What If?

Last night I spent 3 hours in the ER with my mom babysitting my sister. She's a drug user. She was prescribed a medicine that interacted with her other medications and possibly meth use 2 weeks before. I am annoyed with her lies about the sores on her body. Should I tell her she is a terrible liar and no one believes her crap?! I want to tell her to quit playing this game. She's had lots of help. She also has many other things going on due to her stupid choices. There are times that I wish I didn't care so much. Times I wish that she would choose not to have anything to do with me. Times when I knew how to reach her.

And then . . . .

I picture this scene.

In the pre-existence there is a meeting with a small group of spirits. The Lord has told us that we need to come up with a way to learn tolerance, patience, and unconditional love.

As we toss ideas around one of the spirits says, "I'll provide the opportunity for us to do this." "I'll suffer through a sexual assault at age 10 and then as you try to help me, even though you won't know what is going on, we can learn unconditional love. To help us learn patience, I will try to do what you all know I should do, but I will also fight against it. It's hard to fix a bad hurt and you will need patience to help me do it."

We protest saying that there must be an easier way.

"Easy Schmeesy! Don't you remember what Christ told us? It won't be easy, but it will be worth it. We can't do easy. I'm up for it."

No, no. It's too much to ask for just one. Let's come up with another way.

"Listen to me. We need to have one person willing to sacrifice for our learning and testing. I will need all of you to help me get back. I'll need your unconditional love. I'll need you to be patient with me. I can't come back to you without your help."

Another offers to help us learn tolerance. We come up with a way to learn tolerance.

As the Lord reviews our plan he informs us that if we don't remember our task to our sister that we will need to learn tolerance the hard way. It will take all of you. If only a few are learning it won't be enough.

What if only 2 were committed to love and be patient with this sister? Would that be where the tolerance comes in? We would have to tolerate what it feels like to have a drug addict in our family that looks terrible from the ravaging effects of the drugs.

How do we get everyone to see what we need to do? We need to love her, yet set boundaries to keep us safe. We need to be patient with her and encourage her to keep trying. We need to tolerate her as she has evolved into a rough, calloused, and scarred being.

All these things she teaches us, for our own good. I feel she trusted us to help her come back. Have we failed her? How do we reach that spirit that trusted to us to learn what we needed through her sacrifice? How do we get everyone on the same page? What will happen if it's just the few of us that continue to fight for her?

I am resolved to continue to try. No matter how hard.