In the Chaos.... and In the Calm

Why do these things always seem to happen in the middle of the night?  It's 4 am and my son's insulin pump has stopped working. Bleary eyed, I muscle through drowsiness, giving a shot of insulin to bring down a blood glucose level of almost 600... and wait. I restart the pump;  it kicks back into gear.   I pray, and wait.  Every hour, on the hour, I check blood glucose levels and pray . Mid morning the pump shuts down again. It won't re-boot. After a conversation with the insulin pump company, a new pump is sent out. I find an older pump, our "back up", and continue to check Blood Glucose levels hourly,  correcting high BG levels via syringe. Late in the afternoon, the "substitute" pump stops working... and I panic . I have back up "24 hour" insulin on hand, but need the doctor's guidance regarding dosage. I call the endocrinologist's office and wait. And wait. Wait to see if he'll switch over to "shot therapy" til ...

Sometimes life is more than complicated- it's staggering . It's tangled and muddled, raveled into a turbulent mire. Caregivers can find themselves deluged as special needs or medical issues bring much more than we can handle. Beth Moore writes : "I am so glad God did not limit his Holy Writ to high and lofty subjects. " No, he gets down and dirty with the best of us, reaching for us in the midst of the messiest, most desperate times. " So that we don't lose heart or hope, He graciously made sure we'd know... abnormal is more normal than normal ." (Believing God: Week 4, Day 5)  Still, there are secret shames that haunt our paths. Pressures and broken places, shards littering the path to greater wellness. Some of the stumbling places are losses or wounds. Others are diagnoses. The ones we don't talk about. The ones that come with a stigma. Diabetes is generally accepted, but what of depression or anxiety? When families flounder through menta...

It was one of those days. One of those weeks, really. One of those homeschooling, lucky-if-I-get-five-minutes-to-myself-between-doctor-visits kinds of weeks. Busy is an understatement. That evening my youngest had a school event where I'd see friends and neighbors and I was feeling thrown together, and not really keen on the world seeing me in this condition.  I have one child in public school and am homeschooling the other. Both have some specific medical issues requiring this tactic. This leads to an interesting, and mostly manageable dynamic, but leaves little time for self care-- and a great need for recovery. All week I'd been grabbing lightening quick showers... but it was beyond hair washing day, ya'll. Way beyond. My ultra-fine-straight-as-a-board hair needed more TLC than I had time to give. My focus had been on basic hygiene: soap, deodorant, and toothpaste. (I've postponed more than one hot date with the curlers this month.)  I'd also had the drea...

One of the great myths of modern day Christianity is that of a controlling God. Whether the day is going badly or the horrendous has happened, the platitude "God is in control" abounds.  My sweet friend Marilynn, from our Ladies By Design writing group gave me food for thought during a discussion about control. Control is self centered manipulation of people and circumstances to reach a desired outcome- sometimes through the compromising of values. Most often control is rooted in fear . God, however, is not fearful. Nor is God self centered.   God is the embodiment of unselfish, unconditional love. He has no need to "control".  Consider the flowers in the field, Marilynn urged.  God created the seed, set in motion the processes of wind dispersal and weather systems, providing soil and seasons, rain and sun. Yet God does not force the flower to bloom. He invites the seed to die, to germinate, to put down roots into fertile soil, to grow and blossom. So,...

I have longed for joy in this season when my son's health seems to have spiraled out of control. I have had to pray and release, pray and release, all while strains of Christmas music fill the air. So many songs about peace and joy. I wonder, what is joy? Where, exactly, does it begin and end? Throughout my life Christmas has been a time of wonder and awe. My birthday falls on the day after we celebrate the birth of this Savior for all mankind. It was personally significant to me to share my birthday with Jesus- to have my own birth celebrated even while celebrating the miracle of God's great love for us. His love, in fact, has permeated my existence. Every season, whether I walked close to him or held my heart at a distance, I was drawn by that glorious love. But joy? I have struggled to find joy on this special needs pathway. I am beginning to accept that my definition of joy differs from God's deep understanding of it. I have seen joy as a great burst- a sudden a...

Tonight was spent searching. Searching back over ramblings from this medically intense journey, re-reading lessons learned along the way. Stories from past seasons jog memories, and rather than linger, I kick against the goads. Another diagnosis has been added and I am already stretched thin. I know that each new diagnosis must be grieved, worked through, but I'd rather be where I was, in a place of schedules and simpler uncertainties. I've come so far, still I have much to learn and live out. Again I am caught in a cross-fire of medical chaos. Unanticipated? Not really. Unaccepted? For sure. No parent wants to watch their child suffer. A mother's heart is pierced by her child's pain. Pieces of me cleaved and torn again, old fears resurfacing along the way. For years I've spent my days carefully guarding a sometimes fragile life- a multitude of moments seeking to accept that it is God who sustains breath , while I am stretched to find balance in the roles of careg...

I find myself overwhelmed these days. I want to run , I want to tunnel in, I want to find lasting rest; freedom from this dizzying pace. In seasons when I rush to and from medical appointments, trying to find a time to fit in grocery shopping can be a challenge. I miss that slower pace, recognize my need to unwind, remember a recent retreat (in Ireland). Together with other wounded warrior families, for an entire week my husband and I were blessed by lavish love. Such an amazing gift, having every one of my needs met- often without even asking. We came home, jolting into reality .  My teenage son was dealing with major health issues and urgent appointments needed to be made. Difficult conversations have peppered the weeks since our return- and even more medical appointments than usual. I am so very grateful for the respite granted, and when I close my eyes I can still see the lush greens that soothe and heal a heart battered by busy-ness. Now it seems ther...