Pages

6/03/2015

Diary of loving someone with an unseen disease

It is called a disease. 
A doctor diagnosed it after visiting several different doctors and taking several exams. 
They treat it with medicine, really expensive medicine I must add. 
The doctor needs a specialization to be able to give therapy for this disease. 
Even he knows this disease takes a toil on himself, so he only treats a patient with this disease a day. 
It breaks you apart from the inside. 
You, as a spectator, feel so impotent and useless, unable to help or relieve. 
It breaks up your family. 
But you can't talk about it.
SHHHHH!!! Never mention it. 
Oh no! Don't fool yourself; people won't understand. 
They'll think, and unfortunately say, it is an easy fix. 
"Just grow up and mature already!"
SHHHH! Don't mention it to your employer; you won't get the job, even if you need to make a living like everyone else. 
SHHHHH! Don't tell your friends. 
They can see something has changed.
It will break you even more to hear them say the same remarks others already have: "Why don't you just change how you feel?", "Why don't you just mature already?", "We all learn to control our emotions!"
And that is what they'll say to her face. 
To my face, mine that loves her with all the fibers in my body, to my face they'll dare say what they hold  infront of her. 
Those lightly spoken words: "crazy", "manipulative", "childish."
And you! You puny, weak human! You have thought it too!
God forgive me- you have said it too!
You have delivered judgment with your mouth instead of understanding.
You can't understand! Can you understand that?
The tears are real.
The fears are real; to her they are. 
They are there all day every day. 
They crawl from beneath the covers of her bed and wrap themselves around her neck, sucking joy and life from her.
The tears are so real. They're hot and thick and salty, but they bring no relief, no release. 
You feel lost because you feel impotent. Well, she feels lost because she feels helpless. 
How can she be helped? She can't even talk about it. 
I can't talk about it!
People can only connect disease with physical malady. 
Why is disease looked at differently when accompanied by the word "mental"?
You can show compassion for your friend with cancer as you watch it eat her body away.
Well, I've watch it eat her up.
I've watched the light in her eyes go out in a body that is still breathing. 
I have had a real fear of that body no longer breathing by voluntary choice. 
I have seen the wounds in her heart manifest in her body.
God forgive me, I have asked where is God in all this?
I have reassured myself that He can do something about it. 
Please, Lord, because the medicines definitely haven't. 
I have yet to learn to trust You can do something because I have a harder time asking You to. 
She has seen it too: all the prayers, the imposing of hands, the anointing with oil. 
I see the light momentarily return to her eyes.
She is so beuatiful. 
She loves disinterestedly. 
She gives generously. 
She plays with the innocence of a child. 
And I beg the Heavens it will stick. Make it last. Set her free. 
But darkness returns, sadness is unbearable, and hopelessness reigns. 
But again I tell you, 
SHHHHHHHHH! You mustn't speak of this. 

According to a statistic online, one in four adults suffers from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year. That translates to 57.7 million people in the US alone. Why, then, do we barely hear of anyone suffering from them? I think my sentiments on the post above state why. Funny, I have always thought the U.S. is wrong in trying to be so politically correct, and here I am wishing for more correctness.
Someone made a remark on Sunday which sparked this post. "She is so crazy," he said. And I had considered him a good friend to her. I am not saying he no longer is, but he definitely doesn't understand. How can he? He barely knows. If these are my sentiments, what would hers be?
I write this because someone in your family or you yourself are being silent while you carry this huge burden alone. I see it in one of my sixth graders. Heavens be gracious, a sixth grader! 
"Odd", "loner", "weird"! Words that follow her around while no one knows the depth of the struggle in her heart. I know the signs, so I detect the deep sorrow in her eyes while she feigns another smile. Twelve years old with no joy for life! How did it get there? Who will speak out for her? How will others understand her? Can you understand that that side of her is a huge part of who she is? Will you love her the same? Will you be able to keep your mouth shut of what you think you know, which is nothing, and listen to her? Can you make her day just by sitting next to her without speaking a word? 
Can you join me in praying for those who suffer the unseen marks of an unseen disease that is just as real as the cancer patient that everyone shows compassion to?