blogging and hoping

Hi all (those I know and those I don't), blogging is a wonderful tool to keep everyone informed about Jan's progress after her aneurysm last year. I am impressed of the number of friends Jan has collected over the years that still keep in touch. I know she has done her share to maintain these contacts alive. So, it is true that you reap what you planted. She planted friendship and that's what she is harvesting. In addition, she has this wonderful extended family that has made the wagon circle closer in her time of need. I say to all of you: cheers! May your love for Jan never dry up.
Her progress after the last surgery continues at one level. With no staples, her growing hair is covering the scar fast; soon it will be unnoticeable. She has said that she is ready to grow her hair long again. On the other hand, she is starting a new medication, yes, number 8. For a week she has to take both together, reducing the previous and increasing the new until she is only with the new. This new medication allows her greater speech skills but makes her drowsy. We don't know yet its full effect because there is a mixed effect right now. She is looking forward to stopping the medication sometime in the future.

For me, time seems to have frozen in multiple ways (I talk about my own experience because Jan asked not to talk about her thoughts or feelings, she prefers to do that for herself. Yes. most of this blog is my own take on the process). Time seems to be moving ever so slowly. I now realize that I'm running a marathon, when my conditioning was for hardly 100 meters. The daily grind is absorbing beyond belief; I often find it difficult to see beyond my nose. I experience life as empty of meaning. Some days, little makes sense. Just like Jan is having now trouble with making sense of reading or listening as a result of the medication, I also experience this disassociation between what I thought I knew and what I see, what I can grasp of the daily grind. There are days in which I feel all alone and puzzled, I realize how tough life as a main caregiver really is. I question everything. I feel I'm at the end of my rope; stretched to the limit; I doubt, I moan, I fall, I get up again, and then at the end of the day, I just remember that my call is to serve Jan today. Tomorrow is another day. I remember that I made a vow to Jan in our wedding that I would love her in health and in illness... and well, this is the time to do it. I am convinced that serving Jan is my most basic attempt to live in integrity: at some point in life I must mean what I say and say what I mean. "I must keep my word and honour my commitments". Anything else would be delusion and deceit. Some people find this out of the ordinary, but in reality, I would expect Jan to do the same for me, and I suspect everyone would expect their partners to be there for them in similar circumstances. It is the way we are re-wired when we meet Jesus. We have the wiring in place, it’s just that we are too busy with ourselves trying to change the original design. Why have I stuck to Jan? Because I believe Jesus did the same for me and because I pledged her my love in thick or thin. And, so, on a day to day basis I raise above the blinding pain and confusion and reframe my life. This is not easy.
I struggle with the existence and meaning of suffering. Jan’s aneurysm raised an old question in my mind, a question as old as the book of Job. Like him, we have suffered when the core areas of our life as a couple were touched: health, family, and finances. I feel troubled not so much by experiencing suffering, but by feeling that this suffering is undeserved. I have asked Why? Why her? I have protested loudly and I have not taken silence for an answer. I know that this suffering is not a form of punishment or divine discipline. When I look around I realize that the amount of pain does not correspond to the amount of wrong a person does, there are criminals who prey on the weak and defenceless who seemingly go through life without the punishment they deserve. Paradoxically, the opposite seems to be true: often those who do right are the ones who get knocked down and sometimes they can’t get up again. E. Peterson says “this is the kind of suffering that first bewilder us and then outrages us. Just like Job who was doing everything right when everything went wrong” . However, this is the kind of suffering that brings us closer to God, and instead of ending resentful and disappointed, somehow we love God more. God does not promise to take away suffering but we know that he is the God that walks with us through the suffering just as he showed it in Jesus -the suffering man-God.
Yeah, it is not easy to live through Jan's healing stage . Given the option, I would rather not choose this path. However, in spite of the suffering we have gone through, I find myself with more strength and inner peace than I could have imagined. Go figure.

Fede