The Pain of Parenting a Suffering Child
I have had to walk through some tough, horrible days (years) as a parent.
I mean, really tough! Life altering tough! Gut wrenching tough!
And I am not alone. Many of my friends have their own almost unimaginable hardships and trials in parenting their older “children” – navigating uncharted waters of terrible things that they could not have conceived of in earlier years of parenting – things that make a mockery of every complaint ever lodged about “terrible toddler” years. I won’t even dare to name these because they are the kind of things that are only shared within close trusted circles because it is too hard to speak the words out loud.
Every one of these parents are loving Christian parents who raised their children to love the Lord. One might wonder, “Where is the fruit of God’s promises to me and to my children?” “Why do some families appear to have great blessing and no trials?”
What went wrong?
What did I do wrong?
Scars of Love
But time goes on and some of those children have already come through “to the other side” – but not all without the smell of smoke still clinging.
Sometimes I remember the heartache of the worst of those days – the days when I thought that my heart was irreparably broken – when Satan’s lies and rejection crushed me – when hopelessness consumed me – when I cried so hard that my eyes were swollen shut. How would it be possible to forgive the ugly words and ugly deeds?
Although the years have healed and brought joy and thankfulness as we have discovered that God’s arms are indeed big enough to hold and comfort, strengthen and act on our behalf; we will always carry the scars of love. There will likely be more.
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