SICU

I believe you still heal.
And demons still bow.
I’m convinced there is power
In trusting in a faithful God

So I will praise til you appear
and set your foot upon this shore
I declare that every foe
Is subject to my faithful God

Faithful God-Zach Nees

Oh man.

This last week has been brutal. I have no words to describe the kind of spiritual, emotional, and physical pain I have been hit with since last Sunday. I do not mean depression. I have been through depression before. I am a veteran of the kind of depression that makes leaving bed impossible, that makes breathing difficult and chokes life out of your heart. I was not depressed. I was frustrated to the point of wanting to break things, felt betrayed by God, could not feel positive about new opportunities that were right in front of me because I literally did not trust, did not feel that I could trust, that they would come to fruition without more pain.
Perhaps I should back up and try to make a more cohesive story out of it.
Sunday night I was preparing for an interview with a Home Health company that called me on Friday. Problem is, my phone had gone out, which is a pretty key item for a home health nursing job (also, my GPS is on my phone), and my computer was for some reason suddenly running s-l-o-w a-s m-o-l-a-s-s-e-s-s. My pain level was high. Okay, now the stage is set.
The interview Monday went well-so well, in fact, that they began to train me.
You'd think I'd be happy, right?
I couldn't bring myself to hope. I just couldn't do it. If you'll remember the last Home Health job I got, everything went south as soon as I finished my training. Normally I am tirelessly optimistic, and only hit pessimistic spots when I indulge depression. I couldn't help it. Try as I might, I couldn't feel happy.
You see, I was overloaded on pain. Everything hurts right now. Everywhere I turn there are more things to endure, more reasons that I have to "pull myself together" and keep going, and everything, everything, EVERYTHING is agony. I swear, I'm not whining. I know it sounds like I am, but I have tried and will try to find new and creative ways to deal, at least until we can start running tests again.
But all week I have been on overload. Every time I am alone I dissolve into hysteria, screaming, crying until my eyes swell shut, praying desperately, and hear nothing from heaven. I know that this is because a) I am too hurt/panicked/tired/whatever to hear it or b) God wants to show me a new way to listen. Either way, my desperation grew. I knew there was SOMETHING on the horizon. Every time I opened the Word, all I found were verses telling me "ask, and I'll give you what you need." Stories about wild and crazy miracles coming at just the right time, prophets praying for and receiving blessings for poor widows and children, Jesus healing the sick and broken and telling the disciples, "You will do greater things than these in My name,"
But I needed more than SOMETHING. I was in agony, could barely hold on. Money running short, hope gone, no emotional reserves. I asked God for little things, not to test Him, but because, as I cried to Him one night, "I need something other than pain from Your hand."
I asked God, most notably, that when I called the people that hold the note on my car, that they would be compassionate and not get angry with me that my payment would be late. My hands trembled when I told her, "I'm so sorry, but I've been out of work for a month...It's got to do with the health problems I've been having, but I got a new job today. I'll let you know as soon as I find out when my first pay check will be." The woman's voice turned soft and compassionate.
"Oh, honey...you must be really, really sick. I'm so sorry."
I nearly started sobbing on the phone with a creditor. Not a cool look.
But God did several things like that, to let me know that He really was still taking care of me. But I still didn't understand, still writhed like an animal in a trap. Everywhere I turned there was anguish, and I couldn't escape.
Tuesday evening with Laura was a blessed refuge. She made me enchiladas and we watched YouTube, and I was shocked to find that she understood some things that a lot of people don't grasp right away. She's been going through her own shadowlands. We prayed together, and I wound up crying again into their leather sofa.
Since then, I have been thinking, and I've come to understand that this week I've been more or less in the Spiritual ICU. It's what happens sometimes when a callous world beats us bloody and for whatever reason God lets us walk through a Job period. The pain is there, the damage is done, but God is faithful, God is Healer, and God can deal with our frustration and rage and lashing out and asking why and feeling hurt.
Today I was listening to the song, which lyrics I have typed out in part above. When I heard that part of the song, it was as if God finall plugged the hole in my heart where I've been bleeding out all week.
Now I feel as though I'm just beginning to drift into that normal spiritual state that I usually occupy, the heavenly equivalent of coming out of a seizure or ICU psychosis. It was far too violent for a coma.
Hey, God, maybe more drugs next time?