My Lack of Faith Disturbs Me

OK. Here’s the honest truth about my struggles for the last 8 days. It has…made me question things that I’ve never questioned before, and this is hard to admit.

I have ALWAYS had faith in God. I have ALWAYS had faith that every bad thing that he allowed was for a reason. The reason for mine was always clear to me:

I needed to help children who will be where I’ve been.

It was that simple. God has us go through events that will help shape us to help the people who come after us.

I don’t know now like I knew before.

First, let me start by saying: I’ve had two things I have always wanted in life.

1. I have wanted to be loved for who I am.
2. I wanted to use my own traumatic experiences to help other traumatized children. I want to believe that is why God put me on this earth. (I NEED to believe there’s a purpose.)

Like I said. Two things I’ve wanted.

Two things I’ve lost.

I was finally loved for exactly who I was.

Sometimes, as part of my grief, I’m still afraid that Aaron was tired of me. He changed so much at the end. To be honest, the drugs, pain, and illness made him snappy and slightly dismissive with me…he became someone who basically wanted me to be quiet and look pretty. Which was not Aaron. And…as I remember telling an ex in the past, when I asked if I could help him with a problem, and he literally told me to just be quiet and look pretty…I’m not exactly a be quiet and look pretty type of girl. LOL Sorry!! I’m not quiet with my opinions and…honestly…I’m cute, but I’m not pretty enough to just sit there silently. 😂

But, deep down, I know…I was finally loved for exactly who I was.

And…minutes before midnight on New Year’s Eve…I lost the one person who’s ever truly loved me for exactly who I am.

I was never too much to him. He never asked me to be less (unless it was about his mother…and we’ll give that a “boys and their moms” pass LOL). I was never not enough for him. I was everything to him. He was everything to me. I truly believed that God had finally granted this one prayer of mine.

To be loved for who I am.

Once again, I’m surrounded only by people who want me to be less…or more. (This excludes select friends and my amazing daughter.)

The world is Goldilocks. I am the first two bowls of porridge. I’m just not what Goldilocks wants.

Which leads me to the second loss.

The absolute faith that God never put me through anything without a purpose.

My abduction.

My illnesses.

My PTSD.

Even the loss of Aaron.

My life.

My life was all supposed to lead to this one thing. Helping traumatized children not become like me.

Helping them not become…well…an, admittedly, pretty okay human being. A person who can never trust enough to believe that anyone else sees, in me, any of the good that I see in myself. A woman struggles to let go of the “everybody leaves” mentality. Because I have always allowed people in my life who…yeah…leave.

Even after Aaron passed. When I threw myself into the idea that God was telling me it was time. It was time to more actively pursue that second deep prayer that I had for my life.

I decided CASA was a great fit for me. Literally being an adult that these children can trust.

I made it through the interview. I was very open about my traumatic past. I explained why I wanted to volunteer. I was very honest about my PTSD. I *did* believe they might factor that into their decision. I was transparent throughout the entire process. They accepted me anyway.

I made it through the background checks.

I made it through the two nights of training.

I didn’t make it past 2.75 nights of training. I was triggered when I discovered that parental abduction is still seen as a “victimless crime”. Even once the child is found.

Between that and, I’m fairly certain, the “team” at CASA reading my Deathiversary blog. The traffic was too exact on the day that they rejected me. I was determined to be “not a good fit”. (Blog link here, if you’re interested. https://jazzhandsmom.com/2022/11/18/my-deathiversary/ )

Let me say that again.

Finding out that 10-year-old Sheri *still* wouldn’t have been helped triggered me. A blog that I wrote about how my abduction was traumatic made them judge me as unfit to help children.

I’m devastated. Not about CASA per se. I mean…yes, they hurt my feelings. Yes, I feel like they victim shamed me. Yes, I feel like they stalked me to decide that I’m unfit. Yes, I feel like their generic “we don’t want you” email lacked the insight expected. It was not the writing of someone who should understand how childhood trauma affects adults. They could have done better. They should have done better. I deserved better.

But, they’re not wrong.

I’m not fit to have my hands tied by a broken system. I’m not fit to be part of observing traumatic events happen to children. I can’t be the judge, jury, and executioner of their trauma’s validity. I’m not fit to push my triangle self into their oval-shaped hole.

I’m not fit to ignore the fact that a system is broken.

But it still hurt.

The rejection hurt.

But, mostly, the feeling that it stole my faith that everything happened to me for a reason, hurt. This hurt more than anything else, besides Aaron’s death, has ever hurt me.

The loss of that faith…the THEFT of that faith…I’m struggling with it.

Yes, I’m still going through with my advocacy plan (https://jazzhandsmom.com/2025/06/14/the-plan/). I have letters drafted for my state Representatives and for the Governor. I also have letters for their Chiefs of Staff, for Senate and Congress, and for the state DFCS. The letters are so solid that my editor friend blessed them with only a suggestion for more statistics. They do not throw my county’s DFCS or CASA under the bus. That’s not the purpose. The purpose is change.

I’m trying to believe that *this* is the path God is sending me down. I’m hoping that I can effect even more change this way than by being a CASA.

I’m trying to believe that there’s still a purpose.

I’m trying not to lose faith that God doesn’t allow bad things to happen, especially to children, for no reason.

But I’m struggling.

In a matter of 5.5 months…I lost every vision of the future that I had for myself.

Me. The girl who never believed in forever, but then found it and cherished it until the bitter end. The girl who always believed that nothing happens without meaning.

I find myself in this place where I can’t picture my future anymore. My future, and everything we had planned for it, is gone…and even my hope has been damaged…

I can’t see where life is supposed to go now.

This…emptiness…it makes me feel like there’s no point to anything.

How do I try to find new hobbies and passions? I feel like I can’t even decipher who I’m going to be in my next chapter of life.

How do I try to push passed the anxiety and fear, and meet new people, without being able to see the future? When I can’t even tell you if I’m staying where I am…or throwing my hands up in the air and finding a remote cabin to live out my days?

How do I feel true happiness when everything feels so empty?

My daughter is going to continue being the light of my life. This is the one certainty about my future. But she’s 19 and she will move out one day. Even if she does swear that she will never live away from her mother. LOL So, the one happy part of my future that I can see…includes a vision of her going off to follow her own dreams…leaving me, again, in that remote cabin.

I want to believe.

I want to believe that I will matter to someone (anyone) again one day. I want to believe that I will be truly loved for who I am again. (Not romantically. I still say my romance days are over. I found my person, and now he’s gone. But it would still be nice to find other people who can love me.)

I want to have faith that God DOES love me. He would only let bad things happen because he has a plan. I want to have faith in his path. I want to truly be able to say my favorite prayer and mean it.

Dear Lord,

Please allow me to hear your voice louder than the voice of my hopes

and allow me to hear the voice of my hopes louder than the voice of my fears.