THE SOFTENING OF SUFFERING

By Lori Carmody

Have you ever accompanied someone as they suffered in pain?  I am not talking about the “skinned knee that will be better in a couple days kind of hurt.”  No.  I am referring to the type  pain, be it physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, or economic that takes a hold of a person and doesn’t let go. 

Recently I walked along-side of my uncle as he suffered with nerve damage with resulting pain that shot through his back and legs.  Medication only took the edge off.  Surgical procedures were ineffective.  Pain persisted.

Whether we are basically healthy with an occasional bout of pain or ill with an on-going medical condition, most of us have battles we face.  It’s just the human condition.

In my uncle’s case, he didn’t want to be constantly complaining or to be a burden to his family.  Just like with my uncle, our aches and pains are, for the most part, suffered in silence as well.  

What, then, are we to do other than to stay silent and suffer in pain, when the best medicine has to offer isn’t enough for us or those we love?  Where do we turn for strength and a dose of courage?  For each of us the answers may be unique for our particular personality.  Yet, there very well may be three concepts that together we can consider for sustenance.

• We can bring our requests to God.  No thought, prayer, petition, desire, or wish is too small or insignificant when brought before God. Nor is there anything too large for which to seek God’s help.  We make God small when we limit the help we will ask for by thinking we shouldn’t bother God with something too small or by assuming God isn’t interested in our personal lives.  We can and should ask God for anything we want and need. Putting our hopes and dreams into God’s hands and knowing we are heard by a loving Presence is doing something.  It is trusting God and it is caring for you and your loved ones.
• In many conversations with my uncle, he expressed the difficulty of living with acute, chronic pain.  Yet each time he shared about this, he’d follow that up by saying that when it got unbearable, he would “offer it up” to the good Lord to use his suffering to bless his family, especially those who were in battles of their own.  He wanted grace to pour over them as he continued to pray through his pain with submission.  We too can suffer for others whenever we silently take our pain and offer it to God, willingly accepting it on behalf of others.
• Often times with chronic pain we find it easier to shut out the world including shutting down our emotions around the pain and all that it has taken from us.  A recent quote by Kayla McClurg on suffering struck me as powerfully insightful: “If we don’t shut down, suffering softens us; carves out more capacity to receive what God wants to give.”  Although a more difficult path, the softening that occurs as we suffer and the gifts from God are without question.  This is one of the primary reasons for wholeheartedly opposing euthanasia.  These gifts are given and shared not only with those who are in pain but with the community supporting them. 

We have available to us the capacity to open ourselves to the softening grace of experiencing more and more of who we are by entering into every part of what life has to offer.  The choice is ours.  Will we enter fully?  Even our pain and suffering?  Blessings await us, if we have eyes to see and a heart open to receive the gift.

Thanks for reading.

Lori