My Brothers Keeper

I’m going to be honest.  This post is not humorous or uplifting, because I’m in the midst of a wrestling match:  my selfish nature vs. God.  This post is real with nothing to sugar coat it.  So if you were hoping for something light and comical, read one of my fiction pieces and steer clear of this one.

“Yield your rights to God.” This was a catch phrase of a fundamentalist group that I grew up in.  In theory, it means that you are giving up your own selfish desires so that God can work through you.  A good thing, right?  In reality though, it many times meant that if you felt violated, angry, or taken advantage of, it was really your own fault.  You needed to confess your selfish desires and repent and “yield that right to God.”  This made it easy for people to take advantage of those who really just wanted to do the right thing.

As a child and teenager, I was one that let people take advantage of me because I thought I was doing the right thing.  I thought that being used and abused by people was okay.  I refer mainly to the relationship with my parents at that time.  I know that it is frowned upon to speak ill of the dead, but it’s true.  And in defense of my father, he is a very different man now than he was then.

My mother suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder and Bipolar.  The best way to describe her is to say that she could be the most kind and caring person one moment (and I think this was who she really was) and immediately turn verbally and sometimes physically abusive the next.  It was as if two people were constantly warring within her and no one knew what would set her off.  Accidents–like spilling your bowl of cereal–in our house meant spankings, yelling, and sometimes a good hard slap.  At other times, she would laugh.  You never knew which it would be.

As a child and a teenager, I thought that I was doing the right thing by becoming the buffer between my mother and my siblings.  I would work from morning to night, caring for the kids and the house because if I didn’t, it meant very bad things for them.  Whenever something bad would occur, I was the one who comforted people and picked up the pieces.  I remember many times finding a quiet room to cry in after taking some sort of brunt for something I didn’t do.  I wrongly thought that I was being heroic and yielding my rights to God.  I firmly believed that to “forgive and forget” was the way to love the offenders.  And if I purposefully put things out of my mind for long enough, I did slowly forget.  I didn’t realize then what I know now; that even if the details of a situation are forgotten, the remnants of the feelings that you felt then, still haunt you.

At the time, my father was not much better. I was about 16 at the time, and was working a part time job, working through high school, homeschooling my siblings, and caring for the 3 youngest who were still toddlers and babies. One evening, I made dinner and both parents came home from work (my mom took a temporary job) to eat.  I set the plate in front of my father who took a bite and spit it out, pushing the plate away from him.

“This is disgusting,” he said. “Can’t you make anything other than chicken and broccoli?”

It made me angry, but I didn’t say anything (yielding my rights…).  A few minutes later, Mom was yelling at my brother who was a toddler at the time.  He wouldn’t obey her, so I told him to do what mom was asking and he obeyed me without a second thought.  At this, she became irate.

“How dare you usurp my authority!” she yelled. “Who do you think you are? You’re not their mother, so quit acting like it.  Stop trying to turn them against me!”

I don’t remember if I said anything, I just remember thinking, “That’s it.  That’s the last straw.”

Up to that point, I had in the back of my mind that I would run away.  I had read about an island of wealthy people off of the coast of GA.  I had saved up enough money for a train ticket.  I would buy a train ticket to somewhere in south GA, and because I knew that trains went very slowly through Savannah, GA, I would jump off the train there so that my parents couldn’t trace my destination.  I would go to the island and apply to be a housekeeper.  I had my resumes ready.  While I was marking up my map, God stopped me in my tracks.  “If not you, then who will be your brothers keeper?”

I had plenty of reason to leave, I told him in my head.  The first being, they’re not my children.  The second being, I had taken care of them since I was their age.

“What more do want from me?” I roared aloud.

A similar dialogue went on for three days.  At the end of three days, I stopped fighting.  “If not you,” God said, “then who will show them that they are loved?” I knew he was right.

“I will be my brothers keeper,” I said, and meant it.  That was my vow.

From that point on, I remained true to my vow.  I didn’t think that I would ever go to college or have my own life.  As things turned out, though, I did have the chance to go to college, to get married and live my own life for nearly 7 years now.

So what has this to do with a wrestling match now?  Well, as a side note, I will say that for nearly 3 years, I’ve been sick with different ongoing illnesses, the last underlying illness of which is yet to be identified, and I’m tired, literally. Physically, mentally, and spiritually, tired.  I feel like I have nothing left to give.  That is where I’m at.

And now, my vow has returned to me in the form of becoming the legal guardian and caretaker of my youngest brother.  I love him and am excited that he is coming to live with us.  Our plan was to begin the adoption process this year (of some kids internationally), but that and other plans will have to wait.  Putting my life on hold, brings back my old feelings of losing my freedom.  And if you don’t know how it feels to give up your freedom, it feels like you’re grieving the loss of a dear friend.

I know that God gives the grace we need at the moment.  It’s just not an easy moment.