Find the Support You Need

A Witness to Hope

I Believe in Hope for three reasons.

First: For me, the alternative is not an option.

Second: I come by Hope naturally.
I am one of those people whose default is optimism …
whose glass is always at least a drop full …
who are annoyingly cheerful at seven in the morning.

As a wee girl, at this time of year, I was filled with Hope that Santa would come.
He always did.

As a teenager, I Hoped for good friends and social experiences. (Forget about learning!)
I was endowed with both – and some learning, too.
In college, I Hoped to become the next Barbara Walters.
That didn’t happen … but I stumbled into a wonderful, rewarding career.
I was a Hope-full Romantic that, “someday my prince will come” …
well, I’m still hopin’ on that one!

I was blessed early in my life …
with Loving family and a healthy home …
in friends and opportunities and simple success.
Why wouldn’t I be a Hope-filled person?

In 1981, I learned that, for me, Hope, like Love, is an Action Verb.
In those days, [whispered] cancer was still a whispered word.
Nonetheless, I Hoped-in-Prayer that surgery or chemo would save my Dad.
In fact, right back there …
in the beat-up pews of this church,
old and empty,
its paint peeling,
I found in these luminescent windows
and in the dark and Quiet of Old St. Patrick’s,
my sacred space for Prayer and Faith and Hope – and, in their absence, Peace.

For the first time, my Prayers weren’t answered my way.
I remember 25 years ago with visceral acuity …
standing in St. Denis Church at the end of Dad’s funeral Mass …
Hoping that what Dad’s brother, the Priest, promised was true:
Dad is in Paradise with the all-Knowing …
and I will see Dad again someday.
So I Hoped … and Prayed … and chose to Believe it is true.

A few years later, Mom began to repeat herself … to get lost … to be easily flustered.
I Hoped it was depression … or diabetes … or a thyroid imbalance.
I Prayed it was, simply, the utter destruction of Life without Dad.
It wasn’t.

During her 20-year battle with [whispered] Alzheimer’s -
for a battle it is, whispered or otherwise –
Mom manifested Acceptance and Grace and Courage beyond my understanding.
And she Loved as she always did …
and does, still, in the present tense.

I choose to Believe she IS right there [in the niche] …
with Dad and all our Beloved Saints.
I choose to Believe, Joy-fully, that Mom is dancing with Dad in Paradise …
and that she is, at last, clear thinking again.

And a constant conversation with Mom
started the morning after she passed in 2005 …
and quite often takes place in that same pew
in this now-beautiful and still-sacred space.

I Hope and Pray for – and, yes, Believe in – a cure for Alzheimer’s.
I Endeavor to honor Mom in a Love- and Hope- and Prayer-based charity
for all people who battle Alzheimer’s – and their Families and Caregivers.
I call it, simply, Betty’s Love.
And I Hope I am sufficient.

I planned to have eight children.
God laughed … and sent me eight cats instead.
(It’s how I know God is either hard of hearing – or just has a wicked sense of humor!)
Three years ago, I adopted a little girl I named Máiréad … but I lost her.
I know not with whom or where or how she is.
So I Pray every day that she is safe and nurtured and Loved.
I Believe that someday she will know I Love her …
and that being her Mummy was the single-greatest Joy of my Life.
And I Hope that, wherever Máiréad is,
she is Hope-filled …
and that Santa will come.

Merriam-Webster offers three definitions of Hope:
To cherish a desire with anticipation.
To desire with expectation of obtainment.
To expect with confidence.

And so I do.

This is our Faith’s Season of Hope …
of Mary’s Immaculate Conception …
of barren Elizabeth bearing a son.

So, I anticipate with Joy the Virgin Birth of our Savior.
I expect to obtain Miracles.
I have confidence in Heaven.
“For nothing is impossible with God.” [Luke 1:37]

And that’s the third reason I am a Hope-filled person: God promises.
I choose to Trust God.

This Christmas,
I Pray for Peace beyond understanding …
in this sacred space, our city, our country …
in Ireland and around the world …
and in our hearts.

I Pray we remember – whether or not we come by it naturally:
Hope is always an option.

I Pray we work Hope as an Action Verb
of Faith and Prayer and Endeavor and Trust – and Love.

And I pray we all choose to be Hope-filled. It’s in us. God Promises.

Amen!

Please share your story! Please submit 500-1,000 Words (or whatever it takes to tell it!) and a photograph of you and your Blessed Warrior, and send Your Story – and a brief permission statement – to families@bettyslove.org. Thank you! Then, please join us for Betty’s University programs we can tailor to your Family.

And thank you for supporting Betty’s Vision of JOY. With your support, our grassroots movement will keep changing brains, lives, and the world … one family like yours at a time.