Turning 66... and counting..

Mother celebrated her 66th birthday last Sunday. It was a simple celebration - I just had my brothers and their families come over the house for a simple lunch of mom's favorites, and then joining her after in her favorite pastime - lounging around in front of TV, commenting on every trying-hard young actors and laughing at every shallow jokes. There was something sweet about this year's celebration though as we gathered around the newest member of our family - Gabriel Karl, born barely a month before mother turned another year older. 


Mother has been single handedly parenting us since father died 15 years ago. She has witnessed major events in our lives alone - the marriages of my 2 brothers, the births of my niece & nephew, my first time behind my own wheel (dad saw me drive - but not my own car), the death of my grandfather, and the many renovations of our small house - the house we have all lived in most of our lives. I heard her question so many times why she had to face it alone, why father didn't live long enough to see these with her, and then pull in those memories again of great testing where she had to brave her way in and out of the hospital to be with father during his dialysis, his kidney transplant, his reverse isolation days and up until his death. Those memories haunt her to this day and has imprisoned her to fear sickness and death more than she has ever before. 

I have tried to look into her fears many times, and whenever I do I find myself upset and to a certain extent even angry. Not because I have not accepted our fate but because our fate has kept her from experiencing the joy of a life free from fear other than fear of God. I know that while we had to deal with the same pain of death, it had touched us differently. 15 years into the journey and I am still learning. I sometimes just wish my mom is embracing it as much as I am. 

I have grown to embrace the pains and discomfort of a single parent home, of being the one to stand by mother when it should be a husband's role, of being a "parent" to her now that she is getting old, and of feeling a certain sting whenever I see her fearful and lonely. This is fate I have learned to accept and slowly but surely starting to find joy in. In one of our rare pillow talk, I told her that I have yet to see her claiming her life of abundance in God. She has allowed so much of the ghosts of her past creep into the tender crevices of her soul, it has rubbed her off her joy and confidence in the Lord who has proven Himself trustworthy over and over again. She knows all these, she has read the bible cover to cover to cover many times over but getting God's word from her head to her heart has been a fierce battle ground for her. She acknowledges her need for God's touch to renew her mind, to be transformed into a woman not clinging on her past pains but on her faithful God. She's trying and I know she's trying very hard - but there is still that scar that continues to feel tender even when it has all been healed and sealed.


And now we will be working on getting those scars all sorted out again. Yesterday her ultrasound finding says Bilateral Renal Parenchymal Disease. I looked it up and I didn't have to look for more to be able to internalize what we have up ahead of us - I just need to see the words kidneys, hypertension, creatinine - words just too familiar for me. As I was laying down on my bed, I kept on mumbling words of prayer "Lord, you know how my mom has very low resistance to stress related to her health. If it pleases you Father, do not allow her to be subjected to another round of medicines, hospital visits and more so operations". I prayed this prayer with her last night and know deep in my heart that while the days ahead are without any guarantees of health and wealth, it is full of hope and peace because God has remained to be the author of our lives. 


Simple Abundance: God knows exactly when to turn fearful situations into great celebrations. Romans 8:28..