these people He had put in my life cared for me. And the blessing of actually being able to eat a little bit instead of taking nourishment through a PEG tube was amazing, even if it did have the consistency of baby food.

I found great comfort during that season just sitting on my front porch. I would sit there and listen to the breeze and the birds and pretend that Jesus was sitting in the chair next to me. And I would talk to Him. A lot. Out loud. I think I grew even closer to Him as I began to process my terror of life outside my haven, and the fact that I did not recognize the face I saw in the mirror. At the same time, Scriptures kept coming to mind about how I was supposed to rejoice in everything and give thanks. The one that really hammered home a lot was Hebrews 12:2 (CSB): “…for the joy that lay before Him, He endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” I agonized over these verses because I knew I was not rejoicing or being thankful. One morning, I poured out my heart to Him because I could tell that the old fear of not measuring up and being rejected by Him for being disobedient was rising in me again. He showed me the Garden of Gethsemane, and Jesus crying out there before He went to the cross. And Dad asked me, “Do you think He was rejoicing then?” Having that visual and recognizing that Jesus also wrestled over doing Dad’s will renewed my hope. It showed me that it is okay to wrestle with Dad. He welcomes my wrestling. If I am wrestling with Him, then I am not giving up. My faith was strengthened and settled in my relationship and security with Him again.

Until March. I had been struggling with a persistent infection for a number of months. I was receiving hyperbaric oxygen therapy in the hopes that it would heal the infection, but by late March it was clear that it had not accomplished what my surgeon had hoped, and I was looking at another surgery. It was also becoming apparent that my initial custom-made hardware had failed on one side so I was going to need either an internal replacement or an external one. I burst into tears when she told me. I already felt so uncomfortable in my own body. The idea of having an external frame outside my jaw to hold it in place was so devastating. I had also learned a bit more about the details of what happened the day I was shot, and I was suddenly hit with this internal question: was this allowance or causation? Did Dad ALLOW this to happen to me or was I CHOSEN for it? I was the only other person hit besides the original target, and I realized later, from reading the report and doing some deductive reasoning, that I was actually hit by the first bullet. This threw me into a tailspin. There were a lot of other people around that day. Why was I the one shot? I was back to wrestling.

Here is where I am very glad for recovery. I am glad that recovery has taught me that it is okay to be angry at Dad. He is big enough to take it. And He wants honesty most between us. No one else could answer this question for me, so I went to the only One who could. No answer. That hurt. I was hoping for an easy answer. Years ago, when processing through my sexual abuse as a child, it was so healing for me when He told me that He gave us free will, and He wouldn’t violate my abuser’s will any more than He would violate mine. But He did show me all the ways that He showed up and provided for me in that season, even though I didn’t know Him yet. I was asking the same here…tell me something that will make this easier to understand and accept.

Crickets.

It was really the first time since all this happened that Dad went silent. And here I was again, wrestling. I reached out to the therapist I had been seeing before all this and made an appointment. I was angry that this was my lot. I was angry that my face had been irrevocably changed. I was angry that all the work I had done to learn to love myself was for nothing because now I didn’t even feel like me anymore. I was furious. This wasn’t fair. And here I was, facing another major surgery when I had JUST gotten to the point where I could do normal things again like sleep on my right side and chew actual food. This would put me right back to the beginning again, and I was not happy. My therapist encouraged me to create a “Book of Remembrance”: a single place where I could record everything Dad has ever told me, taught me, provided for me, and all the ways He has shown up for me-a record of Dad’s faithfulness TO ME in the past so that I don’t have to go digging through years of journals to find it. I did NOT want to do this exercise. I wanted to be angry. I wanted Him to know I felt this was very unfair. And then memories started flooding in of other times I had felt similarly and Dad came through. Not on my schedule, but He always delivered. It didn’t always look like what I wanted or expected, but it always ended up being better.

The more I wrote, the more I realized it didn’t really matter which it was. I am following Jesus to the Celestial City, and whatever difficulties and hardships I bear along the way in this life are opportunities for me to see Him better, to know His love more deeply, and to be able to share with others what He has done in my life because the hardships and struggles have never been the end of the story. The end of the story is that I am His and He is mine and nothing and no one in this life can ever take that away. I say with Simon Peter, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and KNOW that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6: 68-69 CSB; emphasis mine). He is my Rock. My refuge. My Safety and Security. When everything else gives way, He is the One to whom I run and find shelter and rest.