Chronic Pain

At some point in our lives we will all experience a tragedy, a physical illness, the death of a loved one, or the loss of a dream. In these moments, doubts and questions will arise. How could this happen? Why me? What did I do to deserve this? How am I ever going to survive this? Where is God in all of this?

I have been there. Three times, in fact. My father suddenly died in his 40’s, leaving me to pick up the pieces of my shattered teenage heart. In college, I battled a dark depression that threatened to undermine my faith, my mind, and my emotional well being. And recently, with the rapid decline of my physical health and diagnosis of an autoimmune disease. Did I really trust God to take care of me? Could I really depend on Him to provide what I needed? If He really cared about me, why was He letting me suffer? I knew He could heal me, but could I keep my faith even if He chose not to? Do I still believe God is good and loving even when He doesn’t step in to relieve my suffering? These questions haunted me.

But these questions saved my life. Continue reading →

the broken road my journey with disease It started out as a normal summer day and we couldn’t have been more thrilled. Hubs and I had just purchased our very first home. And it was yellow. I had prayed for yellow. Moving day was set, our boxes packed. We were moving right along with our list of goals: New house, check. Jobs, check. Furniture, check. Search for a dog, check. Our future was looking bright.

And then it happened. Something didn’t feel quite right. My energy started to fail and I found myself getting easily fatigued. Over the next few weeks my knees began to swell until they became the size of cantaloupes. As the swelling increased, the pain grew. It hurt to walk, it hurt to stand, it hurt to move.

I spent my 30th birthday and a good part of that year battling a crippling disease. Instead of gracefully waltzing into a new decade, I hobbled my way through. Within two weeks of our move I became confined to our couch, utterly fatigued without even enough energy to make myself a sandwich. Even hobbling across the floor to the bathroom became a tremendous feat. My body was rapidly breaking down before my very eyes and there was nothing I could do about it. Continue reading →