He Already Has a Savior.....

Well, I think this post will be short, but this experience has been nagging at me for days to post, so here it goes.

Maybe it's because General Conference was so good 2 weekends ago, but I can't stop thinking about just how powerful the Godhead is. Rewind beck to April 2007. This was a super bad month for us, right up there in the top 2. With all that was happening with Scott's health and our finances, I had spun myself into such a tizzy (is that a word?) that it was difficult to function as a mother or a person. We spent about a week or more in Vegas, looking for any kind of work that Scott could do sitting down, and I was trying to renew contacts with people because it looked like we were going to lose the house for sure and I was calling people like mad seeing if anyone had a casita or something that we could rent for nothing. It took all my energy to put on a face of normality at Roma's birthday party that Scott's sister let us have at her house (thank you again, Teresa!). But by the end of our time in Vegas I was a walking zombie.

Roma's Par-tay

Roma begged me to take her to Target so she could spend her giftcard someone had given her for a present. I took all 4 of the kids there at about 7 pm and in the middle of shopping, my friend Jonelle calls to let me know that she has set up so our other friend (who will remain nameless) is expecting me at her house in an hour or so to talk with me. She's an intuitive soul, this friend of ours, but I was reluctant to go. Being how this friend is, I knew I wouldn't be able to hide anything from her, and did I really want to let anybody know just how far down the rabbit hole I was? I called Scott and let him know that I agreed to go over. He wasn't too jazzed about me going either, because he knew she'd know what was going on with him, too.

So, I show up at her house and we small talk and then sit for a few minutes. She reads me like a book and then says point blank to me, "Scott already has a Savior, and He can do a lot better job than you can if you will let Him." So, it took me a minute to process. But then I got it. This whole time Scott had been sick, I was trying to

Rescue him
Protect him
Heal him
Baby him
Do everything for him
even Receive inspiration for him

Isn't this what a 'good' wife does? Meeting with my friend that night made me realize that there's a fine and subtle line between supporting someone and enabling dependency. I had crossed that line and the life was being sucked out of me because of it. I was, in fact, delaying his physical and emotional progress. Even though I thought I was, I was not doing him any favors by trying to hold him up on my shoulders. Every waking minute was either spent rescuing him in some way or on parenting, and I was suffering for it. Quite honestly, Scott was getting used to it, too. I told him that I would no longer be doing things for him that he was capable of doing himself, even if it was hard for him to do. And believe me, in his condition everything was hard for him to do. Solving complex problems was hard, digesting his food was hard, staying awake was hard, praying was hard...everything was hard. And because it was, I assumed my role was to do everything for him until it became easy for him again.

I learned something from Kaye Bullock, my friend, midwife and mentor, that has always stuck with me. We were at a birth together once and the woman needed to move and change positions. I went to go pick her up completely and move her legs and everything for her. Kaye threw me this silent look to stop what I was doing - she could see what I was about to do. I looked back at her in confusion thinking, 'uh, hello, she needs to move and I'm going to help her. It would be mean not to.' A while later during the labor we caught a moment alone. I asked her to explain the look. She said, "This labor is going to get much harder for her. She is going to need to work more. If she thinks that you are going to do everything for her, she will give up when things get harder because she won't be strong enough to get to the top of the mountain because you've done all her work for her."

Again, the fine and subtle line.
Comfort, care, helping when someone can't help themselves. This is support.
Doing something for someone that they can do themselves, even if it's hard? That is actually weakening them.

Because....
Did things get even harder after April? They sure did.
Did Scott need more strength to ride out those waves? He sure did.
Did I back off and let him do hard things? I sure did.
Was I happy and more productive when I did? I sure was.
Was Scott more happy and productive when I backed off? He sure was.


I did everyone a favor when I learned how to not take on Scott's energy for him and try to save him.

Afterall, he has a Savior already, and He can do a much better job than I can.