St. Peter’s Keys
Key #1
He will sustain me in the trials of my life.
Key #2
He will be there in spite of my decisions that I make without Him.
Key #3
Listen within your soul what the Spirit Sees.
Key #4
Our Lord is the way to forgiveness
Key #5
Worship the Lord with love and joy of heart.
II Corinthians 4:5
For we preach not ourselves, but Christ
Jesus, the Lord; and ourselves your servants for
Jesus’ sake.
St. Peter’s Keys
Introduction
The beauty of Our Lord takes my breath away. His Love is to be cherished within the heart of the believer and to be lifted up and set free whenever doubts arise in our thoughts.
There is no difference – He is the same today as yesterday – the same tomorrow as forever. Our soul does join and does hold fast to His Portrait of Love. All remains the same from within – there is no difference.
My God, My King – how I love Your Words, for You Lord are so great. Heal me, Lord, thru the lonely days, for I know You hear me and comfort me. Deep are Your Words – never to turn me away when I cry out. For what is in me is Your Blessing to others. Oh, my soul renewed is in Your Grace and let Your Drawing Near surround me in the power of Your Love.
I seek Your Face, Oh God. A passion to live in Yor Presence, Oh Jesus😊
Chapter One
I remember having mental illness as far back as the age of about three. When able to tell my mother of my psychotic episodes, usually as they were happening at the time, her reactions to them were quite violent towards me. Which she had later said, after I had questioned her about why she had hit me during that time, she had said, “I didn’t want you turning out like your dad (who also had mental illness) and I thought doing that would stop you from doing this.” Not able to understand, at that age, the connection between the hurt she caused me and telling her about what I was seeing and hearing, I continued to tell her until the episodes subsided. This was, to my guess, before the age of four.
Relating to my psychotic episodes as far as remembering, consisted of seeing a skull appearing on a turned off tv screen. This skull would move its mouth up and down saying, ‘Janet, I am your mother.’ ‘Janet, your mother is dead.’ This happened quite a few times and only upset me because I wanted to watch tv but didn’t know how to turn the set on because I couldn’t reach the knob to try. And I thought that would be nice for my mother to be dead because she was hurting me. Another time a lady was in a commercial, selling something, and she was in a long white robe with a wreath of flowers in her short hair saying she was an heavenly angel sent to protect me. But, of course, she never did. All this was in black and white before tv was in color. In fact, I dreamed in black and white until colored tv happened.
There was also a time, my sister Elaine, who is two years older than me, I thought was the devil himself. Which I told my mom and after my mother did a barrage of hits and slaps, there was my sister smiling at me and telling me everything was fine and not to worry that she would take care of me. And me being scared to death of my sister, with me thinking she was ‘Thee Devil.’ I have a picture of her and I together during that episode.
Another time, I was in our backyard and I was standing by some Iris’s. An evil angel who said he was Satan was talking to me. I was muttering things back to him and we were actually having a conversation. I remember my Nana going in and out of the back door and she wanted to take my picture but I was ignoring her. In fact, I was scared of her but couldn’t move. If I ran, I would be chased. Every time she went in the house, my mom was yelling from inside for me to ‘stop it’ or ‘You’ll know what will happen.’ I eventually ‘posed’ for my Nana after Satan left with his verbal threats of death to me and for all the world. I have the picture that was taken during that time.
Ephesians 1:5
To guide, under His Care, the
Adoption of children by Jesus Christ
To Himself, according to the good pleasure
Of His Will.
Key #1
He will sustain me in the trials of my life.
Chapter Two
I wasn’t allowed to climb the trees out in the woods behind our house. So, the time when I was four years old and climbing a big Elm, I was pretty happy climbing one because I was getting away with it.
Here I am sitting on the limb of this huge tree, talking to Charlie who was sitting down below, when I turned to my right and there sat a little boy about my age. He said, ‘Hi’ to me and told me his name. He told me, ‘Don’t have the first one.’ And, ‘I’ll be the only boy, I love you.’ And when I asked him his name again, he said, ‘You will know me when you name me.’
Then I woke up lying on the ground with dirt and dried leaves in my mouth and on my clothes and face. I felt like the wind was forced out of me and Charlie was still sitting there looking over at me. I stood up and wiped myself off feeling like my insides were pressed together and when I breathed my chest and stomach hurt. I sat down next to Charlie and he was real quiet while I was struggling to breathe. When I finally felt better and wasn’t hurting anymore, I asked Charlie if he saw that little boy that I was talking to up in that tree. Charlie said, ‘No, I didn’t.’
Then we talked about other things but I was still puzzled by Charlie not seeing that little boy. I finally got up and went home and told my mom what happened leaving out the part about climbing the tree of course. My mom did a twenty-question inquiry and then she said she couldn’t figure it out either. Her expression was worry and concern but she didn’t do anything but said that I had to figure it out for myself.
So, I took a walk down to the dead-end street and sat on the curb and thought of that little boy and what his name could have been. When I couldn’t figure it out, I thought of my little girl I was going to have and how I was going to name her Valerie and that made me happy. Then I saw my sister Elaine’s face, and it was evil, and she said, ‘You are not having a little girl named Valerie.’ But I was still happy because I knew I was. So, I got up and walked home thinking it would be dinner soon.
Many years later, my son Mark had his Kindergarten pictures taken and I received those photos, I saw that same little boy that was sitting next to me in that Elm tree.
Revelation 6:12
And behold when he had opened the sixth
Seal, and lo, there was a great earthquake; and
The sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and
The moon became as blood;
Key #2
He will be there in spite of my decisions that I make without Him.
Chapter Three
Thirteen years of age found me watching tv and seeing a cartoon program with the characters’ expressions and words fitting a scenario in my mind. After a couple of Saturday mornings of this happening, I stopped watching those Saturday cartoons. I thought it was crazy what I was going through and I didn’t relate this with any previous experiences when I was younger.
A week later I was watching tv during the week and I was wondering where my favorite actor, Gregory Peck, was because it had been years since I last seen and heard of him. Then, all of a sudden, during a car commercial, ole Greg showed up, talking about these cars that were for sale. His expressions and the words in my mind said, ‘Here I am, Janet.’ This was quite a shock to me. So, I turned off the tv set and stopped watching television for quite some time after that. I never shared this with anyone.
St. John 12:50
“And I know that His Commandment is life
Everlasting: Whatsoever I speak therefore,
Even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.
Key #3
Listen within your soul what The Spirit Sees.
Chapter Four
I believe within some degree that I have autism. I believe within some degree my daughter is autistic. Autism runs in my family; my second cousin Jeanine has it. Along with the fact, her mother tried to abort her with a knitting needle, which made Jeanine blind, deaf, and dumb. When Jeanine was born, her mother institutionalized her.
Therefore, when I saw a magazine at the store on how clinics were treating autism, a bought it, thinking I would be able to help my daughter, what was described in this article were exercises that were administered to autistic children to help them along with reality. Like yelling, a helmet that was worn over the head with different volumes of white noise, and different degrees of spankings. Each was tried and was proven to get the autistic child to learn and accomplish different tasks. So, I thought I would try it on my daughter, who was withdrawn and quite contrary with everything. (Little did I realize it at the time that she was withdrawn and contrary much more than usual because of my divorce from her dad. Her lack of learning and social skills were magnified as well because of the divorce. I just didn’t see it. I did my best to be in tune with her) I wasn’t thinking.
After trying a few days of trying different things, like yelling and spankings, I called my sister Peggy and was telling her about what I was doing and how it wasn’t working and I thought I should keep trying. My sister said, ‘What if you are not supposed to be doing this? What if you stop now, it would be more of a help to her? It sounds like it isn’t working.’ Two days after that I stopped. I just began to accept my daughter, but I was concerned about her social skills with other children. So, when she was four, I enrolled her in a Little Peoples Play Group our community had started.
Well, as it turned out, after a few months, my daughter told me a teacher had touched her. I did everything I should have done during that time. I took her to the hospital and had her examined, which was found an abrasion on her. The doctor said it was probably from riding a tricycle, which I told the doctor that my daughter didn’t have the motor skills yet to pedal a tricycle.
When I got home that day, I reported the abuse to the police and they sent me an officer that my daughter refused to talk to. The officer and I figured because she never had any contact with a black person before which was the reason, she was so shy. After the officer left, my husband was told about what happened. Well, he got angry and yelled and said it never happened. My daughter’s dad didn’t believe it either. (To this day both of them still don’t believe it had happened. My ex. told me that Mark, my six-year-old son, told him it never happened.)
The next day, I took my daughter to the police station and waited outside for hours while the male and female detectives questioned her. Apparently, according to them, this teacher had also spanked her. Well, these detectives confronted this teacher and took her in for a lie detector test, which she passed, so the District Attorney dropped the case.
I took my daughter for three months to Catholic Charities for therapy and I went to a women’s therapist once a week for about a month. With all of this, no support from my husband, him saying, ‘It didn’t happen’ and ‘You’re wasting your time.’ With all the turmoil that I was going through I stopped going and my daughter’s therapist said she couldn’t do anymore. And that when my daughter got older, I would probably have to bring her in again. Which I did when she was older and needed to go in again.
I was able, for about a month, to keep my mind off my problems, with this guy who would call me. Little did I realize he was ‘working’ me and bilked me out of some money. Then I started proceedings against my husband and on October 31st of 1987 I had my first breakdown.
I Thessalonians 4:9
But as touching brotherly love ye need not
That I write unto you: for ye yourselves are
Taught of God to love one another.
Key #4
Our Lord is the way to forgiveness.
Chapter Five
All four of my breakdowns, which I had within three years, were confusing and humbling. All the expressions and words from the tv, music, and other people that fit the scenarios in my mind were so, that it was, very normal to me. It appeared, with all that happened; my reality was not really reality.
Let’s face it, I can’t go shopping at the nearest store and get a ‘new’ brain. *I am, but alas, stuck with me. Desperation and hopelessness rule my life when it comes to my shortcomings as a person, wife, and mother. I feel so useless emotionally and mentally. And that is how I feel the majority of the time.
What lifts my spirits though, are the people that God has put in my path. My husband, my children, my mother, and my siblings are my friends. Anyone else, so far, are just acquaintances.
My one regret is at one time I remember hitting my daughter on the back when I thought she was ‘talking’ to me and giving me ‘signals’. Later on, when she did it again, I turned around and walked away from her. Letting God Deal with her.
I’ll always remember the day that my husband told me I had to stay on my medicine. Which I thought was the bravest thing. His research from books at the library made him realize that I couldn’t do this on my own. His love for me kept me together during these hard times of my life. I owe my survival to Our Lord for choosing my husband for me because he and I grew together out of friendship.
Acts 15:18
KNOWN UNTO GOD ARE ALL HIS WORKS FROM
THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD.
Key #5
Worship the Lord with love and joy of heart.
*Quote from A Beautiful Mind