Showing posts with label waiting rooms. Show all posts
Showing posts with label waiting rooms. Show all posts

Someone I Do Not Know

I'm sitting here crying for someone I do not know...
Their story just came across my feed...
An accident, an injury, a brain bleed...
Terms I know too well on a path I've traveled too long..

My heart hurts and I don't even know their name...
I'm crying with parents, loved ones and friends...
Knowing that the pain and grief never ends...
Now I'm praying for someone I don't even know... never knew before...

My eyes turn loose of tears I'd held in from my own pain...
As I remember the early parts of my own journey...
I know what they can endure - what they may face...

Those long days of hoping, praying, believing...
Long nights just watching them keep breathing...
Don't stop.... please don't stop...

Then there's the waiting...
Dark nights, warm tears, terrible coffee...
Uncertainty abounds - so many ifs...

If there's a future what does it look like now?
If dreams are still valid...
If there's life after this...
If there's anything outside a waiting room... a hospital room...
If home exists... where do I fit...
If my loved one will ever speak, walk, wake, or move again...

What does life look like from the waiting room?
How can I find certainty for tomorrow when today's breath is already gone?
No thinking about tomorrow, this afternoon, or one minute away - only waiting...
Surviving one second at a time looking for one more breath to arise... hopefully
In me - in them - what is life anyway?

I'm hurting all over again for someone I do not know...
Someone like me...
So I pray - they find peace...
They find hope...
They get the answers they want but have grace to trust and deal with the ones they didn't want...

This someone I don't know - gets lots of prayers - but they will never know...

Measure for Measure

Before I was officially a "caregiver" I lived in an ICU waiting room for three weeks and then in a hospital room with my son for another 3 1/2 months. I had flown in from another state and there was no "home" to return to. One thing I noticed was the instant connection all of the people hanging out in the waiting rooms had. We shared stories, food, laughter and tears; yet we had never met before whatever trauma had brought us in.

We understood each other. One event had turned our lives upside down and even though we had never met we became instantly bonded with one another. I felt like this unique experience offered a picture of how the church should act. We shared our lives for the short time we were together and all of the normal boundaries like social status, economic status and our belief systems really didn't matter. We helped each other out in any way we could. When one was down- another would comfort knowing they may need the same thing within the next hour. We held each other and poured out our hearts. Each person in the waiting area had had a significant event that brought them there and we could be mutually supportive and comforting.

In 2 Corinthians 1:3, Paul states that God is the God of all comfort. In the next verse he explains why God comforts us - so we can comfort others. I noticed that verse 4 says He comforts us in  our affliction - not before or after - but during our affliction He provides the comfort we need. It seems that He is able to provide the perfect level of comfort needed to match the level of suffering or affliction. And since He is the God of all comfort He has enough to carry us all the way through the trial. He doesn't walk half way with us and say, "that's all I got." He is in it with us for the long haul; in it for the duration of the trial.

No matter how intense our days as caregivers may become, how deep or difficult the trial becomes, He provides us the comfort we need to endure.

Why? Why does He comfort us in the midst of our trials? So we can comfort others. We are comforted by the Great I Am and then we are to turn to others and be His hands and feet. No one understands the path like someone who has walked it before. Just like my "waiting room church" who comforted each other in our shared afflictions we as caregivers can receive His comfort and then minister it to others. 

Today I will meditate on receiving His comfort and allowing it to bring peace to my  whole being. I will turn my thoughts toward His word and think about how He alone is the God of all comfort. And I will look for opportunities to share His comfort with others. Will you join me?

The Stare

  Do you ever just find yourself sitting and staring at the wall? It doesn't really happen too often because, quite frankly, who has tim...