Yesterday, I received the news that a very dear friend has received a devastating diagnosis. For 10 weeks, she has carried a heavy heart as she has undergone tests only to learn that the news is not good. Here’s the thing that kicks you in the gut – she’s 23. Twenty-three. Twenty-three-years-old with a lifetime unlived. I’m speechless.
Oceans and continents divide us, but she is so dear to me that while time and space separate us, our connection is strong. Rock solid. I love her as if she were my own niece or even a daughter.
To say I’m devastated for her is an understatement. The journey ahead is a battle that no young person should have to fight. I don’t know what to say, how to comfort her. How do you comfort someone who’s received unimaginable news?
It’s times like this that faith is shaken. Faith in the universe, faith in God, faith in what is right. We are told that if we “believe”, it will be okay. All day I have struggled with the thought that if I pray hard enough, if I send only loving thoughts of healing out into the universe and chase away all the negative demons, it will be okay. But, these platitudes crash to the ground around me with a hollow thud.
To protect her privacy, I’m not publishing her name. But, she knows who she is. She knows how much I love her. She knows how I wish I could reach across the vast ocean that separates us and give her a hug, so that we could cry together.
She has a loving family with her and is surrounded by people who care for her; so she is not physically alone. But, the truth of the matter is that we are all “alone” in our individual journey, no matter what that journey is and even if we are surrounded by loving and caring family and friends, we have to fight the battle ourselves.
My darling Princess A: I have loved you all of your young life. The precious baby girl with the head full of curls, the young school girl who would bring me coffee in bed before she headed out the door to school, the teenager who wanted to return to her “roots” and seek out her past, the young adult who is so kind, loving, adventurous and strong.
With love and a heavy heart,
Dear Carole, you’ve been on my mind all day, and now that I read your post I can see why. A dear friend of mine emailed this morning asking for prayers for three year old Sophie and her parents, who are all facing dealing with a mass in Sophie’s brain. For some reason I’ve been thinking of you and your site all day, and was intending to see if I could see your latest post, when here you are. I am so sorry for your friend’s plight, and for your feelings of heaviness as you deal with the shock of learning about her illness. It is so hard for us to understand the things that happen in our lives. My mother, her two sisters, and their mother and aunts all died in their late forties and early fifties of an hereditary kidney disease, so I grew up knowing what it was like to see illness all around me. I hope that by “unburdening” your heart to us, your readers, today, it has lightened your being, and I hope that you know that we share in your grief. I will pray for your friend, and I know that the Good Lord has her in the palm of His hand no matter what. Psalm 125:6 says, “Those who sow with tears shall reap with joy and singing.” Remember that your tears are drops of liquid sunshine, heading your loved one’s way. I pray for a beautiful rainbow of love for her. I will continue to pray, and to watch your post for news of how your loved one is doing. She has a wonderful friend in you!
Welda: what an incredibly kind and thoughtful comment! I so appreciate you sharing about young Sophia, who will now be in my prayers, too. I’m so sorry to hear the about your family’s great loss of your mother and the rest of your relatives at such a young age. Thank you so much for your words of kindness…