Scripture is clear:
“Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved, for You are my praise.”—Jeremiah 17:14
And yet, there’s no magic here. In fact, it’s a process just like everything else. What have I learned in the last eight and a half weeks?
- The pain is real. And honestly, I’m not even talking about the initial breaks. I’m talking about this healing process. Most people ask, is it getting better? I guess. I can do a little more, move more, and it only hurts part of the time, not all of the time. That’s progress. I’ll not mention the ice pick jabs that stop me in my tracks.
- It’s slow. I mean painfully slow. After eight weeks, I only have to wear my brace at night but now I’m supposed to voluntarily move my hand and wrist. Each effort is a test: does it still hurt? See point one.
- The healing is not observable. In fact, I think my wrist looks like something leftover from a Frankensteinian procedure. There’s some weird things going on inside my skin: the tendons are tormented, the nerves are shaken, the bone is unyielding. The outer skin is poor camouflage to what is happening inside.
- Limitations are numerous. I suppose there is improvement here, after all, I can wash my own hair, put on deodorant, and snap my bra. Breakthroughs. But not for many weeks on the front end and the last thing I wanted to do was ask for help. But I see the truth of it. The initial pain is simply too much to bear alone. I had to confess to my restrictions, my body imposed prohibitions.
- Inertia prevailed. Exercise? Forget it. Productivity? No chance. Typing? Be still my hands. Field trips or escapades? Not hardly. The bed drew me mostly. I wasn’t just tired in my body, I was tired in my mind. I didn’t want to think about my injury. I still don’t, not really.
So where is the good news? The list is the same as always: patience, trust, gentleness with oneself, and a sense of humor. This is tortoise territory (as in the tortoise and the hare); slow and steady wins the race.
But the last thing I want to share is that these lessons are the same for the heart. If anyone has experienced a broken heart, the symptoms are probably the same, as well as the “solution.”
Time heals, God heals. That’s a promise. But it’s still up to each one of us to walk it.
I have discovered that resentment is right up there with disappointment. They have the same root in the heart. They are both married to expectations and ultimately “control.” I am resentful when things don’t go the way I expect them to go. I am disappointed when things don’t turn out the way I had dreamed they would. As though I know what is the best way, the best time, the best outcome.
Basic definition of character: “
I can claim these three just because they speak to the last two years of my life, reinventing myself as a widow, enduring the loss and the sorrow, initiating new routines and lifestyle (even selling and buying a house), and then tackling all the little jobs that are now all mine, working to make those efforts the best they can be. But have I embraced the Presence of God in the midst of these traits as I walked them out? Not as much as I should have. Much of these are part of my nature (my family background and the influence of my mother). I know that. And yet, I also know, then the gas ran out in my energy, God was there, filling up my tank. Things might have been easier had I used God’s gas all along. Hindsight reveals much.
Contentment. This is not about never trying or working toward a goal, but it is saying yes to now, today, this moment, this life.
Meditations from Zion 