And Now a PSA for Dealing With a Difficult Person

I'm taking advantage again of not having a set schedule to ease into the day at a rather slow pace.  I woke up early and spent a little bit of time working on getting those small things that are strewn about put away.  All that is pretty much what is left to do, small things.  Roy and I did get a lot done last week.  Well, I still have my closet which is not a small thing but it will get done.

Today is the release of Melanie Shankle's book, Nobody is Cuter Than You.  It is a book on friendship and how friends have changed the course of her life.  I ordered the book and it should be delivered sometime this week.  This is a book I could have written because friends throughout my life have been lifesavers and anchors in the storms of life.  Storms come and go but I am fortunate to have life-long friends that come with sticking power.  Do we talk everyday?  No.  Do we email everyday? No.  But we can pick up right where we last left off.  The thoughts of my friends this morning is especially powerful and poignant because if it is April and I'm in North Carolina, you can bet the farm we will get a call from Adult Protective Services investigating the false accusations by my father.  They called last week and Roy returned their call yesterday.  He said it was a short conversation when this case worker heard we have not seen or spoken with him in three years and hearing that I am in North Carolina pretty much closed out the case.  She never told him what the accusations were but we can guess with precision accuracy though and that's fine with us.  Throughout the years in the ups and downs of dealing with him and experiencing the hurt and abuse of a unstable person, there has been a God-given blessing with friends.  They listened to my complaints and we prayed through so many situations.  Then as years continued and his interruptions weren't so impactful and menacing, friends helped me think through situations and how I could handle him without fighting or arguing or getting really mad, because that is usually what people like him want, a confrontation so that they are able to unleash all their toxic words and thoughts.  Then two major things happened, I started going to a therapist who gave me the correct tools for his situation and I released Roy to tackle my father head on and it was kind of funny, my father didn't know what hit him because he saw Roy as a weak and not worthy man.  He had never seen "work Roy" and he was quite unnerved having to go through him to talk with me.  (We were in the midst of my heart issues and knew stress was a factor that triggered really bad a-fib)  Conversations with my father totally did me in and it would take several days to recover from them.  Marty F called me the other day as she was driving home from California and I had a chance to thank her for listening and praying and then I apologized that she had to listen to all that junk.  She was so gracious in her response.  Beth R in Seattle listened to me a whole lot and of all my friends, she saw the damage being done up close and personal.  Mary Madeline let me escape many a day through phone calls or by coming to her home.  I am ever so grateful that her mom let me come over and hang out with them.  And you can fast forward to the present, Peggy and Dena let me tell them the latest incident and then we laugh and go on with life.  In the aftermath of hearing from Roy what the phone call was all about yesterday, I wrote the following yesterday afternoon:

If it is April and if I am in North Carolina you can almost bet there will be a call from Adult Protective Services investigating accusations brought against us by my father.  Only thing every time they have called with the exception of the first call, I have been in North Carolina.  Again, he says we have been over at his house moving things, taking things or harassing him.  Once again we state we have not seen him in three years and he severed the relationship with papers given to me by his then attorney.  I haven't a clue if any of his posse remains or if he has run them off as well.  We again had to explain that he is a notorious liar and can sound reasonable.  Then we share with them his hatred for me since the age of five. It gets a little less painful every time we have to tell that story because really who wants to explain the deep hatred of a mentally ill man, who has been this way all of his life.  Back in the day he could cover his tracks and lies, but he isn't that adept anymore at keeping info from whom he wants to and what "stories" he shares with those he has deemed usable in his weaving of facts and lies to make the whole conglomeration his truth.  Every time he reports us the spotlight on him gets a little hotter.  A guardian needs to be appointed for him because he doesn't trust his family to care for his well being.  It was not lost on me that when we left on March 27th, it had been three years since that fateful day.  God is the God of details.  Since that whole box debacle in September, the eyes of my heart and understanding have been opened.  Things from the past that never made sense finally made sense because his hatred for me has been continuous, not here and there like I had always believed.  I now understand my mother's predicament and how showing too much compassion toward me put her in harms way, because he is and was a genius at emotional abuse.  Where our treasure is, there our heart will be also.  His treasure, his heart has always been money and possessions.  If he felt he couldn't compete with anyone from church or the neighborhood, he just tore them down to others to justify his ego.  Many times I think he was friends with those he felt he was better than insuring his savior complex would remain in tack.  Truly, I wish he could have gotten help at some point but with a personality disorder, nothing is ever his fault.  He would have to admit he is wrong and that is something he doesn't do.  Well not like normal folks, instead he takes the victim role until he thinks he can once again dominate and intimidate and overpower whomever his target is at the time.

I share all of this for those who might be dealing with a person like my father who is constantly churning and stirring up conflict and strife.  There is a good life apart from people like this and it is a difficult start to the journey because you have to set boundaries when they haven't been used to you doing that.  Give a lot of time to prayer because without the Lord this is an impossible journey but He does sustain and give hope when we feel utterly hopeless.  You can know you are loved and have purpose no matter what they have said to you in the past.  Ask God to bring friends into your life that will pray with you and then cheer you on because we are over comers!  Don't burden your friends with all the details though, because some of that can only be understood by you or if you don't understand it, can only be processed by you.  God is there and He gives us the resources and tools, most importantly His Word.  Also, ask the Lord to reveal to you any of "your persons" traits in you. I will share with you that I was going down that same path long ago because that is all I knew and in hindsight see that what I had been taught was for my own detriment and destruction.  Shake that junk off of you, read the Epistles and see what life in Christ looks like especially in relationship to others.  Really study God's love and what that looks like and then receive it for yourself and then share and give it away.  You'll be much better for that.  And God is faithful because He has given me friends here that bring much joy and fun to life.

The day is in the later part of the morning and I am still in my jammies.  It could be a pajama day though.  I am almost bruised from pinching myself that I am really here and really enjoying the peace and pace of life and the beauty of God's creation.