My Shell

I suppose when some of you look at the title of this posting, you might be thinking about someone who reverts into their "shell" when life gets hard.  Those of you who know me well know that is not what I do.  I'm not talking about that kind of shell, but the earthly shell of my body.

I got to thinking about this about a week ago when I received my daily devotion entitled "How Are You Today?".  What struck me the most in this devotion was the first paragraph:

 "Pearl was one of the most enthusiastic Christians I’ve known, even though she suffered through the pain of polio and all of its complications for many years. When people would greet her and inquire, "How are you today?" she would cheerfully answer, "Just fine!" Those who knew what Pearl went through in life—difficulties including being confined to a wheelchair and losing her fiancée because of the polio—sometimes questioned her sincerity. "How can you say you're fine when you are suffering so much?" Pearl's sincere response was: "How I feel has very little to do with how I am. You see, the part of me that hurts is just a shell, not the real me, and the real me is just fine!"

It really got me thinking about my attitude toward my chemo and my cancer.  My standard response lately has been, "I'm ok, just really tired. We just keep going one day at a time."  I've been disheartened because I am so tired already, and have already noticed that I don't feel comfortable doing things that I was able to do just a month ago.  Chemo-brain has come back with a vengeance.  I can't remember names, I loose my train of thought easily and I can get confused by things that made sense before.  After almost two years of feeling somewhat normal again, it's been hard accepting that things are going to change again.

Yet, I can say with Pearl, the real me is just fine.  This passage from 2 Corinthians tells me why.

 
Outwardly, my body and parts of my mind are going to increasingly waste away with this chemo.  I learned today on a board that the worst part of the chemo is the tiredness.  I'm going to have to learn to adjust to that.  Of course my confusion at times with chemo-brain will get worse.  I will have to be patient with myself and my family will have to learn to be patient with me by not trying to finish my sentences or figure out what I'm trying to say.  Yet those parts of me don't really matter.  It's my soul that matters, and God is using many things to keep me focused on Him and to make sure I am renewed every day.

This week I was blessed with a great renewal.  The Junior Class at Evergreen Lutheran High School was given an assignment to write letters to me encouraging me and my family as we continue in this journey we are on.  Most of them don't know me well, even though they know my daughter.  These letters could have easily been very simple things that were written, but they weren't.  Each letter was written to truly help me.  Stories were shared, Bible passages quoted and used, and promises of prayers were given.  Each letter renewed my soul.  Some made me laugh, others made me cry, but each one was a gift from God to renew me.  

Tomorrow I have my next chemo session. Outwardly, because of this, I am wasting away.  That's just the way it is for all of us.  But these troubles we all face are just light and momentary.  One day our shells will be renewed to their perfect glory.  Until then, I will be thankful for the many ways that God uses people and His Word to renew my soul. And I can say with confidence "I'm just fine!" 

Learning to Always be Thankful

 

Being thankful is something that we think should come naturally, but it always doesn't.  It's easy to be thankful when things are going well, but what about when things aren't going well?  Of course, that is when it gets harder.  In the life of a cancer patient, the thankfulness can easily come and go.

2012 ended with much thankfulness for our family.  I am on a treatment that is working and I am feeling better than I have in years.  I have more energy and I feel almost normal again, or at least what I think normal should now be.  But the beginning of 2012 was not like that.  I got sick very quickly.  I was admitted to the hospital three times.  I had to take an ambulance to the hospital because I couldn't breathe, and my children saw that ambulance in front of our house.  I had liters and liters of fluid drained from my abdomen and lungs.  I had to rest for three days just to get to my children's big events.  In some ways all of that seems like a dream now.  But I do remember that it was hard to find those things for which to be thankful.

But when I look back at the beginning of 2012, I can more easily see that there were things that make me overflow with thankfulness.  Our family got closer; our faith grew stronger; we were never without help.  These are all big things, but I'm sure there were many little things that I should have recognized and in turn been thankful.   

That sign above is like a slap in the face, isn't it?  Even in our struggles we are called to be thankful. 

This year I want to strive to be consciously thankful of things every day.  I want to learn to look for the little things to be thankful for, not just the big things.  It won't always be easy, but I will strive to do it.

To accomplish this goal I will have some help.  On New Year's Day a friend posted about this same thankful journey she was going on.  It's called  The Joy Dare.  (The link right here explains what this author, Ann Voskamp, is trying to do and encouraging others to do.)  When I looked at the pdf file I noticed how unique the things were that she was looking for.  I knew instantly this was something I wanted to do.

But the tricky part always is accountability.  I thought about writing everything in a journal, but journal writing for me comes and goes.  Then I remembered my other goal of 2013 was to do some more blogging.  And God, as he always does, helped me realize this was the perfect way to do both.

So throughout the next year I will be posting about the things for which I am thankful.  I will just keep it to one blog post per month and edit it, hopefully, every day.  By the time I am done I should have at least 1000 things that I have been thankful for over 2013.  It's going to be an amazing journey and I hope you enjoy going along with me. 

My prayer for all of us this year is that we can see God in so many more ways than we even thought possible, from the best of the best, to the small of the small.

Learning to Be an Inspiration

Inspiration.  One dictionary definition states that inspiration is

 I'm sure we've all seen things or known people who inspire us for different reasons.  I never thought that becoming a cancer patient would make me an inspiration. 


Throughout the past three years some people have said that I'm inspirational. I still don't quite know how to react to that. I can't say it's anything that I've ever striven to be. It's very humbling to have someone say that to me. In all honesty though, when you are a cancer patient it's hard to see yourself as an inspriation because this isn't something you chose to do, but instead it's something that has been thrust upon you.  I heard one cancer patient say that after so many times of being called someone's hero she felt like saying, "I can't be.  It's not like I ran into a burning building to save someone's life!" 


But as cancer patients surviving each day, sometimes with dignity and grace, and other times with not so much, people look at us and are surprised how we survive it all.  That's what is inspiring to them and makes us heroes of sorts.  We look at it as just survival while they look at it as something amazing and something they could never do.  I'm sure that even as cancer patients we can look at other's struggles and wonder if we could get through that.  That's why I  think anyone can be inspirational. Let me tell you about a few who have been inspirational to me.

I have a friend who is the first to volunteer meals and help whenever someone is sick or in need. I have another friend who lost part of her family in a car accident and then was able to direct a wonderful Christmas concert a month later. I have friends who after their father died were able to sing in full voice and as loudly as they could their father's favorite hymns at his visitation. I have another friend who can look money problems in the eye and with full confidence know that God will take care of them. I have another friend who you know when she promises to pray for you will do so for days on end, even when she has many trials of her own. I never knew if I could do what they did. But they weren't inspirational for what they did. These people were inspirational to me because I could see God through them. They knew God was right there and they could get through the bad stuff. And I've learned that's what is hard for one, can be easy for another. It's all in God's plan.


So for us, cancer might be the "easy" trial. It's not because of anything we have done. And it's not because there aren't hard parts. There are many parts of this trial that have been dowright discouraging over the past three years.   It's because God through His grace and mercy is letting us feel Him every day in some way. We have done nothing to deserve this. Our prayer is that when the next trial comes our way, that we can remember how God helped us through this one and that we can keep clinging to Him knowing that He is guiding our path for His good.


Yes, it is hard to hear the words that I am an inspiration to others at times.  I don't feel worthy to be called an inspiration.  But if I can in any way shine God's light through this cancer, then, with God's help, that it what I will strive to do.  And with God's help you can do it too.