An Interrupted Life!

by Biancia Tate
(Lynchburg, Virginia)

My husband and I were just beginning our new life as husband and wife. I had just received a position as a Probation Counselor for the Department of Youth and Family Services and, my husband worked for the Department of Corrections as a Treatment Program Supervisor.

We were looking forward to our new life but, then, it became interrupted when my husband was diagnosed with an Anterior Venous Malformation in the back of his brain. He would need surgery which would come with complications which placed him in a 2 and 1 half month coma and a lot of rehabilitation.

When he returned home, he was a different person as was I and, we had an entirely different marriage. Instead of celebrating new life, we were now grieving what we were having to leave to embrace what we were having to chase.

Our careers ended, our intimacy was no more, and our purposes were unknown. So, we took home correspondence courses thinking that would help us to start our lives over again. That did not work. Then, we tried working in the church and, that did not work.

So, finally, we realized that the purpose for our lives was contained within the lessons we had learned since John's brain injury. We would help survivors of trauma rebuild their faith, restore their confidence and renew their hope in Jesus Christ after trauma and/or crisis.

We are in the process of creating our dream as we continue to heal from the after-effects of what has occurred in our lives. We have taken our interrupted lives and, allowed God to lead us into the direction He has ordained for us to go.

We have found that an end is only a new beginning if one only chooses not to give up. We call ourselves Hope Bearers.