Category: Illness and Health

Posted on in Aging, Challenge, Faith, Humor, Illness and Health, medical treatment

Humor Amidst Chronic Pain

Bob and I were driving some place. Beats me where? I had this thought that sort of made me giggle.

If you were to write a commercial for contemporary television, what would you say about chronic pain?

This is what came to me. Body rearrange – what is clamoring for attention – sort of like a brat child.

“This body rearrange is brought to you, by aches and pains au naturel. If it hurts, you ain’t dead yet!“

As the seasons change I find relief in the lack of HUMIDITY and air that is stifling. The cooler temperatures make for great sleeping. But there are days … oh my are there days … when everything hurts. The nice thing about Fibro is the pain moves about. If my elbows hurt this morning in a few hours it might be my knees. Tomorrow it could be some other place.

This body rearrange is brought to you, by aches and pains au naturel. If it hurts, you ain’t dead yet!“

Satchel Paige is quoted as having said, “Never give up … Find another way. And don’t pray when it rains if you don’t pray when the sun shines.”

And from https://freepuns.com/pain-puns/

84. Joint pain: proof I’m aging like a fine… curdled milk.

92. I am joint-ing hands with pain today.

62. My muscles are screaming for a massage.

74. I am trying to flex my way to a good mood.

Sounds like Gibbs with all the rule numbers!!

No matter what ails you, try to keep finding humor in the situation. We joked recently while walking what seemed like miles to a pulmonary appointment. We told the doc the office should be closer to the elevators at Christ hospital. Or perhaps they were hoping for a pulmonary crisis and an admission? Just kidding. I think.

Posted on in Aging, Art, Book quotes, Challenge, Faith, Illness and Health, Prayer, Spiritual discipline, Spiritual growth, Surrender, Trust, Worship

Wise Maya

How is your courage today? Perhaps you did not need to call upon courage at all today? Maybe you feel as if all your courage drained out like dishwater from the sink. Most of us need courage in some aspect of our life.

Without courage you can’t practice any other virtue consistently. You can be anything erratically—kind, fair, true, generous, all that. But to be that thing time after time, you need courage.

MAYA ANGELOU

Do you have the courage to be consistent in your walk and life with Jesus? Each day a new beginning but hopefully with the same conviction to honor God and do the will of the Almighty over your own wishes and desires.

I have found that courage comes with increased trust in the will of God for my life. I do believe the often quoted verse in Jeremiah 29: 11

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

There is a woman who is watching her husband fold under the ravages of Parkinson’s disease. She must do almost everything for him now. She requires courage to face every day. Recently she went to the store and for some reason her phone ringer was turned off. While she was away he had an episode of illness. The Paramedics tried to call her to tell her they were transporting her husband to the local hospital. They did not get an answer and left no message on the phone. Through the intervention of the Holy Spirit and the quick action of neighbors she was notified by text and actually arrived at the hospital before the ambulance.

Living with someone who suffers from a terrible disease requires courage on the part of the one who is not suffering the same malady. She needs courage to keep placing one foot in front of the other. She requires courage to face the unknown future. This is a terrible disease that will ravage his being and most likely require he will eventually be cared for at a nursing facility. For now, she is his nurse, his wife, his chief cook and dishwasher. She, too, has a disease. Though it is a rare one, it takes a toll on her every season.

God, our Father, give these caregivers the courage to walk with their loved ones day in and day out as they suffer and experience the various stages of disease.

The Benedictines remind us to keep death always before us. Most of us stuff that idea under the sofa cushions and refuse to even examine the truth therein.

By keeping death always before us we come to cherish life more than if we pretend death will never happen to us. Life is precious and to be enjoyed. Even when it is not enjoyable, there are gifts in our midst. A TV sports conflict to take our minds off ourselves. The taste of a lovely coconut macaroon to delight our senses. The change of seasons to bring us fresh air. The softness of a pet’s fur. The songs of cricket and tree frogs. The shadow cast by objects under the light of a full moon on a clear night.

We can embrace the fact of our coming death and say no to denial. I have repeatedly come across the idea that we have been dying ever since we were born. There is a mystery in birth that is not to be considered greater than the mystery in death. We are all hurtling towards death the moment we are born. As someone has said, “I do not fear dying. It is how I am to die that has been shivering in my boots.”

Memento mori means remember that you have to die. Once I wrote in this blog about being aghast at seeing the star of The Chosen wearing skull rings. Then I realized they were to remind him he too will have to die. Here is a video short where he explains ….

Courage to live this day fully. Yes, Lord, I need courage for that!

Posted on in Aging, Challenge, Faith, Illness and Health, medical treatment, Poetry, Prayer, Surrender, Trust, Yield

Chronic

Chronic means: continuing or occurring again and again for a long time. Being, providing, or requiring long-term medical care. Always present or encountered, especially : constantly vexing, weakening, or troubling.

This pain will not go away. Yes, it waxes and wanes, but it is never going to leave me until I die. I get so tired of it all. Lately I have especially had great difficulty when trying to get to sleep at night.

Today I will not have any caffeine at all in the afternoon. I will set up sleep meditations in case I cannot drift off on my own.

There are times when no matter how I prepare or take care of myself the chronic pain disrupts my life, my goals, my rhythm of living. There has not been a medication found to treat this. There are a few that help with some of the symptoms, but nothing that covers the umbrella of distress. It is chronic and sometimes crushing. I tell Bob there are times I feel as if I have been ground into a powder.

Why am I putting this in the blog? Well, there are likely others out there struggling with this or a similar problem. Sometimes I can get away from the all consuming pain sensations by getting focused upon a challenge or a project such as writing. Even one hour of departure from the torture chamber can be good. Cooking for an hour while singing favorite praise music can help. Sadly not every hour of the day can be spent planning a project, performing a task or rejoicing over a task completed.

I keep hearing snippets of a poem from 1985. When I looked for it just now it was about relationship trouble, not necessarily physical struggle.

Eleven Fifty-three Post Meridiem ©Molly Lin Dutina


Nighttime and the Unresolved
Come marching to my bedroom
Tramping through my head
Hurling accusations
Quoting words once said
Reason takes a low profile
While logic flees the scene
Where is the solution
For circumstances now turned mean
Never, shoulds, and woulds
Paint dismal, hopeless scenes
Understanding vanishes
Deep each insult bleeds.
Forgiveness is the answer
That makes the war to cease.


Let it go. Let go. Release.
Present moment calls to me
Be NowHere in God’s sweet peace
A song can be resung
The past can’t be undone
But pouring in forgiveness
The fall-out is made numb


Come to here and now
Feast on today’s plenty
In gratitude for all
Dare to now drink deeply
From streams of joy and love
We are granted
Only to
“Live our lives by moments”
Aren’t we now
1985

Though “Come to the here and now, feast on today’s plenty, in gratitude for all” does help me cope. When I come to the here and now in a painful night I have to place my focus upon Jesus Christ who loves me better than I love myself. I offer my pain on behalf of another. (I am not quite certain how that works, but I make the offering regardless.) I remember to breathe in Jesus and breathe out me, or breathe out my pain. I try not to watch the clock. Rest, just rest. Sink into the center down silence of love and peace.

I am seriously a work in progress. There is no medication that can help me with this. With St. Patrick I try to “arise today through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity with belief in the threeness and confession of the oneness towards the Creator.” Help me Lord not to project fear or negativity on this day and whatever it might bring. Help me to lie down tonight in Your arms of love and rest in Your everlasting care.

I will try to remember to pray compline especially with the wonderful portion of Psalm 4

verse 8 I lie down in peace; at once I call asleep; for only you, LORD, make me dwell in safety.

Posted on in Amazing Creations, Book quotes, Faith, Focus, Illness and Health, Music, Spiritual discipline, Spiritual growth, Surrender, Trust, Yield

Struggle Continues

I came across this poem set to music after reading Amy Carmichael’s chapter entitled Rose from Brier in her collected writings in the book by the same title. (Pages 51-53) I found it enchanting. The photography, also, especially the raindrops on the pavement! She heard this poem as “a little song that sang within me” as she longed to be at a welcoming service in the House of Prayer, but could not leave her bed.

Amy Carmichael Rose From Brier

She describes the sweetbrier of England in contrast to the roses of India. “I saw a little, low, very prickly bush in an old-fashioned English garden; it was covered with inconspicuous pink roses. But the wonder of the bush was its all-pervading fragrance, for it was a sweetbrier. And I saw one who has long been in the land where no thorns grow, cutting a spray from the bush, stripping the thorns off and giving it to me. May these for whom a rose from my brier may be caused to blow, those who do indeed walk the dear familiar ways of home, and road, and street, as unregarded as a breath of air, but there in love and longing, always there, find no pricking thorn on the stem of this rose from my brier.

“I think that when He whom our soul loveth comes so near to us, and so gently helps our human weakness, then what Madame Guyon wrote more than three hundred years ago becomes a present truth. We are borne over the oppression that would hold us down, we mount up on wings, we find a secret sweetness in our brier. But it is not of us. It’s Love that lifts us up. It is Love that is the sweetness.

“Is the one who reads this in a great weariness, or the exhaustion that follows a sore hurt, or in the terrible grasp of pain? He who loves as no one else can love understands to the uttermost, is not far away. He wants us to say, He can give it to us to say, “My Lord, my Love, I am content with Thee.”

Beautiful pink and yellow flower of dog-rose, sweet brier

In America we often call the same plant a Dog Rose. My neighbor has them in her backyard. I will have to experiment next spring to find out if the foliage is also fragrant as the internet reports!

I find the fragrance of Amy’s writings a gift to my soul.

Posted on in Art, Beagle, Faith, Family, Humor, Illness and Health, medical treatment, Praise, Prayer, Rest, Spiritual discipline, Spiritual growth, Thanks

Greeting Cards

I received so many nice cards while I was recovering from toe surgery! I eventually stapled them to a ribbon and hung them from the curtain rod in the dining room. A few of my favorites I actually read multiple times. The sentiments, though written for Hallmark or Day Spring audiences, spoke to me. I hope they find meaning in your heart also.

(Ugh I am still trying to find the most comfortable way to situate myself while writing at my desktop computer. Not easy with one leg elevated!)

It looks much better now, but still swells and then throbs.

The first card remains the funniest. I had confided in my friend Kathy that I was uncertain how I would manage the bathroom on one foot. She was right there when Bob brought me home from the outpatient procedure. She left a card and a small gift for me to open when I was up to it. The gift was this block sign:

And I have relied on her! She will text she is “going to Kroger. Need anything?” And whether I ask for an avocado or throat lozenges for dry mouth, she will find it and bring it to me. Her card was the funniest.

The sentiment reads, “Hope crappy turns into happy …get well soon!” Yes the perfect card for the event and the proloooonged recovery. And sort of looks like Lucky, too!

A little over half way through this recovery I go this one. “Stay positive. Stay hopeful. Keep going.” How did this dear friend know that I would be tempted to negativity. Tempted to lose hope? Tempted to just give up? Likely because I often confide in her my prayer requests. The card shows a close up of the center of a daisy. That is the flower I think of when I think of my daughter. Her birthday is in June and that is when many daisies here bloom. The inside sentiment reads, “I know you’re working hard at getting better, and I want you to know I’ll be rooting for you every step of the way.”

My life has sudden filled with 3 women named Debby. This particular Debby nails it on the head every time! Each Debbie is a blessing in her own right. One has a sister named Sandy. I am able to remember her name as I have cousins who are sisters: Debbie and Sandy!

Another recent card reads: “May each new day bring you gentle reminders of God’s ever-faithful love as He strengthens you with His healing touch.” I would read this and center myself in the knowledge that God loves each of us and I would look for the reminder round about me. There was always something there to cheer me on.

Another card came from a neighbor. This particular woman had been through several crises the last couple of years. I remember praying over her and trying to calm her during one in particular. I am not aware of this couple attending any church, but I try to share my faith wherever I am. They do know I am willing to pray for them whatever they are walking through. When she presented the card to me with a very generous gift card she seemed to take delight in telling me she remembered me talking with her about patience. Now is was her turn to reinforce the message about patience! Her card read, “Recovery is a process. It takes time. It takes patience. It takes everything you’ve got …. and you’ve got a lot – a kind heart, an amazing spirit, and people who really care about you.“

I placed that card on the kitchen counter where I could read it easily from the wheelchair I had to use after twisting my knee (adding insult to injury). It brought me great encouragement and comfort.

These are a few of the things that gave me pause to give give thanks to God. If you are compelled to send someone a greeting card do not underestimate what it might mean to the person receiving it. You never know how God might use you for such a time as this!

Posted on in Family, Amazing Creations, Faith, Illness and Health, Art, Look

Pumpkins!!

There is a new exhibit at the Cincinnati Art Museum by Yayoi Kusama called “All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins.” Click on the arrow below to get a feel for the exhibit.

We look forward to attending! Evidently there is an admission charge for this exhibit. In the room with the pumpkins and mirrors only 2 people at a time are allowed in the room. And you may only stay for 90 seconds. This exhibit has traveled to several museums and is evidently a huge hit.

More facts: “Born in 1929 and raised in Matsumoto, Japan, Yayoi first encountered pumpkins in the fields surrounding her childhood home. Her family cultivated and sold plant seeds, and pumpkins became a recurring motif in her artwork, serving as a self-portraiture. Before entering the installation, visitors can also view a rare collection of a dozen acrylic pumpkin paintings on canvas created between 1990 and 2004.”

“I hope that our visitors’ interests are piqued, and that they are curious about Kusama, her practice, and what she is doing within the contemporary art realm today. She’s still a living artist. She is a practicing artist,” Cameron says. Today, Kusama is 97 years old. “As a museum practitioner of ways that sort of take us out of our typical experience, to take us out of our day-to-day existence, that’s what this can do. I want people to walk out of that room with a bit of a reset. I hope it encourages people to manifest a joyful reality in similar ways that Kusama has created for herself and for us.” says Cameron Kitchin, Louis and Louise Dieterle Nipper director.

Kusama suffers from physical and emotional abuse administered by her mother. Her art is one way she copes with that.

Just in time for autumn around the corner. LOL! Wonder if they will serve pumpkin spiced lattes? HA-ha!

Posted on in Aging, Faith, Humor, Illness and Health, medical treatment, Memories, Music

Did You Sing This?

As I child I remember the song that went something like this:

Great green gobs of 
greasy grimy gopher guts
Little oggy doggie tails
mutilated monkey meat

That is what my week has been like, coughing up the entrails of this nasty virus.

Bob even asked if our tissues are one ply. No, they are not. These are just two tissue blows!

They say the song is important as they give kids a way to express the gory truth about life, usually to the parents’ disdain.”It is extremely popular because children often enjoy taboo subjects and references to things that are disgusting!”

Nope, not something I coughed up. Just as Osage Orange you might see along the road!

So do not catch this summer cold. It is disgusting and exhausting. Spray, throat lozenge, blow, neti pot, blow, pills, throat lozenge, blow and pray for a good night’s rest!

All the while thumping around in this boot that is beginning to feel massive. Yes, I do need another ice pack!

Posted on in Nature, Amazing Creations, Aging, Faith, Just do it, Thanks, Prayer, Collection of Quotes, Spiritual discipline, Illness and Health, Praise, Focus, Look, Joy

A Little Bit of Awe

Bob reads Time magazine. I occasionally pick it up if there is an article that catches my attention. In the throes of this recovery from surgery we both caught a wicked cold. The headache and coughing are exhausting. When I moved his magazine this article caught my attention, “5 Ways to Experience a Little Bit of Awe Every Day. ”My first reaction was , “Not again!?”

I was finding it difficult to think about awe in the midst of the ripping sound of Velcro, hot ortho boot, inability to move about the house without forethought and planning, gripping abdominal pain from coughing so long and so hard. Now someone wants me to find awe?

When I finally stopped long enough to read the article I realized the exercise was exactly what I needed. Dacher Keltner a psychologist and author is quoted as describing awe as the feeling you get “when you encounter things that are vast and beyond your frame of reference,” shifting attention away from self and toward something larger.

You can read the article here. https://www.pressreader.com/australia/time-international/20260727/281754161083947

I read through the list of 5 ways and made myself look away from the coughing and the lingering limitation to my walking ability. I found indeed there could be a shift in my thinking. I knew this to be true, but have not experienced this noticeable shift in several months. The shift is very difficult when you feel unwell.

For example, we had some nasty storms pass through our area recently. One tornado came within a handful of miles from our house. We watched the neighbor’s trees twist and turn in the wind as never before and the elephant ears in our garden were being whipped into a frenzy. I wondered what would happen to the newly bloomed mallow flowers on the shrub next to the giant ears. Two days later we were both marveling at how the flowers seemed to be entwined and hugged by the elephant ears in our garden. In other words, the plants were still standing and prospering despite all the storm threw at them.

If you don’t feel good and are limited in your physical function one challenge you don’t want to encounter is the invasion of the tiny black ants. One treat I am allowed is a couple of ginger snaps or a few select low carb cookies with my morning coffee. I opened the can with the coconut cookies and it was literally crawling with ants. So many in fact that I just threw the cookies away. There was no way to pick off a few and save the cookies.

Bob helped me pull things out of the closet and vacuum up ants. I sprayed bug killer and shut the pantry door. If would take hours to wash things off and replace them in the pantry. By the time I was finished I was exhausted. At some point in the housekeeping event I remembered the verse about consider the ant you sluggard, while contemplating how do they even get inside this house? Look they are congregating around the edges of the dishwasher. How do I spray there?

6 Go to the ant, you lazybones;
    consider its ways and be wise.
7 Without having any chief
    or officer or ruler,
8 it prepares its food in summer
    and gathers its sustenance in harvest.
9 How long will you lie there, O lazybones?
    When will you rise from your sleep?
10 A little sleep, a little slumber,
    a little folding of the hands to rest,
11 and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
    and want, like an armed warrior. Proverbs 6:6-11 NRSVUE

We find those tiny critters on the dining room table. I will occasionally find one walking up my arm. I am getting to the point if I feel like something is crawling on me I check to be sure it is not an ant.

There is the reset button! This invasion did not have to be more fuel for frustration and despair! We may never win the battle with the ants, but we can hold a little bit of territory. There are likely ten thousand upon ten thousand ants living in our backyard alone. When Bob pulls up a solar light to change the battery he often encounters them going mad up his arm and all over the light. A moment ago he saw none. Then wham he is battling for his own skin.

This marvel is occurring in all the neighbors houses. Some even find the ants where this is no food about such as in an office. Yet the ants explore and send out sentries and food gatherers. Can we just for a moment be in awe of them?

This awe is one thing that makes it possible to turn away from the attention my ailing self demands and look to the Lord. This marvel, even for a moment, helps me move towards praise and pray again. It is no slight thing to find a way to focus on the Risen Christ when your body of flesh is clamoring so loudly. Here again is a big reason why I admire Amy Carmichael so much. Her writings delineate her turning away from the flesh and the world to God Almighty.

You might want to try it today, if even for a moment.

Posted on in Amazing Creations, Challenge, Faith, Illness and Health, Praise, Rest, Surrender, Thanks, Trust, Worship

Limitations Can be Fun?

Everything, even the hard things, are wrapped up in the loving kindnesses of the Lord, and His loving-kindnesses “have been ever of old.” Psalm 25:6 I have searched, but I cannot find the place Amy Carmichael is quoting from with this passage about even the hard things.

I have been trying to sing “Li-mi-ta-tions can be fun,” but through the sarcasm I try to realize the truth of the matter.

Amy quoted Isaiah 63:7: I will mention the loving kindnesses of the Lord, and the praises of the Lord, according to all that the Lord hath bestowed on us, and the great goodness toward the house of Israel, which He hath bestowed on them according to His mercies, and according to the multitude of His loving kindnesses. Douay-Rheims 1898

I am truly sick and tired of the limitations after foot surgery. Then Bob and I both caught a VERY NASTY cold. What a mess. Doc said it is not covid or the flu. Likely a virus. I wondered about covid as I coughed so hard I feel as if I tore all of my abdominal muscles. You know it is bad when you wonder if it might be less painful to cough with a corset on? So yep, holding my belly and trying not to cough though coughing has been productive and gunk is clearing out of my sinuses and throat. Doc said 7-10 days until I feel better.

“Everything, even the hard things are wrapped up in love.” I have been searching for the love wrappings here. At times that wrapping is difficult to discern! Over a year ago my granddaughter gave me a bunch of crocheted squares that she grew tired of. She thought perhaps I could join them into a blanket, “or something.” They were placed in an area with other unfinished crochet projects. With this arthritic right thumb I have to be careful how much I actually crochet or I aggravate the joint into throbbing pain. When I grew tired of making hats for children I began putting an edge on the squares and noticed right away the increase in thumb pain. So I did just a bit a day. Soon I had the squares joined and began to plan how to increase the overall size.

I had purchased similar yarn to join the squares. I even have a deep turquoise but uncertain I will use it. I did not try to match the yarn she used. Besides, she had thrown away the wrappers, so I could have searched for a long time and would likely never find it.

Here I am seven weeks into this recovery. It has been difficult to pass the time without losing my cotton pickin’ mind. There is some what of a routine, but I would gladly toss that routine out the window for the ability to function without foot pain and swelling; from 4:00 PM on is the worst.

There are times I wonder if doc implanted a chameleon foot in place of my other one? It can turn the most awful shade of purple if I leave it hanging down for too long.

The other day I was remembering how I used to be able to pick things up with my toes. Those days are gone at least for the left foot! Looking for chameleon photos just now I wondered if this new toe could fetch me snacks like this chameleon is about to enjoy?

Love those little front paws/hands!

Nope, I have not learned origami though I started one piece. When the pattern got difficult I realized I was losing my patience and put it aside.

I have been able to do more things around the house than those first few weeks. Bob tells people he used to have to do 200 things for me everyday. Now he is down to about 40? Sometimes if I ask him to do something he will tease me saying, “45!” Such a clown. My strength and endurance is increasing.

Several friends have come from time to time to work on my list of things to do that I cannot do. They have been such a blessing to us both! Their help reduces the things I require from Bob. Lord knows, he has been doing PLENTY!

I will recount the gracious deeds of the Lord,
    the praiseworthy acts of the Lord,
because of all that the Lord has done for us
    and the great favor to the house of Israel
that he has shown them according to his mercy,
    according to the abundance of his steadfast love. Isaiah 63: 7 NRSVUE

Grateful for the healing that is occurring. Grateful for a loving husband willing to do whatever I ask during this time of recovery. I praise God for church family who lift me constantly in prayer and in person, through texts and greeting cards, always there with me through this long season of recovery.

Posted on in Book quotes, Faith, Illness and Health, Praise, Prayer, Spiritual discipline, Spiritual growth, Surrender, Thanks, Worship

Amy Carmichael

Have I told you how much I treasure her book The Edges of His Ways? Oh what a challenge and encouragement and comfort her writing is to me. I think I will tire of it and another year passes with me reading a passage each morning and pondering the meaning for each of us in the current year.

Is this passage she writes:

“As I read the New Testament over and over, I am more and more impressed by the way suffering was taken for granted as something appointed; but always there is the thought of joy not far off. In our Lord’s private talks with His disciples there is continually and clearly that “Must” of suffering, and the joy to follow. We often act as if the place that is called Calvary had been taken out of the landscape of life, or were an accident there. It is not so; but just out of sight is the joy that is set before us, and there is the power which can enable us to treat the invisible as visible, the promised as present.”

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God. Hebrews 12:1-2 NRSVUE

That describes suffering we more than likely will never have to endure.The example is set for us though by our Savior. Whatever the suffering, endure it. Disregard or despise any shame involved with that suffering. Always reach for the joy set before us. What joy you may ask? The joy of eternal companionship with the Trinity. The joy of the promises of Jesus: we are never alone. We will know His voice. EVERYTHING we need has been given to us.

My friend Chuck who has an acute form of leukemia recently texted me, “Our faith and the good Lord’s strength are what gets us through each day. I still have a big hallelujah even on the worst day.”

So I sent him the song Hard Fought Hallelujah performed by Brandon Lake, John Batiste and Jelly Roll.

I have no idea what the purpose the water on stage was, except maybe to symbolize the Holy Spirit?

“And there is the power which can enable us to treat the invisible as visible, the promised as present.” Thank you Amy and the folks who continue to make her writings available.