Healing Journey Part 1

By: mellowsong Mood: Contemplative Date: 10/29/2007 15:06:39 Music: None

I have been a journey of finding Christ and healing for the past 6 months.  I figured this would be a good place to journal this and maybe help somebody else!

I am an RN who got seriously hurt on the job 3 years ago, herniating 4 disks.   The state of FL and my employer's insurance caused me to lose almost everything, but that's another story.  This past April, the neurosurgeon basically told me that surgery had failed, scar tissue was pressing on my spinal cord and there was nothing further they could do.  I was told to go back on morphine and that I would probably be totally wheelchair bound within a year.  He said he couldn't operate again because there would be a greater than 90% chance I'd come out of it paralyzed.  I've always considered myself a Christian but I never really understood what turning my life over to Jesus meant.  I was a good person, lived a decent life, followed all the "rules", believed I was "saved" etc but went on with my life on my terms.

In April, my sister started talking to me about prayer.  I had it in my head that it was OK to pray for everybody else, but not ok to ask for anything for myself.  Cathy made a huge impression on me and I started reading the Bible and praying differently than I ever had before, but I still didn't know how to let God take care of things.  Yes, I'd pray, but I didn't know how to listen for answers.

That fateful day in April, I came home from the doctor and laid down crying my eyes out.  I was tired of hurting, of being sick and after what I had been told that day, frankly, I was tired of living.  I remember saying "God, if you want me to live, You have to do it, I can't anymore, otherwise, please just let me die".  I wasn't suicidal, but I would have been more than happy to go to sleep and never wake up again.

Shortly after that prayer, I felt compelled to pick up the telephone and call a chiropractor whom I had heard speak at a pain support group I attended in February.  I had been impressed with what he said, but the neurosurgeons had told me not to see a chiropractor, that he could hurt me and undo what they had done.  Well, hadn't they just told me the surgery failed and there was nothing else they could do?   I called Dr. James and my life started to change.

One thing that had impressed me about him was that he openly talked about God and the place of God in healing.  Hmm, that was different.  I went to my first appointment broken and despairing.  I HAD several serious illnesses as well as multiple back and joint problems.  I was well over 100lbs overweight even though I barely ate.  This part is important.  Except for the rare times I went out to eat, my daily diet was usually a grilled cheese sandwich or a couple of slices of peanut butter toast, that was it, 400-900 calories a day.  Of course, nobody but the people around me ever believed me.  I was in denial, lying etc.  Dr. James believed me and had me do a 3 day food diary.  What he had to say totally shocked me.  He told me I wasn't eating enough, and even more that I NEEDED TO EAT MORE FAT!!!  I honestly thought he was joking.  After all, I'm an RN, I'd been sticking to a LOW fat diet for almost 10 years and my cholesterol and LDL getting higher and higher, I'm morbidly obese and this nut is telling me to EAT MORE FAT??????  No way!