Since last August, I have lived every day in constant pain. It started around the time I began going to Adoration: increased kneeling exacerbated some musculoskeletal issues and initiated a whole chain of problems that I’m still struggling to mitigate and control. So, in a way, I can rationally explain my pain. But I find it significant that it started with Adoration.
While I take steps to reduce the pain to a manageable level to be able to care for my kids and quotidian matters, I rarely ask that my pain be taken away. At times, I think of it as part of a battle that is being fought; at other times, as a graciously granted way to suffer now in partial reparation for my many sins. Often, I beg that my pain may lessen the trials of others. In those instances, I liken myself to my two-year-old “helping” to carry in the heavy bags of groceries. I know that nothing I can do is truly enough, yet I want so badly to help that God lets me hold onto a handle of the bag to do my part, while He is carrying the true weight.
More than anything, constant pain and the accompanying sleepless nights have shown me in a way nothing else could how truly small and weak and dependent I am. I can do nothing. On some of the bad pain days, I may not even be able to get out of bed. On the other days, I may struggle with even basic things. There are days that are clearly a litany of trust and dependence, where without Him, every moment would be an insurmountable obstacle. When all I am capable of on my own is to curl up in pain, with His grace I am able to make it through the day completing the necessary tasks.
It is most difficult when it prevents me from caring for my children the way I long to. When I have to ask my five-year-old to stop leaning against me because of the back pain. When I can’t run and play with my two-year-old because of the nausea and dizziness. When I can’t snuggle with them to read bedtime stories because of a migraine. When I am irascible instead of calm and loving. Those are incredibly painful moments for me as a mother. Because of this inability to love and care for them, in addition to my other struggles as a mother, I have had to turn to another family to take care of them. To entrust my children to the care of the Holy Family, since I see how clearly I lack and fail.
It has also shown me how precious my limited resources are. I have had to prioritize everything in my life, getting rid of pretty much all things superfluous. It has forced me to decide what I value in this life, and then to truly stand by that decision. While it is difficult to give up so many things that I love, I am grateful for the opportunity to order my life in this way. Grateful for the many times I have had to struggle through pain trying—and many times failing—to practice virtue. It is like the preseason of virtue practice for me, and I am out of shape.
Prior to this ongoing experience of pain, I had come to a new appreciation of aging for much the same reason. How terrible it would be for so many to rush headlong into death following the same pattern of living they had been used to since youth. Our lives are full of the call to “even now . . . return to Me with all your heart” (Joel 2:12), but we are good at ignoring it.
I began to see aging as a blessing: This forced slowing down. This introduction of pain and helplessness. This limiting of abilities. This warning of death drawing closer. Because, in our pain and frustration, we are more likely to search for meaning outside of ourselves. When we do not see ourselves as capable of “taking care of” everything on our own strength, maybe we can start to turn to the One who is capable. What a grace that He gives us this last period of our lives as an opportunity to turn once again to Him! That He shows us our dependence in ever more pressing ways. That He woos us in our pain and suffering and helplessness to come rest with Him.
If I can’t play soccer anymore, what joy is there in life? If I am not working anymore, how can my life have meaning? If I can no longer taste the food I used to love, if I am in constant pain, if I need someone else to bathe and clothe me, if I can’t remember my name or where I live, if I can’t drive, if I can’t walk . . .
Throughout our lives, we learn to define ourselves in so many ways. God asks that we define ourselves in one: as a child of God. What a painful process to cut through the old ties. But what a blessing to be given the opportunity to do so. To depend more and more completely and perfectly on Him alone. To see our lives and ourselves as having value in relationship with Him, and not through anything we say or do.
I am not yet old enough to speak with authority on aging. This is another reason I am grateful for the experience of pain I now have. It helps me believe even more that these reflections I had a while ago have truth in them. Because I also cannot do what I used to do. I also hurt all the time. I also have had to search for what is indispensable in my life. To find meaning, to turn ever more to God.
If I had not been driven into His arms through my hardships and pain, I would still be lost. But now I cling to the foot of the cross with all my strength, begging that He will never let me go. May we learn to “rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom. 5:3-5).
Photo by Sven Mieke on Unsplash
