Family Distress

In the early winter of 2008 a few members of my extended family went up to our family cabin to ride snowmobiles and partake in the wonderful precipitation that we had been blessed with that year. My grandma and grandpa and four of my aunts and uncles and their children all went up, my parents had gone to the temple that day, so my family was not present. It was late in the evening and of that same early winter day that my Aunt Laura called our home. As an eight-year-old, I was not allowed to answer the phone while mom and dad were gone. The receiver picked up and my aunt left a message that will forever be imprinted into my memory, “Beth its La, dads hurt, and it doesn’t look good, we’re at the hospital now call back when you can.” The rest is a blur, I remember my parents rushing into the house after returning home from their temple session and running right back out in different clothes. My grandpa had been riding a snowmobile when his glove slipped, and his hand hit the throttle sending him headfirst into a tree. His neck was immediately broken, and he was life-flighted in a helicopter to the University of Utah hospital where he lay now a quadriplegic, paralyzed from the neck down. Over the span of the next five years my family set up a system to help my grandma care for my grandpa. Luckily for her they had nine children and each of their spouses that were willing to help and provide whatever care was needed. While two of my aunts and their husbands lived states away, there was a perfect seven couples left who could take one day a week to help out. My parents took the Sunday night Monday day shift, which included pillow pushes every 30 minutes to prevent bed sores, teeth brushing, cough assists, showers, and many more medical needs.

This experience tested my family. My grandpa was a faithful righteous member of the church his whole life. He served a mission as a young boy in Finland, and later went back to serve three more missions there with my grandma. He served as a bishop and stake president and was a wonderful father, and grandfather. I have truly never admired anyone’s spirit more than I admire his. So why? Why would this happen? Why would this happen to my grandmas’ husband, my aunts and uncles’ father, my cousins and sibling’s and I’s grandpa, why? It seemed that many of us struggled with these thoughts. As parents had to leave their children to help out, parents lost sleep getting up in the night to care to his medical needs. This was definitely a stressful situation and brought us all to our knees. But at the same time my family had never been closer. Relationships always seemed skin deep but because of this they became so much more. We really took the time to appreciate one another and a whole new family dynamic was introduced. Everyone in my family learned to adapt and adjust to this new curveball. As a family, of about 50 people, we came together more often and spent more time with each other. But not just time, actual quality time where we learned to love each other as individuals. We learned to care for someone who absolutely couldn’t do anything for himself, he called all of us his angels, whether we cared for his needs or if we just came to visit and show our love. After a long five years of fighting with pneumonia and holes in his lungs my grandpa finally got to return home to our Heavenly Father and continue his journey as our angel.

People cope with the stresses of family crisis’s in many different ways. Some ways are more effective than others, and some are simply ineffective for long term healing. 

Denial, Lauer and Lauer state that “When denial is a temporary measure that enables family members to mobilize their resources, it is useful. When denial becomes a long-term pattern of ignoring the problem it is destructive.” 

Avoidance, Lauer and Lauer also say that “At the same time, like denial, avoidance is not always a dysfunctional way of coping. There may be times when avoidance is necessary in order to give the family time to mobilize their resources. If avoidance means long term refusal to deal with the problem, it can have the same disastrous results as denial.

To effectively cope with family stresses all parties involved must take responsibility, affirm your own and your families worth, balance self-concern with other-concern, learn the art of reframing, and find and use available resources. 

I’m grateful for the influence of the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life and the joy and hope it brings even in times of hardship. I hope to teach my children someday to faithfully put their trust in the Lord to help them through the troubles of this life.