How Do We Get through the Bad Times?

 

We all go through bad times during our journey on earth. These grave times might be divorce, financial ruin, or health issues.

My current era is filled with trials. I’ve been the number one caregiver for eight years to our daughter who has dementia, and I recently had major surgery - a total knee replacement. Movement is hampered, and I’ve managed the bare necessities, but fighting fatigue and depression is a major ordeal. Some days, I don't succeed. I haven't written many blogs or much on a book I started long ago. 

How do we proceed with life when we are faced with challenging times? 

I decided to inquire from some of my writer friends how they coped with trying situations.

I asked my writing author friend, Gail Pallotta how she coped with her sickness.

She suddenly became ill, and she continued to write.  It isn't easy to carry on with life and a job, but God shows each of us how to do just that.

Here’s Gail's response.

“Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, Move from here to there, and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you” (NIV). Matthew 17: 20.

When I got a mysterious illness eighteen years ago, I already had had several slipped disks and a dislocated sacroiliac joint. Not only did my back hurt, but I couldn’t sit without a cushion to tilt me to a 90-degree angle and had to lie in the backseat on trips. We were traveling when the strange malady struck with chills and fever.

Since I’d started the vacation with a virus, I used common remedies. Unfortunately, I grew much worse with many weird symptoms, such as getting horrible indigestion and shaking all over whenever a bite of food hit my stomach. When we returned home, I visited the doctor, who told me after a month of tests he couldn’t treat me because he couldn’t diagnose my problem. A strong believer in prayer, I went to the house so numb I couldn’t pray, but God intervened. A name, Dr. David Lee, kept popping in my head, even though I had no idea who he was. I finally recalled him as a chiropractor who had treated a friend of mine ten years earlier, and I thought, I’m on death’s door. What do I want with a chiropractor? But the name kept flashing in my mind. I finally got his number and called him. Now an alternative doctor as well as a chiropractor, he treated me immediately for Chronic Lyme disease. Quite ill, I couldn’t deal with anything else going wrong with my back on top of my current condition, so I told him, “Take care of the Chronic Lyme disease, but don’t touch my back. Every time someone tries to help, it gets worse.”

Terribly sick, I did well to get to Dr. Lee’s, let alone pay attention to the therapies I received, until I noticed my back pain had disappeared. I asked Dr. Lee, “Are you treating my back?”

He said, “Yes.”

“Will I still need to sit at a 90-degree angle?”

“No, you can lounge around like the rest of us,” he said.

I still struggled with Chronic Lyme disease, but remembering words from a sermon I’d heard helped me put it in perspective. “If you ask ‘Why me?’ you also have to ask ‘Why not me?’” Of course, I lived in an imperfect, fallen world. I had two choices: Go on with life with Chronic Lyme disease or waste away with the disease. I prayed for God to help me go on at the same time others prayed for me. My daughter’s friend sent a mustard seed in a clear bottle for me to keep where I could see the symbol of God’s faithfulness and greatness. By God’s grace I’ve kept up with day-to-day chores, swum and continued to write. He’s much more powerful than Chronic Lyme disease.

I was working on Stopped Cold, a teen novel during the time I struggled with the back pain and early symptoms of Chronic Lyme disease.

Blurb to Gail's novel, 

Stopped Cold 

Things aren what they seem in peaceful Mistville, North Carolina.

Margaret McWhorter enjoys a laid-back Freshman year in high school swimming and hanging out with friends—until the day her brother, Sean, suffers a stroke from taking steroids. Now he's lying unconscious in a hospital.

Anger sets a fire for retribution inside her, and Margaret vows to make the criminals pay. Even the cop on the case can't stop her from investigating. Looking for justice, she convinces two friends, Jimmy and Emily to join her in a quest that takes them through a twisted, drug-filled sub-culture they discover deep in the woods behind the school. Time and again they walk a treacherous path, and come face-to-face with danger.

All the while Margaret really wants to cure Sean, heal the hate inside, and open her heart.

Can she do it?

On Amazon