It was the Worst of times..Then the best of times..

Yes folks it was the worst of times and then the best of times..or was it the other way around? Or then again didn't it circle back around and do it all over again?  Lord a mercy folks.  I am speaking of Monday, October 29th.  This was a day I will NEVER forget.  Neither will probably my neighbors and once it's all said and done....Home Depot.  This morning started off like most mornings had turned into starting off as...horrible lately.  A constant battle between Bryson and myself.  A morning I dreaded before I even got up, and a morning I counted the seconds during until Bryson got on the bus.  This is how my life has turned out.  See my husband goes to work very early and Bryson has formed this opinion of myself and his sister and well every woman in his life that we are stupid and annoying and really do not matter (in his words).  Which translate into anger, bitterness, disrespect, and violence.  So when I say I dreaded the mornings I am alone with Bryson and the kids that my dear friends was becoming an under-statement. 

So like I said Gary leaves very early and we have a rule in place in our home that Bryson is not to get out of his room until I come get him in the mornings (he doesn't sleep well because of anxiety and sneaks around).  SO this rule has been in place for a very long time.  If he breaks this rule he is in his room for a longer duration.  Anyway this morning I bet Gary was still in the driveway when I heard Bryson sneaking around upstairs and I busted him.  Well friends that is all it took.  The battle royal was on.  I sent him back to his room and it started.  The disrespect that your mamma would roll over if she witnessed or our grand-mammas would have smacked us silly over.  Now I learned a LONG time ago I could not get fired up when he was this angry.  That would do no good.  So I sent aka dragged his butt to his room and forced him in there to do his time.  Well he wouldn't have it.  I gave him the choice.  Do it now or do it tonight without dinner.  Yes friends I said without dinner!  In our house..dinner with the family has become a privilege that can be taken away.  So he chose the latter.  I finally got him to school.  He missed the bus and I took him myself.  The whole trip I began to speak words of encouragement and love into him.  Now folks talk about needing some powerful prayer!  Lord a mercy.  All I wanted to do was bury that kid...but God gave me truths to say to him and he calmed down and guess what....so did I.  Funny how that worked out.  Venom was spewing from his mouth...venom only an adult (his father)can place in a mind of that child...and God provided me a way to give forth love even when I didn't feel it. Guys I felt beat up and abused myself after that morning.  So guess what my day was like??   Yep dreaded the moment he stepped off his bus.  I knew as a "reformed" parent of 4 years(meaning I don't give in or spoil my children anymore regardless of circumstances or if it's going to be hard cause trust me being consistent is the tougher challenge.  I learned years ago I was not raising happy children nor was that my goal but that's another story for another day) that I could not waver when it came to disciplining my son no matter what the outcome.

So my dear sweet boy got off the bus and wouldn't you know it had a ridiculously fantastic day at school!  Yeah I couldn't believe it either!  He was so happy and out of his mouth came, "I had a great day can I eat dinner?"  My heart sank.  "No," I replied, "you cannot.  You chose to not get to eat dinner by your actions toward me this morning and I have to enforce your decision or I would be a liar."  (that was a good one huh?!)  Oh he didn't think so!  He reached over from where he was sitting and smacked his sister out of nowhere!  I sent him to his room and he wouldn't go.  Folks it got so ugly I can't even describe.  Let's just say I went into protective mode.  I protected my little ones from what Bryson had become until Gary could get home.  He finally got home.  52 long minutes later.  When he got home Bryson had worked himself up into such a destructive state we actually had to isolate him from us to keep him from hurting us and himself.  So we turned his lock on his door around.  Yep we locked his butt in his room.  DO you think that stopped him?  Nah!  He took the slats out from under his bed (because really that's the only thing he has left in his room Dr. Phil style y'all) and used it as an axe and axed his way through that door!!!  Kids this is no movie.  This is what our lives has become!  We cranked the praise music and sat through the worse dinner of our lives as he did this.  We were told this is all we could do.  When we tried to intercede in the past it made things worse.  So we waited in horror.  And prayed and waited and prayed and pretended that everything was okay for Bailey and Brantley's sake.  We finally finished dinner and baths as if we were in a daze.  All the while hearing Bryson make progress on the increasing larger hole in his door.  Finally the screaming and banging stopped.  All we heard was weeping and begging and "I'm sorry." now.  We put the babies to bed and finally went into Bryson's room.  He was sobbing and had asked us why couldn't he just be bad and not be disciplined.  That's when we got to bring out our bible.  Well our smart phone edition. Praise God for that one.  All we had to do was type in discipline and BAM!  God started speaking.
Proverbs 19:18  Discipline your children, for in that there is hope;
    do not be a willing party to their death.
Proverbs 29:17 Discipline your children, and they will give you peace;
    they will bring you the delights you desire.
Hebrews 12:11  No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

It was cool to show him these verses and he then started to calm even further and started weeping...He looked up at us and said clear as day."A voice in my head keeps telling me I am going to Hell." Now Folks that stopped us in our tracks!  We asked him if he ever asked Jesus in his heart and he said no.  I couldn't believe it as much as we have that boy in church..anyway so lo and behold guys that young man made Jesus his Lord and Savior that horrible awful night. As we looked through the Brantley sized hole in the door, he fell asleep that night with a peace on his face I hadn't seen in awhile. He actually woke up the next morning and prayed over his sister to ask Jesus in her heart when she got older.  And guys he was just Baptized this past Sunday by his own choice.  Now are things perfect not even close..will they be..nah.  But we won one for the big guy that night! And it gave us strength to keep fighting another day! Funny how God does that.