The Gift, by: linda marie pharaoh-carlson
The Gift
by: linda marie pharaoh-carlson©copyright, all rights reserved
Some days are just like an endless summer.
I've had several actually. Those ones where you wake up and realize that life isn't some bad dream you've been having after all. It's real and pretty relentless at that.
Such is the case with so many who suffer silently with invisible illness. Mental illness fits that bill, and so does Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction and Fibromyalgia (which some people mistakenly equate with mental illness). You know the old, "It's all in your head-thing".
Those who suffer these things, do so often times more deeply even, than those with easily recognizable disease. After all, who doesn't hurt to the core when someone they care about, a beloved family member or friend brings home a diagnosis of cancer, heart disease, multiple sclerosis, or diabetes? Not that these diseases are more visible to the naked eye, but they are recognized as being legitimate and serious.
We who suffer the horrible affects of immune disorder, in the form of CFS or FMS, or Adrenal Disorder, or one of the countless numbers of immune modifying illnesses, are often shoved to the side, (unintentionally maybe) by others. This includes those in the medical community as well as people who surround us. Loneliness for us, can become a very real and heavy burden to bear.
In reflecting back, the realization comes that somewhere in all these years, I used to actually have relationships with others. Meaningful ones that I thought mattered. Chronic disease came in and spoiled all that. One never knows the true meaning of "fair-weather friends", until confronted with constant thunderheads and hail showers in life.
Even family members can become distant and seemingly, an uncaring lot. It is so many times their inability to flex and change in situations that alter life, that this happens. And most just do not have the proper understanding of what's taking place in this one who used to be 'the life of the party', the drop-everything-and-take-charge person that lives in the body they see that is so familiar, yet so incapable of doing any of those things anymore.
It's a sad scenario all around.
Be that as it may, through years of pain, heartache, and struggle on a daily basis ... the loss of identity, who you are, or thought you once were, and what made you ... you, only to find yourself starting again to face a life you don't really know...one truth stands out.
And that is; what a GIFT your life is! Especially a strong and healthy one. One where the word 'limitations' does not exist. Where you don't have to put activities and decisions 'on hold', to think about whether you can come through on a commitment, or follow through with a plan.
Life is challenging.
And it's been said that those who make it through it alive, just don't exist. I say, "Life is challenging, and those who live a life full of love and laughter, despite the challenges...live beyond this world of trouble".
When you learn to live each day as if it were the only day that you'll ever have, and you've touched one more heart than you'd originally planned on, with a word of encouragement an act of kindness, you will have a life to take along with you, when your time here on earth is through.
We are endowed with gifts from a God that knows us personally, intimately. They are ours to use as we see fit. To share or not to share. My constant prayer is that if there is anything worthy in my life, any gift I can bestow, that God give me strength enough to do it.
To be able to look past the hurts, disappointments and pain, the lack of my own reserve, and trust that He who began a good work in me...who gave me the gift of insights learned from under the wise tutelage of illness, will complete it to the end. That He will help me use what I have to reach beyond my human condition to the heart of another, embroiled in pain and struggle.
Yes, as challenging as life can possibly get to be - I have (we have all) been given a tremendous GIFT. May you use yours in ways that will bless you because you have given, as well as received.
Because you have unearthed precious treasure under mountains of
of adversity. And may you be able to say, " The life I live is one of discovery and underlying joy, even from behind the confining walls of pain and constriction". And may you be blessed beyond earthly measure because you received a precious gift to keep - but wisely chose instead to give it away.
Thank you for your precious ... GIFT.
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