OT more

At some point it sadly looks like you're going to have to turn away from those you've expected encouragement from - ie husband, parents, friends. It sounds like they're turning their backs on the opportunity to be your companions. Now, I'm not saying leave them or anything - please don't misinterpret. In my early marriage, my husband was actually gone 80% of the time, out of state, working construction. I was home raising his special needs son, alone. I'd become a Christian, but the church wasn't the kind of real life support I needed, and my parents lived 2000 miles away. One evening, when I was unable to do a thing but sit on the bed and cry, I asked God to be my companion for real, so I could feel Him with me and wouldn't be so lonely. I've never been lonely since then. Anne, I know that no 2 situations are the same. I also know that those closest to us, who ought to be helping us just as we've helped them, will usually fail us. I'm still with hubby, and we get along great, but the kinds of things that are possible - intimate secrets, looks that communicate without words, praying together - we don't have them. We could have, but he's made choices, followed by my own choices, that killed or injured that potential. sigh. Hugs to you all week - all month - all year. Life can get better - but it never gets easy.

Musicmaker

Musicmaker...this is one powerful post. You and I are two different people that have led two separate lives, but what you have written below contains so much truth about my life.

I'm never alone either these days for the exact same reason you stated. Isn't it wonderful that God is that huge and caring and so full of love !!

Donna in WA

There are pluses and minuses to talking to folks who don't know you well when you're in a crisis; the pluses vastly outweigh the minuses in the short term, and maybe in the long term as well.

There's no emotional baggage involved: because they *don't* know you, they aren't going to build expectations around how you "used to be" or "always are" or whatever of that ilk. Even when we don't mean to, we tend to be limiting in our support of people we know well---friends and family---because we think we know what they can---and can't, or won't---do. Makes it very hard to excel and be more than we thought we could be when our support system's version of "cheering us on" is a constant message of "YOU can't do that. You can't, you know. You're not capable. You're wasting your time trying. Just proves that once again you're out of touch with reality."

Doesn't mean strangers are somehow morally better than the folks we know: could be that they're terribly hard on their friends and family. But there's something about the detachment involved in dealing with someone we don't know well enough to limit that frees us to perhaps be more encouraging than we usually are.

--pig

Great observations, Megan. Yes, the people on a list or in a newsgroup may be able to be more objective. And the anonymity of the internet also allows such people to share their personal experiences--something some may be reluctant to do to people they face everyday.

Best regards, Michelle > There are pluses and minuses to talking to folks who don't know you well