A Medical Mama’s Tips, Tricks and Tales

There are the two things I have needed more than anything and two things I cannot buy. You see, I am not wealthy by any means, but I am a medical provider in a primary care office and with that comes the hard truth that as complicated as things are for me raising a special needs child, for other families, it’s likely a lot harder.

First, we are financially able to swing paying for *some* therapies, covering our daughter on insurance, and even for a private nurse/sitter a few hours a week when needed. But, we are also rich in medical knowledge and know-how, and in the ability to navigate a complicated medical system because I work in it.

Yet! The realities of a sick kid, the unknowns that lie ahead… like, who will take care of my kid if something happens to me? Will she ever walk? Will she ever say “Mama?” Will she die like most kids with her condition at an incredibly young age?

I can’t buy peace. I can only crave it. I can only lean in on the God who moves mountains and parts seas, who literally breathes life into existence. Jesus died so I could know His here and now peace, and His ultimate peace.

And that is where peace begins. With, through and because of the grace of Jesus. There is no real peace without the real grace of Jesus’s gift to us.

Because I can’t buy peace, I can’t buy a cure for every anxiety and every worry and how each worry leads me to be a little sassy. I can’t buy peace and that means sometimes my mind gets in cycles of the “what if” game. And that worry, instead of Lament (crying out to our Mighty God), in many cases is sin. It’s ok to think on these forever concerns, but when they consume me, I need more grace. I need more peace. I need forgiveness for not trusting in the goodness and the power of our sweet, Mighty, loving Father.

And, forgiveness is ours for the accepting. God doesn’t want us to live in these anxious, panicky cycles, but I truly believe He knows our hearts, He hears our cries and aches with us at the brokenness of this world. He wants us to cry out to Him. To say, God I have no clue what to do, I am exhausted. And to hear Him say, “but I do.”

So back to Ephesians 1:1-3

“To the church in Ephesus,”

Might as well say, “to the church in Charleston…” “to the people who make up the special needs church..” “to Friendship Church.”

God has blessed us with every Spiritual blessing. It’s our access because of the grace and peace of Jesus.

God has adopted us, made us daughters through Jesus. What a mercy, what an undeserving gift!

When R is sick and I am exhausted, up all night… suctioning, cleaning, doing more laundry than I could ever imagine, I long for nothing more than the loving assuring words of my family. And, like all families, sometimes, they aren’t there. Sometimes, they are busy with their own work, life, kids, or are simply oblivious to my needs.

But the God who created the moon and the stars, the God who never sleeps and is all knowing, who knows each exhausted, heart aching feeling says right here: adopted before we could ever do anything good or bad to lose or gain his love. Our adoption is only through Jesus. And our adoption is his grace to us. His mercy. And our adoption, these sweet family words mean: He cares. He listens. He aches. He has blessings of peace to give.