I attended the
luncheon afterward to help serve dessert. While I was there, I met Dee’s sister-in-law
and sat at a table with one of Janell’s nieces and her family. That helped me
feel more connected to Janell. As I mentioned earlier, I met Janell’s
half-sister on the day we found out about her death in April. Over the months
that followed, we kept in touch by text and email. I also treated her to lunch
and I appreciated the opportunity to talk with her again in person. She
reminded me that Janell talked about our walks often. She felt that no one did
more to help Janell be happy than I did before she died. I was so thankful for
that privilege and opportunity that God gave me! About two weeks after our lunch,
Janell’s husband died suddenly in mid-August 2014. I don’t think the timing of our
lunch was a coincidence. Because we were now friends, I stood by her and her
family at Dee’s graveside service. His ashes were placed in the grave with
their daughter and Janell’s ashes had previously been placed in the grave with
their son. After the service, I talked with the daughter of Janell’s half-sister
and her two children. I don’t think that as a coincidence either.
I ended up visiting Janell’s
half-sister and niece several times in Saratoga Springs. I also met Janell’s
niece for lunch a few times. They had returned to Utah from Seattle within that
past year and, while they were up there, they became active in the church again
because of the kindness of missionaries and several members of their ward. God obviously
knew they would need to continue to feel His love after they returned to Utah,
so I think that was also part of the reason I was supposed to knock on Janell’s
door. Otherwise, I probably would have never met them, since they live 30
minutes away from me. My friendship with Janell’s niece continued and we met at
the temple several times. This strengthened her to deal with some difficult
circumstances in her life and it was also good preparation for when we did
Janell’s temple work on May 12, 2015. I was so grateful for the privilege of being with Janell’s
niece when she did the initiatory and endowment for her aunt that I loved. At
one point, I just held Janell’s temple card to my heart and hugged it because I
loved and missed her so much. That day was filled with feelings of great joy. The
Lord had clearly been orchestrating this whole situation from the beginning. There
is more to this story, but I will continue telling it in a future chapter.
***
Meanwhile, I continued to visit
women in our stake. I visited one woman on May
7, 2014 (which was 15 days after Janell passed away). During our visit, she
asked me to try to help her daughter, who had also struggled with serious
depression for over 20 years. I knocked on her daughter’s door each of the
following days and she finally opened the door four days later on May 12th
(which was exactly one year prior to the day that Janell’s niece and I completed
her temple work). She invited me in and we quickly became friends. She was
extremely overweight and deeply depressed, so we started walking together when
she returned home from work on most days. Janell and I had walked in the
afternoons as well, so each walk helped to heal my heart. Most of the time, this
friend picked me up after she decompressed from work and we usually drove up
the canyon to walk by the river. That beautiful, relaxing atmosphere was the
perfect venue for gradual changes in her life
I learned more about her life each time we walked and
talked. She self-harmed by cutting her arms for several years and both arms
were covered with scars. She was the middle daughter in a family of nine
children and felt neglected on several levels. She had been in a relationship
with a verbally abusive boyfriend for a few years and didn’t stand up for
herself because she felt that she didn’t deserve to be treated any differently.
She stayed in the relationship because her boyfriend had MS and his health was
progressively deteriorating, so it gave her life some purpose to help take care
of him. When they started dating, he asked her to stop cutting and she did, so
she also felt indebted to him for that. She was actually diagnosed with Borderline
Personality Disorder, in addition to depression, and that manifested itself
in several other ways. She constantly dyed her hair different colors and would
often wear different styles of wigs over her hair as well. She eventually shaved
her hair completely and continued to just wear wigs instead. As I observed this
over several months, I realized that it was probably because her hair was one
of the only things about her life she had any control over. She also had limited
money management skills and spent most of her paychecks on clothes, purses, and
eating out. She often let her mail pile up and wouldn’t open her bills, so she
was sent to collections several times, along with some of her wages being garnished.
I tried to help her through some of those difficult
circumstances with varying degrees of success over the following 2 ½ years. After
knowing her for a couple of weeks, I felt prompted to suggest that if she
stopped eating out for most of her meals, she would have enough money to pay all
her bills, she could start paying tithing if she wanted to, and would probably lose
some weight as well. I’m normally not quite that bold! She actually listened to
me, even though she could have easily chosen to be very offended. As a result, she
lost 70 pounds during the next year and felt better emotionally because of our
regular walking. She sometimes forgot to fill her prescriptions, so I always
offered to go with her to make sure she picked them up, since it was very important
for her mental stability. I often walked over to her basement apartment to
visit her and helped her redecorate in August 2015. She chose some of her favorite
patterns from my scrapbook paper and I cut out large letters to make an uplifting
saying for her bedroom wall, at her request. The phrase she chose was, “When
you learn you grow. When you grow you change.”
She was stable enough to have the same full-time job for
several years, which was a huge accomplishment. However, she constantly
struggled with her finances. After about a year of watching her flounder, I
asked if she would like some help, since I have a talent of keeping track of our
finances. I helped her make a budget, but she struggled to follow it. I showed
her how she could pay off some of her credit cards and even went with her to
the bank, but she always maxed out the balances again. After a few weeks, we
decided to add her accounts on my Quicken program, so I could help her track
her spending. She made progress for a few days and then she would blow all her
money on wigs or purses. This pattern occurred frequently and it was frustrating
for me, but I continued to try to help her. I discovered during this time that
she always remembered to pay her car payment. I asked her why that was
different and she explained that the title was in her boyfriend’s name, since
she couldn’t qualify for a loan, and she didn’t want to ruin his credit. I realized
that the car was another way he could control her. So we worked on several
different plans for her to pay off the loan and then she could arrange to have
the title transferred to her name. During this same time, I tried to build up
her confidence even more than I had in the past and tried to convince her that
she deserved to be treated well. She started to believe me, but never felt like she could break up with her boyfriend
because that would include returning the car and she had no way to pay for one
herself. Each time she would return from spending the weekend with him, it took
me days to build her back up again. That became more and more difficult the
longer it went on.
In August 2015, I felt strongly that I needed to help her
in a way I hadn’t before. I made a few judgement calls to help her pay off and
close some of her credit cards, so she could pay down the car loan faster. Then
we made a simple plan for her to consistently pay me back over the coming
months as well. It worked for about five paychecks and then she found ways to
start blowing her money again. The more I tried to help her, the more things
spiraled. By October 2015, it looked like I would never get the remaining
$1,500 back and that really discouraged me because I thought I had followed
promptings. I was also sad because she gained back most of the weight she lost
over the previous year. I returned to college that semester, so I didn’t have
as much time to spend and she pulled back as well. She rented from a family
member and they decided to move, so that meant she had to find a new place to
live also. I helped her declutter, clean, and pack up her apartment in late
spring 2016 and then helped her move into another small basement apartment in
June 2016. I visited her a couple of times to help her get organized, but I didn’t
find her home much after that. One time, I did find her home and I spontaneously
took her out to dinner at her favorite restaurant. We talked about how she was
feeling in the relationship with her boyfriend and she had finally decided to break
up with him. She was scared about the retaliation, though, so we discussed a
few different scenarios. I didn’t see her much during fall 2016 and I worried
about her, but couldn’t force her to communicate with me.
During that time, she started dating another guy. He
encouraged her to grow her hair back out and to stop hiding behind wigs. He
also helped her return the car to her ex-boyfriend late one night with an
apology note that she wasn’t able to continue paying on the loan. He comforted her
through her episodes of depression and encouraged her in other ways as well. They
found an inexpensive car to share and she ended up moving out in January 2017.
She texted to ask me for money, but I had to tell her no, which I felt bad
about. I just couldn’t afford to lose more than I already had. They rented a small
house in a poor, kind of scary, neighborhood in Salt Lake county and began living
together from then on. I drove up to treat her to a birthday lunch in December
2017 and she still seemed to be doing okay. She surprised me by sending a
wedding announcement in August 2018. I helped served lunch at the church,
attended the wedding in her parents’ back yard, and stayed to help with refreshments
during the reception that evening. That was the last time I saw her and I hope
she’s doing well, since she doesn’t respond to my texts. I sometimes think back
to the early days of our friendship when she told people that “God dropped me
on her doorstep.” I do believe I was in her life to help her in the ways I
could and I’m grateful for the time we shared together.
***
During my visiting journey, I met three other women who struggled
deeply with depression and needed a significant amount of support. Two of them
were single and both of their moms passed away during the time I was trying to
help them. I stood and sat by one of them at the viewing, funeral, graveside
service, and luncheon to try to be supportive. Both were borderline hoarders
and I spent several months during summer and fall 2017 helping one of them
organize the basement of her parents’ house where she still lived. However, every
time I went back over, the progress from the previous time had disappeared. It drained
my energy and was very discouraging, so I eventually had to take a step back from
helping her in that way. However, I did help her move all her preschool
equipment twice, which took several days each time. I also helped the other woman
move into an apartment in Provo. I walked and talked with them as much as they
would allow me to and that seemed to help their emotional state. One of them earned
her master’s degree online during those years and is now employed part-time as
a therapist. I earned my associate degree during that same time frame, so we
encouraged each other through the almost constant stress we both felt. These
two women still struggle and have ongoing challenges, but I was grateful for
the opportunity to help in whatever way I could over several years.
The third woman moved from our ward after she and her
husband retired. While she still lived in our neighborhood, she struggled with
depression and debilitating anxiety for many years. She had complications from
a hip surgery that made it difficult for her to walk and also suffered from
congestive heart disease. After they moved to a retirement community in Pleasant
Grove, her anxiety and depression became even more difficult for her to bear.
One day in 2015, I was driving to the Mt. Timpanogos Temple and felt prompted
to text her. I stopped by the next time I was in her area and that began the extensive
amount of time I spent in her home trying to uplift and comfort her. She often
texted me in between the visits and I tried to give her hope until the next visit.
She was too anxious to drive very far and feeling trapped at home was part of
her struggle. Sometimes her husband dropped her off at a hair salon and I would
sit with her to keep her company. Then I would drive her back home. I encouraged
her to drive when I was there and just tried to keep her calm from the
passenger seat. Often, we would drive to Subway or Purple Turtle for lunch that
way. Two other times, I attended an appointment with her psychiatrist and also
with her cardiologist to provide moral support.
After three years, nothing I did or said seemed to help
for more than a couple hours. I felt exhausted trying to balance my visits with
her, helping two of the women I wrote about previously, keeping up with my college
classes, attending the temple regularly, and trying to still have time for my
family. Finally, I made the difficult decision to stop visiting her, but we still
texted back and forth quite a bit for 1 ½ more years. She sent me a text on the
night our grandson was born in January 2020 to tell me she was having heart bypass
surgery the next day. I had a strong feeling that she wouldn’t survive the
surgery, so I texted back that I would pray for her, told her again how much I
loved her, and that I was grateful for our friendship. She passed away from
complications later that week. I attended her funeral and couldn’t help but be
grateful, even though I was sad, that she was finally free of the mental and
physical challenges that had plagued her for so many years.
My time with each of these women helped me to understand
that it’s important to try not to worry about
the results when you reach out to others. Kindness or service to
others doesn’t need to end in a certain result for the kindness or service to
matter. I believe that my kindness
mattered to Janell even though that situation didn’t end at all like I hoped it
would. I believe it mattered to the others also, even though I wasn’t able to do
as much as I wanted to for them. In another type of service, missionaries spend
most of their time planting seeds. The changes in people’s lives usually take a
long time. I continue to remind myself to not be overly concerned
with the outcome of my efforts.
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