My guest today author Leslie J Sherrod tells a story of an amazing woman, her mother. Leslie is also offering a book for a drawing here. Please leave a comment to enter the drawing. Here’s Leslie:

“I was eleven years old

when my father was diagnosed with sarcoidosis. Prior to his diagnosis, severe fatigue and drastic coughing spells had left him weak, bedridden. The doctors tossed around words like pneumonia, tuberculosis, even lung cancer, until tests exposed the true culprit attacking his lungs: the systemic inflammatory disease of sarcoidosis.

Some people with sarcoidosis improve spontaneously, but a small number have a continuing, life-altering relationship with it. My father is in that number.  Over twenty-five years have passed since that initial diagnosis, and the decades have been filled with constant medical appointments, invasive tests, countless hospitalizations, and additional disabling chronic conditions that now have him confined to a wheelchair and the hospital bed set up in his living room.

And in the midst of all of this is my mother.

A quiet woman with busy hands, my mother has been a constant caretaker. When that diagnosis first entered our family in the late 1980s, my mother was working as a nurse on the night shift. With an ill husband and two daughters to raise in Baltimore City, she continued working while caring for him, nurturing my sister and I, and also tending to her father who had Alzheimer’s, and her mother who had a stroke.

I do not know when my mother slept,

and now that I am an adult with a family of my own, I do not know how she balanced it all. Resources were always limited. Sometimes the electricity was off and the food and clothes we had were donated. But she managed. And to this day, now unable to work but still required to serve, I haven’t heard her complain. She shares silly jokes and plays goofy games with her grandchildren, and few would know the trauma, the trials she’s endured, is enduring.

Her faith in Christ a foundation,

my mother’s compassion and care for others extends beyond her previous nursing duties and ongoing family obligations. She looks for ways to help others, even strangers, while facing her own challenges. I remember as a teen, a young woman with sad eyes, alone and pregnant, happened to sit next to us at church. My mother asked for her name, took down her address, and a few days later we drove to the young woman’s house with bags full of baby supplies. There are many such stories that reveal my mom’s faith and character in action.

To purchase, click here. Without Faith: Book Two of the Sienna St. James Series

My current series’ protagonist, Sienna St. James,

a social worker like me, is a woman who faces private pain while working for the public good. Her marriage is in disrepair and the mysteries on her caseload keep her hands full. However, the lessons Sienna learns about faith and hope, sacrifice and joy, are ones I’ve witnessed firsthand through the life and continuing legacies of my mother.

You can learn more about me and my novels Like Sheep Gone Astray, Secret Place, Losing Hope, Without Faith, and the upcoming Sacrifices of Joy on my website, www.LeslieJSherrod.com“–Leslie

Facebook: Leslie J. Sherrod
Twitter: @LeslieJSherrod

Thanks, Leslie. I’m so glad you had a godly mother who lived her faith. Too many times I’ve seen spouses abandon their husband or wife because of a life-threatening or life-altering illness. QUESTION: Was there ever a time in your life when you thought you had been pushed to your limits but pushed on anyway? Please share to be entered into the drawing for Leslie’s book!–Lyn