Caregiving With Grit and Grace | Jess Ronne

If you're a caregiver for a child, a relative, or a friend, don't miss the help and hope on today's Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman.

It's just amazing to me what God has done with his story and how there has been so much beauty from ashes when initially I thought, you know, my situation was completely hopeless. Welcome to Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . The demands of caregiving can often leave you feeling exhausted, isolated, stressed, or unappreciated. Today, Jessica Ronnie shares her caregiving story and how her perspective has been transformed by grace. Our featured resource at buildingrelationships.us is Jessica's book, Caregiving with Grit and Grace. A mom discovers meaning, strength, and gratitude as a caregiver.

You can find out more at buildingrelationships.us. Gary, as a pastor, you have seen the silent struggles of caregivers and the difficulties they face, haven't you? Absolutely, Chris. You know, I deeply, deeply admire those people who are caregivers because it's 24 hours for many of them. If they're in the home with family members, it's a 24-hour situation. So, yeah, there's a lot of struggle there. But hopefully and thankfully, when God gives grace, people never, ever regret caring for family members, you know. And of course, there are people, that's their lifestyle.

I mean, that's what they do. They work as caregivers. So, I'm excited about our conversation today.

Let me introduce our guest. Jess Ronnie is an author, caregiver advocate, podcast host of Coffee with Caregivers, and associate producer of the documentary Unseen, How We're Failing Parent Caregivers and Why It Matters. She holds a master's degree in education. She's the founder of Hope Farm, which is a residential home for disabled adults, and the executive director of the Lucas Project, a nonprofit dedicated to serving parent caregivers.

Jess and her husband, Ryan, live in Holland, Michigan, with their eight children. And our featured resource, if you go to buildingrelationships.us, you'll see it right there, Caregiving with Grit and Grace. A mom discovers meaning, strength, and gratitude as a caregiver.

Again, go to buildingrelationships.us. Well, Jess, welcome to Building Relationships. Yeah, I'm excited to be here. Thanks for having me. It seems to me that the ministry you have is directly related to a lot of the pain and struggle you've experienced in your own life.

Is that true? Yeah, absolutely. You know, Lucas, my son, who is profoundly disabled, has always been the thread to everything I've really created for the past 12, 15 years, from the nonprofit, to the books, to the podcast, to the documentary.

It's all been to not only bring awareness and resources for other people, but it's been to create awareness and resources for our family as well. How old is Lucas now? He's 20.

20, yeah. Well, before we get into your story, tell us what inspired you to write Caregiving with Grit and Grace. Yeah, that's kind of a funny story. My husband actually said to me for years, you should write a devotional book for caregivers. And I said, I don't know that I'm the right person to do that.

I didn't feel equipped, I guess, to minister to caregivers in such a profound capacity. And he finally convinced me, along with my agent, to write a proposal. And I did, and a publisher loved it and offered me a contract. And that's how Caregiving with Grit and Grace came about. And it's so funny, I actually wrote that book as we were creating a group home for Lucas. And it almost became like God was downloading a love letter to a grieving mother as I prepared to release my son to the care of others.

And it, in turn, has become a love letter to caregivers around the world. Yeah, sometimes God does things we don't anticipate, right? Yeah, sometimes. That's the story of my life.

Yeah. And what do you hope caregivers who are listening today take away from our conversation? I really hope that they're encouraged to reframe their perspectives in regards to caregiving.

I know it's often seen as monotonous and mundane and, you know, grub work that we have to do. And I would just really encourage caregivers to reframe their perspective and see it as holy work. Really, the holiest work we can do this side of eternity is caring for someone who cannot care for themselves. And in fact, through our caregiving, we are becoming more like Christ, who came to earth with the sole purpose of caring for us, our physical needs, our mental needs, our spiritual needs. And so to reframe our perspectives and see it in light of becoming more Christ-like has just been really a game changer for me and my personal caregiving journey as well. Yeah, I greatly admire caregivers.

I mean, I just stand in awe sometimes as I see what you and others deal with on a regular basis. So you dedicate the book to your son Lucas, who you thank for teaching you what it truly looks like to lay down your life for another. What happened with Lucas? Lucas was diagnosed with a stroke in utero at my 20-week ultrasound appointment. We were told that there was very little hope and it was suggested that we terminate and try again.

In the doctor's words, you're young and healthy, you won't have any problems getting pregnant. It's just nature's way. These fetuses aren't supposed to make it. And my husband, Jason, and I instead put Lucas in the Lord's hands and trusted that his will would be done. And Lucas came out screaming with life four months later. He underwent brain surgery, spent two weeks in the NICU, and then we were handed our baby with kind of an umbrella diagnosis of special needs and told good luck.

And Jason and I just looked at each other in awe. We had gone from there's no hope, your baby's going to die, to here you go, good luck. So we just went home elated that we were going home with our miracle baby.

I did not grieve one single bit that Lucas might have any additional needs or disabilities. I was just thrilled to be going home with a life baby. Yeah. Wow. Wow. Well, I know a lot of caregivers who recognize the pain, the struggle, which you came to recognize as time went on. How do you come to grips with the term of the prospect of being a lifelong caregiver, which is what it's really turning out to you for you?

Mm hmm. That was a process. And I don't really think I came to grips with it until Lucas started to go through puberty and became aggressive. And we had behavioral challenges and he would lash out at me and at his siblings. And he was incontinent and nonverbal. And, you know, when he was an adorable little boy, it was easy to find people to help even to step in, you know, with a five or six year old who's in diapers.

But when that child is 16, 17, 18, still in diapers and now capable of hurting people, nobody wants to help anymore. And that's when it became very apparent to me that this was a lifelong gig that the Lord had called me to. And I think that's when I really even began to grieve the fact that Lucas had special needs and and even grieve the fact that he wasn't a typical child and began to process, like, what will our future look like with this child? Well, what advice would you give other parents who are facing a similar situation to what you faced? I think it boils down to really one word, surrender. And that is like a daily surrender to the father's care and trusting his heart, not only for yourself as a parent, but trusting his heart for your child and for your family and truly trusting that he is able to do exceedingly more than we could ever comprehend or imagine with our stories when we are obedient and step into the plan and the life that he has for us.

I think a lot of listeners who have never experienced anything like this, really, it's hard to even comprehend what that would be like. Well, Jess, what are the daily challenges of caring for your son Lucas now in this juncture? Well, like I mentioned earlier, we actually created a group home for him and he moved into that home a year ago, February 1st. So for the past year, I've been really processing and grieving and accepting over and over again the fact that I'm not his full time primary caregiver anymore.

And so it looks very different than it did even a year ago. But even up to 19 years, he required full time care, bathing, diapering, feeding, getting him ready every morning. I slept with a baby monitor beside my head for 19 years because he didn't sleep very well and would wake up in the middle of the night screaming or creating self injuries by banging his head against his arm. So just 24-7 care. So living like 19 years really in a form of survival mode as a caregiver. Yeah.

I want to ask you a really personal question. Have you ever felt angry or frustration toward God in this situation? Oh, absolutely.

Yeah. And especially I feel like I surrendered much faster during my pregnancy with Lucas. Later on, as I walked through my husband's three year journey with cancer, I was extremely angry and could not understand or comprehend why the Lord would require such a difficult path for me. With numerous brain surgeries with Lucas and his father and four young children that I had to care for.

I don't know that I managed those emotions very well during Jason's cancer journey. I acknowledged them. God and I wrestled greatly. I lamented.

I screamed. I wailed. And really only up until two weeks before Jason passed away did I finally drop to my knees and surrender and say, Okay, I wanted you to take this cup from me, just like Jesus pleaded in the Garden of Gethsemane. I don't want to carry this heavy burden, but you have called me to carry this and not my will, but yours be done.

You are God and I am not. And from that moment forward, something shifted and Jason actually passed away two weeks later. But in that shift, I did find peace moving forward. I think sometimes Christians say we used to never get angry with God or frustrated with God. The reality is we all do at times when we don't understand what's going on. But the reality is we're not going to understand everything that happens in our lives.

And somewhere along the line, we have to come to where you finally came, you know, and that is accepting the reality and putting the whole thing in God's hands, even though we don't understand. So you became a widow with four children. How did you deal with that? And did you have a support system that was helping you?

Wow. I mean, I'm just feeling a lot of pain myself as I'm listening to you. It was, you know, the funny, not the funny thing, the interesting thing, really, when Jason passed away, there was finally almost some peace because I had put forth so much energy caring for him for three years.

Brain cancer is a cruel, cruel taskmaster. By the time he passed away, I missed him deeply, but I did not miss Jason who had brain cancer. Our relationship had definitely shifted from a spousal relationship to a caregiver and one who needed care. And I devoted myself to him in his final months, years, and so much so that I really missed my kids. And so when he passed away, I just really dove into being a mom again and reconnecting with my four young children.

I had four children under seven years old, including Lucas, who was profoundly disabled. And so to not have cancer to deal with anymore, there was sort of this peace to be able to focus on my kids again. And I had a really strong support system for the three years that Jason went through brain cancer.

And it's always interesting as I look back and reflect, I didn't cook a meal or do my laundry or clean my house or anything really for three years. I had so much help as Jason was battling cancer. But then I compare that to raising Lucas for 20 years and there's been very little help. And I think people are just much more eager to step into those short-term opportunities and help out. And there's something very daunting about those longer years upon years upon years of raising a child that they don't maybe know what to do with or there's some fear associated with stepping in and helping those families.

Yeah, I can see that. How long were you and Jason married before he passed away? Eleven years. Eleven years.

Wow. How old was he? He was 33.

33. Most of our marriage was just fighting one hurdle battle after another. You know, it's interesting to reflect back on that even. We had very little periods of peace just between Lucas and Jason's constant battles with brain cancer. Yeah. Are your other four children all healthy physically? I have eight children now. Yes, all seven of them are healthy. Yes, and the other three are very healthy.

Okay. Well, now you've got to tell us how you got eight children. In due time, it sounds like God led you to another man.

He did. Yes, very interesting part of the story. At Jason's funeral, his mom actually pulled me aside and said, Jess, I just want you to know I'm praying for your next husband. And that kind of shocked me because I wasn't in any frame of mind to be thinking about getting married again at that point. I was hopeful that I would get married again. I really enjoyed marriage.

I had a good marriage and I wanted that again in my life. And little did I know, three months later, a stranger left a comment on my blog. I had blogged during Jason's cancer journey just to keep the masses updated. And she was from Pennsylvania. And she said, I don't know why I'm asking you to do this, but I just would like you to reach out to this widower in Oklahoma. He lost his wife to brain cancer four days after Jason died.

And he has three young children and he's not doing very well. And so I found his blog and left a comment and I woke up the next day to an email from this man. And those emails turned into phone calls and we eventually met and we were married in April of 2011. He moved to Michigan and we adopted each other's children. And we went on to have an eighth and final child together in 2015.

Wow. Now tell me, I know our listeners are asking, I'm asking, how long was it from the time Jason died until you actually got married? Well, Jason passed away in August and we were married in April. Okay. In my defense, and I often say this, I do move quickly. Jason and I were married 11 months after meeting as well. So I'm just a very decisive woman.

Okay, I hear you, I hear you. You know, I think sometimes we experience this where, now your children were still young, but where children that are older and their father dies and their mother marries, you know, within six months or seven months or whatever. You say, wait a minute, mama, wait a minute, wait a minute, what are you doing? I've seen that in my counseling, you know, through the years. Yes.

But there is no pattern, you know, and time pattern in terms of when God brings someone into your life and brings you together. Well, I'm impressed that he moved to Michigan from Oklahoma. Oklahoma, is that what you say? Well, he only lasted two years in Michigan and then he said, I can't deal with the snow, so we moved to Tennessee. Oh, okay, all right. He didn't last real long, but here we are back in Michigan now. Oh, you're back in Michigan, okay.

Right. Okay, so being a parent caregiver can give you anxiety, can bring depression, can bring chronic stress. And you say in the documentary that your heart races. What do you do with all these feelings that affect you even physically?

Yeah, that was a battle. Like I mentioned, you kind of live in this constant state of survival mode and I recognized it, I acknowledged it, I prayed about it, I was honest about my needs, but my body still was in a chronic state of pain that nobody could really figure out. And only honestly, since Lucas moved into his new home, a couple of daily practices have been able to release a lot of that pain from my body. And one daily practice is going for a walk and really kind of shaking out some of that stress and that trauma. Another daily practice is inviting the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit into my daily life and praying for courage and clarity and anointing and operating in the spirit.

And then I try to set aside some time too to do some stretching. But it's very, very challenging when you're living in the middle of it because I know I did a lot of things right and I was still really feeling the chronic effects of the stress on my body. And so I think it's, for a lot of caregivers, just being very honest about your needs and inviting people to step into your life and help out and accepting that help. I know a lot of times as caregivers, it's really challenging for us to admit that we could use the help.

And so we'll say we're fine, everything's fine, and everything's really not fine. So accepting that help and then trying to take some time to really take care of yourself. Yeah, so that self-care and the things you were talking about really is important, right?

Because if we don't take care of ourselves, we can't take care of children or anybody else ultimately. Yeah, exactly. Chris mentioned the documentary earlier. Tell us a little bit about that documentary, how that came about. Yeah, that came about after I created the Lucas Project, which is a nonprofit that serves special needs families with resources and support. And we wanted to bring awareness to families like mine. I just thought, you know, we need to create a documentary that kind of peels back the curtain and exposes what life looks like because a lot of times people just are not familiar with families like ours because we don't go out into the world. It's not very accommodating or accessible.

And so we stay home isolated. And a couple of years ago, I think it was 2018, actually, I just posted on Facebook. I said I have this great idea. I'd like to create a documentary just kind of peeling back the curtain of a special needs life. And if there's a filmmaker or producer out there that would want to meet with me and discuss this idea, I'd love to set something up. And the next day, a filmmaker from Nashville reached out and we met for lunch. And four years later, we created a documentary. They followed our family around for about four years. The documentary is called Unseen, How We're Failing Parent Caregivers and Why It Matters. And if you head to our website, CaregiverDoc.com, and sign up for our newsletter, you will be kept up to date on all of the future showings that we're going to be offering. Well, I'm sure that's going to help a lot of people who, as you said earlier, are not aware.

Many have no idea of what this kind of lifestyle looks like. So I think that's a real asset. It's amazing how God works things out, isn't it? It gets you to the right person to do that. One of the most powerful things in it, not only following your family around and seeing your husband Ryan talk about how he's not going to make five-year plans anymore, that it's day by day, but one of the most powerful things is just the people that were interviewed who talk about what a struggle this is and they're just real and authentic and vulnerable. And I think that's one of the most powerful things of that documentary.

Yeah, I would agree. And just to realize how many families are out there dealing with the same emotions, the same isolation, the same depression, anxiety. And I think it just really brings an awareness that there are all these families and they need help in some way. Well, even the comparison of COVID, the pandemic and what happened with the shutdown, you say in there that in a lot of ways this is the same thing that happened to families who are doing that caregiving. It's just for them it didn't end, right?

No, we kind of left even during the pandemic. The whole world was freaking out about not being able to go out. And we were like, this is just life as normal outside of Luke not being able to go to school.

That was very challenging because he loved school and did not understand or comprehend why he couldn't go to school. And so that resulted in a lot of screaming all day long. But yeah, other than that, it was kind of life as normal.

Like this is just how we do life. One of the really powerful comments came from a woman and she was teary-eyed as she talked. And she was speaking a little softer and she says, two o'clock in the morning, this is the only time that I have to myself. And I saw that and it's like, that speaks volumes, doesn't it Jess? Yeah, it does. Yeah, and I mean, I would never sacrifice sleep, but she apparently, I enjoy my sleep too much.

But yeah, you just learn to cope however you need to cope so that you can continue to rise another day and do it all over again. This is The Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman Podcast. Gary's the author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . You can take a quiz to discover your love language and find out about our featured resource at buildingrelationships.us. Jess Rawney is our guest and her book is our featured resource. It's titled Caregiving with Grit and Grace.

Just go to buildingrelationships.us. Jess, you mentioned earlier, of course, you obviously were praying through all this, but you prayed for healing for your son Lucas and your first husband Jason. What did you come to understand after you realized that healing was not going to occur? I came to understand years later that it was really more about healing me, of my preconceived ideas of how I thought God should orchestrate my life, my ideas of control, and really healing me of my ideas of pride and ego, which are ultimately steeped in this idea of control that we think we have over our lives, and even an understanding that Jason is completely healed. He received the best kind of healing when he went home to heaven, and Lucas too is completely healed according to the way God wanted Lucas's life to bring glory to him.

I look at him as one of the most humble individuals on this planet who has no ego or pride, and it's just amazing to me what God has done with his story and how he's brought so much hope and encouragement through his life and the documentary and the nonprofit and the books about him. It's just really remarkable to me how there has been so much beauty from ashes when initially I thought my situation was completely hopeless. I can certainly understand where you would get to the place where you feel like there's just no hope.

It's not going to happen. They're not going to be healed. And yet, as you say, we recognize God is sovereign and God is going to work good out of our situation. We just need to be open to him and gear into what he's doing, right? Exactly.

Now, you describe caregiving as holy work, H-O-L-Y, holy work. What does that mean? For me, like I mentioned earlier, it was really a process of learning to reframe my perspective, and it came after a day. Lucas was around 15 years old, and he was sick and he was not happy.

I had a deadline for a book I was writing. I was the executive director of this new nonprofit that I had just started. Lots of big, exciting things on the horizon, and Lucas kept screaming all day because he wasn't feeling well.

He had numerous diapers that I was changing, and I was just very irritated and annoyed and grumbling about it. And the Holy Spirit just whispered to me, just, this is holy work, this is the holiest work that you can do in serving your son. That moment changed me so much so that I had a sign created that says, this is holy work, and hung it above Lucas's bed just as a constant, tangible reminder that caring for my son was the most important work.

All of the other stuff was good stuff. The ordained stuff, but in laying down my life to care for my son, I was becoming more Christ-like. Wow. I'm sure there are people when they find themselves in a caregiver situation that they don't feel equipped to do this. I'm assuming you probably felt the same way. What guidance would you give to someone who just says, I'm just not equipped to do this.

I just don't know how I'm going to do this. I kind of jokingly call myself a reluctant caregiver, because if I were God looking for somebody to put in a caregiver role, it would not be just Ronnie. I would make a horrible nurse. I'm not like the mom who snuggles with sick kids on the couch. I'm more of a like, here's your bucket.

Let me know if you need something. But the Lord in His great mercy has used my particular skill set to not only teach me how to care for others, but also in using my skill set, I've realized that I am a doer, I'm a fixer, I'm a problem solver. And so I've been able to model these attributes for other caregivers and I think bring hope and encouragement along the journey. And I would just say to that person, God does know what He's doing.

You may look at it and be like, this does not seem right. I am not the right person to care for this individual, but He will equip you. And it again comes back to that surrender. If you surrender and obey, just obey the next step, the next action that you need to take and He will equip you each and every step of the way if you allow Him to.

So it's reaching out to ask God for wisdom. And are there other people in a community that you can reach out to that might begin to help you cope with this? Or do you sometimes recommend counseling for somebody that's in this situation? I would recommend counseling, I think, if the counselor had an understanding of what families like ours go through. You know, my husband and I pursued counseling a couple of times. And honestly, the counselor had no background with what families like mine go through and suggested to my husband that when times get tough, that he breathe in a paper sack.

And a couple of weeks later, he was actually in the ER with panic attacks that resembled heart attacks because our life had gotten so overwhelming. And personally, I've found more comfort really in talking to other families that do get it and feeling seen. And I'm sure counselors can offer some coping skills or tools. But again, if you're not familiar, it's truly for some of these families, it's like being in a war zone day after day.

And they compare the PTSD that families like mine go through to that of vets because of the aggression and the behavioral challenges that we walk through. So there are support groups. I know the Lucas Project offers a free support group. It's a virtual support group called Caregivers Cove.

We currently have over 2,000 participants. But I would find something like that just so that you don't feel so alone and you have somebody or a group of people that you can talk to honestly and vulnerably about your life. Yeah. Give us that website where they might go and learn about this online care group. It's thelucasproject.org and it's under our resource tab.

It's called Caregivers Cove. Okay. Because I think there are many out there, if they are in this situation, they want all the help they can get.

And that sounds like another source of help. Let me ask this. How has all the suffering, the loss, the struggle that you have gone through, how has that affected your other children?

I get asked this question quite often. And we've been very honest with our kids. And having eight children, there hasn't been as much time to have that individual one-on-one time with each child. And when we recognize that a child really needs that, we would carve out that time. And we've formulated more of a tribal model where it was really important to all gather around the dinner table every night and share a meal together. And when one of the family members was struggling, it was important to rally around that individual and help them out.

So really living in a community model within our family. And we've had a lot of honest conversations about the fact that seven of them have a very tragic story. Seven of my kids lost a parent, and all eight of them have grown up with a profoundly disabled brother. And it's up to them really what they're going to do with their story. They can wallow in the injustice of it, or they can trust that God has a plan for their life and for their story. And they can move forward in faith and do something positive with their story. And it's been really remarkable to see now, we have four kids who live outside of our home. All very well-adjusted, kind individuals who really see other people who don't have this narcissistic tendency that you see so often in so many individuals nowadays because they did have to rally around their brother. They helped with their brother, and they were one of eight kids.

And as a mother, I'm just so proud to see how they do see other people, and they step in, and they offer assistance where that's needed. So again, it's their story. It's my story. It's their story.

We've all had a hard story, and it's up to us to decide, are we going to trust God with that story and move forward in faith and do something positive? Now, when you married Ryan, you said he had three children, and so they moved in with you and your four children. How did that step-parent, step-child thing, was that something that there was early on acceptance of those children?

Or how did you visualize all of that? There really was. Because they were all so young, they were very excited to have all of these built-in playmates. And you alluded to earlier, it probably would have been very different if they were older, and we recognize that. But they were very excited to have a mom and a dad figure again.

They were very excited for all of these built-in playmates. And we didn't really have these step labels because we adopted them so early on. And in fact, my daughter, Maya, one of her teachers referred to me as her stepmom, and she said, that's not my stepmom, that's my mom. But again, we recognize they were young, and so they just really all grew up together, and they're all extremely close to this day. But I mean, we had challenges, I would say more so in our marriage and the blending of what that looked like than with the kids. I'm also the oldest of 12, so I've been sort of preparing for all these children my whole life. I've been in kind of a caregiver role since I was two years old when my mom had twins. And I see these pictures now of two-year-old Jessica sitting on the couch with her twin brothers under her arms, feeding them bottles.

So it was just really second nature. It wasn't all that shocking to me to have so many children. I think it was more shocking to Ryan to have so many children. How old were his children when they came in?

Six, four and one. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I can see how it would be easier at that age than if they had been 10, 12, 15, 13, you know, whatever.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's talk about the marriage. Maybe, first of all, words about your time with Jason. How does all this pressure and all caring for Lucas and everything, how did that affect your marriage? And then let's talk about your marriage with Ryan and how this has affected the marriage.

And what are the challenges? Yeah, with Jason, like I mentioned earlier, we just, our whole marriage was basically living in survival mode. And that makes me sad sometimes because it just felt like we were always fighting the next battle. We both had a very deep faith and we really enjoyed each other's company and we're best friends, but it was so hard to carve out those fun times together because of all of the challenges, all of the brain surgeries that felt like were occurring almost every couple of months, honestly. But I remember some of the happiest times of my life were when we were first married and we lived in a double wide and we're just making enough money to survive. And I had Caleb and we were just blissfully unaware of what was coming around the bend for our lives together. But I'm proud of that marriage. I'm proud of how we stood firm in our faith.

I'm proud of how he brought glory to God through his struggles, even up until the very end. And then marrying Ryan, we did get married very quickly and we recognize that in that decision, we did not necessarily process and grieve the loss of our former spouses prior to coming together. And in fact, we kind of grieved and processed together, which was not necessarily the best idea. And in looking back, we should have found somebody that we could work through some of those feelings with rather than dump it all on each other, because that's a very challenging place to be, like grieving the loss of one spouse and falling in love with a new spouse.

I can't even hardly explain it, but it's just a murky, messy place at times. But we did realize early on, too, that if our marriage was going to work, we had to be really intentional about spending time together and really getting to know each other and cultivating that intimacy. And so from the very beginning, we went on a weekly date. We have been praying together every morning for 14 years, and we would carve out time to get away just the two of us every year. And those were intentional choices.

We have never driven fancy vehicles or gone out to eat all the time. But we do set aside money to go on those date nights and to spend that week away every year to reconnect, because we wanted to give our eight children the gift of a healthy marriage. And so that was a choice very early on that we committed to.

Yeah. I was talking to a gentleman recently whose wife died, and he remarried. And he was saying in our conversation, he said, you know, we each feel freedom to talk about our former spouse, you know, to bring up things. If something happens, it reminds me of my wife, you know, she's happy for me to share that, and she does the same thing. Have you all found that to be a part of your communication, or has that not been a part of it?

It's changed. Initially, I think there was some insecurities that came up when we would bring up the former spouses. And part of that was, you know, when somebody dies, there's a sainthood aspect. And so every memory would be this beautiful memory while the two of us are battling through this new marriage and trying to find our way. And so there was some insecurity in the initial stages, and we've had to figure out how to walk through that gracefully with one another. 14 years later, now that we have our own shared history, we've been raising these children, we feel very firmly established in our love for one another.

It's very different. And those conversations arise quite often where something will remind us of that former spouse. So I think just recognizing that sometimes it takes time to build that history together and to build that trust and that love, too. Because in those initial stages, you're kind of running on passion and endorphins, and not so much the trust and the foundation of what truly solidifies you to each other. It takes time. It takes time to build that sense of confidence with each other. And I think it would be more difficult in a second marriage than it would be in a first marriage. I mean, we all have to do that in a first marriage as well, you know, because there's a whole lot we don't know about each other when we get married. And we have to work through all of that.

But I think in a second marriage, it would probably be even more difficult. Just say a word to the caregiver who's listening who just feels hopeless. You know, it's just too overwhelming to them.

What would you say to them? I think hopelessness comes from a feeling that you're alone. And I would just say to that caregiver, you're not alone. God is right in the midst of your suffering. He's right in the midst of the mundane and the monotonous and the screaming and the diaper changes and the feeding and all of it. God is right there just as he was with Jesus, his son, in the Garden of Gethsemane when he begged his father in heaven, please take this cup from me.

But then surrendered and said, but not my will, but yours be done. I would just encourage this individual to surrender and to recognize God is right there and to invite him into your struggles and allow him to strengthen you and sustain you. Well, Jess, I really appreciate you being with us today. And I think this book is going to help any caregiver out there. And we just want to help get the word out because I think it's so important. And I think also encourage them to go to the website, your website, and Chris can share that with us again before we go off the air later. But thank you for being with us and thank you for allowing God to use all the hard stuff in your life to bless the lives of others. So thanks for being with us. Yeah, thanks for having me. And next week, how to discover the power to create a marriage you and your spouse love. Hear Dr. Bob Paul's encouragement in one week. Our thanks to our production team, Steve Wick and Janice Backing. Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman is a production of Moody Radio in association with Moody Publishers, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute. Thanks for listening.