All sorts of Pain

 Well, this month can be summed up in one word.  Pain.  Pain takes on a lot of forms.  Sometimes it is emotional, sometimes it is physical,  but it can hurt equally and sometimes pain screams silently. Even though many great things happened this month, pain seems to want to steal the limelight.
We had a precious girl here.  She had family members on the outside, and for whatever reason, I let their families come sometimes for a visit, even against my better judgement.  Her older sister visited and filled this little one's head full of information about a father she had never met and she told her that not only wanted to see her, but that he wanted to help pay for her schooling.  She was twelve and was beyond the moon thinking her daddy wanted to be with her.  The girl started behaving poorly in school and socially and talked about running away.    I kept trying to tell her that although that was nice about her father wanting to visit, I ask her why hadn't he tried to contact her here.  I just didn't want to rain on her parade but really , things weren't adding up.  However, I told her if she wanted to go, that we needed to do it right and so we got the officials involved.  The sister was to pick her up in Feb. 2012

Well, in January 2013 of this year, we get a call from the older sister person again and she wants to come a get the 12 year old.  "A little late", I thought scarcastically, and I just figured that the sister had changed her mind and so did the 12 year old.  The 12 year old had knuckled down and was behaving so well and performing in school, and I really didn't want to move her but the papers were signed.  It didn't matter that it was a year ago.  I wanted an investigation, or some kind of home study that was never done, but it just didn't happen and the girl left with the older sister, thinking it to be a grand adventure.  One of her siblings that left with the same older sister two years prior, had to leave the older sister's house shortly after arriving.  She had some trials for a couple of years and finally this 20 year old got together with a man who was 38 and they were having a baby.  Our 12 year old, who loves babies, was elated to think she would be an aunt and be able to help with the baby and be with her sibling she was raised with at our farm, and that she hadn't seen in over 2 years.  She was thinking it was a dream come true, but the whole thing was a nightmare.

We called her about 4 weeks after she left.  She was so overcome with emotion she couldn't speak and when she did finally tell us, it wasn't good.  She didn't get see her dad and she wasn't going to get to help with the baby and her older sister was going to put her in a center for juvenile felons.  ??????  She begged me not to call back or talk to the sister because she would be in trouble.  The older sister had forgotten her phone and she was due back any minute, and she said things would be worse for her.  I couldn't figure how anything could be worse, so we waited, so not to get her into trouble.

We called back on her birthday a couple of weeks later.  A man answered the phone and said the older sister was helping her sister deliver a baby about 6 hours away.  I asked where was the 12 year old.  "She is with some friends next door," he said.  "Great", I responded and asked if I could call back.  He was very helpful and said "Sure".  I called back only to be told another number.  A man answered, he said that the 12 year old was with her older sister 6 hours away. "Really?" I asked. " I thought she was with your family."  He assured me she was with the sister and gave me her new number.  So I call the sister, and she said that the 12 year old was in Tegucigalpa with a family.  She then relayed this story with out even taking a breath, that within the 2 months that the 12 year old was with her, had become super rebellious wasn't talking to anyone, and was hanging with street gangs and that she thought she was with pregnant, so she was sending her to a juvenile prison for girls.  Now the 12 year old had issues for sure, but she had always been a kid of few words and since she was a 2 year old she only spoke in a whisper.  She was very sensitive and extremely shy.  I couldn't picture her with gang members at all, but conceded that it could have happened.

Next day, I called the "family" back and he said that she was at a friends.  I get the number and they said they couldn't find her.  I told the guy that the older sister said she was with them and so where was she?  We just wanted to tell her Happy Birthday.  I might have mentioned having to check with police, because I was concerned if she was okay, but we hung up the phone.  Five minutes later I get a phone call from a lady who didn't want to be identified, and said that she had talked with the 12 year old  girl a lot. She said she was suffering and that she thought she might be pregnant.  I am trying to talk calmly through all this.  I asked if she had be running wild with gangs and the lady said "no", that she only saw her going to purchase things on errands from the local pulperia, which is a tiny store in somebody's house.  The lady said the 12 year old is extremely shy and that she hardly would talk to her and all she would do while trying to talk, is cry.  She promised she would report it, but she didn't because she was to frightened of the older sister.

So what to do.  I start making calls to the public defenders office, the judges office, the police and she is out of their jurisdiction and out of my reach.  I am not her guardian anymore and the one who is her guardian, doesn't want her.  I have no legal grounds, even though this child has been with us for so long.  PAIN....

During this time, I fell.  I was in the kitchen on a Sunday, ready for church, making some soup, when a worker came to the door to buy a pig.  I put down the butcher knife (thank The Lord) and the tip of my boot got caught on a roaster pan filled with two cast iron dutch ovens. The girls had straightened up earlier and placed the items there and the electricity was off so it was dark and I didn't see them.  The roaster didn't move but I went sprawling across the kitchen floor and I hit hard.  I came down on my elbows, hands down.  I didn't hit my head on the refrigerator, which I was thankful, but I hit so hard that my stocking rolled up the skin on my knees and injured one elbow.  I was badly shaken, and sat there for a while and realized I was okay, just banged up a bit.

I went to the States for about 4 weeks and came back with some sciatica problems, but I just rested a few days went to the doctor and got some strong pain killers during the time a team was there, who were helping me, and it went away.
I got to the United States this week again to celebrate my daughter's graduation from Valdosta State University.  I didn't have much luggage at all.  When I arrived I was fine, but something happened when I got out of my daughter's little red Honda del Sol sports car and I was totally out in my back and my leg was drawing up in a knot on one side.  I have had 5 children and never experienced pain like what I was feeling.  I laid around a couple of days like I had done before and it got worse.  I started taking tylenol and ibuprofen. Then because I rarely take a tylenol and was consuming those along with ibuprofen, my stomach got upset. I was in a mess.  I finally had to go to the chiropractor because I couldn't walk.  So instead of have a great time of celebration, I have been having a recuperation time.  I haven't been able to do those things I had planned with my daughter or with anyone else.
I am better but still not 100 percent at all.  I am slow moving right now, but appreciate my motion that I have.  I took advantage of how easily I could get around before,  but I am thanking God a lot more for the little movement I have.  I am always busy. Though I kept up with my devotions, I had not had one on one with God  with all my running around, even with things that were needful for the mission I hadn't done like Mary and chosen the better thing.  So I am thankful that I have had a forced time to stop.  I had been telling my girls in Honduras, to learn the scriptures that have the word "all in them".  I can do all things, through Christ who strengthens me.  He sent His Word and healed them all, and Count it all joy when you fall into various trials.  I kept telling them every morning that all means all.  Now I have to walk what I talked and I can't walk very well right now.  .
 I was reading my Word, quoting scriptures, reading books on sciatica, watching Youtube on different exercises, and nothing was helping.  I was frustrated, and still hurting, and so you start making your spiritual check list.  Then you get to the point, where you just have to believe what His Word says, and have peace about it.  Miracles are wonderful, but healing is an ongoing thing, just like the fallen world that is around us and that we are a part of.  Stress is there, broken hearts are there, broken relationships, broken lives, can be all around you like so many legos spilled all over the floor, and God is Lord over every part of your life, good, bad, happy, sad.   He is with us through it all
Please be praying for the 12 year old.  Pray that God will keep her safe, and that somehow He will get Glory out of this situation.  Pray for my healing, also that I may give glory to His name when I overcome these "various trials"  God is faithful, loving and kind, full of grace and forgiveness.  He knows our name, our frame and our pain, and He came to deliver us all.
Thanks to all of you that have been praying over all of us.
Blessings, the Hurt, but Healing, Honduran Mom.
Sent from my iPad