Where is God?

 This post delves into religious themes. If that makes you uncomfortable, feel free to skip this post.

To better understand the following, I have had chronic pain for eight years. I was nine years old when it began and as of this writing, I have not found a diagnosis.

Where is God? On my bad pain days, this question features prominently in my mind. How could He watch and let this happen to me? is another. I don’t like playing the victim, and that’s not what I intend to do. But I think it’s healthy to acknowledge that when I’m in a more severe amount of pain than usual, I do everything everyone tells Christians not to do—I question God. I bargain. If I get all As, please make my pain better. If I pray a little more, maybe the pain wouldn’t be as bad. I worry. Maybe I disappointed God, and this is the consequence. I grow bitter. Why me? Because no one expects to wake up one day with pain that never goes away, and I did.

Growing up, I believed—and I still do—in a loving God that gives grace and is merciful. As a nine-year-old (and sometimes even now), this pain doesn’t feel like mercy. How could a merciful God do this? This felt like a punishment.

Eventually, as my pain continued and had no signs of going away, I wondered where God was. Surely, He wasn’t in the doctor’s office as my first rheumatologist told nine-year-old me that I had fibromyalgia and sent me home crying. Surely, God wasn’t there for my many blood draws when the phlebotomists couldn’t find a vein. Surely, He wasn’t with me as I struggled to explain to my friends that not only did my legs not move like theirs did, but I now hurt all the time. How could God have been there as the many medications supposed to relieve my symptoms failed? Where was God as my body, ridden with aches and pains, stopped feeling like mine and turned into someone else’s entirely?

But God was there. I know He was. God was there to whisper strength into my ear when I wanted to give up. God was the crack of light peeking through that told me to hold onto my hope. As I slowly realized my pain was there to stay, God was holding my hand, telling me that He wasn’t ever going to give up on me. 

Having said that, there are days where if anyone tells me that God has a reason for my being in pain, I will want to scream at them. On my bad days, being told that God’s plan is for me to have chronic pain will make me seethe at the injustice I feel. 

I wanted more for my life than hurting all the time. When my chronic pain began, I thought it was the end of having a productive, fulfilling—and, most importantly, happy—life. But human plans can change. Ultimately, I firmly believe that God has a plan for us all, and having chronic pain just happens to be part of His plan for me.

When I was younger, I wanted to be a physical therapist (PT) to return the kindness that had been extended to me. As my pain changed and worsened over the years, I realized that I wouldn’t have the strength or stamina I needed to help patients as much as I felt they deserved. (My cerebral palsy limits the amount of strength I have anyway, but my chronic pain has sapped any ability I would have had to stand for a long time.) At first I was disappointed. I was confused. How is a physical therapist with chronic pain supposed to work? I wanted to ask God. Don’t you want me to use my cerebral palsy to help people? If not this, then how? But if God had a plan for me, who was I to shout at Him and tell Him “no”? 

Granted, I’ve had my days when I’ve been tired, angry, and just plain sad.

 “No, God, I can’t do this.”

“God, I don’t want this pain anymore.”

“God, why did you choose me? Please, please give this to someone else.”

“I’m not worthy. I’m not good. I’ve cried to You and begged and pleaded. Please give me a different plan.”

But for whatever reason, God’s plan for me right now involves my having pain. There are times where I worry God isn’t there, but there are so many more times when I know that He is—my pastor giving a sermon on pain and discomfort. My PT telling me that it was okay to be upset. Waking up after surgery to see my feet turned completely outward. My friend pushing me up a hill in a wheelchair after my surgery when I couldn’t make it on my own. Inching along the wall of the hallway at school as I relearned how to walk, my friends supporting me. An amazing physical therapist who was recommended at the right time and who I’ve worked with for 16+ years. 

All of these examples and more tell me that God is here, as difficult as my challenges seem sometimes. Even though my faith shakes occasionally, I can trust in God’s plan and know that He believes in me as much as I believe in Him. As much as I struggle with my path in life and wondering why I have to suffer, I know that I will never walk my path alone. 

There Is Purpose In My Pain

 

September is Pain Awareness Month. I have been struggling in my relationship with my chronic pain lately, so I wrote this article as an outlet for my thoughts.

 “You’re too young to have chronic pain.”

This was one of the comments I’ve heard recently. When it first registered, I felt a flash of irritation, but honestly, I’ve thought about the comment ever since.

The lady who told me this, in a way, is right. I’m too young to have to deal with chronic pain. Most people deal with persistent aches and pains when they’re older, when they’ve lived a full life. Instead, I’ve had to grow up with the pain, learn to live with it. I’ve lost two of my grandparents while in pain instead of becoming one, like what’s supposed to happen in the cycle of life, and I’ll probably go to college while in pain. 

I try not to be bitter, but it’s hard. Going through adolescence causes a lot of people to dislike their bodies. Going through adolescence with chronic pain made me hate mine. 

Recently, my chronic pain has gotten progressively worse. The increased pain has led to depression on my part because I feel hopeless. I love my life, but being in pain indefinitely is a difficult reality to face sometimes. It’s even more difficult not to loathe my body when I feel it has let me down so drastically.

Having cerebral palsy limits my ability to do many physical activities. What physical things I can do—like walking and climbing stairs—are made ten times harder because of my chronic pain. At times I feel that chronic pain has taken away the rest of my physical ability, but I won’t let it. I will fight my pain, but all the fighting makes me despise myself more.

When aspects of my life are untethered—being in a severe amount of pain, being depressed, struggling to love my body—I cling to my faith. I believe there must be a reason for everything. Thinking this way helps me get unstuck and allows me to find a purpose.

As I’ve grappled between despising and trying to love myself and my body, I’ve thought about what the reason could be for my pain and suffering. Not the cause, but the reason. 

Laying in bed at night, gritting my teeth against the throbbing and aching in my hips, it takes at least two hours from the time I go to bed until I can actually sleep, so I use the time to think.

What I’ve come up with is this:

My pain gives me purpose. My chosen career is to be a rehabilitation counselor so I can help other people with disabilities improve their mental health. I do already have cerebral palsy, but my chronic pain gives me a supplemental experience to relate to my future clients.

More important than that, though, my chronic pain will teach me to love myself unconditionally. I struggle with self-love, but I will be the first to say that it is very important. I am working on learning to love myself in therapy right now, because if I don’t learn that skill, I will be miserable living my life in a body I can’t stand. I need to change how I think about myself and my body. I love others unconditionally, so I might as well give myself the same grace.

My chronic pain will make that goal of self-love more thorough. When people learn to love themselves, that love often stops at their bodies. My chronic pain affects every aspect of my mind and body. The way my body feels at any given time impacts how I think about myself, so in other words, to change one will change the other. 

Because I have chronic pain, to love my body unconditionally means to love it no matter what it can do. My pain changes on a day-to-day basis, so my expectations of myself need to change, too. If I can walk a long distance one day and then I’m in severe pain the next day, I need to learn to love myself anyway. After all, how can I help other disabled people with self-love if I can’t love myself?

So on my bad days, on the days where every step is an internal battle, on the days where I wonder if my pain will ever get better, I remind myself that pain has a purpose. I tell myself that although my pain causes suffering, if it lets me help others, it is all worth it. And if I can endure pain throughout my life and learn to love myself at the end of this, it is honestly the best sign of a life well-lived.