“My people will dwell in a peaceful habitation,
In secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.”

Isaiah 32:18

Yesterday, I shed tears of joy and praised our mighty God regarding the healing that has taken place in my son. His disposition is completely different and for the good!

I honestly used to dread when I heard him wake up in the morning or anytime I heard him coming for that matter. Why? Because the symptoms of autism (not my son) made it impossible to have a peaceful relationship and home.

I never knew what itty bitty molehill was going to become some mountain to him that would send him from okay to tearing through the house and tearing it up. Therefore, I spent my days walking on eggshells, with a knot of dread in the pit of my stomach not knowing what would happen from one moment to the next.

The symptoms of this disorder (which means chaos) often USED to express themselves as rage, aggression, head ramming, destruction, name calling, falsely blaming me for every single thing that went wrong in his life, etc. He was always mean and cruel to me, never smiled or laughed and used to have this empty, utterly vacant look in his eyes.

Some meltdowns, I kid you not, lasted over 24 hours in a row. I think the longest one was over 40 hours in a row. To say I felt like I would go mad is putting it mildly.

One meltdown left every wall in the house covered in black Sharpie marker and another with pen marks all over my bedroom wall, with deep grooves where he used it to repeatedly work his way into the drywall.

Sometimes that irrational rage (caused by brain inflammation amongst other things) turned on me. I still need healing from PTSD and acute startle response issues from everything I went through because of the traumatizing symptoms of autism that robs a child or young adult of the ability to properly reason and rationalize, etc. etc. By His stripes I was healed too (1 Peter 2:24).

Only Jesus kept me sane through it all – alone as a solo mom. His father abandoned him many years ago. My son is twenty now, by the way, so when he got aggressive, all the way up until 19 years old, it was no small thing.

Now, he’s a delight to be around – totally healed from the above mentioned symptoms of disorder and chaos.

My son is now kind, sweet, considerate, smiles, laughs, hugs me, tells me he loves me often, shows and expresses concern for me and my wellbeing, and even get jokes. (Before he was healed jokes and any expressions of my joy really ticked him off. It was awful).

His eyes are no longer vacant but bright and “smiley.” When a problem arises, we can now converse about it rationally, and I can easily explain to him why it’s not a mountain, I’m here to help, and it’s an easy solvable problem. And he stays calm.

Recently, a thunderstorm woke him up, and he stayed calm and reacted appropriately. In the past, that alone would have sent him into a house tearing up rage because he couldn’t stand being woken up.

On his own, he has said about himself, “I’m not like I used to be. I’m much better now. I used to be like a monster” – his words, not mine. I never referred to him as a monster as I knew the source of the behaviors that controlled his will and irrational responses that robbed him of his real self. Thank You, Jesus! He’s not 100% healed yet but is well on his way by Jesus’s stripes (1 Peter 2:24)!

The above, lead verse, Isaiah 32:18, is one I prayed and declared almost daily and over our home as well as from Proverbs 31, “My child rises up and calls me blessed.”

Glory to God alone! Who is worthy to be praised and receive all honor and blessing! Whose Word CANNOT return unto Him void.

Don’t give up on the Word and its promises for He is the Word! (John 1:1).