Suffering

As I had my quiet time today with the Lord, I was reading in Psalms, and I read verses about God hearing and helping his people who call out to them.  I thought of a particular friend that I thought might be encouraged and I shared those scriptures with her.  As my day continued, I happened upon an article about a couple who were struggling with infertility, and I have obviously not struggled with that, however, some of the feelings she wrote about began to work on me.  She talked about how she felt God had left her at times and wasn't there when she was so desperate to conceive.  I began to cry a little, ( her article was very emotional)

It got me to thinking about suffering.  About why people struggle with certain things. I realize suffering is a part of life.  Some suffer more and some suffer less.  This then led me to thinking of my sweet Lillian.  How much I've prayed for healing, yet tried to be content with her having life today.
We were told she would not live this long.  We were the ones who decided we would continue life saving measures for her although we could have made the opposite choice.  I began to wonder if I truly had faith that God would heal her.  I believe that he can. But have my prayers been faithless words?

I don't know.

Then a pain welled out of my chest as I wept and prayed for the suffering of my child.  I've yet to experience a greater pain.   I prayed for her to be covered in protection for the illnesses that will come.  Because they will come.  We've been living them these past nine years.  Oh, how I LONG for my daughter to be healthy.  To speak.  To learn.  To EAT.  TO be HEALTHY above all.  I know, I KNOW there are children that suffer so much more, I know there are people who lose their children.  It breaks my heart.  I've been unable to clear the lump in my throat most of the day.

The pain that I buried unleashed in my physical body today and I'm still aching from it. I didn't realize I had that much pain still buried.  I feel like I'm bleeding today. Literally.  This whole experience is difficult even to put into words.

So, those words that I shared with my friend, those scriptures I quoted her, I keep telling myself.  I'm clinging to them.  Are you hurting too?  I get it.  I do.  So I'll share these words and may the be healing to your pain.

Psalms 34:17-20 NLT
"The Lord hears his people when they call to him for help.  He rescues them from all their troubles The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; He rescues those whose spirits are crushed. The righteous person faces many troubles, but the Lord comes to the rescue each time., For the Lord protects teh bones fo the righteous;not one of them is broken."

Dirty Toilets and grattitude

Sorry it's been so long, you know life just happens and my laptop is busy doing homework and other such things...I'm sure there are so many people waiting with anticipation for my next blog post...anyway. Today a sweet Momma that I met in the NICU posted about her little girl with Spina bifida and how she prayed for poop.  She wondered if anyone prayed for poop as much as she did.  I giggled a little bit, but Lillian struggles with this very same issue.  She deals with constipation, diarrhea, and bloating.  All which majorly affects her feeds and well, everything.  This topic led me to thinking about how frustrated I get because my toilet is dirty ALL. THE. TIME.  in a very weird place because of the constant "pooping" issue.( Because we have to give medication to keep poop flowing and there is just no happy medium with that med. ) I scrub and I scrub but to no avail, toilet is always dirty.  As I sit there, bent over, steam rolling out my ears because I'm cleaning the toilet for the billionth ( spelling, is that even a word?) time, I find myself chided.  My inner voice says HEY! that dirty toilet is a constant sign of answered prayer and then I'm in tears as I'm so so grateful that my daughter was able to achieve potty training.  She was almost 8 years old, but she did it.  And for all that scrubbing...well....I could be changing her dirty diapers.  (although I'm still doing that too, but on my son...tee hee)

That, my friends, is how you find grattitude in a dirty toilet.