I know how you are feeling.  My son who is 14 years old gives me a hard time
with everything.  He takes advantage of my lack of sight to try to get away
with things he couldn't get away with if I were sighted.  We do yell and
scream at each other quite a bit because I try to force him to do things my
way.  Blind people must have a sort of hands on approach when it comes to
raising children because our children think they can get away with so much
more than they should.  This angers me more because what he tries to get
away with is willful disobedience.  He forgets he is 14 years old and thinks
he is 21.  He insists on playing with the wrong sort of boys and every time
he says he is sorry, I fear it is just an attempt to make me forgive him so
he can turn rite around and do the same sort of things again.  My husband
has Alzheimer's and never listens to me either and often puts himself in
harms way because he never listens.  I know he is sick and can't help
himself but I often become short of patience.  I am going through the change
as well and am the only one in the house who recognizes this as a problem as
far as mood swings are concerned.  Needless to say I have a very short
temper these days.  So, I would like to ask your prayers as the days
proceed.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Scovell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 8:59 PM
Subject: Re: What a week!


> Kathy,
>
> It is too long to try and detail but tell Greg that my youngest son and I
> came close to having a fist fight the other night.  Not really, but
> something happened, like I said, it is too long to detail, that caused me
to
> insist my youngest son leave my house.  My reason was due to the fact the
> whole incident decayed into a shoutting match.  My son, however, became
> disrespectful in the process in moe ways than one.  I was in my office and
> he was in the kitchen.  He said, after something I yelled, "Do you think I
> am afraid of you dad?"  This is my son who has his third degree black belt
> and is about to take the test for his forth degree black belt.  When he
said
> that, I knew the whole thing would do nothing but get worse.  So I told
him
> to get out of my house.  He does not know this, but I did this in order to
> stop things from getting worse and they were bad enough the way they were.
> He refused to leave.  As over weight as I am, as stupid as I am, as short
as
> I am, and as out of shape as I am, I am still not afraid of any of my
> children.  I got out of my chair from behind my desk and walked up into
the
> kitchen.  My son stood fast.  I pushed him on his chest with my hands.  He
> backed up, although he certainly didn't have to, so I pushed him again.
He
> put up some resistance, so I pushed even harder.  I was pushing him toward
> the front door.  It became exceedingly more and more difficult because
> Everett put up more and more resistance.  You might say he is quite large
> and my actions were, to say the least, quite stupid based upon our size
> differences.  I continued pushing, anyhow, until he basically decided he
> wasn't going to move backwards any longr regardless how hard his dad
pushed
> him.  So the idea of calling the police came to mind and I pretended, the
> key words here is pretended, to act as if I was calling the police.  He
> decided to leave at this point but I broke his heart.  I should have broke
> his nose for the way he was acting but being the smart ass that I am, I
> acted as if I would call the police on him instead.  I honestly didn't
mean
> to break his heart; I just wanted to break his will.  I failed miserably.
I
> had sort of forgotten how much larger he really was than I am but when you
> are mad, certain things don't make any difference.  Anyhow, it was a hell
of
> a mess and I don't mean that in a swaring sort of way either.  Some really
> dumb things were said, and done, over the next few hours but I guess one
of
> my good traits is that once it is over, my anger dissipates rapidly.
Plus,
> I have been doing a lot of meditative prayer to search for anything that
> caused my anger to get out of hand.  Preaching in Baptist, and now
> Charismatic churches, as I have over the years, I've developed quite a
> volume to my voice but I wasn't preaching very good the other night.  The
> Lord allowed it, in one sense, to show me I'm not as perfect as I think.
> Our deck swing broke the other night and we purchased a new one.  My son,
> using it as an opportunity to say he was sorry, put the swing together for
> us and came through our back fence and put it on the deck.  Sandy came and
> told me what he was doing so I thought she was right and that I should go
> out and look at it.  He talked to me as if nothing was wrong, of course,
but
> we both knew better.  The Lord said, "You better show him your sorry for
> letting things get out of hand," so as we looked at the swing, I just
> reached for him and hugged him and we said we were sorry and confessed we
> loved each other.  Yes, I feel stupid but so what else is knew.  Yes, I
had
> some very legitimate complaints.  Yes, there were things which were wrong
> and needed fixing.  Yes, it could have been handled a whole lot better.
So,
> Jesus is still Lord and I am still just a servant.  So it shall always be.
> Anyhow, I know, and so does Sandy, exactly how you and Greg are feeling
> about Chris right now.  Gretchen is doing well now but those last few
years
> were no Sunday school picnic and if I still had all the tears I cried over
> that situation a lone, I'd have my own private lake in the backyard.
> Fortunately, according to the Psalms, the Lord does keep all those tears
in
> a bottle for us and He knows absolutely everything we are feeling.  so,
> Kathy, you guys will just have to hang in there.  Yes, even as pastors of
a
> church.  Pastor's are sheep, too.
>
> Phil.