| Helen Gaughan - Textimony to the Power of Prayer |
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In 1983 I had been an alcoholic for some eight years. As time went on this was becoming more chronic.
My drinking was affecting my ability to do the job I loved. I was a nurse. It was obviously causing great stress to my family, in particular to my father who was terminally ill and I was supposed to be taking care of him!
I was visiting psychiatrists and going to group therapy but I felt a great need for spiritual care. I wanted to be at peace and feel God in my life, and to be a good person. My parish Priest was a great source of strength, spiritually and as a friend.
I had a great love for Lourdes – I’d been on six pilgrimages and had an overwhelming desire to return. I felt strongly that I would receive peace in Lourdes. My father gave me the fare to go with some friends who had planned this Pilgrimage.
We arrived in Lourdes on 2nd July 1983. I was drinking heavily for the first two days.
I was befriended by an Irish/American nun, Sister Elizabeth King, an Incarnate Word Sister. She was obviously concerned about me! On the evening of 4th July she came with me to the torchlight procession – I was not sober.
After the procession we went to the Grotto. As we went inside the Grotto I noticed a vase of roses at the altar. I took one and gave it to Sister Elizabeth. I did not know she had a devotion to St. Therese of Lisieux. She told me that she had been praying for me and she always received a rose when her prayers were answered. My prayers had been answered too! It was no coincidence that I had my prayers answered by returning to Lourdes. Now I felt at peace.
I returned to the Hotel and poured a bottle of whisky down the sink!
Next morning I went to the Grotto with Sister Elizabeth. I thanked Our Lady for bringing me to Lourdes and for bringing Sister Elizabeth too! I told Our Lady that I’d never touch alcohol again and felt so much happiness and joy!
I fully expected to have problems with withdrawal, and to have to fight temptation, but it was as though the problems had never existed in the first place!
I’ve never once had the desire to drink in the twenty years since my moment of grace at the Grotto. I thank God and Our Lady every day and often wonder why they gave me such a wonderful gift. I know it was because they love me, and know too that it was to prepare me for what was to come. The following year I began to suffer terrible depression – the menopause - which lasted for seventeen years, resulting in early retirement from my work as a nurse.
I know too, had I still been an alcoholic, I would never have survived it. In all those years of depression I’ve never once had the desire to drink alcohol.
On my return from Lourdes, my father was overjoyed, as were my family and my Parish Priest, Father Daniel Boyle and my doctors too.
At the hospital where I worked, I was told by my Superiors that what happened to me in Lourdes was no small miracle. It was a big one. I’d probably been going to lose my job!
Since July 1983 I thank God that I’ve returned to Lourdes every year and encouraged many people - especially sick pilgrims - to visit Lourdes.
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"No need to remember past events, no need to think about what was done before. Look, I am doing something new, now it emerges; can you not see it. Yes I am making a road in the desert and rivers in wastelands." (Isaiah 43:18-19)
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