Just when you think your own life couldn't get much worse, you meet someone who has faced real problems and tragedy - the extent of which makes yours seem almost trivial.
That's what happened to me this past weekend at the Mississippi Federation of Business and Professional Women's meeting in Tunica.
What I thought were major problems in my life are just meaningless inconveniences compared to those of a guest speaker we had for one of our professional development workshops on Saturday.
Her story touched me in such a way that I wanted to share it with all of you.
Alyce Kemp DeWitt walked into our conference room at the Gold Strike nicely dressed in a skirt, white cotton blouse and a red jacket. She looked like the typical professional business woman, or so it appeared.
Alyce is employed by Bryan Psychiatric Hospital in Columbia, S.C., which made her more than qualified to discuss the topic of our workshop - getting your desserts out of being stressed.
"Stressed" spelled backwards is "desserts," she explained. I think I had heard that one before, but it was good to hear it again. It always makes me see stress in a different way.
Alyce pointed out that stress sometimes doesn't show up in our outward appearance, and she demonstrated this point in a unique way.
She asked if we thought she looked pretty well put together on the outside. We all nodded yes.
Alyce had on the typical business attire, or so we thought. After our response to her question, she pulled off the red jacket to show us her shirt had torn sleeves. She also removed her wraparound skirt to reveal a shredded one underneath.
It really made me stop and think that just because people smile and appear to be OK on the outside, they could have a broken heart or be filled with despair on the inside. I've always heard about people who hide their problems behind a smile.
As for me, I have always worn my emotions on my sleeve for the world to see. I think that sometimes makes it easier to deal with because I like to talk about what's bothering me.
As Alyce told us her story, I started to see her in a different light. It just goes to show you that you can't judge someone on their outward appearance.
Alyce is the former wife of a minister. After 30 years of marriage, she said her husband left her for a woman younger than their two children.
Ending a marriage can often be worse than death, she said, because there isn't that closure or peace you get when you lay a loved one to rest.
But that was just the tip of the iceberg for Alyce.
A few years after her divorce, her son, who had a 3-day-old baby girl, went out to buy diapers, but he never returned. Alyce's son was hit by a drunk driver, and 10 days later he died.
Although she misses her son terribly and thinks about him every day, Alyce said she got her desserts from the situation. If it had not been for her son, she would not have a beautiful 21-year-old granddaughter today. And she said she wouldn't go back and change the 21 years she spent with him for anything in the world.
But the tragedies didn't end there for Alyce.
After helping with a wedding a few years later, she was dropped off at her car by some friends. As her friends pulled away, she found two men standing in wait. They raped and beat her and left her in a ditch.
But Alyce survived. Now she talks with other women who have faced similar situations and tells them that they can get past this, and life does go on.
And if the loss of a husband and son and being raped weren't enough, Alyce lost every material thing she owned after marrying her second husband. She learned that he was an alcoholic and owed the IRS thousands of dollars in taxes after being hospitalized with dementia that was caused from the alcoholism. Since the couple filed a joint tax return, Alyce was responsible for paying back the money.
But through it all, Alyce said she has found the good in each situation and carried on with her life.
When she lost everything she owned except the house she lived in, Alyce's daughter and son-in-law bought the house from her and allowed her to live there. She had a nice apartment in the basement, she said. After living with them for several years, she was finally able to move out on her own. But the day she left, she said her daughter and son-in-law stood on the steps with tears in their eyes asking her not to leave. "Can you imagine a son-in-law crying over his mother-in-law moving out?" she laughed. At that moment she found her dessert from that situation.
As she told incident after incident, I cried, as did all the other women in the room.
I'm not sure how well I would have fared if it had been me in her place. I too might be associated with a mental facility, but I wouldn't be there as an employee. I probably would be in a padded room if all that had happened to me.
But I've always heard that God doesn't put on us more than we can handle.
She used the analogy of the storms and the rainbow to demonstrate her point. While the storms may blow for a time, at the end come the rainbows that give us hope of a brighter tomorrow.
I plan to take the things Alyce shared to heart.
The next time I face what I call a problem, I will think of Alyce and realize just how blessed I truly am. And when a big problem does come my way, I hope I will stop and ask God to show me the desserts of my stressed situation. I hope you will do the same.
