It will be a slower morning with a lot of treatments this afternoon. Picking up from my posting last night, of course, I’m (like my family) are still grief. I feel like I’m using my tip toes reaching downward trying to find the bottom of the darkness of grief, but yet I can still feel just empty space, that I have not yet explored the full depth of it and without God’s grace, it will beyond what this mere mortal can handle. How can I bare this?
I have a new nurse, which is a good thing. He actually came into my room and spoke with me and prayed with me. The previous nurses (except for 1) avoided me like the plague. This nurse, Jason, and I talked about how some people cope with grief by avoiding it. That some of the other nurses and staff wanted to just close my door and not come in unless it was an absolutely emergency.
After dialysis, I’m feeling some stronger, but we started out slow.
I spend time reading for a path out. I’ve read about a couple of people who were this bad off and lived, lived for a few years at least. But my hopes have been dashed so much, I’m so afraid to have hope.
I have never believed in a magician or jenny-in-a-bottle God. That is the God that changes history only if we pray hard enough. I’ve learned through life experiences that doesn’t happen most of the time, only wishful thinking.
I have never known how God works with fate. This is something the Greeks struggled with an as do I. God has to beyond fate, bigger than fate, or He could not be more of a God than the Greek gods. But it is clear that God lets history take it place, even if that history is horrid. I trust that He knows how all this works out.
So, I argue with myself if it is good for me spiritually and mentally to imagine that there is a road out of this nightmare? Will I ever see outside of a hospital? Will I ever smell clean fresh air? Will I be able to sit on our dock and hold hands with my wife again? Or, will those hopes only worsen the despair when it doesn’t come?
J. Michael Jones 
5 responses to “I’m Vertical Once More”
Thank you for sharing these raw emotions. I continue to pray for you all to have peace, strength and love whatever the outcome. Glad to hear you have a new nurse who understands that silence isn’t a good way to deal with grief. Thinking of you all.
LikeLike
Mike – I know 2 people who have lived long and well with MM, one still with us after a decade, so hope isn’t unfounded. Your grief is healthy – I believe people who face their death and loss actually do better – wallow in it as you are. But eventually begin to envision how you want to live knowing you will die AND how you want to live if you survive – plan for both and hold both possibilities in your hands at the same time. It is completely unpredictable. My prayer for you is that you arrive to where you are OK with either path.
LikeLike
I’m grateful that Jason showed up this morning. Being “heard” is a gift… I’m glad he was there to listen.
I’m praying that God is big enough for the abyss beneath you. I know He is and yet surely it doesn’t feel this way when you are hanging, wondering what story lies ahead for you and your family. He is such a mystery and there are a hundred questions for every one answered.
I’m praying He’ll enable you to know His goodness in the presence of such heart-wrenching pain.
If I have one prayer for you today is that hope will not die. That the tiniest flicker of hope will remain, sustain and carry you through every question and fear.
God be present with you and those you love, dear man.
Praying…
LikeLike
You will make it out of this. You are loved by too many and too much for us to let you stay in this dark tunnel. The power of positive thinking no matter how dire the situation is what gives you the strength to fight. Negative thoughts are your enemy and the diseases’ friend. Don’t play for the other team. You are my brother and you are a fighter. You always have been. How else would we have survived Gary’s daily torture sessions as we grew up together. I guess tickling us to we peed our pants sounds pretty good to you right now! But don’t test our faith, embrace it. I have and will continue to KNOW you are my baby brother and you will fight this fight and you will win. Don’t let statistics be your Bible. Your a writer and a great one. Write your own ending to your story. The ending where you are the hero that fearlessly fought with your sling shot and beat the giant. Every time one negative thought creeps into your brain, replace it with two positive ones. You can have my kidney, you can have my bone marrow and you can have my strength to fight and win. I’ll be right beside you every day and every night with my spirit willing you to good health again. Don’t you dare let me down! I’m coming to sit on that dock with you and beside you and Denise. And we will bow our heads in thanks that you had the strength mentally and physically slay this dragon with the help and support from all of those who love you! Your Sis
LikeLiked by 1 person
You don’t know me, other than I was a stranger that came to tell you at Safeway several years ago that your words in church moved me like no other. I have a husband who deals with the world in a scientific mind frame and you reminded me of him with all your statistics and figures but then you pulled faith out of the next paragraph and you made the concept of science and God so beautiful.
Since last Sunday, my husband and I have been talking about you every night at dinner. He asks me, “have you heard any news about Mike?” I am the prayer and he is the solver of medical mysteries. He tells me that you are strong, have your faith, that you love your wife and she loves you and that there are total strangers in Anacortes that are keeping you in their thoughts and prayers. God bless you.
LikeLike