My Story – Part 1. My Journey Begins

Image by ~jjjohn~ via FlickrBy Neal Stone

My personal story is quite long so will be breaking it down into smaller posts.

It all began in German back in 1965. My mother went into labor and off to the hospital she went. The German nurse in charge of her hated Americans. She ignored my mom at every turn or treated bad when she did pay attention. My mother went into labor at 9pm March 16th. No one came to her aid because of this nurse ignoring her and I would be stuck in the birth canal for 12 hours.

When the doctors finally found her she was laying in a pool of blood. Don't worry, my mother survived and wasn't seriously harmed other than the shock of what she went through.

As a result of this I was born blind in my right eye.

My father was US Army, an alcoholic and a mean drunk who would come home and beat the wife and kids. I was too young so he never hurt me, but for the first two years of my life I got to witness what he did to everyone else.

He was “nice” enough to trade me my bottles for his left over beer. Yes, before age two, I was “drinking,” so to speak. My mom divorced him when I was two. After the divorce he would drive by our house and we would hide behind the bed in fear. I found in my adult life my mom tends to over react or exaggerate the situation so never really know if I needed to be afraid or not, more on this later. But keep in mind he was a violent alcoholic.

Now we move to age five where things really start to build. As my mother as taking me home from a routine hospital visit when I started walking funny and having problems. We turned around and headed back into the hospital and I was tested and found to have severe epilepsy.

From age five on I would battle this disease. Medication at this time was still somewhat experimental and I was the guinea pig. If you have Epilepsy and your life is good, you owe people like me. We were the trial and error cases that brought about todays better treatments.

I would develop a serious learning disability as a result of either the disease or the medications. It was believed I would never succeed in life, go to college, have a career or even marry and have relationships as a result of the issues I had.

Now the stage is set. It was due to the above issues that religion would play a large part in my life later on and I would be taken advantage of and be misled into ideas and beliefs that no rational person should follow. I would also be held back at every turn just to keep me under control.

Many of the issues I had would be made worse by the hand of Christians who are the very ones who were supposed to help. Rather than encourage and bring me in, they would make fun and push me away.

It is a shame that when you go to a place for help and encouragement you are treated as an outcast and pushed away. I can see this happening at a night club, school or other social event, but not in church. Church is the last place you should have to fight to belong and for love. My quest for freedom and victory in my life would first lead through imprisonment and failure.

I am telling this part to set the stage so that you can see how I started out in life and the challenges I would face. Fear not, my story gets a lot better and it is still going and getting better all the time. More on this when I get to the end of my story. I have never shared the detailed story of my life and feel I can do so here without fear.

Next Post - Part 2. The Miracle Child


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