Pain is something we avoid at all costs, and when in severe pain we will do almost anything to cure it. Had I known how closely I would walk with that word this past year, surely I would have run from this past year entirely.
Pain started in my life last January, and it relentlessly clung on to me for dear life and hit almost every aspect of my being. Thankfully I've never been a person with physical pain, and if I did have pain- I didn't talk about it much. No history of headaches, migraines, chronic soreness, or sickness. I was a marathon runner for years so in my mind pain was something that got pushed away, ignored, it was something to overcome. Last year at this time I began having an intense flare up from a recent car accident injury that only intensified over a few weeks' time. I have three herniated disks from my prior accident, two of which are in my neck and those two started a major revolt in my body. I am not a stranger to physical pain, I birthed a 9+pound baby, had my eardrum explode as a young adult, ran multiple marathons in my day and nothing could prepare me for the months of pain I would have to endure. At its peak, I had lost 13 pounds in 2 weeks, which in a normal January, post holiday I would have been thrilled about. Let me tell you; Worst. Weight loss. Plan. Ever. To the people who have not a clue what I am talking about, the pain was like when you were a kid and a peer would take your arm and wrap it behind your back and then pull up towards your shoulder blades until you said "mercy" for them to quit. That was like the pain I was in, except I would shout, "Mercy!" and the pain never stopped, not ever. I couldn't sit in a chair, I couldn't stand for long, and laying in bed had to be done with many proppings and pillows. I would take the walk down stairs only to stand at the counter and force myself to eat 5 bites of yogurt so that I could take my pain meds with out getting nauseous. I had the food/ medication thing down to a science. I had MRI's done, went multiple times to the ER, and specialists had been visited. I had tried oils, naturals remedies, pain meds, stronger pain meds, various recommended specialists, muscle relaxers, and medical treatments.
I remember laying in bed 24 hours a day, staring at the ceiling counting the imperfections on the wooden beams to distract myself, not able to focus on the TV or get my head in a position to even watch the TV. Of course, I went to online message boards, (probably not recommended and have now dubbed "fear boards"), with people with the same injuries to the same disks. I heard nightmare stories of chronic, lifelong pain. There were horror stories of treatments gone wrong, surgeries that only made their issues worse and I thought, "I never signed up for this." Pain had my attention and refused to be ignored. I had told my Dad that I simply couldn't stand the pain anymore and if this was the way it was going to be with no end in sight, I wanted out. I could not live years or months with this type of pain. I needed relief. I needed mercy. When you are in severe pain, no matter if it is physical, emotional, or spiritual pain you'll try anything to find relief. I plead with God to remove the pain. I bargained with God if only He would take the pain, what I would do for Him. Then came the self -examining of why I was in this position. Did I do something wrong? Had I failed God in some way and now this was my punishment? Yes, I absolutely tormented myself! (Side bar.... Sometimes pain happens to you. Period. We live in a fallen world. Period. Bad things happen to everyone sometimes. We all need Grace and do not deserve it. Period. John 16:33 says "In this world you WILL have trouble and sorrow. BUT take heart I have overcome the world.")
One day I had spent the day just staring up at the ceiling, I was about 6 hours in, and tears were streaming down the side of my face, (a real hot mess of pity). I had gotten off of the phone with my parents who were out of state at the time, and I was feeling SUPER sorry for myself. My husband was out of town, I had NO mom in town to take care of me, I couldn't drive my kids around, I couldn't even get up to shower. I was feeling helpless, hopeless, and stuck. I had it out with God and just told him that He had the capacity to heal me in a instant, I had the faith to believe it, He had healed me of much harder things in the past, what was His hold up? A soft whisper came back to my heart and He said, "I am here."
That made me mad, furious actually. Now the tears came hot and streaming and I said back out loud, "Then YOU are a mean God, what joy do you get from watching me suffer? Am I supposed to feel glad that you are up there just watching me?' I just heard God's soft voice repeat back, "I am here. I am very much working on your behalf." Minutes later, I got a random phone call from my sister with whom we don't talk over the phone with too much and lives further away than any of my family members. She called and said, "Hi, I know this is random but I was praying for you early this morning when I woke up and I felt I was supposed to cancel my plans for the day and come up and just be "Mom" to you for the weekend." You see, God was very much in the midst of my situation, and was working- just not in the way I had planned.
A longer story short, eventually my pain decreased on a physical level-with the help of some epidural steroid injections into my spine, rehab, etc, my physical pain is lessened. However the pain of 2016 morphed into other areas of my life and it was unbearable at times.
This past year I've witnessed up close, front and center, the pain of a daughter losing her mother to cancer, I have witnessed family turned upside down, shaken up, torn apart at its very core, I have seen parents lose children/grandchildren, I have seen people in turmoil of inner pain that is so raw and deep inside that it shows up on the outside of a body.
Pain. it is no respecter of persons; it is raw, deep, relentless, and it is powerful enough to bring the strongest of us to our knees. I have enough experience the last 9 months of 2016 to fill a book, and maybe someday I will. The first 3 months of physical pain was only a shadow of what the next 9 months of other types of pain would entail. I am not an expert in pain, hopefully I will never wear that title, no one wants that title.
There is plenty I do not know, but what I do know I have walked through and that can not be shaken or taken away. I do know that God is no stranger to suffering and pain. That he became pain and suffered with us..... for us. I do know that he is my Emmanuel, meaning God is with us, ever present. He is with us in every season and can be trusted. He is very near to those who are broken in heart. Some of my darkest of nights I have heard his voice clearer, gentler, and so divine. I also know that some things in life will always be painful, there isn't a pretty bow to be wrapped around every thing that happens, and that's okay too. He is good, but not everything that happens to me is good. He can be trusted, he is sovereign and I am not. We can learn to function with some degree of pain or move around a painful situation, and we have a God that is our helper in times of need. We are enough and have enough in Him. I do know God does not cause pain, but he does redeem it. I have heard in my life more times than I can count that "God doesn't give us more than we can handle." I think God allows us more than we can handle ALL of the stinking time. How else would be recognize our need of a Savior?
I would not wish my last year on anyone, nor would I want to repeat it. But I am better for it. I remember last winter telling a few people in my small tribe what I was feeling in regards just to my physical pain and interestingly enough three different people at three different times had the same response. A look of familiarity brushed over them. Their eyes filled with tears, the mouth trembled as they told similar stories and ways they had resolved that pain. That touched me in profound ways for THEY KNEW firsthand what I had been experiencing, they could identify and actually felt my pain. From their eyes I could see that they understood in ways others could not, they prayed for me in different ways than others did. If there was one thing good from my painful year it is that I identify pain in others more easily; emotionally, physically, spiritually. Maybe that is what the scripture means when it says, "to carry one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ." Maybe in the redeeming process of our own pain we learn to carry another's pain a bit more tenderly, a little more full of grace, a little more like Jesus did.
I did get a new Giving Key this fall and I had it specially made with the word ENDURE on it. God showed me this year he was going to "Strengthen my frame," Isaiah 58:10. In James 1:2-4, it says that our "suffering produces endurance," and in Peter 5:10 it says, "And after you have suffered a little while longer, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore you, confirm you, strengthen you, and establish you." He takes our broken parts and brings his healing if we let him into our messy lives, He takes our ashes and makes something beautiful from them. My father-in-law calls it, "The Great Exchange." In Isaiah 61:3 it says, "He gives us beauty for ashes, joy for our mourning, and praise for our despair." In the end if he can take a year of PAIN and exchange it for a year I learned to lean into his grace and ENDURE, I can get behind that kind of redemption process.
