Take Heart

Rising Above Ministries: An Interview With Becky Davidson

• Amy J Brown, Carrie Holt and Sara Clime • Season 1 • Episode 44

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Becky Davidson from Rising Above Ministries shares about raising her son, the loss of her husband, and how she’s dealt with both types of grief. Practical tips for connection with God and others as well as reminders that as mothers, we set the tone for how others perceive our children with special needs will leave you encouraged.

June 15, 2021; Ep. 44

Timestamps & Key Topics:

  • 0:21-    Introduction
  • 2:29-    Becky’s Story
  • 4:03-    Not a Surprise to God
  • 7:25-    Trust God’s Heart
  • 13:34-  True Joy
  • 16:27-  Two Connections
  • 26:35-  You’re a Mom First
  • 31:25-  Rising Above Ministry
  • 35:25-  Outro

Episode Links & Resources:

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Sara Clime  0:21  
Welcome to Take Heart where our goal is to give you hope, offer insight and encouragement, so you can flourish in your journey as a special needs mom. Each week, Amy, Carrie and Sara will explore a theme and share an inspiring story, practical tips and an encouraging blessing using our combined experience of over 30 years of parenting children with special needs. We hope that you've been enjoying the Take Heart Summer Interview Series. Thank you for listening to our podcast and sharing it with others.

Hi, everyone, it's Sara this week, and I am here with Becky Davidson. Becky is the  cofounder and president of Rising Above Ministries, a multi dimensional outreach to families impacted by disabilities. Rising Above serves and encourages each member of the special needs family by providing small group studies, virtual retreat experiences, community groups and encouraging video messages all available through an interactive app. Becky is passionate about supporting and encouraging special needs families. She co authored Common Man, Extraordinary Call: Thriving as the Dad of a Child with Special Needs with her late husband, Jeff Davidson. Becky and her adult son with special needs, John Alex, live in Cookeville, Tennessee. Hi, Becky, thanks for joining us today.

Becky Davidson  1:58  
Hey, Sara, I am so glad to be having this conversation with you today.

Sara Clime  2:02  
I have been looking forward to this for so long. I'm really excited. I just know that our listeners here are just going to get so much from this conversation. Tell us a little bit. Let's just start. We went through all the things but we're going to touch on more of that later. But I just want to start with what has been your journey so far? What is it about? You have an adult son with special needs? What has been your journey with that? 

Becky Davidson  2:29  
Well, like you said, I have an adult son, John Alex, who is 23 years old. I feel like I'm on the veteran side of things now. I've been doing this a long time. John Alex, when he was born, we had no idea about all of his unique needs. As the months progressed, we got one diagnosis upon the next. Right now, his diagnoses are cerebral palsy, autism and epilepsy, 24/7 care, nonspeaking (nonverbal), using a wheelchair, but he has a smile that lights up a room and is a boy, well excuse me, a young man that is full of complete joy and has completely transformed my life through his life. Then four years ago, his dad passed away. I have been doing this life these past four years as a widow and solo parent, which is a whole different ball game. I've learned a lot about trusting in God through these, especially these past four years.

Sara Clime  3:43  
I bet. It's like you said it just adds a different layer to it I assume.

Becky Davidson  3:49  
Absolutely.

Sara Clime  3:50  
Yeah. Well, so you've been through so much so far, and continue to do so. What's one way Your faith has grown as a result of this journey? How have you been changed?

Becky Davidson  4:03  
Well, you know, when I was born, we were at church, if the doors were open, we were there. I went to Christian school. I went to Christian University. My whole life, I have been a part of a church, that's been a part of my journey. Until I had my son, and especially until I lost my husband, that faith was really surfacey. I knew the stuff, and I lived it out, but until you are walking this life when you have no control, everything is completely out of your control, then do you go, I've got to trust that God is in control.  I think in this past year with all that's going on in the world, in light of COVID and the fear, worry and the concern and the lockdowns, I have truly come to embrace that God is sovereign, that God is in control. Though the world looks like it is utterly falling apart, things are really falling into place. None of this about my life took God by surprise. He didn't just wake up and go, Oh, my goodness, Becky is now a solo parent, and a widow in the midst of a pandemic. I mean, this, this does not come to him by surprise. That can give me such great peace. This is the life God ordained for me, and he's going to equip me to be able to live out whatever comes my way. Especially in this last year, just coming to that realization that this is really real, and that God is sovereign. God is in control. Knowing that, deep down in my soul, I can have peace when there's chaos swarming all around me.

Sara Clime  6:10  
Absolutely. I love that you just said that you can have peace when there's chaos, just swarming around you. That is. It's almost like you're in your own little cocoon, specially that God has provided for you. Nothing's changed on the outside. It's what changes on the inside, and it's just so vital for this journey. I think that it's so important. What I would love for the listeners to realize, and this is something I've touched on before is that it is so difficult. This isn't a surprise for God. Our walk, our journey, all of the things that happen, doesn't come as a surprise, he can, like you said, he will equip us. It's okay to be confused and to just say, okay, God, I know you can equip me. I have no idea what that looks like right now.

Becky Davidson  7:00  
I don't.

Sara Clime  7:01  
Yeah, but I know you will. Yeah, and I love that. Thank you. You have been changed a lot also by the past four years. Do you think that your special needs journey and your widow journey, do those impact each other in a profound way?

Becky Davidson  7:25  
Absolutely. I think, especially when you look at the grief component. As special needs parents, we are grieving anytime there's a milestone missed, anytime there's something that we see someone else's child doing that our child will never be able to do you know, you grieve those things that life you didn't have. Now I grieve the life that I had with my husband and the loss of my husband. A lot of things that I learned about grief through being a special needs parent, honestly helped me through the grief process with my husband. Learning how to look at things through God's eyes and through his lens. You know, a lot of people look at me and they go, I don't know how you're functioning. How are you? How are you still going? How are you doing now? I'll say, "It is not me. It is only through what God has done in me." Now, I will tell you, I have yelled at God, I have screamed at God, I have been angry at God, over what has happened in my life. I'll always come back to: God, you are sovereign, you are in control, I trust in you. For some reason, this is part of your plan. I think almost the special needs journey, in some strange way, prepared me for being a solo parent and for the grief of that loss. Again, just like with the special needs parenting part of it, you have a choice to make. You have a choice to make as to whether you're going to be angry, bitter and mad, or whether you're going to offer that up to God and go, how can you use this? Will you please use this for some greater good. Same thing with the loss of my husband, I was mad. I was angry. I went through the season of going, you know, I don't like you. I don't trust you. I mean, I literally yelled out at God, "I don't trust you." Then my husband's own words, I'm standing in my kitchen. This was about a month after he passed away. I'm yelling at God going I can't pray to you because I don't trust you. Then my husband's own words come back into my mind. He had this saying that he would say especially in the latter part of his life. When you feel you cannot trust God's actions in your life. You must trust his heart. In that moment I heard my husband's words. It was like, okay, God, I may not like these actions. I may not like what's going on, but I trust that your heart for me is good. So I'm going to trust that for whatever crazy reason, I may never see this side of heaven, but your plans are good. I'm going to trust you in that. That has given me this, like, okay, deep breath. Then I'm able to walk this out. If I was holding on to all that bitterness and anger, I would not be able to care for my son. I wouldn't be able to be in full time ministry. I would be a wreck. It's just kind of offering that up to God to say, use this as you will.

Sara Clime  10:44  
Oh my gosh, I love that. I love your husband's words, when you can't trust his actions, you must trust his heart. That's amazing. I'm going to be using that, by the way. Just like you said, with all of the doubts and the anger. I just want to stress this to so many people. I've had people say too, "I don't know how you do it. How do you? I just don't know if I can ever get there with God - get to that place of peace with them." I say, "Oh, it's not. It's a journey. Like any relationship. This is how I always tell people is with any relationship. I love my husband. We've been married for 24 years. I've known him since I was 14 years old. I love him dearly. We fight. When we sit down, and we discuss, and we hash things out, not always in the best way, but we do, it's in those moments that we grow. I believe it's in those moments when you say, "Well, God, I'm angry. I do not like you right now. I'm angry. It does not make sense. But I know. I trust you." Sometimes that's all you have to go on, but that's enough.

Becky Davidson  12:04  
Yes, You have to settle it in your heart. You have to settle that peace in your heart. You have to know deep in your heart, who God is, and know that he is sovereign, he is in control. If you don't have that settled, then anything that comes at you, you're just going to be tossed, you're gonna be tossed in those waves.

Sara Clime  12:32  
Like you said, you wouldn't be able to take care of your son and be in ministry and all of the things that you're being called to do. One of the things I've said before is that if I become a victim of my son's diagnosis, he stands no chance of not becoming a victim of it as well. Whether or not they're verbal, nonverbal, ambulatory, nonambulatory, you are their biggest advocate. You are their biggest teacher. It's gonna bleed off occasionally. Don't get me wrong. For the most part, they'll follow you. If you are honest with God, and you trust him, they'll see that, and they'll be able to mimic that. So wonderful. Love it. So what is one thing about your child, and or your life is a special needs parent, that gives you true joy.

Becky Davidson  13:34  
You know, it's actually seeing the true joy that just spills out of my son. My son is non speaking, he's in a wheelchair. He can't go and do the things that you would think would bring a 23 year old joy- going out with friends going and doing those kinds of things. My son lives in this place of joy. Honestly, if you see him, most all the time, he has a smile on his face. He has content. He is happy. He is not concerned about all the craziness that's going on in the world. He knows, hey, my mom's gonna take care of me. I have everything that I need. I am safe. I'm happy. That's all that he cares about. He always wants to be with me. When I see that in him, how can you not be filled with joy?  I look at so many things he's taught me over his 23 years of life. He's taught me more than any other teacher I could have ever had, just by watching him go through his life. I'm just telling you, if I were not able to do what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it, if I could not communicate to someone what I needed or wanted, I would be one frustrated, angry person. I think looking at him and seeing him, he's just the best example. I hear from so many people who like to look at him, he's so happy and so content. I joke, when I grow up, I want to be like John Alex, because just to be not concerned about the things of this world, to be like God's gonna take care of me. In his mind, mom's gonna take care of me. When I see him living out this joyful life in the midst of what he goes through, in the midst of what's going on in the world, Oh, my goodness, I can't imagine not having him the beautiful way that he is in my life.

Sara Clime  15:39 
That's so true. I've heard so many people say that their biggest joy comes from their child and what they've learned from them. It's hard in the midst of all of the daily "to dos" and all of the daily tasks and the heartache of just stopping and taking all that in. I love that reminder. Thank you for that. Here at Take Heart, one of the most important aspects that we think of being a special needs mom, is that connection. So what is one piece, and I know you're gonna have more than one. I'm just gonna let you talk because guys, she has so much to offer, I am so excited. What is one piece of encouragement you could give our listeners on the topic of connection? 

Becky Davidson  16:27  
I want to touch on two different things, and one piece is the connection to God. If I didn't have that, honestly, I would be curled up in the corner, not being able to function. I haven't always done a real good job making that a priority because there's therapy, and there's food to cook, and there's things to do. We all have this long list of things that we have to do. Truthfully, that has not always been like, okay, I'm going to do this first thing in the morning. It's been, if I got time, I'll fit that in. Part of my community group, one of my groups of friends, at the beginning of this year, all started doing the Bible recap together, which is through You Version. There also is a podcast that goes along with it. We're all reading along together. Some of us are in different spots, because life happens. Every morning, literally, I wake up first thing, and that's the first thing that I do before I even get out of bed. For me, quite honestly, I listen, I listen to the Bible reading. I'll put it on, it's still dark. It's 4:30 in the morning, and I will listen to whatever the Bible reading is for that day. It's all laid out for you on the Youversion app. Then I'll listen. There's a podcast that recaps it all. I cannot tell you what the change that has made in me. I have this desire that I've never really had before about getting into the word. It totally explains just this little snippet of what you've read. I can't recommend that high enough. I do that, that's the first thing every morning, having that first morning connection with God praying. Another thing that I try to do, and I'm not always successful, but on my ride to work in the morning when I'm coming to the Rising Above office, I turn everything off, no radio, no nothing. That is my moment to pray, try to hear from God, try to quiet myself. It doesn't always happen, but I try to do that. That connection with God has to be first place in my life. Some days I do better than others. I can't stress that enough. You cannot make it on this journey as a special needs mom without filling yourself first, so that you can pour back out to others. You will not be able to love and serve your family if you are not filling yourself with the truth of God's word, you cannot do it. I can't stress that enough. I know you agree with that, Sara, that it's just like you cannot walk out this journey if that is not a priority. You will not survive successfully, you just won't.

Then the second piece of that is community with others. In light of all the restrictions and COVID, we haven't been inside a church, at least my son hasn't in over a year. We're still doing online church. How do you make that work? You know, a lot of people are: I'm so tired of zoom groups. I'm so over it, and I get that. I'll tell you through Rising Above, we have community groups that meet all throughout the week. I'm part of two different groups where we're studying the Bible together. I've made some amazing friends through the different groups. I have friends in California. I have friends in Arizona. I have friends in New York and New Jersey and Boston, in Louisiana, all over the country. Again, face to face is always best. It's always best, but you can find community through Zoom as well. For people who are struggling, making that happen, I cannot stress that enough to find a way to make it happen. Also, I have a group of friends, I'm actually getting with them tonight, that are local friends. Some of them are special needs mamas, some of them are not. We formed this friends group right after my husband died. We all knew each other, but the group just kind of came together in this very organic, crazy way. We're meeting together tonight in person. So, you can have both, and still have that deep, rich community. It's just vital to our lives as special needs parents, to have other people speaking truth into us, to have other people who understand and get our life, who can pour into us for those days. Some days, it's going to be me that needs someone pouring into me. Then some days, it's going to be me pouring back out into someone else. It starts with that God piece and letting God fill you up, so that you were then able to share. I cannot say enough about the importance of finding that group of people who you can be raw and real and vulnerable with and share those things. So when the enemy is lying to you saying, "Oh, you're a bad mom, or you should have done this differently," then someone can come and speak truth. Then, you go, that is not the truth. Here's the truth. Find that group of people if you do not have them.

Sara Clime  21:56  
Good. So good. It is so vital to have those people that can say, "No, you are not a failure. No, that is the enemy talking to you." So you need somebody to counteract that because the enemy will talk to you, and the enemy will tell you how horrible you are. So it's vital to have those with you. By the way, guys, we are going to have all of this that she's talking about, we're going to have this link to in our show notes. You can find links to all of this. The Bible recap, I cannot wait to check that out. When you were talking about community with others, one of the things that stood out to me so much was that you said that the groups come together organically. I think that that is such an important piece to talk about. I think in order to love well, you have to slow down, and you have to really pay attention and be intentional with your relationships, and that includes the new ones, and the soon to be relationships. Just to take the time to say, okay, let's see where this goes. If it doesn't go anywhere, it doesn't go anywhere. You're not ever going to know if you don't try it. There's connections that I've made that I thought, oh my gosh, this is it, and it's not. Then there's connections that I had no idea. It sounds like with you, you didn't know what was going to come out of it, but you're so grateful that you took that chance to lean into those other people, right?

Becky Davidson  23:38  
Yes, it's been life giving in. That group started just out of a need that I had. It just slowly piece by piece, different people came into this group. Now I can't imagine doing life without them. In fact, here recently, about two weeks ago, there's eight of us, and one of our eight actually passed away. She got sick and passed away. We as a friend group are grieving that loss and that's kind of why we're getting together tonight is to share memories of our friend and process through that. You have to have people that you can do life with, for the funny times when you want to laugh and share, you know, share those great times. There's also those sorrowful moments that you need to have. As special needs families, we can come with a million and one excuses as to why we can't have community. Oh, I can't because of my child's behavior, or I can't because of this. There is a way to make it happen. Like who else? We special needs moms are the best at coming up with ways to help our children and ways to make things happen for our kids, but we need to be brave and do that for ourselves. You know? Do it for yourself. A lot of times my group meets at my house because of childcare. You can find, you can make up all the excuses you want. There's a way to make it happen. I can't encourage you enough to do that.

Sara Clime  25:20  
Yeah. Yeah. I'm laughing because I think sometimes I can be the queen of that, because I'm like, oh, my gosh, I just have so much to do. Sometimes it's just, I'm tired. I'm so tired. I just want to nap, if I have time to do anything, I just want to sit down. I get so rejuvenated. I get more rejuvenated by those that speak into my life. The co hosts on this podcast, for instance, I know without a shadow of a doubt, that God gave them to me. They are a gift to me. That's how I view that. If I am so tired, they'll rejuvenate me more than a good nap. We were not meant to do this life. 

Becky Davidson  26:12  
Yeah, absolutely. I couldn't agree more. 

Sara Clime  26:14  
We are built for community. Wonderful. It's such good stuff. I know you're gonna have a lot to say on that. I'm so glad that you did. So I always love asking the question: if you could go back and give yourself any advice at the beginning of your journey, what would that be?

Becky Davidson  26:35  
Well, I wish that someone had told me: Hey, you're John Alex's mom, first. You are not the therapist. You are not the teacher. You're his mom. I was a former school teacher before my son was born. And so, you know, lesson plans, and all that was just part of who I was. When my son was born, I literally got a lesson plan book, and I was writing out what we were going to do every single day. All that is good. All that is important, but I missed out moments of just being his mom and just going, no, we're not doing therapy. Today, we're going to go out on the swing. Even though that would have been part of therapy, too, but we're going to do something you want to do. There's so many days I looked at him, and he was so frustrated. He just wanted to be a kid. I'm not saying therapy's not important. Yes, there are things we have to do to help our child along. Remember you're a mom first. That's your first role. That is your God given role is to be the mom and the nurturer for this for this child. I wish I had known that. Now the best piece of advice that someone gave me, I think moms need to hear as well. My sister told me when John Alex was a little guy. We were just getting all his diagnoses in and trying to navigate all this. She said, "Becky, you will set the tone for how people respond to John Alex." She was so right, because I'm going to determine how people respond to my son. I'm going to say how they treat my son. If I am always like, oh, my goodness, this is so hard or oh my word I can't believe him at all. You just wouldn't believe all that I have to do. Then you know what? People are going to look at my son as a burden. They're going to look at my son as oh my goodness, their life is so hard. I want them to hear: oh my goodness look at him smile. Look at that. He just grins from ear to ear. He is the happiest child ever. There was a story I told. We were in the grocery store one time. It was after church on a Sunday, and I had my son with me. He's in a wheelchair. I'm pushing him and pulling a cart behind me. Those moms who've done that. How many times have you hit her heel with the grocery cart in the store? You know what I'm talking about. I mean, it hurt. There was a sweet lady. If you haven't experienced that you just don't know what we're talking about. Anyway, this sweet, sweet older lady, she just looked at me and she said, "Oh my goodness. I don't know how you do that." I had a split second to think about that. I thought, John Alex can hear this conversation. I don't want to say anything that's gonna hurt him.  Even though he's non speaking, he has feelings. He knows what's going on around him. I just looked at her and I said, "You know, it is really not that hard. We have a system. He is a great shopper." She looked at me like I was crazy. I was like, no, I'm going to set the tone. I'm going to set the tone for this conversation. That has honestly been the best piece of advice that anybody gave me. That's what I now pass on to others because it's so true. Wherever we are, we are determining how people are going to respond to our child by our actions and by how we respond. So those are my two pieces.

Sara Clime  30:21  
I love it. One of the things that I know. In our special needs ministry, in our church, one of the very first questions we ask other than what's their name and age, is we ask what makes your child awesome. I always tell my moms that are just starting on this journey, always keep that in mind. I love how you said, "You are going to set the tone for how people respond to your child." If your life is always such a burden, they're going to respond to your child that way. So that's so good. We could end the podcast right now. That's so good. 

Becky Davidson  31:03  
Oh, but I have more. I'm kidding. 

Sara Clime  31:06  
No, we could go on. I wish I had hours to talk to you. Tell us where we can find you? You are part of Rising Above, like we said before. Let us know, how can we get in touch with you? How can you pull from the resources that you have created that you're a part of?

Becky Davidson  31:25  
Well, like you said, I'm part of Rising Above ministries. My late husband, Jeff and I started rising above back in 2005, out of the life of John Alex. It's amazing to see how this ministry has grown and changed over the years. In light of COVID, we took almost everything that we do, and it's now online. I'm just telling you what. Whatever you need as a special needs family for spiritual encouragement, you will find on our website. Our website is www.risingaboveministries.org. You can find all kinds of information there about us. The cool thing that came out at the beginning of 2021 was we now have an app. It's a free downloadable app, where you will find encouragement, encouraging videos, encouraging memes, encouraging blogs. Anything to help you on this journey as a special needs parent is there. Anything to help you spiritually, it's there. We also have a prayer wall, where we have people all throughout the week who are praying for our family. If you have a child, you're having behavior issues. It's amazing the different things that families have left on the prayer wall to be prayed for. Then you get an email when someone has prayed for you. It's a great resource. You can find that in the App Store, through Apple or through Google Play. It's Rising Above Ministries, and you will find you'll find the app there. So I highly recommend downloading that. Now we also have small group curriculum. If you have a small group through your church, or with a group of moms, or a group of dads, we have about 12 different series available on our website with more being added all the time. So you can check that out. It would walk you through like a six week, seven week series on a different topic related to special needs life. We also have, which I mentioned before, our online community groups. We have community groups for dads. I'm part of one on Sunday afternoons, that's moms and dads where we actually take a book of the Bible, and we're studying that book of the Bible. We have groups that meet all throughout the week, for whatever, hopefully would work for you. Then we do events. We do events for moms, events for dads, events for married couples. This year, we're adding an event for siblings, because so often the siblings get overlooked. It's called sibling celebration. We're just going to honor and celebrate the siblings. There are so many different things that are available again. Previous events that we've hosted, you can download the video content. You can find all that on our website. I think something that is one of the most favorite things that we do as a ministry is something that we have coming up this summer, called By the Brook. By the Brook is a weekend for moms of individuals with special needs or chronic illness, where we pour into the moms with hope, truth, encouragement, and a lot of fun. It's just a great, great weekend. Last year because of COVID...We used to host it in person here, where I live. We'd have moms from all over the southeast to come to Cookeville for this event. Last year, we had to go online and what we saw was that we grew. We had moms from almost every state in the U.S., six countries outside of the U.S. We saw that we were able to reach so many moms who had wanted for years to come to the event here live but couldn't. We were now able to serve them. We had pockets of moms who met in churches. We had one group who went camping together and watched the content together and did the retreat together. We had moms, who went to hotel rooms. They all had different kinds of things where they could still have a getaway and make it fun. So that's coming up on June 25, and 26. We are so excited about that. You can find all the information on our website or on our app of how you can sign up for that.

Sara Clime  35:25  
Wonderful, thank you so much. Again, we'll have links to things in the show notes too. So it will be really easy to get in contact with her. I know I've personally used the resources that you have many times, and I always appreciate it. The work that you're doing is so beneficial. I would just thank you. I thoroughly enjoyed our talk today. Thank you so much. I wish you the best of luck and just mainly well out of selfishness too. We just wish you the best of luck so you can keep serving us special needs moms and dads. Thank you for joining us this week on Take Heart. If you are loving our podcast would you do us a favor and leave us a review on whatever platform you're listening to. You can follow us on Instagram or Facebook @takeheartspecialmoms. If you have any questions or comments or would like to share your story with us, follow the links in our show notes. We love hearing from our listeners.