Restored Friendship

Last year when my dad died was a horrible time for me. Not only was I dealing with paralyzing sadness and at times, depression, but I was overwhelmed with all the things I needed to do to help my mother. She'd always been so self-sufficient and it was a completely new role for me to have to step in and deal with finances and insurance and make decisions that could affect her for the rest of her life. Since we live over 650 miles apart, I had to go out there three times in six weeks and I spent hours on the phone every day. My mother was so down I was worried about her and that meant at least two calls a day to her in addition to the calls regarding whatever the latest problem I was working on was. All of that is to say that a casualty of all of this was a friendship I'd cherished for longer than I've known my husband. We said God had not given us sisters, so we got to choose our own.

I remember the last time she called me, she told me it was never a good time to call me. And she was right. I never wanted to talk on the phone. In fact, I still don't like to though I am better. I almost never pick up the phone to call someone unless there is a specific topic to discuss. I will visit if someone calls me, but I still don't initiate calls very often. I know that I am different. I am no longer depressed, but without a doubt, the emotion I am most capable of experiencing is still sadness. I have moments of happiness and I've never lost my joy in the Lord, but I'm just not the same person.

Today, the doorbell rang and I came bounding down the stairs expecting to find the mail carrier at the door, but it was my friend, my sister. She came bearing a Cappuccino Macchiato from Starbucks (I used to indulge, but cutting down on sugar mightily in the past couple of years made it a huge treat) and we had the opportunity to sit and talk for nearly six hours today. My husband joined us for lunch and we had a lot of catching up to do. And she cried when I shared what I'd been going through. She didn't know and now understands that she didn't know, and I couldn't have told her back then what was going on. I was struggling just to make myself get up every day and face what I had to do. It was months before I returned to a "normal" routine. We won't even pretend that I ever reached "normal". In fact, that was probably out of reach before the traumatic year. I said it so you wouldn't feel the need to point it out to me.

Still, the friendship has been restored. In fact, twice during the last week, I'd thought "I miss her". I think that was God preparing me for today. One of the times I thought that was when I was frantically sending out urgent requests for prayer for my daughter this week. I missed being able to add my "sister" to that group who was praying, but because we'd been out of touch, she wouldn't have known what the situation was that created this urgent need. So I am grateful to have her back in my life. I hope we return to our old patterns - and I believe we will, because just like real sisters, there have been other rough spots in our life together, but we've always overcome them.

She said she was afraid to come today. I'm sorry for that. I was never mad, just too overwhelmed to deal with anyone else's emotions at the time. I hope I learned something from all of this and I will do better in the next crisis. Undoubtedly, there will be others. I never want to push her away again, and I know I did that. But God has stepped in with yet another blessing this week.

By the way, He took care of my daughter's situation for that day. She's still going to have to deal with the same issues for a few more weeks, but He took care of it that day, and we will just continue to pray for her each day until she gets to move on to something else. And that day is coming, too.