I Brought a Child Into This World, As a Grandmother by Lori j Loesch

“We put ourselves, in a world left for younger people, a world we were in, then left, and came back to again.”

I have a lot to be thankful for, and there’s a lot going on in my life that I wish would change.  David and I are making positive steps to repair our marriage, and it’s a good feeling.  It’s amazing how fast things can turn around.  We both want to be better partners and parents.  Personally I feel it’s our health, that has turned us into what we have become.  Nineteen years ago, Jules and I liked to watch very old cartoons, probably the first ever made, remade onto video.  There was one cartoon that we thought was pretty funny, and it went something like this…A King was portrayed, looking like a fat, Humpty Dumpty, limping around, while his royal subjects sang, ” Why you look so sad and grumpy? Cheer up!”  The limping Humpty Dumpty, king laments, ” I’m not as young as I used to was!”  And he goes into how his body doesn’t work as it used to.  We used to laugh!  I’m not laughing now.  

 I had an awful realization a few weeks ago. When I met my husband’s dad, he was sixty-four.  David will be sixty this year.  If I look back into my minds eye, David’s dad looked like an old man.  David doesn’t look anything like his dad looked at sixty.  He has all of his hair, very little gray, and he’s thin, not overweight like his dad was.  We are not doing the activities that his parents were doing in their sixties.  They were semi-retired and their activities were that of retired people. We have a ten year old.  I had another realization, David’s dad died when he was sixty-eight and his grandfather was in his mid sixties, when he passed.  The “oh my gosh” moment came seconds later…David will be sixty-eight in just eight years.  This does not mean that he too, will follow in their footsteps, but what a scary thought.  

I brought a child into this world as a grandmother and grandfather!  We are forced into a world left to younger people.  A world we were in, and then left, only to be thrust back into, again.  We really could be Jules’ grandparents and definitely Faith’s.  I didn’t feel old and grandmotherly ten years ago, when I had Faith, I do now.  David has always said that he hopes he sees Faith graduate high-school, I just brushed it off as, him overreacting.  Of course he’ll be alive when she’s eighteen.  

I wonder if the saying, “having kids at an older age keeps you young”, because we still have a huge responsibility to raise our daughter.  It gets more difficult when you’re dealing with health issues.  I love my husband, and I’m glad that I have prayed and gotten back to the truth of life, and that is, God knows right where I am.  He placed me here, where I am safe.  David is my fortress.  I needed a very strong fortress, to protect me from all the crooks that try to take advantage of  naive, abused, girls.  God knows what’s bothering me and I’m right where I need to be.  Before I met David, I had a dream one night.  I was standing next to an antique, wooden, roller coaster, there was a guy, in a green corvette, with no arm, coming around a turn, the roller coaster went way up a steep climb, then woosh, down, down and around a sharp corner.  This was the man I would be married to.  I didn’t think much more about it, until years later, I put it all together.  David had a few corvettes and came close to death a couple of times while driving them.  The other thing…he lost his fingers, in a frost bite accident.  In my dream the guy was missing an arm or hand, David doesn’t have all of his fingers.  It took many more years to put together the roller coaster part, but yea, I had that dream years before meeting David, my husband.  He is my mighty fortress, and God knows where I am, and no one ever said, and was telling the truth about it, that marriage will be smooth sailing.  I love that David wants to make things better, that says a lot about him.  He’s a great guy, husband, and dad.  He’s had to put up with a lot of baggage, that I brought along, and maybe he didn’t handle every situation with grace, who does?  It takes a strong, intelligent person for this job.  There’s one thing for sure, he’s just the guy for the job, and what a job it’s been!  He will probably get a free ride to Heaven for it!  ( I’ll be it, in a Corvette?! )   

Shalom

Tags: being thankful, children later, for better, for poorer, for richer, for worse, health concerns, in health, in sickness, marriage, till death