Just Enough Light to Thrive

By Miriam Butler Conrad

Miriam Conrad’s life could not have been more difficult—from childhood neglect and sexual abuse to extramarital affairs, domestic turmoil, and more. Readers looking for a storybook ending may be disappointed, but those entering the story with curiosity and courage will find one of the most painfully amazing and exhilarating stories of grace they have ever encountered. Even the most hopeless circumstances leave room for God’s redemption. Even when the visible circumstances leave no hints of vindication, God is ever present, kind, and abundantly gracious. Evil doesn’t get the last word. As Miriam’s story demonstrates, by confronting the darkness we find just enough light to thrive.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Seedbed
• Release date: Dec 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9781937824204

Book preview

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INTRODUCTION

I FEEL THAT BEFORE WE BEGIN OUR JOURNEY TOGETHER through the pages of this book, I should alert you about my purpose for writing it: to encourage and enlighten those of you who are facing or have faced rejection, fear, discouragement, disappointment, abuse, and guilt. As I reveal to you how those things have affected my life, I hope that sharing my doubts, fears, and confusion will resonate with your desire to be free of the chains that might be holding you in abeyance while desperately trying to make meaning of your circumstances. It is my desire that as we share our feelings, we can grow together in God’s love to find purpose and meaning for our lives. I have experienced the depths and the heights of emotion and consequence as I still struggle to connect what I know of God with what happened to me. While reading this book, my hope is that you will take inventory of yourself and your response to your circumstances. Be honest with your feelings as you discover God’s nature in response to your experience. Do any of the following statements/questions sound familiar with your heart’s struggle? Some of them still do with mine.

If I would have known God then the way I know Him now, I would have been much more cautious when casually talking about God’s love and care.

If I had been wiser then, I would have been very careful regarding preaching about God’s promises to answer prayer.

Would it show a lack of faith on my part if I were to seek professional help with my problems?

How do I reconcile the reality of my life with the promises of God?

What exactly does an answer to prayer really mean?

What is a Christian supposed to believe if nothing changes after long periods of fervent prayer?

Have I done something wrong, prayed wrong, sinned, doubted, stayed away from church, that keeps me from being eligible for answers to prayer?

Is my faith dependent upon God fixing things?

Do I really want God to make my life easier or holier?

Does my day-to-day attitude reflect my environment or Jesus?

How badly do I want God to punish people who have hurt me? Do I want them to have a second chance at asking for forgiveness, or have I mentally and emotionally dismissed them forever?

Is there anyone in my life that I am just waiting to see mess up and experience loss or hurt?

What must happen before I can truthfully claim to be joyful?

When was the last time it was clear that God answered a prayer of mine?

Now that you know my purpose, I invite you to join me in personal examination as we use Scripture and reflection to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus together (see 2 Peter 3:18).

JUST ENOUGH

LIGHT TO

THRIVE

CHAPTER ONE

IN THE

BEGINNING

EVEN THE PATHETIC WAIL OF THE NEWBORN COULD NOT prevent the rejection of her mother. Flailing her arms against the tiny baby girl, she screamed, Get her away from me! The nurse’s eyes scanned the room, hoping to find someone whose expression would indicate they understood what was going on. Seeing only horror and disbelief reflected back, she took the naked infant and put her on a stainless-steel table until there would be a spare minute to attend to her cries.

The woman who had just brought this life into the world was close to dying. She required every bit of attention available from the nurses and doctors present, so the baby’s screams were ignored.

Even after the medical emergency was resolved, the mother adamantly refused to recognize any responsibility she might have to contribute to a healthy beginning of this little girl’s life. The tiny soul was denied the love, joy, personal touch, and physical nourishment God had designed her to receive at her mother’s breast.

It was the harbinger of a lifetime of rejection.

My father stood outside the door and looked through the six-by-six-inch window into the delivery room. He had been watching nervously ever since they took his wife in what now seemed like a long time before. The doctor told him that his wife was ready to deliver, and the baby was obviously ready to be born, but she wasn’t cooperating with the doctors. As they wheeled her into the delivery room, my father pleaded with my mother to help the doctors and not fight against them, but she was irrationally determined not to have another child, even if it killed her in the process.

Once in the delivery room, nature took over and I was born, ready or not, wanted or not, beautiful or not. I made my appearance.

The nurse who put me on the table eventually returned to clean me, wrap me in a blanket, and carry me outside to my father who awkwardly received me. She told him she was running downstairs to get a bottle of formula since my own mother wouldn’t touch me, much less put me to her breast.

Confused, heartbroken, and afraid, Dad found a chair in the little waiting room and sat down. I had stopped screaming by that time. He knew the formula might satisfy me for the moment, but what about later? Tonight? Tomorrow? Who was going to feed me then?

Dad should not have been surprised. Mom had warned him. If the newborn were a boy, he would be welcome to share the family unit with his two-and-a-half-year-old brother. But if it were a girl—she, it, wasn’t even going to darken the door of their home. There would be no girl babies in her house!

And now the very worst had happened. It was a girl baby, and to say it wasn’t welcome was a vast understatement.

The formula appeared and the nurse handed the bottle to Daddy: Here, you better get used to feeding this child right now—it’s obvious her mother isn’t going to do it!

And with that command came an idea: If I can learn to feed this baby, I can learn to change this baby, and I can learn to dress this baby, and, ultimately, I can learn how to raise this little girl. Even if her mother won’t do it, there’s nothing stopping me from saving our family humiliation and shame. Surely her mother can’t refuse to let me bring her home if she doesn’t have to have anything to do with her!

There was a lot at stake besides the welfare of the infant. My dad was the pastor of a small church in the community. All those who attended certainly knew Mother was pregnant and about to deliver. To quietly put the child up for adoption was out of the question.

After the infant was fed and returned to the nursery, Dad found Mom’s room and approached her with a plan: How about if we take her home as if everything is just fine, and I will assume all responsibility for her and you won’t have to do anything? You can just pretend she never happened until she can take care of herself.

I am convinced that if Mom had been physically and emotionally stronger at that minute, she would have laughed in Dad’s face at such a bizarre suggestion. But the delivery had so weakened her in spirit as well as in body that she had no power left to argue with him, and so nodded her head, acknowledging her reluctant willingness for me to be brought home.

The next day when Dad returned to the hospital, he saw the delivery room nurse who had been so compassionate the day before. The name tag on her uniform read: Miriam Anderson. Dad told her that he was going to name me Miriam because he was certain I would not have survived had it not been for her concern and caring. Decades later, God worked it out that I would meet Miriam Anderson (by that time long retired from nursing), who had never forgotten my story, and told it to me just as I have now told it to you.

Eventually the dreaded day came to bring me home. Since Mom refused to touch me, Dad lied to one of the women in the church and told her Mom wasn’t strong enough to hold me in the car (long before the days of car seats or seat belts), and asked if she would come along to hold me as he drove.

Mom kept her word. She lived the years of my childhood as though I were invisible and not part of the family. Dad told me much later that from the time I was a newborn until I could fend for myself, Mom utterly ignored my presence except for times of rage. At home she never held, fed, bathed, or changed me—and rarely spoke to me as an infant or toddler.

She never spoke my name. You, or That Girl, and sometimes It all referred to me. I don’t remember her ever touching me except when she would grip my arm to keep me from running from her beatings.

Public life was a totally different matter. It was as if someone pulled the curtain back and set our family down in an entirely different dimension of reality.

Suddenly Mom became the loving, doting, all-consumed mother. She held me and fed me and changed me and cooed at me and bragged on my looks. I’m sure her friends believed me to be the most fortunate infant ever.

Such tenderness.

Such attention.

Such love being poured out on me.

Such lies.

And they never knew. The charade continued through my infancy and right into my toddler years. Later, I would hear from a few of Mom’s friends that they felt something wasn’t right about our home, but Dad’s position as a pastor intimidated them so much, they couldn’t work up the courage to ask questions. The people who suspected I was not being treated with love and kindness cared much more for themselves than they did about me.

I had no one to love me.

I had no one to defend me.

Or hold me.

I was alone.

Within a year, Dad resigned his pastorate as he couldn’t keep up with the stresses of raising an infant and meeting the demands of a congregation.

A few years ago, I spent several months as a hospital chaplain. My assignment was the PICU—Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. Here were tiny babies receiving varying levels of life-giving treatment. Mothers and fathers, nurses and doctors gathered around the precious infant who sometimes could hardly be seen under all the equipment.

The nurses encouraged the parents to make skin-to-skin contact as often as possible: Find some place where there isn’t a bandage or a needle or a tube, and gently and slowly just move your finger around, up and down, and speak tenderly to them. Watch as their breathing slows and their heartbeats become regular. They understand the touch of love no matter how ill they are.

I have held infants in my arms as I performed baptismal rites for those who passed away in their mother’s womb before they were born. There were teeny ones who died before ever leaving the hospital. Those were excruciatingly difficult times. The sadness experienced during the delivery by the parents, as well as the entire attending staff, can be overwhelming. I have watched strong, tough physicians weep while assisting the mother. Still the mother holds her arms out to take the precious, lifeless infant; speaks words of love and affirmation over the child who cannot hear; caresses the skin that cannot feel; holds the infant tight against her chest as she sobs with anguish. The depth of pain when an infant dies is immeasurable.

Contrasted with that sadness was the obstetrics floor. The atmosphere there was constant festivity. Nervous first-time fathers parading with pride; grandparents, sisters, brothers, friends—all joining in the celebration.

Then comes the first road trip home to the nursery painted in anticipation; beds designed just for their comfort and safety; blankets, pacifiers, and every gadget imaginable to make the baby happy. Friends drop in to see the new addition. Oohs and ahs. She looks like her daddy. Look at those long fingers. I bet she’ll play the piano.

Proud, proud daddy. Weary, wiped-out mommy. Hovering grandparents. Caring friends. Every single one speaking words of affirmation over the infant—and somewhere, somehow, that tiny little brain miraculously records the love, the care, the pride, their own worthiness and beauty. They are already affirmed as part of a unit—a family whom they resemble and to whom they belong.

Touched gently.

Rocked often.

Fed at the slightest whimper.

Changed and bathed when necessary in order to be kept clean and healthy.

Wrapped tightly to comfort.

In some miraculous way, God has had a part in the development of every fetus. Boy, girl, multiple births. And malformed babies, Down syndrome babies, babies destined to live only a few minutes or hours, if at all. Babies who look beautiful, respond, learn to smile, and then, sometimes, comes a deadly discovery that part of their internal system has been operating incorrectly and the child will die before the first birthday.

All birth defects are not physically apparent. Some children are born with severe brain or internal imperfections that are not discovered until months, perhaps years, maybe decades later. Some birth defects will never be seen nor diagnosed. They are hidden in the deep places that regulate and balance both cognitive and emotional states.

Then there are those injuries caused by sins committed against the child in utero.

Anger.

Screaming.

Alcohol.

Drugs.

Hatred.

Rebellion.

There would have been no defect had the child been welcome in the mother’s womb.

Somewhere in my tiny, newborn brain I was unconsciously—but certainly—absorbing rejection, neglect, even apparent abandonment.

In the councils of heaven, however, God had already put into place an entire cadre of angels specifically assigned to my care. Unknown, unseen, but infinitely more powerful, more wise, more loving than any human effort would ever be, while acting on orders from the Author and Finisher of faith and love (see Hebrews 12:2), these superhuman agents of the Almighty would become my protectors, my deliverers, my silent, invisible representatives of the Savior of my soul working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year, and now eighty-one years to ultimately— though, not easily—accomplish the will of God for my life.

About the time I learned to eat without making a mess, I was banned from sharing meals with the family. My plate would be prepared, and I would be sent to my bedroom to eat alone while my parents and brother ate together around the table. There was no reason ever given for this treatment, even though I would often whimper and beg to sit at the table with the family.

You can imagine there was no room in our house for the normal terrible twos. I was not allowed to cry. Period. There was so much fear of my mother’s displeasure and physical abuse in my little mind that I learned very early to run to my room and be quiet rather than disobey and be screamed at and/or beaten.

Toys of all kinds were banned. No dolls, no cars like for my brother, no playing house. After infant toys became old and passé for me, I was introduced to reading and arithmetic. Yes, as bizarre as it sounds, about age two my father began my education by sitting me on his lap and reading to me. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I would sit for long periods of time on Daddy’s lap learning letters, numbers, and words in addition to geography, and lots and lots of memorization of Bible passages. It was a safe place, a relatively quiet place, and at this tender age I learned to take refuge in books and numbers and all things academic.

When I was four, I was enrolled in kindergarten where I lasted for two weeks and then was promoted to first grade. I think that was because I could already read fluently. I stayed in first grade two months, was declared too advanced for this grade level, and was promoted to second grade. I was still four years old. My parents had the good sense not to allow me to move on to the next grade at the end of the year, but kept me back in second grade.

That decision was good for my ultimate social development, but it was