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The perspective of hindsight allows a visit to the past with a teaspoon of detachment and a pinch of humility. I never thought that I would be the dependent one. It’s simply not a part of my DNA. If scientists ever identify that particular gene, it will be missing on my chromosomes. I am stubborn, I am strong, I will fight. This call to arms would find an ironic answer as trumpet sounds would not pierce the air during the battle, but only at surrender. Not surrender at stepping up to the challenge. But surrender of the thought that this invisible, tasteless, odorless amorphous enemy could be defeated without help.
Pain can suffocate a person. Seeing beyond it takes more air than is present in the moment. Fear can blind. Pride can deafen. Lying in a hospital bed with pain exploding, ricocheting firework bolts from head to toe, I danced with the idea of death. Beyond reason, beyond pain, yes death might be better than this. Who knows? My husband could care for our girls. It wouldn’t be easy but God holds him and our daughters, holds them all like the snow holds white. They would manage.
Leukemia brought me to God in a very different way. The two by four experience – being smacked upside the head – allows for a different view once you regain consciousness. Love is so present. It hovers close to feel your breath. It writes itself on cards from friends. Love holds your husband’s hands as he lifts your head off the pillow for a sip of water. It perches on the bed rail and coaxes you out of bed. Love winds its way down hospital corridors with two little girls leading IV poles that hold poison promised to save you. Love cajoles you to surrender to its grip. It curls up beside you and wraps its arms around you as you wrestle with sleep, then stands sentry during long hospital nights. Love shows its face to death and tells it to find another dance partner. This one is taken and truly, I love to dance.
It’s easy to see how leukemia taught me about blood but who would have thought it would teach me so much more about love?
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