Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Blessings Through Trials

I've hesitated writing about this, but I've decided that since God has been really teaching me a lot through this trial, that I want to share the ways He has been working.

For years, I've always been more tired than my friends, and I've always had difficulties thinking clearly, but we never could figure out what the reason was. This last semester, with the stress of college work and life piling on me, it got completely unbearable. I just curled up and hid from everything, avoiding my problems. I didn't know why I was feeling so awful... When I went back home for Thanksgiving break, I got some blood tests done to see what might be causing the issues.

During finals week, my mom called me and said she got the lab results back, and it showed high levels for lymes disease. I knew so many people with lymes disease, my own roommate being one, but I never thought that I would actually have it...

So the doctor set up a treatment plan for me. It's going to take a long time, possibly never being completely healed. A lot of pills and antibiotics. But slowly and surely, I'm fighting the lyme in my body. It's not been easy though, in fact, it's been pretty awful at times. The thing that frustrates me about a chronic illness like this (and it's also pretty selfish), is that no one can see from the outside how much I'm fighting everyday to get up, and walk to class. Taking the antibiotics makes my symptoms worse for a little while, called "herxing". They've made me lose my appetite, and begin hating swallowing pills.

But you know what?

God has been really teaching me so many things through this. I'll occasionally have a bad day with my lymes, and my attitude about it will be so wrong. I've been repeating 2 Corinthians 16-18 every day to myself... "So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal."

I've been learning the importance of supportive friends who are always there for a shoulder to cry on, or for them to pray for you. I've been learning not to judge people from the outside, because you never know what battle they're fighting that you can't see. I've been learning to cast away my selfish thoughts of "no one understands the pain I'm going through", but rather, to appreciate the people that make an effort to understand. I've been learning that if I don't get fed from God's word every day, I won't make it. I've been learning not to sit and let the pain engulf me, but to rise up stronger, and keep fighting everyday to make the most of my life for Jesus. And, I've been learning to thank God everyday for my trials, because it is a testing and strengthening of my faith.

"Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have it's full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." -James 1:2-4