January 19th: The Pressure is Increased

Again, thanks for your prayers anew. Today, I’d like to ask for your prayers for my mother-in-law, Janet (aka “Grandma B”). We (and by “we” I mostly mean “Sue”) have repented. We realized that we had overstepped our authority in her life: we’ve been pressing forward for the reverse mortgage (which we still believe she desperately needs), taking initiative that belongs to her.

We have stopped that. Last night, we visited with Janet, and explained that it is her decision to live at home, and she is capable of making decisions, and has indicated that she wanted to make this one, so we were leaving it in her hands. We will help; we will not do it for her. She was grateful: there were happy tears and hugs all around, and that part was good. There was a sense of relief on all sides.

She quickly grasped that now she needs to come up with a solution (instead of depending on her daughter to come up with a solution, which she would then oppose), and also grasped that she didn’t have the resources to pay her caregivers.

The good news is that she’s getting stronger: she can get out of her bed, she can get into her wheelchair, and get around. There is food (rather a lot of food) in her refrigerator which she can reach.

The bad news is that her caregivers – knowing that they haven’t been paid for a while and now learning that they wouldn’t be paid for a longer while – have stopped working for her, and have left for jobs that include paychecks. Janet is now on her own. This is fresh news, so we don’t know how she feels about it; Sue is freaking out. She wants to take responsibility for her mom, but knows that she can’t (or at least mustn’t) and she shouldn’t, and there’s a great conflict in her.

We love Grandma B – we really do! – but we must let her make her own decisions, and yet we must also help her without rescuing her. And it would be best if we survived in the process.

In the midst of all this, we have some other fun and exciting things going on. Josiah had just gotten a dream job (barista at our favorite coffee shop near home) and found a car he wants to buy; but the shop just closed, and now he’s looking for work, really looking for the first time. And this weekend, I start co-teaching a prophecy class to a group of gifted individuals from several churches: I’m terribly excited and not just a little intimidated. And TJ is facing some challenges with school that may threaten her graduating with the rest of her class: there are some classes that she’s been taking online that are having challenges, so we’re waiting for books in order to finish the classes.

God warned us that a season like this was coming. The prophetic word said, “I’m going to begin the repotting, re-rooting, re-pruning process so that you can grow into what I need for you to be in order to accomplish my purpose and destiny,” and “You might tell some people around you, “If we get ugly, love us for a while.” Because when God does a process like that, you get ugly for a little while.” I guess we’re getting ugly for a while. Thanks for loving us!

So if you’d pray for Janet and Sue and for our family, I’d appreciate it. Our number one prayer is “God, please accomplish your plans in our family,” but prayers for wisdom, humility, grace, diligence, courage, a job and the like are not out of line! :-)

You’re terrific! Thanks!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! I’m counting on 2008 being an interesting year!

Thanks for your prayers again! It looks like our need for them is ramping up again, particularly in relationship with Sue’s mom, and how Sue’s handling the very substantial stress on that account.

“Grandma B” is unable to live on her own: she can’t get out of bed, use the restroom, or make her own meals by herself. She’s chosen thus far to live at home with caretakers. It’s expensive, really expensive, but good care at a high quality home would be in the same ballpark. She’s exhausted all of her money paying the caretakers; she’s a little stronger, physically, which makes her think she’ll be “all better” real shortly. It appears that she may have been having a series of small strokes which makes progress difficult, as does being 92 years old!

The only choices before her now are to sell her house and move into a nursing home, or to get a reverse mortgage, use the proceeds to pay her in-home care, and continue to live at home. (Obviously, there are limits on how long those funds will last; that’s a concern, but for another day.)

She steadfastly refuses to move to a home, which is fine, except she has convinced herself that she can not or should not consider a reverse mortgage either. That leaves her the option of living on her own, and there are two problems with that: 1) she can’t live on her own. 2) we’ve already been informed by elder-care advocates that if she does attempt to live on her own, they are legally required to report her as “at risk” and “unsafe”, and at that point, the state steps in, and she loses all say in the matter: she will be moved to a nursing home (we are told) against her will.

Since we don’t want her in a home against her will, we’re moving forward with the reverse mortgage; we should have done it a month ago, when she was in favor of it. Now she is not; she’s angry, hurt, confused. Did I say “angry”? Boy howdy. She’s making completely baseless accusations against everyone, she has disowned Sue & me (again), declaring “I have no daughter!” She’s seeing the attorney this week, we presume to change her will (again). As you might imagine, it’s tough to take. Yeah, she’s in a tough place, but her confusion and her choices (past and present) are making it much worse than it needs to be.

So Sue & I are dealing with stress-induced challenges in great quantity. We hurt physically, emotionally, and some other “ally”s.

This is going to sound funny: we’re also working on finding our place in the church in this community. We stopped attending our church (GloryHouse: cool place) at what we believe was God’s instruction. Hindsight would support that conclusion; we could not have coped with our past several months had we still carried those responsibilities, and we’re too strong-willed to lay it down when times are tough.

We feel that God has not called us out of one Sunday morning gathering in order to plug into another, so we’re looking at non-standard models. We’ll explore house church, home groups, and other Revolutionary options. We’ll definitely stay in relationship with church – with several of them in fact – but probably not become members of any. In fact, it looks like I’ll be teaching at a couple of congregations in the next several weeks. Sue & I are hoping to be on the SOZO ministry team with one church. If you’re needy, sometimes it’s good to give; we hope to practice that.

Oddly perhaps, in the midst of all of this, we’re observing that our marriage is growing stronger; our hands-on relationship with God is also growing stronger. We see this as (in Paul’s words) “light and momentary trials” that lead to greater things, and we find ourselves excited. Pretty cool: we limp, but we dance with that limp!

Please pray for Grandma B (“Janet”): for clarity, for understanding, for peace, for trust, for whatever else you can think of. She’s in a tough place. Please pray for our health: physically, emotionally, relationally, psychologically, spiritually (let’s see, what else is there?) You might also pray for both of our finances: Janet’s and ours; this whole process has been very costly.

Thanks again for your prayers!

David