You see, I was in an emotional state. We had recently gotten word that the body of a twelve year old boy had been recovered not far from where we live. He had either slipped or jumped into a flood-swollen creek which had carried him away. I do not know many of the details, but I have read that the mom and sister were present, the creek is normally only ankle deep, and the boy had autism.
It just so happens that two of my Facebook friends had personally worked with this youth... and that is how I got myself into trouble. One of them had posted and asked for prayers for the family. In preparing to write a response to her request, I was horrified to find the following comment: " I'm sorry too, but he should NOT have been anywhere near that creek." I was filled with indignation. How dare she say such a thing! This was not the time or place. How could she show such little compassion? Did she possibly know what the last twelve years had been like for this family? Before I could stop myself, my fingers typed up a biting response and hit send.
After the heat of the moment had passed, I regretted my decision. I realized that I was passing judgment on this woman in the same way that I had felt she was doing to the grieving mom. I was no better than her. I realized (again!) that we are all in process and that it is wrong of us to be impatient with anybody else's journey. I had been angry that she did not know the family or details, yet I did not know her or her details either. Ironically, I had ended my response to her with, "You should be ashamed of yourself." Now it was I who was feeling ashamed of myself! Not to mention that I had shown disrespect to my FB friend by bringing such things to her page. I quietly deleted my comment.
But not before the woman saw it and sent me a scathing personal message. You would have thought after my humbling that I would have taken it better, but my flesh was giving me a run for my money. I responded honestly and somewhat graciously, though I was not successful in keeping all emotion or sarcasm out of my reply. I basically wanted her to know that, "Yes, a little bit of common sense goes a long way, especially with a special needs kid (part of her reply to me). I know ALL about that. But mistakes happen and I really do hope that if a tragedy ever befalls my family that people will have compassion rather than discuss how wrong I was on Facebook. I am sure that mother already feels badly enough without hearing others basically say that her son is dead because she wasn't cautious enough." Oh, it was a hard conversation. And it was with all of these things in mind that I decided to take my boy swimming.
The similarities did not escape my notice: both boys had special needs and both boys had a mom and sister present with them. Fear is something that I struggle with, but I do not want it to box me in and render me or my children paralyzed. I want us to be able to enjoy life to the fullest. Fear did color our entire evening, but not enough to seriously hinder us. It was more of an annoyance and, yes, perhaps a bit draining. I watched my little guy like crazy and felt thankful that it was not crowded. I felt a tug of anxiety as he became braver and submerged more of his body. What if I lost sight of him for just a few seconds and he scooted into water that was too deep? I second guessed myself when I asked him if he wanted to jump off the one foot edge into the shallow water. I thought of young Nic Shaffer and the creek that was normally not very deep. What if I taught Levi how to jump in shallow water and he ended up jumping into deep water at some point? What if I wasn't right there to help him? I knew from my recent experience that there would be those who would harshly judge me... and that knowledge weighed on me. But we made it with God's help and protection - and a great time was had by all.
I am reminding myself of all of the things the Lord knows. He knows the number of hairs on my head and the number of stars in the sky. He knows what is too much for me to bear and will never give me more than He and I can handle together. Most importantly, He knows how many days I will have here on this earth... and He knows how many days my Levi will have. I need not live in fear that every little thing I allow or do not allow could end tragically for my boy, taking him out of our lives before God intended. No, that will not happen. He knows what He's doing and I'm going to choose to rest in Him rather than stress about all of the "what ifs?"
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