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    Healing Strength: Loss: Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It
    Healing Strength: Loss: Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It
    Healing Strength: Loss: Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It
    Ebook116 pages1 hour

    Healing Strength: Loss: Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It

    By Vicki Schmidt

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    About this ebook

    Without feelings,

    we wouldnt experience suffering.

    Without suffering,

    we wouldnt have a need for God.

    Without God,

    we wouldnt have hope.

    Without hope,

    well, we are doomed.

    This easy-to-read resource explores how Gods plan for our lives does not always lead us to a life without hard times, but it does lead us to fulfilling lives through our trust in and our desire to be more like Him. Author Vicki Schmidt understands how Scripture and humor combine for all the healing strength you need to be your new you.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateJan 27, 2012
    ISBN9781449733827
    Healing Strength: Loss: Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It
    Author

    Vicki Schmidt

    Wanting to write books and writing books that people want to read requires a leap of faith first-time author Vicki Schmidt overcomes in this book. Her passion for research and her journey as a Christian bring an insightful and inspiring look at overcoming the effects of loss. Vicki lives in Marion, Ohio, with her husband of twenty years, her daughters and her house full of four-legged furry critters.

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      Book preview

      Healing Strength - Vicki Schmidt

      Healing Strength: Loss

      Recognizing Loss in Your Life and Overcoming It

      Vicki Schmidt

      logoBlackwTN.ai

      Copyright © 2012 by Vicki Schmidt.

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-3383-4 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-3384-1 (hc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-3382-7 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2011962311

      Printed in the United States of America

      WestBow Press rev. date: 1/23/2012

      Contents

      Dedication

      Acknowledgements

      Introduction

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Dedication

      To Aunt Carol whose courage to live through tremendous suffering thirty years ago and to be an inspiration to her children and her family is a credit to her faith as a Godly woman. I love and admire her.

      And to Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior, who gives to all who reach out to Him the Healing and the Strength needed to get through each day we spend on this earth, and most especially those days after we experience loss.

      Without His blessings, this book, written so others can be renewed in His Glory and so others can receive His Grace, would not have been possible.

      Acknowledgements

      Thank you to my husband who supported me and stood by me—and best of all—didn’t laugh at me not only when I approached him with my idea for this book, but when I needed to talk through some of it with him. Thank you to my daughters and puppies that had to put up with their mom writing during times when they wanted her attention, too. Thank you, Ghirardelli and Starbucks. And thank You, Lord, for giving me the words to write when I had no words of my own. You are my strength and my Redeemer.

      Introduction

      When I wrote the story in Chapter 1 at the vulnerable age of fifteen, I didn’t really know why I felt the need to write it all down. I liked to write. I wanted to be a writer. Maybe I wrote it for Aunt Carol, who after all, was going through a very stressful situation. She probably wouldn’t remember some of the details of what she and her family were going through. Maybe I wanted her to have something she could read, later… something she could share with her children and her grandchildren.

      Looking back, when my uncle’s life was taken from him, I cried… a lot. It was scary! I had never experienced death like that before—I’ve never experienced death like it since. To me, there’s unexpecting death and expecting death. The latter is the kind you know is coming because someone is elderly or has a terminal disease, there may not be anger and there may not be a need to forgive anyone. It all hurts, but when prepared for it, because of the situation, to me, it seems easier to accept, somehow. But maybe for you it is not easier to accept when, well, you know it is going to happen.

      When I saw Uncle Joe in the hospital, I never saw anyone look like that. It didn’t look like him. I went to the hospital to see him and my Grandpa both. At the time, though, maybe I went because I was nosy. Maybe it was because I needed my curiosity satisfied. Maybe it was because I really cared.

      Whatever the reason I went, it made an impression on me I didn’t think I’d ever forget. Maybe that’s why Dad let me go the day after it had happened. I was a year away from being a licensed driver, after all. This was a pretty powerful visual lesson for me.

      *     *     *

      Now, moving forward 27 years, I am a mother of two, and am six years older than Joe was when he died. I was sitting in my chair one evening a few months ago, and the Lord placed something on my heart. You see, I, like every other Christian, want to know what God’s plan is for the gifts that He has given to me.

      But my life is worth nothing unless I use it for doing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus.

      (Acts 20:24)

      I pulled out my notebook and I started journaling about death and loss. I could not get Uncle Joe and Aunt Carol off my mind. And the next night I started writing some more. The outcome is not as I originally envisioned, for what I envisioned is what my human brain could comprehend at the time. I had no idea where the Holy Spirit was taking me. But it was all coming together, and with every chapter, it was becoming clearer to me: this book is why I wrote that story. And I believe there is still healing to be done.

      Chapter 1

      A Farmer Loves His Land

      I knew something was wrong when Dad called me into his room one May morning in the early 1980’s as I was getting ready for school. He told me to sit on his bed and asked me if I had heard the phone ring earlier that morning. I told him that I hadn’t. He asked me if I knew why Mom wasn’t there. I assumed that she had probably gone to work early.

      The look on his face clearly told me that Mom hadn’t gone to work early—something was wrong. I couldn’t quite figure out what that phone call had to do with Mom, though.

      Your Uncle Joe and Grandpa Charlie were in a car accident yesterday.

      The first two things I immediately thought of were that they were either both killed or that my grandfather was driving and something had gone wrong with his heart. He had had a heart attack before, and I was afraid that he had suffered another.

      What happened? Are they both dead? I asked Dad, trembling.

      They aren’t dead, but they are both in critical condition at Doctors General. Your mother is over there now. Some guy didn’t stop at a stop sign and hit them. Joe was driving and took the full brunt of the impact, and they were both thrown from the car. Your grandpa’s heart was bruised, and the doctor thinks his foot may be broken. He also has a few cracked ribs, and of course, a lot of contusions. Contusions? What the heck are contusions?

      My heart was pounding with fear, and tears were rolling down my face. Frightened, I kept yelling, Why? Why them? Dad held me as I wept. I then remembered that I hadn’t asked him how Joe was.

      He’s in intensive care, and is in a coma. The doctors had to operate on his stomach because all, or most, of his insides were pushed up into his ribs. The doctors could tell from the way Joe lay that he has severe brain damage.

      Can I go over to the hospital with you to see them? I asked. When are you going over?

      I’ll probably go over after lunch.

      *     *     *

      When we arrived at the hospital, we went straight up to the ICU waiting room. Already up there were my Aunt Debra (Joe’s sister) and her family, Aunt Sandra (Joe’s older sister who lives out of state), and a few of Aunt Carol’s family. They were the only relatives visible. We asked where Carol was, as well as my mother and my grandmother; they had been visiting Joe and Grandpa. When they entered the waiting room and saw Dad and me, they reached out to us.

      Dad spoke first. Vicki wanted to see Joe and Charlie, so I brought her with me.

      Aunt Carol put her arm around me, and I did the same to her. She explained to me how Uncle Joe would look so I wouldn’t be too shocked

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