Grateful in ALL things??

It’s easy to be thankful for your home and your family. Most people are thankful for their health and their careers or education. We should always treasure the people who are good to us, the comforts of home and our abilities, as life is so fragile. Those familiar with serious illness or tragedy understand that better than anyone.
But what if you lost everything?
What if tomorrow it was all gone?
What if you were left with only your physical pain and all of your loss?
How then would you have gratitude?

When I set out to write about gratitude this year, it was only through the eyes of my faith that I could write it.

The Bible asks me not only to be thankful for my blessings, but to be thankful INSIDE of my struggles, in my weakness, in my illness, in my loss, to be thankful in my…mess.
Sometimes all our eyes can see are the broken pieces. Sometimes all our bodies can feel is the pain. At times struggle and burden is all that our hearts will allow us to hold.

Let’s be serious, I’m not thankful for my illness or my loss! But the thought of being thankful INSIDE of it is a concept I can lean into. Maybe I can embrace these challenges because I am being changed, transformed. Maybe I can be thankful through it because I know there will be good to come of it.
What if tomorrow the broken pieces of your life as they are now can be used for something better than the pain you feel today?

What has come out of a dark time in your life that you can now be thankful for?

Have a blessed Thanksgiving.

Thank you to the wonderful writer,  lifeinslowmotionblog.com and admin of Changing the World when you are Chronically Ill, Disabled, or Homebound for encouraging me to dig deep and write this.

An Unlocking Spell: Conjuring Myself

Blooming Beauty | Peggy Wolf

My sister asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday last year. I told her that if I had been well enough, I would’ve wanted to invite friends over to make sandwiches to bring to hungry area children. I used to do this type of thing in high school sometimes, and last year fantasized that it might make for a unique summer birthday gathering that my friends would like to participate in (being my awesome friends). I was really only thinking out loud, and then asked her what she wanted to do for her birthday (since our birthdays fall inside the same week).

When my birthday came around, I went to stay at my parent’s for the week. On the day of my birthday, my family gave me a small photo album filled with pictures of smiling children. “How cute…What is this?” I asked, curious what my family was up to. My parents and sister had arranged to spend the day volunteering for a back to school program called Give a Kid a Chance which prepares underprivileged children for the coming school year. My family donated goods, packed backpacks and checked little heads for lice. They spent their entire Saturday volunteering for this wonderful program in honor of my birthday!!!! I was crying, they were crying, we were all emotional as they shared the details of the day. It is absolutely one of the most heartfelt and most humbling gifts I had ever received, (which others received) and I know I will never forget their beautiful selfless gesture.

When my mom explained why they did it, she said, “Volunteer work has always been such a big part of who you are. After you couldn’t help in the community any more, you turned your attention to caring for people online. Your sister told us what you would have wanted to do for your birthday, so we did this because you would have been doing this if you could have.”

I didn’t realize how much I needed a wake up call until that moment. I felt like a doorbell was being rung to the door of my soul that a warrior part of me had to close in order to stay alive. To fight the illness, I had to know my enemy, and get in the trenches with him. But the price was that a piece of me had to be shrouded away, protected in that way, while I fought through the very worst of it. My family didn’t know how much I desperately NEEDED this reminder of my core, of who I am.

No one had spoken of my former self out loud in what felt like years. Their gracious act and words were like an unlocking spell. Something awakened inside of me on that birthday that started a transformation- which is still in progress. I am so thankful and fortunate for them, for having the ability to see the good in who I am now, and for never forgetting the person I have always been.

I woke up the following morning with this poem trickling from my brain:

~The Apparition~

 

In the time and space between

dark rooms and restless painful nights,

you might have time to count

too many stains on the paint.

* 

The time between forgotton breaths

may have left you wondering

who you used to be.

* 

Did the air sneak your old life out?

Under the door?

Through the cracks in the floor?

 *

Like Russian dolls,

the top one falls:

Broken.

And mama sweeps it away.

* 

Those who recall that ghost,

tip toe beside the host of the demon.

They bring pieces of the past,

until at last you remember.

* 

The apparition waits outside.

Now, you can smell her perfume.

-aBodyofHope 7/23/14

*******

There are times during the fight that we must lay down our old lives and find a way to nurture today, without looking back or too far ahead. But I’ve also learned that reminders of your past can boost your spirit in the midst of a struggle. Wherever you are in your journey, I hope you have someone in your life who sees the strength in you and reminds you of it.

Peace.

Blooming Beauty | Peggy Wolf

Blooming Beauty is by one of my favorite artists: Peggy Wolf. Check out her gallery on Etsy, you’ll love her as much as I do.

“How can a body withstand this?” quote by Ellen Bass

“To love life, to love it even

when you have no stomach for it

and everything you’ve held dear

crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,

your throat filled with the silt of it.

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weights you like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face,

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again.”

― Ellen Bass

A Season of Waiting

Waiting is never a simple task. If you ask me if I am a patient person, I will say that I am patient with others, but have difficulty being patient with myself.

You might be waiting for an important test result to come in, for doctors to finally diagnose you after years of unexplained illness, for the medication trial to become available, or you might be waiting to see if your surgery heals without additional complications. You might be waiting for a loved one to return safely from a dangerous trip overseas, for important news about your finances, or you might be waiting to see if your friend will recover from cancer.

Waiting is a helpless feeling, no matter how much we can “help” the situation…the feeling that we are not the ones in control of the outcome makes us feel useless. Not knowing the outcome causes anxious, nervous impatient feelings that, for me come in waves which are accompanied by a racing mind.

For a person who started out bread to be the go-to person for fixing and fast problem solving, it seems life instead has been teaching me about patience, seeking guidance and waiting out storms. Instead of giving me problems to solve, I have problems that can only be solved through the healing of time.

Even though it is a useless feeling to wait, wait, wait, I don’t believe in waiting we are supposed to throw our hands up and stop seeking guidance. There are always more calls we can make, more specialists we can see, ways we can take care of our health, and people we can reach out to. But, if you have been waiting on something that weighs on your heart, there is only so much you can do to push the pace of the answer you so desire. Sometimes we can spin ourselves into a frenzy trying to get the answer we want to come to us faster, when some things are out of our hands. Praying, quietly seeking guidance and listening are also useful actions- though exceedingly more difficult to choose.

I am waiting for some very important answers in my life right now…Some answers that will forever change life as I know it to be. Maybe you remember a stretch of time like that from your past, and how you felt. How did you fill those long days waiting for tomorrow? Because of so many years of chronic illness, it feels as though waiting has been a regular part of life. Life with chronic illness teaches us to find the good, useful, and gratitude inside of the seemingly unlivable. These years of health struggles have taught me to lean into my faith and seek spiritual guidance. I am so grateful for the support and wisdom from those I respect, and I hope to be molded during this trial – what is God teaching me in this moment? …Because nothing is ever wasted.

Earlier this year, I wrote that “strength comes at the step we are on. Not weeks or months ahead.” As I work on waiting, and asking for patience, I try not to dwell on what challenges might come tomorrow. If you remember, my opening post for 2015 was a “No Fear Campaign.” It makes me want to shake my head when I think of the year God has been preparing me for!

About waiting, many say, “Just give it to God” as though it is as simple as forgetting about your heartache with your spouse, or your worries with your family, or your daily physical struggle with health that I know so many reading this are living with. I’m sorry if anyone has said that to you without compassion for what you are going through.

The past couple weeks have felt like an avalanche in many ways. When all of the rubble and dirt fell over me, and I went sliding down the hillside into the valley with the mound, even though I’m covered in a whole pile of dark unanswered questions, underneath, I’m praying, and studying, and being still (listening). Hopefully, this trial of waiting will lead to growth from that soil and rubble. My story is not finished. God is not through with me. Waiting is not doing nothing, waiting can be the most growing period in a person’s life. I am asking to be transformed during a time in limbo.

What did you do or what did you learn while you were in a season of limbo?

“Patience is power.

Patience is not an absence of action;

rather it is “timing”

it waits on the right time to act,

for the right principles

and in the right way.”

― Fulton J. Sheen

“But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength;

They shall mount up with wings like eagles,

They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.” Isaiah 40:31

“What we are waiting for is not as important as what happens to us while we are waiting. Trust the process.”

― Mandy Hale