The Grace Between Us

On Tuesday, Mom's abdominal pain increased, this after three days of treatment for the yeast infection. She also stopped putting out urine. After discussion back and forth between Dr. Karkosak and Michelle, Mom's Vital Care nurse, it was determined that her catheter was blocked by collection of sediment in her urine. After the catheter was replaced with a new one, the pain was gone.

It's frustrating, always trying to ask the right questions, make the right choices, do the right things, and yet never doing it completely well, always running into a hitch, an exception, an unknown. But God has been faithful to us in that every turn, in the long run, has worked out for her good. I think of the trip to the hospital before Thanksgiving for a UTI, and then the blood clots were discovered. Of the pain in her stomach in January after breaking her ribs in a fall, and another UTI was found. We're stumbling in the dark, but God has faithfully nudged us in the direction of her best care.

As much as we respect Mom's doctors, they can't treat her perfectly. Every person that has touched her over these last few months, however professional and caring, has not done it perfectly. As much as we love Mom, even we as her children have not cared for her perfectly. And Mom hasn't always been the perfect patient.

Some of the most poignant moments of my life to this point have been in the bathroom with Mom and Suzy, sharing information, expressing feelings, laughing uncontrollably, meeting each other in the middle of the cancer that has brought us there. No more vulnerable a place, no more helpless a parent and child. This is where grace meets us.

Perfect care, perfect compliance, perfect love. I want perfect care for my mother, but reality is that I can't care for her - no one can care for her - perfectly. Only Jesus, the Captain of her salvation made perfect through suffering, can care for her that well. And He does.