Sometimes life drags you through the deepest levels of Hell. Levels so deep and foul, you couldn’t have imagined they even existed.
In the midst of the fetid mire, light cannot reach, color doesn’t exist. You choke from the lack of air, and every movement feels like you’re pushing through impenetrable wet cement.
But there exists an unseen force that not only permeates that darkness but bursts through, touching everything and everyone, healing as it goes. I learned, while mired in the bowels of Hell, that Love is the immense power that suffuses and conquers even the most dire and sinister situations.
Imprisoned and Free
In 2001, I became a single mother when the Department of Homeland Security arrested and incarcerated my Yemeni husband in a prison 10 hours’ drive away.
When he was arrested, I had just received my admission letter to attend medical school — my lifelong dream. But I set the opportunity aside, trading it for the responsibility of raising 3 gifted children by myself.
With his absence, and for the first time, I could raise my children without fear of violence. I could teach them what I wanted. I could play with them at the park at sunset. I could watch the sheer joy on their faces as they opened Christmas presents for the first time. The interminable years of domestic violence had ended, and I was free to enjoy each precious moment. And enjoy it I did.
I homeschooled them because they had tested as gifted, but the local school had nothing to offer for gifted children. Each day was an adventure as we explored our amazing world together. We dissected starfish and sharks, tested which laundry detergent worked best, toured landfills to see where our garbage goes, and made every day a wondrous opportunity to share, learn, and grow together.
Before long, somehow the sheer joy of sharing life with these 3 wonderful beings erased my personal identity and replaced it with theirs. Before, I wanted to go out, attend med school, be social, build a career. Now, however, I only wanted to raise three happy humans who could change the world in their unique way. My desires receded, and their desires took over.
My whole life was based on them.
Four years later, everything changed.
The Winds of Change
My husband got out of jail. He kidnapped my kids to Yemen, a small, poverty-stricken and strictly-Islamic Middle Eastern country.
I sought help through all the official avenues in the US. I begged, cajoled, pleaded, filled out all the right paperwork, talked to powerful people. But it soon became apparent that there was no help, even though I had sole custody. No one was going to save my kids or bring them home. It was all up to me.
I traveled to Yemen several times. I needed to be with the only thing that mattered to me — my kids.
For me, Yemen was a terrible place. Women had to be covered head to foot at all times even when it was 100 degrees. There were no freedoms. Most of the time there was no electricity.
My kids were with a man who I considered abusive, and I had no say in anything. When one of the kids tried to sit on my lap one day, he yelled at them to “get away from her”. We were so bored, so one day I made them a seesaw in the backyard. He ran out screaming, “Stop it! Get off of that! What will the neighbors think?”
He and I argued, and he kicked me out of his house. I went to the street and sat on the searing concrete sidewalk, crying. Passersby thought I was one of the many street beggars, and they threw coins at me. I stared as the shiny silver coins plopped onto my long black robe.
He called the military police and said he would put me in jail for “disobedience”. I had no idea that men could just arbitrarily put their wives in jail for disobeying. I didn’t go to jail, but seeing the reality of how life is there crushed my soul.
Unable to live with him in his house, I returned to the US — alone. The trip back home was a 3-day journey, and I cried for every minute of it across half the world.
I knew it was up to me to get them home, regardless. He had banned the kids from boarding a plane without his permission, so I studied Google Maps.
I found a 15-mile stretch across the Red Sea that would get us to Djibouti. This area is often referred to as the “Strait of Tears” because so many ships crash there. The US 5th fleet was stationed there on the Djibouti side, and I thought if we could get across the Red Sea, we could find the US Embassy in Djibouti and get home to the US.
I bought a sea-worthy 15-foot inflatable boat and made plans. I made Plan A, Plan B, Plan C, and Plan D, trying to account for anything that could go wrong. The day came, and I packed my boat in a suitcase and flew to Yemen.
I don’t speak Arabic, so navigating around Yemen was a challenge. I could find few people who knew any English. Traveling alone as a woman in a place where women are supposed to be accompanied by men made me more conspicuous.
But, I found his house.
I waited outside in my long black robe and black veil. In Yemen, you have to wear a black face covering, as well, so as I watched his family members leave the house to go to work, they didn’t recognize me. As soon as everyone had left, I grabbed my kids and ran.
For three weeks, we ran across the country, chased by the military police who were always one step behind us. We made it to the coast of the Red Sea at a tiny place called Bab al-Mandeb.
However, this was tribal country, a place known for kidnapping foreigners. As soon as we arrived, 4 men grabbed us and locked us in a room inside a gas station. We spent the night sitting in that room on the concrete floor, staring at a large, hairy orange spider 4 feet away from us hanging on the wall. We talked, laughed, cried, and hugged. The kids excitedly made plans for how they were going to fix up their rooms once they got back to the states.
They believed in me.
And then I failed.
Defeat
The men eventually let us go, and we got caught. The kids were taken back to their father’s house, and I was on a plane headed back to the US.
When I got back, I lost everything.
There was no more hope. I laid in bed, unable to get up to even go to the bathroom. My muscles wouldn’t work. I’d slither down the side of the bed and crawl into the bathroom.
I looked out my window, staring at the trees. The leaves were no longer green. They were various shades of grey. I couldn’t see colors anymore. Everything everywhere was a drab shade of grey.
I had to force myself to breathe in and out. Every breath felt like I was lifting a 10-lb weight on my chest up and down, up and down. I had no desire to eat. Or move. Or breathe.
I saw my daughters — locked in that concrete room in Yemen, getting hit by their father, unable to go to Girl Scouts, no longer able to have sleepovers with friends, unable to do anything without explicit permission from him. Which meant permission to do nothing.
I could no longer teach them all the things I wanted them to know. I tried sending gifts, but he would give them away without telling them that I sent anything because that would make me “look good” in his eyes.
I was allowed to call once a week on Sundays, but it had to be on speakerphone so he could monitor anything that was said. Which meant we really couldn’t say anything at all beyond, “Hi, How are you?”…”I’m fine, how are you?”.
Once I managed to muster the energy to go to Walmart to buy a few groceries. I walked in and saw a mother holding the hand of her daughter. I froze. Then uncontrollably, I started bawling and shrieking. I couldn’t bear to see what I had lost. I fled the store as fast as my legs would run.
I couldn’t function at all.
For over a year, I could barely move. I laid in bed, forcing myself to breathe in and out. But I always made the effort to never miss that 1:00 pm Sunday phone call to my children.
All through my weeks, I felt like I couldn’t breathe, but then when I called and heard that “Hi Mama!”, a profusion of cool, fresh live-giving air flooded my lungs. I could sit up straight and feel something again. When the conversation ended, though, I slowly sank back into the black pit of paucity and despair.
It Was Only Love
For 14 years, I used that Sunday phone call to infuse my kids with every ounce of love I felt. I couldn’t hug them. I wasn’t there when they needed to buy their first bra. I wasn’t there to cheer them up when they had a bad day at school. I couldn’t do anything except love them, and try to share that love with them in a 30-minute phone call once a week.
Little by little, that love seeped everywhere, starting with me. I started to love myself more and forgive myself for failing to rescue my children. I took better care of myself and made the effort to act and make the world a tiny bit better place.
In every Sunday conversation, I listened to every word, wholly present. I shared my immense love in every response. I felt it wasn’t nearly enough, but it was all I could do. To love them and try to convey it to them.
My daughters are still in Yemen, and I still make the phone call every Sunday.
7 years ago, the Houthis took over, and the airports got bombed. So there’s no way to send anything there. And they aren’t issuing visas to Americans, so I can’t go there. I haven’t seen my kids in years.
I can only share my love through a phone call or a Whatsapp message.
Yesterday, my daughter sent me a song. She said, “If I could write music, I would write this song for you”. The name of the song was “It’s Always Been You” by Phil Wickham.
My daughter feels that I was always her saving grace, that it was my love that brought her through all her bad times. My love made her what she is today. My love makes her smile and helps her strive every day to be a great person.
I always felt that all I had to give was love — which was so much less than what they needed and wanted.
She says that love sustained her.
That love didn’t just save her, it saved me as well. It affects everyone I meet, and every act I take.
Lurking there in the darkest, deepest pits of Hell, love permeates everything, pulling the chaos into beautiful harmony. It echoes through the years, and it reaches farther than you can imagine. It transforms lives, and it makes the ugly beautiful again.
When you find yourself in the bowels of Hell, have patience and hold on to love.
Love always endures.
Love always heals.
Love is enough.
