Let's talk about abuse...

I used to think what I saw on television was sensationalized simply to outdo whatever was on the other channels.  But sadly, I’ve learned through my experience at Blue Monarch that the violence on television actually falls way short of what people really do to one another. 

Strangely enough, I’ve heard more than one first-hand story from a woman who was beaten and then left for dead in a ditch before getting discovered days later.  Several of our residents have suffered from hearing loss or even brain damage from severe blows to the head.  We had one survivor at Blue Monarch who was stabbed seven times and then amazingly lived to tell about it.  And we currently have a courageous woman who miraculously survived five gunshot wounds to her belly and will face her attacker in court soon.  (There are much more horrific stories that I keep to myself because I don’t want others to wish they could un-hear them, too.)

Sometimes I think abuse takes a backseat to addiction.  In the beginning of Blue Monarch, I expected to focus primarily on domestic violence, but I quickly learned that drug use becomes the easiest way to self-medicate, and then this often leads to drug addiction.  The two go hand in hand much of the time.

Abuse is such a part of the culture in some families that it’s not even recognized as abuse.   Often our applicants do not consider themselves as victims of abuse until they later learn their experience was not normal – or legal.  This is especially true if domestic violence was something they observed growing up.

I can’t count the times I have been asked, usually in a sympathetic whisper, if I was motivated to start Blue Monarch because I was a victim of domestic violence.  Thankfully the answer to that question is a big, fat “no”. 

However, someone very dear to me was, and I struggled for over twenty years to help her find a way out.  Somehow there was always an obstacle that prevented her from leaving – and most of those obstacles had to do with one thing:  her extremely low self-esteem, which was a hard thing to fix by that time.  Surprisingly, one day she actually made the decision to leave, so we took off to Florida for a few days.

She was like a bird out of a cage for the first time.  She took absolute delight in the simplest things: being able to empty the contents of her purse onto the bed, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, walking barefoot across the room with sandy feet, not having to straighten her naturally curly hair…For the first time in many years, she was in control of her life, and she was loving it! 

But sadly this story had a tragic ending.  Before our flight back home landed at the airport, her husband violently took his own life, which ended the abuse but did not end the pain, trauma, or damage by a long shot.  (I suspect I’m not the only one who has pondered “what if” hundreds of times since then.) 

We do not exclude men at Blue Monarch.  Quite the contrary, we love to have good men participate in our program.  We have two very smart and wonderful men who lead a book study every Friday with our residents.  Faithful male volunteers help by mentoring and tutoring our children or working on maintenance projects.  We believe it’s important to expose the women and children to men who are kind, generous, and respectful.  In fact, just yesterday one of our residents told me she hoped she could find someone like Daniel one day (a pastor who leads Bible study twice a week) because “if she could find someone who loved God the way he did, he would surely love her the right way.”

We recently had a lunch to honor Madeline and Howell Adams, who have completed a significant pledge to Blue Monarch.  After every visit we always hear lots of comments about how “down to earth and nice” they are.  This is so true, but what seems to make the greatest impression on the women of Blue Monarch is how Madeline and Howell express their tremendous love and respect for one another.  “Did you see the way she looked at him?”  “Could you believe how sweet he was to her?” 

We cover a lot of important issues at Blue Monarch, but through our work to improve self-esteem, build confidence, and study healthy relationships, if we can also raise the bar for future partners, we may have one more chance at changing future generations to come. 

We want every woman at Blue Monarch to celebrate who she is and realize just how very special God made her!  For every day she’s reminded of how uniquely wonderful she is, the stronger that conviction becomes embedded in her heart – and the further she gets from allowing someone to convince her otherwise someday.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made… Psalms 139:14

A Scary Cup of Tea...

One of my greatest pleasures at Blue Monarch is introducing our residents to new and exciting experiences.  For instance, every year it's our tradition to take the residents to a "fancy" dinner at Opryland Hotel.  (We look for folks to sponsor this event in case you're interested...)

The ride there is almost as fun as the dinner.  "What fork do I use?" is one of the most common questions, which usually brings up a reference to Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman.  One year we clearly didn't get the fork thing figured out because someone at the table thought it made sense for each person to use a grouping of silverware, which included your two forks and your neighbor's knife and spoon.  That makes sense.  So as that pattern traveled down the table, it cheated the person at the end, of course.  Otherwise it was a pretty good idea.

Another special event is when we get all dressed up and frilly and make our annual trip to Tea on the Mountain in Tracy City.  If you haven't been there, you might have passed it and never imagined that inside that unassuming white concrete block building on the corner is a tantalizing tearoom, much like you might find in British Columbia.  Dainty tea sets are displayed on tables covered in beautiful, lacy tablecloths.  And you are treated to a never-ending supply of wonderful, bite-sized sweet and savory treats delivered on a 3-tiered rack with a bottomless cup of hot tea.

This year our staff members drew names to see which residents would sit with them at the table.  Naturally the ones I drew were especially nervous because they didn't want to slurp, break or spill anything sitting next to the person they considered to have the most authority.  Cassie and Samantha sat on either side of me and Cassie looked like she was on the verge of hyperventilating.  She couldn't have been more nervous.

I heard someone say that people often make connections through imperfections and that's so true.  I knew exactly how Cassie felt.  Years ago when I first met my former husband, I was invited to Christmas dinner with his family.  His world was much different than the one I was accustomed to so instead of folks wearing their favorite faded jeans for Christmas dinner, the women in his family wore strapless, formal gowns and the men wore coats and ties.  There was a staff of people in the kitchen who quietly delivered food on silver platters and in crystal bowls to the beautifully laid buffet that sat alongside the elegant dining room table that comfortably seated fourteen.

Since I was a guest, I was invited to be the first in line at the buffet.  I was horrified (much like Cassie and Samantha were the other day).  With no one to watch for direction, I made my way through the line of food and was delighted to discover roast beef and mashed potatoes.  Good.  I could handle that, although I thought the bowl of mashed potatoes was surprisingly small, which surely meant they were bringing out more in a minute.
I put several slabs of beef on my delicate china plate and topped it with a huge mound of mashed potatoes.  Then I made a well, of course, in the middle of the potatoes and filled it with ample gravy.  I looked for someone to quickly refill the bowl with more potatoes.  Surely they would, since what I left would never be enough for everyone.
 
Much to my surprise, when I took a big bite of my potatoes I immediately discovered it was not mashed potatoes - but horseradish!  (Who had heard of such a thing?)  Naturally I was completely mortified and I painfully proceeded to eat the pile of horseradish as if I intended to eat a big helping of it all along - with the well full of gravy.  My eyes filled with tears and my sinuses opened up in ways I never knew possible.  I thought I would die.

So the other day when I saw Cassie panic and turn fifty shades of red when she accidentally slurped her soup, when she clinked her cup a little too loud, and when we thought her asparagus soup might come out her nose when she laughed, it was wonderful.  She went into that experience scared to death.  But you know what?  She enjoyed herself, she learned a lot about proper etiquette, she tasted foods she had never seen before, and she broadened her horizons in the meantime.  The world doesn't look the same to her now.

It turns out it's the willingness to step out and try new things - and laugh at yourself in the process - that gives you the courage to take the next step.  Cassie was not the same person when she put down that teacup and walked out the door.  She was braver, smarter - and a thousand times more confident.  It's all about conquering your fears - even if it's a mountain of horseradish or a cup of hot tea.  And that's what Blue Monarch is all about.

Returning to old friends and stomping grounds is rarely successful after rehabilitation.  We pray that each new and exciting experience makes the old world look less and less appealing.

Is Mother's Day complicated or what?

I recently heard that the highest volume of calls to addiction crisis hot lines is on Mother’s Day.  I’ve not heard a reason why, but looking at the complicated meaning of Mother’s Day at Blue Monarch, I can only imagine.

Let’s face it.  Some of the mothers who come to Blue Monarch are not always the ones people want to celebrate.  After all, they may have lost custody of their children at some point because of something they shouldn’t have done.  They may have pawned them off on family members or friends so they could pursue what was more important – drugs.  Their children may have ended up in the foster care system because the state had to step in to take care of them. 

Because of that, a huge focus of our program is helping women who have not been very good parents in the past, gain the tools to become healthier mothers.  And thankfully, through the love and grace of Jesus Christ, nearly 200 children through Blue Monarch have been able to reestablish a relationship with their mothers who had previously lost custody.  But how can we possibly celebrate mothers like that?

We often receive tearful calls from concerned mothers who are desperate to find help for their grown daughters.  They are very distraught and sometimes just need someone to listen.  

But sadly, we also see countless cases where the mother has been perhaps the worst influence in a woman’s life.   We’ve heard over and over from our residents, heartbreaking stories of their mothers trading them out for sex as young girls in order to support their own drug addictions.  We’ve had a number of women at Blue Monarch who were arrested with their own mothers and were even court ordered to have no more communication with them.  I remember the mother of one of our residents trying to justify why she taught her daughter to use meth at the age of 14.  “Well, if I had known it was her first time I wouldn’t have done it!”  

Much of what we see at Blue Monarch is generations of drug use and abuse.  It’s a known fact that one’s social development stops when drug use begins.  And since most begin using between the ages of 11 and 13, that means we see grown women who arrive acting like preteens even though they have children of their own.  It actually takes re-parenting at Blue Monarch to help them grow up and become parents, themselves. 

But the shocking fact is that sometimes their own mothers, and perhaps even grandmothers, began using drugs at the same age so their social maturity never developed either.  So look what you have - an entire family tree where no one has matured beyond the age of 13.  Imagine the level of dysfunction and chaos that creates.  And consider what it would take to break that cycle.

For a woman to step out of that vicious, familiar cycle and come to Blue Monarch where everything is completely new takes tremendous courage!  She may have left behind family members who are angry with her for wanting to get better, who may even try to sabotage her recovery.  We recently had one resident’s mother who planted drug paraphernalia in her daughter’s room, hoping she would get discharged from our program.  After all, when one person gets better, it throws off the entire family dynamics. 

We had a young woman here one time who had been sold for drugs by her own mother as a young girl.  When she arrived she easily lost patience with her toddlers and struggled to be a nurturing parent.  But something happened in her tenth month here that showed me that terrible cycle had been broken. 

Her girls were playing with word magnets on the refrigerator door and yelling, "Mommy, Mommy, what is this word?!"  I expected her to get irritated but much to my surprise, she carefully examined one of the word magnets in her hand and said, "That word is 'beautiful' and that's what you are."  Then I knew it.  That cycle had been broken because her own mother probably never said something like that to her.

   
The amazing and courageous women we see who take that uncertain step to come out of their homes where everyone uses drugs, and bring their children to Blue Monarch where they can begin a new and completely unfamiliar life, possibly with no family support, are the women I want to salute.  They are, without a doubt, the unsung heroes in my eyes. 

It’s easy to judge women who haven’t been good to their children.  But thank God, when they decide they want to become loving and nurturing mothers, there is a place they can go to learn how.  Here.

 

This month when we focus on mothers, I’d like to celebrate the brave and remarkable mothers at Blue Monarch!  Hold your heads up high.  After all, because of your courageous and steadfast determination, your children will now have a chance at the childhood you always wanted.  And guess what.  So will your grandchildren one day…and their children…and their children…  And that’s something to celebrate. 

Train a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not turn from it.  Proverbs 22:6 

What am I called if my mother and father are both in prison?

Seven-year-old Adam asked this question recently. He had heard if both your parents were dead you were called an orphan. So he wanted to know what he would be called if both his parents were in prison. His dad is already there for five more years and his mother is looking at a possible four years in federal prison, although we are hopeful the judge will allow her to remain at Blue Monarch. This painful uncertainty is something Adam and his sisters are accustomed to living with daily. 

Since Adam brought this up I haven't been able to get this question out of my head. It immediately brought me back to a time when I was a child and the kids from the local Children's Home attended my church. A few times I rode back on the bus with them after church to spend the afternoon with some of my friends who lived there.  Today that same Children's Home has individual homes to provide a more typical family environment but at that time it was much like a Little Orphan Annie dorm. There was a large, dark brick building with vast rooms, tall ceilings, cold hardwood floors and each child had a twin-sized bed and chest of drawers filled with only a few belongings, lined up against the wall with numerous children to a room. 

Meals were loud and chaotic in the dining hall and each child had a chore to complete before leaving the room. It was common for the children there to insist their moms and dads were coming for them, which rarely happened. And they often gazed out the windows as if they expected their parents to drive up at any moment. I wonder now if some of those kids had the same question Adam is asking today. 

I think back on the Adam who first arrived here ten months ago. He was an absolute handful! He was angry and bad about biting those around him. He hit others, including his mom. He yelled A LOT - and was in trouble most of the time.  His first week at school started badly when he threatened to kill the father of a classmate. Apparently it all started when he told a little girl she was pretty. Not sure how it escalated so quickly, but in Adam's world this was probably a pretty normal chain of events.

Adam's young world had already been packed with turmoil. His parents had both been in and out of jail his whole life, he had been moved from place to place numerous times, and had even been struck by lightning at the age of four. Yes, struck by lightning. And this apparently has nothing to do with his double vision.

But after ten months at Blue Monarch, Adam is a different child. He has soaked up his life here like a sponge. He absolutely adores his tutor, a gracious seminarian who inspires and motivates Adam to learn and always takes the time to play after their lessons. I can't count the number of times I have watched the two of them run past my office on their way to play basketball or toss the football. And Adam's grades? Well, he started the year with only dashes on his report card. But now? He's advanced in three subjects!

He's seeing the eye doctor as I'm writing this, getting prepared for an upcoming surgery to correct his double vision. And Adam's behavior? He's so proud to run in and report to me that he was "green" all day, which means he stayed out of trouble at school.

Adam loves church, the Bible, and the Lord. He recently made a card for two of our major donors and inside the card he asked, "Do you love Jesus?" He drew boxes to mark yes or no. (I suspect they checked yes.)

A card Adam made me

One day I held Adam by the shoulders, looked him in the eyes and said, "Adam, I am SO PROUD of you!" He just stood there staring back for the longest time, then with big ole' tears in his eyes he gave me a tight, lingering bear hug and said, "Thank you so much!"

And that's when it hit me. Yes, there actually is a name for Adam if both his parents are in prison. Like all children, either way, he will always be a Child of God.

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith... Galatians 3:26

"You can be President one day."

Years ago when I was single and my daughter was in second grade, I decided I wanted to live on a horse farm and run it myself. Actually, the only thing I brought to the job was a love for horses and the outdoors. Beyond that I had nothing.

So we moved to a horse farm and did it anyway. Farmers up and down the road grumbled about how I didn't know what I was doing. This was the topic of local gossip, usually around the table at the nearby market. "She doesn't know the first thing about bush hogging or getting up hay!" And they were so right.

But then there was my dad. He told me from the time I was little that I could do anything I put my mind to - even be president one day. (It wasn't until I was in my thirties that it occurred to me this was probably not going to happen.) Did he point out to me that I knew nothing about taking on a horse farm? Did he remind me that I had a fine arts degree and no idea how to drive a tractor?

No. You know what he did? He gave me this pocketknife. He believed in me and knew I would need it for the tremendous challenge I had taken on. This little knife lived in my pocket every single day for the next four years. It cut twine off thousands of bales of hay - the ones I tossed up on the trailer behind the John Deere tractor I learned to drive.

From the day I was born I had someone teaching me, encouraging me, and believing in me. My dad taught me how to catch a softball, how to use a sewing machine (which he learned in the Navy), and how to hit the bullseye with a pistol - as if nothing was impossible for me. But many of the women who come to Blue Monarch never had that. In fact, they quite possibly had someone telling them they were worthless and would never amount to anything. I can't even count the number of times I have complimented a woman on something she has done and she's tearfully responded with, "No one has ever told me anything like that." Sadly, she's telling the truth.

Here at Blue Monarch we encourage, we believe in miracles, we affirm, we build up, and we celebrate accomplishments. Just like my pocketknife became a symbol of courage for me, the charms we give out for significant achievements are symbols of courage for the amazing women we serve.  They are proud to wear them and show them to their children. For some, it's the first time they have completed something and have a token to show for it.

The courage it takes to willfully walk into a strange place with your children and submit to a totally new way of life in every aspect - the way you spend your time, the way you spend your money, the way you parent your children, the way you interact with others, the manner in which you resolve conflict, even the meals you feed your children - well, that takes way more courage than trying to run a horse farm when you don't know what you're doing. And for that - I applaud the incredible women we serve.  They are truly my heroes.

But my first hero was the one who taught me the tremendous power of an encouraging word - even when I said I wanted to start a residential recovery program for women and their children and didn't know the first thing about addiction. 

"I'm trying to do the Lord's work, (bad word)!"

In the beginning of my Blue Monarch journey, I was on a pretty exciting and totally unpredictable roller coaster ride.  Seemed like I would begin every day with a question and before the day was out a perfect stranger would give me the answer or it would suddenly show up out of nowhere.  Money came in from unexpected places.  Miracles were around every corner and rainbows filled my days.  It was great!  This "doing the Lord's work" was awesome.

But as time went by I became overwhelmed with the enormity of my responsibility to raise the money we needed to operate.  I hired people with the disclaimer up front that they may be laid off any day - only to lay them off two weeks later because we didn't have the funds to pay them.  I remember one year going door to door to raise enough money to pay our tiny staff.  The pressure was awful.  

 

I vividly remember eating lunch one day, looking at all the women and children around the table and wondering to myself, “where are they going to go if we can’t pay the electric bill?”  It was agonizing.

There were many days I was angry that God had given me this difficult assignment and actually felt it was more of a punishment than a blessing.  I sometimes felt like saying, “Get out of my way!  I’m trying to do the Lord’s work, (bad word)!”

One day I was at home having one of those angry conversations with God – the kind where you’re screaming and crying – the kind you hopefully have in the privacy of your own home.  "WHY DID YOU ASK ME TO DO THIS IF YOU WEREN'T GOING TO GIVE ME THE TOOLS TO MAKE IT HAPPEN, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!" 

Then suddenly I heard God speak to me.  He said, "YOU are the one who makes it so hard - by not trusting me."  Hmmm... 
 

That stopped me in my tracks.  I began to consider this and realized I had been trying to do it all on my own.  No wonder it was so flippin’ hard!  I had not trusted God.  I had taken on the entire responsibility myself and foolishly thought I could do it alone. 

At that point I began learning to rely on God for direction.  I started every day with a trust fall that was not easy, but it did become easier as time went on.  What I discovered was that when I truly trusted God, things turned out better than I could have planned myself, and guess what - money began to come in from places I never imagined. 

I finally realized that God had not asked me to do this as punishment.  He had actually given me a priceless gift and beautiful blessing.  I had been offered the amazing privilege of seeing His tremendous work in the lives of the women and children we served and all I had done was agonize over the difficulty of it. 

As my faith grew stronger, not only did I personally develop a joy unlike any I had ever experienced, I began to really see the joy in the faces of the people who came to us for help, despite the fact their problems were much bigger than my own. 

There was the young woman who delighted in feeling snowflakes on her face because the last time it had snowed, she watched it from her jail cell window feeling hopeless and lost.

I saw a mother overcome with joy for her healthy baby that was not born addicted to drugs. 

 

And I watched countless children show great joy over playing with our farm animals when just a few weeks before they were struggling with some pretty painful problems.

Truth is, joy is everywhere and at Blue Monarch you don’t have to look far to find it.  I’m just grateful for a loving, faithful, and patient God who gave me time to finally experience the great joy He wanted for me all along. 

I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.  Until now you have not asked for anything in my name.  Ask and you will receive and your joy will be complete.  John 16: 23-24

What a holy mess...

One of my earliest and most difficult lessons through Blue Monarch took place the first time a resident left early.  It was 2004 and at that time our curriculum was twelve months long.  (It’s now a one-to-two year program.)

Jeannie was our poster child.  She came to us directly from jail in our very first year.  She had three girls and was able to be reunited with them through our program.  Jeannie was not only beautiful inside and out - she was smart and capable of doing great things.  She developed a strong relationship with God, improved her parenting skills, and even got a job in a nursing home helping the elderly, which she loved.  As far as I could tell, she was a perfect example of what Blue Monarch was supposed to provide and how women could expect to transform their lives while they were with us.  Yep, that was a job well done for all of us.

So when Jeannie decided to leave after only six months I was devastated.  I thought it was a terrible mistake because I knew she wasn’t ready but she was so hardheaded she wouldn’t listen.  So that made me angry.  I remember standing in Jeannie’s upstairs room trying to reason with her while she packed and it ended up in a heated argument because we were both so emotional about it.  Jeannie felt she had accomplished all she came to Blue Monarch to do, and she was ready to go back to her old friends and change them as well.

I might have been new to addiction and recovery, but even I knew that was a terrible mistake.  I couldn’t imagine it working the way she thought it would.  So she left.  And I felt completely defeated and heartbroken.  I actually began to wonder if Blue Monarch was a complete failure. It looked like a holy mess to me.

It wasn’t long after that I ran into Steve Blount, who happened to be Jeannie’s prosecutor.  I shared with him my disappointing news about Jeannie and he patiently listened to me.  When I finished he said, “You tell that story as if it’s a failure.  But to me, it’s still a success story.”

“How can you say that?  She was only with us for six months and she left when she wasn’t ready.  We failed her.”

“Well, the way I see it,” he said, “that’s six months she was not on the streets selling drugs.  And for six months her children were exposed to a much better way of life.  That to me is a success story.”

This revelation completely changed the way I looked at our program after that.  I began to consider what could have taken place during those six months if Jeannie and her girls had not been with us.  The possibilities were endless and the potential for disaster was great.  I eventually came to understand that even if someone leaves our program early, they still gain something valuable while they are with us.  And I now have a box full of letters women have sent me to confirm just that.

Some of those letters are from Jeannie.  Her plan to change her friends failed miserably and quickly.  She ended up in federal prison for four years and during that time we stayed in touch.  I even remember meeting her at Waffle House in the middle of the night when she was transported from one prison to another to participate in an intense recovery program there.  It was great to see her, but it hurt to think of her being separated from her girls for so long and to have all that time wasted in prison.  Again, it looked like a holy mess to me.

During those four years, though, Jeannie developed and strengthened her faith and worked diligently to become the woman Christ intended her to be.  It was a beautiful process to witness as she described her journey through the letters she wrote. 

All those years in prison Jeannie expressed to me that she would love to find a way to help Blue Monarch one day.  She always felt Blue Monarch was a special place and that she and her children had developed a lasting bond here.  She often expressed that their time at Blue Monarch probably prevented a devastating crisis for all of them.  

So after she was released and settled back into the real world, Jeannie began coming to Blue Monarch every Friday night to conduct a Bible study with our residents.  Right away it became evident that Jeannie was able to offer something the rest of us couldn’t.  And it was really valuable. 

One of my greatest dreams has now come true.  Because of a surprising and amazing gift from some generous folks, we have been able to hire Jeannie and add her to our amazing team at Blue Monarch!  More than once I have heard Jeannie described as someone who “just lights up the room.”  Yes, I would agree. She glows by the light of the Holy Spirit.  We are blessed that God took Jeannie’s personal journey that was painful and difficult, and found a way to bless others in a way that only He can do.

Now when I hear Jeannie talking to our residents with such great compassion and rich understanding that only she can offer, I’m reminded in living color how God can take what appears to be a holy mess and turn it into a holy blessing. So I just have to wonder...what looks like a holy mess to me today? 

 Click to hear Jeannie talk about her journey: