Ep 66 | Dawn's Story: Surrendering Your Savior Complex and Finding Hope in Christ

What happens when a Christian mother's deepest fears about addiction come true not just once, but twice? Dawn Ward author of "From Guilt to Grace: Hope and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children," never imagined she'd write a book, yet her personal journey through her sons' addictions transformed not just her approach to parenting but her entire relationship with God. 

If you're walking the heartbreaking path of loving someone struggling with addiction, Dawn's story offers both practical wisdom and spiritual hope. Subscribe now to hear how one mother learned to trust God with her children's destiny while reclaiming her own life and purpose. 

-

Dawn Ward is a speaker, writer, and Bible teacher. She is the founder of The Faith to Flourish, a ministry equipping women to live transformed lives through inspiring teaching, mentoring, and biblical resources. The ministry also offers support and encouragement to women with addicted loved ones. She is married to Steve and mom to three adult children. Her book, "From Guilt to Grace: Hope and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children", published September 2024, is available for order.

Connect with Dawn:
thefaithtoflourish.com
Facebook
Instagram
LinkedIn

Links Mentioned: 

"From Guilt to Grace: Hope and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children"

About the She Surrenders Podcast:

On the She Surrenders podcast we are talking about women, faith and addiction all on the same platform. There are many podcasts for women and sobriety, but very few for women seeking information and stories from others about faith-based recovery.   

Help us reach more listeners: like, subscribe, review, and share. 

Find us on Instagram @shesurrenders_sherry, on Facebook @shesurrenderssherry, and online at www.shesurrenders.com. 

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:04

Welcome back. And today we have a new friend of mine, dawn Ward, and Dawn is a author and a speaker. Her book is called From Guilt to Grace Hope and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children, so the title right there tells you what it's all about, and the last 30 minutes that we've talked already tells you that we have a lot to talk about in this podcast. Dawn said something in our conversation before we started that just really struck me, so I know this is going to be a great conversation. She said ultimately it was about saving herself from the mindset that she had to be the saver and the fixer. And isn't that who we are as moms in the first place, who we try to be? And let's put our moms of addicted children hats on as well and be the saver and the fixer. So I know there's going to be a lot of good stuff here, so I invite you to listen in and welcome Dawn. I am so glad you're here.

Speaker 2 1:07

Thank you so much for having me, Sherry. I am so excited to be here and to just have a chance to chat with you and your listeners.

Speaker 1 1:14

Oh, we're so glad you're here, so I'm just going to invite you to just dive in and start sharing your story, and I'll interrupt with a question here and there, probably, but otherwise I'm giving you the platform.

Speaker 2 1:26

Okay, great. Well, first of all, I'm so excited to be able to come and talk as a mom and my husband has, of course, read every letter that I've written of this book and he says, dawn, it's really not to moms, it's to all the family members, the support people, the caregivers, or to anyone whose loved one is struggling, even with like life-destructive behaviors. And because it really is about us being healthy and happy and whole ourselves so that we can be a healthy and good support to them, if we bring all of our stuff in and we're just we're going to be, you know, trying to fix them out of our pain. And that's really what happened to me. I was raised in a home where my dad was a good provider. He was a fireman, but he just drank too much and he was one of those kind that kind of confused me because he could go to work, be perfectly sober and all of that, but when he started drinking if I heard that beer can open, I knew it was going to go until my dad blacked out, and that was very regular. It was whenever he wasn't working at the fire department and so I grew up with a lot of fear because and a lot of false sense of responsibility, because my parents would say things like or my dad especially would say you kids, drive me to drink, or if you weren't fighting all the time, I wouldn't have to drink so much, and he would blame my mother. And so, if you know, whatever the thing was, there was always this blame game, and I talk about that in the book, but this blame game of somebody is to blame for my drinking, and that went on my entire childhood and so I didn't even realize it.

Speaker 2 3:03

But when I finally got married and had children of my own, I was hypervigilant and trying to ensure that they would not become drinkers. My dad's brothers were drinkers. They were more the happy-go-lucky kind. My dad was the angry drunk, you know that would yell and cuss and demean people and all of that Never beat us, never hit us or anything like that, but just verbally abusive. And his brothers were friendly, laughing, funny, and so I just was very confused about what was normal behavior, what was okay, what wasn't okay. But as an adult I could look and say, well, they were all struggling with alcohol. It was just they displayed it differently.

Speaker 2 3:43

And so by the time my children were of the age where I was concerned about them drinking drugs weren't on my radar. I wasn't thinking about drugs, I was just concerned about them being maybe predisposed to alcohol and alcoholism. And so I spent a lot of time really talking to them about it and saying be really careful around this. And they were going to Christian school and we had Christian friends and all of that. I was vetting who they were hanging out with and so it really caught me by surprise when my middle son it was actually my middle son who had just we'd put him into public high school He'd wanted that and he came.

Speaker 2 4:22

I noticed some changes in him and I noticed that his appearance was changing. His grades were slipping and he was in his senior year. He was 17. I thought I dodged a bullet. His older brother had graduated, he was in college and I thought, whew, I dodged a bullet. With these kids they're doing good.

Speaker 2 4:40

This son was, you know, he wanted to go to college, he was very great grades and everything. And then it seemed like right around that middle point of his senior year he just everything started changing. I caught him smoking. He'd always been involved in sports, he quit all that. Just different things like that were going on and I just didn't even know to look for other substances. Like I didn't know how you even would know what drugs look like, and that was again almost 20 years ago. So I didn't realize that you could purchase a drug test. I figured you'd have to take them to the doctor and have the doctor check them. Like I was naive, I knew what alcohol looked like and maybe had a little bit of experience around pot, you know, because that was popular back in those days and I had not ever had it myself, but I'd been around people that their eyes were red and you know they were actually funny.

Speaker 2 5:33

That was it, and so I would say what's going on with you?

Speaker 2 5:37

And nothing, mom, you're just being paranoid and a little bit of a backstory was that my husband had had numerous surgeries back injury and he was not working anymore and he was disabled and he was home with the kids and he didn't seem to think anything was wrong. And then I was working all day, I had long hours in a medical office, so I would come home and be like you know, like mom radar was going on, but it didn't even cross my mind, is what I'm saying. So I just want to give all the parents out there in the world a break, right?

Speaker 1 6:07

Can you remember, though, when you first had that first thought of is it drugs Like, because it was so foreign of a thought.

Speaker 2 6:18

Yes, yeah. So what happened was? I wondered if maybe he was getting into marijuana because, his eyes being red, I found some Visine he was using, you know, colognes and things like that. And I started to wonder gosh, you know, he kind of looks like he's getting high. But my thought was only that far, and so one day he came in pretty early on in all of this and took my husband aside, and a few minutes later they came down and my husband said Don, you know, he's using something.

Speaker 2 6:50

He thought he was smoking marijuana, but he can't stop and so something is wrong and he doesn't know what it is. And but his friend is in the same boat. Him and his friend were both doing this and they both had decided to go to their parents and ask for help. So when we took him and they did the toxicology, he was smoking marijuana, but it was laced with black tar heroin, which is what they was around here in Vegas in that day. It was put in with it and some other things, and so he was blown away. He kept saying I'm not smoking heroin, I'm not using heroin, like, and he was having a hard time even understanding when the doctor set him down at the treatment center and said look, this is what's going on. And so they called me and they said you know, he's just stunned and had no idea, that's just that's how, yeah, he had no idea that he was smoking way more than marijuana.

Speaker 2 7:45

And that's how predators prey on our kids. And it's worse out there now. I mean it's not worse, but it's different drugs that are much even more scary. So that wasn't scary enough and so of course I just immediately was like you know what's the best treatment center? I got to do all of this? We just got to get him help, and it was probably a few weeks later I mean he help, and it was probably a few weeks later. I mean he'd gone through the detox.

Speaker 2 8:08

And then he was maybe there about a week or so and the actual director called me and said you know, he's so young and he thinks he can conquer the world. Most of these people are addicted to pain meds and stuff that are in this Lency Lohan version of a treatment center and we just think he might do better to be in just the outpatient and come to the outpatient meetings and all of that. He'll probably have some slip ups, but at least he'll understand, because this is just almost not reality to him. And so we took their advice and put him in the outpatient where he would go three times a week for intensive IOP and all of that. And he did. I mean he relapsed first on marijuana and then he went back to his old stuff and but it really kind of went quickly for us in that he genuinely did have goals and plans for his life and so after a few slip ups and us just really drawing a hard line which meant, hey, you just turned 18, you get to move out. And this isn't going on here, because I'd seen drug dealers in front of my house and I had a daughter living at home, a young daughter, and this isn't going on here because I'd seen drug dealers in front of my house and I had a daughter living at home, a young daughter, and I just wasn't going to. I had to look at the collateral damage for how, the risk for the whole family unit that were playing by the rules versus the one who was doing endangering the family.

Speaker 2 9:19

So as much as I loved him and I was worried about him, I'm like if you're going to do these kind of adult choices about not continuing on in your treatment and in your recovery and you're just going to keep going and doing this, I can't have it here. And maybe I was a lot stronger even in the beginning. I hadn't worn me out as much as it has over the years. So back then I was like, okay, I'll just do everything. They tell me Strong boundaries, be really strict with the rules, all of those things and so.

Speaker 2 9:48

But the counselor said, don, I promise you he won't be out there more than a couple of days. He'll, he'll, he'll, couch surf, and when he runs out of couch surfing he'll call mom and want help. He's just, he's so reliant on you, he's still just a little kid and that's what's going to happen. And that's exactly how it played out. So when he did that and he called us a few days later and I said you have to call your counselor, there's an intervention in place. And he called the counselor and the counselor got him and we ended up taking him out of state and taking him out of state to a faith-based program at that point and that really grew him quickly and he ended up deciding I really want to help people. He became a licensed mental health worker and drug counselor and worked out of state in a faith-based program and in a state-run program for a few years and then ultimately, he did ask, you know, if he could come back here. And he went to college and finished his degree and and he and so it was a Cinderella story in that as well as things could have gone in that situation for for that son. So we had thought that we had dodged a bullet.

Speaker 2 10:54

And then his older brother had surgery and was prescribed very strong opiates. How long after, I would say, within cause he, he says, my older son would beat the younger one up for, like, like you know, threaten him for what he was putting mom and dad through. So I would say probably it wasn't too long. He was 25. He was two and a half years older than his brother, so I would say no more than a year, year and a half, okay, yeah. And so we were really still going back and forth to out of state to see my other son encourage him and all of that, and it was just winding down.

Speaker 2 11:31

And then we got hit with this and so he had had surgery and they told him at that time big pharma was saying those drugs weren't addictive and we know a whole generation of people did get addicted to those and, for whatever reason, it seemed to just really take him lower and hit him harder. And I think it was because he had some depression and anxiety, the problem that he had come to find out, even though he was about 25 at the time, was a congenital birth defect, and so he had been living in pain in his stomach for something that needed major surgery, and they actually wrapped his stomach around his esophagus. That was. The solution to the problem is to take his stomach and actually wrap it around his esophagus, so they knew he wasn't going to be eating solid food for quite a while and there was just a lot of things, so it really allowed him the time that the doctors were prescribing the medication and then when they decided to drop it cold turkey is when we just saw the bottom fall out. You know, he was so sick, we had no idea what was going on, and we took him to our family doctor and she said well, I'm sorry, the medical profession has done you wrong. Basically, they, they failed you and your son's now addicted to the very drugs that they prescribed. And that's what she told us. And so that started our journey.

Speaker 2 12:52

But I think, because of some of the mental health issues and things, it, it became like mother's milk to him. I think it was actually a drug that he really liked because it, he said it made him feel normal. So I think it made his stomach, his chronic pain and then also this anxiety he lived with. Everything made him feel normal, and so while we thought you look like you're stoned out of your mind, he was like what's wrong? I feel great. You know what are you talking about. And so it was hard to reason with him because it was much harder to get him to admit the problem. That was a big deal, and you know really that he did not have control of this.

Speaker 1 13:32

And at this point, how far into this are we from surgery to now? I mean time frame wise, would you say. This current day right now we've been doing. No, I mean like so he's had surgery, you've been at the doctors? You've been told I mean um like, so he's had surgery, you've been at the doctors, you've been told you know, and now he's like I like this stuff.

Speaker 2 13:52

Yeah, I would say probably about six months by then. Okay, so yeah, flip, it can happen to people because, uh, some people you know they'll take just only what's prescribed or just less, because they're afraid of that. He tended to want it sooner. He, you know, like the intervals of what, how it was prescribed, and he tended to have what, as I look back now, an addictive personality. I do remember when he was 16, he was caught drinking by another mom and the two boys together had drank an entire bottle of vodka. So obviously wasn't an off switch for him. And where the other I think my other one was just messing around, hanging out with the wrong kids got into something over his head, he at least had an off switch. So he was dealing with a physical dependency and also, you know, realizing I got to get out and get into a positive crowd that's going to help help me stay sober. He recognized the need for all of that.

Speaker 2 14:46

The other one, my older one, really, was trying to figure out how to manage continuing to use these drugs, and that brought along with it benzodiazepines, which seemed to really be a drug of choice for him, which would be like the Xanax family, and it tends to be an amnesiac. So a lot of what they do they don't even remember once they've done it. Amnesiac, so a lot of what they do, they don't even remember once they've done it. So they really do experience some blackouts, and that can happen even months after discontinuing it. Excuse me, it's dry here. I live in the desert and so you know it became something where none of the tools in my tool belt from my first experience with addiction worked with this one Also. He was older and he was at the time living out of the house.

Speaker 2 15:29

But of course, as this cycle continues of using and sobriety and using and sobriety, and mental health breakdowns and all the different things that happen, he would end up winding up back at our house again. You know, no roof over his head, no job Went through. Okay, I've hit bottom, I don't have a job. I, you know, don't have any money to buy my drugs. Okay, I think I'll go ahead and go into detox, then get him into detox, then he would only go for a little while, make some excuse to not do any kind of long-term thing. I can handle this, I can go to meetings, I can do those things, and then the cycle would continue and then the next time it might be a rollover car accident, it might be. We've had suicide attempts. We've had time in jail not prison, thank God, but in jail and so we were dealing with a lot of that and so every time we thought, okay, good, he's on, he's at a good place.

Speaker 2 16:25

Again, we would try to help him get back on his feet. And that was really that's really hard for parents because it's all those consequences like we can't control anything about the addiction. But when they start trying to get help, that's when we swoop in because they've got debt, they have legal fees, they have you know all different kinds of things, that they're just buried, and as parents we see them trying and then we swoop in and try to help them. Them trying, and then we swoop in and try to help them and then be, and then the cycle could happen again and I found that my son would relapse either once, once or twice a year, so sooner were we about six months in? Things are looking pretty good. He'd also seem to relapse and have mental health issues and breakdowns and things right around the winter, so some of it could have been related to. You know, people get seasonal depression and that type of thing, and so we were just always putting out fires financially, emotionally, all of that.

Speaker 2 17:28

And for me, what happened was I came to the place where, I think, after my upbringing and everything, I came to the place where I was working in a medical office all day. I was seeing patients, I was a caregiver, I was an esthetician, doing lasers, chemical peels, all these things all day long. But even in the back of my mind it was like I was listening to a record or a radio playing and I could hear this voice saying you have to fix your son, you have to save your son, you have to fix your son, you have to save your son. So I could be having this conversation with you, but I would hear it plain. So I now have such an appreciation and more compassion for people who truly have mental health breakdowns, because there comes a point sometimes when there's so much stress, so much cortisol, there's so much in your body that and you're trying to process this and it doesn't know how and it's having to compartmentalize things so it can function, and then it just starts doing things that are weird and maybe you're not sleeping right.

Speaker 2 18:25

And so I look back now and I think, gosh, I thought I handled that so well, but I realized that that was really taking a toll on me and so when I wasn't at work I was googling like Dr Google, trying to fix, trying to trying to just. This has got to be the last time. We cannot go through another relapse. You know, we can't survive it as his parents and as a family, and I would be doing that. And one day my husband just said you're going to worry yourself to death and I talk about that in my book. And I stopped and I said you know what? You're right, you have permission to write that on my tombstone. She worried herself to death. Like, put it on there, that's cause of death. Tell him to put that on my death certificate.

Speaker 2 19:08

And right then I felt the Lord say no, I want to say she trusted God. And I'd had one other experience where I really felt the Lord. I was just a young child living in just chaos of alcoholism and everything. I felt the Lord say to me hold my hand and never let go, because you're going to need me for this life. And I wasn't raised in a Christian home, but I knew that was God speaking to me. And so we had that relationship where I learned how to hear his voice when he spoke to me and for most of us he speaks to us through his word and all of that and sound counsel and all that and that's generally how he speaks to me.

Speaker 2 19:41

But this time, when he said I wanted to say she trusted God, I knew he meant business and I said, okay, that's how I'm going to proceed. But I didn't know what that looked like. And people often ask me what does it look like to trust God? Does that mean you turn your back on your child, you let go and you never look at him again and you just say go figure it out. What does that mean? And I didn't know what that meant. But I knew that I had to start the process of really placing my children and my husband and my father and everybody at his feet and saying, lord, you know better, you love them more than I do. You may allow things to happen that I don't understand, but I trust you with them. And that meant I had to trust him with my own life and I realized that my entire life was spent in a place of hypervigilance trying to protect myself.

Speaker 2 20:33

I didn't like that pain. I didn't like being scared around. Addiction, addiction and alcoholism scared me. It caused me to feel unsafe. I didn't like the pain. I didn't like being scared around. Addiction, addiction and alcoholism scared me. It caused me to feel unsafe. I didn't like the yelling and the screaming and the fighting. So I had become a peacemaker and a people pleaser and all that was in my parenting and so when I made that decision, the first thing I did was he said look for help for moms of children struggling with addiction, like he gave me. That first step in the plan was go on there and Google something for yourself, because you've spent the last five or six years now trying to save your boys.

Speaker 1 21:08

Right, right. Had you ever talked to anybody else in your situation? A Christian mom.

Speaker 2 21:15

Oh, you know I had. I mean I was I was seeing a Christian counselor who was helping walk and they were telling me these things and I honestly thought I was doing pretty good because by all outward appearances I looked like I was doing okay. I had gone to some uh, parents support like AA, I'll, you know what's that? Yeah, and I had done some of those definitely celebrate recovery and was was. But I think I just kept going back to what I knew and I couldn't figure out how to support. My biggest thing was I did pretty well when they were in active addiction.

Speaker 2 21:53

It was when they started recovery that I swooped in and wanted to fix all the problems Now. I wanted to save them from their addiction. So of course I was doing what I could to intervene there, but I really wanted to fix and control their consequences. That was the heart, a real hard thing for me. And that's when a lot of confusion would happen and that's when people in the support community said all the right stuff and did all the wrong things because they were parents. They just as parents it's so especially moms. We've been nurturing them, we've carried them in our body, we've nursed them, we've taken care of their boo-boos. We've done everything and now we see these problems and our brain is so hardwired to solve that problem and now we have to step back and not solve the problem for them.

Speaker 2 22:42

And so for me, that was what I had to figure out really was you know, I tried all all the different treatments, all the different faith-based programs, everything that way, but it was. I didn't know how to take back my own life and and to not let this thing continue to take me down that path, because the cycles, they'll just, they will just break you, they will break your sanity if they continue. And my friend called it the rollercoaster from hell. I felt more like I was in a pinball machine and I was the ball and I was just bouncing off all the different things ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, and uh, and I couldn't even see what direction it was coming from. So it was like I couldn't even predict the next drop because it was just so much chaos and that was a hard thing for me.

Speaker 1 23:31

Well, as moms, we're not wired to let our children suffer. Like you just said, we're wired to fix. So you know, you're being faced with the dilemma of how do I go on with my life while my son is hurting and while my son needs help, and we're supposed to be the ones helping him. So God is basically asking you, give him to me, right, that's what? Trust me, give him to me, and that's one of the heart I mean. We say that. You know, I say that in my prayers every morning. God, they're yours. You know, I've said that since they were newborns and now they're adults. You know. But when faced in crisis, my journey as I started to really explore even what the Bible said about addiction.

Speaker 2 24:21

We all have different things that we can make idols in our life. For some people it could be lust, it could be food and gluttony, it could be alcohol, it could be pride and love of money and all of that. So all of us have our thing. And when we realize that that thing is what's coming between us and the Lord and that he wants us to surrender that thing, that really helped me because I recognized then that my children, whatever path they're going to get on to get to that place where they can live free from drugs and addiction, is one thing. But the truth is, how was I praying for them as far as their relationship with God and letting him, who knows their heart, do that work in their heart? Me not playing God, not playing Holy Spirit, not playing their conscience, but let him do the work. And I started to really pray for their self. I mean, I knew the boys were both proclaimed to be Christians, but to pray for their salvation, their sanctification, their relationship with the Lord. Before I prayed for their sobriety and I say they because I always continue to pray for both of them, whether they're in, they're in using or not using, and my, my middle son has not gone back to using. He's been almost 20 years and so but still I pray for him because I see a lot of the mindsets and things that got him in trouble in the first place can still get into his head. So I'm always praying for them and praying for their, their relationship with God.

Speaker 2 25:45

And so as I went on that journey of figuring out what was wrong with me and how I'd made idols out of my children right, and when it really came down to, it wasn't even my children I hate to put it on them, because my dad put that on me it was really I was making an idol out of my need for peace and to be afraid of fear and fear to be to get rid of all of that, like I wanted control so that I didn't have to live in that kind of pain. Well, that's why so many people struggle with addiction. They they do that because they don't want to live in pain. So what I was dealing with was not wanting to live in pain and the Lord was asking me can you trust me when it hurts? Can you trust me in those painful, hard places? And that was the journey that him and I had to go on. And so one of the good things that I did pick up when I was going to Al-Anon was you didn't cause it, you can't cure it, you can't control it. I remember that one was so important to me that really helped me a lot.

Speaker 2 26:44

But then what happened was, over time, I was finally really getting to a place where I was feeling like, okay, lord, I'm more messed up than I ever thought I was, but I'm trusting you more, and that's what's important. And he had me start an online support group, a Facebook support group for Christian moms of addicted children. And I was like but the funny thing, the backstory was when he said he was going to have me start a ministry, I said anything but addiction. And him and I bantered back and forth for a while on that. And it wasn't because I didn't want to do addiction, it was because I didn't feel qualified. I thought if anybody knows me, they're going to think, gosh, well, she seems to think she has it all figured out. But as people get to know me, they realize that I'm very real about the struggles and the everyday of all of this. And so when he finally got through to me and I started it.

Speaker 2 27:30

I had a chance to really see a lot of women going through this Christian moms and they were able to talk about the guilt and the shame and the self-blame and the overweighted feeling of responsibility. But from a perspective of I'm a Christian, I shouldn't be feeling this way, so that's even adding more guilt and shame. I should be trusting the Lord and so, where other people, maybe that don't share that kind of a faith, might feel like God's helping me, he's helping me on this journey. We were now feeling a responsibility, not only to our children but to God, that we had somehow failed him to, and I see, I see that a lot and that gave me a lot of compassion for them and I think that led me to write the book ultimately.

Speaker 1 28:11

Yeah, I always said that too, as a Christian woman in addiction, that I was always afraid that someone would challenge me on my faith and say where was your God? Then you know, like it just added, being a Christian, I didn't feel like I had a testimony or I had any right to share God with anybody, because I had this extra layer of shame and guilt that I shouldn't have fallen and, as a mom, and having been in your shoes as well, that my family shouldn't have fallen. You know, it's just the whole. You know living behind a mask, and you know, and that's not who God calls us to be. And so good for you for starting that group and giving these women a place to be real, and I'm sure it's valuable. Do you still run that group?

Speaker 2 29:04

Yes, and it's been a little over eight years now and we I didn't know. I said Lord, why don't we start a group? You're like there's so many groups on Facebook and you know, and sometimes they're kind of depressing and it's hard to be in there and cause you hear these stories and and you know, sometimes they're kind of depressing and it's hard to be in there. And because you hear these stories and and you know we had, we lost another child, adult child, a few days ago to suicide. He just had given up. You know, he had battled addiction for so long and so it's painful sometimes to hear these stories. When this happens, you feel like you're losing one of your own and we're aunties. But the Lord had me started and I didn't really know why I was just being obedient. And once I did start he said because I said what, what do you want me to do? Ultimately, we pray for our children, encourage the moms and glorify God, and so we're not in there. We're not an advocacy group. We're not in there with medical solutions and things. We're just on a spiritual and emotional level, encouraging each other. And if a mom's just like I don't know what to do in this situation, all the other moms will jump in and kind of offer some encouragement and so for the most part at this point they're really doing such a good job of taking care of each other.

Speaker 2 30:07

In the beginning it was a lot more hard work on my part to kind of ready up and on my admits, but now it's like we're sitting back and just other than just making sure that nobody gets in there. That's troubled, you know, because you know they just are weird on social media. We try to keep it a really safe place, and so it's given me a chance to see that this is a normal mindset, whether the mother is a Christian or not, is to really start digging into what she could have done and when she finally reconciles that I couldn't do anything to prevent this, even whatever it was, that there's still choices that were out of my control, and then I cannot control this thing. This addiction thing is way bigger than anything that I can. If I kept my eyes open 24 seven and stood over their bed, at one point I'm going to nod off and they're going to run for it to go get their drugs. So there's no control and I can only control myself, my choices, and ultimately you know, that has to be my choice, and so one of the things I do remember saying to my counselor early on was I'm never going to be happy again.

Speaker 2 31:15

I didn't think it was possible to be happy. And when you hear that saying a mother is only as happy as her least happy child, and we hear that, and it's not a good thing, moms, it's not a good thing. If that's the case and we're Christians, let's turn that over to Jesus, because that's a lie from the enemy. There is a way to have happiness and joy and peace even in the midst of turmoil and heartbreak. It's interesting how our bodies are so complex that we can.

Speaker 2 31:44

I'm grieving the loss of my father right now. I'm sad, I miss him, I'm heartbroken, I cried about him this morning and yet I'm enjoying my time with you, isn't that? And we're, and I'm being encouraged by hanging out here and talking to you. So it's possible. We're very complex and we can feel all the emotions. You know, we're like a smorgasbord of emotions and so if we compartmentalize in a healthy way how we're feeling about our child, then we can move forward, you know. So we're still honoring it, we're still saying this hurts me, I'm grieving for my child. But, god, I'm trusting you, with him. What do you have for me today? And moving forward in that thing that he has for us today. Even when we might look at that situation, it might bring us to tears, and so that's what I had to learn.

Speaker 1 32:34

Other people need you too, Not just that one son, you know we tend to neglect everybody, not just ourselves, we neglect everybody else. All of the world stops when you know that's going on in your family. So how did? How long? Or I mean, do you want to share more about um the journey?

Speaker 2 32:55

One more thought.

Speaker 2 32:56

I, my daughter, is 33 now. She still lives at home. She's on the autism spectrum, very, very closed up, and so you know, verbally, at that young age she could not process what was going on in our house, the chaos that was going on, and because she was quiet and flying under the radar. It's just even now that I see some of the long-term ramifications of her starting to feel like she has a voice, that she could self-advocate. And so I look back and I think and my mother was a victim of sexual assault in her own home and I knew that it was and it was somebody who'd followed her into her home and everything. I knew that the chances that somebody could come in and hurt somebody and hurt my daughter if I was allowing the boys to hang out and bring around these friends and this kind of thing, I just knew it was a recipe for disaster. So I was able to have a lot stronger boundaries by saying, no, you can't live under my roof, right. But the chaos still went on, still asking for money, still coming to rescue the jail, all the different calls, all those things we had to learn to handle. And it doesn't come overnight and you can't read one book and be instantly fixed, because every time you think you've got it managed, something else happens. And just for those moms out there whose kids are in recovery and they're constantly asking for help Maybe they even have children and they're like we're going to be homeless if you don't pay my rent and I know one of our moms is going through. They've put out thousands of dollars so the little children aren't put on the streets or grandchildren aren't put on the streets trying to keep a roof over their head.

Speaker 2 34:40

And it's so hard because that part of it is to me in a lot of ways, where you know you're now you're not just running a sprint, you're running a marathon and you're exhausted and you've got another 24 miles ahead of you. You're like I can't possibly do this. And so my encouragement there is get a lot of support, but also recognize God's only asking you to do what you can do. And so my encouragement there is get a lot of support, but also recognize God's only asking you to do what you can do. And one key thing he helped me with and I want to hand this back over to you after that, but one key thing he helped me with is, he said Don, are you enabling a sinful mindset?

Speaker 2 35:15

Are you getting in the way of something that I'm dealing with them on mindset? Are you getting in the way of something that I'm dealing with them on? So if I want them to trust me with the money and to provide all of my, god shall supply all my needs, according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. But you keep getting in, you're the ATM, you keep being the bank. You don't have any savings anymore, you don't have anything, but you keep giving to help them get back on their feet. You're not caught, you're just delaying their need to learn to trust me, to be their provider.

Speaker 2 35:47

And so those were the challenges became again circling back around to did I trust God? I'm not going to say I got it right every time. I also believe that it's between you and the Lord, and so I don't put judgment on any of the moms. Like they really are in a journey of learning to trust him, and they're going to make mistakes along the way, as we all do, and so and they're going to learn from their mistakes. So don't do it because Dawn told you to do it in her book or in the support group.

Speaker 2 36:15

Do it because you really feel like this is what God's asking you to do with your child and it'll give you a lot more peace. So if things do go bad and they don't look good, you can say you know what I prayed about that and I believe that's what God wanted me to do and that's a decision I made and I'm going to trust him with the consequences. And that would be my encouragement to them, because this is a long, hard journey. They call them miracles when the people get set free overnight, real quick. Those are miracles for a reason. For most of us it's a lifetime journey of learning to let go of those things that hold us captive and put our trust in God.

Speaker 1 36:49

I love that advice, though, you know, don't get it, don't get in the way, because you might be delaying exactly what God is trying to teach someone and the messiness of having children involved, or children that are hurting and say, oh, that's a horrible place to be, but that's great advice. So we'll be sure to have links to you, know everything you do, and for the mom. So yeah, so all right, let's, let's hear the rest of your story here in these few minutes we have left.

Speaker 2 37:21

Okay. So that's really what ended up happening was that after I'd been observing the moms for a while and the Lord said to me I want you to write a book. And again, I wasn't even feeling ready to write a book, but he said remember, sometimes you're just a few steps ahead of the next person who needs to hear your story and needs to hear how I worked in your life. And for me, that's what happened. When I put out that before the, before this book, when I put out, Lord, what do you want me to do? And he said I want you to work on you and learning to trust me.

Speaker 2 37:55

I did come across a friend who at the time I didn't know she was a friend, but we're going to be a lifetime friend. But she she ended up that she had a book out there and it wasn't necessarily for Christian moms, but she was. You know, she, she is a Christian, but she was writing it for all moms. And I got my hands on it and it kind of a funny set of circumstances was I went to download it from Amazon because there was a $1. She had a $1 sale on it for the Kindle version and it didn't download. So I just sent a message to Amazon saying, oh, my book didn't download. Well, I guess she was a third party seller. So she contacted me directly and said, oh, let me just send it to you. Tell me your story. And that was when I really started to feel like connection, like you were talking about other Christian moms. It was like finding my tribe, if that's what they used as a kind of. They used to say my tribe back then. Yeah, and, and the ladies that the Lord brought in that little circle we were there were all different kinds of faiths, at different places with their faith, but we started that kind of that journey together. And then her and I had co-authored, she had a workbook and it was, like I said, written to every mom and I was filling it in with scriptures, I was writing all these. I'd gone through it like three times and I happened to share it with her and she goes well, let's do a faith-based version of it. And so that was the first workbook that I wrote and it was a faith-based workbook for moms and women just women who were struggling with codependency, enabling all of that. And we had a Facebook group and she was deciding to close that group that she didn't want to have it anymore, and that was at the point when the Lord had me start the Christian one, and so that's how my journey went, and so that's where I just had to really step out in faith because I didn't feel equipped. So where am I today? That was eight years ago, right, and since then I've written a book just with my story and all of that. But that's like I told you earlier.

Speaker 2 39:51

I have a second version already, a second part, Because I'm realizing so much more about myself, you know, and how we grow, and every corner that we turn, God's teaching us something else on this. And this morning I said something, and I want to speak this into anyone's life who's feeling this? My son right now is was a few months ago. I had to throw him out. He was staying with me, he was going to be moving back to Vegas and I caught him using and I had to say throw him out. Sorry, I'm sorry, that sounds rough, but it was literally get your stuff and get out, because I wasn't going to. I just couldn't even believe it. He'd even I'd even had him sign a contract. Don't have them sign contracts, they won't honor them if they're an active addiction but that he wouldn't use it in the house.

Speaker 2 40:42

And so to find that I just felt so betrayed. I had all these emotions, all this pain, so much, you know. I said, just got to go figure it out. So again he went into detox and then came right back out, moved back in with his girlfriend, and you know how much support he's getting to prevent the cycle from continuing. I don't even know. He seems to get it right out of the gate. Get all the support, get the sponsor. Within a few months that's all gone, you know, it's just all gone again. He's back to doing things his own way and a really good person. Just so many consequences now that I think just the stress is just so hard on him and and he just ends up going back to his coping mechanisms, and that involves opiates and benzodiazepines.

Speaker 2 41:22

And so I finally said, I finally yelled out I think it was probably last year, about a year ago God, don't you see us, Don't you care? And I never, even ever accused God of not seeing me or not caring, but I honestly felt so alone in the world and I didn't realize. The next day my son went into a treatment program because my husband and my son's girlfriend were working behind the scenes to get him into something. Here I was, as a mother, sitting there feeling so alone, feeling like it was all on me, still doing the thing you know, still doing in the middle of writing a book, but still feeling like, well, if I don't get involved, who's going to get involved? Because no one seems to care. And here God was working on the hearts of other people, his dad and his girlfriend.

Speaker 2 42:11

And so a few months ago, when he had to, when I had to remove him again, this time I didn't get my hope back of him figuring it out. Normally, when he'd step into that detox program or into the long-term rehab which you never stayed for very long, but always about 30 days, right, and then they come out, I would have hope. I'd say, well, you know, maybe this time, maybe this time this was the first time I didn't say maybe this time Like I don't have any hope in the system anymore. I don't have any hope in he's got, he's got everything in his toolbox he'll need. As far as that goes, the one thing he doesn't have is that strong connection with the Lord you know he has, he knows. I've talked to his sponsors who said, yeah, as soon as he gets on his feet, about four, six weeks into this, I won't hear from him again. So I so I've all the tools are there, but he doesn't pick them up and use them unless he's in crisis.

Speaker 2 43:07

And so this long-term thing, that's a hard thing. That's the part that the marathon, that's the hard part for me. I said it's so. I don't see a light at the end of the tunnel and my husband goes what do you mean? And I go I just don't. I know if this pattern continues, this isn't going to end well, and so I have to look at the light. Jesus, he's the light at the end of my tunnel. Because all the other things there's no magic bullet out there.

Speaker 2 43:38

Whatever is going to have to happen for my son that this finally breaks this cycle has to happen between him and God, and I cannot get in his head. Only God knows his heart. So that's the place I'm at right now is just living in that pain of feeling like, really, that there's nothing else I can do but love him and pray for him Really. Keep in mind the rest of the family, you know. Keep my focus on the things that God's called me to do my son's 38, almost 39.

Speaker 2 44:11

So there does kind of come that point, and what I see happens at this point for moms who've been going through this a long time is that they can really become manipulative and controlling in what they want you to do to help them, get them out of whatever consequence.

Speaker 2 44:24

He's good about that, you know, he really is pretty good about that. But but I've seen, you know, terrible threats and things against family, against parents, and and so I finally just had to get to that place where I just said, Lord, you know, this is and that's my encouragement Like, don't feel discouraged, because I'm telling you I've gone through this for almost 20 years. Right, Understand that I have grown and my relationship with God has grown and I can see God's hand in my children's life. I can see him working in them, I can see that he's knocking on the door, that he wants them to know. You know that deep love and care and to rely on him. I can see all of that. That's what gives me hope. But the system itself doesn't give me hope, because I know that whenever the time is right, God can use an AA meeting, he can use a homeless shelter, he can use jail, he can use whatever he needs to use to help that person, and so it doesn't have to be mom figuring it out.

Speaker 1 45:24

Right, and you never, ever, ever give up hope. And we have true hope and we have this. You know, we believe that God can do anything Right. He promises us that, so that's where my hope is.

Speaker 2 45:39

Is him instead of myself, my own ability or in putting it on other people.

Speaker 1 45:45

And that hope is way more real than what we have to offer as as moms or as human beings.

Speaker 2 45:51

So yeah, I was getting a lot of pressure on my husband at times too.

Speaker 1 45:56

You know, like he would say I need to do something with the AA meetings and stuff.

Speaker 2 46:02

I hope shouldn't be in them or hope has to be in the Lord and trust him that he'll put the right people at the right time in the right place.

Speaker 1 46:12

Yeah, that's straight from the word. So well, thank you. Thank you. You do have a favorite scriptures share that I believe ties in really well.

Speaker 2 46:23

Here I do this scripture is such a good one for me Hebrews 416. Let us then, with confidence, draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And what that says to me is you know God's grace, his grace is sufficient. His power is made perfect in my weakness, and I learned that sufficient doesn't just mean ah, good enough, I'll get by. Sufficient, literally, when translated, means all, everything, all that you need. So his grace is all that you need. It's not just sufficient and getting by, but it's everything. And that just means, every time we're weak and we can't do it, we can just trust him, and that is such a life-preserving verse for me.

Speaker 1 47:12

I love that and I will think of that verse from now on as the life preserver verse. That's great. That's great, don. How can people find you and I know your books on Amazon and all the other outlets and on your website, and your website is a faith to flourish, I believe. Yeah, the faith to flourish. Faith to flourish and we'll have those links on our website is all the information on there that they would need to get to your Facebook group If they weren't interested in that, or reaching out to you.

Speaker 2 47:42

It's all on there and they can find the Faith to Flourish on social media. And they can find Dawn R Ward. I have initial in there because Dawn is a housewife, one of those housewives from Cheshire and so DawnRWardcom. So I'm DawnRWardcom, or the faith to flourish, and it'll Okay.

Speaker 1 48:00

Okay, well, that will. We'll make sure to have it correct in the show notes too. So, like I said, people can find you and yeah, highly recommend reading her book Life experiences and those that have stood in the same shoes as you there's and loving and believing God through it. There's no better resource, um, here on earth and um, so I would highly encourage that if you are related to Don's story especially. So thank you, don. Thank you so much for being here.