I avoid doing hard things. Worst yet, I am a flight person- not usually a fight person. So put those two things together and you have a disaster waiting to happen. And I have felt the “flight” feeling at the WORST time of my life. As in, my daughter was literally dying in front of me and I pictured myself running out of the hospital and getting as far away from the current situation as possible. Not something I am proud to admit. But it’s true. Here’s a glimpse of that day:
A few hours after Mia began chemotherapy, she was flung into a very severe downward spiral: she was in respiratory distress; all the cancer cells had burst and were rapidly poisoning her organs. The doctors were pumping so much fluid into her she had literally swelled up like a balloon within minutes, and I could hear the fluid in her chest and lungs as she tried hard to breathe. Worst of all, Mia was awake for all of this.
As the Mommy, I knew I needed to shield her from the worried, bewildered looks of the team of nurses and doctors as they tried to figure out what to do. Mia began to thrash around and fight, so I leaned over her upper chest, shielding her eyes from the rest of the room and the chaos around her. I pressed gently over her, singing into her ear her two favorite nursery songs that I made up for her when she was a baby. As I sang, I changed up the words a little: “You are the bravest girl, you are the best girl, you are the biggest girl in the whole wide world. And yes, I love you, I really love you. You are the bravest girl.”
I sang it over, and over, and over for the next hour, trying to provide something steady, dependable, soothing to my baby girl. Mia calmed a bit, but I became increasingly aware of my own internal disquiet: I felt all sorts of anxieties and cold raw fear bubble up within me. As I was singing to my daughter and the doctors were scrambling to save her life, there were a few moments when I literally saw myself walking out of the hospital room, running down the street, and getting as far away from this hospital bed as possible. My impulse to flee seemed so unnatural to me as a mom, so horrible, but also so human. At the time, I felt piercing guilt; “I must be a horrible parent for visualizing running from my dying child,” said my thoughts. Even as that feeling of flight came, I squashed it. I needed to put the jumbled mixture of guilt, anxiety, and the impulse to evade aside—I needed to continue to fight; after all, my daughter was in the fight of her life.
Man, I hated that day; it is forever seared in my brain. Looking back, I know those thoughts of running were simply to get away from the pain and fear that at any moment I could lose my child, my baby girl, the most precious gift I had ever asked God to give me. And yet, it is one of my prouder moments. Maybe I would not have fled the hospital, but the normal Emily would have stepped away from the bed, covered my face and hovered in the hallway as the doctors tried to save her. “Let it be on them” I was thinking at the time. And yet I didn’t. I stayed, knowing it could be my last moments with her. It has been one of the hardest times of my life, but another stronger thought kept playing in my head. “When this hard time passes, will you be proud of who you were during it?”
I wish I could say from that point on in my life I never took flight…I really wish I could, but I can’t. I have still had many moments where I just ignored the warning signs, changed the subject of a conversation or faked optimism to avoid having to stay in the fight for something….like a relationship or healing painful emotions or making a touch decision. Ugh. I have done it too many times.
And now, guess what? That girl who was fighting for her life on a hospital bed well now she is a pre-teen with the added bonus of having learning and speech difficulties. I see, in her, days where she just wants to run from the daily onslaught of anxiety in social settings, struggling to learn something that comes easy to her peers and having to navigate the hormones of a 13 year old! I watch her struggle to not shut down, give up or just “take a break” from her reality. And I am reminded how all of us humans have to fight the same thing over and over again. It is sooooo much easier to just check out from our situation. But that means checking out from our potential, too. If you quit or give up you may also be giving up on the best part of who you were meant to be and the best part of your life. Yikes, that’s a hard consequence for avoiding hardships, right? See, here’s the crazy truth…. these hard times, if we stay in the fight and not go for flight, they bring out the best of us. There are so many amazing, incredible qualities inside you and when life is smooth, easy and uncomplicated you aren’t always required to use them. But when the hard times come, when you have to make hard decisions, function under high stress, heartache and brokenness, well that is when you find out just how strong you are.
I recently spent a week in Guatemala as part of a team traveling with author and motivational speaker John Maxwell. Throughout the week he kept saying, “Everything worthwhile is uphill. Everything.”
So what is that uphill in your life? Maybe what’s worthwhile is a new career, pursuing a secret dream you have had, getting out of an unhealthy rut in life or breaking free from a toxic relationship. I am sure hard times come along the way, NO; I know they will, but the only way to reach the summit of that mountain…is to travel through the hard times. And you can do it…you can! You’ve got it in you; God put it in there from the moment you were conceived. And if you struggle to believe you can make it, then it’s time to find someone in your life that will remind you. Maybe it’s a best friend, a sibling or a mentor. Heck, maybe it’s a great audiobook that has a great message (lately that’s been my new favorite way to boost my confidence!)
Someone you definitely have is the Lord, who defines Himself as a Comforter, Teacher and Friend.
So maybe you are struggling to find your footing as you climb up a steep part of your hill. Maybe you’ve slipped, fallen a bit and have a bruised foot. And now the thoughts are coming, telling you to just stop, give up and move to the next thing. But don’t do it, GET UP! You have to keep going. Hard times are here, but your success, your dreams, your life is on the other side of that hardship. Someone said it like this:
“You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have.”
So make being strong, being brave the only choice you have to make it to the top of your mountain.
Much love and confidence in you,
Emily
Broken But Brave 