A Compassionate Voice for the Parents of Children with Hidden Disabilities
Melanie Boudreau
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Ordinary as Enough

11/9/2019

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Photos courtesy of Jessica Roy​


​I feel ordinary. Absolutely ordinary. 

Recently I was asked if I would teach a webinar on Radical Faith. How do we get from ordinary to radical faith? 

We don’t. We live in radical faith while still being absolutely ordinary. 

I am a Mom. And I had special needs kids with hidden disabilities. I was often not esteemed by acquaintances because the way moms are judged is by the behavior of their children. ​

Children with invisible disabilities do not typically elicit accolades from onlookers. Wrong assumptions are often made about both the children and parenting. I had to learn how to live under judgement and unjust accusation. How to live without taking offense. How to push toward maturity with no mentors. 
I learned books can be mentors. And the Holy Spirit is our ultimate Mentor and guarantees all the negative circumstances in our life bear beautiful fruit. All things are not good,  but He promises to work them out for our good, redeeming our circumstances— beauty from ashes. 

So how does one go from being ordinary as a house mom to being ordinary with radical faith? My ordinary just looks different now. My faith is largely the same. 

My current ordinary prays for shattered bones in the ankle of a Buddhist woman in Myanmar and she is healed. My ordinary now has scuba dived through sunken WW2 ships in the Philippines, in the underwater ancient port of Caesarea in the Mediterranean Sea, in the Gulf of Aqaba between Egypt, Jordan, and Israel. I dove in the Caribbean and in Cuba. I ski the Continental Divide and have summited Mount Kinabalu on the island of Borneo in Asia. 

My ordinary organizes regional pastors’ conferences globally and I bring teams to teach about God’s heart for the disabled. I bring a better way for autism intervention (RDIconnect.com) into regions of the world with the least access training professionals and parents alike. My ordinary has presented at secular national Autism conferences. 

But I’m still the same. Absolutely ordinary. I never had to graduate to super-spiritual or even super-rich. I mean, how much more spiritual can a person get than hosting the presence of the living God? ​

As one who has committed your life to Christ, You host His presence— now! 



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My toddler-mom friend Jessica is called to what sounds extraordinary but is living what feels ordinary. With the faith to move mountains she is currently moving mountains of laundry. 

Jessica adds: “It’s all eternal.” 

             Kids: eternal
             Modeling self/soul care: eternal
             Hosting the Presence in the grocery store: eternal
             Enjoying the Presence whilst doing dishes: eternal
             Loving and serving a husband with the honor and love of Christ: eternal

This is our life in Him. Ordering cabinets. Doing car line. Bringing Christ into our bedrooms and to our dinner tables and dreaming with God about how to impact the world around us because of His goodness within. 

His Presence and empowerment are EXACTLY the same no matter how our ordinary looks in our current season of life. 

We never have to “arrive”. We are exactly who we are, and we carry the God of the universe who owns everything and thinks great big and takes our ordinary and adds His spectacular.


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    About Melanie

    Two of our three children have Tourette's Syndrome as well as a few other co-morbidities, inherited neuropsychiatric disorders. I'm still happily married, love life and want to share encouragement bringing hope, humor and insight into the process of raising children who are different. 

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