Reflections on the past few days...

It is without a doubt been one of the hardest stretches of life in these past few days. The future is yet unknown and it is painstakingly one day at time for a long time to come.

My husband lost his father to cancer only three years ago this past January and now with his mom having a major stroke it very well could be that she'll never be the same mom that he has been used to all this time. It is a new normal and not very normal at that. I can't even begin to understand or imagine what it is to be him right now. To have lost one parent and to not know what lies ahead for the remaining parent. It is hard to see the love of your life go through something so awful. It is simply painful.

Yet, it is amazing to me how resilient one can be in the midst of dire circumstances. James gets stronger in his ability to handle the situation knowing that his mom needs him right now. Today as I lost it he was able to be there for me even though he can hardly be there for himself. It is also amazing to the focus these types of things can bring to our lives. James and I prayed for the first time as a couple last night. He asked me to pray and we sobbed as I prayed desperately for recovery. I even have yet to pray on my own and this man is asking complete strangers and non-religious types to pray for his mom. A friend of his who is not a religious man is going to pray for us just because it is us.

That is a the beauty of it all. James and I have hardly been alone in this process. As if it were a grand orchestra, we've had visitor after visitor in the hospital coming to see Jane. It's been phone call after phone call and email after email. We feel surrounded by people who loves us, will do anything for us and most importantly are praying for Jane. James' cousin Franklin has been with us for the entirety of two afternoons taking time from his wife and his job to sit with us, talk with us and take us to the cafeteria so we can eat. It was normal yesterday to see him but today we he came in again to sit with us for several hours, I was just so touched to have family who cares so much about Jane and us to sacrifice so much time. We had friends of our comes to be with James tonight while I went to see clients. They withstood rush hour traffic and took James to dinner and let him talk, reminisce and do some processing that he needed to do about the situation. None of the visitors have overlapped. All of them have been beautifully timed to keep a steady flow of support. Amazing how God is in the tiniest of details that we don't even know need paying attention to.

Now I just have to trust that God is going to be in the big and small details of the other aspects of my life that can't stop right now. My last quarter of school. My last three months of practicum. Saying goodbye to clients I've worked with for the past year. Going through the process of securing an internship. My ability to support James in a way that is helpful to him and all the decisions that lay ahead for us. That my marriage of just 3 1/2 will continue to remain strong and focused. It has been incredibly hectic for us settling into figuring out marriage for us, living together, my health problems, surgery and recovery (ref. large kidney stone!) and now this. We have known more aspects of the tough part of the marriage vows (worse, poorer, sickness) in the first several months and yet have had glimmers of the good stuff too. The wedding seems a distant memory and so does the honeymoom but we are just thankful to have each other to lean on during this time. I am so glad we were married during my health problems and he has beens o thankful we're married as we go through this with his mom. That I guess is what marriage is all about.

So, I better sign off and get some sleep. I just needed to get some stuff off my mind and other stuff I needed to process as I hit the keys of my laptop. I'm sure you can return back here often for many more ramblings in the coming days and weeks.