It’s Saturday morning and as I sit with coffee in hand, my
mind is still on a reel from the past several weeks. The only thing that keeps
coming to my mind is “How did I do that?” This month comes in, in at least the
top three most stressful eras I have faced. I teach at what is considered a
satellite campus for the district. The first week of school was a MONSTER. Did
I mention the internet being down and parents impatiently making requests for
registration that I could not grant and administrators frantically demanding
paper work? As a PreK teacher the first
day is very chaotic and stressful as there are tears and often blood curdling
screams from students and sometimes parents, who are emotional leaving their
babies for the first time. This year was no different. Thankfully by day two
internet had been restored and we were able to continue with enrollment (notice
I said enrollment and not teaching…somehow I was expected to do both. I’m good
but not that good). The building had flooded two weeks prior, so we had gotten
in with JUST enough time to set up. Documents were damaged in the flood and
paper work was missing that had to be redone for registration. I have many
English language learners and really cannot explain to you how extremely
stressful it is to walk refugee parents with limited language, through online
registration. Yet, all of the above, oddly enough, are reasons I love my job. I
love the population I serve in a Title 1 program. My heart is there. It thrives
there. In the midst of the crazy and the stress, I was beginning to feel like
me again. Not the cancer patient. Not that one teacher who had cancer and was
out last spring. But me. The old me.'
In the middle of first week chaos, I had an oncology follow-up
and results from the biopsies taken the week prior. Unfortunately, the news was
not good. Cancer remains. Right now the treatment will be surgery and depending
on how surgery goes maybe another round of chemotherapy. My heart is so
thankful for an oncologist who will sit and talk to me. Who will shoot straight
with me, who I feel has my best interest at heart. I am beyond thankful for a
plan forward. I trust her with my very life.
Yet…I am so sick of being sick. Wasn’t I JUST starting to
gain some energy? Wasn’t I JUST feeling like me again? And now major surgery?? I am tired of this. I
long for normalcy, but I don’t even know what that is. I was looking through
photos last night and can’t even pinpoint when things changed. I can kind of
get it within a few months, but not really. Part of me wants things to go back
to how it was before cancer, but I know I never can. And would I really choose
that anyway? I am not the same person. I
don’t even feel like I look like the same woman and on a realistic note, it has
aged the hell out of me. Inside, I am changed beyond what I can fully explain.
Perspective shift is an understatement. I see absolutely nothing the way I did
before. Nothing. Even the, “Oh wait, you still have cancer” thing looks and
feels completely different on this side.
Before, cancer was unknown. I didn’t even want to say the word. I was
completely fearful, and unsure. I am still those things to an extent, but it
feels more familiar. I have been around it a lot, which is the part that makes
me feel comfortable yet afraid because I have watched with my eyes what it can
do. The fact that mine is still hanging around is unnerving and yes, I am
afraid. Yet there IS a plan forward and reasons to be thankful.
Which leads me to lay out the constant conversation I have
been having with myself the past few weeks….Can you be afraid and unsettled YET
still thankful there is a plan? Can you admit fear and still have faith in the
One who holds your very life? Can you admit your weakness, weariness, and
frustration and STILL be thankful there is a plan forward in treatment?
Every
single one of those feels like they are in opposition to one another but I feel
every single one of those-at any given moment. At any point during my recent
days I have been on the verge of either tears of fatigue, tears of fear, tears
of frustration, tears of thankfulness and humility, OR cursing out of
frustration because people want to either act like I’m their hero (which can
feel very uncomfortable) OR like NOTHING has happened, or cursing out of
frustration that I have been feeling more like me and now I am getting my legs
kicked in again. Now, you tell me….does THAT sound like someone who trusts in
God’s plan for her life? Does that look like someone who has it together and is
holding fast to her faith?
How beautiful and amazing, that the answer to those
questions is a big fat NO…..yet a big fat YES at the same time? See, God is
showing me that admitting my weakness is actually strength. Y’all, I’m talking
about the kind of weakness where you cry out in tears, throw up your hands, and
yell out some F bombs because you got nothing. I’m talking about admitting that
you are terrified that cancer will not ever fully go away and you’re bound to a
life of treatment. I’m talking about admitting that you don’t understand why
God chose you to carry this burden, even if just for a season. I’m talking
about weakness, where you say “I’m confused by God’s choice for ME to not have
biological kids, but I see first-hand, every day, selfish adults who appear to
be baby factories.” I’m talking about asking God why He asked me to do this for
a little bit longer.
The beauty of it is that when our hearts get to that point
and we are stripped naked with nothing left to hold on to-and we admit out
weakness, we have a choice. We can either continue to wallow in those questions
and live in limbo and anger OR we can choose to lay them at the feet of the One
who made us. Think about it. He made me. He knows I am pissed. He knows I am
scared and afraid. He knows I am wondering how in the world He will redeem this?
The absolute beauty of the gospel is that I can be honest with Him, He can hold
me in my weakness and that I am may NEVER understand any of this….but He will
hold me. AND in my weakness, I may crawl out of His lap several times a day,
thinking “I got this” “I can do this now”….. and when I finally start seeing
how very much “I don’t have it” and how “I can’t do it, “ He scoops me right
back up and I bury my head in His lap and weep.
The truth is, I am no one’s hero. I am weak. I do not have
it together in any way. I just admitted to you that I am basically on the verge
of either tears or cursing, at any given moment. I am not “doing great” and I
feel like I hobble home every day and hobble around my house and then fall into
bed. I really am mostly dry shampoo and coffee.
The only thing I know for sure, is that my heart desires to
stay in His lap. I fail miserably at this daily, sometime multiple times. Maybe
you do too? Is that okay? Does that make your faith weak? Does asking questions
make you weak? I have personally never felt so close to God than I do now. It’s
funny how that is. I have not been able to attend church regularly since
February, I have said more F bombs in the last 8 months than I ever have in my
life, I am admitting that there is a lot I do not understand and a lot that I want
to go away, I am admitting that I am weak and want this cup to pass, and
yet….He is with me. Daily I feel Him more than ever. As I hobble around my life, every moment I am aware of His presence and that only by His provision and
goodness, am I here. He is here.
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| A flower I found on a walk this week. |
Luna keeping me company after biopsy surgery.
