Hope

Following the hospital stay, I was discharged to rehab. Kaiser has an excellent, intensive therapy rehab center that is about 90 minutes away from where we live. When I heard about it, I was pretty excited to get started with a team of physical and occupational therapists and doctors. It sounded intense and intense is just what I needed. We kept waiting for a bed to open up...but nothing. Finally, I got the good news! It was worth waiting for....Kaiser was moving me to an equivalent out of network facility 10 MINUTES from my house!!! This meant my family could visit easier. My kids could come and visit. And friends!!! Oh thank you, my sweet friends.

I arrived on a Sunday. It is the only day off in the therapy schedule. It is also the only hair washing day for patients that need their hair washed in their bed, which because of surgery; I did! I can't think of anything better! It had been 10 days! It was also the first time in 10 days that I was dressed in my own clothes! not hospital gowns. I was smiling ear to ear!

What I didn't know at the time was that my doctor had given me a 50/50 chance to walk again after the spine compression that had left me paralyzed. In the hospital I was working on sitting up with assistance in bed instead of lying down. At first it caused me to feel dizzy just to be in an upright position after so long. I think we attempted to stand before I left the hospital. I was not quite, but almost there! My first week in rehab went great! The progress I made was miraculous....continues to be miraculous! I always held onto the thought that I WOULD walk again. I just couldn't see it any other way. Until, finally, I learned the prognosis my doctor had given me. 50/50 chance....

At this point I was in a wheelchair and getting along well. I had been standing in a standing frame to strengthen my legs. My energy was high. I knew God was with me. He had been present in his joy for the last 21 days or so. However, when I got this news, hope flew out of me and I was immediately flung into despair. The possibility of being in a wheelchair the rest of my life loomed before me and I was scared! In that moment I cried out to God in prayer. “LORD! I WILL NOT LET THIS DEFEAT ME! I WILL NOT GIVE INTO THIS!”. And by “this” I meant despair. I knew that if I gave it even a little room in my life it was going to pull me down and drown me. I'm not talking about fear or sadness, which continue to be a part of my emotional process and I count as healthy. I am talking about DESPAIR. The despair that my fate is laid out...it is the worst outcome...and I am hopeless. It is the hopelessness that I could not let in. Not then, and not later when I was given a bleak prognosis with my cancer.

The hope that I have is not in an outcome. It isn't just a hope that things will “work out” for me. I am hoping in a person...in Jesus. My hope is not just for living on earth, but for an eternal place with Christ...a place without sickness or death, where God himself will wipe away every tear.

I do not know what will happen to me on earth between now and then. I don't know the outcome of my disease. Or how it will effect my family and loved ones. (That part is the hardest for me). I do know my God. I know that he will be with all of us who call on him and seek him out. My hope is in Him.