Hello friends! If you are visiting from the Rankin Baptist newsletter or the Crossroads Counseling Facebook page, then welcome! I'm Whitney Caves, a Licensed Professional Counselor with Crossroads Christian Marriage and Family Counseling Center. I work with clients facing a variety of issues including anxiety, depression, and low-self esteem. I see clients at our Clinton and Pearl locations, and Crossroads has several other locations throughout the state. For more information about our services, visit our website by clicking here.
The piece of the article that I shared in the Rankin Baptist newsletter was first published on my blog a few months ago. Here is the full article:
January 11, 2011 was a rare snow day in Clinton. My graduate school classes had been cancelled, and I was at my then-fiancé-now-husband Will’s apartment with a couple of other friends watching the college football national championship when my mom called. I didn’t answer the first time, but I was worried that something might be wrong when she called back immediately.
“Whitney. Your dad has had some sort of a
spell. You need to come home right now”, she told me in a voice that
didn’t belong to her. Absolute panic raced through my mind and body and I
had a thousand questions that she couldn’t answer. “It doesn’t look
good. You just need to come right now”, she told me.
All I remember about that moment is that I
wasn’t able to coherently speak to my friends to explain what had happened, nor
could I coherently think. A moment like this will make you realize what
your faith is really made of, and I am forever grateful that my first instinct
was to run into Will’s room and fall onto my knees. I tried to pray, and I
felt like I was, but later my friends told me that I wasn’t speaking real words
but just making sounds. When I look back at that moment, I am certain,
absolutely, supernaturally certain, that the Holy Spirit was there, interceding
for me when I couldn’t pray real words for myself.
My friends got me up, and Will drove me two
hours south to Forrest General hospital in Hattiesburg. When we got to the
hospital, we found out that my dad had suffered a massive heart attack known as
the Widow Maker, a type of heart attack that immediately kills 9 out of 10
people. He had been without a pulse when he got to the hospital, without
oxygen to his brain for 45 minutes, and shocked over a dozen times before he
somewhat stabilized. The doctors at the hospital in my hometown of
Picayune had told my mom that he probably wouldn’t survive the ambulance ride
to the cardiac unit an hour north in Hattiesburg, but that he definitely
wouldn’t make it if they didn’t try.
Fortunately, this story ends in the happiest way
possible. After the doctors told us that he likely wouldn’t make it, my
dad started making tiny improvements and miraculously woke up a couple of days
later. He left the hospital 7 days after arriving, rode his motorcycle for
the first time 6 weeks later, and went back to work at the beginning of the
summer. He walked me down the aisle at my wedding that September, and I
don’t know if there has ever been a bride more thankful to have her dad beside
her. Today he is healthier than ever with no lasting damage at all.
My dad looking fine as ever!
I’d known this verse for a long time, but it
didn’t really become personal to me until the months following that
night. For several different reasons those months were HARD, probably
the hardest of my life so far. Despite being so happy and thankful that my
dad was ok, life suddenly seemed unpredictable, out of my control, and
terrifying. If something this terrible could happen, what else could happen?
What if it didn’t turn out so well the next time something bad happened? For
months I suffered from crippling anxiety plus guilt for feeling the
anxiety. Nothing seemed to be going right and it was hard for me to find
“the good” in my situation.
What good things did I eventually find? Most significantly,
my relationship with God took a very real turn that night. It didn’t
happen quickly, but I can look back and see that it was the turning point. The
anxiety I experienced finally resulted in me turning to scripture in a way that
I never had before, and this strengthened my sometimes shaky faith in a way
that nothing else ever had. Second, spending time in
counseling helped me to be able to connect to the desperation that some of my
clients feel the first time they meet with me—I wouldn’t understand that
feeling if I hadn’t experienced it myself. Third, I now have a story to share
that may encourage someone else.
Why do I share this story? Because sometimes it
seems impossible to find the good right away. Let me be
very clear about this—I am in no way trying to compare my experience to whatever
painful things that others go through. My dad made it, but someone out
there has a dad who didn’t and that is a pain that I can’t pretend to
understand. Someone lost a baby. A marriage. A dream. A
job. Maybe you’ve made a big mistake. Maybe you haven’t lost
anything, but maybe you’re just disappointed with life and with God about the
things that haven’t worked out the way you hoped.
But whatever your trouble is, know this—as long
as you’re living, God has a good plan and a purpose for your life. God brings
purpose from the good things—your talents, experiences, and successes--but He
also redeems and brings good from your hard times and mistakes too. It may
not be in the way that you expect or hope, but God, in His timing, will bring
something good from your deepest pain. We can count on this promise, today
and always.
“To all who mourn in Israel, he will give a crown of beauty for
ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of
despair. In their righteousness they will be like great
oaks that the Lord has planted for his own glory.” Isaiah 61:3
After I originally posted this story the Mutual of Omaha organization contacted me and asked me to make a video for their Aha Moment Tour. Click here if you'd like to hear me talk a little about why I love counseling and finding purpose in everyday life.
Thanks so much for reading!
Whitney
