Healing Bitterness

Well, I decided this post was worth the effort to re-write it. I'm trying to let go of my bitterness toward BLOGGER for losing my post yesterday.

I am enjoying Bible Study with some friends on Monday nights. This week we talked of many things, including God as healer. I liked that! Maybe because I am a nurse, I don't know, but I really like to think of God as a healer.

It is easy to think of healing in regards to disease and injury. Something discussed Monday night, though, was our need for healing of bitterness.  Yes, bitterness. Of course I first started thinking of people I know who seem really bitter. It's always easier to see what is wrong with someone else, huh? The trust is, though, most of us have something that can makes us feel bitter.

Often people who are bitter about something don't realize it or wouldn't call it bitterness. Can you think of anything about which you might be retaining some bitterness? If you can identify something about which you are bitter, you have likely found something for which you need to consider offering forgiveness.

Forgiveness is a tricky thing. Sometimes we want to hold on to our pain, including our bitterness. Sometimes we want to wallow in it, huh? Eventually, though, it starts to smell bad, so to speak. In fact, one of the things we read was bitterness is like a cancer. It can grow and spread until you don't really even remember where it all began. 

So, how to wash yourself clean of bitterness? As I said, forgiveness is usually the ticket. God shows us forgiveness; we need to pass that on. Another tricky thing about forgiveness, though, is that we may worry about what message we are sending. Sometimes our bitterness is based on something really seriously bad that someone did to us. Does offering forgiveness mean to say that the wrong done to you was really ok? Nope. Forgiving and letting go of bitterness is not about saying a wrong is ok, it is about saying YOU are ok. It is to say you wish to quit allowing the wrong thing to keep hurting you. You want to be rid of it. You want to be healed of it.

OK, that is one of the things we talked about and I really wanted to share it. Now, I have. I feel better.

Bitter About Bitterness

So, here is the deal...

I wrote a post for today titled "Healing Bitterness". Doesn't that sound intersting? However, I did it from my phone and when I sent it to publish, it got stuck. AAAAAAAAALLLLL day long it keeps saying "publishing" but it never really did that. It is stuck. I can't access the post at all from my phone nor from my computer.

Perhaps I will rewrite it. Right now, I feel bitter about it and I'm going to wallow in that bitterness for awhile.

Sorry.

A Healing Purpose?

(This photo has nothing to do with this post.  I just liked it.  

The painting in the background is by my talented mother.)

Last week at work I re-met a lady whom I'd met last year while working at hospice.  Last week she was just accompanying someone who was in for a colonoscopy.  Last year she was at the bedside of a young woman who had suffered a sudden event and was sent from the emergency room to our hospice home.  Over the course of a few days she'd gone from independent living to being on her death bed.  I was with her and her family as she breathed her last.  I was the one who said those sad words, "Time of death...."

At the surgical center where I now work I am finding that I often meet people from my past jobs.  I guess that isn't surprising as this is not a metropolis.  Working at hospice I often got to know patients and family members over an extended period of time.  Even further back, as a chemotherapy nurse, I developed friendships with patients and their families that often spanned a number of months or even years.  Actually, that was one of my favorite parts about those jobs.  Many of those patients gave more to me than I ever gave to them.

My concern, now, is the effect seeing me has on the survivors.  I am seeing them at a time when they are likely a bit nervous as they are coming to our center for a procedure.  They are vulnerable.  Then, in I walk.  Does it give them comfort to have someone they already know enter their room?  Maybe.  I am happy to see them and greet them with joy, but I know that the sight of me represents painful memories as well.  That doesn't make me happy but it is what it is.

As I thought about this, wondering how I could make it easier on my current patients, I realized I may be looking at it all wrong.  Maybe these meetings are a time when I'm supposed to offer something of a healing presence.  Do you suppose that I can say or do something that helps them through their grief?  Maybe just knowing that I remember their loved one, cared about their loved one, sometimes even still mourn their loss myself could be healing for them.  I don't know.

Yesterday a patient came in who was a family member to one of my previous patients... a nurse herself who became a friend and mentor to me, even as I cared for her.  I gave her chemotherapy over the course of several years.  I loved her!  When I saw her family member, I knew they would know me.  My friend/patient had kept my photograph on her refrigerator and had included me in some of her family events.  Since her death, though, I'd only seen her family a few times.

I prayed before I entered his room.  I wanted to help him face his procedure.  I did NOT want to cause him pain.  So, I went in smiling.  We hugged.  We talked.  I tried to pay attention to what he might need to hear.  Finally, I felt he needed to hear me say some of what she had meant to me.  I told him how I still go to her grave site sometimes to pray.  I told him I still think of her.  I still miss her.

THEN, we moved on.  We talked of his life now, four years after his loss.  We talked of his family.  We talked of the future.  I think it was good.  I realized then, that maybe these meetings could be more than just painful reminders to people.  Maybe they could have a healing purpose.  Maybe that healing is for me, as well as for them.  I don't know.  

The Case of the Mysterious Crutch

It is really windy where we live.  No, I don't mean breezy.  I mean REALLY windy.  Some days it blows and it blows and it blows with a dreadful monotany, only to be interrupted by gusts of 50-90 mph.   A few weeks ago, while driving the 15 minute route to Cordy's house (Yes, Maria and Eric live there too but she refers to it as "Cordy's House" so now I do as well.) I came upon a semi that had been blown over.  Unfortunately that is not that uncommon here.

When Beth Moore was here she was telling the audience of her shock when she arrived at our airport and got off the little plane.  She demonstrated with her body how hard it was to just stand up!  She then commented that she was terrified it would blow the bleach right off her hair!

Well, after one of those really windy weeks I found this in our front yard.

We often have odd things blow up into our yard but this was surprising indeed!  I couldn't quite come up with an explanation for this.  If it blew into our yard, was there a limping person also blown off course?  Had someone left this in their yard and it blew down to ours?  I was puzzled.

But then it was suggested to me

"Maybe someone was healed!"

I'm going with that explanation!

 

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I Sometimes Forget

I didn't write the following.  I found it probably 6 years ago, printed in a church bulletin for an advent service I attended.  It really spoke to me that night.  I stumbled upon it this morning and thought it was perfect following the blog about fear that I posted yesterday.  I would give credit to the author but no name was attached to it.  I hope the poem touches you as it did me.

In the dark,
I sometimes forget the light will come, the stars will shine.
In the rain,
I sometimes forget the sun will come out, the land will be green and fresh.
In the rush,
I sometimes forget how to slow down, how to be still.
In the noise,
I sometimes forget the quiet will come, peace will return.
In the loneliness,
I sometimes forget you are always here, you are holding me.
In the cold,
I sometimes forget who warms my heart, who holds my soul.
In the fear,
I sometimes forget to trust in you, to lean on you.
Forgive me, God, for not remembering that laughter will follow tears,
Joy will follow the sorrow, healing will follow the hurt,
Day will follow the night, because I sometimes forget. Amen