Finding strength through Hard Times.

I'd love to say I handled the situation as gracefully as I'm going to write about it, but I haven't.

When bad things happen to other people, I express shock and concern, and offer to help in anyway I can.  Try to redirect the negative and help them focus on the positive.  Secretly, I'm just grateful it didn't happen to me.  Until it does.  Which it did.

Trials aren't a new thing for our family.  I think that's a pretty generic statement that can be applied to any person.  Some trials in this life are harder than others and you can often catch yourself looking at the lives of others and wondering why things go a certain way.  I try not to spend too much time in that place because I have SO much to be grateful for.  I really do.  My life is far from perfect, but I have a wonderful little family filled with the sweetest spirits who set examples for me each day and make me want to be a better person.  I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and its gospel are the same teachings as the church in Christ's time... it's literally His church, restored.  It's amazing and I would be LOST without this knowledge.  I have a wonderful support group of family and friends and people that are invested in the well being of our family.  These are GOOD people.  I really believe that people are inherently good.

Even with all that knowledge, it was quickly forgotten earlier today.

We had a quiet morning and after cleaning up and getting ready for the day, I had promised Bella we would get out of the house and go to the library.  We have recently moved into our own place (YAY) and so most of my time has been spent maintaining and unpacking.  Neither one very successfully but I am trying my best.

As we approach our car I see a torn seatbelt right by our trunk.  It looks very out of place as I make a mental note of it but nothing clicks until I go to open the car doors to let it air our since it's so hot.  I place Ronan in the drivers seat while I open Bella's door only to find no car seat.

 I am in shock.  I'm angry.  I feel violated.  I feel so overwhelmed.  How will we replace this?   What kind of person STEALS a car seat?  How are we going to afford to replace all of this?  Why me? How do I explain this to  Bella? Where is Mitch?

(I'd like to include not even a week ago, there were two car break ins in our complex and last Friday and Saturday at TWO separate locations, someone stole Mitch's landscaping equipment, while he was working EARNING a living.  The first causing me to be grateful it wasn't me, and the second, leaving me to try to focus on the positive.)

But this was different.  This was where we live.  This belonged to my child.  It was my means to protect her.  And it had been taken from me where I call home.  I couldn't believe someone would steal our car seat.  It wasn't a rinky dink one either.  It's a heavy duty $300 car seat to protect Bella if we were in a car accident.  With our hard earned money (Mitch works manual labor so he earns every bit of his paycheck).  I would love to say I fell to my knees and said a prayer calling for my Father's aid.

I failed once again and ugly cried.  And the anger, it just boiled over and it was everything I could do not to say bad words or wish horrible things on this person who did this to our family.  They left my CD player, my cell phone charger, a car full of STUFF from the move, but they took my Bella's car seat.  It's a complicated car seat so even if you unbuckle it, it's not going to just come right out because its in a base and if you don't know what you're doing its hard to handle.  And it's heavy.  So they went into a lot of effort to get the car seat and just to taunt me, they left the cut seat belt where I would find it.

It would be a completely different thing if we were in a position to replace these things or had means to do so, but the person who STOLE our carseat is probably in a better financial situation than we are.

I went through all the motions of filing the police report, crying, thinking the thoughts of how could this happen to me and just utter despair.  But mostly anger.  And violation,  I can't remember a time in my life where I haven't felt safe and this was at my front door.  How do you react?  I went through the whole conversation of "We are good people.  We go to church.  We pay our tithing. We try our best to serve others.  Why me?"  It didn't affect my testimony but seriously tested the limits of wanting to understand and not being able to.  Good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people.  God is for my good and not against me.  He wants me to be happy and aches with me when things are done against me.  I know justice will be served in this life or the next, but it can still be quite a hurtful pill to swallow.

After a rollercoaster of emotions, and explaining to Bella why I was crying or why it wasn't her fault.  I did drop down to my knees and offer a prayer.  It wasn't my most heartfelt prayer but I really did give it everything I could in the moment.  There wasn't a pause button for me as a mother just because this happened.  Mitch still had to work and I locked ourselves in our home for the remainder of the day.

Around dinnertime, I was able to talk without the anger boiling over or crying.  I was able to offer a more sincere prayer.  The response of love and outrage from others (from what happened to us) was comforting.  We have a wonderful church member who is going to give us their carseat and also another who is going to help us repair our car at a fraction of the cost.  So instead of having to find over $600 to replace everything, we will only have to out of pocket $50 which is still not awesome but it could be so much worse.  I am grateful for these blessings.

I am always the one to give the other person the benefit of the doubt, walk a mile in their shoes, the mercy of it all... "they aren't bad people, just good people that made a bad choice."  Well, Ladies and Gentleman, today was the first day I told my child that there are actually BAD people.   It's amazing what happens when you have to practice what you preach.  It's actually quite hard at times.

My heart was hardened for a good bit today.  After the day was over and the kids were asleep, I asked Mitch to say a prayer with me and if we could have scripture study together.  I really needed it.

 My actual paper scriptures are somewhere in the pile of stuff the will be our dining room and my phone had just died, so we went to LDS. org and this is what I found.

http://www.lds.org/bible-videos/videos/forgive-70-times-7?cid=HPL2P05W01043&lang=eng

It's what we needed to hear.  We all need forgiveness and we are required to forgive everyone, no matter the offense.  That message took a whole new light for me tonight as I watched the video.

So even though I'd like to persecute this person to the fullest letter of the law, we have both decided if this person is found, and returns our stuff, and pay for the damages to the car, we won't press further charges.  I forgive them.  The longer I progress in this life,  I see how truly hard it can be to do sometimes, but I really do forgive them.  Either way, I forgive them.

I'd love to say I handled this with the knowledge that I have, but I'm human.  I failed in that respect as far as faith went.  I should have trusted in the Lord from the beginning and not when I was doing being selfish and wallowing in the trial.  I'm human, but thankfully, through the Atonement, I can be forgiven too and have a second chance at tomorrow.

The whole situation is just crummy for all people involved, but long story shot, I've been touched by the love and support of so many.  I feel like I leave this day feeling less innocent and more violated.  I feel like Bella will grow up in a much crueler world than I have ever known, and that's scary as a a parent, as a person.  But I also know that this will work for my good in the end.  I know good people do exist and it's a few ignorant, misguided ones that leave a sour taste in my mouth at  the moment.  But I know as I continue to pray for peace and protection, I will be given that too.  I will not be deterred from my goals or raising a righteous family.  I'm not mad at God or blame Him for what happened today.  I will eventually reach the point where I can learn from this and see all the positives.  For now,  I will focus on Christ's teachings and work on truly forgiving as I have been commanded to do.