What About Her?

Its 1978, I was 14 years old, and in my 9th grade year. I barely made it through this year. Mom was sicker than ever. She couldn’t’ wear clothing because it made her too hot, so she was continually naked. Her bed was right out in the living room. I had to turn her over and spoon feed her and even wash her hair in bed. “The dad from across the street” would come home a few times a day to check on her while we were in school. But as soon as I got home, she was my responsibility right up till I went to bed, and even then she was still my responsibility.

I remember one night, during the middle of the night; when I was sleeping on the floor next to her bed, and my wrist was tied to hers by the yarn, she called me and called me to wake me up to help her with something. I was so completely exhausted she couldn’t wake me up. Even with her pulling the string, I just could not wake up. So finally she got the energy (from fear) to yank that string so hard it about yanked my arm out of the socket and cut my wrist in the process. I finally woke up. She told me that she could feel a spider walking along her leg under the blanket. I started crying. I thought that was the worst thing that she has ever pulled to try to get me up. I told her there wasn’t one and tried to go back to sleep. She was crying by now and begged me to get up. Once I noticed she was crying I got up. This was serious. I took the blanket off her leg, and sure enough! There was a spider walking right up her thigh! I smacked it and killed it, right there. She was so relieved. I felt horrible. I felt so ashamed for not getting up when she first called. I never got over that, even to this day.

My boyfriend “serpent” was still my boyfriend. He was treating me worse than ever and yet I still stayed with him. I was still allowing him to treat me like that, to do those things to me.

My heart was so shattered. It was in shreds, millions of pieces. I barely could hold it together anymore. I needed strength from my Jesus but I just could not call out to Him. I still loved him. That never left me. But I was so ashamed for leaving Him for “the serpent” that I just could not face Him. I needed Him so bad though. But every time I tried to reach out to Him, the pain in my heart would explode and I’d cry from such excruciating pain. So I never went to Him.

Well there had to be some relief in sight or I would have died. Ninth grade went on and I finally made it through that. I actually passed that year, but only by a thread. The summer came and went and I was still barely hanging on.

My older sister was still going to church, but between mom being so sick and me being so devastated, we weren’t up to going at all. So we just quit.