Eve’s Daughter

Continuing on from ‘Stepping Into A New Life’  and ‘Stepping Into A New Life - The Battle’  

At the end of October/start of November Tim went on a detox - a Breuss detox, which is quite involved, well researched and documented, not the quick fix detox you can buy over the counter at the chemist. The Breuss detox is the sort of detox they’ve been using in Sweden to help cure cancer victims and stuff, and needless to say, before entering into this detox Tim did a lot of research.

 Anyway, that was a year ago now because on Melbourne Cup Day last year we were at my parents for a Cup Day BBQ and Tim was drinking his veggie juice while we all tucked into steaks, chops and sausages with mum’s wonderful devilled eggs and salad! By that stage he’d been on it for about a week and had two more weeks to go.

Now the idea of doing this detox was to clean his body out from all the toxins that had been going in over the years (including lots of antibiotics he’d been prescribed over the last few years to deal with all these illnesses he kept catching) and give his body a kick start, or a jump start into new good health! That was the idea anyway - as you may have already guessed, the detox didn’t have the result we’d hoped. If it had done all we expected it to do, then I would have gone on one too once I’d stopped breastfeeding - it didn’t and I haven’t.

By the end of the second week Tim was meant to start feeling better, have more energy and all that kind of stuff, instead he just started getting worse again. By the end of the detox he was just as bad as he had been before he’d begun, perhaps even worse, and he was just 10 kgs lighter! That wasn’t too bad, although he was definitely on the skinnier side. The problem was after that, he just couldn’t seem to put on weight and kept losing it. At this stage we still had money, so we were getting organic fruit and vegetables and eating really well - I lost weight too, just from eating well.

Because he was still not better we started looking for a local naturopath - by this time we were pretty skeptical of what the local GP would say, so we thought we’d see if we could get any better results from a naturopath. This naturopath put Tim on another detox which was meant to stabilise his blood sugars (high protein, no carbs - I think) - it didn’t. He went downhill even faster and lost even more weight. He HAD to eat every hour or he changed and behaved like a woman with really bad PMT! It was scary, for all of us - when Tim had moments like these it was kinda like Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, fortunately they didn’t happen too often as we mostly managed to stuff food down his throat in time.

And he was dangerous to drive! He took the boys to Bunnings one afternoon and he didn’t have enough food or water with him and his energy and capacity for anything just fizzled out. He remembers driving home and it was like he was drunk - he did silly things like pulling out in front of cars when he should have waited, weaving all over the lane and stuff. After hearing that I said you’re not safe to drive and I’m not going to let you drive anywhere by yourself - that of course makes life difficult, but I’d prefer that to him killing himself in the car. He should have got a taxi, but when he gets to this state he can’t think, his brain has shut down and he’s just doing what he can to survive.

This happened over Christmas and of course the naturopath was away on holidays like everyone else, so in desperation we looked him up in the phone book and fortunately found his home number and was able to contact him. He said Tim’s response to the diet was unusual, he’d only ever had one other patient respond this way and told him to immediately discontinue it. And once Tim resumed a ‘normal’ diet, he wasn’t as bad, but he wasn’t good either.

He continued seeing the naturopath who tried him on a few different things and at the same time he was seeing a healing masseus who was dealing with energy blocks in his body. This was no gentle massage either. Tim said to me once, “don’t ever be jealous about me getting a massage twice a week because these are not nice relaxing massages, they’re awful!” I was feeling kinda jealous, especially as I was all tight and crunchy on my shoulders and could really do with a massage. However, when I started seeing the bruises that Tim was coming home with, I began to think that maybe I wasn’t so keen anymore!

Also during this time Tim had to have an emergency operation to remove a tooth - there was night when he just could not sleep he was in so much pain. This was in late February this year as he had the tooth out on the Thursday before Xavier’s 1st birthday party! He looked pretty awful, more awful than normal - I mean, at this stage he’s still really skinny, really skinny. Tim is around 6 foot and he was down to 68kg! That was only 8kg heavier than me!! And I’m only about 5 foot 6 inches and small boned! His mum was really upset when she saw him and when she went back to my sister-in-laws she cried - he’d reminded her of Tim’s dad who’d died a 18 months earlier with cancer!

And all the while that this is going on I’m on an emotional roller coaster ride yet again. I keep losing my temper, screaming at the boys, shutting myself in my room and lying on the bed sobbing and listening to all the whispers about being a bad mother, a failure, that people didn’t really like me or my family (apart from another couple, none of our friends turned up to Xavier’s birthday, just family) and all that kinda stuff. And I would believe them, believe that this was it, I was stuck here and this is what our life was gonna be like forever and we didn’t really have any good friends…! It was a hard time - it’s all been hard, but at least there are moments when it doesn’t seem as hard and you’ve got time to stop and catch your breath.

A year ago I found the following in my emails as I was cleaning stuff up (it was sent ages and ages ago) by a friend who is not a Christian - she thought I might like it. I did. And when I found it again, I thought it applied more to our church and what we were going through as a church, than for me as an individual. But as things kept happening and crappola kept surfacing in my life and in my family I began to realise that this story and this scripture ‘He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.’ (Malachi 3:3) was for me. This was in the first half of last year (2006), by the second half of last year I’d forgotten all about it, but it came to mind again recently, in the last week or so! I love this story, have a read and enjoy. I hope it speaks to you in the way it spoke and still speaks to me.

This verse puzzled some women in a Bible Study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God. One of the women offered to find out about the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study. That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn’t mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.

As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot then she thought again about the verse that says, “He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.” She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire.  If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.

The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, “How do you know when the silver is fully refined?” He looked at her and answered, “Oh, that’s easy - when I see my image in it.”

I am being refined. Tim is being refined. Our entire family is being refined. And it’s tough, it’s really, really tough and hot. We are being refined; we are being prepared. For what? No idea! Absolutely no idea!! But we know this to be the truth. God has plans for us, big plans. Plans we are not ready to fulfill because there’s still stuff in our life, major stuff that needs to be dealt with. And this stuff, this dross, all the baggage and issues, all the crappola can only come to the surface and be burnt away when we are held in the fire.

When I read this I am encouraged; there is a reason, a purpose for all the stuff that we have been going through and still are going through. We are being refined and purified so we can carry out God’s specific plans for our lives. It’s hard though and we are tired; tired and worn out. Being refined is really good though and I am ecstatic that I can look back on my life over the last almost two years and see how God has been working in me and in Tim and how much we have changed - especially in the last six months which have been soooo intense - but being refined is tiring, it’s hard and hot, very uncomfortable, painful and emotional, and I must admit, I’d dearly love for it to be over! However, I don’t want to rush into the plans God has for us without being prepared either. I want to be as ready as I can be, we can be; I want to be refined and purified and able to do what God has called me to do, us to do. So I guess in that sense, if I’m not ready yet, we’re not ready yet, then I’m prepared to be held in fire again. Aaaaggghh! What am I saying?!!! Actually, I know what I am saying - God please help us to learn and apply all the lessons that you have been teaching us, really learn and really apply.

Anyway, back to Tim’s ongoing health saga - the naturopath finally said to him that he couldn’t figure out what was wrong with him, Tim should have been improving and wasn’t. The GP wasn’t much ‘chop’ either. He did send Tim to a general specialist who was worse than no help at all. Tim took in a list of all his symptoms, the general specialist read through them and said, “it’s just a bunch of symptoms, if it was anything ’serious’ it would have presented by now. You’re depressed. I’ll prescribe you some antidepressents.” He came to this conclusion before he did any of the tests! Thing is, Tim isn’t depressed - he has his moments, but then, so do I, and I reckon, so does everyone else and when you’ve been unwell for as long as he has, then the odd bout of depression is actually pretty normal. Needless to say Tim was pretty ‘ticked off’ with this diagnosis. At first I thought it was a good thing - finally, something, and even if it’s all in his head, that’s okay, at least it can be “fixed”, but Tim was adamant that he was NOT depressed and he refused the antidepressents. He doesn’t want to poison his system any more than he already has with drugs, even if they might provide some short term relief and he especially does not want to be taking drugs ‘permanently’. And I agree with him.

However, I still wondered whether some of the illness was caused by ‘bad thinking’ and after a while I managed to convince him to see a counsellor. He went to see our old assistant pastor from many years ago who had become a counsellor for the Salvation Army and is very good, in May this year (2007). During one of his sessions the counsellor asked him, “What if this is as good as it gets? What if you are this sick for the rest of your life? Are you living the life you want to live? Would you change anything about the way you are living?”

This was a VERY significant question and became a major turning point for us - we talked about this question for a very long time the Friday this question had been asked and came to the realisation that, no, we are not living the life we want to live and there is heaps we want to change about the life we are living. For more insight on this you can read my posts entitled ‘The Countdown Begins!’ , ‘More To Life’.  It was also at this time that Tim began reading ‘Wild At Heart’ by John Eldredge and I went to the Adore Women’s Conference and began reading ‘Captivating’ by Stasi & John Eldredge and for both of us major life changes began and God has been working hard and fast in us ever since! Looking back on our lives up to this point I can see that we were progressing steadily, generally in an upward slant, but since mid May (2007) we’ve been climbing a mountain really fast!

Reading ‘Captivating’ is what inspired me to begin this blog, documenting my story, my journey, my life. To be honest, I don’t care if no-one ever reads this, I enjoy writing it, I’m having a ball writing it all down. However, if people do read this blog, I hope it’s as interesting for them as it is for me and I hope it inspires, encourages, brings hope, uplifts and all that kind of stuff. Anyway, if you want to know more about the impact of ‘Captivating’ on my life check out these posts (if you haven’t already) - ‘Girly Stuff & Women’s Conferences’ , ‘Embrace Your Femininity!’ , ‘Captivating - Part 2′ , ‘Desires of A Woman’s Heart - Romance’ - this list is nowhere near complete, but it gives you a starting point if you want it.

Okay, this post is just way too long and it is still going! I had no idea when I started chronicling our journey of the last year that it would take soooo long and be so huge!! Okay, hopefully the next post in the series, ‘Stepping Into A New Life - The Saga Continues’ will be the last!

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