Trust

I have been writing in my head for several weeks now. When I can't sleep, which is often, my thoughts become even more introspective and I work through them by thinking about them even more and writing essays in my head. I think its time to commit some of my internal ramblings to ink... or typeface.

Part of me doesn't know where to begin with this subject because, while it is easy to pinpoint where it began, it permeates most aspects of my life. It is a subject that lends itself to many tangents.

My problem has grown worse over the years. At first it attacked only at night. It was frequent at first but eventually subsided. Then after certain life events it started knocking on my door again, as unwelcome as ever. At first the visits were few and far between but as time progressed the visits became more frequent and they felt more viscous.

These gruesome visitors of which I write are nightmares. They aren't your run of the mill menaces where you wake up running away from a bad guy or realize, no, you weren't just in public buck naked. I wish. No, these nightmares come and steal my family. My loved ones.

It all started in 1981. The year my dad died. He died a few months before my 5th birthday. He was 27 and had 3 children, 7, 4 1/2 and 18 months. He had a known heart condition for which he had seen a cardiologist. He was told he was going to need a pacemaker by age 40. They were off by 13 years. His heart went into some sort of fibrillation, he went into a coma and died in the early hours of the morning as he was watching the news in the living room.

I could tell you all about that morning. I didn't really know what was going on. The walls in my parents room was pulsating red and I think blue, from the paramedics parked out front. My mom must have taken me and my brothers and put us in her room while the paramedics were in the house. I stood at the head of the bed and peered over the headboard, looking at the still dark outside where the ambulance lit up our street with its lights.

Wanting to know what was going on I opened the bedroom door but mom was standing right there and she very quickly shut it. I lied and told her I had to go to the bathroom - my older brother joined the lie and mom ushered us the few feet from the bedroom to the bathroom, trying to shield us from seeing our dad but I managed to peer around her legs and just saw a figure with a cloth draped over it and really tall people milling about with clipboards.

I had no idea. I didn't cry until I was at my grandma's house. I sat on the couch while all of the adults sat at the dining room table, their tones were low and hushed; the coffee they sipped was hot as I heard some them trying to get just a few drops at a time without burning their lips. The most noise was made when they set their mugs on the table. My grandpa called my dad's mom and told her the news. It was a small house and the distance wasn't that great from where the phone was mounted on the wall to where I was sitting on the couch but I still heard my grandma scream on the other end of the line. When my mom came home from wherever she was, the coroner's office, maybe, I ran to her and asked, "Did he make it?" She said no - maybe everyone thought I knew or didn't know how to talk to me or they were all in shock themselves. I ran to the couch and cried. I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. I don't know how long I cried for, it felt like days.

Soon after that the nightmares started.

Of course I had fantasy dreams where my dad was with us on Christmas morning. I would wake up happy for a split second before I realized it was a dream. I would prefer those heart wrenching dreams any day over the nightmares. For a long time it was the same nightmare. My family was in a house that was a huge spool - the kind you would wrap industrial cable around - and it would catch fire and start rolling down a hill. I have no idea how long that nightmare went on for.

Fortunately, we talked about my dad a lot. There was no nonsense about ignoring what had happened and not talking about him to avoid sad feelings. If we wanted to talk about my dad we were given free reign. I think that helped my waking self but it did nothing for the nighttime.

Eventually the nightmares subsided. My nights were filled with peaceful sleep for many years. Then sometime in high school they slowly started again. Sometimes I had pleasant, if not bizarre dreams. I used to keep a journal of my dreams because they were so darn entertaining. One dream I remember vividly involved stealing milk from a fabric store (which was inside my grandparents motor home) and being chased by an animated superman turned into a red streak when he chased a mob of people after an earthquake - and the mob turned around and chased superman. Hilarious stuff.

I wish every night brought such great entertainment. When the nightmares came back they were few and far between but they involved one of my brothers, mom or step dad meeting an untimely end. After the first "showing" of the nightmare my mind would replay it over and over with alternate endings. I think I was trying to take away the bad ending but it would just change, always resulting in death.

The nightmares really ramped up when my older brother had his first daughter and my younger brother moved to Oklahoma. Ike and Joel were always dying - usually together. Then I think my niece was always in danger. I would wake up with my pillow drenched in tears. Even when I was awake I couldn't shake that awful feeling even though I knew everyone was ok. If I went back to sleep too soon the nightmare would continue. So I learned to pray and read my bible a bit before going back to sleep. That usually worked and brought me back from the edge.

As I got older the nightmares became more frequent. I think I woke Ryan up once or twice and asked him to pray for me.

All hell broke loose, or so I thought, when I was pregnant with Gavin. It seemed like most nights there was someone trying to kill me or steal my baby. Then Gavin was born. That's when hell came to visit me during the day. It's one thing to have Satan and his minions knocking at your door when you are unconscious, but to have him grab your heart in the middle of the day is another thing altogether. The daytime terror subsided as Gavin got older and I wasn't so concerned with always making sure he was breathing - which is, as I understand, not all that uncommon for a new parent.

It doesn't take anything now for me to have a nightmare. Hearing a story about a kid being kidnapped on the news. The toddler who woke up from his nap while his mom was also napping and got outside and drowned in the pool. Flipping through the tv channels and seeing a mangled stroller in the road on the news, staying in a high rise hotel with a balcony, visiting my in-laws whose back yard terminates into a canyon (it's fenced now but it doesn't keep my brain from conjuring up ways Gavin can get around the barriers).

The nightmares come in waves. I'll have a horrible couple of nights or weeks. Even worse is when a horrible though pops into my head when Gavin is not with me. I know Ryan is a good dad. He's very concerned about Gavin's safety but that doesn't stop me from freaking out. Ryan knows how devastating these nightmares are so he is very good about not taking offense when I grill him on safety issues. Every so often I check in to make sure he wouldn't leave Gavin in the tub unattended even if it was to go answer his phone, that he cuts grapes in half because they are a choking hazard, that he wouldn't leave him unattended on the balcony (like in the hotel where we stayed in Hawaii). Once I'm certain Gavin is safe and Ryan is acutely aware of the dangers that surround our son I can breath easier.

I know how to stop the nightmares once they start. Wake up, get out of bed, pray (which usually involves me just begging God to make it stop), watching TV, reading... anything to get my mind on something else. Then I can usually fall back asleep with no more attacks. Until the next night, at least.

What I would really like to do is to stop the nightmares from happening in the first place. There's the rub. I have been told to trust God. Well, sure. Trust the God who guarantees nothing other than his faithful, undying love. It's just I know what that pain feels like when a loved one dies. It is all consuming and it crushes you, eviscerates you. I don't ever want to feel that again. If that is how I felt when my dad died.... I can't even write it out.

If something were to happen to my family I know God would love me and see me through but that does nothing to stop the fear and nightmares. I trust God that if our home was taken away, if Ryan lost his job, that we would still have a good life. Food would be there, we would have some sort of shelter.

I'm not concerned about the day to day issues of life. I'm concerned about life. Period.

How can I trust that God will spare my family from death when he didn't spare my dad? It seems unfair and unrealistic to have God shelter me and my family while the rest of the world can fend for itself. I look at the life of the disciples - all of whom, except one, met an early horrible death.

That doesn't sit well with me. I know that God doesn't love anyone person more than another and that all of our good deeds aren't stored up in a cosmic safety bank where He he checks the account and says, "Well, April. You've read your bible and said your prayers and gave money to the poor so I will keep you and your family safe."

Over Lent my pastor was talking about giving up fear instead of chocolate or TV.

How?

I know that fear isn't keeping my family safe unless I think I would be less vigilant if I thought my children be given full, long lives.

I should probably see a shrink about this but how are they going to help me trust God who I know loves me but makes no guarantees. If only God told me to carve into tablets, not the 10 commandments, but the promise that my children will all live long, healthy productive lives all the while serving Him then Iwould have it in writing.

Christians often point to Job as an example of God's faithfulness. Sure, he gave Job lots of stuff and a bigger family but only after he allowed his first family to be wiped out. I don't want a new family - I want to keep the ones I have.

Many, many people balk when I answer "3-4" when they ask me how many kids I want. I hear all of the reasons why one or two is better than 3 or 4. Like I'm a bad person for wanting a big family. Or at least just crazy.

Now that I think about crazy may be one of the factors. I know 3 people who have had children die at a young age. One woman, Anne (was in her 90's when I met her at the adult care facility where I worked) lost her only daughter when she was returning home to visit while in college. Anne kept a framed photo of her beautiful daughter on her nightstand. It always made me so sad knowing Anne lived so long without her child. My high school band teacher lost his only daughter in a car accident on her way home from college - now he has one child, his son. My grandmother had 4 children. Dennis died when he was 2 from pneumonia and my dad died when was 27. Now she has two kids. What if she only had my dad and Dennis to begin with? She would be left with no children.

As I get further and further in this post I feel better and better. There is of course some time put into writing all of this which puts some distance between and the nightmare but I think writing it out also helps. I hope sharing it helps, too. Me and whoever reads it. I'm not putting this out there for people to feel sorry for me but I think we all grow when we can share in another person's anguish. I think Ryan would disagree with that, though. He hates it when I tell him sad stories (not my own - he's a good husband, he listens) because he doesn't like to feel such pain. He's a good guy, he wants everyone to be happy.

Too bad for him he married a melancholy woman who bleeds for everyone else around her.