The Unanswered Questions

Healthy diet, exercise....these have taken a back seat to eating at all...and to surviving. I have no appetite. Food sits like lead in my stomach. I struggle not to toss those cookies as soon as I eat them. It's all I can do to get out of bed with this body that resists my every move...the thought of exercising is the last thing on my mind.

I'm sick in body, and mind.
Pain is my closest companion these days.
And it's all I can do to face it another day.

I haven't slept more than an hour or two in over a week.
Pain disrupts me and springs my eyes open moments after they close. I crawl from the bed to my recliner and back again...all night long. I finally found a plug outlet that will reach both spots for my laptop....so that doubles my options of where I might rest. The arthritis is a pittance of my pain...a drop in the bucket. It' s the lethal combo of bone and disc disintegration in my spine...and some unnamed pain in my abdomen that is killing me.... but way too slowly.

Music is the only respite I am finding. If I can blast it loudly enough...it does distract me a little.
I listen to music at full volume in my iPod earbuds...It's the science of diversion. If I could just find a thing that consumed more of my body's focus than my pain, then the pain would feel less. At least that's how the theory goes.

There' s a Rich Mullins song: My Deliverer. and it says..."my Deliverer is coming ; my Deliverer is near." I play it over and over. LOUDLY.

I love God. with my whole heart. But when really pressed...I do ask Him "Why?" and the only answer I get is "Trust." It's not one I want to hear. I want ANSWERS. Time frames. a finish line. I want it signed on the dotted line, sealed, and delivered.
Instead I'm the only one sealed and not yet delivered. At least in one sense. In another sense...my Deliverance is complete.

The worst part is being alone. Alone in my house, day after day...my husband often leaves before dawn and is home after I'm already trying to sleep. My daughter is usually gone too. And there is the other kind of loneliness....the kind that comes when it dawns on you that, as much as people want to understand ....they don't have a clue.

But here I am.
Here He has me...Roped and bound.
Fit to be tied.
Longing for sleep and waiting for morning.
And clinging to the mantra I've adopted from a disabled pastor, "This sucks. God is in it. and God is (still) good."

Not sure what that---or this-- all means in the grand scheme of things. It's one of the questions I will ask him when I get to Heaven....
After I'm done holding him.
And AFTER I'm done roller blading.