Your Dying Spouse 404 - Precious Moments

When you see your physical situation deteriorating, you get the message - each moment is precious.

This was brought home to me the other day, when I knocked over a stack of boxes...a stack that I'd knocked over before,and before that. I simply had not had the energy to put them away properly.

I became irritated, and used language, that, were I to reproduce it here, would doubtless fry the hard drive. Can't afford that, so I shall spare your sensibilities...and my ego.

But the question arose...was it really worth it, getting angry over something like that? Was the negative input to the day justified for something that took less than a minute to set right?

Obviously not. Yes, it could be excused as an OW-I-hit-my-thumb-with-a-hammer! moment, but really, when time and life is limited, that's cold comfort.

So I have to practice. When something goes pear-shaped, I can use it as an opportunity to take a breath and say, "It's OK. These things happen. Clean up and move on."

Too ill to write more, but I would love to hear your thoughts; I may not be able to respond to every comment now but I read and treasure them all.

Musical accompaniment, just for fun, is from Lillix, with It's About Time.

Still hoping to get the new and improved version of Blessed Are The Pure Of Heart up and running in the near future. Just haven't had the energy to do it yet...but if you would like to read it, please say so in your comment and I'd be glad to send you a PDF (which should fit your Kindle).

I have another blog, "Starting The Day With Grace". The focus is a grace quote from someone you might not expect (like, say Mick Jagger) and a short commentary. I hope you'll join me.

Marley update... been moved to a sanctuary, and Bay County will revise their 'dangerous dog' codes.

WE MADE A DIFFERENCE!

And marley has a Facebook page! Please drop by to see how happy he is today.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.

Your Dying Spouse 403 - The End Of Despair {FMF}

This worked out to be a kind of impromptu three part series...The Face of Despair, The Pit Of Despair, and now this post.

Guess I was kind of missing the thematic nature of #write31days!

It's easy to fall into despair in the face of a crushing illness. The future becomes truncated, and shuddered about with the scary-face things that presage the onset of death...being stuck in a hospital, tied to the machines that merely prolong life while shredding its quality.

I've spent long nights in hospitals. I never want to go there again.

And the past becomes painful, because then, seemingly just barely out of reach, was a time when your body and dreams were intact. If I could just...reach...back..!

But yesterday never comes again. We try to tune in on the oldies, but there's only a static-filled silence. Life has moved on, and only the quiet pictures are left. (Silence is the FMF prompt this week.}

Yeah, despair comes easy.

But the end of despair comes easier, if you just let go of what you thought you owned.

Not possessions, but life.

We are conditioned to think that the world owes us a life, that God somehow is constrained to meet our 'deal', that if we do it right, He's got to come through for us.

But that's not the way it works at all; look at what happened to His Son, and to the dudes who followed Him.

"Stephen stoned" had nothing to do with funny cigarettes, and everything to do with God forming a Faith, His faith, that would grow strong enough, watered by blood, to win back His creation from the pit of hell.

It's got nothing to do with what we have...and when we loose our grip, we can step back and see that what we tried to hold was not ours, but it was for us, a gift of God's own heart.

We can't lose what we never had, but when we give it back to God, we get it all back.

Because we are His.

Our musical theme comes from Sister hazel, with All For You. Hope you enjoy it!

I do ask that you be patient with my slow replies to your comments (which we treasure). I'm trying to stay caught up.

Still hoping to get the new and improved version of Blessed Are The Pure Of Heart up and running in the near future. Just haven't had the energy to do it yet...but if you would like to read it, please say so in your comment and I'd be glad to send you a PDF (which should fit your Kindle).

I have another blog, "Starting The Day With Grace". The focus is a grace quote from someone you might not expect (like, say Mick Jagger) and a short commentary. I hope you'll join me.

Marley update... been moved to a sanctuary, and Bay County will revise their 'dangerous dog' codes.

WE MADE A DIFFERENCE!

And marley has a Facebook page! Please drop by to see how happy he is today.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.

Your Dying Spouse 402 - The Pit Of Despair

When Barb came home this afternoon, she too one look at me and said, "How can I help?"

I thought for a minute, and then said, "Well, surgery, radiation and chemo would be good...but you can have dinner first."

And that, dear readers, is how you cope with a day in the lowest circle of pain-and-nausea hell. With a bad joke that makes your dear wife wince.

I mean, a day that begins with an urgent laundry-run, and continues through puking on poor Humphrey the Pit Bull...it ind of went downhill from there to here, as I type this.

Humphrey took it in stride. When my knees buckled, he sat next to me and ept me propped up.

It was a day when one wanted nothing more than to curl up on a sofa in a foetal position, and half-listen to a funny movie.

But that's not the way to handle the lowest circle of hell. You've got to get up and do.

You've got to stay focused on the next task, and however long it takes, accomplish it. Then move on to the one after that

It begs the question of Why, when all really does feel lost...and the answer's simple.

My life was worth living yesterday, and it's worth living today. I may not accomplish much, but I can do one small thing, or two...and the important thing, for climbing out of that pit, is not the quantity of accomplishment.

It's the intention, that bright center of which hope is made.

Music today from Joe Jackson, with Steppin' Out. I mean, why not?

I do ask that you be patient with my slow replies to your comments (which we treasure). I'm trying to stay caught up.

Still hoping to get the new and improved version of Blessed Are The Pure Of Heart up and running in the near future. Just haven't had the energy to do it yet...but if you would like to read it, please say so in your comment and I'd be glad to send you a PDF (which should fit your Kindle).

I have another blog, "Starting The Day With Grace". The focus is a grace quote from someone you might not expect (like, say Mick Jagger) and a short commentary. I hope you'll join me.

Marley update... been moved to a sanctuary, and Bay County will revise their 'dangerous dog' codes.

WE MADE A DIFFERENCE!

And marley has a Facebook page! Please drop by to see how happy he is today.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.

Your Dying Spouse 401 - The Face Of Despair

This will be short, as I'm feeling both physically and spiritually wrecked. Things just keep getting harder, and I'm stumbling, literally, when I try to gain my feet.

Not from weakness, but from pain for which I simply can make no more allowances.

And where will it end?

Scratch that. I don't want to think about it.

And I have to look into the mirror, and see the face of despair.

I can't turn away, because that would be the ultimate betrayal...not of myself, but, oddly enough, of my illness.

The vicious path means something, and it has a message for which I've been selected as a delivery boy. I sure didn't want the job; I sure wanted it to pass from me.

The message changes with the depth of, well, agony.

Awhile ago it was, You can still do SOMEthing worthwhile.

The it turned into the sparkles of joy, like fresh grass blades, shining dew-borne in the early sun, peeking up through the cracks in the hard paving.

And now it's this:

I can still be kind.

And I try.

Music is from Sister Hazel, with Champagne High.

I do ask that you be patient with my slow replies to your comments (which we treasure). I'm trying to stay caught up.

Still hoping to get the new and improved version of Blessed Are The Pure Of Heart up and running in the near future. Just haven't had the energy to do it yet...but if you would like to read it, please say so in your comment and I'd be glad to send you a PDF (which should fit your Kindle).

I have another blog, "Starting The Day With Grace". The focus is a grace quote from someone you might not expect (like, say Mick Jagger) and a short commentary. I hope you'll join me.

Marley update... been moved to a sanctuary, and Bay County will revise their 'dangerous dog' codes.

WE MADE A DIFFERENCE!

And marley has a Facebook page! Please drop by to see how happy he is today.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.

Your Dying Spouse 400 - The Price We Pay {FMF}

A comment that my dear friend Tara Ulrich left on my final post for #write31days got me thinking...

Death is the price we pay for living, and grief is the price we pay for loving.

We can't 'not live'...or can we?

I think maybe some people do, hiding behind material things and thrills and self-medication, refusing to look in the mirror that show's time's passage.

They can't conceive of a death that will take them from their lives, and they seek to enmesh themselves so deeply that maybe death won't be able to take them. They're just too busy!

Or they'll be so well hidden, and perhaps so stoned, that death just won't bother.

Neither is an effective strategy; death will come, but these unfortunates will miss an important truth, neatly summed up in a famous Klingon proverb:

Death is an experience best shared.

By fighting to ignore death and deny it,one also keeps community at arm's length. We offer grace when we help others, but I suspect we offer a wider and deeper grace when we let others help us.

When we share our mortality, our very frightened vulnerability, we give our friends...and sometimes those we may have thought of as enemies...the chance to walk in Christ's footsteps, and to carry His Compassion to wipe our fevered brow.

And thus, love.

When we shy away from grief, we shy away from love, both given and received. We all have to wear our suits or armour, like the knights of old, lest we be overcome by sorrow...but the person who forswears grief has grown into that armour, and it's steel all the way through.

And they think steel is invulnerable, but it's not.

Hearts are not flint, and flint is rent;

hearts are not steel, and steel is bent.

These words, from Sir Walter Scott's Rokeby, speak a terrible truth. We can harden our hearts enough to keep out those who would love us, but even the hardest heart - and I had one of these - cannot keep from being touched by love.

And in the hardness, we end up alone. The grief is not deflected; it can focus on us all the more, and by taking the hard road we can find ourselves with no one to help carry that crushing weight.

The price we pay for open hearts and open arms is the foreknowledge of death, and the grief of loss, but these are infinitely more bearable than the alternative.

Our hearts need to bleed, for only thus can our blood mingle with the Blood of the Lamb. (Need is the FMF prompt this week.)

Music from the Alan Parsons Project, with the lovely hymn Closer To Heaven.

I did make it through the #write31days challenge!

October 1 - Worship For Caregivers

October 2 - Talk To A Caregiver

October 3 -  Create A Caregiver Haven

October 4 - A Caregiver's Raw Hope

October 5 - A Caregiver's Trust

October 6 - Caregiving For Our Country

October 7 - Caregiver, Don't Hold Too Tight

October 8 - Caregiver, You Will Find Freedom In Truth

October 9 - A Caregiving Plan?

October 10 - A Caregiver's Listening Heart

October 11 - Caregiving Remembrances?

October 12 - Caregiver, Write It Down!

October 13 - Taking Care Of God

October 14 - Caregiver, Don't Try Too Hard

October 15 - The Caregiver Will Remain

October 16 - Readings For Caregivers

October 17 - Caregiver, Grow A Thick Skin

October 18 - Caregiver, Share Your Heart

October 19 - A Caregiver's Brave

October 20 - A Caregiver So Far From Home

October 21 - Caregiver, Give Hope

October 22 - Caregiver, Bring The Light

October 23 - Caregiver, Sometimes Nothing Works

October 24 - The Caregiver's Life, Revised

October 25 - Why, Caregiver? Just Because

October 26 - Caregiver, Let Change Come

October 27 - Caregiver To The Stars

October 28 - Caregiver, Stay Connected With God

October 29 - Caregiver, Follow A Routine

October 30 - Caregiver, Refine Your Life

October 31 - Caregiver, You Have The Rest Of Your Life

I do ask that you be patient with my slow replies to your comments (which we treasure). I'm trying to stay caught up.

Still hoping to get the new and improved version of Blessed Are The Pure Of Heart up and running in the near future. Just haven't had the energy to do it yet...but if you would like to read it, please say so in your comment and I'd be glad to send you a PDF (which should fit your Kindle).

I have another blog, "Starting The Day With Grace". The focus is a grace quote from someone you might not expect (like, say Mick Jagger) and a short commentary. I hope you'll join me.

Marley update... been moved to a sanctuary, and Bay County will revise their 'dangerous dog' codes.

WE MADE A DIFFERENCE!

And marley has a Facebook page! Please drop by to see how happy he is today.

If you can, please do leave a comment. I am trying to answer all, and I am failing, but please know this - I read and treasure each one.

Below are my recent releases on Kindle -please excuse their presence in the body of the blog. I haven't the energy to get them up as 'buttons' in the sidebar. You can click on the covers to go to the Amazon links.