A Life Worth Living

By Barbara Fafard

In today's world, we may be faced with all kinds of trials and heartbreaks that can cause us to believe that our life is not worth living.

That was true for Barbara Fafard.

Having come from an abusive home and with her marriage falling apart as her young, alcoholic husband became verbally abusive, Barbara became totally hopeless, and without even thinking about her two toddler sons, she decided to end her life. This is where God interceded and helped Barbara to realize that through God's guidance, He could help her see that her life was worth living.

In her book A Life Worth Living, Barbara invites her readers to experience God's faithfulness as He encouraged her along her journey to become the woman whom God created her to be. With God's help and lots of research, Barbara was able to acquire tools to mend and bless her marriage. Wanting to help other couples to achieve a blessed marriage, Barbara wrote a marriage workshop that she titled "Keeping the Marriage Alive." During the last twenty years, Barbara and Larry have taught their workshop to over five thousand attendees.

The tools that Barbara and Larry taught were such a success that Barbara has included them in her book so that her readers' marriages can be blessed as well.

Along with achieving valuable tools to bless their marriage, Barbara's readers will enjoy reading about Barbara and Larry's amazing journey, along with experiencing profound lessons that God has taught Barbara along her journey with Him.

During Barbara and Larry's fifty-two years of being married, they have had to face several trials, but as they applied the marriage tools that they learned and taught other couples, they have been able to achieve a blessed, happy, and flourishing marriage.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 30, 2023
• ISBN: 9798887514369

Book preview

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A Life Worth Living

Barbara Fafard

ISBN 979-8-88751-435-2 (paperback)

ISBN 979-8-88751-436-9 (digital)

Copyright © 2023 by Barbara Fafard

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

About the Author

Chapter 1

As I sat there holding the two sharp razor blades against my trembling wrist as they glistened from the moonlight shining through our bathroom window, every fiber of my body kept saying, Do it, just do it! Just end it all! In that moment, the idea of stopping my extreme pain and despair was so inviting. But I was having a tough time steadying the sharp blades against my wrist because my fingers would not stop shaking.

During those heartbreaking moments, I started to reflect on my past to try to figure out how everything went so wrong and how I got to a point in my life where my life was not worth living. Yes, I did not have memories of a happy childhood. Instead, I remember growing up with a lot of fear and loneliness. Most of my fear was based on my father's anger.

It was obvious to me as a child that my father adored my mother, as he was always going out of his way to do kind things for her. But when my parents would get in a fight, my mother would end up yelling, I'm going to have a nervous breakdown. And then she would run into their bedroom and slam the door on my dad, locking him out.

These scenes would usually happen while my three younger brothers and I were in the dining room eating dinner. And eventually, my dad would emerge from the hallway with rage in his eyes and would yell at me, What are you looking at! and then he would start hitting and kicking me as my three younger brothers watched in terror.

To be honest, the physical abuse was not as bad as my father's constant verbal abuse, which was hurled at me as he cursed while he said horrible things to me. If he saw me sitting on the couch and he was angry about something, he would yell, Get off your fat, lazy ass and start cleaning up around here! I remember how those words were painful and confusing because I was a skinny preteen, and his words made me think I was lazy and fat.

As I entered my teen years, I had no scars from the years of physical abuse, but I carried many scars from the years of verbal abuse. During those lonely teen years of never feeling loved by my parents, I would lay in bed at night and pray that God would bring someone into my life who would love me. Sadly, as a teen, I realized that if my mother loved me, she would have protected me from my father's abuse, but instead of stopping him, it seemed like she was provoking him with her angry outburst.

When I was seventeen, it seemed like God had answered my prayers when I got a job at our local Wienerschnitzel because that is where I met an attractive seventeen-year-old boy named Larry who was the sweetest, kindest boy that I had ever met. He was, tall, dark, and handsome, which was just my type. You see, living in Huntington Beach, California, I had no interest in blond surfer dudes.

Immediately after meeting each other, Larry and I started dating. And I quickly realized that Larry was nothing like the boys I had dated in the past, who had only one thing on their minds. There was something special about this guy. By his actions, I really felt that he cared about what I wanted to do.

Larry and I had a special booth at Denny's that we loved to go and sit in as we talked for hours. We also loved holding hands as we window-shopped at our local mall. One of our favorite things to do on a date was to go to this quaint little Italian restaurant that was very romantic and had the best Italian grinder sandwiches ever.

One night, Larry asked me to go to the drive-in theater to see his favorite movie, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. He was excited for me to see it because Larry believed he looked so much like the star that he could be his double. The handsome star was Clint Eastwood. During the movie, Larry excitingly asked me if I agreed that there was a resemblance between the actor and him. And I will never forget the sweet look he had on his face when I told him that I saw a resemblance between Clint Eastwood and him.

Soon after we started dating, Larry professed his love for me. And I fell madly in love with him as well. Looking back at those early days, we were so young, and for the first time in my life, I felt like someone loved and adored me.

It was not long before we both wanted to take our relationship to the next level, but in the back of my mind, I could hear my mother telling me that I should wait till I got married before I had sex because I would probably be like her and get pregnant the very first time. So I was committed to being a virgin when I got married. But my new boyfriend was very persistent, and I was blinded by my passion and love for Larry, so I agreed to have sex on one condition. Larry had to use a rubber because I was convinced that I would get pregnant if we did not use protection.

Now in today's world, things are quite different from the way they were in 1969. In our present day, you can find condoms everywhere, but in our day, they were not even called rubbers or condoms. Instead, they were called prophylactics, and you could only get them from the pharmacist, which was very daunting to two naive seventeen-year-old lovers.

Larry shared with me that he could not even pronounce the word prophylactic let alone face the fear of asking the pharmacist for one. Now this does not mean that he did not try. In fact, a few times, he mustered up his courage as I waited in the car because there was no way that I was going in that store with him. But each time, the idea of having to ask the angry-looking pharmacist for a prophylactic was too daunting for Larry, so he would come out of the store with some gum or a candy bar.

One day, Larry talked me into ditching school with him to hang out at his apartment while his dad was at work. And it was there that we both agreed that we could not wait any longer. So Larry left me at his apartment to go to the nearby drugstore to finally ask the mean-looking pharmacist for those elusive prophylactics. But as he approached the counter, his fear once again kicked in, and he arrived back at his apartment with cheese and crackers along with a Scrabble game. Larry told me that instead of having sex, we could play Scrabble on his bed. Big mistake! Case in point: nine months later, I gave birth to our baby boy Michael, whom we secretly nicknamed Scrabble.

Chapter 2

Back in 1969, it was a disgrace to a family if a young girl got pregnant out of wedlock. So within two weeks from us telling my parents I was pregnant, my parents organized a quick wedding in a minister's living room with ten people in attendance. Yes, it was quick, but we were both in love, and we looked forward to spending the rest of our lives as husband and wife.

Shortly after our wedding, Larry went to work with his dad, and we rented a one-bedroom apartment in Huntington Beach as we looked forward to having our first child.

On July 14, 1970, Larry and I were blessed to welcome our adorable baby boy Michael (Scrabble) into our lives, and our sweet bundle of joy quickly stole both of our hearts.

Our wedding on January 16, 1970, in the pastor's living room

In October of that year, Larry found himself without a job when his dad lost his dry cleaning business, so as Larry searched for a new job, we struggled as we tried to pay our mounting bills.

During this time, my doctor gave us the green light to have sex again, and Larry could not have been more excited about the good news. Also, during this time, the popular new movie Woodstock was playing at our nearby drive-in theater. So we had a dilemma that no nineteen-year-old newlyweds with raging hormones should have to face. You see, we were short on money and only had enough money left from our budget to pay for birth control. That was it! But Larry really wanted to see Woodstock. So he came up with the brilliant idea that we would wait to have sex until the following week when he got his unemployment check. This way, we could use the birth control money to go to our nearby drive-in theater to see Woodstock, which I hesitantly agreed to. So off to the drive-in theater we went. Big mistake! Because exactly nine months later, July 13, 1971, we welcomed our second child David into our lives, whom we secretly nicknamed Woodstock. So here we were, two nineteen-year-olds with a newborn and a one-year-old, as we struggled financially because there never seemed to be enough money to pay the bills.

Then the following year, when Larry turned twenty, he got a fantastic job as a new car salesman, which was an exciting time for both of us. One of the benefits of the job was that Larry drove a demo, so as a family, we got to ride around in beautiful new cars. I remember thinking at the time that life could not be any better, and I was so proud of my sweet, wonderful husband for landing such a wonderful job.

What I did not know at the time when Larry took this job is that the salesmen whom Larry worked with were twice his age, and they had a daily ritual, which was, if they sold a car, that night they would all go to a bar and celebrate. And if they did not sell a car, they would go to the bars anyway so that they would feel better. And even though Larry was only twenty years old, he always looked older than his age, so he would never have to show his license at the bars.

Sadly, within a couple of months, my sweet husband Larry became a full-blown alcoholic. And whenever he would drink, he could not stop at one or two drinks; instead, he would drink until he would become horribly drunk.

During this time, Larry would get off work at 9:00 p.m., so on the nights that he worked, I would feed our sons dinner and put them to bed before Larry got home, so we could have a romantic dinner alone. But hours would go by, and he would never show up. Meanwhile, I was frantically calling all the hospitals, thinking that he was in an accident. Then a little after two in the morning, Larry would come stumbling through the door, drunker than ever.

The hardest thing about Larry's drinking was that the alcohol turned my sweet husband into a Jekyll and Hyde. So when he came home, he would be very mean and would break anything he could get his hands on while he was calling me all kinds of names as he blamed me for all his troubles. And then he would get sick in the bathroom and pass out.

After several months of this abuse, I felt like I could not take it anymore, but I had nowhere to go. Who would take in a young woman with two toddler sons? And then after one of Larry's