Home for Christmas

My daughter wrote this wonderful poem the other day. Let’s not forget the ones who are unable to be home with their loved ones for Christmas.

From Russia’s mountains to Iran,
Alaska, Georgia, Afghanistan.
Soldier’s wives and Army men
Have hope to be together again.

A little girl with curly hair
Dimpled cheek and skin so fair
“Daddy, please – you are so far,
Come home for Christmas – missed you are.”

Tears trickle down a woman’s face
Her hair disheveled – out of place
Crying softly, whispers low
“Come home, my dear – I miss you so.”

A troubled man sits in his tent,
At home in place his thoughts are meant.
His wife – his child – oh, to be near!
For Christmas time to spread the cheer.

This Christmas we must not forget
Of those whose Christmas they’ll regret
That together they could not be
With family gathered ‘round the tree.

For soldier standing in harm’s way
For wives and children we must pray
God keep them safe, for Christmas may
They be together – glad, glad day.

– By Sharon R.

December 2008

Identifying Compassion Fatigue

Identifying “Compassion Fatigue”

My Beloved has a tremendous opportunity to help those that are coming back from war who are wounded.  Many of these are not actually physically wounded, but are experiencing varying degrees of PTSD, or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. 

While meeting with the chaplain of the wounded soldiers, My Beloved came to understand that the greatest need in this area is the staff members who work with the wounded soldiers.  “My staff really needs help,” the chaplain told him.  “They are constantly dealing with those who are high need, and when one group has sufficiently recovered and moved on, another high-needs group takes their place.  My staff is constantly dealing with individuals in crisis, and they are experiencing Compassion Fatigue.”

I have never heard of the term “Compassion Fatigue” before, but I have heard of, and experienced “Burnout.”  In my life, I have experienced both “Home School Burnout,” and “Ministry Burnout.”  These were times when I was pouring out, pouring out, and pouring out, and never able to take enough in to retain my sanity.  Looking back, they were some of the hardest times of my life.

I have buried one of my own babies, lost my own mother to the grave, and through tears sold most everything that I owned and moved hundreds of miles away from anyone I knew and loved in order to minister.  But through those times, I was undergirded by the support and love of my family and felt the presence of the Lord.  Those times seem to have been easier to deal with than the awful loneliness of feeling like I am running on a treadmill and can’t get off.  It is in times of hopelessness that we experience “burnout,” or “compassion fatigue.” 

As mothers, we are always doing for others, giving to others, and pouring out of our own lives.  What happens when we reach the end of our resources?

I know in my life, some of the symptoms of Compassion Fatigue are:

–          Withdrawal from others

–          Constantly physically tired

–          Absent-minded

–          Preoccupied

–          Unable to think through simple tasks

–          Distaste for group situations, especially regarding noise

If you or someone you love is experiencing some or all of these, take a few minutes to pour yourself a cup of relaxing tea, prop your feet up, and read what God did for Elijah in 1 Kings 19. 

A New Kind of War

Joe was ratcheting on a bolt at the diesel repair shop where he worked when it happened.  It was such a small thing that no one else seemed to notice it, but the explosive sound that came from a blown tire out on the street caused Joe to drop his tools and hit the ground, clasping his hands over his head as he had done so many times in Iraq.

For an awful instant, it all came flooding back: the shouts, explosions, and the incredible noise.  The fear – that cold, gripping fear –  pounded in his ears and sweat poured from his face.  Then as quickly as it happened, the awful scene passed away and he found himself back in his shop, strangely on the floor.

He was just dusting himself off when his boss, Jerry, came around the corner.  “Are you doing ok, man?” Jerry asked, putting his hand on his shoulder. 

“Yeah,” Joe replied nervously.  “I guess I just thought I’d take a break and rest a bit,” he joked.

“Well, if you need to get yourself a soda and relax for a few minutes, you can,” Jerry told him. 

“Thanks, boss.  I may just do that.”

As Joe popped the can of soda and took his first sip, his thoughts went back to his tour of duty in Iraq.  Though he was only twenty-three, he felt so old sometimes.  After seeing several of his best friends die, and then coming upon some other casualties of war, he knew he would never be the same.  Though he had the same body, he was a different person.

His mind went back to the time he came home from Iraq.  As he hugged his wife for the first time in a year and a half, her tears mingled with her laughter as she whispered in his ear, “I’m so glad to have you back!”  He knew she meant every word of it, but she was not prepared for the fact that he had changed.    There was many a late-night discussion, and many tears were shed, but finally she came to understand how badly he needed her to just love him anyway.  His wife was a special lady.

As Joe finished up the last of his soda and headed back to his bay, he smiled as he thought of his wonderful “support group”: the Lord, his wife, his boss, and his church.  He was waging a new kind of war now, an internal one that can only be won by the reinforcement of those near and dear to him.

****************

Joe suffers from a mild form of PTSD – Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Many of our soldiers coming back from the war are experiencing varying degrees of PTSD, and need our support and love.  If you know of anyone who has been in Iraq, Afghanistan, or any other combat, they need to know that those who are closest to them love them!

 

Monday Musings on the Military

Meet the “real” Jamie Martin!

 

A few weeks ago as I was pondering about writing the story, “Alone, Yet Not Alone,” I remembered a conversation I had with a lady in the church.  Tawn Lowell, wife of Army pilot Steve Lowell, very kindly shared her experience with me as a basis of my story. 

In real life, Steve was heading out the door of their home in Savannah, Georgia, to go to NTC in California for four weeks when Tawn, suddenly realizing that he might not be present for the delivery, called out, “But wait!  What do we name the baby if she comes while you are gone?”  As he was getting in the car, he quickly replied, “Savannah!” 

Also, in real life, her mother was present for the birth, which turned sour with an emergency c-section.  Tawn thought it strange that her baby did not cry when she was born, but found out soon that little Savannah had a hole in her lung and was rushed to NICU.  Within a day or so, her mother had to leave, and so Tawn was alone.  It was as though she hadn’t even had a baby.  But God, in His kindness, healed little Savannah, who is now fourteen years old and loves the Lord.

As the story goes, the doctors were unwilling to release her from the hospital without help at home, and a kind nurse sent several requests through the Red Cross to have Steve come home from NTC.  All of this was done, however, without Tawn’s knowledge, so she was completely astonished to see Steve walk in the door!

Through all this, she kept praying and trusting God, who very kindly worked some wonderful surprises on her behalf.

After all this, I wonder to myself…  What about the many, many military wives who have to go through such hard times by themselves, especially if they have no relationship to God?  What if they have no one to hear their prayers?

Please continue to pray for our men and women in uniform!

Alone, Yet Not Alone, part 2

(As part of the “Musings of Military Missions on Mondays,” I am writing a fiction story to show what many of our military wives go through regularly – lonliness.  See my post last Monday for part 1 of the story.)

Jamie’s eyes followed the doctor out the door of her hospital room.  It can’t be! She thought.  No, no, no!  This just can’t be!  Her heart sank as she tried to recall what the doctor had said about her newborn baby girl. 

“It’s a lung problem,” he told her.  “She seems to have a small hole in the lung, and she wasn’t breathing well on her own.  Though she appears to be doing alright at the moment, she needs to stay in NICU for awhile, so this can be taken care of.”

Jamie struggled to remember everything he said, but it all seemed so confusing, and there was no one to talk to the doctor for her.  She bitterly recalled that she was here – alone.  So very alone.

Her eyes filled with tears as she thought of her baby, struggling for her first breath and being unable to take one.  To think that her own daughter would be strung up to tubes, wires, and monitors just to survive!

To make matters worse, she had been unable to contact her husband deployed in Iraq.  Her heart longed to tell him, somehow, that their baby had been born; to let him know that she was having troubles, and desperately needed her father’s prayers.  She yearned to hear his deep gentle voice as he spoke to God in prayer and to know everything would be all right.  If he were here, he could go make sure the baby was being taken care of, and could ask the doctor the questions she seemed unable to think of.

A dark cloud settled over the young mother as she lay in her bed recovering from her emergency cesarean.  She tried to pray, but words simply would not come.   She knew God knew her heart, and that He understood her heart cry.  She lay in the dark softly weeping until she heard a nurse come into the room.

“Are you doing ok?” the nurse eyed her keenly.

Jamie wiped her eyes and smiled wanly.  Brushing back a wayward hair, she replied, “I’m ok, I guess.  Just a touch of the baby blues.” 

The nurse nodded understandingly.  “Hey, are you the one whose husband is gone?” she asked, wrapping her blood pressure cuff around Jamie’s arm.

“Yeah,” Jamie replied, tears threatening to spill over again.  “He’s in Iraq, and I have no way to get in touch with him.”

“Do you have anyone who can help you when you go home?”

“Not really.  I’m new here, and I don’t know anyone yet.” Jamie answered.

The nurse stopped and looked at her inquisitively.  “Really?” 

“Really,” Jamie replied flatly. 

The nurse paused for a moment, thinking, and then patted Jamie’s arm.  “You rest, now.  We’ll see what we can do to get some help for you,” she muttered as she went out the door, but Jamie had already drifted back into a fitful sleep and didn’t hear.

The next day, a different nurse seemed to make it her mission to get Jamie moving and out of bed.  “The more you move, the faster you heal,” she told her.  Jamie wasn’t sure if it could possibly be true, but this nurse didn’t take “no” for an answer.  Though the pain was incredible, Jamie bit her lip and slowly, ever so slowly stood, leaning on the IV pole.  With help from the nurse, she slowly shuffled out the door and made her way to the nursery.

Her heart beating fast, Jamie wondered, What does my baby look like?  Is she going to be ok?  To the young mother, the short corridor seemed a mile long.  Finally she arrived at the window of the Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit.  Her heart seemed to stop as she scanned the glass incubators, her eyes finally coming to rest on a little bald red baby with the namecard “Martin.”

She was completely unprepared to see her own baby tangled in a mass of wires, tubes, and monitors.  There were tubes in her nose, and a tiny IV in her foot.  Several pads on her chest relayed information about the baby’s heart rate and breathing to the cold monitors blipping by her incubator.  The whole scene seemed so surreal and unnatural, yet here was her baby, struggling for life.

Suddenly the baby squirmed, whimpered, and began to cry the most pathetic little cry Jamie ever heard.  The overpowering desire to pick her up and cradle her flooded through her.  It seemed to most brutal torment to watch her own baby cry and be helpless to do anything to help her.  Jamie burst into tears.

Oh, God, she prayed, closing her eyes and steadying herself on the windowsill.  You have said that Your grace is sufficient.  I need a little bit of that grace right now.  The baby needs a lot of that grace, Lord.  Please help us!

Back in her bed once more, Jamie reached for her Bible, and with trembling hands carefully thumbed through the well-worn pages.  She remembered a saying from her pastor in the church she attended before moving.  “There is balm in the psalms,” he would say, adding, “When your heart needs healing, head for the psalms.  God graciously poured out His love for us there.” 

Her eyes quickly scanned the pages and came to rest on Psalm 37.  The words of verses three and four seemed to leap off the page directly into her weary heart.  “Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.  Delight thyself also in the Lord; trust also in Him; and He shall give thee the desires of thy heart.  Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in Him, and he shall bring it to pass.”   

Jamie closed her eyes.  Before going into the hospital she had read all the books and taken childbirth classes.  No, this was not at all the way the birth was supposed to go!  The fear, cold and clammy, was there in the delivery room, and the dark and forboding loneliness, oh, such loneliness!  Then there was the frustration and helplessness of being unable to do anything to help her little girl.  But God had been gracious and strengthened her and given her His presence, which was more important to her than anything else in the world.  And He knew what was best.  She knew she could trust Him.

There in her lonely hospital room, as Jamie poured her heart out unto the Lord, He filled her soul with that calm soothing peace that comes only from a deep abiding trust in Him.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, a commander received a message from the Red Cross.  Carefully unfolding the paper, he wiped the sweat from his brow and read:

            “Sgt. Martin’s wife delivered a baby girl and needs her husband to come home”

The commander sighed a deep sigh, shook his head, and grumbled, “Who do they think they are?  I can’t just send any soldier home every time his wife has a baby!  We’ve got a war to win!”  He took out his pen and hastily scribbled his response.

            “Permission denied,”

and handed the paper back to the messenger, who saluted smartly and quickly went out.

….to be continued

 

 

Alone, Yet Not Alone

This is a fiction story, but it happens all the time.  Many of our military wives have to face the valley of the shadow of death in the worst state imaginable – alone. 

 

Wincing as another wave of pain washed over her, Jamie tried vainly to focus on the clock on the wall of her labor room.  The soft, rhythmic splush-splush sound that indicated the baby’s heartbeat seemed to get louder and just a bit faster as the contraction peaked, and then slowed a bit again as the contraction monitor indicator went back down.  Jamie sighed and shook her head, hoping it would clear her sluggish brain.  She reached for some ice chips to cool her parched lips, letting her mind drift to the last day she had seen her husband, the day he left for Iraq.

She remembered watching him stride off into the plane in his army uniform, his pack slung over his shoulder.  Just before reaching the door, he turned, locked her eyes with his, smiled his lopsided grin and waved.  Was it really only a month ago? She wondered.  They were both so looking forward to this baby, their first, and now he was overseas.  That one month seemed to last forever. 

Her reverie was broken by another contraction, this one even more brutal than the last.  Her breath came in sharp gasps, though she tried valiantly to control it, and the pain was almost unbearable.  She heard someone enter the room, a nurse maybe, and check the instruments.  “You’re doing real well,” the nurse told Jamie when the contraction was over.  Jamie smiled weakly and mumbled her thanks.  She was just about to try to tell the nurse how the Lord has been giving her strength, when she was interrupted by another contraction.

Through this whole month she had felt so very alone, and yet she knew God was with her, strengthening her.  She had been dreading going through labor and delivery by herself, but she simply didn’t know anyone well enough in this area yet to invite them to the labor room with her, having only moved to Fort Benning three months ago.  And so, when her husband got deployed to Iraq, she knew she was facing a lonely delivery.  But even though her faith was strong, she was totally unprepared for the valley she was about to enter.

The nurse had checked her and discovered that the baby was breach, and that the cord was prolapsed, or coming out first.  This made a normal delivery impossible, since the oxygen supply to the baby would be cut off during the whole pushing phase.  Jamie was still trying to make sense of the words the nurse said before running out the door, “emergency cesarean!”  As the next wave of pain struck her, Jamie felt so terribly alone – and afraid.  Through the pain, she wondered if the Lord was still in control.  Her heart poured forth her burdens in prayer. Oh God, please give me the strength to have this baby, and may it be healthy.  You are the only one who can help me!

Within seconds, the room erupted in a whirl of activity.  Most of it Jamie couldn’t understand through the pain, but she heard the nurse tell her to breathe through the oxygen mask and did what she was told.  “It’s for the baby,” the nurse explained quickly.  One nurse was trying to remove her earrings, but another nurse stopped her.  “There just isn’t time!” she hissed.  Into the IV they put some pain killer, and Jamie was borne away to a noisy place where nothing seemed to matter. 

So tired, Jamie thought.  And I hurt from head to toe!  Though her eyes were closed, she could hear that two people had entered the room.  “She’s starting to come around,” one kind voice said. 

“Mrs. Martin, you’ve had a baby girl,” said the other.  The mush in Jamie’s mind began to clear.  Baby?  Oh, yes, that’s right!  I was in the hospital in labor!  Her eyes fluttered open and she asked, “Where is she?  Is she alright?”  There was a brief pause before the nurse answered.

“She’s being tested right now, but the doctors think she’ll be fine,” the kind nurse replied. 

“Tested?!  What happened??  Ouch!” Jamie tried to move, but was instantly stopped by a sharp pain in her abdomen.

“The doctor will come in soon to tell you all about it,” the nurse replied.  “Meanwhile, you try to get some rest.  You’ve been through a lot.”  Then both nurses filed out the door, leaving Jamie to figure out what was going on through her muddled brain. 

Lord, what happened?  Why did this happen to me?  Is the baby going to be ok?  Hot tears squeezed slid down her cheeks as she tried to sort things out. 

Not only did she have to go through labor and delivery alone, but she had to have an emergency cesarean, and now she didn’t even have her baby with her!  She felt like she hadn’t even had a baby.

Suddenly it seemed as though the presence of God filled the little recovery room.  There, amongst the blinking lights, the whirring machines, and the impersonal monitors, her gracious Lord poured His love into her spirit.  His still, small voice spoke peace to her heart, as plainly as if someone had laid a nice warm blanket over her aching, weary body.  A Scripture verse ran through her numbed mind.  “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee.  For I am the LORD thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour” (Isaiah 43:2)  She sighed and snuggled deeper into her blankets, contented in the realization that, though she was alone, she was not alone.  Her Lord was with her, and would help her through.

Moments later, she settled into a deep, restful sleep, knowing that the Lord was truly in control, and she was not alone.

…to be continued next week, Lord Willing!

HIDDEN HEROS

We were privileged to have a military spouse over for Christmas dinner whose husband is deployed to Iraq. We had a wonderful time, and especially were thankful to talk to her about the importance of being sure of the soul’s home in eternity. Though she didn’t trust Christ yet, she was attentive.

 

Being from Germany, she brought over some German potato salad and a cucumber salad. She told me, “It took me all morning to make it, since I can only use one hand.” When I inquired further about her condition, she said, “I broke my arm last week while horseback riding.” In a few minutes, she told me a most amazing story.

 

The previous Wednesday, she stopped on the way home from the commissary (militaryspeak for grocery store) to “test ride” a horse she was thinking about buying. During the ride, the horse got spooked by some other horses, bucked, and threw her off. She landed on her left elbow, cracking her humerus and bruising the whole left side of her body. Though she felt sick, she knew that a trip to the emergency room would take forever, so before she went in, she drove herself home, put away all her groceries in severe pain, and then drove herself to the hospital. Alone and in pain, far from family and friends, she did what needed to be done.

 

She is one of the many hidden heroes of our military: the military wife.

Independent and self-reliant, she deals with the most difficult of human experiences, and often does it alone. She must know how to fix the screen, take care of the sick children, make the right decision at the car shop, and still fix dinner while not watching the latest news of car bombings in Iraq. She knows that any day she may be permanently alone, a widow. Yet she does it all, without any pay, without any praise, because it is her duty. She’s a military wife.

 

We honor you, military wives. Your fulfillment of your duty has earned the respect and admiration of those who know true sacrifice.