The Story Behind Helen's Stuffed Ribbit -ESOTROPIA

It's about time I share the story about Helen's Ribbit. Ribbit is the name she choose for her stuffed frog. She calls all frogs ribbit's even though she knows their proper name is frog.

It was the night before Helen's big day. The day of her eye surgery to correct the esotropia in both her eyes. Even though she already had her special stuffed animal, I wanted to get her a simple gift for the day of her surgery. Another stuffed animal. Or should I really say a stuffed amphibian frog in science terms? Helen had a thing for frogs then and still does to this day. Or should I say for ribbits.

Before the three of us left for Target to see what we could find, in hopes to find a stuffed ribbit, I said a prayer. At this moment I was alone in a room in our home. I often like to pray alone. I have been struggling with with many emotions about Helen's surgery coming up for sometime before hand. Now we were down to the night before.

As I sat in the room by myself praying I all of a sudden felt this overwhelming sense of ease. A sense that everything was going to be alright, I was going to be calm, Helen was going to be okay, Surgery was going to be successful, everything was going to go smoothly. At that very moment it felt like we had two guardian Angels watching over us. I all of a sudden broke down in tears from feeling at ease. Something I have not felt in months prior to Helen's surgery. I didn't open up to many people about my prayer and feeling at ease for a while after Helen's surgery.

Once I collected my tears, we were off to Target. The first thing I had on my mind was to get to the toy section and look for a stuffed ribbit. Lone behold there was right before my eyes one lovely perfect as can be stuffed ribbit. As if it were meant to be. As if our guardian Angels were telling us they were going to be with us every step of the process.

Ribbit was a major part of Helen's surgery day. Ribbit helped her get through so much. I still believe to this day it was all apart of her guardian Angels. And another reason why I am a believer in the power of prayer.

                 

The Power Of Prayer

Let me start off by saying I am a true believe in the power of prayer.

I was born and raised most of my life in a Christian Reformed church. Although I do believe it takes our own time to become a honest believer in God. I have always believed and still do that there is a haven and hell. I've always believed there is one God, I've always trusted in the Bible and so forth. It wasn't till I had my break through when I became pregnant at the age 18 and put all my faith and trust in our God. 

That's when I learned the power of prayer is real. It wasn't just something people would tell me to do so I would feel better about a situation. I finally realized others weren't saying "I'll pray for you" just to make themselves look like a better Christian. Even though I was an honest believer in God and attended church with my family as often as I could and volunteered in the nursery, I didn't pray as often as I should have.

I started off with little prayers here and there. It was amazing how I felt as a human being afterwards. I don't pray out loud or in front of people often. Maybe I should? I wouldn't even tell my own husband when I would pray about a certain situation when my prayer was answered. After a while I started to tell my husband about my prayers being answered. I didn't know whether he believed me or not; he is sometimes hard to read. 

Then it hit me. If you recall in a previous post about me writing that our dog ran away and we couldn't find him. We usually find him within 15 minutes in the park behind our home. This time was different, he escaped without his collar on. Night drew near and I was sobbing like a little girl who lost her dog. Yes I admit it. I felt lost and not sure which direction to take at this point to find him. The next morning we had my husband's Grandma's funeral, which we had to be there at 10AM. I felt doomed that I was not going to have time to find our dog again. So I went to bed knowing there was nothing I could do at that point but PRAY. I prayed and prayed and talked to God while my husband was sleeping next to me. He had no clue because I was praying in my head. 

The next morning I get a call from a strange number.  I answered the phone with a simple hello since it was 8AM. The lady on the other end then says, "We have your dog Porter at a local Veterinary clinic. He is fine. A client of ours found him and brought him in." my prayers was answered. 

Later that day while driving my husband had asked me if I prayed that we would somehow find Porter. I replied yes I did pray and continued to ask him why he was even asking me. Ha ha. He had no reason. I left it at that and just thought maybe he's starting to become a believer in the power of prayer.