My Breaking Point God's Turning Point

By Ricky Texada

This book was given to me by Bethany House for the purpose of reading and writing a review on it.

These days I find myself drawn to books that talk about grief and healing and tough times.  This is a book that talks about the loss of Ricky's wife in a car accident, his subsequent remarriage and then the loss of at least one child through miscarriage.

Ricky had a lot of good points in this book, but I'll be honest.  There were parts that left me disillusioned and maybe that is to my shame.  While I believe he really did grieve deeply the loss of his wife, he describes his experience as though it was just a big drawing closer to God time in his life. As I read it, immediately upon hearing that his wife had died, he chooses to draw closer to God, he asks God to not be silent and he prays that Debra's death is not in vain.  I am not doubting his sincerity in all of this, but I just wonder where was the anger, the grief, the "whys", the tears?  And I think he does allude to those things a bit in his story.  I also have to realize everyone processes things differently; for me I found myself almost unable to pray and to seek God and feeling God carrying me along through the prayers and support of His people around me.

Another thing he said that really puzzles me is this: "I'm no longer grieving, though I miss Debra terribly."  This was written about 6 months after she died.  Again, this is something I cannot really fathom.  How do you decide when you are done grieving?  Grief for me is sporadic--I expect to grieve Nicole the rest of my life--not as intensely as I did at the beginning, but I will always miss her. Is grief and missing someone two different things?  Am I trying to make mountains out of molehills and it really isn't a big deal?  I don't know--I just remember reading that and going, "Whoa, who decides this?"

Otherwise though, it was a great book.  One of the things that I really needed to hear, but didn't necessarily like was the encouragement to reach out through community to help those around me.  It has been difficult for me to reach out in the last 7 months--I tend to close in on myself, but I do think there is benefit to be gained in reaching out and allowing our hurts to strengthen us and in turn strengthening and encouraging others.

So that is my take on the book--I would recommend it as a good book.  It had a lot of good things to be learned, but remember that everyone has a different journey, a different perspective, a different way of grieving and processing.  I do feel I could use the challenge to draw more closely to God through my grief rather than using it as a road block to growing my spiritual life.