We will spend one more session considering our times during treatment for cancer. Hopefully there will be something strengthening for those now undergoing treatment. For long term survivors we visit this time again, seeking insight. We acknowledge that one of our learning points is: Getting over it is knowing you will never get over it. You will never be "well" in the same sense again.
One overwhelming experience during cancer treatment is how easily we lose our humanity. We become a "thing" to be studied, poked, tested, examined, cut up and invaded. Many times we feel like a specimen--a non-person. This is the stage of hanging-on and hanging-in and a time to consider courage. I found comfort in this statement:
The only kind of ;courage that matters is the kind that gets you from one moment to the next.
The pain may be sharp, the misery deep, but the commitment to another day, another moment must be made.
This period raises some hard questions: What is the purpose of my life now? Does my life have any value? Hopes fade and plans go unfinished. We want to be brave and cheerful but only survivors know how much energy this takes out of us.
Still, there are lessons we can learn from this experience. First, we can witness to the fact that pain and suffering are a part of every life. One of my students said, "I will never again so naively think nothing bad can happen to me." Just as weather contains sunny days and rainy days, so do our lives. We can affirm THIS moment. This is where we are now. We have this moment to live and our life has value.
We also learn about the fragility of life. We don't know why some suffer more than others. Cancer causes us to probe deeper into our faith. You may want to say, "Hang in there through this painful period and you may discover God at a deeper level of faith". Our faith is tested during great pain. It's easier if we have been in remission for some time but our goal is to trust God in this painful moment and not just in retrospect later.
Take the time to jot these and other thoughts in your journal and ponder them.
Finally we witness to the fact that we cannot answer these questions. We only learn to live with the mystery and we affirm that we can trust God whatever our life situation.
My grace is sufficient for you--my power is made perfect in weakness.
2 Cor. 12:9
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