#health – Innerdialects

Before the sun sets today I need to repost from Lorraine’s Blog: Blindzanygirl

Oh thrilled to have found a favourite happy place in my own world of shadows and valleys of doubt. Here I find not just beauty and reality but a peace that comes from knowing we are pilgrims in an earth that will fade away before we see that Perfect Light of Christ. Lorraine, thankyou for allowing me to post your work here. Stay blest beautiful one.

http://blindwilderness.wordpress.com

“And let perpetual light shine on them,”
Those words I heard today,
Not expecting them to come,
Quite suddenly they pierced the air,
I raised my head,
Looking to the heavens
As if to take in all my memories,
The joy, the pain, the laughter

Suddenly all were one,
Joined together seamlessly,
Chickens, corn and sandpits
Apples, nuts and tractors in the fields,
Starry nights that made me ask
“Where is God?”
And in my child’s mind’s eye
I saw Him beyond the stars
Swathed in mystery
And yet
So simple
Here, in the evening of my life
I sat, re-connecting with my past
And all of those who went before me,
On them and on all my memories the words did fall,
“And let perpetual light shine on them….”

…..

Hello and welcome to my site.

My name is Lorraine Lewis, and I am blind. I became blind in 2016 as a result of a very serious and advanced cancer, and the treatment that I received.

In 2013 it was touch and go whether I lived or died, and there began the loneliest journey of my life. A true wilderness experience.

Now, I am in remission, but as well as being blind I am unable to walk, and am wheelchair bound. My husband too is wheelchair bound, and we face daily challenges just to survive. The wilderness experience, with all its difficulties and obstacles continues, but somehow or other we get through.

In the midst of all the pain and suffering, and the deepest loneliness I have ever known, I found a well deep inside me that I did not know I had until I started to drink from it. It was not a physical well, but a spiritual one, and I would like to share with you in various ways, my journey in the wilderness of cancer, blindness, and inability to walk. Along the way we may meet deep pains and sorrows, but also a depth of joy that defies everything that life has thrown at me.

Here, on this site you will find Poems and Reflections that will bring you into my world, and that may touch your world. And as we journey, we will find that even in the wilderness we can be enabled to drink from the Fountain of Life.

I hope that you enjoy visiting this site, and that you find it helpful.

….

“Love knows no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps over obstacles penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.”

Maya Angelou

Lorraine’s poems, blogs and reflections are from her wilderness experience of having cancer and being blind. “The wilderness is a very isolating and lonely place, with many hardships and sometimes seemingly insurmountable difficulties to face. It is a place of suffering and this site reflects the many struggles that any of us can undergo in our differing wilderness experiences. Despite the pains and the darkness of the wilderness and desert places, the stars can still be seen, and even deserts can bloom, so along the way, there will be gems to be found. I have chosen to use the Cross as a symbol also, because I have discovered that for me, the way through suffering was and is to be found in the Cross Although that is a Christian symbol, the wilderness or desert experience can come to any of us, no matter what faith we hold, or even if we hold none. So I hope that as Maya Angelou says, there will be no barriers, and that all of us, through our sharing, can find our way through, appreciating the gems that we find on the way whilst not denying the suffering that we go through. May we all learn to look to the stars, and see how brightly they shine out in the darkness, and take heart and courage...”

Lorraine

cross — http://blindwilderness.wordpress.com/
Seeing
Comes from within
Deeper than eyes can see
Pain makes you see much more clearly
For pain
Makes gold
That has been tested in the fires
That gives insight to hearts
On paths untrod
Before

Thank you Lorraine, oneday we will meet, if not in this life in the next, when you and precious people like our son will see not just all our faces but His…

where the rest of humanity too will see what we never could not before, blinded by the nether lights of human comprehension. Oneday we will see through that dark glass, face to Face.

…

Here’s another one I love of Blindzanygirls’ work, oh every one of them leaves footprints of a thing I’m learning to hold….GRACE.

RAINBEAMS!

Janbi Street half hours drive from here, there they were, two bikers – one with bloodied nose, then bloodied mouth, as the other rammed his fist in him, over and over. A crowd gathered, they try separate the two. The wounded guy just sits there taking it, as the other rears to go again, his fist readying….

Jeff and I are silenced, words choke. What’s to say. We just saw rage, violence. What had caused it? An accident prior?

*My son’s palm in mine, 31st December prayer meet*

Road rage, all kinds of rage, is getting more in the news, it competes with rape and glitzy page 3 spreads. I’m shivering as we reach home. Those guys were in their 20s,30s? What makes things go so out of control we can ram our fists into each other over and over till flesh breaks and blood pours down? Why is it easier to be explosive than be anything else? It gets easier to rave than try peace. Tempers are not leash-able, not much.

What happened to us all, that we cannot control emotions; we believe in mortal wounding, anything but a gentler option.

And ofcourse we cannot/ will not pray; it’s a foolish silly old- fashioned, ignorant thing to do, right.

Here’s the thing: something does happen when we hold our hands and join forces with that Unseen power from where Grace flows. I’m talking 100% nonsense, right? Try me.

I’m veering off a bit here, but these past few months at home we’ve had to deal with violence as a family, following post- seizure drug-induced aggression from our youngest who for 18 years has been the gentlest person we’ve ever met. I won’t do details here, but it’s been bad. There’s been days in November we just hugged together and wept. He’s unfortunately been on 3 drugs – previous Neuro Doc should not have given him. New doc now retracts those and we introduce new med. We have withdrawal which is a Syndrome in itself. Rage? You think I don’t know it first hand- my own frustration at a system that is this careless with a serious medical condition.

Psychiatry would call the Act of Prayer ‘Self Counsel’. If I were left to self-counsel I’d have turned into a monster, trust me. What happens when we pray, is beyond me, but this happened here, among a whole stack of other changes – both interpersonal/ personal. Anyone want details, please say. Happy to help. idialects@gmail.com

1. A peace that human understanding alone cannot understand, that’s happening.

2. Clear instructions to not use harsh tones in our own voices, even a loud yell of joy, these could trigger a reaction, among other triggers.

3. Harvesting joy in our own selves, this somehow broke through to our troubled son, don’t ask me how. Joy spreads. He knows the air has changed for the better. I said ‘harvesting’ … because it takes work to do that sometimes, hard work. Forget self, count blessings… 🙄 yet, it works. Joy is a Force to reckon with.

4. Remembering all the 18 years of this young person’s gentle nature, and seeing him through that filter, knowing this is drug reaction. If not, God help us, but there’s that deep well of Quiet, I don’t know how else to describe it.

5. Gratitude, songs of love, thanking God for everything, even for this trying time, it takes the sting off the moment. Horror loses its claw hold on me, it has no control over any area in my life, if, in everything I can say,”I thank you Lord.”

One morning I prayed in the stars; the rest of the family were still in bed. It was softening grey misty, like my heart softening, waiting in silence. And I’d be a liar if I didn’t tell you He sent Comfort and Joy and Strength. (Wouldn’t be blogging without it, 😊).

“I love it when You speak to me…

@innerdialects.