S.L.I.R...chapter one page one

It's always so difficult for me to find a place to begin. To begin to tell the world of this incredible life I've been living. To find a starting place that will honorably share the grace and forgiveness of God in my life, and how patient love can and has been to me.

Today, I will just begin where my heart has led me to begin. Funny thing is, it's NOT at the beginning..but instead, in the middle. The middle of chaos.

My eyes closed, my breathing steady, the sun shining in my part of the world today, my mind travels a short distance to a place not far from here...into the past. I am troubled for the millionth time about that fateful phone call just more than 365 days ago...
"Mommy...Mom...please...mom...please promise me you won't cry...mom, but you have to do this. Get David and don't cry, mom. you have to be strong for him. Are you sitting down? Mom? Mom, it's Dad. He shot himself tonight. and mom, you have to tell David and not cry. please promise me, you won't cry, mom."

With my eyes still closed, I cross over this conversation three or four times, until, with horror, I move just to the left of the past and see something I haven't ever seen until now...something that causes my eyes to open so that the pain might stop.

This is what I see....I see my daughter, just before her call to me about David, I see her receiving HER phone call from grandpa. And I'm thinking..."if the call I got that night from her was so painful and difficult, just how much torment has my daughter been thru??"

Oh...OH This Hell ON EARTH!! When will it stop?? My beautiful daughter, who deserved so much better than I gave her....why? Why? Why did SHE have to receive that dreadful first call? Why couldn't I have been the one to tell ALL OF MY KIDS what had happened to their mentally-ill father, who seflishly and hopelessly pulled the trigger? Why did she have to carry that load? Will she ever be over her guilt? Could I have re-written life for her if my voice would have delivered the blow to her heart? Oh, this dream-like vision is not a dream. This is real life.

Today, now with my eyes and my journal open, I face this pain. I accept that it is painful. Having been designed to feel emotion, I embrace this moment and stay in control of it, not giving control to it. And as balance and mental health become the symptoms of my choices, it is my prayer that you who are out there, stuck in the muck of madnessing pain, can take what you like and leave the rest of this experience, strength and hope that I give freely, just as it has been freely given to me.

the beginning...

Hello world, and welcome to the first posting of "shattered lives in recovery". It's simply experience, strength, and hope that will be shared here, and a few of my weaker moments as i pass thru the tunnel of memories that come and go. For the most part, I have been trying to write several books over the past few years, and haven't been able to complete anything....ha! ....the story of my life. But not any more. I believe that this blogger and the rest of you out there can help aid in the sharing and healing of broken pieces. To my children: I have asked you all permission to write about this, and none of you objected. Now, it is time. And since the time has arrived, I believe that what is shared in this blog will give to that someone out there who is hurting beyond life ifself. Basically, sharing the truth and facts of my life are an act of doing what's right, and passing over the act of what's popular. And where I'm from, doing what's right is all that counts.