Hope: Confident Trust in the Person & Promises of God.

Welcome to MarthaGrimmBrady.com

We're all about hope, particularly for older women.

I'm Martha Grimm Brady. I have introduced myself on the About page. But briefly I'll let you know here that I've been a wife to Ron for 57 years (1968) and am now his caregiver as the side effects of his four strokes have kicked in and resulted in some vascular dementia and more recently, swallowing issues.

He is a retired pastor. We served in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, where we met in 1965, married in 1968; Mandeville, Jamaica, where he taught at Jamaica Bible College for 7 years and where our children were born; Miami, FL, where we served in 3 different churches; Tyler, TX, where we served 16 years and lived about 25 years; and Hanna City, IL, where we served after Ron retired the first time.

I am a retired RN and mom of 3 daughters and 7 grandchildren. We actually had 2 boys in the mix of grands. They are ages 14-23 now.

Logo made in Canva

My recent history of Caregiving.

The last 5 years I worked were in neuro rehab. In 2015, 2 years after we both retired and moved to Huntsville, AL, to be closer to one of our kids, Ron had his first, and worst stroke. Over the next few years, he had 4 strokes all together before we found out:

1. He was one of those people that plavix didn't work on.

2. They found the blood thinner that did work on him.

Then, he didn't have another stroke! But by then, the damage was done.

It has been a roller coaster of emotions over the past 10+ years and I have written quite a bit about it on this blog. I'm gradually moving over the more helpful posts. This past Spring, his swallowing has gotten much worse and he is now on a pureed diet. Sadly, it gets very boring over time. Of course, he has lost weight too. He falls more and more. Things keep going downhill on this side of heaven.

The thing about caregiving is this: it is never neat and tidy. Plan on it. It just isn't. You have too many hats to wear. You are caring for your husband/wife, parent, whoever. You carry baggage with that relationship. That part of it tends to be more emotional.

Then you have the caregiving to manage in the middle of it. That is often more physical.

The spiritual part is confident trust in God and His promises or Hope

The spiritual part is when either or both tanks start to run on empty. Depending on the demands of your relationship and caregiving, that can happen rather quickly. It all depends. It also depends on how many other demands you have on your time and emotions, you know, like a job, family, financial stress... things like that.

That's when you need hope. You need to confidently trust in God to carry you through your times of weakness--both emotionally and physically. How does He do it? It is often through other people but some of it is through your thinking. Details are in coming posts.

In Closing

Over the past 10+ years, I have learned a lot about who God is and what His promises are. I have also learned a lot about how much I need to learn. I'll share with you some of what I have learned in the coming posts.

What have you learned about God? What promises have you learned from His Word as you have aged or been through hard times? Share in the comments.