As I have been at work this week life, death and suffering have come to the forefront.
For those of you who don’t know, I work for a home care company in the pharmacy and nutrition services department. Basically I am in charge of providing patients with supplies to care for their IV lines at home and also provide formula and supplies for tube feedings.
Since I am the supervisor I have been covering for my friend who takes in new referrals for tube feedings this week while she is on vacation in Dubai. (and you owe me BIG time, Jen!)
This has stirred up a lot of thoughts and feelings about children with birth defects.
I wonder why God allows some to live without too many problems while others have all types of special needs requiring multiple therapies and meds and so on. I wonder why God allows others, like Gabriel, to be “beyond repair.”
I see so many kids who have admission after admission to the hospital. Some have had multiple transplants, others trying all different types of treatments to help cure their diseases – standard and experimental. Parents and kids fighting for their lives against things like cancer, short gut syndrome, cerebral palsy, pulmonary (lung) disorders… the list just goes on and on. And it makes my heart ache.
I like what I am doing at my job and hope that in some way it makes things easier on the families we serve. But sometimes it’s hard. Especially when I’m grieving the loss of children whose lives I fought for in the spirit but lost in the end.
I always hesitate to say “I know just how you feel,” because let’s face it — I don’t.
So, I’ll say that I’ve had a similar experience. I’m far too often on the other end of that feeding tube conversation, explaining to families that their child will need one (sometimes forever) and trying to navigate those parents’ emotions as they unfold before me. When I was younger and hadn’t lived through my mother’s death I could always get through it. But then it was MY mom who needed the tube, and MY mom who wasn’t going to get better, and suddenly I understood what was happening to those families. Different, sure — but in so many ways the same.
I can’t say it made me a better or more sympathetic therapist, or that it ever really got easier. I’m not sure what it did to me except change me in whatever way I was meant to change. Maybe some day it will make sense. Probably not. So many things won’t, at least on this side of life.
Thanks for putting this out there, Amanda. There is strength in numbers, I think. We all just keep making each other stronger.
I often ask God similar questions. All I know is that all life is sacred and that God has a reason. I wish I had the answers for while our children had to die while I others live in hardship. I just dont know… But God has a reason and gives us the strength to press forward.
I have often wondered the same thing. I haven’t lost children, but I did lose my mom when I was 15. To this day, I ask myself why God took her and not someone elses mom. Is that selfish of me? Yes-I think it is, however I miss her dearly every day. I just keep thinking I am blessed to have her as my GUARDIAN ANGEL!! Keeping you in my prayers and in my heart. I am here if you need me…Love and hugs:)
Oh how I wish I knew these answers. But then I think – do I really want to know? I don’t think any answer would be good enough for me, and I don’t think my humanity could ever comprehend it.
One day, though, we shall know. I Corinthians 13:12 (NLT) “Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.”
I think it is hard to grasp that God’s will is not always done here on earth. For example, we know that God’s will is that none should parish, but all have everlasting life. So if God’s will was always done here on earth, then everyone would get saved, he would come again, and we would get this party started. But it’s not. Jesus taught us to pray “thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.” So why pray for something if it is already so? Think about it a minute. In heaven there is no sickness or disease, rape, murder, war, and so on. So while I have no answers as to why this happened, I will never believe it to be God’s will. He loves us so much that he would never, dare I say, could never hurt us in this way.
Love you,
Aunt Ang