Faith, again

I'm still pondering my faith question in my last post. I still don't have an answer. I'm just hanging on for dear life.

We rearranged our living room to accommodate a bed and a night table for Sissy's "space". We don't want to call it her "room" because the ideology is that she will work toward relationship with us and toward feeling safe and eventually return to room-sharing with Wonder Girl. But we also want to acknowledge that the transition from RTC to home will be challenging for all and a quiet space to herself may be very beneficial. A quiet space, I might add, that is very close to me. I don't miss the fact that as Mom, I play the largest roll in Sissy's healing.

We've got king size flat sheets for curtains that will represent the walls of her space and a motion sensor so we'll know when she's wandering at night. Previously we used the baby monitor in the girls' room which works but isn't perfect for alerting me to night time habits, in part because I'm a hard sleeper. Luckily, the girls' bunk beds were actually stackable twin beds with nearly a foot clearance from the floor, allowing ample space for storage. A quick trip to the dollar store netted me three bins, two with locking lids. It looks quite cozy, actually and although when all was said and done, I had a quiet cry to myself in the bathroom (the only place a woman can get 10 minutes to herself) because it still feels so underhanded and mean, I know it is the right thing to do. The bottom line is safety and ease in transition for her and us.

Sissy cried bitterly on the phone when The Dad told her what some of the plans at home would be upon her return, although he did not breathe a word of her projected discharge date. Tonight's the night she's supposed to call us, let's see if she pulls it off. Tomorrow i brave the 6 hour round trip with Wonder Girl and Aspie Boy in tow for a family therapy session in that tiny, sensory-nightmarish space of a therapist's office. I'm really crossing my fingers that Aspie Boy, who is pretty high-strung lately, will be off his rocker after the trip and extremely excitable by the tiny room (small spaces make him unnerved) thereby causing the type of reaction Sissy typically gives us at home, which is highly combative. I want the therapist to witness this. I want her to know what I'll have going on when Sissy returns. I want it in writing. I want insurance to know.

Attending church today, the children learned about the four friends that lowered their fifth, paralyzed friend, through the roof of the building Jesus was in, believing without question, that Christ would heal their friend. And of course, Jesus cites their faith as the impetus for the healing he did in fact, provide. The paralyzed man being told to get up and walk, to take his mat and go home. Faith. It comes to faith, again. Faith that God is capable, that nothing is impossible for him. Nothing.

Just when I think I've hoed the hardest road in my life, I get to the next row and it always proves to be harder. Maybe faith is sustaining me even now as I mentally prepare my aching muscles to raise the hoe again and strike the rocky, hard soil. Maybe I need to imagine myself as one of those four friends, tearing out the tile of a roof for their paralyzed friend. Maybe preparing the room for Sissy is my physical effort in faith.

I'm going to look back on this time in my life and be amazed. That's the faith I'm clinging to. That in the future, I'll see how Christ ordered my steps and paved a path for me and my family. But right now, in the middle of it, staring at this fallow field and the acres of untilled, unyielding earth feeling alone and uncared for, I want to chuck my hoe after breaking it in two and run away.