There are somethings in life that you have to wait a long
time for. When they eventually come, sometimes they are everything you expected
them to be, sometimes they are more than you could have ever imagined, and
sometimes they fall so far short of what you thought they would be that they
leave you feeling empty inside. This week I had an appointment with a
Neurologist. An appointment I had been waiting for since I was discharged from
hospital over six weeks ago. It was an appointment I was expecting to explain
how I was going to be treated and how long I could expect to have to wait until
I would be able to go back home to Papua New Guinea. It didn’t. The Doctor and
I had the exact same conversation that I had with the Neurologists whilst I was
an inpatient in the hospital six weeks ago and he came up with the same
conclusion – I have something called Functional Neurological Disorder. He then
told me that he couldn’t help me any further but that I would have to see an
even more specialised specialist but he didn’t know how long I would have to
wait until I could get an appointment with him because he was so special. I’m
not going to lie, this hit me hard. I had made none of the progress I had been
hoping to, and rather than feeling stationary, I somehow felt like I was
falling backwards away from my goal. (Please note that this is no criticism of
the Doctor who was both a lovely man and a very good Doctor, nor of the NHS
which I feel very privileged to have access to).
A description of the book of Job
I spent a long time alone in my room with God afterwards.
Not talking to Him, just sitting, knowing that He was there. I recently watched
a YouTube video about Job. (Now please don’t think I’m making any comparison
between myself and Job, I am not. To do so would be to undermine the real and
awful suffering that both He and many people in the world have to go through
every day, my life is heaven compared to theirs and I would do well to remember
that). The funny thing about the book of Job is that it comprises of about two
chapters describing something that happened to him and then about 34 chapters
of him wrestling with the question of why it happened, but in the end, despite
this being what the book is all about, he never finds out. Instead it concludes
with about four chapters of God pointing out that Job’s experience and
knowledge was infinitesimally small in comparison to God’s and that Job
couldn’t even begin to understand even if he tried. It then concludes with an
epilogue of Job apologising for stuff he shouldn’t have said about God and
explains what happened to Job afterwards. After that time just sitting in my
room, I knew that God knew that this wasn’t how I wanted it to go. I also knew
that it was how God wanted it to go and that I couldn’t even begin to
understand how God was moving in all of this, particularly whilst I was so
focused on myself. I can only pray that in this time of rest and thought I can
begin to see the world a little less through my eyes and a little more through
His.
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