LETTER TO GOD

Dear God, I want to thank you for the 59+ years I have walked on this beautiful planet...for the husband I was married to for 19 years and the two awesome boys I had with him.. thank you to my great mother-in-law who has been my best friend and mother for 38 years, thank you for my parents who adopted a little baby girl after they had raised 6 before me and thank you for giving me Bob when I had given up on ever finding love again...thank you for the education that I pursued as a nutritionist, personal trainer, make-up artist, massage therapist and Neuro-muscular therapist...I know I helped so many people with my hands, that were your hands and words that were your words, there is no doubt in my mind that you were working miracles then and continue to do so...You have brought the masses to their feet and made them see that there is so much more charity in this world than I ever thought to imagine. Where there is charity there is hope for a bett er tomorrow. Where there is hope there is love that comes from the very hearts and souls of the givers...this is what my dying has taught me...the lessons have been slowly learned and my teacher is never tired of showing me what life is all about...so I thank you my Father for this lesson and I will be very happy when summer vacation gets here so I can rest a while and then learn some more about helping others who are lost and are seeking Your truth...I am thankful for the life I have lived even though it was full of pain and hard times, I will look at these times as the best of times to learn what I needed to learn to be in Your grace and mercy. My life will end here but I will be reborn into Heaven. Just like a flower that returns every year more beautiful than the year before from the love and nurturing it has received. You all have given me the love and nurturing so I can bloom in Heaven. I will never forget any of you...I love you all! Patricia Palleschi Patricia died on December 3, 2012 at the age of 59 yrs of cervical cancer

DANA'S STORY

It was three years ago that I finally thanked God for my life. Up until then I was so lost. I know now that I wasn't but honestly I felt like I was worthless and would never have His love or for that matter any other person's. I know now that I, Dana, am His creation! I believe He has plans for me but the years I spent not believing, not loving, not living.....I thought were wasted. I was wrong. He WAS acting in my life all along. Powerful acts, some not understandable, some horrific, ALL confusiong. I never understood why I was given the abusive mother, the step brother who raped me as a child, the father who abandoned me, let alone the birth of my severly handicapped daughter who died when she was 21. Yes, I went to Catholic schools and church and yes, I thought all of those 'bad' things that happened were a punishment for my sins, so I turned my back. I stopped kneeling. I stopped looking up. Anger was my life, no faith. All was gone, or so I thought.

I believe now that God created Me! He exclaimed in joy at His cxreation! I wasn't the bad little girl who deserved what my mother did to me. I wasn't the bad little girl whose daddy abandoned her and I wasn't the bad person who deserved to have a handicapped child. NO, I know now that He was preparing ME for His precious gift. A gift for me! A gift of purpose on earth and I hope in Heaven. By living through those tormenting years and surviving, my 'gift' is now realized. I honestly believe He was preparing me so that I could and would handle and accept this wondrous gift and use it to glorify Him! He gave me a gift of compassion for others.

What I think is that from all the abuse, sorrow, grief for what wasn't, He was preparing me to act, and acting I have been doing through the guidance of the Holy Spirit. My heart is so filled with desire to help others. Not for glorification of myself, No, not for attention, but solely to help others in their time of need. All of my 'acts' are done with a heart full of mercy and compassion. My 'gifts' from God. Just as he performed 'acts' on me, I now can Act for Him by loving others and freely giving of myself in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.