Pain
is one of the most powerful adversaries that we face on this earth. It does not
matter if it is physical or emotional pain, either can alter your life
permanently. It changes the way you view
life, the way you live it and what you believe in. Pain often does mean change. Most people hate
change, especially when it was not our choice to make that change. We don’t
know if it is going to be a change for the worse or for the better and the
unknown is feared beyond all else. What
makes us human though is the different ways we deal with pain and the sudden
changes to our lives. How we react and ultimately how we overcome the adversity
using it to help us grow into better versions of ourselves is testament to our personal
spirit and character.
Thankfully there are gifts we are
given that are stronger than any pain we may go through and are what see us
through. Our resilient spirits and our innate belief in
faith, hope and love are the strongest power on earth and in the heavens. Even now I balance on the ledge of acceptance
of my new life. I am thankful for the blessings I received in the outcome from
the pain and I still hope that my
health will continue to improve. The love I received from my family,
friends and church family made all the difference in my fight so I was able to go on. As did my
faith in an ever present and omnipotent God who guides me through deep
waters and burning fires protecting me from serious harm and helping me to
continue to fight and grow to be stronger on the other side of the trial. True my
body is not as strong as it once was, but the increase of strength and wisdom
in my soul and spirit more than make up for the loss.
Our
lives are made up of seasons of joy, sadness, growth, decline, trials and
triumphs; because of these we change in many ways. Fighting for your health is another one of
these seasons and does not have to be the end of the other seasons. It
is just another season we will pass through.
You must not rush yourself though; take the time to mourn and feel the
range of emotions that come. Look for the lessons that can be learned to make
this a season of growth. You found this page and therefore you are
fighting!!! This is another very hard
concept to swallow in the middle of the fray. When you are on day 78 of a
headache, any kind of severe pain or depression it seems as if it will never
end. The most important thing you can do
at that point is to find a friend to talk to and take it one day at a time. Just make that one day as good as you can. At that point you can not even imagine an end to the suffering, but I am here to tell you that it does come. I can see the sun on the horizon and you will get there too if you have not already.As you learn to make each day as good as you can, you learn the lesson of how to truly live in the moment. You learn to pay better attention to the small joys in life that you once took for granted because you were focusing on your five year plan. You also become hyper aware of what you sincerely cannot live without and what is superfluous. Your priorities and their order come into stark reality as you realize that your desire for a new fancy house come before your loved ones or your desire to be a size 4 is atop of giving back to others. Your new set of priorities gives your life a new joy and purpose that you may not have felt before as you learn to take your eyes off yourself and onto others. This is how it was for me. My desire for owning my own home was knocked down several rows as I realized how much I was missing of my daughter growing and the encouragement in my marriage and friendships.
We may have to switch careers, or go from climbing the career ladder to a stay at home parent or work at home job as I did. You will adjust and find new passions or old ones may come back to life. You will learn who your true friends are when you tell them about your ailments for the tenth time that week. The friends that stick around will be your friends for a lifetime. Your pride takes a blow when you have to lean on others more then you ever thought you would need to. Then you learn that many people are more than glad to be there for you because they love you for you and not for what you do for them. The individual that can ask for help grows in honest confidence because they learn that their self-worth does not lie in their physical body and abilities but in their character. Asking for help also gives the other person the opportunity to bless you and grow themselves. Whenever two individuals go through a trial together they bond in a way that cannot be replicated and lifelong relationships are born.
I also discovered the reality of my story only being a small part in a larger story. Our lives affect the outcome and circumstances of many others lives in the present and future. I want the way I react to the trials in my life to have a positive effect on the bigger story. We will not be remembered for the size of house we lived in but for number of friends and family that we invited into our little house and our lives despite that difficulty. Pain is powerful is it not?
I am good with where I am at now and thankful for this season of hardship and pain. Yes I wish I had a few less aches and more energy but I wouldn't trade the lessons that I have learned and the growth I have made. This series of events somehow has resurrected old dreams and opened doors that were locked tight before it. My relationships are more meaningful and my desires are a little less selfish. At the beginning of my battle when I was still trying to figure out what I was suffering from I certainly would not have agreed with any of this in any shape or form. Nor would I accept that I would be the one who would write it in two years.
I had a wise friend who went through the same
battle make a similar statement and I accused her of giving up. I apologize now to you my friend. You told me
I would come to the same conclusion and I have. I thank you for your
encouragement. This is not a state of
mind that I easily or quickly achieved. I fought the idea of accepting anything
but returning to my old life exactly as it was before. I had to reach the
depths of despair as I call it, and look at my brokenness and inability to control the situation to figure out
how I was going to get my life back in any form.
I finally accepted that it was not going to go back to the way it was. Once I did I felt a new motivation to make this new season of my life mean something There is a Katy Perry song that says “I picked myself up off the floor,
put one foot in front of the other and looked in the mirror and decided to
stay”. It was as simple and as difficult
as that. I had to accept that I could
not change what had happened and I was going to go ahead and change my attitude
and perspective. I also got to a mental health professional ASAP and got some
help, as depression is a sibling of chronic illnesses that cause pain. It is a personal mental battle to find peace
in the outcome and the knowledge that you did everything possible to get better.
You hopefully can see how your battle has helped you to become a better version
of yourself despite the pain that may still linger. That pain becomes a reminder that you are a
work in progress as are those around you.
We must reach out
and join together to fight, overcome, grow and live a life that we could have
never lived on our own. Pain is
powerful, but when you dig down deep and then reach out to others for help and
to give help you find that it is no match for your human spirit.
Give Katy Perry’s
song By the Grace of God a listen. It is a great song to give you a lift and a
few goose bumps.
May you find peace
and comfort,
Cassandra
