This month we are in Honduras on the gorgeous island of Roatan. It is absolutely stunning surrounded by clear blue water, and the people are incredibly friendly and loving. We are living in a medical clinic, and some of the girls are working there as well. Others of our team are working at the Kingdom Bilingual Education Center which is a school Pre-k through 12th grade.
The first day of school was a little hectic, kids were running around screaming, packed into a small school, and it was very hot. Brittany, a teacher at the school, had driven us to school and was assigning us classes as she showed us around the school. When we arrived at one of the two first grade classrooms her eyes set on me and I volunteered.
The kids were super cute and immediately after being introduced responded in a monotone unison, “Good morning Miss Kathleen, it’s nice to see you, how are you doing today?” Little did I know that the extreme cuteness would transition into mayhem in all of 15 minutes.
I began walking around, helping the kids with their workbooks, and helping the teacher keep them on track. As I walked around, I quickly noticed certain kids who within every 2 minutes or so would slip out of their seat and wander around, or would say, “teacher, teacher” and wave me over. I noticed a few of them were just leaving everything blank, and when I asked them questions or tried to help they looked at me with wide, inquisitive eyes. The range of learning was so wide, one of the kids was reading and spelling full words, and another didn’t know what the letter B was.
There is a certain part of my life that I have slowly been realizing on the race is actually a huge part of my testimony, having a great deal to do with why I am the person today. But before the race, it wasn’t a part of my testimony, because I had just perceived it as adversity, and then a victory. Most people in my life know that I struggled pretty badly with ADHD when I was a kid. However, I haven’t truly revisited the actual memories of what was probably the first half of my life in a long time—at least I didn’t acknowledge what role it has played in my formation as a person and my perception of God.
When I was in first grade, I remember sitting in class completely confused about what the teacher was saying. I remember looking at the other kids who seemed to get it all so quickly, and being jealous and feeling very very different from them. I couldn’t sit still or focus on one thing for more than a few minutes at a time. I remember my teacher would constantly send me in the hallway, at least once a day, for distracting the class. I was also told to sit on my hands, and even called stupid by my classmates. I couldn’t read, or count, or listen, or even learn to tie my shoes like the other kids did. I don’t think that I would have known how to verbalize these feelings then, but I remember wondering if God had made me wrong, if he had possibly made me defective or perhaps even forgot a few things.
I was so frustrated with myself, and in a constant state of catch up. Once I caught up, they were all learning something new. Eventually, my parents took me to get tested, and after some confusing questions and being super self-concious about being observed, I was prescribed heavy medication. I quickly realized that it made me feel very unlike myself, it made me not hungry at all, and I was barely geting a few hours of sleep a night. So within a few years of taking the medication I started hiding it and not taking it. Eventually, my parents asked me about it and I confessed that I hated it. They agreed to let me ween myself off of it.
It was very very difficult at first, it seemed to me like I had to spend double the time working on a problem, I had to read things three times through, and I had to train myself to sit still for extended periods of time through doing jigsaw puzzles. But eventually, when I reached about 8th grade, I wasn’t behind, I was excelling in school and I developed a thirst for more knowledge, it was as if now that I could learn I wanted to learn it all.
Nevertheless, I don’t know if it was because of the two students who reminded me of myself, but after the first day at KBEC I did not want to go back to school. I was deeply troubled and actually finding a lot of blame with the teachers. Thinking things like, they’re letting these kids pass unnoticed without individual att stood, they have no patience, who is fighting for these kids? I also realized that I really disconnected myself from the students the second day. I knew that there was something deeper going on, and I realized that it was because being in that classroom made me return to mine—something I hadn’t really processed.
I realized that when I saw Kaylor constantly slipping out of his seat, or slamming his pencil down on his desk, or when Ariana blatantly took her notebook out during a test and got in trouble because she just really had no idea, that I was looking at myself and there was still a lot of unprocessed deep hurt there. Deep hurt with my teachers and classmates, deep hurt within myself thinking that different meant wrong, and most of all a deep deep anger with God for wiring me the way he has.
After just one day of class, I was withdrawing, realizing that I had a personal connection and deep hurt related to my ministry. The next few days I prayed through it and God told me to let ministry be personal. Life is ministry, so why separate the two? If I do that, it will just dull my passions and makes a student with a face and a name just another child in another country into someone else’s concern.
If I know how it feels, and I know the effects that it can deliver in young adulthood, it is all the more important for me to tell them that different doesn’t mean wrong. That they are works of God, and that his works are marvelous, and according to Him there is not a flaw in us. Pretty much just as Albert Einstein said it, “everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live it’s whole life believing that it is stupid.”
There is so much that God gave me through having a learning disability that I might not have otherwise had. The most relevant one was my passion for books and reading, and my curiosity, and patience for myself and others. When I finally learned to read it was like I had a super power, and had a responsibility to use it. In truth, I really met and found Jesus through opening my bible. I was intrigued around the age of 13 by people, but what really made me fall in love with him was reading His word. In realizing that contrary to popular belief, the gospel isn’t just a narrative, its a romantic love story that he performed for humanity—including me. I may not have met Jesus if God hadn’t instilled in me a constant desire to know more, to follow my curiosity, and the deep excitement that I feel when I crack a book open.
I absolutely adore Shel Silverstien and his poetry, especially at that age when shorter poems were easier for me to read. And there’s this poem that made me feel a little less different, and showed me that I could dream big dreams and not wear the letters ADHD written across my forehead.
It goes, “Listen to the MUSTN’TS child, listen to the DON’TS, listen to the SHOULDN’TS, the IMPOSSIBLE’S, the WONT’S. Listen to the NEVER HAVE’S, then listen close to me—anything can happen, child, ANYTHING can be.”
In the midst of the World Race, God is showing me to be a child again, to let ministry be personal and let the injustices of the world affect me, to let my passions and dreams run rampant—so that I can tell Kaylor and Ariana that they were made just right and so that they can see that I believe in them, and God made them on purpose for a purpose.
