This is part two in a series of my latest journey with God. Click here to read the first post, ‘They Say I Had a Stroke,’ to follow the journey. 

I’d hit my breaking point, again, at least for that morning. My blow dryer stopped working in the midst of trying to fix my hair, and I cried another river of tears. Seriously? Seriously? My blow dryer? The one day I’d actually decided to put makeup on and do something with my hair. The one day I was trying to feel normal, whatever that looked like.

I called a friend and through my tears said, “I can’t do this. I’m not cut out for this. I’m tired. I don’t know what to do. And my freaking blow dryer won’t work!” She listened. She validated. She prayed with me, and I was calm again.

I stood in the bathroom of the motel room, refusing to be shoeless thanks to the multiple overflows of our toilet. It’d been two weeks since we moved into the motel room – myself and Caleb, the sweet 15-year old I told you about.

It had been two weeks since our lives had been changed, again. Two weeks since I stood in the home I rented and said goodbye to almost every single one of my possessions. Two weeks since I’d said goodbye to the culprit that had taken my inability to live, to breathe, to speak, to function.

Mold. The reason I had to sleep in sunglasses. The reason I’d lost my memory. The reason I couldn’t eat. The reason I couldn’t form complete senses. The reason I was trying not to find my identity in being known as a “stroke patient”. The reason I could only get out of bed long enough to send Caleb off to school and put food in the crockpot so he could have something for dinner. You could smell it here and there and see tiny bits of it in my home office, but after a week of non-stop rain, it seemed to turn into The Incredible Hulk, angrily growing throughout parts of the house with a vengeance to destroy me. It was winning.

It was both a blessing and a curse. I’d been begging God for an explanation – to show me what to do. To help me figure out what had happened to me. He answered that prayer – and it was black, deadly, and every breath I took was another step towards total destruction of every part of my body. I’m allergic to mold and it was literally destroying me.

I had an answer I was grateful for, but now I needed another answer. Where do we go from here? What do we do? “You get out immediately,” others said, including the neurologist. If only it were that easy. If only it were as simple as finding another place to rent, packing up your things, and renting a moving truck. It wasn’t, especially when you barely have the ability to think for yourself or the energy to lift a box to pack.

There was nothing available for rent in my tiny hometown. Nothing. I sat without answers, wondering what to do next, but refusing to ask God why. I knew in the midst of this chaos, He was still good. He had to be, because that’s what His Word says. He said He would never leave me or abandon me. That was a promise I vowed to hold onto as I prayed for Him to protect me from any more damage and reverse the damage which had already been done. I asked Him to help us find a place to live.

He did, but certainly not in the way I expected. A motel room with two double beds would soon become our home while we sought refuge from the toxic air we were breathing. I felt like a complete failure. Here I was now raising a 15-year old who I promised to provide a stable environment for, writing a check for the weekly rental, where he’d keep his milk for cereal in the cooler and wash his bowl out in the bathroom sink. We each packed a bag and said goodbye to the home we’d known, and I sought out a place of refuge for Booger, the white Schnauzer I’d adopted only months before, and Max and Ruby, the cats I’d rescued out of a hole in the ditch a year earlier. I didn’t have time to grieve. I didn’t have time to process. I was just trying to survive.

But then there would be more to grieve. More news to absorb. Not only were we walking away from our home – we had to walk away from almost every single one of our possessions. Here’s the thing about mold – it isn’t just something you see. The spores carry through the air, touching everything you own, soaking into fibers and fabric and wood and plastic. Almost everything I owned was contaminated. Almost everything I’d spent years working for was no longer mine.

With a mask covering my face, I stood in the house walking from room to room trying to figure out what I could salvage. Almost nothing. I stood over a box with my Dolly Parton record collection. Surely they were fine. Nope. I sat in the floor staring at that box and let the tears flow. It wasn’t just records. It had nothing to do with Dolly Parton. I know all things are replaceable. But that collection started with my grandma. She gave me my first set of records for Christmas when I was 13.

It was the greatest Christmas gift I remember receiving still to this day. Why? Because I grew up longing for my grandma’s love. When she gave me those records, I knew she had genuinely put thought into that gift, providing me with something I thoroughly enjoyed, Dolly Parton music. The thought of putting those gifts back into a box to be destroyed did me in.
“It’s like my house has burned to the ground and I’ve lost almost everything, yet I’m still standing in it, surrounded by possessions which are no longer mine,” I told my mom. I cried again.

After one last walk through I said goodbye to almost everything I owned and closed the door, and Caleb said goodbye to a home he’d barely been able to settle into. Later that evening, we ate Pop Tarts in our double beds and watched The Voice.
“Let’s pretend like we’re camping,” I told him. “We’ll make this an adventure. Surely it won’t be long and we’ll find another place.” He nodded his head as to say yes while brown sugar and cinnamon crumbs fell off his lip. “I just want you to be okay,” he said. I kissed his forehead, told him I loved him, and rolled over to go to sleep, holding my Bible tightly in my arms. God was still good.

There is more to the story I’m excited to tell you about, but it’s far too much for one blog post, so stay tuned..