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July 30, 2005
Spinal Unit, July 30, 9 AM
i can't believe it has been 3 days since i wrote the last update. it has been virtually impossible to be in a position to write one until now. part of that is due to time, and the other part of it is that when there has been time i have not had access to a computer, or i have just been too tired.
what we have been waiting for since coming to atlanta, and shepherd, finally happened late thursday afternoon. asher was moved out of the acquired brain injury unit to the spinal injury unit. this is truly an indication of the amazing progress that asher has made in terms of his brain function improving to the degree that he can now undergo the rigorous demands of spinal injury rehab.
asher is now back in a private room, which on the one hand is very wonderful, but on the other hand, he has new fears for being left alone. he has become quite emotional as he is trying to adjust to being in another unfamiliar setting with a lot of new and very unfamiliar faces. whereas in the brain injury unit there was closer monitoring of the patients, here in the spinal unit there is far less, especially throughout the night. what this has meant is that gloria and i are taking turns, again, spending the night with asher. he has all but begged us not to leave him.
our struggle, intially, was whether this would be a good idea for us to stay. we were worried that this might hamper asher's overall rehab progress by causing asher to cling to us in an unhealthy way that would help cause him not to engage in his therapy sessions in the ways that would benefit him the most. we were assured, though, that with this new change, and because of asher's brain injuries, that it would actually be a very good thing to stay with him as much as possible when he is not actually in his therapy sessions. what this means for all of us, now, is trying to figure out and adjust to a completely new schedule. which, at this point, you would think we would have become very flexible and adjusting to a new schedule would not be all that difficult. i wish that were the case, but i am finding that the opposite is true: our bending feels more like breaking.
in the midst of finding myself extremely tired, and on top of that i am getting some kind of a cold or something, i have had some of the most wonderful times with asher that i have ever had in my whole life with him. when i spent the night with him thursday night, about 5 AM, he was wide awake and wanted to talk. i was not wide awake and i really didn't want to talk, but his persistence soon had me sitting right next to him holding his hand. i am so thankful, now, for his persistence. the conversation and time we spent will be in my heart for the rest of my life. the tenderness of the moment was like nothing that i believe i have ever experienced. here i was, "the well one, the strong one," and here he was "the infirmed one, the broken one," and i found that he was the one that was giving it all to me and i could not possibly give back to him what he so, obviously, seemed to need. the feelings i had of selfishness and inadequacy were only compounded every time i would tell him that i loved him and his immediate response would always be: "i love you more."
after all that asher has been through, and knowing all that asher has yet to go through, and yet he still has love in his heart. love that expresses itself in a way that tells me that it really is more than mine, and it reminds me that just as we tell God we love Him, and we are doing it as "the well and strong and able ones," God's reply is always one that expresses itself as, "i love you more." and eveytime i hear Him say this to me He is saying it after being beaten and tortured and hanging on a cross all day at the point of breathing His last breath. and when i think about it, realize it in this way, i am confronted with how easy it is to say "i love you" when everything is going so well in our lives, but how difficult it is to show it when it is not.....
Lord bless you all for continuing to hang in there with us, especially when the basis for it is God's unfathomable love. I am truly thankful. your faithfulness in prayer has allowed me to be reminded in, perhaps, the most profound way that God has ever reminded me that "He loves me/us more. and He always will.
being blessed by my son,
andy mendonsa
| By Andy Mendonsa | 9:49 AM
