Sunday, November 17, 2013

End of Day 10 - Strength is Rising

Do you want to know my greatest fear?

It isn't that Billy or one of my children might die.

That's my second greatest fear.

***

I have deep respect for profound grief.

I watched my father's sudden and tragic death tear my mother's heart and soul so deeply it tore into her mind.

13 years later, I am watching God slowly redeem and restore.

I know that He looses the chains of wasted years.

***

Granga said to me once, "The older you get, the more people you know who've died."

Truth be told, if one lived LONG enough, they could possibly live to see everyone they ever loved die, yes?

***

My greatest fear, is that if I were called, entrusted even to bear the weight of such a horrific moment...

That I couldn't in that day -- or any day ever after -- say again that God Is Good.

That - God Is Unfailing.

And for those who are quick to respond, "Yes YOU could."

Please know, that I've spent hours, days, years even contemplating this as it relates to myself.  And, I say, I'm not sure.

At the thought, my forehead is actually wrinkled with worry and I have to think about catching my breath.

***

I haven't posted since Day 7.

Because Days 8, and 9 were more than I could bear.

Truthfully, had Elizabeth not had the where-with-all to come home to be with me this weekend, I would have had an all out mental breakdown.

The last couple of days have left me speechless and well, that doesn't happen often.

Actually, I wasn't speechless.

I was exhausted.  I didn't want to update the world.

So, me and the kids got an online journal going.  For Billy.  And, it was therapeutic for us.

His mind seemed all but broken.  I believed he sensed this too.

His pain unbearable.

 Delirium, hallucination, depression, hopelessness...

3 families around us, unhooked their husbands, their fathers and waited for them to die.

Leaving every night ripped my heart out.

Whether or not he knew I was there, I laid my hands on his chest, and commanded strength to rise.

Laid my hands on his head and commanded pain to separate from his body.

I picked up the medical pamphlets and prayed over every function of his body to work supernaturally, just the way God had designed it to work.

Then I'd drive the hour home and cry, cry out, so intensely that I couldn't remember how I got there.

***

And, this is what I think.

Should my heart and flesh fail in the worst of the worst moments...

If my greatest fears materialize...

Should I find one day that I am in fact incapable of saying with my mouth, much less deep in my Spirit, that God is good -- that He does not fail...

Then, in that moment...MY FAILURE is what I'll offer.

For I already know that sometimes, our pain, our searing grief, our disappointment, our anger, our unbelief, our hate...well...these things are at times all we can offer.

So, I circle back around to knowing that the deepest need of my heart, of my life, and the prayer that is more real to me today than 10 days ago...

"One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple."  Psalms 27:4


And, I look my worried and tired children in the eye and say these very things.

***

And...by the way...

Today, Billy turned a corner.  At least that's what the doctor called it.

His pain was considerably less -- and they have begun to wean him off some of the meds.

His status was down graded.

Non critical.  

Stable.

Benign.

Non traumatic.

Although, we'd beg to disagree with that last part.

He was moved to a regular room.

He showered TWICE.  He walked.  He talked like a normal person mostly.

Three of our five children came to see him.

So night and day from their last visit...they buried their heads in his chest and cried.

He cried too.

***

Much to process.

***

Tomorrow he begins physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, and cognitive therapy.

And, we'll miss another day of school and work.  And drive an hour to Denver.

And, it'll be a new day.

And we can live with that.

Blessings,












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