Allison – Looking for my happy to follow!

Allison, Blog, Dustin, Lessons from God, Trauma

Yelling

Posted on June 5, 2022 by Leah

I saw this on Twitter today & I had to save this to an image. I needed to see this. 84 likes so far. I don’t like yelling & talking loud. This is what my anger from my grief has done to me. I’m praying for healing. I do also plan on going back to my first GriefShare group I attended in February 2015. I’m also talking to a few close friends that are helping me.

Allison, Blog, Trauma

Being tormented in The Valley of the Shadow of Death

Posted on September 28, 2021September 28, 2021 by Leah

I recently heard this song for the first time when I was working graveyard at 3am, alone in the aisle stocking the baby food and tears fell down my face. This is just like Allie Leigh Gledhill. I know at 25 she thought she had time to get herself together. I prayed with my daughter when she prayed to Jesus for forgiveness & salvation. I know she believed Jesus was God but she got herself bound up in chains messing with a drug that opens herself up to the demonic. The devil has tormented me with the false teaching of you can lose your salvation, putting images in my mind that my daughter is in Hell. This has been The Valley of the Shadow of Death with me. I HATE RELIGION!! It has tortured me!! God gave me Allison, I prayed to get pregnant with her! I had to have an operation to get pregnant with her. I taught her who Jesus was constantly & when she understood she prayed with me and got saved & baptized also. Surely my God would not give me Allison & then put her in Hell!! And if this is true it makes me struggle with why God would do that to me!!! I can’t read the Bible: I just can’t. I know what it says. I believe Jesus was God in the flesh & I never understood that you could lose this gift! We still sin, but we also pay the consequences. Once saved always saved is the truth or how can you believe in a God that strikes you when you get bound up? My daughter was bound up & also my wild child and she died a prodigal. Like Toby says there’s only one reason his wild child prodigal son is in Heaven… Listen to what he says in the introduction of his video 🦋🦋🦋 When I can hear God’s voice and believe it’s Him I believe He’s telling me she was never going to get it together, she was too bound & He took her out of the clutches of the demons and snatched her to Heaven. She was in jail 6 weeks before her 4wheeler accident. I believe in my heart that with all I taught her about Jesus she was crying out to Him. I believe it. But when she got out of jail she went to the old playground. God saved her. He had to take her to save her from the chains of the drug she was so drawn to. The devil has tortured me & I’m done fighting these thoughts. My daughter is with Jesus! My God would not allow me to keep being tortured. But God allowed the devil to make the consequences of my sin painful enough to teach me lessons that cause repentance while my salvation is secure, He never leaves us! God is holding Allison while I’m holding her in my heart ❤️ #NotinVain

Allison, Blog, Dustin, Trauma

So Great A Pain

Posted on November 25, 2018July 21, 2021 by Leah

I’ve missed Allie Leigh G and Dustin. Missed their dad, remembering our holiday’s past. Realized in Dustin’s short life of 4 months he was never with us on a holiday. Dustin & his father having their first thanksgiving together was in my thoughts. But yeah, for real, being a bereaved mother is tough & I sense that God is helping me get stronger. Dustin has been gone 29 years & Allison almost 2 years & you never stop hurting. The pain is in the middle of my heart and mixed in with all the joy of living. I have my moments. ❤️🦋🦋🦋

https://www.facebook.com/182400808462546/posts/1920593137976629/

Allison, Butch, Dustin, Trauma

Losing Butch…Father of Dustin and Allison.

Posted on November 24, 2018July 21, 2021 by Leah

I’ve been grieving and maybe this will help:

I want to tell you about the Butch Gledhill I knew. I met him in Orlando, Fl June of 1985, I was 24 & he was 26. His longtime time friend Critter dated my roommate Charlotte. It took a month of Butch pursing me & not taking no for an answer for me to take the time and sit down and talk to him as a #friend. Also, our roommates wouldn’t let up either. The first night I talked with him he intrigued me with his intelligence. We were able to have deep conversation. Then he was as cute as can be. Then we all started hanging out at his house with the parties. Oh my goodness, so much fun for me because I love people. I noticed Butch did too. We went to concerts together & I liked concerts. His friends were close and really cared. His brothers & dad (with stepmom everyone loved, miss Peggy) was there working out of town too. I liked them and we were all happy. Like a when “America was great” time. I was a bank teller with a 3 year old daughter when we met. He was not scared. He treated her right & respectfully. Butch was a Patriot and he loved America. He was a full blooded southern man. I only “endured” roll tide and laughed at him when he got on the floor during the football game after Thanksgiving with all the family. He was jolly and happy. Everyone loved Butch.

I was a Christian and he wasn’t. I wouldn’t marry him until he was. A year later in August 1986 we went to church together and he went to the altar and prayed. I watched him. We talked about Jesus a lot while dating. Butch knew the Gospel. We married December 1986 after moving to Georgia September 1986.

We went to church together & prayed together. He really never studied the bible with me but that was ok. He worked everyday and drove 45 miles to Savannah to make more money. I got to be a stay at home mom. Looking back at 57 years old with my children grown, that was the best gift a momma could ever want. The blessing of raising your children until Kindergarten. This will be my best memory with Butch. That was the best gift he gave me. Everyone in Georgia in our community and our church family (Baptist) loved Butch also. His personality was contagious. He was a fisherman, hunter and I was one of the hunting widows with the women in our circle. I learned how to have a garden and de-head shrimp, can & make homemade bread. Butch & I learned from the ones older than us like the Bible says to do. We had cookouts with our neighbors and church friends. We did truly love each other……..

Then we had Dustin April 1989. Then we lost him August 1989.

I cannot tell you what that did to my family, my church and neighbors and to us. It was a hurricane and I became homeless in my soul. I will honor Butch and just leave it as our marriage was destroyed by this & my surviving children. Now one of them, Allie, we lost too. Oh my soul.

Now Butch is gone. When Allison died it’s like I went back to the day Dustin died and I’m starting all over again. Then Butch dies and I go back to 1985 and I’m there. These are the only deaths I have suffered in my life. And he’s with our babies. I will always remember Butch since they are together as a family now, I can’t think of them without their dad with them. My grief is different now and I can’t explain it. I was somebody in his life. I know he’s talked bad about me through the years after our divorce. Of course, isn’t that how divorce stories go? But we lost a baby in our story and no one can touch our sacred bond unless they are a bereaved parent too. He’s in heaven with our children and I will never forget him. I felt his apology, remorse & regret because I knew he was standing before God. He repented for what he did to me in our divorce. I felt it strong all the way with me to the funeral. He had a lot of regret and remorse. I had to accept the fact I got it in death and that’s not how I wanted it. I wanted more holidays with him and Paige and our grandchildren. He was the leader. He was the man. I wish he didn’t have to go.