Gaining Strength from Fellow Travelers

On Tuesday, I drove over to the east coast of Florida to interview Bryon and Susan Mondok for Her.meneutics. The Mondoks adopted their granddaughter Allie after she was abused by her father and diagnosed with Shaken Baby Syndrome. I first came across the Mondok’s story at the Phoenix Preacher blog in 2007 and have followed it ever since.

The primary reason I’ve done so is because the Mondok’s journey through suffering resonates with my own, even though the precipitating factors are entirely different. It was great to talk to fellow travelers, if only because their experience affirms my own responses to tragedy. I’ll save those reflections for CT.

Here I want to say that tragedy changes people, in ways both positive and negative. I wrote about this at Double X: I have infinitely more patience now for some people and issues and infinitely less for others. The Mondoks have gone through a similar transformation.

I liken our experience to that of our friend Brian Figaro. Brian was a handsome, charming soccer player until he was paralyzed in an ATV accident that Jeff witnessed. Brian spent many months in rehab and eventually recovered enough to marry and have a son. Although he later divorced and he died in his mid-thirties, Brian lived a full life. But nobody ever expected him to play soccer again. He was a quadriplegic. What constituted “the good life” for him meant something completely different from what it meant before his accident. What constitutes “the good life” for me and my family is completely different from what it was before all this tragedy befell us. I wish people would understand and accept this. I am exceedingly grateful when they do.