Desperation & drudgery

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turn my collar to the cold and damp

~Sound of Silence, Paul Simon, 1965

Tired of telling you, you have me
When I know you really don't
Tired of telling you I'll follow
When I know I really won't
Cause I'd rather stand here speechless
With no great words to say
If my silence is more truthful
And my ears can hear how to walk in your way

In the silence
You are speaking
In the quiet I can feel the fire
And it's burning, burning deeply
Burning all that it is that you desire to be silent, in me
~ In the Silence, Jason Upton

Here it is again, this old familiar place, where the rubber meets the road. We survived the separation, we survived cancer again for a 3rd time. Now we wait for results. And survive the consequences of cancer. They are never easy: taking yourself to the brink of hypothyroid death, taking your children to the edge of sanity, taking your husband into a new realm of miserable coping. Mouth sores are healing, and now my hair is falling out in chunks and my skin is dry and numb. My fingers and toes are completely dead, like chunks of wood I haul around with no purpose. My eyesight is blurry, my body aches, especially the joints in my arms, legs, hands and feet. I feel as though I'm on the brink of another double kidney infection - but it's just my body in its inability to handle the slough and crud that builds up over time in every cell and joint and space. Pain reaches a peak around 11 a.m. and then improves with a nap (meaning the laundry and cleaning still isn't getting done), peaks again just after dinner, and improves when I take my daily Synthroid dose at 8 p.m. Add to that the symptoms of hyperthyroidism because of the high dose of Synthroid! My body is getting deliberate double messages. Never a good thing. My heart rate is 140 between 10 p.m. and 9 a.m. Weird! Especially for me - I usually run very low on the heartrate spectrum, around 55 during the day and around 40 at night.

The kids are so, so sick with this latest cold. I am stressed as I watch Amy deteriorate because of asthma and lung gunk. She is requiring nebulizer albuterol for her asthma every 3-4 hours today. She still has good energy. I find I am so much more paranoid since her encephalitis in October/November. I don't want to miss something and end up in the hospital with her over Christmas. Of course, how could I know. I just have to trust, and be watchful, and try to hand it over to God.

I feel as though I've descended further into darkness since coming home, rather than emerging as I expected. God feels very, very far away today, as I struggle through the inconsequential and exhausting work of motherhood. Just being alive in my own skin feels like work. I feel depressed, knowing this is my lot for so many more years, even if it is only once a year in the future. How can I survive this? How am I going to ever bring glory to God through this? I feel miserable, I feel like everyone around me is miserable as well.

And then, just for perspective, at least I am not going through this today:

http://cecemeetsworld.wordpress.com/losing-eli/