Posted on 02/21/2003 12:41:01 AM PST by Recovering_Democrat
During the week before my amputation, I would lie awake at night, softly crying to myself, "I don’t want to lose my leg. I don’t want to lose my leg."
I would look down at my pillow and see that I had lost the last remaining bristles of my hair. I would look under the covers at my frail, sixty-five-pound body. Then I would wonder what other nine-year-olds were doing.
It had been three months since doctors gave me a fifty/fifty chance to live and I began chemotherapy. When tests showed that the tumor remained, amputation at the hip became the only option.
The day finally arrived. My parents and I got in the car and began the journey across the mountain to the hospital. As we drove, sadness hung in our minivan like a thick cloud. I was holding on to my leg with both arms. Then my parents read Romans 8:28. As I thought about the verse, I sat up: God was in control. Maybe I didn’t understand why I’d never play soccer again, but He did.
After the amputation, I didn’t look back. By the third day, I was running laps around the seventh floor of the hospital, worried nurses chasing close behind. Although doctors expected me to stay in the hospital for three weeks of recovery, I healed so quickly that they released me after five days.
Normally, when people lose limbs, they go through a grieving process. The doctors couldn’t understand why I didn’t show any such symptoms. They sent in a psychologist, but even she couldn’t figure out where all of these feelings of grief were.
Of course, I knew where they were. I had given them to the only One Who was really in control.
Lord, help me to trust and follow Your plan for my life whenever life doesn’t conform to my plan.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.