Every bride dreams of her wedding day. Those dreams usually begin when she’s a little girl. Everything perfect. Every detail thought out completely and executed perfectly. Everything in its place and everything just so. As much as we can dream about a perfect day, it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen that way. I’m not one to get hung up on the small details. I’ve coordinated enough events for work to understand that something isn’t going to go as planned, there is going to be something I haven’t thought about and there is going to be something that didn’t get communicated and therefore leading to a failed execution. I’m not so concerned with that. At the end of the day, Jeff and I will be married and that is the most important thing.
There is a particular wedding day circumstance that stays in the back of my mind and I feel the need to share and address it. I know I’m certainly not the only bride that feels this way and my hopes are that by sharing, it may uplift another bride and maybe give her words that she doesn’t know quite how to express. And to be honest, it’s a reminder to myself. Every bride wants to look her best and most brides elect to lose “x” amount of weight before the wedding. I am no different. My goal was relatively small. 10 pounds, I wanted to lose 10 pounds and if I accomplished that, I was going to lose more. The year of 2018 has proven a year of challenges and setbacks and I can tell you I’m walking down the aisle having lost basically zero. I am ok with this and I’m not ok with it. Let me explain.
There’s not a minute that goes by during the day that I don’t think about needing to get a workout in, to make better food choices, to take the stairs instead of the elevator, to park further from the store to get more steps in, to hit 12,000 steps a day….and the list continues. The truth is, even though I’ve been known as the “fitness girl” several years back, sometimes life’s challenges don’t allow you to be “fitness girl”. As I mentioned before, 2018 has been a year of challenges and setbacks. One of which I recently blogged about, Bell’s Palsy. Other challenges I’ve encountered are…hurting my back 3 times which in turn caused incredible discomfort down my left leg. My beloved cat of 16 years had to be put to sleep. The most difficult decision I’ve made and literally shredded my heart. Two weeks after my beloved cat passed, my beloved, 14-year-old dog became extremely ill, having to go to the ER vet 4 times and her regular vet 3 times. My job moved to Midland, TX which meant I had to find another job in Houston, so I changed jobs as well this year. I am not throwing a pity party and these words are not to hash out all the stuff that went wrong this year. The point of all of this is to say that life happens, and you do the best you can with it. It may not look perfect, but it’s the best you can do, and you must be ok with it, even when you aren’t. When your world falls apart and everything is going wrong, you pick up the pieces and put them back together again as best as you can and that’s all that can be expected. So, I say this as a reminder to myself, instead of beating yourself up, remember the fire you’ve walked through. You’ve survived, and you are still standing and own your wedding day! Celebrate it! Life comes in seasons and this is definitely not the season to be at my top fitness level. One day it will be, but not today and I’m ok with that. Love yourself where you are. Enjoy today! Feel the beauty that makes up who you are and radiate that from within because your wedding day will reflect it. What I’m looking forward to most is sharing this special day with our closest friends and family. We will share our love, our united family and what an incredible day it will be! That is a blessing and everything else is just the details. Love who you are today, where you are today! Own it and rock it down the aisle!
Thursday, May 31, 2018 is the day I woke up like any other day to get ready for work…feed my dog, Sophie Bear, pick out my outfit for the day, shower, dress, fix my hair and brush my teeth. It wasn’t until I brushed my teeth that I realized something was wrong with my face. I leaned over the sink to spit out the toothpaste and my mouth wouldn’t work right. My lips went sideways, I couldn’t pucker to spit. Weird, I thought. Maybe I did that wrong? That was my thought. I spit wrong. Even though I’ve been spitting toothpaste in the sink for years upon years. How does someone forget how to spit?! So, I tried again. Same thing. My lips went sideways, I couldn’t pucker to spit. That’s when I really examined myself in the mirror. What’s wrong?!?! My heart started beating a little faster and I was becoming more alarmed by the minute. I then realized my left eye wasn’t closing as firmly as my right. I tried squeezing as hard as I could, and the left side wouldn’t squeeze shut. What.was.wrong?!?! Stroke was the word that entered my mind. I flew out of the bathroom to the mirror in the living room and looked there as if I thought changing mirrors would change the function of my face. I tried puckering my lips and they just looked weird, my pucker wasn’t centered (if that makes any sense). I looked at my eyes again and tried squeezing them shut. The right eye felt strong and squeezed shut as my muscles commanded it to, the left eye was lacking. I was scared! Jeff and I commute into work together and I told him to go without me, I was going to the Urgent Care.
Bell’s Palsy or a stroke?
Among all the frantic thoughts in my head, thoughts of my mom were there too. She suffered from having several mini strokes in her last months. Was this happening to me? What was going on? When I pulled up to the Urgent Care, of course, they don’t open until 8:00 am and I arrived at 7:15 am. Great! Now I get to sit in my car and let my thoughts swirl in my head about what is happening to me. Those minutes ticked by so, so slowly. It was excruciating. Finally, the doors opened. When I was signing in at the front desk, the nurse asked me for the symptoms I was experiencing. As soon as I got out of my mouth that the left side of my face wasn’t working right, she immediately sent me to triage. This only concerned me more and it validated that something was wrong. My body was rebelling against me and it came out of nowhere. The doctor followed right behind me into triage and ran several physical tests like asking me to squeeze her fingers to check for weakness in my hands and arms. She asked several questions like did I feel weakness on one side of my body and asking me to repeat phrases. The only other symptom I had was the left side of my tongue had gone numb the day before. I couldn’t taste on that side, but I didn’t think much of it. The doctor then told me her diagnosis was Bell’s Palsy. “Do you know what Bells Palsy is?”, she asked. “No. Can it be healed?”, I replied in response. The doctor was very gracious in assuring me she had experienced Bells Palsy about 15 years before and often it comes out of nowhere, but it can be caused by a virus that attacks the facial muscles usually on just one side of the face. She urged me, though, to go to an emergency room to get an MRI to rule out the possibility of a stroke.
I left Urgent Care in a daze. I was frantic, heart still racing, yet calm at the same time. Jeff was blowing up my phone, but I didn’t want to talk. I was trying to process what my body was doing and how I was going to spring into action. If you know me well, you know I’m a person of action. I do not take things laying down. I’m proactive to the nth degree. ß All that sounds great, the being proactive stuff, right? Well, yes and no. Here’s the negative part of being so proactive and feeling the need to be in control…I don’t let others care for me. At this point, I’m shutting Jeff out because I don’t know how to deal. I don’t know how to process what’s going on with me and I’m shutting him out. When I finally answer the phone when he calls, he says he’s packing up at work and will meet me at the ER. “No.” I tell him. “I will go to the ER, but I’m going into work first.” Weird reaction, right? I know, thus is the conundrum of me. I am a soldier in the mist of my world falling apart. Pushing onward, not letting myself feel, just doing. Jeff is frantic on the other end of the phone and I start crying as I knew I would and I told him I had to go. I don’t deal well with not knowing what to do. I was struggling to control my own emotions and I didn’t have room for anyone else’s emotions even though Jeff was certainly entitled.
I drove to work. When I got to the parking garage, I pulled out my makeup that I hadn’t put on yet. Tears were still rolling down my cheeks. I pulled the mirrored visor down and looked at my face. My face was betraying me. Even in crying, the left side of my face was not distorting with emotion. It was sort of frozen which made me cry more. What was happening to me? I dried up my tears as much as I could and put on my makeup. Putting on eye makeup was strange and made the tears start to roll again because I couldn’t close my left eyelid to put on eye shadow.
I only checked in at work, talked with my boss, told him what was going on and cried tremendously while telling him. I told him about my mom and the strokes that she had and how concerned that made me. Hearing the word Stoke in reference to yourself is a hard pill to swallow. Jeff met me at my office and we soon left for the ER for the MRI and had the diagnosis of stroke ruled out. I had Bells Palsy and I would experience the symptoms for weeks.
The above is a play by play of how I spent my Thursday morning and afternoon of May 31. What happened after the diagnosis and how I dealt with the blow of my body rebelling against me is what I want to share with you. This is the first sickness I have ever experienced, one in which isn’t curable with a round of antibiotics in a few days and one that isn’t really known by doctors what causes it. No, this would be something that would take weeks to heal. Not to mention, it effects the very part of your body that everyone sees every time they see you. It challenged my faith in ways that I didn’t expect and made me rely on my Heavenly Father in a way that I am unaccustomed. I’m not comfortable relying on anyone really…I’m not good with being vulnerable. I want to be in control and Bell’s Palsy took that from me.
Journal entry from June 10, 2018…
“This has been a very difficult week. I have contemplated my health and body more than ever. I’ve been scared out of my mind, overwhelmed beyond belief and beaten down. I didn’t know being sick would affect me that way. It has rattled me to my core. When your body decides to rebel against you, it’s unnerving. The thing that has scared me and continues to scare me is becoming sick and not being able to live life as I once was able to. So much can be taken away so quickly. No warning. The emotional ramifications of that is profound. In those moments, you realize how much you take for granted all the time. And you realize just how much you aren’t in control. It’s funny how I believe I’m in control all the time or at least most of the time and the reality is I’ve never been in control. I’ve only conned myself into thinking that. Surrendering is hard. Surrendering my strong-will is hard. And this week I wasn’t left with much of anything but surrender. What I mean is I found myself alone, struggling to understand even what the meaning of life is, what happiness is, reflecting on how I’ve been living my life, treating my body, caring or not caring for my body, my emotional wellbeing, utterly overwhelmed and consumed, not able to focus or think or function. Realizing that when you are sick, it’s you and you alone. There’s no other person that can go through it with you. No one else truly knows how you feel. It’s only you. And it leaves you reflecting on your spiritual life, clinging to God because He’s the only one that can go through this with you. Learning to rely on Him is hard. Surrendering is hard, and I don’t like surrendering. I laugh when I say that because God made me after all! He knows I’m stubborn and strong-willed, not going down without a fight, He knows I’ll get scrappy if needed. 🙂 Maybe surrendering is the strongest thing I can do. Asking Him to fill me with His peace and joy. (Romans 15:13) I found myself casting out the evil one’s anxiety and fear in Jesus name because my God is bigger than that. I found myself heavily relying on God to carry me through this. And it’s amazing that at every turn, no matter, the progress in recovery I have made, the evil one is standing by interjecting fear and worry at every turn. The evil one is unrelenting. I wonder if God gets weary of us and our inability to remain faithful even for a few minutes? That’s been another prayer of mine as well, “Lord, please help me in my unbelief.” (Mark 9:24) I do believe, but I am weak. God would show me His healing power by my tongue becoming functional to taste again. My eyelids blinking at the same time, strength coming back to my lips so I could spit toothpaste in the sink from the center of my mouth. Even all these ways He’s showing me He’s taking care of me and I still fear and wait anxiously. Giving it over to Him is hard. All the while knowing He can do so much better at all this than me. Being sick is scary. Being helpless is frightening. I have thought about my mom a lot. She was sick for so long and I’m sure she was scared and felt alone. I regret that I judged her, at times, so harshly. I should have had more compassion. I’m not sure that was possible, but she could have used more compassion all the way around from those around her.
…help me in my unbelief…
Today I feel much improved, but anxiety and worry still take up way too many of my thoughts. I’ve been anxious about my back now after hurting it a few weeks ago. Scared that I may not functionally be able to do some things anymore. Scared of surgery, if that’s even needed, and what that might cause, it’s long term effects. All craziness. I know this logically, but the fear and worry have another agenda. The devil’s mind games.
I know my God does not want me to suffer. He does not want me to worry. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. (Matthew 11:30) I want to have a closer relationship with Him. One that I can trust and lean upon Him. Surrender to Him. I have a lot of work to do in this area, with His help, of course. I’m reading a book that talks about soul training. Soul training is practicing those things that will help you deepen your spiritual walk with Him. Kind of like how an athlete practices, the same principles could be applied to the Christian walk. Just like a doctor practices medicine, I think we practice Christianity. We won’t ever perfect our walk, but we sure can get better. I want to have close to my heart the knowing that God loves me, He delights in me. I want to put down the knowing that I have now. I often see God as disappointed in me, displeased with me. A punishing God because I have not done the things I should. All of those negative, ugly ways I was taught about God, I want to put down. I want to know Him as my Father who loves me and cares for me and wants the best for me. He wants me to follow Him, surrender to Him. And I think I’ve been unable to know Him, to follow Him because I’ve been ashamed. Feeling too unworthy to approach Him, unworthy of His love, unworthy to really know Him. Why would God want to know me? I think it’s easy to believe that when you’re sometimes not seen by those who are closest to you. If you’ve ever experienced a loved one that seemingly doesn’t openly delight in you or that’s how you’ve interpreted it anyway. You are left feeling unnoticed and unworthy and unimportant. All lies from the devil in association with God. I pray God’s grace upon my unworthiness. I pray for His help in my surrender to His ways. To lean on Him and not worry. I pray for release from the anxiety, to live in His joy and His freedom. Help me in my unbelief. To be still and know. (Psalm 46:10) To wait because He will fight for me. (Exodus 14:14) His grace and mercy is sufficient. (2 Corinthians 12:9) God wants me to be happy and live a full life in Him and I should stop living in fear and start doing just that. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. (Matthew 11:30) Lord help me to know that, not just logically but in all ways and to rest in You. (Matthew 11:28)”
During church recently I was reminded of a scene in the movie, The Shack. Have you seen it? If not, I recommend that you do. It’s a powerful movie. The scene I’m referring to is the one where Mack is in the boat on the lake. Everything seems peaceful and then his mind starts taking him back to a pivotal point in his life. Playing mind games and then suddenly the boat begins filling with black water and Mack is panicking. Then you hear the sound of Jesus’ voice telling Mack he’s ok. Jesus says, “I’m right here, I’m not going anywhere.” “Focus on me,” he says. When Mack is finally able to raise his eyes to focus on Jesus, the boat returns as it was and Mack is ok.
Click on the link below to watch the scene from The Shack, the first 2:30 minutes.
Isn’t that how life is? When we are drowning, we are focusing on the pain and the turmoil. If we can lift our eyes to focus on Him…know that He’s there and He will never leave. I struggle to keep my eyes lifted and focused on Him and Bell’s Palsy proved no different. On the other side of Bell’s Palsy, I can see the beautiful picture that God painted for me and how He strengthened my faith. Hardships make our faith strong. “I am made strong in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:5-10) I promise you are too. If you are wrestling with trying times that life has dealt you, I encourage you to lift your eyes and focus on Him as best you can. He’s there and He’s walking beside you.
There is a particular wedding day circumstance that stays in the back of my mind and I feel the need to share and address it. I know I’m certainly not the only bride that feels this way and my hopes are that by sharing, it may uplift another bride and maybe give her words that she doesn’t know quite how to express. And to be honest, it’s a reminder to myself. Every bride wants to look her best and most brides elect to lose “x” amount of weight before the wedding. I am no different. My goal was relatively small. 10 pounds, I wanted to lose 10 pounds and if I accomplished that, I was going to lose more. The year of 2018 has proven a year of challenges and setbacks and I can tell you I’m walking down the aisle having lost basically zero. I am ok with this and I’m not ok with it. Let me explain.
