Do you know the joke that goes, “If you ask God for patience, he’ll give you a long bank line”?

I have a story to illustrate this is no joke.

I have a need for safety. And my husband is away a LOT for work. In the past, whenever my safety felt compromised, I didn’t trust my own ability to handle it. I would wish for someone strong to help me deal with the situation. Perhaps you can see where this is going….

Almost all of the challenging situations in my life have occurred when my husband was away or unavailable, and I had to deal on my own. I’ve faced a threatening painting contractor who wanted premature payment, car trouble in a passenger-loaded minivan on the highway hours from home, managing challenging house renovations, ice melt dripping through the ceiling into my son’s bedroom, a malfunctioning dishwasher smoking up the kitchen after the kids and I were tucked in bed, hurricane winds felling trees around our home, my son breaking his arm on the football field and requiring surgery, and (as you see here) the basement flooding during the spring thaw, not to mention the various truly alarming parenting challenges which I won’t detail to protect my children’s privacy.

For too long, I used all of these emergencies as fuel to blame and resent my husband for not having my back, not being there to protect me and the children, or to help me parent. I couldn’t accept that he was fighting his own battles, to earn the income to support us all. It took me many years, and many crises, and many tears, to realize I HAVE been handling it… all along! I don’t need my husband or anyone else to keep me safe, and deal with life’s challenges.

I prayed for someone strong. And God gave me opportunity after opportunity to BE the strong one. I am the strong one. I am the one I’ve been wishing for, and I have been all along.

May you too realize, sooner than I did, and without dishing out all the grief that I have, that YOU are the strong one.