Patience and Wonder

I have been writing this blog in my head ever since John came home on Friday.  It is clear to me that patience is needed in this next chapter and it is a big challenge.  This has been an extremely stressful time that has had no quick and easy answers.

I have a picture on the wall in the living room with a quote from Walt Whitman"

"Adopt the pace of nature: Her secret is Patience" 

 

John has been home for a week now and it has been a good thing.  He is walking with a walker as he has issues with his balance following the fall.  Every day is seems he is getting a little more able to manage this new normal for him and for me.  I could write a book about what I am learning about myself through this time.  File it under: patience, waiting, trust

 

I have known always that I am not a patient person by nature.  I am - when left to my own devices - fast moving, fast thinking and fast talking.  Part of my spiritual journey has been to learn to value slowing down.  I can literally remember sitting in the sanctuary at First Christian Church in Zanesville in prayer and wanting God to speak to me.  I received two words:  Slow Down.  That was almost forty years ago. Over and over again God continues to show me that the good life, the God life, is one of trusting that ultimately "all will be well."  My hurry and my worry doesn't help but gets in the way of the peace and freedom I could enjoy.  And my hurry and worry doesn't make me easy to live with. 

 

Anyway, the first problem has been who will take care of John when I am in the hospital.  It may be as many of 7 days and the doctors and physical therapist says that he cannot be alone.  We have a house with a beautiful upstairs bedroom and a spacious walk in shower.  The problem is the 14 steps that are required to get there.  He puts a belt on and I have been trained to guide him and I feel comfortable doing that but he cannot do it alone.  

 

We have had all sorts of  solutions: hire a care company to stay all night and cobble together volunteers who might fill during the day.  He wants to visit me in the hospital, so there is finding people who are welling to get him in and out of the car with his walker and drive to the James Hospital at OSU. Then there were questions about his meals?  What to do?

 

Two nights ago a miracle happened.  I had explained to his friend Jim about our tentative plan to have people bring meals to John at dinner and then wait for the care company to arrive.  He told his wife Pat and she said: "He can stay with us."  It was the answer to prayer.  They have a ranch house and a "Mother in Law" suite with a private bathroom.  They were comfortable with his staying for a week.  The stress lever within me almost dissipated.  It feels like a miracle.

 

John will return to our home from 9 to 5 during the day.  For the most part I have arranged to have two people companion him - on in the morning and one in the afternoon.  Those who come in the afternoon have offered to bring him to the hospital and then return him to Jim's house. This way John can continue to the physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy which is helping him to improve from the effects of the fall.  

Also we are making changes that will be helpful.  We are looking into a chair lift for those 14 steps, have a raised toilet seat and are getting John a life line (I've fallen and I can't get up.)  Every little thing helps. 

The second issue is of course, what happens after my surgery.  I cannot take care of him or myself perhaps and he can't take care of me.  We both need help.  This is where we are hiring a care company to take care of both of us for at least a week.  It will be fluid and we recognize what are needs will be.  

 

The stress for me has been living in the world of "I don't know" and having to make plans.  I still don't know when on Thursday my surgery will be, how extensive it will be or what kind of help I will need.  We also don't know how long it will take John to get his balance back?  Live without the walker?  Not be dependent on me or others for his safety?

 

What I have learned is that if I am patient the answers (which are always going to be partial answers) will come as we need them.  And give me a sense of some kind of inner peace that "all will be well." 

 

And really live in wonder as the angels appear over and over again in different forms.  

 

 

 

So, slowly John walks up the stairs holding onto the railing.  My hand is supports him with his belt as he walks up fourteen steps. 

 

Slowly John walks down the stairs and I walk before him holding the belt  and watch his feet land - first one, then the other on the fourteen steps.  

 

I have learned that sometimes my wanting to help is to speed up the process - but that is not what he needs as he learns how to put on his trousers and socks and shoes.  

 

But it has been more than watching John struggle and improve slowly from this terrible fall.  

 

I have been aware that