And When I Come to Die

We're not going to leave you behind, he said, and I think I could have cried. You sure? I said, the words thick like mud coming up from my throat. Thick like doubt. I'm moving awfully slow. He gave a half-smile and shook his head. We're not going to leave you behind. 

...

Wednesday night, I sing. I pace up and down, wearing patterns in the carpet, barefooted. Something is off with my body, but as usual, I'm ignoring it. It'll pass, someday. Someday I will break free from this crushed shell and mortality won't grip me anymore. But it's after the set now and I'm hot, too hot to stay in the room. I'm just going to take a breath of fresh air. 

Why is my heart pounding? It's nothing, though. I just need a break. I'll reset, regain some composure. I'm washing my hands in the bathroom and the room is spinning a little, black flecks speckling my vision. I might pass out. I'll sit down and it'll pass. 

It does--it always does. I stand up shakily and look in the mirror. Man, I don't feel well. Next thing I know, my legs have crumpled underneath me. I lean back and try to breathe, try to see straight, but something is wrong, more wrong than normal. I'm alone. I'm alone in the bathroom and I don't know what I should do. 

My phone is in my pocket. I dig it out, and my hands are starting to curl over on themselves. Soon, I will lose feeling in them entirely, just like the numbness that is creeping over the rest of my body. I force my fingers to tap out letters. It's probably nothing. I just don't want to be alone right now. 

He's the only one with his phone on him that I know of, and I feel bad for asking him to find me in the girl's bathroom, but I am really starting to be scared. My face is going numb and my heart is pounding so hard and I'm struggling to get enough breath. 

When he comes, I don't know what to tell him--and all my words are slurring anyway. Don't call 9-1-1, I don't think my family can afford the ambulance. I am hot, I need air. I need to breathe. Can you find my inhaler? I am cold now. Yes, water would be good, but I can't hold the cup. I can't move my hands. He carries me like a doll and I hang limply and I want to cry but I can't even do that. I am panicking and I know I need to control my breathing but nothing seems simple anymore. It's like I can feel the world spinning and it is uncontrollably fast and I think I might throw up--

It passes, eventually. It always does.

Thursday. So, we're pretty sure that what happened last night was that you had a seizure. The words hit my chest like a sack of rocks. This changes everything. I shouldn't be driving alone. Next time it happens (she hurriedly adds an if, but I just don't know anything anymore), I have to get to the emergency room and get an MRI--what does that even mean? Could I have swelling in my brain? I have a migraine and my face is still numb--is that normal? What is normal anymore? Am I going to pass out? Am I going to have another--another seizure? 

God?

I enter into the abyss of unknown. This is the first time I have actually thought that this illness could legitimately kill me. Is the floor moving or am I falling? Why is the left half of my body numb? 

When should I worry?

My brother is worried sick and he can't drive his train--he asks the other engineer to take over. My sister is up in the middle of the night ranting. My parents are asking why God doesn't seem to answer prayers. I am sitting on the couch and the fear is clutching at every part of me. 

Things are rushing by me and I am standing in front of this insurmountable wall, and I'm scared that seven times around and it still won't fall--

I can't do this, God. I can't do this. 

"This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek." Hebrews 6:19-20

Everything has changed. Yet--nothing has. God is still God. I am still His. He hasn't forgotten, He hasn't abandoned. This is just another trial, one that seems to last for an eternity, but it is, indeed, temporal. I will not let this end me. I will not let this end my hope. I will not let this end my faith. Beneath the waters, I will rise from the ashes of defeat. The resurrected King is resurrecting me. I choose this. I choose Him. 

"Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel: 'My way is hidden from the LORD, and my just claim is passed over by my God'? Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall, but those who wait on the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:27-31

When there is no strength left in me, when I have a seizure in the bathroom, when I am utterly alone, when I don't know how this thing is going to work out, when I am scared out of my mind, when I feel like they're all going to move on and leave me behind, when my body is roaring with pain, and when I come to die...

Give me Jesus. 

It's enough.