Well Morgan Cooper had a challenging weekend. Friday night Em threw up in her bed and continued to be sick throughout the night. And if you know me at all, we were all waiting to see what happened when this happened to me with my kid. Wes says I was great. Eventually, when her stomach was empty but she was still getting sick, we were a little worried about her and called the on call service with our pediatrician. Learning it took a lot longer than I thought for her to get dehydrated, we were reassured. But it was by far the worse experience thus far as a parent. I did not sleep at all on Friday night, Wes slept a little because Em wasn't sitting on him. But I have apparently bruised my butt bones from sitting on the side of the tub for the hours, and a twisted up muscle in my back from holding her. I napped when she napped yesterday to try to catch up and went to bed at 9:30pm last night. Em slept about 2 1/2 hours straight after she stopped gagging and woke up pretty much fine. Sleepy, but fine. Ready to eat and drink - which of course we couldn't let her do. Wes and I had both been scheduled to work weekend hours this weekend - Engineering Day for him and a home show for my other job for me. We had to cancel on that. Family was in town, randomly, and we couldn't visit. And we had to rearrange our Sunday morning schedule this morning to continue to let her recover.
And it was a challenging weekend because I prayed like I'd never prayed before that Emersen would get better, stop throwing up and just be well. Wes and I prayer over Em, I prayed while she slept and I held her. And she still threw up again. And again. And that's hard to deal with.
I'm sure many are familiar with the Garth Brooks song "Unanswered Prayers" where he thanks God for unanswered prayers - like the one for the high school sweetheart that he didn't get but got his wife instead.
And right now I'm reading a book by Mark Batterson called "In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day" that is about how we avoid risk and pain. That's how we often pray. We pray for our circumstances to change, to end. We pray for the pain to end, for things to get easier. We pray for a break, for a streak of luck. But the author talks about how God uses our circumstances to get us to where He wants us to go. Often, our experiences give us the preparation for ministry later on, becuase you can relate to another person's problems. The title of the book is about a person in the Bible who chased a lion into a pit and slayed it. The point is that most people run from the lion instead of chasing and conquering it.
And in the midst of those circumstances I often find myself trying to pray myself out of, I remember Job. God allowed A LOT of horrible things to happen to Job because he KNEW that Job wouldn't succumb to Satan's temptation but would still worship Him. And I find myself fearing that I will have to go through tests like that. And in my head, I know that that is flattering...that God would be that confident in me. But I don't wanna. My human nature doesn't want to.
Back to the book I'm reading, one of the things Mark Batterson points out is that joy is mind over matter, that one of the things NOBODY can do to you or take from you is your attitude. In a story from a Holocost survivor, that's his "lesson learned" - that they could take his clothes, family, pride and so forth. But they couldn't do anything about his attitude, he controlled that. And he survived the Holocost. And I complain about going to work, or cleaning, or being tired. Come on lady.
So back to my "unanswered prayers" - Emersen did stop throwing anything much up, so I could hold her and she could sleep in spurts and was only gagging. Emersen's bug only lasted through one night. Emersen got some sleep. She could drink and eat that morning. My husband was there to help us out, wash towels in the middle of the night, run to the store for Pedialyte and put a few smiles on her face. It was the weekend so we could catch up on our rest the next day. And praise the Lord, nobody else has gotten sick. And before that Emersen has only just taken her first dose of antibiotics this month - her doctor was so surprised. God is good. Inherently, not dependent on my circumstances. His goodness is unconditional. My joy and attitude should be as well.
Great post. Growing in faith allows us to take on those hard moments... and I, too, am somewhat oddly flattered when things are difficult, because I realize that God knows that I will handle it with grace (mostly) and overcome it. It also means that the devil is more likely to go after us, because we're deeply rooted and he wants to test that. But when it comes with messing with my kid, I am NOT okay with that either! Such a tough time... so glad Em is better.
ReplyDelete