About my friend Mel

About my friend Mel

It's interesting how God uses you in a situation and at the same time blows you away with his AWESOMENESS!!!! Yesterday I called my childhood friend Melissa as I promised I would after texting her on Friday. I was just checking in on her since about a month she shared with me that she is an alcoholic and had been hiding it from her husband for about the majority of their marriage of 11 years. Alcoholism is very evident in my family since I have witnessed first hand the destructive affects of my mom's younger sister who has been struggling with it for about 30 years. It will rip a famliy's core as it has done with mine, but THANK GOD for His GRACE and LOVE, because if I didn't have it I would have written her off a long time ago. So, back to Mel...her husband gave her an ultimatum to get her act together or she would be out and he would take the kids. He had enough of her crazy shenanagians and wasn't going to put up with it anymore. She had made some strides and right after stopped drinking and began going to AA meetings. I was optimistic for her, she would text me her progress so things were coming along. As someone within the mental health field I strongly encouraged her to seek out psychological intervention since she is suffering from depression and due to financial constraints she had to stop therapy and medication. There is some much crap that she has be dealt in her life that she hasn't really dealt with it and now it just surfaced all at once.

About 3 weeks ago I was talking to her and asked about how the AA meeting were going and she said she stopped going because and I quote "I don't think I believe in God and that is primarily what the 12 steps are focused on a 'higher power or God'" Ultressa's response was hmmmm.....I listened to her and than the Holy Spirit did his thing. I told her that her existence right now is because of GOD, her waking up, taking another breath, being with her kids and the love she has for her children is because of GOD. Now, y'all who know me I was about to get my purple choir robe with yellow tassles on and have a lil' church with her, but I know the words that were coming out of my mouth where guided by the Lord with LOVE and TRUTH. She use to be a follower of Christ when we were younger, but again life hit her hard and she has been through a lot, but she stopped believing in the saving grace of the Lord. She also said "I don't think I ever believed in God." That's when the purple choir robe was about to come out friends. She was apprehensive with telling me this because she KNOWS I'm a Christ follower and she thought that it would offend me. Ummm.... no, I told her that she is trying to figure out what she believes and it's not going to change for me, I'm loving Jesus and living a life for Him. I not going to change how I talk to her and I'm going to share God with her. You better PRAISE HIM!!!!


Ok, so back to yesterday, I called her and when she answered the phone I knew sometime was wrong. I asked how she was doing and she told me not good. She continued to share that she had falling back into drinking on Friday and she called her husband at work to let him know and he basically flipped out on her. When it happened the last time she wanted to end her life and we have been through this before when I was in my senior year at Syracuse she attempted to take her life. That rocked my world and I knew once the Lord brought her back into my life that I need to help, and encourage her. I asked her what happened on Friday that she wanted to go to the liquor store and get alcohol, what was the trigger for her to fall off the wagon. She said "Nothing, and that she was having a really good day." WHAT?!?!?!? In my mind are you serious?!?!?!?!? That's the world of an alcoholic, my friends. So, I continued to talk to her and tell her that today was the day that she NEEDED to make a change and get some serious help. As I was talking to her Todd's messages on Suicide and Alcohol Consumption came to mind and I remembered he gave a few numbers for those who needed help to call. Since she lives in Quincy, MA I was looking online for places. She kept saying I don't know where to get help, but best believe y'all I was on a mission at 9:30am to get my friend some type of help! In TRUTH and LOVE I basically told her that this is the breaking point that she needed to get the help. She needed to make the first steps to begin recovery and healing for herself. When she gets to those crappy place of self-loathing she has said that she has suicidial thoughts, I wasn't having her go there. I also told her that even though it is going to be extremely difficult she is not alone and I'm there with her through this. She finally found a crisis number to call and I told her to call me back after she talked with someone. Before she called back I knew that I need people to be lifting her up in prayer so I was on gchat and sent Keri a message, called Ronnie and texted Lo to PRAY. Ronnie prayed with me on the phone and while she was lifting Mel and myself up I began to cry. I'm an emotional person, but I wasn't excepting that to happen. I believe I was crying because Mel was looking and living life with hopelessness. The pain she was experiencing I had taken on and it hit me hard. Carrying each others burdens y'all and it was so apparent for me yesterday.

She called back and said the person told her to go to the ER and then she would be admitted to the psychiatric unit. PRAISE THE LORD!!!!! Someone else confirming she needed serious help! She is finally going to get the help that she needs. I was all done asking her what she is going to do, it was game time, I was telling her. This is life and death. Mel is the type of person to not initiate and just sit while life goes by, not yesterday and not on my watch! So, I told her to call her mom in NY and let her know what was going on, she was hesitant with doing that, but it was as if she needed to take baby sides with each call to family member and she required so much encouragement to do it. She was throwing out ridiculous excuses of not going: "I don't want to miss work, or my mom is coming to visit" I wish I could reach my hand through this phone and smack some Holy Spirit sense into her. She stopped after I continued to reiterate that she needed to get help and start taking care of herself. So this was about 1 1/2 hours. She text be back and said that her husband was angry and she would call me soon. I text her back and said" Get to the ER!!!!!!! He'll get over being angry!" Yup, it was life or death in my mind and I wasn't going to have her get deterred from getting to that hospital. I said to Courtney in between calls from Mel that if I lived up MA it wouldn't matter where I was in that state I would drive up there and take her to the hospital myself!

So friends, with all the calls, text messages I'm just waiting to find out what happened. If she actually made it to the hospital or not. I called and left a message on her cell yesterday afternoon and I haven't heard anything back. She could very well be at hospital and not have access to her cell phone or she didn't go and is avoiding me. ONLY GOD KNOWS!!!!!! Please pray for MELISSA QUINN!!!! Pray for her heart that she will allow the LORD back into her life and to heal her heart and body from the cancer of alcoholism. Pray for me that I continue to love her no matter what her decision and choices are and to be a light! Thanks!