Hospital Souvenirs

After Beka got used to the scar, she had news for me.

“You know what it looks like Mom? Let me show you!”

She dug around in the scissors drawer until she came back with this pair of scissors and held them up triumphantly. Later on, she asked me if the doctor used scissors to open up my neck.

I know what SHE is thinking!

I am getting used to the scar. To turning my whole body to turn my head. And the fact that I am, once again, slower and weaker. What has been hard to deal with is the trauma to the nerves. I didn’t have nerve damage with my first surgery, stayed in the hospital longer, and was on stronger meds longer.

My the pain begins in my right ear, extends down the right side of my face, my right shoulder, and radiates down with a burning, numb feeling. My ear feels like it was burned to a crisp during a too-long-of a day at the beach. It hurts to the touch. I am praying for healing, and I ask for your prayers. The pain ranges only from a 3-4 on a scale of 1-10, but it is a constant sensation.

It reminds me of a conversation I had in the middle of the night with my angel nurse, Janae. The Lord provided one of His sweetest saints to minister to me hour by hour the night I was in the hospital. I wonder if she really was a nurse, or if she was a real angel. As we were joking about my long, ugly scar, and she encouraged me to wear it proudly because I was alive.

I told her that I didn’t have the same kind of trials that the Apostle Paul had, mine aren’t as great, but I have adopted his attitude. “I bear on my body the marks of Jesus Christ.” (Galatians 6:17). I told her I considered my scar to be one for the Lord Jesus Christ, because He allowed the cancer and I wanted to bring Him glory through the cancer.

She smiled and reminded me of something else of Paul’s life, that he asked three times for the Lord to remove the thorn and the Lord said no. (2 Corinthians 12:7) As we continued to talk about the Lord we both loved, I knew the Lord was speaking to me through this angel nurse. I was so thankful for this blessed fellowship in the middle of the night, in the middle of a dark hospital room, where I was surrounded with sounds of sickness and unhappiness and had mistakenly thought, for a few moments, that I was all alone.

Through each stage of this cancer journey I have had to lift up my expectations to the Lord and let Him work as He sees fit. I thought after suffering so nicely for Him the first time, I would be done. I thought that I suffered so nicely the second time that He would heal me. I guess I forgot to ask for no pain. I guess I thought I could suffer only under my terms. I have to repeatedly offer each part of my heart, body and mind to the Lord and let Him truly work as He sees fit.

If He asked me if I was willing to trade the cancer for a little pain, wouldn’t I have said YES? But, He doesn’t ask, because I had already told Him I want to walk by faith, I want to be His, I want to bring Him glory, I want to win souls, I want to be like Him. Why did I offer these valiant prayers with formulas attached?

Yes, pray for my healing. The pain isn’t horrible, but the constancy of it can be draining. I find it hard to not think about how I feel all the time. Instead of now trying to rejoice even though I have the emotional trial of carrying around cancer in my body, now I have the physical trial of the pain it cost to remove the cancer.

But, there is always somebody worse off than ourselves, isn’t there? I haven’t had chemo, I haven’t had radiation,; to some dear cancer sufferers I am barely in the throes of suffering. You may think what you are going through is nothing because you don’t have cancer. We must never measure our trials against someone else’s, only against the purpose the Lord has to refine us.

I Peter 1:6, “We greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, you are in heaviness through many trials.” For every trial there is a need a “need be” tailored to fit you.

I remember in the middle of one sleepless night, where I was communing with the Lord, and asking Him why He allowed the cancer to continue  indefinitely. I went through almost three years of testing with lumps and stuff in my blood, but they were never able to give me a conclusive diagnosis that I did or did not have cancer. The still small voice that broke through the darkness to answer my wondering heart, “That patience may have its perfect work.”

So, dear friend, whatever you are going through, let the voice of the Lord speak to you, that “Patience may have its perfect work.”