My Grown Up Christmas List

In a little town across the river from New Orleans, sits a modest home probably built in the 1960′s.  A couple in their late 80′s/early 90′s live there with their two adult children, both girls, unmarried.  And while most children who live with their parents are rebellious teenagers, these children are completely helpless and need their parents to survive.

These ladies, in their late forties, have multiple sclerosis.  They are both bedridden and in diapers.

Every morning, the mom, Elaine, gets up and makes sure both Renae and Lynda are properly fed and gets her husband, Larry, to help her change them. These adult women were once vibrant and successful ladies.  One of them was a flight attendant for years until someone actually turned her in when they caught her a little shaky to pour a cup of coffee for a passenger.  And that’s when she was laid off and the disability kicked in.

Over in the next parish, Lynda and Renae have another sister, in her fifties who, although she also has MS, walks with a walker and visits from time to time.

I look at this family and my heart just aches.  Because how long can a mother take care of her children?  My resolve as a parent says as long as necessary.  But one day, there will not be anyone to take care of these grown ladies who are completely dependent on someone to feed and change them.  These aging parents have their own health issues.  In normal circumstances, they would have their kids caring for them. Instead, they have a difficult time….as they strain their backs lifting each girl to bathe them. 

I sit back and cry out, “God, why?  Why is it this way for this sweet family? How unfair and sad!” 

Isaiah 55:8-11 (The Message) says:

“I don’t think the way you think.
   The way you work isn’t the way I work.”
         God’s Decree.
“For as the sky soars high above earth,
   so the way I work surpasses the way you work,
   and the way I think is beyond the way you think.”

His ways are different than ours.  He has a plan for them, and I have to be willing to let Him use whatever means necessary to care for them.  You know, I don’t want them being wards of the state.  I don’t know the first thing about caring for MS patients either.  All I know is that there’s a family on the other side of the river who will one day need more than what government or family can give them.  And I pray that somehow God will make a way to help them, even if he has to use me to do it.

Last night, while doing some Christmas shopping, my daughter asks me, “Mom, what do YOU want for Christmas?”

My grown up Christmas Wish: more than anything for myself, I wish that there was a way to have all of that sweet family cared for under one roof; with 3 meals a day that Elaine doesn’t have to make, a full-time nurse who is able to care for both the aging parents and their adult children.  I wish there was some way that they could all live together in the twilight of their lives.

Extreme Home Makeover? Are  you out there?  Are you up for that challenge?