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| Purgatory. |
| 09.19.06 (9:33 pm) [edit] |
|
purgatory |ˈpərgəˌtôrē| |ˌpərgəˈtɔri| |ˌpəːgət(ə)ri| noun ( pl. -ries) (in Roman Catholic doctrine) a place or state of suffering inhabited by the souls of sinners who are expiating their sins before going to heaven. • mental anguish or suffering : this was purgatory, worse than anything she'd faced in her life. adjective archaic having the quality of cleansing or purifying : infernal punishments are purgatory and medicinal. Thesaurus: torment, torture, misery, suffering, affliction, anguish, agony, woe, hell; an ordeal, a nightmare. antonym paradise. So much of my life was picture perfect. I had no real worries, no real problems…just the ‘what ifs.’ When my children were young and would catch a cold, I would get an upset stomach listening to them cough at night and being unable to make it better. When Ali was first diagnosed with cancer, I felt as though I might never sleep again. One minute we were running to soccer games and the next to Mayo Clinic where facts were thrown at us like fast pitch balls at a batting cage. After a while, we couldn’t even duck. The doctors tried to make us feel better with anecdotal information…infert ility, loss of hair, amputation; and oh yes, we treated a girl who had rhabdomyosarcoma and she actually graduated from college. A girl. One girl. One single solitary girl. I pushed this aside and hid it under hope and did not retrieve it again until much, much later. So began our journey with cancer…in a hospital room in Rochester, Minnesota on Christmas morning. My barely 15-year-old girl looked weak and innocent as she lay quietly in the bed recovering from surgery the day before. The day after New Years we began pumping her body full of the poison that we hoped would be our salvation. Five days of chemo…three weeks off. Two days of chemo…three weeks off. Blood drawn at the hospital every Monday and Thursday. This was our schedule for over a year. Then, of course, the inevitable loss of hair, infections, transfusions, injections, nausea, even starting her period sent us to the emergency room. And after a two month reprieve the cancer came back. This was our life--not what I expected--but our life never-the-less. After a while, it didn’t seem abnormal, it didn’t seem scary, and oddly enough I never laid awake at night worrying. It’s strange that when all of your worst fears knock at your front door, it somehow frees you. You no longer worry about money, the size of your house, getting stuck in traffic, being late for an appointment or molding your child into a prodigy of some sort. In retrospect, so much time is spent worrying about the ‘what ifs’, but very little time living like they could actually happen. How much time and energy is spent complaining about inconveniences that are mistaken as problems? No wonder there is stress and dissatisfaction… when every minor detour is seen as some sort of cosmic punishment aimed directly at you. When you are in the middle of a war, the only thing that is important is living. So many things that seemed important went out the window…useless things, wasteful things, a profusion of rules and fussy behaviors. I know that I use the word ‘joy’ a lot, but rarely did I experience it prior to Ali’s cancer. The capacity to experience joy was always there but had been long buried beneath a pile of car payments, petty arguments and dirty laundry. I cannot define what joy is for you. I do not presume to know about your life or your struggles. All I know is the sum of my experience and what it has taught me. If I had to define what it meant for me to live joyfully, I would say this: joy is found in simplicity. It is the ability to find good in the day despite your circumstances. It is the ability to find good in other people despite your expectations. Joy means adopting a philosophy of boldness and courage; it is learning to be outrageous and child-like; to live according to your heart and not the opinion of those around you. Joy is not found in things but in each other; talk more, touch more, listen more, and laugh more. Start saying “I love you” and stop saying ‘I’ll do it tomorrow’. I know that joy and hope go hand in hand. Sometimes that means readjusting what you are hoping for. As we drove to the hospital on Mondays and Thursdays, I would sometimes grab her hand and hold it. I remember exactly what her fingers looked like because I held them so many times. She never pulled away. Sometimes she would switch radio stations and then reach for my hand again. This simple act communicated everything…our fear, our pain, our love and our hope. For me, this was joy. When I started this blog, I had no idea what was around the corner. You always believe that your child will be the girl who graduates from college. Hope—even hope that is smaller than a grain of sand—is what allows us to take the scenic route through life—even when we are traveling through Purgatory. |
posted by: surrogate (reply)
post date: 09.19.06 (9:37 pm)
Amazing.
posted by: judypatooote (reply)
post date: 09.20.06 (3:25 am)
All I can say is "YOU BRING ME JOY"......
Mumsy
posted by: lorischuster (reply)
post date: 09.20.06 (9:09 am)
Reply to: LadyG
Thank you. :)
posted by: lorischuster (reply)
post date: 09.20.06 (9:11 am)
Reply to: surrogate
thank you. I actually had terrible writer's block. this came as a result of something you said...it got me thinking and that's a dangerous thing! So, thank you. :)
posted by: lorischuster (reply)
post date: 09.20.06 (9:12 am)
Reply to: Judy
Thank you mom...I feel the same way. :) Love you.
posted by: thecyberwriter (reply)
post date: 09.20.06 (8:41 pm)
I'm speechless...kudos to you, lori, for sharing this with us. You are so right in that we get so wrapped up in such minor details that we tend to lose sight of what's really important. Something I have been meaning to share - and please forgive me if it sounds corny - is that the love we feel for people never dies. Love and the human spirit are eternal :-) If a person lives in your heart, they will live forever :-) Thanks again for sharing this with us!
posted by: doeeyed (reply)
post date: 09.21.06 (4:34 pm)
Amen Lori, just Amen.
posted by: lorischuster (reply)
post date: 09.21.06 (9:06 pm)
Reply to: thecyberwriter
Thank you for such a lovely comment. I agree with you. I know we are still connected by that love and my hope has changed--now I imagine the day I will get to see her again.
posted by: lorischuster (reply)
post date: 09.21.06 (9:07 pm)
Reply to: doeeyed
thank you Doe. Why is it that whenever you comment...I feel like I've just had a hug?
posted by: doeeyed (reply)
post date: 09.22.06 (5:53 am)
Reply to: lorischuster
Because you have.
You're in my heart.
((Lori))
posted by: graceshaker (reply)
post date: 10.21.06 (12:25 am)
your words are so often like hot chocolate on a cold night.
mmmmm....
Grace, beauty, humor, strength.
Alison Haley Cloud
Nov. 16, 1987-March 1, 2005
