Stories

The Calhoun’s Story

Our family was probably just like many you know or see at church. A beautiful girl, a handsome boy, and two loving parents. Had you seen us, you would have thought we were the All-American family. We did all the things we were supposed to do as “good parents”. We were involved in our children’s lives, attended all their events and activities, and were active in our local church. Despite our best efforts, our son began to make bad choices that directly effected his life and our family.

For us, it began with our son smoking marijuana at age 14. He had been a great kid, with a fabulous sister, two loving parents, growing up in a Christian home without tragedy or drama. That’s why the rebellion didn’t seem to make sense. First we thought, well, it’s just marijuana; it will pass. Plus, we caught it within the first couple of weeks, and early intervention is the key, so everything is under control.

However, despite encouragement, prayer, and punishment he continued his path of poor decision making. At age 15, he found his way to the family medicine cabinet. There was the phone call from the high school informing us that he was unconscious and was being transported by ambulance to the local hospital. The drug induced seizure prompted an outpatient drug rehab. We thought for sure that this was “the bottom”. Sadly, it was not.

Next, there was the funeral of a friend, lost at the hands of a “pharm party”. Our son wept as the coffin of his friend rolled past his seat. Surely, this would be “the bottom”.

With full sincerity, our 16 year old son swore to us, “I’m not going to do any more pills. All I’m ever going to do is smoke marijuana.” After much prayer and advice from his therapist we took him to an outdoor therapeutic program where he would receive hands on treatment for the next 12 months. During this time, our relationship and communication improved dramatically. He finished the program, completed his junior year in high school, and made straight A’s! We rejoiced over his achievements, and what the Lord had done!

Back home and over the course of the next few months, he began slipping into old habits with old friends. At age 17 he was arrested for possession of marijuana. When our son was 18, he moved out and continued “just smoking marijuana.”Our relationship and communication remained good for a while, but at age 19, our son began once again to withdraw. Something was different. Something wasn’t right. And we were exhausted, hurt, and confused by this five-year journey.

In our complete desperation, God lead us to a “Surviving a Prodigal” Bible study sponsored by Prodigal Child Ministries. During this time God begin to heal us, and prepare us for the rough road ahead. We learned that despite being a perfect father, God also had prodigals in Adam and Eve, who ignored His instruction the way our son had ignored ours. We learned that letting things go into His hands wasn’t giving up, but was an act of trust and faith. We learned that our trust needed to continue even if our prodigal never came home. We didn’t want to believe he would never come home, but God knows our end from the beginning. While we had been praying desperately for five years, our hope had been for the outcome we envisioned. It was here that we began to pray, “God, do whatever it takes to bring our son home to You!” We knew this was a dangerous prayer!

On October 19, 2010, we received the most terrible phone call any parent could ever receive. Our 19 year old son had died of an accidental drug overdose. Words cannot describe this moment or the wounds it has left behind.

Through many channels, God began to reveal that our son was in heaven! Through the crushing pain of it all, this was the ultimate desire of our hearts! Our son had been saved! Even in our heartbreak, God had not failed us. God had done “whatever it took” and answered our prayer, though not exactly in the way we had wanted. The question for us was, would we still trust God though the result wasn’t what we had envisioned?

Today, we continue to reach out to many prodigal children, some of whom were friends of our son. We are also involved in John and Fair’s Prodigal Child Ministries by routinely leading “Surviving a Prodigal” Bible studies in our home. This study provides some sanity for parents in crisis. God is using this as a tool to provide healing for our wounds as we reach out to these hurting parents. God is in the process of trading beauty for our ashes! We challenge you with the same question which we have been challenged. “Will you trust God despite the result?”

We would like to thank you Fair and John for their obedience to the Master’s call. It has blessed our life and many others.

It would not have been our choice for our story to have had this ending. However, God, in His wisdom and love, has allowed it to be so and we can truly say, “It is well with my soul.” His best efforts never fail.

The Brocard's Story

Why would we allow 2 strangers to come into your home in the middle of the night to remove your son from your home?

On May 12, 1998, my wife and I hired two strangers to remove our son from our home in the middle of the night to place him in a structured wilderness program in the mountains of Utah.

At the time, our son was 16 years old and in the 10th grade. He was totally out of control. He was using drugs (marijuana), was drinking alcohol, lying, stealing, and manipulating us (his parents). He was extremely disrespectful, used profanity aimed at us and angry all of the time.

He would verbally abuse us and cuss at me in front of my wife and challenge me to fights late at night. He tried to hurt me once by pushing him down his stairs. He would not accept responsibility for anything he did, as he would always blame us or someone else for all of his problems.

His constant outbursts of anger and rage scared his older sister and younger brother to the point they were afraid to be around him. His mood affected our whole household and our marriage. He had a new set of friends that used drugs and they wanted to party all of the time.

He didn’t appreciate anyone or anything we did for him; it was all about him. He was beginning to not only destroy himself, but also our family and our marriage. He was using our time and attention and he drained us of all our energy for our other children.

Our Family

At the time, we had been married 20 years and had a daughter who was 17 and a son who was 9 yrs. old. I was (and still am) an attorney and my wife was working full time for our church. Our struggling son was a boy scout and was a year round swimmer, and was very popular with his high school teachers and friends. He also attended church regularly. We appeared to be the all-American family.

The Impact of Our Son’s Actions on Our Marriage & Children

We seemed to have no time for our other children because our son demanded so much of our time. Our daughter was graduating from high school and we couldn’t really enjoy that special time with her. Our marriage began to suffer. My wife and I argued a lot and we were stressed and tired all of the time. We took this out on each other. We were too embarrassed to talk to anyone about this.

Tough Love

After months of counseling with a psychologist and much prayer we were advised to take our son out of our home and school to send him a long way from home to get help.

This was the most difficult decision we ever made in my entire life.

See, we loved our son so much, we were willing to do whatever we could to get him help. We had to “let Go, and Let God”

We learned he had an anger management problem and that he used drugs and alcohol to self medicate to take away his feelings of anger. While he was away in treatment, he learned how to positively deal with his anger and not to rely on drugs and alcohol to deal with his problems.

Our son went on to graduate from college, became a Young Life leader and then worked for a Transport agency and an Intervention group. He is now mentoring young men and teaching Special Education in our high school and coaching football and Lacrosse.

Good Families Can Have Children That Make Bad Decisions

What We Learned from All of This

1. We learned that there is Hope! We are all subject to pain and suffering, but God will never abandon us. He will get us through these tough times.
2. We learned that we couldn’t fix this problem ourselves –that we had to “Let go, and let God be in control” We didn’t cause it, We can’t control it, We can’t cure it!
3. We learned to love unconditionally – not only our son, but also other kids that are struggling
4. In the end, we all know that God is truly in control, and that He loves our children even more than we do!

After going through this painful experience, God changed us! We started a Bible study support group with 7 other couples and we learned that we could have JOY again in our lives and that there was that HOPE that is found in Jesus Christ.

In 2004, we started Prodigal Child Ministries, a non-profit organization, that reaches out to parents of struggling teens and young adults. We provide support groups and resources to help them in time of crisis.

Our life verse has become Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you a HOPE and a future.”